#“it's for your own good”

[brucewaynehater101]

WHUMPTOBER 2024: PROMPT #25

Surgery, stitches, being monitored, "it's for your own good"

Tw: surgery, lack of consent (for surgery), fighting, blood, suicidal ideation

Mostly canon accurate :)

Brief synopsis: Tim wakes up post splectonomy

Dull pain throbbing near the lower left of his ribs is the first sensation to trickle in. The cold, rough texture of concrete on his back is the next.

With this, he's able to understand three clues: He’s injured, he's on painkillers, and he doesn't know who helped him.

While the bandages wrapped around his torso and the medication indicates his savior doesn't wish him death, it doesn't indicate what they do want with him. They could be a friendly (which is its own cup of fuckery and headaches), or they could be keeping him alive for some nefarious purpose.

He concentrates on what he can hear with his eyes slid shut. Multiple people breathing. Over ten. The sound of water sloshing against a hard surface.

For a moment, Tim continues to just lie there. He should be dead. The sword did too much damage for him to have survived it.

For a moment, he’s disappointed he survived.

Thoughts of Bruce, his mentor, his dad, center him back into reality. Tim may have proven the man is alive, but his work isn't done. No one else believes this. Tim is the only one with the evidence otherwise. Even if he sends it to them, there's no guarantee they'll take it seriously. Tim has to spearhead the rescue or it won't get done.

A soft sigh escapes his lips at his predicament. There's so much to be done before he can rest. He can lament his life then.

Peeling his eyes open, he sees a person dressed head to toe in black. Their eyes, the only portion not covered, widen.

Ninja.

Tim glances to the side only to see wispy green smoke.

Lazarus Pit. Oh gods.

He shouldn't have survived. He should have died. He was going to die. He must have died. There's a Pit. He's been resurrected. Fuck. He's been dipped. Fuck!

He springs to sit up and ignores the stabbing ache in his side. A foot collides with the face of the ninja previously peering over him as he uses his hands to propel him to his feet.

His body automatically counters and attacks as his mind spirals and spirals.

The League put his dead body into a Pit. What the fuck is he going to do?

As he chokes one of Ra's men out, his other arm steals the man's sword. His eyes frantically dart between the threats.

Think… Think! What is he going to do?

More people fall to his antics, but they don't try to lash out. They merely defend Tim's attacks. The teen's brows furrow at this.

Is he already going insane? His body is on fire and they aren't fighting back. He must be losing it.

As Tim brings the sword up to swing like a baseball bat, a shout rings out.

“Stop!”

Tim, despite the fear and panic thrumming in time to the pain in his chest, freezes. A man with what appears to be a white mask strides closer to the teen.

“For your own sake, you must stop!”

With a snarl, Tim continues to maintain a defensive posture. “You bring me back from the dead and just expect me to-”

With an exasperated sigh, the man cuts the teen off. “We did not resurrect you. You did not go into the Pits for healing. You have ripped open the stitches from your surgery.”

Tim relaxes from his tense stance as his eyes drift down to the white bandages that now have red soaking into them.

“Oh.”

The man nods along as if Tim's a kindergartener finally figuring out he needs to raise his hand in class.

As they go over what led to Tim's emergency treatment and what happened to Pru, exhaustion starts to settle further onto his shoulders. He's weary and in pain, but he focuses on the debriefing.

The major points? Tam is being threatened and Tim has no choice but to lead the League. Just another task piling in before Tim can be done.

Red Robin does what he must. He hunts spiders and plans. Every move is monitored and Tim can feel Ra's breathing down his neck. Assassins line the halls, the training grounds, and the missions he sends them on. He’s surrounded by enemies and doesn't have an inch of privacy.

Yet, he still manages to worm his way into the League's computer systems. When it comes down to it, he viciously destroys his own cage.

It's freeing. It's petty.

He has mere minutes before detonation.

For a moment, just one, his feet slow down. He can't help but ponder if he truly needs to escape the base. He could just stay here, feign some inexplicable obstacle, and let the time run out. He could be done.

Yet, as his eyes dart from Pru to Tam, he knows he can't. Pru could save the other woman, but there's still no one left to save Bruce.

Tim needs to keep going. He can't stop now.

Soon, though. It's only a matter of time. Soon, there will be enough reason and enough of an excuse that the teen can finally let go.

All he has to do is save Bruce.

[actress4him]

Whumptober 2024 - Day 25

Surgery | Stitches | Being Monitored | “It’s for your own good”

Contains: generic whumpee and caretaker, needle mentions, mild blood, surgery aftermath, nonconsensual drugging, bedside vigil

Whumpee woke slowly to the sound of rhythmic beeping. It took a moment for them to pry their eyes open, and another to orient themself with where they were. Turning their head, they found Caretaker slumped in a chair next to the bed, dozing with their mouth hanging open.

The pain wasn’t as bad as they thought it might be. Probably had something to do with the IV drip attached to their arm. Pain or no pain, though, they couldn’t keep lying there. This fight wasn’t finished. Just because they got injured didn’t mean that they could stop, there was far too much to do that was way more important than their health. 

Trying to stay as quiet as possible, they pushed themself up off the pillows and swung their legs over the side of the bed. The injury on their stomach felt tight and strange, but not really painful. Caretaker’s head moved slightly, and they froze, but they remained asleep. 

The problem was that they were going to have to disconnect themself from the monitors, and they didn’t know what would happen then. There was no other choice, though. They carefully pulled off the wire, and the room filled with a deafening, high-pitched shriek, sending Whumpee scrambling for the machine. 

A hand gripped their arm, pulling them back onto the bed. “Whumpee! What do you think you’re doing?”

“Sorry!” They winced in apology as they sat back down. “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

Caretaker leaned over to push a button on the monitor and silence it before turning a glare back on Whumpee. “Why are you up? Have you lost your mind? You just had surgery, Whumpee, you’re going to tear out your stitches and start bleeding again!”

“I’ll be careful!” Whumpee protested. 

“No, you’ll lie back down and stay there until the doctor says you can move.”

They scowled. “I can’t just lie in bed while everyone else is still out there risking their lives. I have to help.”

“You already risked your life, and almost lost it, remember? You’ll be of no help if you collapse or bleed to death. You have to heal first.”

Whumpee shook their head. “There’s no time for that.” 

They stood again, but Caretaker did, too, grabbing them by the shoulders to stop them. “Whumpee, please. Don’t fight me on this.”

Raising their arms, Whumpee attempted to push them away. “Let me go! I need to help!” They could feel the surgery site pulling, but paid it no attention. 

Unfortunately, they were still weak from blood loss and sedatives. It took Caretaker very little effort to push them back down onto the bed, only letting go briefly to punch a button before pinning them down again. “I didn’t want to have to do this, but you’re giving me no choice.”

“Let me go, Caretaker!” They were so busy fighting to get up that they barely noticed someone rushing into the room. It definitely caught their attention, though, when the nurse picked up a syringe and held it to their IV port. 

Somehow they had a feeling they knew what was in that syringe. “No…no no, don’t!”

“I’m sorry, Whumpee,” Caretaker sighed. “It’s for your own good.”

Seconds after the drug was dispensed, Whumpee’s eyelids began to grow heavy. “Please,” they whispered, the fight leaving their body. “I need…I need to…” 

They were asleep before they could finish the sentence.

[blackseafoam]

Healed Wrong

part 5 previous WC:749

Clone Trooper Flinch finally gets help and faces the consequences of not doing so sooner, and get's a little tough love from an older-brother for it. Description of injury, non-graphic.

whumptober 2024. Day 25. surgery l stitches l being monitored l "It's for your own good"

“Stop saying that.”

“Hmh? ” 

“Stop saying ‘shut up’ and answer my question, please.”

Flinch opened his eyes, squinting at the bright lights. He went to lift his left hand to cover them, but it didn’t move. When he blinked away the intrusive radiance, the first thing he saw was a clone medic standing over him. 

“Can you hear me? Flinch?” 

Flinch stared at the owner of the voice, taking several moments to process. He glanced around, vision still bleary from heavy sleep. The walls were gray durasteel, they looked like the thin sheet metal like the ones at his last base, designed to fold up and pack into containers. He was on one of many half a dozen cots that lined the wall, a mirrored set on the opposite side, several other soldiers laid nearby.

“Where is this?”

“You’re at the aid tent. You went down in the field, do you remember?” 

“I, I don’t know.” Flinch’s head swam, his thoughts drifting away before they could finish. 

The medic wrote something on his datapad; then began reading off it. “You’ve been fighting off septic shock for a day now, due to a wound in your arm. He gestured to Flinch’s right arm, which was wrapped in a thick bandage around his bicep. 

Flinch took stock as he listened. He had several intravenous lines. A scanner array hovered over his bed, monitoring who knows what inside his body. Most confusingly, his left hand was tied loosely with a cloth to the side of the bed. 

“From what I can tell, it's a wound originating from your tattoo healing wrong. Your personnel report says you had an encounter where you were submerged in the swamp at your base, does that sound correct?” 

Flinch nodded absently, moving his right arm to undo the knot to free his left hand. The movement sent shocks of pain through the deep muscles in his arm, he felt like he could feel his bones. The medic simultaneously leaned over to stop his hand “Don’t move your arm.” He demanded, too late, then worked to untie the cloth. 

“You’re a terrible sleeper. Even on sedatives you were talking in your sleep, and you kept reaching for your injury. So we had to do this, sorry.” 

Flinch’s hand was free, he was self-conscious enough to not instinctively start grabbing at his arm. 

“You were even telling the droids to ‘shut up’ constantly, kept putting them in audio-off mode. We had to have someone whip up a code just so they’d stop obeying you.” He laughed, humored bewilderment in his expression. 

The words entered Flinch’s head but barely registered. He smiled back, even though he wasn’t sure what they were laughing about. 

The medic cleared his throat. “Anyway, the bacteria from the water created a serious infection in your soft-tissue, and it went on long enough that it led to sepsis. Flinch, why didn’t you get help earlier?” He asked, as gently as he could with obvious irritation in his tone. 

Flinch was barely keeping up with the words, his gaze drifting around the room. “You know my name?”

“Your buddy Hanni made sure we knew it when we came to pick you up.” 

Flinch’s eyes finally focused on the medic when he heard his patrol partner’s name. 

“Anyway, we opened your wound and flushed out as much of the bad stuff as we could. The edges have been stitched up but we can’t close it until we’re sure the infection is gone, which is why it’s so important to not touch it.” He raised his eyebrows in emphasis. “ The antibiotics are working for now, but… greater measures may have to be taken once we get you to an actual medical station.” He paused, his face went concerningly serious. Now he had Flinch’s full attention. “I don’t want to alarm you, but I am obligated to prepare you for the possibility that amputation may be on the table.”

Flinch’s blood went cold, he clenched his jaw and looked away, eyes unfocused. The medic gently grabbed his good arm as it reflexively went back toward the bandage, then grabbed his hand. “So, if you don’t want that to happen, you have to listen to everything we say, got it? You have to heal as much as possible before we send you off, then you’ll have the best chance, okay?” He patted Flinch’s forearm gruffly, driving his point home. 

Flinch nodded, suddenly exhausted again. 

“Okay?”

“Okay.” He closed his eyes.

[dangraccoon]

I Will Never

Day 25 ~ being monitored ~ "it's for your own good" ~

Hunter

Word Count: 822 Content: clone cadets and clone mistreatment, so therefore child abuse and referenced past child abuse, threats of violence, references to order 66

Mando'a Guide: kih'vod - little brother ke’gyce lo’shebs’ul narit - you can shove your orders up your ass

Hunter’s head was pounding as he crouched at the floor of the simulated forest floor. The holographic dirt shifted between his fingers, wafting back down to the ground. He took a deep breath, stood back up, and followed the trail he could see ahead, the broken branches and displaced dirt shone lighting up in his vision.

He was tired. Hunter was so tired, but he ran anyway. He needed to finish this test and then the trainer said he could go back to the barracks. He could do this.

As he worked through the seemingly endless woods, something caught the corner of his eye, a rustling sound coming from the South. His body froze as he looked towards the distraction.

He just caught the tail-ends of light hair, long, curly, and barely kept orderly. 

There he is, Hunter thought somewhat smugly.

Hunter took off in that direction, unable to keep from noticing the way the transparent plastoid on the face of the training helmet fogged slightly with each heavy breath. He hated this damn thing. 

His trainer growled over the PA system. “CT-9901, if you take your helmet off one more time–”

Tech’s eyes darted over to him. “Hunter, don’t–”

“I can’t breathe or hear anything!” He’d barked back, helmet tossed to the ground. “How am I supposed to use the osik’la abilities you gave me in this thing?”

The simulation stopped, his brothers all looking back toward him in surprise. Hunter didn’t blow up like this.

The trainer walked into the room, storming to Hunter. He scooped up his helmet, taking a deep breath to start berating him but was stopped by Nala Se saying his name over the intercom. 

The ex-bounty hunter scowled as he shoved Hunter’s training helmet back onto his head roughly. “It’s for your own karking good, clone,” he growled. “Take it off again and I’ll make sure your head goes with it.”

His gear felt heavy as he finally began to encroach on his target’s location. 

Just over the ridge were several gunships in a small clearing. Even in the darkness, he could see that this could easily be a trap, but that didn’t bother him.

As he walked towards the gunships, his steps nearly silent and his practice blaster drawn, he could hear his heart rate pick up. Relax, he told himself. Too many beats per minute and it would affect his score. 

He got to the edge of the first gunship, body stilling. He listened.

The light, misty rain hitting the metal roofs threatened to distract him, but he pushed past it. 

His target was too used to him, but he knew a weakness. He glanced down at his belt, finding the knife he’d found himself becoming fond of. Gripping the blade, he reared his hand back and flung the knife through the air, hitting the metal of another opening just right for the doorway to deflect it. The knife fell to the ground, sticking up in the dirt. Hunter’s movements stilled once more as he listened for that inevitable sound.

There, he thought as his senses honed in on one particular sound he’d heard before. A small huff akin to a taunting laugh.

He tread to the second gunship, dirt shifting almost imperceptibly beneath his boots, though he could hear it. 

His gun led him around that last corner, finding Bugg in his sights with a smirk.

Bugg’s eyes rolled back as he held in a curse. He held his hands up in defeat as Hunter attached the elimination puck to his uniform. Hunter chuckled at Bugg’s dramatic sigh.

“Well done, CT-9901,” the voice of his trainer called through the comms in his helmet. Hunter’s eye twitched at the volume. “Now, complete the mission.”

Hunter blinked. “Sir?”

“Are you stupid like that monster you call ‘brother’? Your mission was to track and eliminate the target. What are you waiting for?”

“I already gave him the puck,” Hunter reasoned. “The mission is over.”

His trainer sighed. “There aren’t any stupid little pucks in war, little clone. You have live rounds. Use them.”

Bugg’s eyes went wide as he searched Hunter’s face. “H-Hunter?”

“It’s gonna be okay, kih’vod,” Hunter assured him, his scowl deepening. “I won’t shoot my brother.”

“You don’t have a choice,” the trainer taunted. “Obey the order, soldier, or it’s two weeks intensive solo training, no rations. Good soldiers follow orders.”

Hunter growled as he threw his rifle down. He stared up into the simulated sky, where he knew the room he was being monitored from was situated.

“Guess it’ll be the solo training then,” he spat, throwing his helmet on the ground. “Ke’gyce lo’shebs’ul narit, because I will never hurt my brothers.”

The simulation faded around them as the trainer stormed in, stopping directly in Hunter’s face. “Is that how you talk to a superior, clone?”

“Sorry, sir.” Hunter feigned a retraction of his attitude. “I meant ‘ke’gyce lo’shebs’ul narit, sir’.”

Mando'a Guide: kih'vod - little brother ke’gyce lo’shebs’ul narit - you can shove your orders up your ass

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Thanks for reading! - River

Whumptober 2024 Masterlist DangRaccoon Masterlist Taglist Form Read on AO3

Tags: @writing-positivelyexisting @nekotaetae @lokigirlszendaya @get-wr3ckered @jediknightjana @idoubleswearimawriter @lucyysthings @unstable-kiwi @6oceansofmoons @l3xi3luv @savebytheodoresnonjosestuff @winter-phoenix1995 @serenityselene @nomercyforthewarrior @ravenclawbitch426 @luna-the-lone-red-wolf @padawancat97 @flowered-bicycles @error6gendernotfound @techs-goggles9902

Wow, you made it this far down? Have my OC 99s made in @squad-724's picrew (found here)!

This is Bugg (CT-9905), who is mentioned in this fic

And Fixer (CT-9906)

Well, that's what they would look like if they had survived to adulthood

And our canon boys (with a few creative liberties read: piercings added)

[sanguinifex]

You gotta read and watch some old books and films that aren’t 100% modern politically correct. I’m not saying you should agree with everything in them but you need to learn where genres came from to understand what those genres are doing today and where media deconstructing old tropes is coming from.

Also, more often than you might think, they’re not actually promoting bigotry so much as “didn’t consider all the implications of something” or just used words that were polite then but considered offensive now.

Kill the censor in your head.

[1-800-dreamgirl]

this is what everyone has been saying!! no one is looking at celebrities for political statements, but they should and must use their platform to amplify the voices of those who need and most importantly be against this genocide!!

[camilleflyingrotten]

[golyadkin]

you'll get the urge as an artist or a writer to say out loud the things you're worried about "the proportions are off" "kind of out of character" "i'm not good at summaries" "didn't get as much detail as i wanted" "i made a mistake and here's how" and that's the self-conscious part of your brain telling you "it's bad and if you don't tell them you know it's bad then they'll think you're stupid" but you've got to ignore that little voice and pretend you think it's good or else that little voice is going to ruin your life

[prolibytherium]

One of my all time biggest pet peeves with historical(ish) fantasy is when the writer constructs a religion with a clear bias that it's stupid and false and therefore only the Stupid People and/or commoners believe in it and all the smart/elite main characters are like, quasi-atheists or otherwise just routinely flout established religious conventions of orthodoxy and/or orthopraxy because they're Too Smart for it or etc.

It's usually an extension of assumptions that people in the past were just less intelligent than in the contemporary, just being like "I know that the sun is a star millions of miles away that the earth orbits, but this ancient religion describes it as a chariot flying through the sky" and not really bothering to learn the context and just (consciously or subconsciously) settling on 'that's a crazy thing to think and was probably believed in because they were Stupid'.

And that whole attitude pisses me off so much. People were as 'smart' 10,000 years ago as they are today. These beliefs aren't just desperate, random flailing to explain phenomena that could not directly be accounted for either, it's not like people just looked at the sun and went "Uhhh I don't know what the fuck that thing is, actually. I guess it might be a chariot or a boat or something?? Yeah let's go with that." and based entire religious practices on this. Every well-established belief system exists within broader contexts of cultural values/subjective perceptions of reality/knowledge systems/etc, and exist as part of a historical continuum of religious practices that came before. Even when not Materially Correct, they have context and internal logic, they're not always dead literal with zero levels of allegory, and they're never a result of stupidity.

[marzipanandminutiae]

what's with the weird glorification of smoking that's come back lately

like

I've seen so many posts that paint opposing smoking as some impossibly Loser-ish or puritanical stance and I really don't get it

it makes you, your house, and your clothing stink, destroys your teeth, and gives you lung cancer. opposing it is. Correct. obviously addiction is very complicated and quitting can be hard, but just saying "smoking is gross and harmful as a practice (including vaping)" is True and Right actually

some of you have never grown up hearing about how some beloved family member died a slow, agonized, wasting death of smoking-induced cancer, or watching it firsthand for yourself, and it shows

[bean-spring]

Hot take and not to be a killjoy or the shipping police but people treating Viktor or Jinx's aroace headcanons as if they were canon is not the revolutionary take people think it is.

Headcanons are always all right but we have to acknowledge that they are somehow damaging when they apply to stereotypes. It might not be the case for everyone but most of the time people unconsciously assume that disability/mental illness=asexuality. These headcanons erase the freedom of attraction from people who are already seen as unable to have sexual/romantic experiences/desires, when it's completely untrue and harmful.

You can headcanon Viktor and Jinx as aroace, but I have seen people changing their minds once Viktor is no longer disabled (s2 with all of his other forms) and Jinx is no longer as mentally ill (alternate universe Powder). And it speaks wonders of how people see these characters.

"I never thought about Jinx being able to feel romantic/sexual attraction until s2!" To believe she's actually only capable of that when she's not "damaged" is incredibly disturbing. Especially since Jinx has always had a bit of a flirty personality too.

"I've always seen Viktor as asexual, I don't know why!" That's fine. You can headcanon him as ace. But I believe there is a reason behind it, most of the time, if for some inexplicable reason the "vibes" of the disabled character are making you think he's ace.

I say all of this being aroaspec myself, by the way. Headcanon all you want but going to people's posts commenting how "it's weird for you that they have romantic/sexual plots when they're clearly aroace" is not a win at all. It's a headcanon, after all, and it should be treated as such, and that's fine. But it also is damaging to spread stereotypes like these.

Of course the disabled character is asexual. Of course the mentally ill character is aromantic. It's not as revolutionary as you might think, tbh.

Fandom is not activism and it's all right to have any headcanons you want BUT some of them are filled with damaging stuff and perhaps we should look into ourselves more before treating these assumptions as something canon.

[soranatus]

The Spider Target By Dan Martins, a character designer and illustrator

[mischievous-thunder]

A guide to Wade's sweet and spicy pet names for Logans across the multiverse:

Then come the pet names Wade gave his Logan:

And his Logan loves each one of them.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

getting older can be so amazing? you get more familiar with yourself. learn tips & tricks for troubleshooting your own brain. trial & error helps you build routines that minimize discomfort, maximize reward. your preferences/interests don't get set in stone, but you do find out which ones are going to stay with you in the long-term, and which ones are fun but transient joys to appreciate in the moment.

you learn that the world is so much more complex than you were taught, and that that's okay, and that there's an endless supply of things you can learn or watch or experience or think about if you want to. if you're lucky, you loosen up, stop putting so much pressure on yourself. if you're lucky, you learn to recognize that negative inner voice, and whack it with a baseball bat until it hushes up. if you're lucky, you learn to treat yourself gently, not because you are fragile but because you are worthy of gentleness. (i hope you are lucky.)

and some things will change. some things will get better. some things will get good. and maybe you start to recover from the dehumanizing stress of childhood/education. maybe you learn the power of your own autonomy. maybe you learn how to walk away from bad situations (which is a superpower even if you don't realize it yet). and you get to choose your own clothes. and your own food. and which relationships to pursue! and what you do with your free time. and with your life (but don't worry you get to choose that gradually). and that's crazy! and sometimes scary. and extraordinarily, indescribably precious.