#tw fictional injuries

[resident-cake-anon]

fictional depictions of the following: implications and/or mentions of childhood sa, religious guilt/trauma, injuries, partial/implied nudity

[fe oc week] oct. 12th I tragedy

"i remember trying to wash the sin off my body...scrubbing away until my skin was red. even now, i can still feel it.."

Broken Vows

❀ catalina's father became a vassal to the knights of seiros for the sake of his family, especially for his daughter to have a better life than he once did

❀ in exchange for his pledge of loyalty, he asked for the monastery and the knights to protect and care for his daughter considering his work would occupy him

❀ they agreed, they vowed that no harm would come to her under their care

❀ some stray staff would break this vow whether it be for their own amusement or sick fantasies, the abuse becoming too regular of an occurance

❀ catalina knew that alerting higher members of the staff and church would only jeopardize the relationship they had with her father and family and all they had worked so hard for

❀ so she wore the pain and guilt every day underneath her tattered clothes and bruises, only finding solace in the fairytales and flowers she remembered from her home, yearning for those days of peace to return

❀ days in the sun turned into prolonged visits to the infirmary and hiding away in her room

❀ the more time passes, the more she holds resentment for the church and their broken vows. was it not their negligence that allowed this to happen? was it not their responsibility to protect her? did they not make a sacred vow?

❀ for now, all she can do is surround herself with with the petals and fantasies of the past, one of happier days

[indieyuugure]

Episode 3 of Fading Fantasies! Happy ending guys! I promise!

Previous: (4) Episode 2

Next: (4) Episode 4

See all...

[spirk-trek]

Nightvisions Fanzine & Novel | Merle Decker, Signe Landon (1979)

Nightvisions, by Susan K. James and Carol A. Frisbie, is one of the first standalone k/s novels published in a zine. It can be read in full here!

[aurorawritestoescape]

LOVERS ON THE RUN || 2,5k

Pt 3 of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang series

Tw: 18+ mdni, smut, angst, rough Joel/soft Joel cos I want it all, m!oral, injury(not reader), blood, cum eating, ball sucking, pussy grinding

Summary: it gets risky… and hot

A/n: hugs and kisses to @milla-frenchy for beta-ing and @iamasaddie for the gif <3<3

Series masterlist || Masterlist

*****

The sirens and gunshots are still ringing loudly in your ears as Tommy is driving Joel and you to a safe place. Yet you can only hope it’ll be safe.

You are sitting in the back of the car with Joel, still clutching the gun in your trembling hand, the other gripping Joel’s jean clad thigh as if grounding yourself to him. The bags with money are at your feet but you forgot all about them. Your widened eyes are fixed on the road. You don’t seem to be followed now but Joel taught you to expect the worst.

“Fuck! That was close!" you exclaim with a tint of hysteria in your loud voice, attempting to shout over the roaring engine of the car and your heart pounding in your ears. You're so high on adrenaline, fear and thrill that you feel invincible, almost immortal.

Tommy's nervous chuckle shows that he's on it too - the only drug that gets you off the best - escaping death with an armful of cash.

Just mere minutes ago you were standing on the brink of the precipice, one wrong move and you’d fall meeting your death. But destiny spared you once again.

“You two are fuckin’ lucky… I had that feeling.. couldn’t relax for shit. Came back and …fucking cops.”

“Thank you, Tommy.” You reach to him and pat his shoulder as he gives you a warm smile in the rear view mirror.

You glance at Joel and say with adoration and almost piety in your voice.

“And thanks to Joel’s number one rule.”

You and Tommy chant it together parodying his drawl, “Always have an escape plan!”

Joel smiles with a corner of his mouth. Your nerves alight, one glance at the man and you wish you two were alone so you could pierce yourself with his cock and ride him until your legs give out. Or suck him off, choking on his length and getting a new fix of adrenaline when you almost suffocate on his member.

But it’s not the place nor the time and Joel isn’t even looking at you.

His head turned to the window, his thoughtful gaze is sliding over the trees and streetlights you’re passing.

Finally the cloud of the high dissipates and you look at him. Really look at him. His forehead is glistening with sweat. He’s chewing on his lower lip and clenching and unclenching his right fist. He’s nervous.

Well he must be, you think, after what happened. Wishing to comfort him you scoot closer, bracing your hand on his chest and lean in to give him a kiss…

“Fuck!, “ Joel winces startling you by a sudden jerk of his whole body and in the next moment you feel the claws of something terrifying grip your heart.

“Where?” You ask with a shaky voice as your eyes are frantically searching all over his body.

He nods down and to the side and you notice his dark shirt stretched over his broad shoulder is glistening. His right arm, the furthest from you, is pressed tightly to his torso.

Your fingers dart to his shoulder but you stop and look at him, eyes screaming ‘What the fuck do I do, Joel?’ You’re frozen, trembling hands raised. You’d never raise them for the police like that but you’re doing it now, staring into the face of your biggest fear - losing him.

“ ‘s gonna be ok baby, don’t worry,” He says through clenched teeth.

The stupor you’ve been in disappears and your head whips to Tommy.

“Joel’s been shot! Floor it!”

*****

The next few minutes flew like a whirlwind of actions and feelings and at the same time dragged on like hours. When you finally arrived at some old abandoned garage you’d already done everything you could in the moving car.

Joel popped a couple of Oxys and now he’s sitting on a stool, shirt ripped off his shoulder exposing a bullet wound. You’re stitching him up, having sent Tommy outside to watch out.

Joel’s every muscle is taught, teeth clenched and he growls with every push of the needle through his skin. The sounds he's making don't let you concentrate. You feel sad for him but can't forget that he growls like that only buried deep in your tight wet heat.

“Can you stop?” you mumble under your breath.

“What?”

“Your growling?”

“Why?” He asks and growls again when you make another stitch.

You shrug and feel him staring at your face, reading you.

It doesn’t take him long, never does, and you hear a soft chuckle coming from the pits of his chest. You glance at him, meeting his narrowed eyes and a shit eating smirk.

“Dirty girl, soakin’ your panties while your man is sufferin’, huh?”

“I’m the one who’s suffering here,” You reply earning another chuckle from him. “And I’m not soaking anything”.

“Should I check, baby?” He smirks tilting his head to the side.

“Jesus, Joel,” you whisper trying to hide that he’s right.

“Don’t call for him yet. I ain’t dead”.

You freeze with a bloody needle hovering over his skin. You can’t see it anymore, your vision gets blurry with tears. You try to hide your face from Joel leaning closer to the wound. But he notices.

“Hey,” he cups your face with the hand he can use, pulling you closer to his face and wipes your tears away with a calloused thumb.

“I’ll be ok, baby.”

“You don’t know it”.

“I do. It’s just a graze”

“No, it’s not. The fucking bullet went through you! You were bleeding so much and.. and …”, you cut yourself off suffocated by the fear.

“Hey,” Joel says and grabs your shoulder, “You stopped it. You did good, ya hear me?”

“Yeah,” you mumble, glistening eyes downcast.

“Look at me,” he asks gently, his gaze is warm and comforting, “Thank you, baby”.

You jerk your head in a nod and a tear falls down on his hand.

“I’m almost done.”

You continue your work in silence.

When it’s done and his arm is secured in a makeshift sling, you take some water from the car to clean yourself off the dark crimson blood. Joel’s blood. Then you start carefully wiping away the red off his big hands and can't help but imagine the world where these hands can’t hold you anymore, can’t wipe away your tears, can’t make you come, can’t be kissed by your loving lips. The wave of panic covers you whole again and you burst into tears.

Immediately embracing you with his healthy arm, no matter the pain he must be in, Joel holds you close kissing wherever he can reach, your hair, eyes, nose, cheeks. No one would believe that this big brutal man could be so gentle and soft.

“I’m s-sorry”, you hiccup after a few minutes of crying on Joel’s healthy shoulder. Your body is still trembling against his and you hate yourself for letting your fear get the best of you.

“Shh.. it’s ok, sweetheart. I’m here. We’re safe,” Joel whispers, pressing you closer to his naked chest peeking from his ripped shirt.

“We aren’t safe, Joel. Not after today.”

“Always have an escape plan, right, baby?”

“You think it’s time? Did we save up enough?”

“Yeah, baby. Enough for us and for Tommy. Can’t wait to see you in that micro bikini you promised me,” he groans in your ear and you quietly giggle. You press your cheek to his broad chest and furrow your brows in thought. You love this life, always have, but you can’t deny that your luck has run out. Going on will be like driving your car towards the edge of the cliff at full speed. With a pang in your heart you realize that it’s time to take another road while you still have each other.

You straighten up, check Joel’s shoulder and arm again and then look deep into his eyes. He notices myriads of thoughts swirling in your mind, wraps his heavy hand around the back of your neck and lightly squeezes.

“If you need somethin’ to calm down…?”

“I can’t smoke now… need clear mind.”

“I ain’t talking about weed, baby”.

“What then?”

“Oh, think, sweetheart. What always helps, huh?” He moves his hand to your face and his thumb brushes your lower lip.

You look confused, head tilted to the side, until he pushes his thick finger into your mouth. Your eyes sparkle with excitement while you’re sucking on his thumb.

“Good girl. C’mon now. Get on your knees.”

He pulls the finger out and you lower yourself kneeling between his legs.

“Sure I won’t hurt you?”

“I’ll be fine. Take what you need, sweetheart,” he replies, spreading his thighs wider for you.

Your heart sings and pussy tingles as you slowly open his jeans, tug them down to the middle of his hips and pull out his soft heavy package.

You press your cheek to his warm crotch and feel his cock twitch. You don’t do anything for a few moments, just breathe in his musk and purr into his soft lightly trimmed hair. Joel’s petting your head and you sink into a trance, as he holds you close.

When you’re ready for more, you start leaving open mouth kisses to his inner thighs, balls, shaft, tip. With every touch of your lips, you feel him grow bigger, stiffer, harder and you can’t help but whine feeling yourself gush. So you start grinding your clothed pussy against your booted heel, desperate for any pressure.

You look up at Joel with your doe eyes, full of devotion and love and he groans, scooting closer to the edge of the seat.

“Go ahead, baby. Suck on it. It’ll calm ya right up.”

You know it will. So you take his already hard cock in your hand and latch on the fat tip. Your eyes flutter shut as soon as precome hits your tongue. You hum as you lick it off him and then take his length deeper into your hot mouth. In a few moments you’re already drooling around him, soaking his cock with your saliva while your warm palms gently caress his heavy balls.

“Fuck… yeah, baby,” Joel groans making your pussy ache with need.

When his cock is nice and wet you pull your mouth away replacing it with your hand and bend lower to suck on the velvet skin of his sack. You trace its seam with the tip of your tongue and take a ball in your mouth. You roll it with your tongue and then suck. Joel’s huge fist clutches your hair, not too hard but enough to signal you to keep going. You suck one into your mouth, slurp and lick around it and then part from it with a pop.

“Hnggg…That’s my girl,” Joel praises you through growls when you start working on the other ball. Your hands aren’t resting, one clasped around his long cock, sliding up and down from the girthy base to the throbbing head, as the other caresses the other ball.

You’re burning up with arousal and not being able to contain yourself, you grind, grind, grind your aching pussy against your heel.

Joel lightly tugs at your hair to get your hazy half lidded eyes to look at him and chuckles when you do,

“Shit, look at ya. Already gone just from suckin’ on my sack.”

You let go of his ball with a pop and his cock twitches in your hand. A clear drop beads on the slit and you lick it off, not tearing your eyes from the man.

“Yeah, now onto the main course, sweetheart,” he groans with a smirk.

You smile back, licking your lips as your hand returns to his sack.

“Don’t hold back, Joel. Please.”

You don’t think it’s possible but his gaze turns even darker, completely obsidian with lust, his cock is throbbing as you’re holding it at the base.

“Ya got it, baby”.

His hand, soft and gentle just a second ago, grabs your hair tight and pulls you closer. You gasp as your lips smash into his warm head but you don’t hesitate to open them and take more and more of his cock, until your nose touches his dark pubic hair. Your throat is trying to accommodate his length, eyes are welling up with tears, fingers gripping his thighs. He fills you so well that all the fears are quickly pushed out of your head by him. You nearly suffocate on his thick cock, squirming between his thighs but he’s holding you tight.

“Keep it in, baby, ya doing so good…”

Your throat contracts around him and he pulls you off with a curse. You cough, swallowing air, drooling all over yourself while he’s holding you by your hair like a dog on a leash.

“Gonna make me come too fast… lemme enjoy this mouth of yours.”

Your mind has already shut down, all your actions, senses, emotions are focused on pleasuring him.

Your mouth is on his cock again, tongue pushing on the underside as you slide up his length and swirl it around his fat head. You’re drunk on Joel, his taste, sounds, scent, his essence is inside you, around you, everywhere. He’s your whole world and they almost took him from you. Angry tears roll out of your eyes while you hollow your cheeks and bob your head up and down, in control of his pleasure but completely under his power. You feel his cock stiffen and then it starts pulsating in your mouth. You take him deeper and drink his cum as Joel is spurting it generously right into your throat. With another roll of your hips against your boot you come, moaning around his length in your mouth, seeing stars behind your eyelids. When he discards of the last drop of his seed, he coos over you,

“Oh, baby, did your little pussy come already?”

Not waiting for the answer, Joel roughly tugs on your hair again, dull pain making you whine, lifts your head off his softening cock and finally sees your face, stained with fresh tears.

“Fuck, baby, c’mere,” he pulls you up on your feet wincing at the pain in his shoulder. You immediately push your face into the crease of his neck, trying not to hurt him, breathing him in. He turns to you and his lips find yours. You kiss each other, desperately and feverishly, like it’s the last time before your old life ends and you meet a new beginning together.

Joel holds you tight one second and in the next his arm falls and his whole weight slumps on you. With his name on your trembling lips, you see his eyes roll back and then close.

*****

Thank you for reading! 🌸

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Series Masterlist

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[selfshippingquotes]

F/O, fatally wounded: S/I, could you kiss my booboo better? Pretty please?

[fo-enjoyer]

Imagine your f/o badly wounded after a fight. They have a bad cuts across their chest you see bleeding on their shirt. So when there's a moment of calm they remove their clothes just enough so you can heal it. Pudding a cotton ball of rubbing alcohol on it gently try not to touch the skin. Maybe even a bit flustered from such a vulnerable moment as you try not to show it. Your f/o tilts their head watching you clean them up, and as you finish they say "Do you like seeing me like this?"

[jumpywhumpywriter]

"The Lost Hero" - Crippled Hero Presumed Dead part 1

Warnings: crippled hero, hero with disabilities, retired hero, reluctant hero, near-death experience, reluctant rescue

***I don't see nearly enough of heroes with seriously traumatic, permanent injuries in writing. Like, not just classic scarring, but the kind that sticks with them every day and impacts everything from the way they move to their confidence levels. Physically handicapping kind of old wounds. Maybe they just didn't heal right, who knows. Anyways I decided to write what I've always wanted to see! Enjoy!! 👇👇

The last time Hero was seen alive was 5 whole years ago, in her final battle with Supervillain. But it had gone so terribly wrong. They had been fighting in the bottom level of a skyscraper Supervillain had rigged to blow, unbeknownst to Hero. Supervillain tried to escape the building, leave Hero to die when the bombs exploded, but Hero had been fighting too hard, keeping him from leaving. And so, the bombs went off, and the skyscraper collapsed... right on top of the two most famous figures in the city, crushing them. Supervillain's body was found a day later... but Hero was never located, though she was presumed dead after the horrific accident. Her final sacrifice to save the city.

After Hero’s death, the city was in shock. There had been years of peace and safety won by Hero's noble sacrifice… Before New Supervillain came along. With no hero to protect the city, New Supervillain easily took over, working his way through the government until he was in total control of the people and businesses, forcing them to bend under his tyrannical rule. Anyone who stood against him would be executed on the spot.

5 years later after Hero’s sacrifice...

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

Logan was a 15 year old boy who was hurrying home, mind abuzz with typical teenager thoughts as he weaved his way through the crowded city streets, when he stepped into the street to cross without looking for traffic. A loud horn blared, and he froze with terror at seeing the two large semi truck headlights bearing down on him, paralyzed with panic.

There was no way the huge truck could stop in time. Logan's instincts screamed at him to run, to move for crying out loud, but his feet were rooted to the spot, muscles locking up with fear, trapping him in place as the truck's brakes screeched and squealed on the asphalt, doing little to slow its momentum.

Logan's breath hitched, terrified as he braced himself for the inevitable impact -- but something else collided with him a millisecond before the truck did, slamming into him from the side with enough force to knock the breath from Logan's lungs, tackling him. Strong arms wrapped around him, and he sucked in a gulping gasp of air as he hit the ground hard, a blast of pain zinging through the arm he'd tried to use to catch himself.

His body suddenly tingled as though he'd just been zapped by a strange static electric shock, and he blinked in surprise to find himself staring up at a woman's face who was practically sprawled on top of him, her eyes filled with muted panic and fear. And worry. She was wearing a black hooded cloak that shrouded her features in darkness, but he still caught a glimpse of those piercing blue eyes before she turned her face away, pushing herself off of him with a grunt.

Logan sat up, dazed, looking around to see a small crowd gathering, gawking at him with concerned faces as the semi-truck driver hopped out of his vehicle to check on him. The driver was saying something frantic to him, probably apologizing profusely, but Logan was still wrapping his head around the fact that he'd almost died, that the strange woman had tackled him out of the way at the last second to save him.

As the woman stepped away from him, her eyes flicked over his prone form, lingering on his now-bloody arm from where he'd hit the edge of the concrete sidewalk. Then, without even saying a single word, she pulled the hood further down over her face and turned, walking briskly away with a slight limp, despite appearing uninjured. She wasn't sticking around as Logan became the center of attention, everyone asking if he was okay.

Logan glanced down at his shirt, blood going cold as ice as he noticed the slightly singed cloth where the stranger's arms had wrapped around him. It couldn't possibly be... could it?

Bystanders helped him to his shaky feet, checking him over while others called an ambulance, but Logan wasn't listening. "I-I'm fine!" He hastily blurted, snapping out of his state of shock and pulled himself away from the worried hands, pushing through the small crowd to chase after his unexpected hero. He needed to thank her... as well as sate his hopeful curiosity.

He barely caught a glimpse of the edge of her black cloak disappearing around a corner, stumbling in his stride before catching his balance as he raced to catch up. Shouts from concerned people called after him, but he ignored them.

Logan skidded around the corner, darting into the dark alleyway the stranger had slipped into. "Wait!" He cried as he finally spotted the hooded figure. He ran up before she could escape, tugging at her cloak to snatch her attention.

The stranger flinched and yanked the edge of her cloak from his hands, whirling around but still slightly turned away.

"I didn't get to thank you," Logan panted breathlessly. "If you hadn't been there--" his voice caught in his throat, and he realized he was trembling all over, adrenaline still coursing through his veins. The woman just nodded in acknowledgment, still unusually silent, before turning to keep walking.

"W-Wait! I need to ask something--"

The stranger paused in her step, but didn't turn to face him.

"My shirt... did you burn it?" Logan knew how it must have sounded, such an out of the blue, unusual question. But the woman's reaction was the exact one he was looking for, as she stiffened, going rigid. His mind reeled with dawning realization.

"You... You're Hero, aren't you?" Logan breathed hopefully, said like more of a statement than a question. Hero was the only one he ever knew of who could do that, who had the ability to control electricity. Who could burn without a flame. And who could have been fast enough to cross the street and tackle him out of the way before he was hit.

The stranger finally turned and reached up and pressed something shiny and metal stuck to her neck, a tiny blue light appearing before she opened her mouth for the first time.

"No... I'm not," a raspy voice sounded, hoarse and wheezy. "You've got the wrong person." Her hand dropped from her neck, and she pointedly turned away. But Logan darted around in front of her to block the path, his eyes huge with excitement and wonder.

"No way... You're alive? The whole city thinks you're dead!" He gasped. Her reaction all but confirmed it. It had to be Hero, the same hero that has disappeared five solid years ago, never seen again.

Hero was presumed dead after an intense battle with Supervillain that went down all those years ago. Supervillain had killed several heroes in the past, leaving Hero as the only one strong enough to face him. He was notoriously well-known for being dangerous and lethal.

The ensuing superpowered battle had leveled several whole blocks, and ended with the destruction of a skyscraper from a bomb Supervillain had intended to use to kill Hero, the last surviving hero in the city. But he'd been trapped in the building with Hero when the structure collapsed prematurely. Supervillain's body was found buried in the rubble a day later. But Hero's never was.

The woman's blue eyes were wide with surprise but tinged with sadness and guilt, before she shook her head grimly, pressing the side of her neck again. Maybe a nervous habit, or something more?

"No... Hero died in the accident, just like the news stations stated. Hero doesn't exist anymore. So leave me alone. I saved you because I just happened to be fast enough. Adrenaline gives you that kind of strength." She brushed off the accusation, reasoning with him. Her shoulders sagged, and she took a step away from Logan. "Go away, kid... there's no hero here."

The words hurt like a dagger to the chest. Logan was so sure this was Hero -- but if she was, why hide for so long? Why let the city fall into chaos under New Supervillain's rein? Why not stand up and fight the new evil?

"What are you so scared of?" Logan challenged. "I mean, you're Hero, you've taken down endless criminals and villains before. Why did you disappear for so long? Why let New Supervillain win?"

"Like I said, kid... Hero doesn't exist anymore." The woman's voice was gruff with a tone of finality, and her sharp blue eyes dropped to Logan’s arms, where blood was streaming down in scarlet rivulets.

"You're hurt. Go see a doctor, get it patched up, and forget this ever happened. Okay? No one will believe you anyway if you tell them I'm alive. After all, you're seeing a ghost."

Logan clapped a hand over the gash in his arm -- the wound had started throbbing now that the adrenaline wore off. But then he looked back at Hero, jutting his chin up and giving her the fiercest glare he could muster. "I'm not going anywhere until you give me answers," he said stubbornly.

Hero pinched the bridge of her nose, muttering something incoherent under her breath, but there was no mistaking the tone of exasperation. Her hood hid her face, but he could have sworn her features were twisted with confliction, torn.

"Please, I want to know what happened," Logan tried, speaking a little softer, more pleadingly.

Hero let her hands drop to her side, and she glared right back at him with equal intensity. Logan jumped as sparks of electricity crackled in her hands, a threat of greater danger to come.

"I'll give you one last warning. Turn around and walk away, or I'll fry your brains out," she growled low in her throat, her voice deadpan and flat.

Logan's heart faltered for a beat with fear. Hero was certainly capable of following through with that threat. But he watched her body closely and could see her weight shifting uneasily on her feet. It was a bluff, a final attempt to scare him off.

"...Then I guess you'll have to fry my brains out," Logan croaked weakly. He was taking a risky gamble.

Hero stayed stiff for a few agonizingly long seconds, before caving, the electricity sizzling out as she sighed wearily. "Why do you even care?" She hissed in annoyance. "New Supervillain's already controlling the city. Sometimes it's better to just... tolerate it, rather than try to be a martyr and go against higher powers. Sometimes you have to go with the flow."

"Only dead fish go with the flow!" Logan retorted angrily. "What happened to fighting for justice, for peace?"

Hero didn't even argue, just let out a long breath. "That was a long time ago, kid. I'm not that hero, not anymore. Not since..." She cut herself off, clearing her throat awkwardly. "My point is, I'm done fighting. My hero days are behind me, and I plan to keep it that way.”

Logan gaped at her in disbelief. "You can't be serious! You're just going to let New Supervillain run this city however he wants and not lift a finger to stop it?!"

Hero nodded tiredly, but he didn't miss the fraction of hesitation that came before. It gave him a sliver of hope.

"Please, Hero... we need you," Logan practically begged.

Hero's eyes suddenly flared with hurt and anger, and her raspy voice rose to a quiet shout, though it was harsh and grating and strained. "I can't, kid! You don't understand, I don't want to be Hero anymore. Screw the city, no one was there to save me when every bone in my body was crushed, when I was choking on blood and dying in a collapsed skyscraper. I gave everything for the people, and all it brought me was pain and suffering and loss. So forgive me if I'm not too keen on taking more bullets for the sake of the citizens. I've given more than my fair share of effort into protecting people, many years of my life dedicated to it. They can save themselves for once."

"But--" Logan sputtered and floundered around his words, reeling.

Hero's eyes softened pityingly. "I'm truly sorry to crush your dreams of freedom, but it's not going to happen. The best advice I can give is to go home, live your life to its fullest. Chances are good you will never cross paths with New Supervillain in-person anyway; he's too busy and distracted ruling his new kingdom of a city."

"Can you at least tell me why?" Logan finally choked out, his voice cracking.

Hero hesitated, her eyes glancing around both ends of the shadowed alley on high alert before she stepped closer. "Fine. You want answers? Come with me. It's... not safe to talk around here." Her voice dropped low and quiet, and without another word, she headed off.

Logan's heart skipped a beat with apprehension mixed with excitement to be trailing after such a legendary figure. Although, she wasn't anything like he'd ever expected. Far from the powerful Hero he'd seen pictures of in the newspapers five years ago, or that he'd caught glimpses of in villain battles.

He followed in silence as Hero traveled through the back alleys, navigating them with resolve and purpose in each step -- though Logan couldn't get his mind off her uneven, almost lurching gait. Subtle, but noticeable, like slightly favoring one leg, or limping.

Eventually Hero stopped in front of a large blue dumpster, suddenly appearing alert and edgy as she scanned around for any unwanted eyes. Then, satisfied that they were alone, she braced her shoulder against the side of the dumpster and pushed against it with her supernatural strength, scooting it to the side with a loud scraping sound.

Then she tapped the wall of the brick building the dumpster had been against before gripping around one of the bricks, pulling off what Logan realized was a false cover made to look exactly like the brick surrounding it. He took a surprised half-step back at seeing the square hole that was revealed, like some kind of creepy hidden tunnel.

"Down here's where I've been hiding out," Hero explained in her wheezing voice. "Follow close, and do not touch any of my stuff without permission. A lot of it is too dangerous for curious hands. Got it?"

Logan nodded eagerly, making note of her words. He watched as Hero crouched down to fit into the small space, disappearing into the dark. He shivered uneasily, but obediently followed her in. He tripped in surprise before realizing he was standing at the top of a staircase, and he felt his way down it with his feet, down into the unknown darkness. He could only hear the rustling of Hero's cloak in front of him as she descended into her underground hideout.

Then, the flip of a switch, and light flooded his vision. Logan winced and covered his eyes with a hand, waiting for them to adjust. He stared around with wide eyes at the room he found himself, taking it all in.

It wasn't as fancy or high-tech as he would have expected, in fact it was rather messy, a few tables cluttered with disorganized piles of various electronics and old devices, evidence of someone who likes to tinker.

Weapons lined the walls, wickedly sharp blades of all kinds along with dozens of others he had no idea how to use. Some junk papers and maps were scattered about randomly on both tables and floors, while others were pinned up on a corkboard in no recognizance order. It looked so strangely... normal, almost. Like a messy apartment room.

But one thing in particular snagged Logan's attention. Pinned up against the back wall, was Hero's hero suit, all mangled and covered in burn marks and dirt. Large holes were torn into the leather, evidence of a fierce fight. To be honest, it looked a lot like it had been through a paper shredder.

Hero strode over and sank into a chair sitting in front of one desk, and for the first time, pulled off the cloak and set it on down.

Logan barely stifled the horrified gasp that threatened to tear out of him. Hero's face was a mess of vicious scars like a messed-up tattoo spiderwebbing across her skin, that stretched all down her neck, and even her arms -- at least the parts that were visible from her short-sleeved shirt.

"...Are those all from the skyscraper accident?" Logan couldn't help asking. He felt insensitive for the question, but Hero answered regardless.

"Most of them are, but others... I got long before the fight with Old Supervillain." She winced at some phantom pain before her cold composure returned.

Logan stepped over to the nearest table, marveling at all the artifacts scattered thoughtlessly about. A loose dagger caught his attention, and he found himself instinctively reaching for it to get a better look, when Hero's stern voice cut in.

"What did I say about no touching?"

Logan instantly jerked his hand back, glancing apologetically at Hero. He thought for sure there was a flicker of amusement in her expression. Then his gaze darted back to the dagger. The blade looked rusty, but as he peered closer he realized that it was just crusted with dried red--oh.

Hero nodded to it, reading his thoughts. "That's the same blade I stabbed Old Supervillain with before the building came down on us both."

"Really?" Logan breathed in amazement. And the corner of Hero's mouth almost twitched up into a smile -- almost.

"Yes."

Logan stared wide-eyed at Hero, a dozen questions bouncing in his mind, but Hero held up a hand to keep him silent before he could pepper her with them.

"First, I assume you want to know why I can't fight New Supervillain?" She quirked an eyebrow, and he nodded vigorously.

Hero pointed to a small metal circle resting innocently against her skin, the one she’d pressed before speaking in the alley. "My vocal cords were crushed in the accident, I can't speak without this device in my throat keeping my entire throat from collapsing. I can control my voice's volume from the button on the side of my neck." Then she gestured to her leg, pulling up the cloth pant leg covering it to reveal giant, ragged scars torn down it, almost more scar tissue than normal flesh, a mangled mess of thick white lines and long-healed gashes and lacerations. That explained the limp Logan had noted.

"My leg is permanently ruined, shattered one too many bones in it when the building caved. It never quite healed right." She let out a humorless laugh. "What use is a crippled hero who can't talk on her own, can't even walk right, let alone fight? I'm done, kid. Retired. Go find someone else to stop Supervillain. Anyone but me." She rubbed her temples with her forefingers as though to soothe a headache.

"But you don't need to walk right to fight!" Logan blurted. "Can't you just, you know, use your powers to zap Supervillain?" He imitated shooting lightning from his fingertips, and that earned a quiet chuckle from Hero.

"It doesn't quite work like that. I need my agility, my skillset, my powers are worthless if I can't keep myself from being hit by whatever weapons Supervillain might have. I need to be able to move, to nimbly dodge. There's a lot more to fighting than just 'see enemy, and strike them'. But you're too young to know better."

"But there has to be something you can do!" Logan argued.

Hero leaned back in her chair with a bone-weary sigh. "It's a miracle I'm even alive at all, after what I went through five years ago. But the damage is permanent, there's nothing you can do to fix it. My body aches and hurts every day of my existence, I'd rather stay hidden away down here in my bunker than go fight another psychopath."

She laughed dryly, shaking her head. "And you know what's even worse? Villain is the one who dragged me out of the wreckage, who stitched me back together like some messed up jigsaw puzzle to keep me alive. And of course, he didn't do it for free." She tapped on the metal piercing her neck that led to the device in her throat. "This thing doesn't just give me my voice back, it's what's keeping me alive. It keeps my throat and airways open so I can breathe. Villain has a device that lets him control its functionality, which means he can snuff my life out on a whim if he wants, leave me drowning in air at any time, suffocating. He was a surgeon before he became a villain, so he knew how to set all my broken bones in place. There wasn't much he could do about my shattered leg, though. Too many bone fragments to piece together." Her gaze fell to the floor with shame.

"I'm only alive because Villain wanted me to be. He wanted to control me. Told me that if he ever needed my help for anything, I would do whatever he wanted or he would use his device to choke me out. Said it was a small favor for 'saving my life' after I fought Old Supervillain.” A bitter laugh escaped her. “I haven’t heard from Villain ever since he let me go, though, so clearly I'm not useful enough to be of any value yet, if he’s never bothered to call me to his aid.”

Hero leaned back in her chair, and Logan saw her visibly wince as the movement jarred her shredded leg.

“So what, you’re just going to spend the rest of your days wasting away down here?!” Logan blurted incredulously.

And to his utter astonishment, Hero merely nodded. There was no fight left in her hollow eyes, her defeated expression. Nothing but pain and exhaustion. “That's exactly what I’m doing,” she rasped tiredly. “Saves me a whole lot of suffering. Because the thing is, kid… you’re too innocent to understand what I've been through, and I'm too broken to remember what ‘peace’ is… there is nothing left for me to fight for. Right here in this bunker, I'm alive. No fighting, no patching myself up in the night – all I have to do here is exist. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

“It sounds lonely," Logan said pointedly. Hero shrugged.

“Some days are harder, when it's just Me, Myself, and I… But I've learned how to live with it.” She gestured to the staircase they'd come down earlier. “You’ve stayed here long enough. It's almost night, you should hurry home before your folks start to worry about you. At least you have someone who will notice when you're missing.” Logan didn't miss the hint of bitter wistfulness lacing Hero’s voice before she averted her gaze away from him.

Logan automatically went to the staircase, but paused at the bottom of it to turn back. “Hero?”

“Hmm?”

“...Thanks. For… For everything you've done, now and… before.”

Hero nodded sadly, and Logan headed up the stairs with a heavy heart to be greeted by the sharp sting of cold night air on his face as he stepped into the alley.

Logan's mind whirred the entire walk home, and the blood on his arm had already dried by the time he made it back. His excuse was that he'd tripped and fell after his parents questioned him. He cleaned himself up and headed to bed, slipping out of his shirt. He stared numbly down at the small singe marks in the cloth, replaying the rescue in his mind over and over again, letting the new knowledge sink in.

Hero was alive. And he was determined to find a way to bring her back, to give her the determination she needed to be the legendary hero she once was. It was up to him to change her mind, to get her to stand up for justice and freedom. He was already working on ideas of how to do that, and he knew just where to start as he flopped down into his bed for the night.

Hero might have lost faith in herself... but Logan certainly hadn't. And he would find a way to prove it.

This one sort of just popped in my head randomly, not sure if I should continue it or not. But hey, a crippled and half-mute hero who's given up fighting getting a reason to live again and get out of the ditch despite all the odds might be an interesting series, right???

Next ⏩️

Masterlist

Masterlist #2

@scoundrelwithboba @lumpofsand @isikedmyself878 @iamheretohurt @fleur-a-whump

@otterfrost @sausages-things

[kiawren]

Imagine patching your f/o up with these bad boys!! would they find it adorable, or demand you to take them off but secretly like it or something else..

[koyoriin]

"DO YOU REMEMBER OUR PROMISE?” // SIGNALIS

http://twitter.com/koyoriin http://patreon.com/koyorin http://instagram.com/koyori_n http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=12576068

[thlayli-ra]

Stray (part 8)

Characters - CM Punk, Drew McIntyre, Larry, Samoa Joe, Ludwig Kaiser, Giovanni Vinci, Gunther

Pairing - CM Punk/Drew McIntyre, CM Punk/Samoa Joe (past)

AU - Stray AU

Rating - Mature

Warnings - Graphic depictions of violence and torture, blood

Words - ~4,700 words

Summary - Punk gets in over his head

(To celebrate bloodied CM Punk, here is some... bloodied CM Punk! 😁)

'PHIL! PHIIIIL!!!!'

Joe yelled into the blackness of the night but Punk was gone. His feet felt like they were stuck in quick-drying cement, trapping him in place while his mind whirred with what to do. Call the cops, it was screaming at him. If he won't do it then you do it. Call the damn cops!

They're all I have.

Joe hitched a breath at Punk's voice filtering through his thoughts. Words he had said to him just moments before. They're all I have.

Suddenly it made sense. Why he wouldn't get the police involved. A quick search would be all it took to find out that Drew was in the country illegally and they would pack him off home. Punk couldn't let that happen. He wanted to keep him. 'You selfish, selfish prick,' Joe muttered under his breath.

Just... watch them for me, ok? ..then I'll never ask for anything else again.

'Fine,' Joe acquiesced the phantom voice in his head. 'I'll watch them, but you'd better come back soon or else.'

Heading back inside, Joe started at the sight of Drew in the sitting room, looking around him in alarm. He circled his palms out in front of him then did the figure of eight on his chest. Where's Punk? Joe didn't answer straight away, instead closing the door behind him and locking it tight. Drew tried again, with more urgency this time.

'He's gone out, I'm not sure where exactly but-'

Drew barged past Joe towards the door and tried to haul it open. Panic gave him unspeakable power and he almost yanked the entire thing off its hinges in his desperation to follow Punk outside.

'Hey, woah, woah,' Joe tried to calm the frantic behemoth he had been tasked with babysitting, lost at how to soothe it. 'He's coming back. He said he'll be right back.'

But Drew wasn't buying it any more than Joe had. He shook his head and began banging the side of his palm against his temple, like he was a broken toy soldier wildly saluting his commander.

'I... I don't understand.'

Drew grabbed at his collar, practically choking himself as he displayed it to Joe then went back to saluting. Yet still, Joe wasn't catching on, all his usual logic blinded by the whole bizarre, frightening situation he found himself in.

'Just... come back in, Drew,' he tried to steady the ship, allow himself a chance to think straight. 'Sit down and we'll wait for him together and-'

Drew grabbed him, iron grips on his upper arms that even made a man-mountain like Joe wince. Their eyes locked, faces close as Drew furrowed his brows in deep concentration.

And his mouth began to move!

'D... d....'

'Holy shit...' Joe hushed out as Drew forced his neglected lips to try and form the word he needed.

'D...d-d-d....'

Joe knew. Knew what he was trying to say because the same word was blaring in his own ear like an air raid siren.

Danger!

Punk's apartment was dark. Carefully, he stepped over the mess at his feet, trying not to disturb anything with his cautious tread. The whole time ignoring the voice berating him at the back of his head, a voice that sounded exactly like Joe's. What are you doing? Are you crazy? What the hell are you doing?

They had to come back. He knew it in his gut. That's what they always did, come back to the scene of the crime. Everybody knew that. But looking around, he found no sign of change or disturbance, everything was still.

He passed by his kitchenette, purposefully ignored the dining table to his left with its gruesome shrine upon it. He thought he could hear the blood still drip, drip, dripping off the edge onto the floor but that might have just been his overactive imagination, high on adrenaline. It had been a lot of blood. He wondered who or what had donated it.

Thnnk!

Punk crouched down low. It had come from upstairs. He stalled his breathing to listen. No doubt about it, there was footsteps coming from the floor above.

He was right!

They were here!

The wraps around his hands creaked as he balled his fingers up into tight fists, holding them in front of him like a shield. He passed by his sofa-bed where Drew had slept peacefully the night before, passed the coffee table where Drew had kindly left him his last muffin towards the staircase. Deliberately lowering each sole down silently as he twisted his way up and up.

It had clicked back in Joe's garden. The house had never been Drew's sanctuary - it was Punk himself! He had been his fingers that had freed him from the muzzle, his arms that had held him close when he'd been afraid and now his fists would rid him of his captors forever.

Reaching the upper level, Punk followed the muffled sound of voices to his master bedroom. Inching his way towards the door, he suddenly wished he had a baseball bat or something to use as a weapon but it was too late. He had to make do with-

The door opened! And a man walked out!

The two of them jumped at the sight of each other but Punk recovered sooner and swung. His right. A savage hook. The man went down. Out cold. Muttering a curse under his breath, Punk shook out his arm, trying to ignore the slight ache that radiated from his recovering tricep. Still got it!

He looked over the intruder and immediately recognised him as one of the men who'd knocked on his door earlier. 'Knew you guys weren't fucking cops,' he muttered icily to the unresponsive blonde. That meant the other was around here somewhere.

'Ludwig?' The voice came from inside Punk's bedroom. Flattening himself against the wall, he listened as heavy footsteps lumbered towards the door. He had enough time to spit out the word 'merda' before Punk lunched, aiming another right hook. Horrific flashbacks to his championship loss came flooding back as the bald man ducked low, Punk's fist skating harmlessly over his head.

But Punk was wiser these days, knew what was coming next and changed his body position in an instant to defend against the tackle to his gut, thwarting the take-down. Snaring his opponent's head in a choke-hold, Punk rammed his elbows into the man's spine, trying to force him to his knees. Ground and pound, you know this routine, ground and pound.

Unfortunately, the man was no rookie to combat and managed to slam his own fist into Punk's gut. Doubling over, Punk tried to ignore the terrible cramps in his stomach as yet another blow pummelled his abdomen. When another caught him right on the diaphragm, winding him badly, he had no choice but to relinquish the hold and back off to regroup.

Too late, he realised that Joe had been right. Joe was always right. This wasn't a cage fight. There no rules, no relegations, no officials. And no respite. The bald man came charging for him again and Punk had no option but to meet him head-on despite the agony flooding his guts. Locking horns, the two men tussled, ramming one another into walls and doors, trying to dislodge the other.

Punk was forced back against the bannister, his foe's hand pushing down on his face and bending his spine painfully over the handrail. Out the corner of his eye he could see his living area far below, pooled in murky darkness like the mouth of the abyss itself. The hand drove down ruthlessly. Punk nearly lost his footing but caught hold of the wooden balusters to stop himself falling over and plummeting to the floor below.

The struggle continued, Punk's hope dwindling as the ache in his injured arm became unbearable. It was then he spotted their stances and saw his chance. Driving his leg up, he whacked his opponent square between his open legs. The man squealed, falling like a sack of bricks and Punk was freed from his peril.

With his foe on his knees, the cage-fighter attacked. Jabbing and punching until blood spilled freely down the bald man's face. Yet still he would not surrender. Fighting back with his own strikes, Punk was forced to retreat when the man successfully managed to wrap his arms around Punk's waist.

Quickly, Punk widened his stance to stop the take-down and both men wrestled for dominance. Fuck! This guy is strong! Punk cursed, aware that his own body was running out of adrenaline and starting to fail. You stupid, stupid old man!

Punk hammered his fist into the other man's kidneys, his blows becoming slow and sluggish, but he put what strength he could behind them. The fake cop responded by ramming his shoulder into Punk's gut, squishing it against the unforgiving surface of the wall. A pocket of something wet and metallic leapt up Punk's throat and began to drip from the corner of his mouth. At first he was convinced it was vomit but when he quickly wiped it with the back of his hand and saw the red smear on his wraps, his worst fears were confirmed.

That's not good!

His foe bulldozed into him again and Punk's knees gave out. His opponent wriggled free and without his support, Punk fell onto all fours, coughing up frothy bubbles of bloody saliva. Come on! Get up! GET UP!

He did. Wobbled up onto his feet like a drunk, swaying from side-to-side, blood pouring down his shirt. His opponent was enraged. Furious at Punk's defiance, he let out a roar and rushed for him. But Punk did not fight back. Instead, he ducked down out of harm's way. The man hit thin air and tripped over Punk, losing his balance.

Right at the top of the staircase!

Punk looked back and saw the panic in the man's eyes as he failed to right himself, feeling the momentum pulling him backwards into nothing. Reaching out, Punk tried to grab him but it was too late and the man fell. Sickening crunches tore throughout through the silent apartment as he tumbled the entire length to the bottom.

Punk ran to the banister and peered down below. He could see his foe, lying face-up on his sitting area floor. He wasn't moving.

'Sssssshit!' Punk cursed and rushed down the staircase, carefully stepping over the man's legs which were splayed on the bottom-most rungs. 'Shit! Shit! Are you alright?'

No answer fell from the man's lips. Hanging as loose as his eyelids, his pupils large and black as they stared up into the void. His chest still while a grisly pool of dark liquid spread out beneath him.

Punk grabbed his own hair by the roots, glanced back up at the spiralling grey structure of wood and steel. Joe had been right after all. 'Fucking death trap stairs!'

What did he do now? He'd just killed a man! Or at least, there was a dead man in his apartment. That he'd just killed. Or had he? He kinda killed himself. It was an accident, he'd been acting in self-defence but would anybody believe that? Did it matter? He couldn't just leave a dead guy on his sitting room floor. He had to do something, he had to call somebody, but... he couldn't call the cops because they'd ask why the intruders were here and then they'd find out about Drew and take him away and-

'Eh-hem!'

The sound of somebody loudly clearing their throat directly behind him made every drop of Punk's blood grind to a halt in his veins. Turning around, he faced down one of the largest men he'd ever seen. As wide and as thick as Joe but taller. Big! Too big!

The man sharply cried out in a foreign language, some kind of command and swiftly folded his hands behind his back. Punk blinked like a little minnow hypnotised by the anglerfish's lure.

He never even saw the strike coming. So quick was the blow to his head that he was knocked out long before his body collided with his own coffee table.

'Drew, I understand you're scared. I am too. But Punk said he would be right back.'

The Scot was refusing to back down, kept tapping his forehead over and over. 'D-d-d-d-d-d-' But he couldn't get the word out. Drew began smacking the butts of his palms against his forehead in frustration.

'Danger, I know!' Joe cut in, letting the taller man know he understood. 'Those men hunting you are dangerous, I get that, but Punk's only going to the convenience store.' Joe felt terrible using the same feeble lie that his ex had given him earlier. 'He's getting some supplies then he'll be back. He promised.'

Drew put down his hands, his large barrel chest heaving up and down with panicked breaths. He swallowed noisily before raising his right arm again. Making the figure of eight on his chest with his thumb, he followed it with the shape of an 'x' using his finger. Punk promised?

'Yeah,' Joe tried to mimic the two signs. 'He promised.' The tide was starting to turn, Drew was calming down. He was nearly there. 'Drew... do you trust him?' The Scotsman's blue eyes blinked, thick dark eyelashes fluttering as he glancing up sheepishly at Joe.

Cat paw.

'Do you believe him?' Another long, hard stare.

Cat paw.

It suddenly hit Joe how well he knew that look in Drew's face. The fear and anxiety that always seemed to go hand-in-hand with a certain tattooed cage-fighter. He found himself feeling a fresh pang of concern, something altogether more wicked in its nature.

Drew... do you... love him?

He didn't dare ask aloud. In case he got an answer he sorely did not want to hear.

'Come on then, come sit down,' Joe motioned back towards his sitting room. 'I'll make us some fresh coffee and we can wait for him to get back. He shouldn't be long.'

Now, he wasn't sure if he was trying to convince Drew or convince himself. After coaxing the large Scotsman down onto his couch, Joe disappeared into the sanctity of his kitchen. He went through his breathing exercises, old, familiar routines that had become second nature to him by now but at that moment, they weren't working. His hands were still shaking. His mind replaying that moment he'd seen Punk go down in the cage. Only when Joe rushed to his side, his eyes were still shut. His hair was short and speckled with greys, the wrinkles on his face more pronounced. And blood began flowing from his nose and mouth...

Joe rapidly made the coffees and returned to Drew. With someone else to take care of, he could occupy his anxiety. The pair sat quietly, the coffee turning cold in their untouched cups.

'I should have moved out of here months ago.'

Joe didn't know what prompted him to speak. Perhaps just a need to break the stifling silence before it suffocated him completely. 'Told myself it was only for a little while. A month or two. Just to make sure he was alright.'

Drew's blue eyes were on him, still large with worry. He couldn't bring himself to look at them. 'I just... never did. I'm still lingering on... still stuck. Like I was when we were together.

'We both agreed that when we got older, started to wind down, we'd retire and move back to SoCal. Punk was champion at the time but he told me that once he lost the belt, we'd talk again. He loses it. We don't talk. We spend two years together in semi-retirement, two amazing, blissful years... then he says he wants another shot. I'm disappointed but, I love him, I support him. So yes, go for it. I've got your back.

'He gets injured. I'm devastated for him but I'm also hoping, deep down, that maybe this time, we could look into new places. He says not now. His doctor is here, his surgeon is here, his PT is here. Fair enough, his foot was badly broken and I want him to heal so...

'He gets better. He says he had unfinished business. He needs to win his championship back. We fight. I give in and say ok. So he enters the cage. Tears his tricep. I say now, come on, this is a sign. You're over. You're done. He walks out. He's gone all night and I'm frantically calling the cops thinking he's done something stupid but he it turns out, he was just at Ace's and I'm so fucking angry with him. I call him a selfish motherfucker and every other curse under the sun. I get it all out of my system and I calm down. I tell him we'll stay until his tricep is healed. He says ok. And that's that.'

Joe sniffed loudly. He had no idea he'd been crying. Drew was looking at him with so much pity it hurts.

'Then he starts talking about one last chance. He just needs one last run and... it suddenly dawns on me. He was never gonna leave. Fighting is all he's ever cared about, it's all he's ever had. Nothing else will ever compare to it.' Joe took a deep gulp, wet tears spilling down his cheeks. 'Not even me.'

Drew dipped his head, levelled his eyes to the ground to give Joe some space to release his grief.

'So I left him. He didn't take it well. He was angry at first but when he realised I wasn't joking, he spiralled into this black hole. I've never seen him so bad. So I got this place, said I'd be around if he needed me, help him get back on his feet. And here I am, nearly eight months later and I'm still just sitting here in limbo. Still waiting... for him.'

Punk awoke to a world of groggy pain. His head felt like it was on the brink of bursting like a gory balloon, the swelling pushing into the back of his eyes. There was a ringing in his ear, a high pitched screech like the kind he'd have after seeing a local punk rock band play, the terrible noise adding fuel to his throbbing headache.

His vision was blurry but he recognised his sitting room, which was a small comfort, even if he was viewing it from a unfamiliar angle. However, the fear started up when he spied the stranger pacing in front of his large windows. Not the tall, dark-haired angel with the blue eyes that he'd scooped up off the street but one with a fierce grimace and a long, dark military coat that snapped every time he turned around.

He didn't seem to notice Punk in the room with him, so the cage-fighter took the opportunity to slink away but found to his horror that he was stuck fast. Looking up, he discovered both of his arms were tied firmly to the balusters of his staircase. A loud sting on his brow bellowed, making him wince against the stickiness of dried blood smearing his face from forehead to jaw.

His heart kicked up several notches, finally understanding the terrible danger he was in. A plight that only got worse when another figure entered his apartment - the blonde cop from earlier, now sporting an impressive black eye that Punk guessed was his own handiwork. The blonde began talking in a foreign language (it sounded European, German perhaps?) when the huge man cut him off.

'In English, Ludwig.' Then he looked directly at Punk. He wanted him to hear!

The blonde - Ludwig - cleared his throat and started over. 'I've wrapped Giovanni's body in the tarpaulin and stored it in the van, General. Thatcher is on his way to dispose of it.'

'Good,' the other man said, never taking his eyes off of Punk. The cage-fighter tugged weakly at his bonds, trying to break free but they had no give at all.

'Do not struggle,' the large man ordered, his voice punching right through Punk's aching skull. 'Do not fight, or you will join Giovanni at the bottom of the lake.' Punk stopped, but only because he could see it was useless. He would have to think of another way out of this predicament. 'Ludwig?'

The blonde took over, stepping smartly towards Punk with his hands behind his back and a smug air of superiority. 'You will answer my questions. Once you do, we will leave and you will never see us again.'

Yeah, right! Punk wasn't buying it.

'Where is the Scotsman?'

Punk glared back with gritted teeth and was punished with a brutal back-hand to his cheek. His head snapped to the side as Ludwig repeated the question again. 'Where is the Scotsman?'

'Don't know,' Punk said, running his tongue over his teeth to make sure they were all still there, well, except for the one that was already missing. 'Guy took one look at the mess you made in here and took off. Haven't seen him since.'

Another blow, a harsh slap to his other cheek. 'I know you are lying.'

'You don't know shit.'

A punch this time and fuck, that hurt! Almost knocked Punk's jaw right out of joint.

'No more to the face, Ludwig,' the larger man warned with a growl. The blonde replied with a 'yes, General' and continued his interrogation.

'We know you left together early this afternoon. Where is he now?'

Punk allowed himself a small glimmer of hope that they hadn't seen them going to Joe's place. 'I told ya already, I don't know,' Punk retorted.

Ludwig punched Punk right in the gut. The bruises from his earlier fight with Giovanni exploded like cluster bombs, spreading bursts of pain throughout his abdomen. With his arms pinned above him, Punk couldn't bend over to relieve the pressure and had to endure the horrific cramping in his gut, trying to breath through the agony in short, jagged pants.

'I expect the truth this time. Where is the Scotsman?'

'Fuck you,' Punk croaked. Another gut punch and Punk started coughing up blood again. That was the least of his worries. Ludwig had turned his attention to Punk's left hand. One-by-one, he tapped each of the cage-fighters inked digits, all of them turning blue from the tightness of the rope wrapped around his wrists.

'Ene mene miste,' Ludwig muttered under his breath. 'Es rippelt in der kiste, ene mene meck, und du bist weg.' He settled on Punk's pinkie finger and held it taut in his fist. Punk only managed to grab a breath before his finger was bent back fiercely, breaking the fragile joint with a loud snap! Punk screamed, his face twisted with the shock and pain while neither of his captors blinked an eye.

'Where is the Scotsman? Or I break another.'

'Ok, ok,' Punk hissed between his teeth. 'I get it. Look.' He motioned upwards with his head, Ludwig followed his gaze. 'You see this one?'

Punk stuck up his middle finger.

Unamused, Ludwig snagged it in his fist.

Snap!

'AAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHH!'

'Where is the Scotsman?'

Punk spat at his captor in reply, hurling a large, wet glob of blood and spit that splattered across his face and dripped down his cheek. The smug, calm mask evaporated, a tight snarl took over and Ludwig grabbed Punk by the jugular, cutting off his air supply.

'I still have eight of your fingers left to break then I will move on to another piece of you and break it too. Now, tell me. Where is the Scotsman?'

Punk struggled to gasp in a breath, his face turning scarlet.

'Ludwig!'

The blonde stood down at the order and stepped away, keeping his cold, hard stare on Punk who coughed and spluttered, trying to heave some oxygen into his empty lungs. Clawing dread tore down his spine when the larger man stepped forward and he knew his dire situation was about to get far, far worse.

'I knew you would be a tough one to break,' the so-called 'General' said in his brash accent. He was holding something in his hands, large and shiny. Punk recognised his old championship belt in its glass case. 'You're a fighter? A champion. Me too, back home in Austria. I defended it all over Europe. Retired unbeaten.'

Before Punk could blink, the man rushed at him, glass case raised above his head like a club. Holding his breath, Punk braced himself for the blow, stuck fast as the titan thundered towards him. Punk yelped as the case smashed directly above his head and shards of glass fell like hail onto his bloodied face and shoulders, getting stuck in his hair.

But there was no pain. It hadn't touched him - just a ploy to scare him.

And it had worked!

Punk trembled from head to foot, creaking his eyes open again to find the General looming over him, blood dripping from the hand where the glass had sliced his skin. He didn't even seem to notice.

'Now tell me where my slave is?'

'Your... your what?'

The bloodied hand grabbed Punk by the chin, smearing fresh blood through his beard. 'The Scot. Where is he?'

Something about hearing that word being used to describe Drew, confirming the fears that Punk knew deep down but was loathe to admit, ignited the cage-fighter's rage and he stared down his tormentor with his brow furrowed and teeth bared.

'Fuck you, you son-of-a-bitch!'

The General stared back stoically, unmoved by Punk's outburst. His gruesome hand trickled down from Punk's jaw to the collar of his shirt and shredded the fabric, slicing it down the middle like he was gutting a wriggling fish. The painted skin of Punk's chest was exposed and examined expertly, the General placing his finger right on the centre between Punk's pecs.

Then he drew back his hand...

Every single muscle in Punk's body tensed up.

The blow sent him crashing against his own staircase, his spine colliding with the hard wood. Any air he had gulped back into his lungs were flushed out and Punk felt himself begin to suffocate. He was given no opportunity for respite, blow after blow pounding against his battered torso, cracking a new rib with each brutal strike.

By the time the onslaught finally came to an end, Punk hung like a mangled piece of meat from the butcher's hook, mouth drooping open as his shattered chest tried to catch air. Each raspy breath stung like a knife slicing between his ribs. His chin was grabbed again, fingers digging into his jawbone.

'How about now? Now, will you tell me where my slave is?'

Despite the fear, despite the pain, Punk laughed. A loud, obnoxious laugh. 'You empty-headed fucking dumb fuck!' he sneered in his tormentor's face. 'You really think this is working? You have no fucking idea. I'm from the cage. I know pain! I've broken my fucking fingers during a fight and kept on punching. Whatever you dish out, I can take.'

The General tilted his head back, narrowing his eyes.

'But the more you hurt me, the more you convince me...' a glob of blood dribbled from Punk's lips, sticky crimson staining his teeth, 'that I'm never gonna let your ugly ass take him again.' He paused to grab a strangled breath, letting his words sink in. 'So I guess, you're just gonna have to kill me, because I'm never gonna tell you where he is.'

The hold on his chin became unbearable and Punk tried to calm his stampeding heart, waiting for the end to come.

But then... his captor began to chuckle. 'You hear that Ludwig? He said to kill him. He makes the orders now.' The blonde gave a snide grin but nothing more. 'No, no, no, no,' the General shook his head. 'No, I am the one in charge here.' He pulled Punk in close, so close the cage-fighter could smell his foul breath. 'And I don't want to kill you. I actually quite like you. You're a lot of fun. I think we should have more fun together, do you agree?'

The General placed his thumb against Punk's lips, pressed them through and into his mouth. Punk could taste the acidy tang of the other man's blood on his tongue as the strange digit hooked itself around his bottom teeth.

'You won't tell me where I can find my slave? Fine! Then you will take his place.'

To be continued...

Previous Chapter

Next Chapter

[selfindulgentfandomstuff]

A couple of doodles ft Eren and Valerian!!

Eren is absolutely fine in that second picture btw, Val’s saliva has got a numbing agent in it (gross but true lol)! This is an added feature in their lore bc realistically I cannot handle a lot of pain. Any vampire biting me is gonna have to be able to make it feel better lol

Eren Deere (left): they/he

Valerian S. Mathis (right): he/him

[mynamesaplant]

Great Risk, Great Reward

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PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS FIC CONTAINS: VIOLENCE TOWARDS ANIMALS AND CHILDREN, BLOOD, INJURY, AND ANIMAL DEATH - IF ANY OF THOSE THINGS MAKE YOU UNCOMFORTABLE, PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION!

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I want to thank my pal Mons for being a constant inspiration for the PLA Mer AU and for beta reading this fic for me. Summary: Gaeric finds out that Dawn likes penguins, but their bonding times goes a little awry.

Don't want to read it on Tumblr? You can read it on AO3!

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“Hey-” Dawn began to scramble across the ground faster, very familiar with the voice and deathly terrified to have yet another bad encounter. “Hey, squirt! I’m talking to you.”

“Oh no, no, no, no-”

Dawn was almost across the room, almost to the same pool that Ingo had disappeared into with Calaba and Irida – where had Gaeric even come from and why hadn’t she heard him? He was so big and, mer or no, seals were not exactly graceful on land. A hand snatched her up with her fingertip’s inches from the frigid water. Enclosed in his warm palm, Dawn felt herself moving through space and mentally preparing for the worst. What was he going to yell at her for today?

To her surprise upon meeting Gaeric eye-to-considerably-larger-eye, he was beaming, looking genuinely excited about… Well, something. Dawn had only even seen him grumpy and tired, and he usually wasn’t awake at this hour.

“I thought we learned from last time,” his tone was chiding, and his expression momentarily reflected the voice, but clearly, he was too excited to permit the disapproving scowl to grace his face. “Stay out of the deeper water without an adult.”

Dawn cringed and shrank in his outstretched palm, edging as far away as she could because her heart was positively slamming against her ribcage with a barely contained anxiety. She was less afraid of Gaeric after that last time Ingo dumped her with the warden. Despite how intimidating she still found him, his coat was very soft and fluffy, which was one point in his favor. It was practically irresistible, many other pups running their fingers through it with a reverent fascination. (And he had been pretty nice to her since then, doubly so after she quelled his noble with her flute.)

Still, this level of excitement for Gaeric was not in character. So, Dawn remained wary even as he propelled himself across the ice toward a different hole. She recognized it. It was a tunnel that led to the outside. A fresh wave of panic swarmed in her head like a cloud of wasps, buzzing irrational thoughts into her ears. She swallowed an anxious whine as it became abundantly clear that Gaeric intended to take her from the settlement. Dawn fiddled with her scarf, keeping her eyes low, and hardly listening as Gaeric chatted at her in amicable tones.

“Ga-Gaeric?” She interrupted him hesitantly. He was just about to set her down so she could follow him, in his excitement, he had even noticed how she was acting. “Wh-Where are you tak-taking me?”

“Hm?”

Oh, he supposed he hadn’t told her just yet. He was just so thrilled, so excited about the news. All the wardens were. Loathe as he was to tell the Diamond clan anything, he also shared the good news with Sabi, who he was sure would find some way to relay that to the rest of her clan.

Now, however, Gaeric was turning vaguely pink. He hadn’t meant to overhear. Honest! People just presumed that he, under his nice, warm stitched walrus skins, was asleep, and often he was dozing off, but it was a catnap like he had seen Lady Sneasler do. Half-conscious but ready to leap into action at a moment’s notice, especially given the strange changes in the sea recently and the encroaching of those humans into their territory.

“I, uh – I heard that you like penguins.”

Dawn’s jaw slackened in disbelief. She had only recently told Ingo of her travels to the northern shores of Hisui, an ice encrusted and ethereally silent snowscape, and witnessed several penguins waddling around. Either Ingo told his fellow wardens, and considering how close to the vest he kept most information concerning Dawn that seemed unlikely, or Gaeric had overheard, which made her nervous about what else he might have inexplicably overheard. Mentally scolding herself for being so careless of her surroundings and tongue so loose as to talk of her secret double-life on the surface.

“Er, yeah! I do.”

A gleeful glint came into Gaeric’s blue eyes, his next sentence actually made her perk up.

“Fantastic! Let’s go look for some penguins then.”

Dawn should have known that it was too good to be true.

The swim to the north shore was actually pretty nice. Gaeric was chatting with her amiably, grinning toothily while she swam around him, his eyes watchful for any potential predators, but they seemed to be getting along famously.  That was, until they made it to the frozen tundra, and Gaeric threw out an arm to make her halt.

“Alright kid,” he said, flashing her a broad smile.

He did not notice her decidedly confused expression as he launched into an in-depth explanation of penguins.

“These guys are speedy in the water, but you probably know that already.”

The warden gently nudged her toward the distant penguins torpedoing through the water, zipping after silvery fish.

“If you need air, the clan has already made a few airholes in the ice. Just be cautious of any predators that might be on the ice if you stick your head out to get a look, alright? I’ll be right here if anything happens.”

“Uh, okay?”

Dawn replied, unsure why Gaeric of all mers would be so excited to show her something like this. Lian loved to show and share things with Dawn, but Gaeric? This was extremely out of character. That was when she started to realize things were not exactly as they seemed.

“This is my first time watching you, so don’t be worried about making any mistakes. We all know Ingo’s not the greatest of hunters.”

Hunters?

Did Gaeric… Oh, no.

Dawn felt another insistent little nudge to the small of her back. That’s why he was excited. He was excited to teach her to hunt because she had said she liked penguins. Gaeric was providing her helpful tricks and hints for her imminent hunt and Dawn could feel her insides roiling. Why did he have to suddenly be so encouraging? Her brain was screaming with panic, clutching her hands in front of her and nervously fussing with the edges of her scarf.

Sensing unease, he stopped pushing – some pups had performance anxiety, they wanted to impress or do well on their first hunt, but they got inside their own heads. Maybe that’s what she was feeling with his incessant chatter.

“Hey kid?” She twisted around to glance at him, and he gave her two thumbs up. “You’ve got this.”

With that final encouragement, Dawn swam forward, the warden unaware of the deep grimace etched into her cheeks. He wanted her to – what? Chase a penguin? He knew how bad she was at swimming. Yes, she had been getting better since she learned to dodge the frenzied nobles, but she was not fast, just better coordinated. She was trying to think fast. Gaeric expected her to try, and she had to do something to maintain her façade, so she would at least chase after some penguins. He would eventually get fed up with her failed attempts… but then what?

Gaeric genuinely enjoyed hunting. Not because he was a bloodthirsty maniac or anything (like Dawn seemed to think), he just felt more in his element chasing prey down, when building his sophisticated traps, when launching a spear into the hide of a seal – he said that it tickled the predatory part of his brain that few other activities seemed to even scrape. Teaching pups to hunt was always an exciting prospect. Pups had so much untapped potential that Gaeric loved to nurture. The next generation of Pearl clan hunters was a serious source of pride for the warden and, although Dawn could be a little weird at times, he was just as invested in teaching her as he was with any pup.

Dawn drifted, penguins and fish danced erratically in the water before her like it was some absurd ballet. Maybe if she had been here with Ingo, it would have been amusing, but not under her current circumstances. How could she make this look convincing? She thought about her excursions with Laventon and his advice on how to get closer to their target. A target was basically prey right?

‘Stay low and move slow. Don’t make any sudden movements or noises that might scare them.’

Maintain the illusion. She knew just enough about penguins to know they would quickly scatter once she started chasing them, probably hop back onto the icepack the moment they saw her advance. She dove down where the sunlight couldn’t reach and the water became even colder, watching the white bellies of the penguins flitting around overhead. Without realizing it, Dawn’s body was responding to an instinct she did not think she possessed as a human who transformed into a mer; muscles coiling, pupils blown wide in anticipation, hands curling and uncurling.

The warden watched with an ember of pride burning brightly in his chest. He waited with great anticipation for her to make her first catch.

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Gaeric watched her for about twenty minutes as penguin after penguin slipped through her clutches with startling regularity. He knew she wasn’t experienced, but even the most novice of pups was able to grab a penguin after a couple of tries. Now all the birds were making a beeline for the shore and there was no point for the pup to follow. If she was this bad in the water, she would have no chance hunting anything on the land.

Dawn actually snarled at him when he shifted himself between her and her quarry, the noise frustrated as she tried to dart around him.

“Pup, stop. You’re going to overheat. Go up and take a breath. Clear your head.”

The surveyor didn’t even realize how much heat she was radiating from physical exertion. Her slim chest heaving and muscles quivering – she didn’t realize how much her focus had consumed her. The large mer guided her to the surface, already giving her pointers as she tried to catch her breath. How long was she chasing the Adélies? She was able to recognize the brush tails and distinct two-toned coats from her previous excursions with the professor. She was genuinely trying to catch one… to do what with? She didn’t want to dwell on it, the mere thought made her shudder with a mix of disgust and horror.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” The warden murmured sympathetically, completely misinterpreting her expression as disappointment. “Catching them gets easier with practice. You stay here.”

No argument from Dawn, she felt exhausted as she watched Gaeric disappear into the gloom. The blood pounded in her ears, otherwise she would have noticed how quiet the surrounding water had become as a predator trawled through the sea.

He was gone for a little while, Dawn waiting idly for the warden to return, but making sure to practice scanning around like Ingo had taught her. She was very small and there were a lot of would-be predators like orcas, leopard seals, and polar bears patrolling for a tasty snack like her.

She smelled Gaeric before she saw him, or rather, she smelled the blood. Thankfully it wasn’t his, but it was putrid, clouding the water in a fine pink mist as he approached, which was when she heard the shrieks that sent a cold shiver up her spine. The warden had a woven net over his shoulder that was chock full of dead Adélie penguins, all except one, which was making those horrific noises.

Dawn covered her mouth, feeling saliva pooling beneath her tongue, but it had nothing to do with hunger. No, the penguin looked far from appetizing. A wave of nausea rolled through her, making her skin feel prickly hot and stomach roil when he came to a stop in front of her.

The smell of blood was all around her, sticking to the inside of her nose, bitter and metallic, while Gaeric rummaged through his catch of the day, seizing the sole penguin left alive, and dropped it before her with an encouraging smile. He had the realization that she would not only be hungry after all that swimming around, but she would also want a chance to prove herself to him. He had done a similar tactic with other pups, the younger ones especially; catch something of an appropriate size for them and injure it, then allow the pup to make the final blow. It was a good boost of confidence after a long string of failures.

The penguin flopped around, plumes of blood misting the water darker and darker pink with each flap of the poor creature’s unbroken wing, wailing in fear and agony. The scene was ghastly.

“Alright pup. Now, what you’re going to want to do is-”

The audible gag over the sounds of the penguin made Gaeric stop midsentence and he looked more closely at the tears collecting in her dark eyes.

“Ga-Gaeric, I c-can’t…”

A frown settled on his face. A new predicament. Dawn probably liked to eat penguins, but she had never been hunting before, certainly not with him and presumably not Ingo. This would be her first kill and, occasionally, pups would get squeamish. It didn’t happen often, but they would suddenly get cold fins, and just couldn’t follow through with a kill. He should have guessed that Dawn would be similar. Ingo had had a similar reaction, but he quickly got over it out of necessity. So, he told her the same thing that he had told all the others in the past.

“Dawn, I know it’s hard, but this is something you have to learn to be comfortable with.”

Gaeric gestured to the flightless bird flopping around. When she didn’t look, he lifted her head with a knuckle placed under her chin. Dawn wouldn’t have expected him to be so gentle. Ingo treated her like glass, which was not within the norm with mers. They bit and scratched and roughhoused. This was completely unexpected of Gaeric.

Dawn emitted a sickened gurgle, averting her eyes away from Gaeric, away from the bird – there was nowhere else to look. Gaeric took up most of her field of vision and the penguin took up what remained. Her eyes snapped closed.

“I can’t,” she moaned, more to herself than the warden, “I can’t do it.” Her hands moved to cover her mouth and nose, trying to block out the assault to her senses.

In her head, she was trying to calculate how badly this would make her look in Gaeric’s eyes. Just because she was able to quell his lord and he was treating her with less suspicion than he usually did, Dawn knew he did not trust her. That was when a thought came to her.

She was alone with Gaeric. Completely alone. He could have been grilling her the whole time about her deal, which he had done in the past, but he was so caught up with hunting that he hadn’t. Without that distraction, without that ounce of “goodwill,” Gaeric had her in a very precarious position.

A palpable wave of anxiety rolled through her, her eyes widening and her nearly hidden ear pinning back, whole body eerily still – and the warden didn’t even seem to notice, already steamrolling into a lecture about the necessity of hunting because it was about survival in this dog-eat-dog world. If Dawn wasn’t feeling so sick to her stomach with fear, she would have found a way to tease him about how he sounded very similar to a certain someone in his clan.

“Do you really want this poor bird to wriggle around in the water until a different predator comes around and does the exact same thing? Because that’s what’s going to happen.”

He watched her wince, cowering to avoid looking at the penguin. He sighed. This might require a little more persuasion. What to do… He considered for a moment. By this point most pups would have gotten over their initial reaction and kill their prey, but Dawn was still resistant. He knew she was picky, but this was something she needed to grow out of for survival purposes. It was all well and good that Palina and Iscan and some of the others were trying to accommodate her picky habits, but Gaeric was trying to look at this realistically.

Food was calories and calories kept you alive. Hunting was what kept you alive and, well… death was a part of life. It wasn’t pretty, but it was necessary.

And she needed to learn for her own good.

Gaeric sighed. A deep, weary sigh that made Dawn peek at him through her fingers.

“We aren’t going anywhere until you kill this penguin.”

“B-But-”

“We have all day. If this one dies, then I’m going to get another until you do what I’m asking you to do.”

The horror in her dark eyes was enough to solidify Gaeric’s resolve. If she didn’t want to be seen as a baby by the older mers, then this was the first step, so he wasn’t going to let her wiggle her way out of this with that silver tongue of hers.

He could have predicted the quick dart to his flank, trying to outmaneuver him with her speed, but he was used to pups. She smacked into his palm at full force and reeled back with a dazed oof! No amount of pleading and crying would sway him, and she could tell he meant what he said, they weren’t going anywhere until Dawn killed it.

On a fundamental level, she knew this was a teaching moment that was meant to strengthen the bond between her and the warden and to hone her hunting skills, but Dawn was also Laventon’s research assistant! She had spent nearly two weeks alongside the professor studying all the animals that the mers ate! She couldn’t do it. Not in good conscious to her researcher nature.

She tried anyway. Grimacing at the bird with a tightness in her throat as she turned her gaze to Gaeric, mouth open only to be cut off.

“No.” He said preemptively. “You’re going to do this. I know you can do it – so do it.”

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There was a long stretch where Dawn just couldn’t move, unable to look at the writhing Adélie and trying to ignore it as it made the more horrible screeching noises. She was hoping that a different predator would swoop in and snag the bleeding penguin by now, but Gaeric was an active deterrent.

The warden seemed to possess infinite patience, preventing her escape with such ease that Dawn found it frustrating. Even when she thought she was being slick when she tried to clamber onto one of the chunks of ice when she was permitted to take another lungful of air, he instantly scooped her up and plopped her back in front of the bird.

In a test of wills, Dawn knew who the winner would be; Gaeric could and would throw his weight around to make her commit the gruesome act. She actually started yelling at him when her frustration at the situation boiled over and, still, he remained resolute, nudging her back toward the penguin indifferently even as she tried to push back against his hand with every ounce of strength in her small body.

“Kid, you have to do this. That bird is suffering, you need to put it out of its misery.”

“You’re the one who hurt it!”

Dawn wriggled, squirming between his fingers, but he held her tail fast between his middle and pointer finger. He swung her back around and that’s when she started baring her teeth at her in a poor attempt to assert herself. Gaeric didn’t let that stand. A low growl resonated in his throat, leaning into Dawn’s space, and narrowing his eyes with a snarl on his lips. She wasn’t intimidating him, and she was quick to cower at his display.

When Gaeric didn’t release her tail and held her in front of the penguin, Dawn knew she was out of options and that frightened her. Her chest and throat grew tighter.

“I can’t – please don’t make me.”

“It’s for your own good, Dawn. Trust me.”

He sensed the change in her demeanor, his perseverance had worn her down, and, although she was trying to stifle her sobs, she was trying to reach for the penguin.

“It’s going to try to snap at you, but you need to take it with your hands by its beak and twist its neck until it snaps. It’s going to seem like a lot more, but also somehow less, pressure than you think you’ll need, but that’s something you get used to.”

She sobbed as she clamped the bird’s beak shut, scooping up the Adélie’s body in up against hers. She nearly vomited as the penguin writhed desperately, its heart pounding so fast and hard that it almost made her drop it in fear. The encouragement over her shoulder was not helping, even if it was meant to be.

Her hands shook violently, unable to perform the motion Gaeric described and unable to open her mouth to beg him to let her go. It was pointless, he wouldn’t, she had to do this. Dawn whispered an apology to the struggling bird and was about to jerk her limbs to get it over with, but that’s when she noticed Gaeric’s grip had loosened.

She cautiously turned her head only to see a look on Gaeric’s face that shook her to the very core. Dawn only saw him in profile, but his ears were pressed nearly flat against his head, his eyes opened wide with dark pupils shrunk to three-quarters of their size, and – she had never seen so many sharp teeth.

Without a word, Gaeric scooped her and the bird up, and moved fast. Dawn barely had time to ask what was happening, he unceremoniously shoved them into a niche in the blue white of the glacial ice.

“What’s-”

“Stay here. Don’t come out until I come get you.”

“But what’s-”

Dawn tried to say, deliberately ignoring what Gaeric had said by trying to slide out, but he was quick to push her back in the crevasse.

“Stay put.” He growled and, this time, Dawn obeyed, fear rooting her to the spot. She did catch Gaeric hissing something under his breath just before he darted out of sight. “Those damn ships…”

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Gaeric was sufficiently deep that the ship sitting atop the wave would have no idea what lurked beneath them. A fury was burning inside him, his eyes narrowing as the ship moved closer in the direction of the settlement. He had been too distracted by Dawn to notice the ship sooner and it was far too close for comfort, just beyond the sheet of ice like they had been following the coastline from their settlement.

The humans weren’t paying attention.

So, he would make them pay attention.

Irida had asked him to deploy nonviolent methods and, thus far, he had obeyed his mentee out of respect for her and for her title as leader. He had dragged many ships to their doom against sharp, rock outcrops and glaciers, some he had capsized with the motions of his massive tail, and other times just used his immense strength to snap off vital pieces to stop their forward progress.

The ships kept coming though. It’s like the humans never ran out of the damn things! He knew Mai had handled one or two that got too close to the Diamond clan and he had disabled or destroyed more than he could count on his fingers, and they still didn’t stop coming.

Gaeric thought it was high time to be proactive about the human situation.

Even at this depth, Gaeric could hear the crew moving along the creaking wood, he could identify each one by the pitch and timbre of their voices. The crew wasn’t large. The water was absolutely silent and eerily still, nothing but he and the ship in the vicinity. The warden edged closer, remaining right beneath the craft, or at least, as much as he could manage. As much as he wanted to bust through the hull and give those arrogant humans a really good scare, he pushed down those instincts.

This ship was going to be demolished, smashed into smithereens to make a point – one that was jagged and razor sharp. His lips were pulled back over his teeth as he watched the prow cut through the glass-like surface of the water. It was a good day to be sailing, or it would have been if the ship had been anywhere else.

He was poised and ready to strike. Every muscle in his body coiled as he went over his plan again in his head. Gaeric would strike with his heavily muscled tail, using it like a battering ram to shatter the ship in two. What about the crew? A voice that sounded suspiciously like Ingo whispered in the back of his head (sort of an oxymoron in itself which helped Gaeric ignore the impending ramifications of his actions). The warden growled under his breath, shaking his head as if to loosen the thought’s hold on him.

Nothing was going to stop him. He would accept whatever punishment Irida dished out because he was doing this for the continued protection of his people. It would be worth it if his clan could survive another day. This ship and every other one that came into their territory – he would break each and every vessel until the humans had nothing but logs lashed together with hemp to take on the rough seas.

Gaeric surged forward with a blinding speed, ready to make his steep descent back into the depths to maximize the damage on the clueless vessel. The silence of the water would have felt deafening, had his ears not picked up a noise that made him stop dead in his tracks. A panic struck the warden like lightning as he heard the noise again. Instantly, his attack on the ship was forgotten, the crew none the wiser of the near miss as Gaeric tore off in the direction he had come from as another scream reached his ears.

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Dawn hadn’t exactly meant for this scenario to be playing out as it was. The second she heard Gaeric saying something about ships, she knew that it had to be one of the Galaxy Team’s, a research vessel or fishing boat. The Ginkgo Guild didn’t head toward the northern shores for much of anything, it didn’t intersect with their trade routes, so it was extremely unlikely to be one of their trade ships.

She panicked.

Gaeric would no doubt be pissed, but Dawn needed to stop him. He had already done a lot of damage and that only made Kamado double down on his efforts to map out the icelands so fewer ships would be lost. It was a never-ending cycle.

She was peeking out of the crevasse that Gaeric had unceremoniously stuffed her into for her own protection. Nothing to see, nothing to hear – the ocean around her was lifeless. It was creepy. Even the penguin behind her was silent, but she was afraid to look around at it. Dawn didn’t want to see if it had finally succumbed to its wounds. 

The idea of sharing a small space with a dead animal made her almost as sick as she had been as Gaeric had been encouraging her to snap the penguin’s neck. Blindly reaching behind her, Dawn flapped around to find the carcass to shove it out of there. Over her internal mental anguish, she did not realize there was one sound she was hearing, ears flicking in the direction of it but listening passively.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”

She mumbled, nearly in tears as she managed to get a hand on the Adélie and was about to push it out of the crevasse when she heard the noises that she had subconsciously been hearing but not registering. Dawn jerked her head, a clicking that sounded familiar but also sent a chill down her spine. Ingo made those sounds sometimes. The sharp squeaks when he attempted to communicate with someone (or ones) no longer at his side. If she could hear it, then it was already too late.

All her disgust was instantly replaced with terror, and she wasted no time, grabbing the Adélie and shoving it out of there just as a massive shadow blotted out the light. Dawn slapped her hands over her mouth, squelching the scream that was pressing against her lower ribs. From her vantage, she could see the penguin floating in the water, its form lifeless and slowly sinking. A dark snout nudged it curiously, a second snout appearing on the other side and nudging it in confirmation.

There was a voice in her head screaming at her that was a mix of her own, Ingo’s, Laventon’s, and every other mer she had ever spoken to get out of there. Not safe. Danger. Predator. Move. Escape!

What had Gaeric said earlier? If she needed to breathe, the clan had made air holes.

Dawn raised her eyes to the top of the crevasse and, true to the warden’s word, there was a small shaft of light. Thank Sinnoh for the foresight of the clans. She moved quietly, not that the orcas could do a whole lot if she was up on the ice, but she didn’t want to attract any attention whatsoever. She reached the hole, a smaller one that had partially frozen over but was clearly made for a mers smaller than Gaeric, Ingo, or even Mai and Adaman, and poked her head out, taking a deep breath of cold air.

She was about to put her hands on the ice to clamber out when she felt her whiskers twitch and something deep in her gut told her to stay low. The sheet of ice seemed barren, but something was setting off a danger alarm in her brain.

Time slowed, all other sounds fell away, even the sounds of the orcas in the water, and Dawn heard something crunching the snow under its feet. The crunching got louder, the sound blurring into one as it got closer, and Dawn did scream this time, ducking back into the water and getting as far away from the air hole as an enormous paw reached through to swipe at nothing. A furry paw as pale as the ice around it fumbled for the prey it knew was down there and Dawn couldn’t stop screaming, alerting all the predators around her.

The polar bear was just able to shove its head through the hole, thank the gods it had shrunk from its previous size, and it blinked at her, beady black eyes following her movements as she tried to get further away. The orcas, now quite alert of one prey in the water, and most likely the bear on the ice, were crowding around the crevasse, squeaking and pushing their snouts into the crack. The bear must have also registered their presence, but seemed to hesitate, weighing its options before two-inch long claws began to tear through the ice. The promise of an easy meal that had nowhere to run just below the ice – if it could make a hole big enough for it to get through.

The orcas were of no consequence to the large land mammal, they couldn’t move tons of ice to force their way into the crevasse, but it did make Dawn a sitting duck. All she could do was scream. Trapped between a rock and a hard place, so Laventon was wont to say. Stuck between two mouth loads (possibly more since orcas moved in pods) of conical teeth and four paws decked with razor sharp claws and a mouth big enough and strong enough to crush her skull.

She was going to die.

Ice crunched all around her, the bear’s paw slapping the water as it excavated the ice piece by piece. Behind her, the orcas squealed and kept throwing her into darkness. Fear was tightening around her lungs and heart, making it hard to think about anything due to lack of oxygen. Everything had finally been going so well! She had quelled the frenzied nobles and the seas had stopped slowly rising. Jubilife was safe for a little longer. People had stopped looking at her with suspicion and she finally felt comfortable in the mer communities that had opened their arms to her.

Now it was all about to come to an end because she couldn’t kill an already doomed penguin.

Dawn didn’t realize she was crying, her tears just mixed with the cold water while she sank lower into the crevasse, as far away from either party as she could get from, but it wouldn’t matter. Gaeric was going to destroy a ship in broad daylight and Dawn was going –

Outside, the orcas were squeaking in agitation as she picked up something with her sensitive ears. Something massive tearing through the water at a breakneck pace.

“Gaeric!”

Dawn had never screamed so loud in her life. The sounds of the bear and the cetaceans were drowned out by her deafening cries.

The fear in her voice only spurred Gaeric to go even faster until – there! Two orcas were poised and waiting in the exact place he had left Dawn, the ignored remains of the penguin he had caught drifting into the abyss with their attention focused on the alive and panicked prey hiding within.

Orcas, like all their cetacea cousins, were intelligent. Orcas in particular are adept hunters and they enjoyed playing with their food before they ate it. Gaeric wasn’t exactly sure why. He wasn’t sure if animals were capable of cruelty like mers and humans were, but he knew that they acted beyond what was necessary to acquire prey. This wasn’t a particularly favorable match up, Gaeric was big, but orcas weren’t exactly small, and they had numbers on their side. Admittedly less numbers than would be normal for the species, but Gaeric wasn’t about to question it, and he hoped, in the back of his head, that that didn’t come back to bite him.

He launched himself like a missile through the water, leading with his shoulder to slam into the unprotected flank of the closer orca. By this point, the warden wasn’t even speaking intelligibly, just hissing and spitting and roaring – because how dare they. How dare they attack his little protégé when she was already going through her own emotional turmoil. He had been so caught up with the creaking and sloshing of the ship in the distance, Gaeric hadn’t noticed the threat around him, and by extension, Dawn.

Without even looking, he knew the other orca was coming toward him. They were faster, but Gaeric was smarter. Just a few well-placed hits - claws digging into sensitive spots like eyes and enough whacks with his heavily muscled tail, then the pair would be on their way.

“Gaeric!”

He could hear her yelling, but he didn’t understand why. He was managing the threat. The whales would be gone soon and then he would take her back to the settlement. This and the penguin were enough trauma for one day.

His claws raked into the underside of the orca, tinging the blood pink as it wailed. What he didn’t need was for them to attract others, he needed just enough time to get Dawn and hightail it out of there because taking on a pod was out of the question. Even if he had Ingo by his side, orcas were meticulous and savage when they chose to be.

“Gaeric! Help!”

Can’t divert his attention now! The orcas were falling back, fleeing into the gloom with high pitch whines that were sure to draw in others in their pod.

“BEAR!”

Bear?

That’s when Gaeric heard the low grumbles and huffs, something big splashing into the water. Like it was in slow motion, he saw Dawn dart towards him as the whales fled, only to see her get jerked back violently.

A polar bear.

An old and all too familiar dread suffocated him. His body was moving even before the electrical impulses raced from his brain to his limbs. His fury blinded him, only allowed to because his thoughts weren’t there. Gaeric was lost to time. Frozen in the memory of another young protégé in mortal peril because he acted stupidly.

Gaeric had promised himself – promised himself – that this wouldn’t happen again.

And yet.

No more blood. No more traumatized pups. No more mistakes.

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

Dawn was too busy trying not to get mauled to see exactly what Gaeric was doing, but the polar bear was alternatively swiping at her and ripping up chunks of ice to get better access to her. The surveyor just kept screaming for the warden with each swipe that came closer, with every scoop of ice that provided a bigger hole for the arctic predator.

It was getting dangerously close now, its head and shoulders almost squeezing through –

There was an agitated squeaking that only grew more distant. Gaeric must have run the orcas off. She just needed to get to him. Dawn darted for the crevasse, even spotting the blue haired warden beyond, looking uninjured, but quite agitated himself.

“BEAR!”

She shrieked at the top of her lungs, but it was too late. The sheet of ice that had been protecting her finally caved in and the polar bear was in the water with her paddling toward her with urgency. A massive paw slammed into her side, knocking the wind out of her and five claws bit through her uniform and into her abdomen.

The last thing she really saw before a flurry of colors was Gaeric’s expression. She had never seen him look scared before. He prided himself on being strong and brave for the sake of the clan, but that heartbeat before he was on top of the pair, Dawn had never seen that look on his face. A haunted look in those blue eyes.

It was a flurry of limbs, the water churning, and the bellowing that almost deafened her, but she saw it all. Her head might have been spinning because of how much she had been flung around (and blood loss), but she watched Gaeric take the bear’s neck and, exactly as he explained to her with the penguin, twisted it sharply.

The snap was the most sickening thing Dawn had ever heard. It made each individual hair on her body stand up and she did actually vomit this time (although, that also might have been her body’s reaction to the severe trauma). Things were moving much too fast. Gaeric was quick to drag her and the bear away, grab his net load of penguins that was swaying in the current at the bottom, and hightailed it out of there before anything else could happen.

So, Dawn saved a ship, at the cost of having a nasty gash through her uniform, unaware just how bad the injury beneath was.

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

Gaeric physically cringed as Ingo got in his face. It was the first and only time the larger warden had ever gotten confrontational with any member of Pearl clan, and it was downright frightening. It was easy to forget just how dangerous Ingo could be if he only chose to. It was easy to grow complacent with that knowledge in mind, that Ingo chose kindness and patience when he didn’t have to be.

Right now, Ingo was not choosing to be anything other than pure rage. A deep, foreign growl resonated in his chest as he demanded to know what happened because his pup was hurt and Gaeric looked remarkably unharmed.

To his credit, Gaeric was willing to take whatever Ingo had to dish out at him on the chin. He failed as a guardian. He failed to keep a pup under his watch safe and now she was getting treatment for wounds inflicted by the polar bear. So, he was willing to accept whatever punishment Ingo was inevitably building toward. In all his years of knowing Ingo, he had never seen him so angry, but before this last year, he never had anything he cared so deeply for. Yes, Ingo was loyal to the clan and devoted to his ward, but Dawn was different. For him, Dawn was family, and for Gaeric to be so careless - it was tantamount to something happening to Irida on Ingo’s watch.

Ingo listened to the story, his hands curled into tight fists as Irida watched on, cautioning him by repeating his name because she didn’t want nor need infighting between her wardens, not with how the sea was so intent on swallowing up the region – humans and nobles included. With a shaking hand, Ingo jabbed a finger into Gaeric’s chest, right in the center of his clan crest, and rumbled dangerously low,

“You had better pray to Sinnoh that she recovers.”

They all knew that Dawn would be just fine, Ingo was just veiling his threat – if anything like this happens again, I will not be so forgiving. Gaeric had narrowly avoided Ingo’s considerable wrath. The cavern was silent in the wake of Ingo’s departure, everyone collectively holding their breath until Irida exhaled slowly. Her wardens followed suit. Catastrophe avoided, they all waited for the medic to be done tending to Dawn so Ingo could see her and start to calm down.

[indieyuugure]

Episode 6 of Ninjas in New York! Stealing cakes is clearly MUCH more important than not getting caught by armed ninjas 👍

Previous: Episode 5

Next: Episode 7

See All…

[propertyofwhitney67]

Ok ok ok- for the prompt event.

F!PC tending to M!Whitney's wounds after a fight.

Bruises, scratches and cuts is what I'm thinking. His knuckles are pretty beat up.

Thank you💙💙✨✨

Bloody Knuckles

M!Whitney x F!Reader

Prompt Event: Injury

Words: 507

Tw: injury, blood, suggestive ending

Note: I fucking love this so much. Blood kink went brrr while writing this and I had to hold myself back.

While walking up the stairs to the roof I heard a loud commotion, it sounded like there’s a fight. I quickened my pace, not wanting to miss the fight, and opened the door to the roof. 

There was indeed a fight going on, it looked like someone pissed off Whitney again. He was on top of some poor soul, beating them. It looked like the other guy had gotten in a few good hits too. Whitney had cuts and bruises on his face but was otherwise unaffected.

Whitney got off the guy with one last punch, leaving them lying on the ground. He spotted me and without looking back made his way to me. He didn’t hesitate in grabbing my face and aggressively kissing me, I tasted blood from his split lip. 

Pulling back, I could see his injuries up close. A few bruises on his face, a split lip and eyebrow, with bruised and bloody knuckles. I smirked and cupped his cheek, rubbing it with my thumb. “You look like shit.”

He angrily furrowed his brows and tightly gripped my waist, “You’re supposed to congratulate me, slut.”

I laughed and took one of his hands, bringing his knuckles to my mouth and kissing them. “You did so great.” I praised him in a sickly sweet voice before licking the blood from his knuckles. 

He shuddered, “Fuck…” With his free hand, he reached up and groped my breast. “I should fuck you right here in front of everyone.”

“Nope, I have to fix you up. You can fuck me later.” I slapped his hand away and dragged him behind me to the nurse's office. Thankfully it’s the end of the day so the nurse is already gone, “Sit down.” I ordered him and searched for the supplies I needed.

Whitney grumbled but did as I asked, sitting down on one of the beds. “Since when do you become a nurse?” He asked sarcastically as he leaned back on his arms.

I rolled my eyes and set out the supplies beside Whitney, “I’ve patched myself up many times and I’ve gotten pretty good at it. Now come here.” He leaned forward without much complaint, letting me clean up his face, wiping off the blood and patching his eyebrow and lip. 

“I should put you in a sexy nurse's uniform.” Whitney joked before wincing as I dabbed at the wounds on his knuckles. “Fucking bitch…” He grumbled but held still as I continued to clean up his knuckles.

I laughed and finished patching him up, “There.” I picked up the leftover trash and threw it away. 

Whitney pulled me down on top of him on the bed, “Now I get a reward.” He groped my chest before unbuttoning my shirt, revealing my bra. “Fucking perfect…” 

I blushed and looked away. He grabbed my face and forced me to look at him, “Don’t you dare look away.” I whimpered but didn’t look away, instead undoing his pants and pulling up my skirt, giving him his prize for winning. “Good girl.”

𝘔𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘭𝘪𝘴𝘵

𝘒𝘰-𝘍𝘪

[mickules]

Rule #3 Don't play with baseballs near the hallway

---

Have you heard what they say?

About why Hope's Peak doesn't have a baseball team? The rumour is that it's because the game is jinxed.

It's said that talent won't make a difference either. Easy swings are missed, sure catches fumbled, pitches always off their mark. Twisted ankles, bloodied noses, damaged property.

If you're lucky that could be the end of it.

The real danger is if you hear the sound of breaking glass.

Because people make mistakes when they panic.

First, in your haste to find the ball, you don't check to see if the window was actually broken.

Second, when you find it, in your relief you don't question how the ball managed to get inside the building.

And third, thinking you've gotten away with it, you'll miss the blur on your periphery.

You have one last chance, Because most say it's not until you pick up that ball, That you'll meet him face to face.

He's bruised. Head to toe. Beaten black and blue, pink stains seeping from beneath his torn and dirty jersey, his hair a wild crown of red. His legs are bowed and buckled beneath him and his arms held at crooked, odd angles.

There's blood on the baseball bat he's holding.

Drop the ball.

Run.

He'll swing for the fences,

And they say he never misses.

[rule#2] [rule#4]

[vveedwacker]

Something About The Self That I Can't Be Bothered To Name