#the whump of my childhood for real

[defire]

Things to say if someone you know finds your whump blog

(mean family vibes)

No, it's not a kink

You weren't supposed to see that

I have 10 followers so you are outvoted unfortunately

Why are you offended? I didn't use your real name

I thought you said you liked tragedy

Am I making you uncomfortable yet? There's more where that came from

I'm sorry

I hate to break it to you but my writing is nothing in comparison to what you will find in real life

Well, I suppose it's time you heard about my childhood trauma

It's a neurodivergent thing, you wouldn't understand

You learn to appreciate the darkness after years in hell

And you call my generation snowflakes

This is America bitch

Which part was your favorite

[honeybewrites]

Writerly Questionnaire

Thank you @paeliae-occasionally for the tag, @harmonic-melodii for the tag, @the-golden-comet for the tag, @sableglass for the tag, @the-letterbox-archives for the tag,

@ominous-feychild for the tag and @willtheweaver for the tag!! Also thanks to @davycoquette for creating the game!!

About You

When did you start writing?

Hmm, that shouldn't be a hard question and yet here we are. Honestly, I don't know. I have a really shitty memory, especially when it comes to my childhood. I think I might have been around ten when I first started?

Are the genres/themes you enjoy reading different from the ones you write?

No, I definitely like writing the same stuff I read. Fantasy and sci-fi is my jam! Throw in some massive world building, some angst and whump and you've got me hooked.

Is there an author (or just a fellow writer!) you want to emulate, or one to whom you’re often compared?

I definitely haven't been compared to anyone. I would like to emulate Brandon Sanderson in the sense of his massive world building and phenomenal magic systems.

Can you tell me a little about your writing space(s)? (Room, coffee shop, desk, etc.)

I don't really have a set space. I often write on the living room couch because it's the most comfortable. I do have a desk that I will occasionally write at, but it's pretty uncomfortable after a short while, and I mostly use it for other work instead.

What’s your most effective way to muster up some muse?

The car or the bathroom. I know it's sounds super strange, but driving without any music, or better yet riding with it, often gets my brain thinking. And wether I'm showering or just washing my face, a lot of my best ideas come to me in the bathroom.

Did the place(s) you grew up in influence the people and places you write about?

I really don't know, but I doubt it. Like I said, my memory is shitty. We had moved about five or six times by the time I graduated high school. It was all in the same city at least, but different parts of it. As for people, I was a hermit. I didn't have any friends or hardly ever talk to people my age.

Are there any recurring themes in your writing, and if so, do they surprise you at all?

Does whump count? On a more serious note, I haven't done what I call a deep edit in years. I think, just off the top of my head, trauma and abuse are pretty reoccurring, along with internal emotional issues like trust.

Your Characters

Would you please tell me about your current favorite character? (Current WIP, past WIP, never used, etc.)

That's a tough one! I love my babies! I think my current favorite would be 703. She's been around the longest and honestly, she'd helped me through some bad times and I'm not sure I would be here without her.

Which of your characters do you think you’d be friends with in real life?

As much as I love her, 703 and I would not get along. She's a little too trigger happy and I'm a little too non confrontational. I think Rage and I would hit it off pretty well though. Maybe Fres too if I could break through their barriers.

Which of your characters would you dislike the most if you met them?

I have said this before and I'll say it again, Master Gerd. That man is a straight up bastard and I would gladly choke the life out of him if ever given the chance. He just makes me so angry.

Tell me about the process of coming up with of one, all, or any of your characters.

It's pretty different for each one. Sometimes they start with a name, other times they don't. It is pretty consistent that I just start writing them into the story before coming up with all the details. If the character sticks around and starts to have a more predominant role, that's generally when I'll go into detail about their backstory and they get their own file in my doc. But this isn't always the case. Sometimes, I just already know all this information from the start and I can write it all down. 703 was like that. Sometimes things come up along the way slowly. But for the most part, I just start writing and everything else works out fine.

Do you notice any recurring themes/traits among your characters?

Trauma!! Gotta have the dark backstory haha! Most of my OCs have very unhappy and traumatic childhoods/young adult lives 😈. Protectiveness also comes up quite a lot along with being physically strong. I mean, most of my OCs are in a "cult" of some kind that generally goes around fighting things... okay maybe cult is a theme too now that I'm thinking about it. I've got the Mors (bad cult) Oraniz (morally gray cult) Ryuk's pack (wholesome cult) and mafia like organizations in Rune Storm (also bad/morally gray cults)... yeah I think that might be a theme.

How do you picture them? (As real people you imagined, as models/actors who exist in real life, as imaginary artwork, as artwork you made or commissioned, anime style, etc.)

Animation style. I've always wanted, especially when I was younger and life hadn't taught me anything yet, to have my work turned into an animated series. Even now, that little dream, that I realize is very unlikely, stays the same. I think you can do a lot more with animation than you can live action, and it's always how I've imagined my OCs. Albeit it is a little more "realistic" animation, like Dreamworks, Disney, those kinds of things.

Your Writing

What’s your reason for writing?

If I don't write down my OCs and world, I'm pretty sure I'll go mad. I love sharing my writing, but I write for myself first and foremost. And writing has gotten me through a lot of really hard times in my life. It's something I can always turn to and it helps me express and process things. I can't imagine my life without it. It's just a part of me.

Is there a specific comment or type of comment you find particularly motivating coming from your readers?

Honestly, just saying you enjoyed it is more than enough. I never thought I'd have anyone that would be interested in my writing enough to leave comments on it. Every time I get one on anything I post, it always makes me smile.

How do you want to be thought of by those who read your work? (For example: as a literary genius, or as a writer who “gets” the human condition; as a talented worldbuilder, as a role model, etc.)

I think I’d like to be seen as just a really good world builder and nice writer in general. I don’t really have any expectations 😂

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer?

Um world building maybe? I’m not really sure I’ve got any greatest strengths deal when it comes to writing. I don’t think I’m horrible, but I’m certainly not great or anything.

What have you been frequently told your greatest writing strength is by others?

Uh, no. This is the only place I’ve ever talked about my writing. Don’t exactly have any irl to discuss it with or anything I trust to read it. That would get me in a less than ideal situation pretty fast.

How do you feel about your own writing? (Answer in whatever way you interpret this question.)

I think it could use a lot of work if I ever want to publish it. I definitely enjoy doing it, but I don’t think it’s all that great.

If you were the last person on earth and knew your writing would never be read by another human, would you still write?

Yes. Honestly, I never thought anyone would be interested in my writing anyway. Plus, if I’m the last human, I need some form of entertainment haha

When you write, are you influenced by what others might enjoy reading, or do you write purely what you enjoy? If it’s a mix of the two, which holds the most influence?

I’d like to say it’s pretty much for my enjoyment, but I’m sure there’s some influence of what other people might like too. I’m a chronic people pleaser unfortunately

Tagging @yourpenpaldee @fractured-shield @anaisbebe @aalinaaaaaa @nczaversnick

@kaylinalexanderbooks @wyked-ao3 @diabolical-blue and anyone else who wants to hop on!! Seriously, everyone should do this tag game, it's super fun and insightful!

[feverdreamsanddelusions]

9.2

prev @dragonfireridge

[tw nonhuman caretaker, caretaker turned whumper, whumper turned whumpee, psychological whump, captivity, threats of torture]

Whumper was guided and locked into one of the guest bedrooms before they could've collected their thoughts. The fact that they'd missed their chance of knocking out the person escorting them barely registered in their mind. All they could do was pace back and forth anxiously, pinching themself until their skin was red and tender.

How the fuck was Caretaker alive?

It only took a couple minutes before the devil appeared, and Whumper spun around and backed up until they hit the wall. This was real. This was actually real. "What's going on?" they choked out.

"Whatever do you mean?" Caretaker closed the door behind themself, taking their time locking it and sliding the key into their pocket.

Whumper had never admitted to the assassination out loud. They never knew who could be wired, which place could be bugged, it was better to just keep it a secret meant for the grave; and that habit was a hard one to break. "I– I mean... I've heard... I thought you... I've heard there was a, an accident..."

"Accident?" Caretaker stayed perfectly neutral as they surveyed Whumper's expression. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar."

"What happened to your face?" they blurted out. That was it. That was a good question.

"Why, you shot me. Don't tell me you shoot so many people that it all blurs together."

Whumper felt like they were going to be sick. "I didn't shoot anyone."

"So why the shock and the terror? Come on, now. You're amongst friends. Of all people, the two of us have an intimate understanding of what happened that day."

Caretaker slowly walked over, coming to a halt just a couple feet away from where Whumper was now cornered. Fuck, that scar was horrific. It wasn't one anyone should've been able to survive. This whole thing was impossible.

"Had you been kept in the dark, oh infamous rebel assassin? Did they not even tell you who any of us were?" The way Caretaker said that, it almost made Whumper feel like... they weren't human. Like Whumper should've known they were something separate, something more powerful... "Did you think no one had ever tried to kill us before you came along?"

"I... I didn't do anything... I'm just here to attend... attend a party..."

Caretaker laughed at that, hearty and genuine. "I do apologise, I'm sure the way you're looking at me right now is strictly due to the scar. I'm certain it has nothing to do with the failed attempt to murder me, since that most definitely wasn't you."

Whumpee shook their head frantically. "I, I don't know what you're talking about."

"And it wasn't you who put poison in the punch tonight."

"Someone poisoned the punch? That's– you ought to tell everyone–"

Caretaker looked endlessly amused by their pitiful attempt at masking their identity. "The guests have been alerted, don't you worry. But really, I can't believe we can't even have an honest conversation after having shared such an... intense experience. Tell you what; I share my secret, and you share yours. That seems like a fair deal."

"I have nothing to share, I'm afraid." Whumper was still glued to the wall, but they made an effort to relax a little. "I'm quite the open book. So unless you're interested in petty secrets from my childhood years–"

"Whumper..." Caretaker stepped even closer, and all of Whumper's previous efforts went out the window. They tensed up again, even holding their breath as Caretaker came within arm's reach. "I know you're curious. You want to know how I survived."

"I don't. I don't."

"Not if it means having to confess, hm?"

"I didn't do anything!" Whumper snapped, flinching when Caretaker raised a hand — but they didn't hit them. They put a finger against Whumper's lips for a brief moment, hushing them.

"Let me introduce your other option, then," they said softly. "I don't tell you anything. Instead I simply bring you down to the torture chamber and we spend an admittedly less pleasant time together, until you're ready to own up to your crimes. Would you prefer that?"

"I didn't do anything," Whumper repeated without thinking. "I didn't do anything... I, I came here for the gathering, I now find out I was close to drinking poisoned punch, I don't understand any of this–"

"Fine." Caretaker stepped back, and Whumper felt so lightheaded they thought they were going to collapse. "I must go back downstairs, I'm sure you understand. But don't worry; I fully respect your wishes. I will be back soon to make good on my promise."

[shijiujun]

Final Thoughts on KDTM + Finale

Where do I even begin?! Honestly this show was filled with a number of plotholes but as long as you're not watching for logic but stupid men in love it's 100% fine XD Like there's really so much to love about the mafia fam dynamic, and this one gave me so many surprises!!

Perfect acting, much better than most Taiwan BLs I've seen - none of that awkward whatever, they were super into it, and it's no wonder too since Hsu Kai is a long-time actor and Jiang Dian is a talented boy who already has an award for a role under his belt, and it SHOWED?!

They've got the childhood friends growing up together plot, the student x teacher, the on-the-road saving thing, all the smexy plots, and they're really not shy to show just how much they desire each other, but it didn't feel like the smexy scenes were THE point which is such a feat considering how many there were LMAO, they've got the old man yaoi, the EVERYTHING

DRAMA >>>> NOVEL so much like the drama filled up so many holes and even then we could probably have used another 10 episodes - novel really left out everyone else but Bai Zongyi and Fan Zherui

Every frickin like trope I liked was there, there was a bit of whump toooooo and like?!?!!? All the usually cringy stuff was great too in this one ;-; (like ahem couple cushions my god)

I AM JUST A LITTLE SAD WE DIDN't GET the part about Fan Jiang Ruichen and his boyfriend (?? maybe 7th uncle ahem??)

Very happy there was like no real amnesia and I have to say everything closed up from start to end more or less, even the last minute knifing :DDD

They really gave every CP enough screen time and I love that they were so damn extra to put every single other BL drama actor in, I'm just sad we didn't get FRICKIN CHRIS JAKE but it's okay we take what we get, because this show is proof that all our Taiwan BL couples live happily ever after okay?!!! EVEN BUY SALT CP they live in other jdramas and whatever else not JUST ARGH not this one and MODC in actuality

AI DIIIIII MY LOVE the most thoughtful, most feral, most sweet and loyal and devoted MEOW MEOW

SO MANY GOOD LINES from the drama <3 The humour was super on point as well and the slightly sad parts too <3

I WILL BE CRYING MYSELF TO SLEEP FOR FOUR WEEKS GOING COLD TURKEY FROM THIS SHOW

[wildlife4life]

Seven (+) Sentence Sunday

Tagged by @hippolotamus, @jeeyuns, @alyxmastershipper, @rogerzsteven, @disasterbuckdiaz, @try-set-me-on-fire. @spaceprincessem, @spotsandsocks @jesuisici33, @wikiangela, @ladydorian05, @buddierights and @giddyupbuck Thank you all so much! You all so wonderful and I cannot wait for all your upcoming works!

I am back home! WOOOOO! And it was a much smoother drive back this time. Anyway... Here is a snippet from NFL Buck that goes along with my inspiration Saturday post.

In late August 2017, Evan, along with the rest of Houston Texans had been relocated to Dallas for the remainder of their pre-season. Christopher was set to join him along with his home health aide Nancy and Buck’s sister. Regrettably, Eddie’s youngest sister Sophia had let their Dallas plans slip to Helena in her own efforts to not return to their childhood home. Eddie’s parents put up an arduous fight to have his son come to El Paso and relentlessly pressured Eddie, telling him over and over that Christopher would feel more comfortable and safer with his real family. Too tired from endless shifts prepping for the incoming hurricane, Eddie gave in, but not without harshly reminding them that Buck and Maddie are family just as much as any other Diaz. Nancy was given the time off to be with her own loved ones and Maddie was sternly told by her brother to stay with Christopher (even without her brother’s persistence, she wasn’t going to leave the young boy). Evan was not risking even the slightest chance Eddie’s parents would use the time as cannon fodder to bully Eddie into giving Christopher to them (again).  Helena and Ramon pitched a bit of fit at first, whining about trust and the whole issue of Maddie’s ex-husband, but a call from Abuela shut them up and Maddie was welcomed with open arms. With his family safely evacuated and their home boarded up, Eddie was living in a very crowded firehouse, waiting for the inevitable. His St. Christopher medal lived pressed to the left side of chest the moment Harvey touched down.  Sometimes to this day Eddie swears he can still feel the ridges in his pec from it. Hurricane Harvey was relentless for almost four days, bullying southern Texas with unforgiving winds and an exurbanite amount of rain. HFD and so many others worked day and night to help those who had not evacuated.  It was absolute chaos.

Eddie whump is incoming!!!!! Hope you all enjoyed! If anyone wants to see more nfl Buck just search the nfl tag on my page.

Tagging: @eddiediaztho, @devirnis, @bvckandeddie, @forthewolves, @thewolvesof1998, @thekristen999, @lizzybizzyzzz, @watchyourbuck @diazblunt @911onabc, @911-on-abc, @monsterrae1 @loserdiaz @exhuastedpigeon @cowboydiazes @cowboy-buddie @cowboy-buck @brokenribsdiaz @buck-coded, @starlingbite, @transbuck, @bekkachaos @shortsighted-owl, @honestlydarkprincess, @housewifebuck And anyone else I forgot or would like to share! I don't mind being tagged!

[theo-grayson]

Anyone who's taken a look at my notes knows I Fucking Ramble, so don't look here unless you wanna see me share way too many thoughts about Our Life: Now and Forever (including way too much about my personal life)

Guys. Oh my god. Where do I even start. Maybe with just:

Little things I love about the demo

I am a sucker for character customization, and this game delivers that in spades. You can choose so many different things, from your appearance with a doll maker/picrew type thing, your gender and pronouns (with a BUNCH of customization), to what your bedroom looks like, to little stuff like what kind of drink you get at a restaurant. This was present in the first game too, Our Life: Beginnings and Always (OL:BA), but it's more in-depth here, and I love it. And I love that you can see your little avatar when your character speaks. I feel like it just flows so nicely, and it makes me wanna replay it with different characters. Of course, you also get many different dialogue choices, and there are so many choices to pick from. I LOVE it.

So, I absolutely adore OL:BA, and I love Cove with my whole entire heart. But man, inside of me there are two wolves: one of them is a Summer Disliker, and one of them is a rabid Autumn Pinterest Girlie. I ADORE fall, colourful leaves, mushrooms, rain, etc etc etc.

So seeing that Our Life: Now and Forever (OL:NF) takes place in a sleepy town in the AUTUMN?? With scenery like THIS???

I want to live here in real life.

The art style in general is just so beautiful. The colours, the softness of it all, the spritework, the cg art: everything is so stunning. The soundtrack is absolutely amazing too.

On a different note, the extent to which you can customize your relationships with Qui and Tamarack is so cool. You can go through a slow-burn romance, as neighbours to childhood friends to crushes to partners. You can have a cute love-at-first-sight childhood crushes story. You can avoid romance altogether and have a chosen-family dynamic. You can have a poly relationship and date both of them. Not ONLY that, but even the way that they interact with you can be customized;

That's so cool!! You can choose whether a character looks up to you or takes care of you, or whether they prefer to compliment you or tease you. And you can choose the same kind of thing when you interact with them in turn! A visual novel having this level of depth in a relationship is so awesome. The game will even remember things: like, if you react negatively to certain types of interactions, the characters can remember and act accordingly in the future. That's so cool!

I like that this story seems to be a little bit more serious than the last game. OL:BA has basically zero stakes, and very little serious conflict. That's not a bad thing at all, it's very much supposed to be a comfy, indulgent game. But OL:NF begins Step 2 by showing that the main characters have drifted apart as they've grown older. Not only is that nice realism, but it also adds both possible comfort potential (bringing your old friends back together and having good times) AND possible whump/angst potential (watching who used to be your best friends drift apart completely). The (optional) jealousy mechanic could also add to this. Obviously the game isn't finished yet and I could totally be off the mark, but even if this kind of thing doesn't end up happening, the fanfic potential is also there!

I really like how complex the characters are. Even as kids, they have wants and motivations and flaws, and they're so likeable. They change throughout the story, because not only are they growing up and older, but they have their own experiences and personal struggles. And speaking of characters:

Quick thoughts about Main Characters

> Tamarack Baumann

Oh my goodness. Ohg. Tammy. She is so so important to me. She is so sweet and supportive, and she's so pretty. Look at her. Oh my god I love her.

I absolutely adore Tamarack, and part of it is that I relate to her in a couple ways. I grew up as the insecure fat girl. I love frogs and toads. The cello is my favourite instrument, and I would love to learn to play one day. When she first said that she lived with her Omi and Opa, I literally gasped in real life, because I lived with my Omi and Opi for about a year, when I was her age.

> Qui "Autumn" Lin

QUI!!!!!! I love them so dearly, their mannerisms and the way they speak are so so endearing. They change a lot throughout the story, which is going to be so interesting to see. And they are ALSO so so pretty. Oh my god.

As a trans person myself who is definitely playing as a trans MC, I'm so curious to see the interactions with Qui, since they struggle with their own gender identity as well. Also, when they do figure out their identity in Step 3:

What??? That's so cool!!!

In which I get a little bit too personal:

This is probably tmi but I don't care. To make a very long story short, I had a really shitty traumatic childhood. Especially around ages 10-15. Even disregarding that, I was always a 'mature for my age' child, who followed all the rules and was terrified of ever stepping out of line. I never got the chance to be a normal kid.

So, getting the chance to go through this game, being able to experience growing up in such a beautiful area, with a supportive family and no trauma and friends that care about you. It's just. So nice.

-

Anyways. I'm gonna go now and make a bunch of OCs to play through the demo with and make different choices, because the hyperfixation is truly all-consuming

[whumpsday]

Annie's Prisoners

Writing Masterlist | G/t writing tag

g/t sideblog here! @smallsday

content: g/t, whump, tiny whump, fairy whumpee, begging, rescue, captivity, wing whump, magical exhaustion, bullying

Whumpmas in July Day 21: "Please" GT July Day 21: Secret

here's the last of the GT July "crossovers" i'm doing during WIJ! it was fun to write more tiny whump :)

-

"Okay, but you don't tell anyone."

Annie got down on the floor, pulling a pink plastic hamster cage out from under her bed.

Parisa could hardly believe what she was seeing. Inside the cage was what looked like a fairy, no more than four inches tall, cowering in the corner. He had wings, but they stopped abruptly about halfway through, leaving him with uneven little trapezoids.

The fairy didn't look pleased to see either of them, hiding himself as well as he could inside the plastic tube running up one wall of the cage- which wasn't very well at all, considering the tube was transparent.

Parisa knelt down on the carpet to see closer, star-struck. "What is this?"

"My fairy!" Annie boasted. "I caught him myself, he was drinking from the birdbath in the backyard! I just shot him with Calvin's Nerf gun and grabbed him while he was all dazed and stuff. Don't act surprised, it's not like you haven't insisted fairies were real since preschool."

Annie was right, Parisa had always been obsessed with fairies. Her notebooks were covered with fairy stickers, she'd spent her whole childhood playing Pixie Hollow, and she'd read book after book on faery mythology. A part of her had always believed that with so many different stories and accounts of them, fairies had to exist in some form, somewhere. Even as she got older and felt more and more that she was being silly, a small part of her always knew.

And she was right.

She would normally be jumping for joy, but... the fairy was obviously not as enamored with Annie's recollection of his capture. He teared up a little, hugging himself as he cringed as far away from them as possible, his severed wings tucked behind him.

Parisa frowned. "He looks kind of sad."

Annie waved away her concern. "He's always pouting. But I haven't even shown you the cool part. He can do magic and stuff!"

The fairy's head snapped up at that, a look of horror dawning on his face.

"But I already did a spell for you today!" Though it seemed like he was attempting to shout, his voice came out tinny and quiet, just as small as he was.

"You can do another for Rissie," Annie said firmly. "But yeah, seriously, you can't tell anyone. Can you imagine? Some government prick would totally take him away from me to experiment on him or whatever, like in the movies."

"Do your parents know?" Parisa asked.

"Oh god no. But I'm taking him to college with me in September, so I won't have to worry about that anymore." Annie sat cross-legged, picking the cage up and moving it into her lap to rest her arms on. The fairy grimaced as she began drumming her fingers absentmindedly on the lid.

"I've had him for almost two months now. I would've shown you sooner, but I wanted to wait until after graduation so you couldn't tell anyone at school. It's not like you talk to anyone besides me anyway, but can't be too careful. But Ciel can change that!"

She held the cage up triumphantly. "I knew you'd be totally helpless without me since we're going to different schools, so I wanted to make sure you were aaaaall set. He can't do like, big things, he's not a genie. But he can do little things. Like make you a little luckier for a while, stuff like that. I use it for studying, too. But I figured he could do a charisma spell on you or something, and it'd help you make new friends at your little state school!"

"I can't do another spell yet, please, I already did one! I don't have enough magic left," Ciel pleaded, looking up at Annie as his tears started to fall. "You said college isn't something that starts until autumn, there's time! It'll hurt too much if I do another now, please no more!"

Parisa's shock slowly gave way to horror as the fairy's deplorable conditions became more and more apparent. She wanted to say something, but she knew Annie would just get defensive and guilt her if she did.

"Yeah, it'd probably be more effective closer to September anyway," Parisa agreed quickly, unable to push down a feeling of hope that Ciel would like her for agreeing with him.

"Fine, whatever," Annie sighed, roughly shoving the cage back under the bed. Parisa got the feeling she was more interested in showing off than actually helping. "Then you can see him more then. He's my fairy, after all. Let's go back downstairs."

Parisa followed Annie, but didn't take her eyes off the dark space under the bed until the door was firmly shut behind them.

It was hard to go back to hanging out normally, and she couldn't keep herself from asking question after question about Ciel. Parisa really wanted to just see him again, but she knew he would hate that, so she didn't ask to.

But as Annie told story after story, it only solidified the fact that what was happening here was wrong. She was practically torturing the delicate little creature, draining him of magic to his absolute limit.

Parisa dreaded the answer, but she couldn't not ask. "What happened to his wings?"

"Don't be a baby about it, but I had to trim them after he tried to fly away one time," Annie said, like it was nothing.

"Wouldn't that hurt?" She tried to do what Annie said, to not be a baby about it, but it was getting ridiculously hard. She wanted to cry, hearing her best friend had done something like that.

"No, it was like getting a haircut, I think. Except permanent. He didn't like, scream or anything." Annie shoved her lightly on the arm. "I said don't be a baby."

"Right. Right." This was all wrong. This wasn't how discovering fairies were real was supposed to be. She had to get out of Annie's face. "I feel like I'm gonna be sick," she lied.

"Ew, go." Annie pointed upstairs. "God, you're so sensitive."

Parisa darted up to the bathroom, where she felt like she could breathe a little better. How was she supposed to live the rest of her life knowing Annie was torturing a fairy? They weren't even going to schools in the same state. She wouldn't be able to do anything to help. She might not ever get to see him again after whatever spell Annie wanted him to do.

Unless she took a peek right now.

Parisa snuck into Annie's room, hoping she wouldn't come to check on her, and carefully pulled the cage out from under the bed.

Ciel clung to the metal spout of the water bottle, like she'd interrupted him while he was drinking. He looked around wildly, relaxing a little bit when he realized Annie wasn't here. "Is she coming?" he asked, his voice so quiet Parisa could just barely hear him.

"No. I'm not supposed to be in here," she admitted. "I just wanted to see you again. And, um, check if you're alright."

"I'm not," he answered without hesitation, eyes still shining with tears. "I don't know how much longer I can go on like this. Please, I desperately need help, Miss." He tentatively stepped forward, though his little hands shook. "Rissie, she said your name was?"

"Parisa. You're Ciel?" she asked.

"I am. Please, I can- I'll come back and do a spell for you, once I've had a chance to rest. If you would just..."

He pointed toward the window with a trembling finger. "Please?"

Oh, Parisa wanted so badly to help. "But your wings? How will you get down?"

Ciel sobbed. "I don't know. I need to be away from here, she plans to keep me imprisoned for life. She's careless, she's going to kill me and I won't even get to die outdoors!"

Parisa had to do something, even if it meant she would lose her only friend. She was probably going to lose her either way anyway, once they left in September.

She unlatched the cage, holding a hand bigger than Ciel's whole body out to him. "I'll help. You just have to trust me."

It was obvious from his face that Ciel had a strong distaste for being grasped in human hands. But with no other options, he climbed readily into Parisa's palm. "Please be gentle," he begged.

She was holding a real fairy. It was like a dream, but Parisa couldn't get caught up in that now, she had to focus on protecting him. She brought Ciel to the front pocket of her hoodie, carefully placing him inside. "Try not to make any noise or move around too much. I'll keep you safe, I promise."

Parisa could feel the fairy's little heartbeat thrumming away against her as she headed back downstairs.

"Yeah, I'm really not feeling good," she told Annie. "I think I'm just gonna go home."

"'Kay, whatever." Annie shrugged. "If you get over yourself by tomorrow, you can come watch him do a spell for me."

Annie would figure out it was her, Parisa knew. But what could she do? It wasn't like she could tell anyone she stole her fairy. And now that they'd graduated high school, she could just... never see Annie again, if she felt like it.

"Goodbye, Annie." Parisa walked out the door without another word.

She waited until she'd walked far enough away from Annie's house and she couldn't see anyone else around to stick her hand in her pocket, offering it to Ciel. "Coast is clear."

He crawled into her hand, and Parisa lifted him out. His eyes instantly went up toward the stars, and she saw him smile for the first time.

"Thank you," he breathed. "It's really over?"

"It's over. I won't let her take you back," Parisa assured him. "What do you want to do?"

"What I want...? I can't just fly off," Ciel lamented. "I'm not sure yet. I- I sort of just want to rest now. She keeps me so tired all the time."

"You can rest. Do you wanna go back in my pocket?" Parisa asked.

He nodded. "Yes, I think I do."

Parisa softly set him back down inside, both of them feeling freer than they'd ever been as she walked them home.

-

tune in monday for some alien whump! 👽 and the following thursday for some kane & jim

this is ciel's cage btw. never put a living creature in this monstrosity

everything taglist:

@lilac-and-lemon-whumps

@t0rture-me

@whump-for-all-and-all-for-whump

@dismemberment-on-a-tuesday-night

@whumpshaped

@pigeonwhumps

@the-scrapegoat

@whumpycries

one-shots taglist:

@icyheart-and-friends

@kira-the-whump-enthusiast

@whuarri

@reborrowing

g/t whump taglist:

@whumpinthepot

@cupcakes-and-pain

@reborrowing

event: @whumpmasinjuly @gianttol

[whumpbug]

guys. guys this fic is a DOOZY. over 4k words total.

no one asked for it, no one requested it, but it literally came to me in a dream and i had to write it. this is really a rough draft and i haven't checked it over too much.... @whump-kia i hope the ending of this will suffice for your forehead kiss prompt (′ꈍᴗꈍ‵)

i hope you all enjoy it because i had such a good time brainstorming it, even if my writng was a bit stale at points...... BUT WHATEVER

(not necessary to read but here is character info as well as backstory that kinda shows up in the fic)

whumpee: Archie

caretaker: Simon

༶•┈┈୨♡୧┈┈•༶

It was Simon’s finals week.

Archie knew this. He’d known for a while; Simon kept bringing it up in passing, quietly grumbling about his upcoming “week from hell”. All he talked about was how much he had to do.

But Archie knew what he was getting at. He knew what he really wanted to say.

I’m going to be busy. Don’t bother me. Leave me alone.

Well, Simon wouldn’t say it like that. Still, Archie got the message and he intended to respect his friend’s wishes.

He couldn’t blame him either. Having to spend all your free time suturing and cleaning up blood and setting broken bones had to get exhausting, even for someone as patient as Simon. Simon deserved at least the week-long break, if not more, of being free from dealing with Archie’s messes. 

All things considered, he had actually been doing pretty well without Simon’s intervention. The only real injuries he’d gotten during patrol were some nasty bruises that he viciously iced whenever he managed to drag himself back to his own apartment.

Now, he was on his 5th consecutive day of patrol, and his 5th consecutive day of leaving Simon alone.

...And he missed him.

But he made a promise, both to Simon and to himself, that he wasn’t going to burden him. He was going to follow through.

He crouched from his place on the rooftops, scanning the streets below him. It had been a pretty quiet night, which meant it had been a boring night. He was idly tossing a piece of brick up and down when he finally heard some commotion coming from below him.

There was a shout, a crash, and a figure booking it from the little store on the block, arms filled with goods.

Nice try.

Archie easily scaled down the wall and landed on the pavement, catching up to the thief almost immediately. A well-placed kick to the back of the knees caused the guy to go sprawling forward, and all the things he stole to scatter in front of him.

He let out a small grunt and slowly, painstakingly picked himself back up.

Upon looking closer, Archie could now see that the thief was.. a kid. he couldn't have been more than 14.

The kid scrambled away from Archie as fast as he could, turning to face him with a small pocket knife in his hand. The thing was rusty and chipped and trembled as he held it.

“S-Stay back..” The kid rasped. “You’re that vigilante f-from the papers, aren’t you..”

Now that Archie was really looking, he could see what he had been trying to steal in the first place. Littered on the sidewalk was some children’s ibuprofen, tissue packets, water bottles and a small can of chicken soup.

Archie met the kid’s eyes and saw that they were glazed over and unfocused. There was a flush on his cheekbones, one that Archie was all to familiar with. He frowned.

“Yeah, I am. What’s all this? You’re a little young to be stealing from convenience stores,” He said softly. "What's going on."

“You.. you don't get it.. you’re just going to send me to the police station..” The boy mumbled, scooting back slightly as if he was going to bolt at any second.

Archie fought the urge to laugh. Of course he would get it. It felt like looking into a mirror, a reflection of his own childhood.

He sighed.

“I won’t. Not until I hear you out, at least.”

The kid narrowed his eyes, really considering it before speaking

“..It’s my sister. She’s really sick. Haven’t seen my mom in days and.. we don’t have money for the medicine.”

Archie bit his lip. This wasn’t the first time he’d heard a story like that. He lived it for a good amount of time, after all. If anyone understood the kid, it was him. He gave him another once over.

“And what about you? You don’t look too good either, bud.”

“I’m fine,” He said quickly. “I just wanted to get stuff for my sister. She’s six. She needs it more than I do.”

Archie ran a hand through his hair in thought. There was no way in hell he was turning this kid in, even if he technically did do something wrong.

An idea suddenly dawned on him.

“Okay. How about this? If you promise to stay here, I’ll go in and pay for all of this to get you off the hook. Then, I’ll go with you to get your sister and I’ll take you both to a clinic.”

The boy thought for a moment, almost considering it, but then his face fell. “No. We can’t afford medicine, what makes you think we can afford a doctor?”

Archie smiled. “No. It’s a free clinic. My friend has been helping organize it. They’ll look after you and your sister, no questions asked and no payment needed.”

Archie watched the kid mull it over. He figured he might be hesitant. The kid had no reason to trust this vigilante except for what he heard on the street.

On the other hand, he looked tired. Archie hoped he let someone take the burden of his stress, just for a little bit.

The boy almost looked like he wanted to argue again, but he was suddenly overtaken by a coughing fit. Archie furrowed his brows and gently patted his back.

“Fine,” The kid wheezed. “I’ll.. we’ll go to your clinic.”

Archie smiled and nodded.

Smoothing things over with the store clerk was easy enough, since Archie was a regular. All it took was some small talk and a decent tip to make the owner forget about his little delinquent situation.

When Archie came back out to the street, the boy was dozing, knees pulled to his chest with his knife clutched in his hand. He could see the flush of his cheeks peeking over his arm. Archie felt his heart clench. 

It reminded him far too much of his own battles with illness while living on the streets. He’d never forget the feeling of falling asleep on the sidewalk, not even able to rest fully lest your guard comes down. It disheartened him to see it still happening.

He slowly approached the kid, trying to give him enough time to notice, but it didn’t stop the kid from startling awake and launching his knife toward Archie.

Archie caught his wrist easily, and gently pulled it down.

“Sorry..” The boy mumbled, scrubbing the sleep from his eyes.

“It’s okay. Let’s go get your sister, yeah?”

Archie offered to carry the kid. He could see he was flagging. He was clearly more sick than he was letting on, and Archie didn’t want to see him get worse. Still, he refused vehemently, and led Archie to his dingy apartment.

On the way to the clinic, Archie ended up carrying both the sister, and the boy.

Once they were situated with one of the volunteer nurses, Archie thanked her profusely and began making his way home. The night seemed to be staying pretty quiet, and he figured he could afford an extra hour of sleep.

As soon as he crossed the threshold of his apartment, the exhaustion hit him like a ton of bricks. He barely pulled off his shoes and half-unzipped his jumpsuit before he was falling bonelessly on his sofa and letting the world fall away.

••••

When Archie first woke up, it had just been a tickle in his throat.

He chalked it up to dehydration. He woke up as if emerging from a coma. Dried drool stained his chin, he was sporting a severe bedhead and every muscle in his body ached. He groggily wondered if Simon was getting enough sleep. He hoped so.

He peeled himself off of the couch, groaning at the feeling of his joints creaking as he got up.

As the grogginess cleared away, he went over the things he had to do today in his mind. He had two classes, his first one starting in only half an hour. Alright. Plenty of time.

He briskly showered, brushed his teeth, got dressed, and packed his bag for school. The tickle in his throat had transformed into more of an ache, but he didn’t think much of it. It was probably just the dry air.

He grabbed his keys and left.

His first class went by in a blur. He couldn’t explain it, but it felt like time was moving as if through molasses. He’d swear an hour had passed, and look up to see it's been barely fifteen minutes. It was torture.

To make things worse, the ache from before had progressed into the need to keep clearing his throat, which, in a silent lecture hall, was the last thing he wanted.

He had given up on taking notes, opting to focus on making the least amount of noise possible. He kept his water bottle close by.

He felt distracted. He kept thinking about that boy from the previous night. He really didn't look good. He hopes the volunteer nurses were able to take good care of him.

When the class was finally over, Archie all but sprinted out of the room only to double over with a coughing fit that shook his entire body.

Huh. That's weird. Wasn't coughing like this earlier.

He stayed hunched over in the hallway for a few minutes more to catch his breath before straightening and heading to the library to work on some of his assignments until his next class.

As soon as he was sitting down in the squashy chair by the window, though, he conked out before he could even open his laptop.

 ••••

He awoke with a jolt, feeling his heart sink when he realized the sun was no longer streaming through the large window. Instead, he could see his reflection in the dark from outside.

He slept through his class.

“No.. no no no no..” He whined, looking around frantically. No one was around. People must be getting ready to head home. He whipped out his phone.

He’d fallen asleep at 3pm.

It was 8:30.

He ran a hand over his face, silently panicking. He didn't know what to do. This had never happened to him before, he'd never slept that long in public before.  

In the end, he had to accept it. There was nothing really to do. He packed his things and shamefully began making his way back home.

His throat had gotten worse, now coupled with an odd chill throughout his body and a heavy feeling in his chest. He felt somehow even more tired than before, despite his accidental five hour nap.

He was dragging his feet as he walked along the sidewalk. His head pulsed a bit. Once again, when he entered his cold, empty apartment, he felt the overwhelming pull of exhaustion threaten to drag him under.

He ignored it. His day wasn’t done yet.

He zipped on his Vigil jumpsuit and splashed some cold water on his face, trying to eke some kind of life back into his complexion. God, he was so tired. He chalked it up to still feeling groggy from his nap, and put on his brave face before heading out into the night.

His first stop was to deliver groceries to the little old lady that lived just a few floors down from him. He’d never typically interact with someone so openly as both Archie and Vigil, but she had bad vision and dementia, so he figured she was safe. She needed the help too, and he was more than happy to provide.

When he unloaded the groceries and helping her put them away, she ended up kissing his cheek and calling him the name of her son. He didn’t have it in him to tell her the truth, instead just smiling and telling her he'd be back next week.

On his way out, his breath hitched and he erupted into another coughing fit. He had to hold on to the railing as the force of the coughs nearly brought him to his knees.

He gasped for air as soon as it was over, head spinning. He soldiered on.

Next, he had to help unload some boxes for the old man named Chuy who owned the Mexican restaurant a few blocks away. Chuy would never ask for help, but he had thrown his back out twice in the same month, so Archie couldn't just leave him to deal with it on his own.

He had to be subtle about it.

He chatted with Chuy while he ordered some tacos de asada to go, and while he was distracted, he was already lifting the boxes into the storage room for him. He was silently grateful for Simon’s mini Spanish lessons, as he was able to hold the conversation for a bit longer this time.

When he was done, Chuy clapped him on the back, thanking him as he sent him on his way with a few extra tacos on the house.

For some reason, Archie couldn’t seem to stomach the thought of eating anything. He ended up passing them off to a random bystander, and heading to his next and last scheduled destination. He needed to check on that kid.

Again, it had been another quiet night. Archie was silently grateful. Usually, between his little excursions as Vigil, he would have to stop to break up a fight or reprimand a mugger, but the streets seemed as sleepy tonight as he was.

And boy was he tired. He was starting to wish he slept longer in the library, because his nap had seemed to do nothing for him. Not to mention that the heaviness in his chest had only gotten worse and his bouts of coughing more frequent.

He also felt even more chilled than before. His skin was overly sensitive, and even the fabric of his jumpsuit was beginning to irritate it. He sighed.

Simon would know what to do.

His chest ached in a way that had nothing to do with the coughing.

He snapped himself back to the present when he realized he’d finally reached the clinic. Alright. Final errand, then you can go home and crash. You don’t need Simon to help you. You can handle this.

He puffed out his chest a bit and approached the woman standing at the front counter.

“Oh! It’s you! You're the one who brought in those siblings last night, yes?” She chirped, taking him by the elbow and leading him inside.

“Mhm! That was me!” He beamed. " I just came to check up on them and see how they were doing, especially that boy."

The woman paused. She pursed her lips.

“..His sister is fine. She just had a bit of a fever, but nothing a little ibuprofen couldn't fix. As for the boy.. well, you’d better follow me.”

Archie felt his heart drop to his stomach. Had he done something wrong? Had he been too late?

The woman led him to one of the curtained-off rooms of the clinic and quietly pulled it open.

Archie let out a tiny gasp.

The boy was lying in the cot, completely limp. He was pale and sweaty and his eyebrows were pinched together in fitful consciousness.

The most alarming part, however, was the ventilator he was strapped to.

“It started as your typical flu,” The woman began. “Much like his sister’s. We're assuming that because he didn't get enough rest when he needed it, it quickly turned into pneumonia. He’s been in and out of sleep for a few hours now.”

Archie walked forward in a daze, sinking into the chair beside the boy. He took his hand. 

“Is he..um..” The words went unsaid.

“He’s going to be alright. We managed to catch it before he became even more serious, thanks to your intervention. He and his sister are tough. They’ll pull through.”

Archie released a breath, stifling a cough into his shoulder.

“That’s.. okay, that’s good,” He whispered, giving the boys hand a gentle squeeze. “I’ll be back to check on them soon.”

“I’ll be sure to tell them you stopped by. You have a good night, okay?"

Archie smiled and nodded.

The rest of the evening went by in a blur of small talk and random tasks. For some reason, Archie couldn’t seem to focus. He found himself zoning out during conversations and, of course, apologizing profusely. When he finally decided to throw in the towel and head home, it was close to midnight.

God, he couldn’t wait to be home.

He passed by Simon’s apartment on his way back. Any thoughts of meeting him were quickly abandoned when he saw that the light was out in his window. He must be getting some sleep. Archie smiled at the thought of Simon resting after a long day of studying.

He really couldn’t wait to see him again.

He finally made it to his building and staggered up the stairs. At the top, he felt another tickle in his lungs that had him holding on to the railing as his body jolted with every harsh cough. It felt like his lungs had weights in them. He clawed at his chest.

He pushed open the door to his apartment, hardly even bothering to lock it behind him before he was hunched with another round of coughing. The ache in his throat had quickly become searing pain, and the chills he felt earlier had become full-blown bodily shivers. His knees buckled. He was still coughing.

He thought about Simon again. He knew he should call him, but he just didn’t have it in him. He couldn’t be a burden, he just couldn’t.

The coughing finally let up. Archie panted for air. 

He managed to crawl to the couch, every inch of his body just craving sleep. He hauled himself up and collapsed listlessly.

He didn’t even have the energy to unzip his jumpsuit or remove his shoes before he was already falling into a restless sleep.

 ••••

Archie was back in the alley.

Everything was the same, but he looked down at himself and realized that he wasn’t. He was bigger now. Older. The dealers didn’t seem to notice him.

He took an experimental step forward. 

Suddenly, they turned their gaze to his left, grinning. He blinked and he was in Simon’s apartment. He didn't remember this.

Archie followed the men’s gazes and-- oh.

Oh no.

Simon stood there, back turned and somehow unaware of what was happening. The men began to approach him with the needle. The same needle that hurt Archie all those years ago. The same needle that made him the monster he is today. He felt the panic bubble up in his chest, coming out in violent, painful gasps.

“Simon! Simon, run away! Please Simon, run!” He said, but his words died on his lips. He was paralyzed. There was nothing he could do. 

••••

Archie awoke with a start, the force of his coughing launching him up to sitting. He gasped for air, scrambling to his feet. He was already out the door before he was even breathing properly.

He needed to get to Simon. He couldn’t let those men hurt him, not like they did him. He needed save him.

He was staggering down the street. All he could hear was the pounding of his own head and the stomping of his feet on the pavement. His body was moving in autopilot. 

He had to stop and lean against a wall to cough again. He was left panting. Part of him just wanted to give up and collapse then and there. He was so tired. Everything felt wrong and he was having trouble even walking in a straight line.

But he couldn’t give up on Simon.

He pushed forward.

When he finally began the arduous climb up the steps of Simon’s building, black dots appeared in his vision. He was wheezing.

He lifted a hand to knock on Simon’s door, but found that it was too weak to produce a sound. He let it fall back down to his side as his knees gave out.

He coughed, but it turned into another gasp. He couldn’t breathe.

Tears welled in his eyes. He was too late. He couldn’t save him. He couldn’t save him, just like he couldn’t save himself.

He clawed at the door as he clung to his last strand of consciousness.

••••

Simon was startled awake by the sound of someone clambering up the stairs to his floor, and immediately went on the defensive. He sprung out of bed, snatching up the bat he kept near his bed and stomping right up to his door, yanking it open and-- oh.

Oh. Oh god.

“Shit, Archie!” He shouted, letting the bat clatter to the floor.

Archie--no, Vigil, based on the jumpsuit-- wasn’t breathing right. He was wheezing, almost gurgling, on his own air. Suddenly, he pitched forward with violent coughs, as if all the breath was being forced out of his lungs.

Simon caught him by the shoulders and patted his back firmly, trying to gather his thoughts and figure out what the hell to do. Archie clung to him like a small child, and Simon nearly pulled back at the unnatural heat he felt.

God Archie, what did you do?

Archie had a strict no hospital rule. They established this early on in their relationship. As much as Simon wanted to respect it, this was serious. This was perhaps even beyond his abilities to fix. Archie’s lips were turning blue, and he Simon knew that wasn't promising.

In a quick spur-of-the-moment rationalization, Simon figured that maybe Vigil couldn’t go to the ER, but Archie definitely needed to. 

“Alright Archie, cmon.. stay with me..” He murmured, pulling him inside and shutting the doors. 

As deftly as he could, he pulled off the Vigil jumpsuit and stuffed Archie into some of his own clothes. Archie's body was alarmingly pliable. He cursed the time they were wasting, but he needed to get Archie into civilian clothing before they headed to the ER.

Archie was not all the way there, but in a moment of fleeting awareness, he looked around the room and let out a little gasp.

“Th.. needle..?” He murmured, looking as if seeing something that wasn’t there.

Simon kneeled in front of him, cupping his cheek. God, he was burning. “There’s nothing here. It’s just me. Simon. It’s just me, Archie.”

Archie suddenly blanched, doing a double take around the room. There were textbooks and papers scattered about, as well as copious amounts of energy drinks. Tears began to well in Archie’s eyes.

“Finals..Si.. S’mon.. so sorry.. m’bothering you..” Archie slurred, wheezing between every syllable.

Simon stared at him blankly before huffing a pained laugh. Only Archie would be on death's door and still worry about cutting into Simon's cram time.

“You’re not serious.. oh Archie.. fuck..” He breathed, yanking Archie up into a fireman’s carry.

They would have to discuss this later. They were wasting precious seconds they might not have.

Once settled into the car, Archie burst into more vicious, wet coughs. This fit was the worst by far. He couldn’t stop choking long enough to get a single breath in. His eyes were glazing over. Simon had to pat his cheek to bring him back to consciousness once he was able to inhale again.

As soon as he was stable enough, Simon put the fucking pedal to the metal.

He ended up making the twenty-five minute drive to the hospital in fifteen.

Archie was seen immediately, which both comforted and concerned Simon.

He buried his face into his hands.

Was this his fault? Should he have checked in with Archie more often while on his hiatus? More than anybody, Simon was aware of Archie’s poor self-care habits. He should have known Archie would avoid coming to him with a problem for fear of disturbing him.

He didn’t know how many times he had to tell Archie he didn't mind until it stuck in his mind.

Simon sighed and prayed to anybody that was listening that his friend was going to be okay.

After an impossibly long hour and a half, Simon was finally called back to Archie’s room.

When he entered, he felt his breath catch in his chest. 

Simon wasn’t a crier. He wasn’t naturally prone to tears like Archie was, yet when he saw the sight of his friend hooked up to a myriad of tubes like the patients he treated every day, his vision blurred.

“Oh Archie..” He murmured, rushing to the side of the bed. His hand hovered for a moment before gently landing on the side of Archie’s face. He had an oxygen mask strapped to him and he was sleeping, but it didn’t look restful.

The doctor rattled off the details of Archie’s condition. Ironically, this was the material Simon was supposed to be studying for anyways. 

Archie had contracted severe, sudden onset pneumonia. The doctor suspected he’d contracted it from someone, but they’d have to wait until Archie woke up to confirm.

They currently had him on a defibrillator and antibiotics, as well as fluids and fever reducers. Though his condition was dire when he came in, he was being treated properly and would be fine.

Simon sank into the chair beside the bed, finally exhaling with relief.

Archie was going to be fine.

He scooted up closer and slipped his hand into Archie’s, running his thumb along the back of it.

“You’re an idiot. You know that?” He whispered, finally content to just be by his side.

••••

When Archie woke up, he felt like someone was sitting on his chest.

Seriously.

It felt like he was being crushed.

He blinked his eyes open, squinting at the bright lights.

He recognized immediately that this was not home.

His breath hitched as he tried to sit up, but it caught in his throat and he began coughing. It was then that he noticed the mask around his face and the needles in his arm-- oh god.

He whimpered sharply, already reaching to rip out the IVs in his arms. His wrist was caught by a familiar hand.

“Hey. Hey Archie. Look at me. Can you do that?”

Archie swallowed and reluctantly brought his gaze to meet the person beside him. Simon.

“You’re okay. You’re in the hospital. You have pneumonia, you showed up at my doorstep and collapsed. You’re here as Archie, okay? Not Vigil. You’re safe,” He explained softly, pulling Archie’s hand away from the IVs. “These are just for your antibiotics and fluids, okay? Nothing bad.. it's okay.”

Archie still felt panic blooming in his chest at the sight of the needles, but they were different enough from the syringe he was actually scared of that he was able to take Simon’s words to heart and settle.

He was too tired to be worked up anyways. He felt the exhaustion deep in his bones, and it ached. He whined softly, breath rattling in his chest.

Simon reached a hand up and carded it through Archie’s hair, smiling down gently at him. He used his other hand to rub gentle circles with his thumb along the back of his hand.

“I’m.. really glad you’re okay..” He whispered, leaning down and pressing a kiss to Archie’s warm brow.

Archie had many things to say, but they were all forgotten as soon as Simon’s lips met his skin. He melted. He felt a dopey smile creep up on his face and he fluttered his eyes shut.

Whatever he needed to say could wait until the morning.

༶•┈┈୨♡୧┈┈•༶

[femhiccy]

I have enough, I have to say it, I love HTTYD, Hiccup raised me, I love his character, he is my comfort boy and this make situation even worse, I FUCKING HATE HTTYD HOMECOMING ... the way they treat him... I love agnst, whump and all, but for the love of Thor, I rewach franchise and homecoming piss me of. They treat him like before toothy, probably because he is different, and don't feat to vikings standards... but really? After all he goes through!? He almost died for all of them multiple times. He fought for peace, risking everything he had, and they... they count on him only when they were in danger. In other situations, all they did was doubt. I seen a coment who said that in the beginning they respect him becouse he was first who had dragon and only who knew how to train them, but it's visible even in third movie like they respected astrid more, even when he was the fucking chief, why? Because now everyone had dragon and knew how to deal with them.... i unfortunately don't remember who's coment was that, but it's broke something inside me. Only toothles and dragons fully accepted him, now they are gone, and my boy left alone... i know, he have children, wife, but comone even they don't respect him. He is too kind for them all... i hate homecoming so much. Sometimes I wish Hiccup been a Vlian... becouse he doesn't deserve that ending... He was the hero, real hero. Dragons treated him better than humans. Don't get me wrong, I love HTTYD, the movies, the shorts, the series, and I even love HTTYD THW! This franchise is my childhood, they my comfort movies, Hiccup is a huge part of my life and reson why I am still alive... literally, I am not hyperbolic... but homecoming ... see my comfort character be treated like that again, after all what he done...pissing me of...

[squidthoughts]

pyramid game up to e6 review/minor spoilers under the cut:

this show is SO GOOOODDD sorry i wont shut up about it its like. bro the acting?? jang da-a is EATINGGG like her rage is so palpable and im actively praying on harin's downfall but at the same time love to hate her. also bona is so good playing all the sides of suji's personality but especially her brilliance like i was snapping a few times shes making money movessss. also i generally like the changes from the webtoon, they make the story more character-focused and add some interesting twists, esp with suji's dad. also maybe looks like they are tweaking the harin/jaeun backstory but i guess we'll see. RYU DA-INNNN the woman you are im obsessed, obsessed i tell u. jaeun wettest saddest poorest little meow meow all of her mannerisms her intense shyness but knight in shining armor heart.... THE RAMEN SCENE when she fell on her OWN DAMN FLOOR and suji was like this clumsy bitch?? why is she endearing??? i died they did that for me fr. take a shot every time suji or jaeun sprint like five miles to save the other one. for girls with terrible running form they are doing quite a lot of it. the sujaeun agenda is real and alive and in my spirit. also yerim/eunjeong and the hopelessly devoted childhood first loves of it all. the insane protective streak. let them be happy maybe?? jaeun falls off a swing at one point. if you even care. she is so pathetic and a loser and suji is saving her but she is saving suji and also everyone else and she is ready to sacrifice herself at any moment and she is traumatized and she is constantly whumped and her first instinct is to throw her body between her friends and danger and she was ready to Kill That Damn Man lmfao. she tries to fit a whole Bread in her mouth. i need her carnally

[hms-tardimpala]

Ficbinding: Broken Road by @thegeminisage

The fic: SPN, Castiel/Dean Winchester, M, 109k

A 14.13 Lebanon rewrite. When Dean uses a wish-granting pearl to try and kill the archangel Michael before he can escape the cage in Dean's head, they instead wind up with a newly-resurrected John Winchester. It's been more than a decade since John died, and a lot has changed: Mary is alive, Sam and Dean have what passes for a proper home in the Men of Letters Bunker, and they're living with angels. John doesn't know angels are real, he doesn't know about the fragile new relationship between Dean and Castiel, and most of all, he doesn't know that Dean said yes to Michael, or that Dean's plan to defeat Michael would send him to a fate worse than death. Now Dean must contend with both his father asking questions he can't answer, and his loved ones learning about the darker truths of his childhood, all while constantly battling the archangel trapped inside him. But Dean coming to terms with his history may be the difference between this being the beginning of a journey—or the end.

This fic has been in my to-read list for more than a year because big wordcounts are daunting to me, but boy am I glad I finally read it! It's a treasure of character writing for all protagonists (and it is so hard to find a well-written John and Mary Winchester) and the canon divergence is brilliant. If you know me, you know how attached I am to canon-compliant stories, so finding a way to resolve the big threat of season 14 (a season I really like) in a way that's satisfying to me is no small feat. What I want from fics is to be able to think "wow, I could have watched this story happen in the actual show" and this fic succeeds at that. I also loved the attention paid to Michael's possession of Dean (that the show shoved aside when it was convenient) because I'm a whump lover and possession whump is amazing. Also, as a Deanguy, it's good to read a Dean fic with a great Sam.

So yeah, I loved it! Now let's talk shop.

The bind: This is the third blue book in a row (guess my favorite color). I chose a light blue because that's the color of the angels' grace, white for the wings, and silver because it's a color associated with angels a lot in the show (the blades, the walls and furniture in Heaven, the clothes angel vessels tend to wear). I used this palette because Michael is omnipresent in the story, so I wanted to show it through the binding, and also it's pretty. The white lines can represent a broken road, but I was having fun trying a new kind of superposition, mainly.

This is the biggest book I've made in a while, with 394 pages. It's 17,2x12,3cm and 2,9cm thick. I had a trimming accident and had to reprint it all and try again. That's my reminder not to do maths when tired.

I didn't use many decorations this time, I wanted to keep it sober. The text dividers for the first six chapters are angel wings and an impala for the last one (when Dean gets to drive it again). Wings and a car are both modes of transportation, that's neat. What's new this time is that I didn't do a chapter heading, but integrated the chapter number to the text. I thought about using drop caps, but it was too much. I did however use color, which I've been tentatively adding to my books. I figured what the hell, I pay for the color ink too.

Now, here's the main new thing I tried with this one: putting a title on the cover. I often say "no titles on my books" because I don't think they're necessary since I recognize the books by color and size, and I don't want to buy a cricut. But I didn't want to die stupid, so I tried transfer paper. Which worked, the title came out good, but naturally the transfer substance came with it, around the words, and it's very visible on cloth. I want to be clear: it worked as intended, I just didn't like the result. I think it'd work best with an image than with letters. With letters, trimming all the extra transfer paper would be impossible to do cleanly.

So I'm happy I tried, but still, no titles on my books.

Fonts: DK Plague Master (title and author name), Moonrising (chapter titles), Gontserrat (text). All free on Dafont.

Materials: Blue and white cloth from Schmedt, 2mm grey board, 70g/m² white copy paper, synthetic bookmark and headbands. Silver endpaper bought in a brick and mortar craft store.

Feel free to ask me more about materials and fonts (or whatever), it won’t bother me at all to tell you what I used, I just can't think of anything else right now.

[thespiritssaidso]

To Feel the Tilt of the Earth (It’s a Bit Wobbly, No?)

Summary: Shawn’s had one too many energy drinks, and now he’s paying the price.

Notes: Based on my own experience with caffeinated energy drinks, mainly Monster. That was a scary night, hoo boy. I’m glad I wasn’t alone (unlike Shawn).

I for real been putting Shawn through the mill with all these whump fics, haven’t I?

Day three of the Whumperless Whump Event

—————

Shawn never got the hype around energy drinks. The caffiene people always said would get them going never lifted him up. It just kind of sat there. And they always tasted… off. Somehow it would manage to taste sugary yet bland at the same time, no matter the flavor.

That is, until he tried the Aussie Lemonade Monster.

He didn’t know how, but it tasted just like lemonade from his childhood. It still had that slightly bland taste to it. But nothing could be perfect, right? Besides, it tasted pretty good.

After he finished the first one, he waited. He waited for about two and a half hours in the psych office with Gus. Nothing happened. So he cracked open the second one he’d bought — the one he’d originally been saving for the next day if it didn’t taste horrible. He drank this one a little more slowly than the first.

He had drained the can of the last drop as he walked into his apartment. He crumbled the can in a fist as he opened the door, chucking it into the overflowing garbage can.

And still nothing had happened… yet…

It was during the middle of a level of Mario Bros that he started feeling off. As in, the world felt just a bit too floaty. His whole body was shaky, and he could feel his face going pale, lips tingling in the way they did when he felt nauseated.

Shawn stood up, and the world bent slightly to the left. This did not feel good, oh he did not like this. He grabbed hold of the nearest solid object — his bed — and steadied himself. Blood roared in his ears as he leaned forward, holding his head in his hands.

As soon as it died down enough, he stumbling over to the kitchen. ‘My iron level is just low, I just need something to eat.’ It made sense, in his head. The first time this had happened, he’d been in high school and forgotten to eat anything all day. The nurse had told him eating some cheese would be the best idea for him at the moment.

Even though right now the mere idea of putting food in his mouth made him want to gag.

He grabbed a bag of shredded cheese from his fridge, and sprinkled a handful of it in his mouth. His vision slowly went back to normal, but the feeling of cotton being stuffed in his ears wasn’t going away.

At this point Shawn wasn’t even thinking clearly. He was just going by some kind of made up routine, and currently that routine was telling him to go take a shower and head to bed.

It was a great idea. In fact, every idea he had seemed like a great idea. Now, if only his body would just stop weighing a thousand pounds. It was making it very difficult to walk.

Numbly, he turned on the shower and began to strip.

‘Oh hey wait. Maybe cold water will make me feel better. It’ll like, shock me back to normal. Yeah, yeah that sounds right.’

He stepped in, the frigid water making his already shaky body shudder harder. But the cottony feeling in his head never left, only being joined by the sound of what he assumed was what a dog whistle would sound like.

And then the worst happened.

Shawn felt the world spin under his feet, as if he’d been placed on a record player. And soon enough, he began to feel himself getting metaphorically closer and closer to the tone arm. His body swayed, threatening to topple over.

There was no way — no way — he was passing out in his shower, not tonight.

Of course, that’s what he proceeded to do.

Shawn’s vision clouded over in darkness, and all his strength left him. Desperately, his arm reached to grab something, anything. His hands were met with air.

Somehow, luck was on his side (for once tonight). As he fell, he missed the sink by a hair. Literally. He felt the porcelain brush by on his way down.

Instead, he crumpled onto the ground in a heap, softening the blow somewhat by landing on his hands and rolling onto his shoulders.

Unfortunately, he managed to twist his wrist in a strange way, a wet snap permeating the air.

If he could, he would’ve screamed. But he only managed to muster up enough energy to let out a weak groan. The black faded somewhat, replaced by the laundry basket and toilet that spun around erratically.

So Shawn lay there, halfway inside the shower and halfway on the cold tile floor, waiting for the room to stop spinning. Eventually, it did, and he sat up.

He dried himself off one handed, his probably-broken wrist throbbing. Still being careful of his hand, he put his clothes back on. He grabbed the phone, and dialed Gus’ number.

Shawn tried acting casual, but his voice came out a little slurred. “Heyyy, Gus! Buddy! So listen, funny story. Remember those Monsters I got earlier?…”

—————

Notes: I’m not as proud of this one as the other ones, but i couldn’t think of anything else to write for this prompt.

Also: yes, this all happened to me (like, 2 years ago while I was still in high school). Yes, I was fine. No, I did not break my wrist like Shawn did.

ao3 link

[midnight-rice]

@lildoodlecat answering this on my sideblog so as not to confuse the tales fans on my main 😅

--

aaaaaa i'm being invited to go off about a random fixation???? thank youuuuu that's so sweet ;_;

OK SO i feel like I should preface by saying I'm probably not the prototypical fan of this show? I watched it more recently when I was older so my nostalgia isn't based off of childhood memories, I just found a really fun show during a kind of depressing time of my life (2020 lol need I say more?). Also a lot of the fans seem into the shipping scene which is fine i guess but i think they're all sleeping on the potential of the adorkable found family of superpowered teenagers who all live together unsupervised and don't even know each other's real names (seriously they're in costume 24/7 and call each other their work names 😂).

I'll guess I'll start this pitch by listing my favorite things about the show in descending order… which means starting with the animation of all things 😅 There are so many well-animated movies and shows out there but I have yet to encounter one so visually appealing to me personally than Teen Titans (2003). I'm a cartoonist at heart, I generally love exaggerated facial expressions for comedic purposes but Teen Titans really hits for me because it's deliberately styled after anime, with familiar visual language like the red blush lines of embarrassment or the large sweatdrop of anxiety. IIRC Teen Titans was produced by Warner Bros, aired on Cartoon Network, and largely outsourced the animation to Korea, but the homage to Japan is so strong that not only is there a variant of the opening theme performed in Japanese but also the one (1) movie they made is set in Tokyo.

But on top of the silliness of the visual gags the rest of the show is also super well animated, especially the fight scenes!!! Sure some sequences are a little stiff but you can tell that's because they were saving the budget for something like a 360 rotation of the entire group mid-battle (something that seriously impresses me in 2D animation) or a hand-to-hand death match that was almost certainly mo-capped of professional martial artists. Robin in particular is my favorite to watch because he is canonically skilled as an acrobat AND a martial artist and the animators Understood That!! The squash and stretch! The swipes! The smears! I'm swooning 😍 He is a skrunkly rubber band and I love him. (also random side note but i love how much their team's strategies involve yeeting each other at the enemy 😂 like "there is a problem, i'm gonna solve it by throwing my friends at it. i'm sure it's fine BeastBoy will probably turn into an elephant by the time he gets there and not go splat against the monster literally made of concrete")

Moving on from the gorgeous and creatively choreographed fight scenes, I'll try to capture the overall vibes I love about it the most. I'm someone who's always down for a story that's character-driven, balanced between comedy and angst, and above all is genuine and true to itself. In other words, I really respect the tone and way a show handles itself, and Teen Titans (2003) really delivers here. Some episodes are the wackiest nonsense you can imagine (every season has one episode I dub the "pink elephant episode" because its whole purpose is to flex the East coast animation influences in purely abstract sequences often accompanied by music). Some episodes are alarmingly dark and edgy (as an angst and whump lover, my favorite episode is S3 ep31 Haunted in which Robin has a mental breakdown and violent delusions so intense they're worried he's going to go into cardiac arrest… in a kid's show 😅) But what matters most is that both types of episodes are presented with as much gusto and geniuine effort as it is possible to cram into a 23 minute runtime.

They don't hold back with the visuals (so many unique POVs and I love the sponge-like texture in the backgrounds), or the acting (all of the voice actors are top-notch though I can't unhear Lloyd Irving as Robin 😅), or even the score (seriously this time around I was marveling at how well the music accents the emotions of the scene as well as the content, like supervillain Billy Numerous having a repeating banjo motif to represent his duplication powers and Southern US origins). I actually think the worst part of the show is the content itself 😅 this is where it becomes clear it's a kid's show, through cliched tropes, ham-fisted morals, and predictable dialogue, but as someone who's still obsessed with Tales of Graces you can probably guess that cliches aren't something that bother me too much, not when they're being performed with whole-pussy effort 😂

When I first watched the show I watched every episode (all 5 seasons, the movie, and even the lost episode) and made a list of ones that I felt like I enjoyed the most. That's what I've been using to guide my current rewatch, because there are episodes that are a little too childish or moralized or weird to me. If you want me to forward you the list I'd be happy to, but I will admit my selection is very biased toward my own tastes that you might not agree with, and that even my least favorite episodes still have decent entertainment value… with the exception of season 5 😅 idk if this is a controversial opinion in the fandom but I do not care for the last season of Teen Titans at all, you can skip it. I don't know the exact details but there were clearly some developmental and probably networking issues at this point in the series' life, and it shows in the drastic drop in quality (especially in the animation, going from glorious sakuga to powerpoint slides hurts my soul 😭). The content also suffers a bit, going from 4 seasons purely focused on the main 5 with some side characters along the way, to expanding those side characters into the main focus which, although I like them, means that none of the characters feel quite as developed since the focus is spread across too many.

Anyway I guess that's the gist of my pitch 😁 thanks for lending me a platform from which to yell from, I have no idea why I fell back into this fixation rn but it's twice as satisfying when I get to talk about it with a willing audience 💜 thanks Jay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[justjasper]

Hellooo! I come with the most basic ask haha

What's your favorite thing about Morgan's character? And about Reid's character? What season made you ship them?

My favourite part about Morgan is his deep, profound empathy, even when it costs him.

Prentiss pegs him early on, when she says "you make the people around you feel good", and that is, I maintain, absolutely central to his character.

An example that stands out to me is his interactions with the unsub Stephen in In Heat (closested gay man who is killing bc of sexuality struggles). And whether you read with with queer!Morgan lenses or not, Morgan being the one to stand there, victimised the way he was, and tell this unsub there is nothing wrong with him for being gay is just... it breaks me.

The way he bears his own trauma, something he buried for 20 years, relives that and hurts himself when he knows it will help someone else, is absolutely heart wrenching.

And I know the other characters share their trauma, but to me personally (your mileage may vary etc), the disclosure of being a survivor of sexual violence (especially in childhood) is such a significant and raw trauma to relive over and over. It's a hard one to speak openly about. And Morgan does it, even when it costs him, because he knows it will help someone.

My favourite part about Reid's character is just how strong he is. I could go on about empathy for him too, but the strength of Reid to keep coming back, fight on, to push himself, that's what gets me.

I believe there is strength in softness, but Reid's the character who I think suffers from the woobification the worst with Criminal Minds, and sometimes that means people's interpretations of him strip him of agency, which I think I identify with from a very autistic point of view.

I don't mean the tendency for Reid to be the focal of "whump" (reid's targetted/kidnapped/hurt) bc I love that shit as much as the next gay, but sometimes the woobification extends to making Reid meek, submissive, helplessness, when it's just not true.

He's smart, quick witted, snarky, can absolutely be a mean git, adaptable to situations, both socially awkward and socially intelligent at once. He knows his worth and knows when people understimate and undermine him. Sometimes it feels like this gets forgotten within fandom. Which isn't a big deal in the end, these are not real people but paper dolls we make kiss, but Reid's strength is so central to why I love him.

---

The exact moment it went from "oh that's kinda cute" to "they are in love and i will die for them" was season 2x12, profiler, profiled, when Morgan's sisters and mother absolutely clock Reid.

"Derek talks about you."

I was a goner then, that was it. Forever OTP, canon and increasingly inconsistant writing and a fundamentaly homophobic network (fuck u CBS) be damned. They're it. They're endgame for me.

Related, the closest "canon" moment where I think they could have been made real honest to god canon would have been season 4's Amplification. Should have had them kiss in that hospital room and broken ground for queer rep on network TV.

But at least we have fanfiction!

[agerefandom]

10 Favourite Regression Dynamics

I’ve made lists of some characters I headcanon as regressors, and characters I headcanon as caregivers: and I love a good ‘character and reader’ dynamic, but here are some canon dynamics that I LOVE to add age regression to! 

Important note: these aren’t necessarily romantic ‘ships’ and they might not be healthy age regression dynamics but they’re dynamics I find it rewarding to write about! 

1. regressor!Will and caregiver!Hannibal (NBC Hannibal) 

Starting strong with a regression dynamic that is not healthy but it is such an interesting thing to add to their existing codependence! Will gives me such agere vibes and Hannibal’s existing trauma around his big brother history make this such an interesting dynamic to explore. It definitely tilts the power balance faaaar in the direction of someone who will take the opportunity to do terrible things with it, but that’s basically what you’re signing up for with any story about Hannibal Lecter. 

2. regressor!Jack and caregiver!Bitty (Check Please!) 

No one exudes stronger caregiver vibes than Bitty: I’m definitely a supporter of this as a double-flip pairing (with both regressing and caregiving) but I want the sad hockey man to get cuddles, goshdarnit, and you know that Bitty would just be the sweetest most thoughtful caregiver and I just gah they’re already such a good pairing with such canonically developed communication as a couple and I would love to see that skill applied to something as vulnerable as regression 

 3. regressor!Harry and caregiver!Sirius (Harry Potter) 

If anyone deserves a chance at a second childhood, it’s Harry Potter. And I think that when he connected with Sirius as a young teen, he really saw that possibility. I think it would be so sweet to see Sirius actually able to give Harry that full parenting: both at the age he is now, and all the ages that he missed. I just strongly feel like Harry is a regressor, and as much as I like writing him with peers supporting him, I feel like he deserves a real parent figure who can support him in that role in and out of regression, especially in his teen years. 

4. regressor!Jon and caregiver!avatars (Magnus Archives) 

Okay, this is more of a whump thing than a good dynamic, but I just want to see little!Jon dealing with avatars when they’re being nice to him, and it’s like 90% manipulation but it’s also a bunch of monsters being sweet and you can kind of read it as genuine if you squint. I’ve got a vision and it includes literally any of the not-quite-human characters of the Magnus Archives, ranging from the mostly-sweet (End!Gerry) to the completely-terrifying (Bouchard). 

5. regressor!Tony, caregiver!Pepper (Marvel) 

This is the first pairing that ever made me run to write regression fanfiction, and I do believe that I would not be an agere writer without them. Ironically, I’ve never finished and published any of my fics about them, but they have my whole heart. Taking Tony’s earlier unthinking dependence on Pepper and bringing it back in a healthy way, with limits and negotiation and emotional vulnerability, showing how much they’ve grown as a couple? Yes please!! 

6. regressor!Cullens, caregivers!Carlisle and Esme (Twilight)

I am such! a! sucker! for immortal beings finding a way to reclaim the concept of time and childhood. Carlisle and Esme canonically find a lot of value in being parents, and considering that they’re such a range of ages, I think that regression is a neat way to create that dynamic, and I just like big groups of regressors in a family and it scratches all of those interests in one!! 

7. regressor!Morty, flip!Rick (Rick and Morty) 

It’s the toxicity for me!!! I make no claims that this would be a good thing, but also I enjoy writing about the things that trigger Rick’s ‘oh shit I have feelings’ mode and you can’t tell me that regression would not key into that, both in his own experiences as a flip and then having to face it as part of Morty’s trauma. And Morty simultaneously trying to get away into independence but getting drawn back by Rick’s kindness in this single circumstance ties into all of the terrible themes of the show. 

8. regressor/caregiver flips Dean and Sam (Supernatural) 

Speaking of codependence, I cannot choose which of these boys is more symbolically resonant to have as a regressor, and both of them certainly have enough trauma to make it a viable coping mechanism. I think they have the art of balancing each other down to an art: especially in the early seasons, you can really see that process in the way they take turns being the Angry one. Writing about that balance in the context of regression is an interesting concept, and then the way that Dean relates to caregiving versus needing care, and Sam’s desperation to be the reliable one... it’s just a lot of tasty angst to play with alongside the sweet opportunity for a childhood without the war they were raised to fight. 

9. regressor!Erik, caregiver!Christine (Phantom of the Opera) 

Okay, this one is like ninety percent for the aesthetics, because you do need to do some handwaving over canon to make it fluffy. But Erik needs reparenting, and flipping the relationship from the original dynamic with Erik as a kind of father-figure is a nice way to reclaim the story from the original gothic maiden themes. 

10. regressor!Dave, caregiver!Roxy (Homestuck)

All hail my Ride Or Die regression dynamic!!! It’s basically canon and I stand by that! Dave called her mom and said that it feels nice to think of her as a mom because he had such a mixed experience with his own parental figure. And she’s got her own complicated feelings about parenthood and guardianship, but says that she likes it when Dave calls her mom, and it all just makes me very happy.  

This has been my TEDtalk on my favourite regression dynamics!! Thank you for coming!! 

[whump-me]

Obscure: Chapter 13

Chapter 13 of Obscure, novel-length interrogation whump about a rebel leader who can erase memories with a thought, an interrogator who can see inside his subjects’ minds… and the connection they share that neither of them suspects.

Masterpost | the Mind Games universe | Read the completed novel on Patreon

---

Elias

It hadn’t been a full day yet.

Normally, no matter how soon after the start of the interrogation session Kirill left, the guards didn’t haul Elias back into the interrogation room for another round until the next morning. But his evening meal hadn’t come yet. The lights hadn’t dimmed for sleep. It wasn’t the next day.

Unless it was. Unless this was Kirill’s way of messing with him—delay his meals, leave the lights on, destroy his sense of time.

It took a long time for Kirill to come in. When he did, Elias stared. The man looked… broken. His eyes were red, like he had been crying, although there were no tear tracks streaking his cheeks. His skin seemed to sag, like gravity was pulling it off his bones. His face had turned a grayish hue.

Another act. Elias had fallen for this one twice before—when they had first met, and then when Kirill had pretended to be a victim like his son. He wouldn’t fall for it a third time.

Kirill collapsed into his chair with a rough exhale. He stared at Elias, and kept staring. He looked at him like he had never seen him before. Like Elias was the answer to a question he had only just remembered to ask.

Elias shivered and looked away. Another trick. But if Kirill meant to unsettle him, it was already working. Unease spread through Elias, and a trickle of memory leaked from his mind. Old fears. Moments when he hadn’t been able to make sense of what he was looking at, except to know it meant nothing good. A shadow on the wall where no shadow should have been; a raised voice from a parent who normally never stopped smiling. Childhood fears.

But he was an adult now, and Kirill was very real.

“Elias.” Kirill’s voice was rough with ragged wonder. As if Elias was some long-lost treasure he had dug up from a forgotten treasure map. As if they hadn’t seen each other that very morning.

“I give up,” Elias said after a moment. “What act are you putting on now?”

“Elias,” Kirill said again, which wasn’t an answer. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry I never remembered.” He let out a soft, broken laugh. It felt like broken glass against Elias’s skin. “But I guess that’s your doing, isn’t it?” Kirill said.

As Elias stared into those pale eyes, another shiver came over him. Photo negatives…

“You didn’t know either, did you?” Kirill asked. “It’s me.” And even though Elias knew it was impossible—he would have known if it was him, he would have recognized him—they said the name together. “Max.”

“I asked if I could change it,” said Kirill. Elias couldn’t bring himself to think of the man as Max. “My name. The old one would have been too much of a reminder. It might have broken the obscuring.”

Obscuring. Kirill had never used the right word for it before.

Elias had seen the resemblance, of course. He had noted it the first time they had met. But there were a lot of people out there with pale hair and pale eyes, even if most of them weren’t as pale as Max. And in the rest of his face, there was no resemblance.

Kirill’s face was a mask. It showed whatever he needed it to show. Mostly, it was cruel. It was only kind when kindness served Kirill’s purposes. And even then, his brand of kindness bore no resemblance to his memories of Max.

The man in front of him now wasn’t Max. He was Kirill—whoever that was. Whoever he had become without Elias by his side.

Whoever PERI had made him into.

Memories spilled out of Elias. He didn’t realize it until Kirill gave a soft, sharp gasp, his eyes defocusing. Memories of Max. Of all the times Elias had worried he couldn’t protect him. The hornets when they were six. The unexpectedly deep pool in the marsh when they were ten.

The fire.

“You threatened my son,” was all Elias could think to say. What had PERI made of him, after Elias had let him go?

“I didn’t know who you were.”

“If you had, would you have done it?”

Kirill’s silence stretched on too long.

“I turned off the cameras,” Kirill finally said.

“You’ve said that before.”

“It’s true this time.”

“I have no reason to trust you.”

Kirill rocked back like Elias’s words had been a blow. “You have no right to judge me. You made me what I am.”

“PERI made you what you are.”

“You took away who I used to be.”

“You chose to leave first,” Elias reminded him. “I obscured you because I wanted to spare you from pain. You broke my heart, but I understood why. You were tired. You were scared.” He had sympathized with Max’s choice back then. Now he looked into Kirill’s eyes and saw nothing there he could feel sympathy for.

“Maybe if you hadn’t taken everything I was, I could have been something besides what they wanted.” As he spoke, Kirill’s eyes widened slightly, like he hadn’t expected his own words.

“Don’t blame me for what you’ve let yourself become.” Anger threaded through Elias’s voice, and through his memories. Stupid, petty childhood grudges. Max stealing the last bite of cake from his plate when they were five. How had those things ever felt like life and death to him?

“You can make mistakes, Elias. Your judgment isn’t perfect. It never was.” If Kirill was putting on a mask now, it was the mask of a teenage boy, his voice shaking with fear, rough with unpracticed rebellion.

“I never thought it was.”

“But you always thought you knew what was best for the two of us. You still think I made the wrong choice by leaving, don’t you?”

“Don’t you?” Elias countered.

“We would have died. Or gotten caught.”

“I survived. If you had stayed with me, you would have, too. I would have taken care of you.” His voice sounded thirty years younger now, too.

“You did get caught,” said Kirill. “Look where you are now.”

“I helped our people for fifteen years. What have you done with yourself?”

“Our people died in that fire. I don’t feel some kind of connection with a bunch of people I’ve never met just because we share the same genetic glitch. Getting my memory back doesn’t change that.”

“What have you been doing for all that time?” Elias asked. “How many children have you tortured while I’ve been saving lives?”

Kirill’s head flinched to the right. His eyes closed slightly. He rocked back. Elias remembered that gesture. It was what Max had always done when he thought someone was upset with him.

But he recovered quickly. “I’ve been saving lives, too,” he said. “Probably more than you. PERI lends my skills to whoever needs them most. I’ve interrogated serial killers, terrorists, foreign spies. I stopped a US soldier from blowing up his own base. I learned the name of a killer’s next victim the night before he was going to kill her.”

“And you had Sammy brought here to be tortured,” Elias said evenly, even as the memories bled from him in a steady stream. “All so you can help them track down everyone I’ve been working with to stop PERI from killing more people like our family.”

“Don’t use our family against me. That part of our past was over a long time ago. More than half our lives.”

“Then why tell me at all?” Then Elias’s eyes widened. “For the memories. You want emotion from me.” He had told himself he wouldn’t fall for any more of Kirill’s tricks. And yet here he was, doing it again.

He just hadn’t thought Max could be so heartless as to use this, of all things, against him.

But this was Kirill, not Max. And he should already have figured out that Kirill’s cruelty knew no limits.

How much had Elias’s obscuring hollowed him out, to make it possible for him to become this?

No. This wasn’t Elias’s fault. He had done the right thing.

It had been the right thing. Hadn’t it? He had been so sure.

Kirill shook his head, his face contorting with actual emotion. Denial. Disgust. A hint of anger. “No. I wouldn’t… no. I don’t want the things you’re putting in my head. I don’t want to remember.”

“Then what do you want?” Elias asked. “Why are you here right now?”

“I want…” Kirill looked lost. Empty. He looked the way he had when Elias had asked him who he was under all the masks. “I don’t know. Until a few hours ago, I didn’t remember you existed. The other you, I mean. The other me.”

“I never forgot you.” Elias’s voice was softer than he expected. Maybe he still felt a little sympathy after all. But for Max, not for Kirill.

“I wouldn’t have forgotten you,” said Kirill, “if not for your obscuring. It was strong. Strong enough that it didn’t even break when read your name in your file, or saw you the first time.”

“The strongest I’ve ever done,” Elias agreed. “That’s why your face who was a blur when you looked inside my memories. It must be. I tried not to think about you, but whatever I said earlier, I never actually tried to forget you. You were too much a part of who I was. It would have been like forgetting myself.”

“It would have been,” Kirill agreed. He sounded like he was about to cry. He sounded, for a brief moment, like Max.

Elias looked away.

This wasn’t his fault.

Was this his fault? This empty automaton in front of him? This cold-eyed vessel for the cruelty their parents’ killers had poured into him? This man who could threaten Sammy like it was nothing?

“What now?” Elias asked, forcing himself to meet Kirill’s eyes again. This time, he could almost see it—Max lying drowned at the bottom of that clear and empty pool. “What happens next?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s up to you.” Elias held up his wrists, jangled his cuffs. “All right, so you’re Max. That doesn’t change anything for me. You’re the only one with power here. You’re the one who has to make a choice.”

“I don’t have as much power as you think. I’m not the one who brought you here. I didn’t even want this assignment.”

“So you came here tonight to reminisce about old times, but you’re not going to let me go? You’re still going to hold my son’s life over my head?” Elias’s memories took on the flavor of hot, sharp anger again. “That’s not how it works.”

“I told you, I don’t want those memories you’re putting in my head.”

“You never told me what it is you do want.”

“Because I don’t know!”

“So you want me to tell you? You came here so I could figure it all out for you?” Elias shook his head. “You didn’t want me protecting you anymore. You walked away. And what do you think I can do for you like this?” He rattled his cuffs again, slammed them hard against the metal table with a discordant clang.

“I wanted to see you. To… to make it make sense.” He blinked hard. His eyes glittered.

The old protectiveness flooded Elias. Memories spilled out on a wave of fear for Kirill—no, for Max. Half a dozen times, he stepped into the body of his childhood self. He clutched Max’s hand. He stood between Max and danger.

But he wasn’t a child anymore. And Kirill wasn’t Max.

He treated it like one more emotional attack. He breathed in. Breathe out. He looked Kirill in the eye as if Kirill wore the face of his grief. He didn’t let himself look away, and he didn’t let the fear consume him. He stepped back, holding it at a distance.

That fear had already come true.

Max had faced a danger Elias couldn’t pull him out of. He had died, and Kirill was what had replaced him. Elias had grieved that loss. He had come to terms with the fact that some wounds left deep scars.

“I can’t help you,” he said. “Not like this.”

“Elias…” Kirill looked at him with a helplessness that sent Elias back thirty years. Maybe it was a mask. Maybe he had finally reached what was underneath all the masks.

It didn’t matter.

“You’re not him,” Elias said. “He wouldn’t have tortured anyone.” He held out the wrist with the electric shock bracelet. “He wouldn’t have threatened children.”

“I didn’t know.”

“You do now. And you can’t have it both ways. You can’t call on our old friendship because you’re afraid of the memories, and also keep on working for them because you’re afraid to leave.”

“I can’t walk away. You don’t know what they would do.” Kirill spoke almost in a whisper. His eyes skittered away from Elias’s.

What he had said was true, except in one detail—Elias did know what they would do. But Elias knew it wasn’t the whole truth.

“You don’t want to leave because you don’t know who you’d be if you left,” said Elias. “Just like you didn’t know who you’d be if you left me, all those years ago.”

“I can’t.” Kirill looked down at his hands. Over Elias’s shoulder. Anywhere but at Elias.

“You chose for yourself once,” said Elias. “You can do it again now.” His voice lowered to a plea. “You can leave them.”

“Help me.”

“I can’t help anyone like this,” Elias reminded him. “You’ll have to help me first.” He kept breathing in and breathing out. His voice was steady and merciless. No emotions leaked out, and no memories.

Finally, Kirill looked at him again. “Look into my eyes,” he challenged, “and then tell me you don’t care. Do it without feeling anything. I’ll know if you’re lying. I’ll see the memories.”

“I never said I didn’t care. I said that if you want to leave, it’s up to you. But you don’t really want to leave, do you?”

“I want it to make sense.”

“Does it make sense that our entire family died?” Elias asked. “Does it make sense that I lost my son? That he’s working for the people I’ve spent the past fifteen years fighting? Does it make sense that you’re here in front of me right now? Nothing in life makes sense, Kirill. Not until we decide for ourselves what it means.”

“My name is Max,” Kirill said, but he pronounced the name as if it were alien to him. “And you knew what I meant to you once.”

“I knew what Max meant. But you’re not him anymore.”

“And are you the same person you used to be? Elias would never have turned me away.”

That was true. And back then, Elias had never questioned whether that was for the best.

“Look in my eyes,” Kirill repeated. “Do it.”

“What will it gain you if I do? I still can’t help you. Not unless you make a choice first, and let go.”

But his eyes found Kirill’s against his will. Once, he hadn’t known how to say no to Max. More than a decade had passed since then, but some habits were impossible to break.

He stared into those clear pools of nothing. But Max was still under there, at the end of that long dive into emptiness. The friend he had lost. The friend who had betrayed him. The friend he had never stopped missing.

Max was dead—a pale, bloated corpse buried deep inside Kirill. Max was an emaciated wraith, his mouth open in a silent cry for help. Max was a wide-eyed boy crouched on a tree branch, shaking, afraid to come down.

The memories came. They spiraled out from that one image of Max trapped up a tree, and became a kaleidoscope of long-past images. In each of them, Max was in danger. In each of them, Elias knew he had to save him.

Elias struggled to focus on Kirill’s face. Kirill’s eyes had defocused again. Elias waited for the hungry, satisfied smile on his lips. He waited for Kirill to bring up his network and shift the focus of the memories.

Kirill did neither.

“It’s still there.” Kirill’s voice was a whisper. His eyes were still unfocused. “What we used to be… it’s still there. You can’t make yourself feel nothing.”

Elias took a deep breath. Another. He stared into the wide eyes of that boy stuck up the tree until the memory receded.

“I never said I could,” he said again. “But that doesn’t change anything. If you want my help, it’s up to you.”

“I don’t know what I want.” Kirill’s eyes slowly came back into focus. “I just know I don’t want to be alone anymore. I don’t want to be hollow inside. I want what you took.”

A hint of anger came into his voice. It sounded different than Kirill’s feigned emotions had. Rougher. More hesitant. Like he was unpracticed at showing emotion—like he was unpracticed at feeling.

“You made your choice,” said Elias. “I said I wouldn’t obscure you if you didn’t want me to.” He had only wanted to spare Max the guilt he knew would come. He had only wanted to spare his friend the pain. Even with his heart freshly broken.

“You said it was for the best,” Kirill said. “I trusted you. When did I ever say no to you?”

“When I asked you to stay with me.” Elias stood. He held his cuffed hands out to Kirill. “You made a choice,” he said. “Make another one. Or take me back to my cell.”

A moment ago, Kirill had begged Elias to look into his eyes. Now he turned away until all Elias could see was the hard line of his cheek. His face had been all softness the last time they had seen each other. Even after years of going hungry.

“I’ll have the guards escort you back.” With every word, a little of the emotion drained from Kirill’s voice, and a little of the vulnerability hardened into something smooth and opaque. “I’ll be back for you later. We’re not done.”

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Tagged: @cakeinthevoid @suspicious-whumping-egg

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