#altprompt7

[flydotnet]

WHUMPTOBER 2023, ALT PROMPT 7: EXAMINATION

I'm dead certain I could've written something with "Neglect" had my brain been in the mood for it, but alas, it didn't come to pass; so instead, I pulled an alt prompt from the depths. I almost made this about another HSAU character because I know I'll have Camilla in a caretaking role later on; but it was too tempting and I was more inspired by this one.

Like, listen. I'm not a big canon Camilla enjoyer (I just think, outside her armour, she looks neat); but I love her HSAU version so much. She's got to be one of my favourite altered characters to write from it with Hikaru, Tsubaki and Yayoi.

Because yes, this is an AU fanfiction, set in a universe that already exists, yada yada yada. It's not mandatory to know my worldbuilding, you just need to keep in mind that this is set in modern France (honhon baguette croissant) and also I write those characters marginally better and very differently than they are in their game of origin. That's kind of it.

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First Response

Summary: Five times Camilla examined the people she cares for, and one time they did it for her (against her wish).

Fandom: Fire Emblem Fates (modern AU)

Word Count: 1.9K words

AO3 version available here.

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Growing up with siblings to take care of makes one very aware of their discomfort and Camilla is very much no exception. In fact, she may have been the reason why this rule exists and why it even exists inside her mind.

It doesn’t take long for her radar to work, this morning: Elise walks down the stairs with a slow, clumsy stride, rubbing her eyes and sniffling; so Camilla walks to her as soon as her baby sister, who goes to hug her with a whine. She puts a hand on her forehead, feeling the wet hair and low-grade fever.

“Cami, I don’t feel good,” Elise whispers, still shoved against her.

Her voice is hoarse, which comes to Camilla’s dulled surprise.

“You poor thing,” she coos. “Do you want to stay home?”

Elise nods, but it’s a light gesture: her head must hurt.

“It’s fine. Let’s get you back to bed, okay?”

She nods again.

Camilla slowly turns her sister in the other direction and back up the stairs, careful to her steps. Once they’re both back upstairs, she lets Elise get comfortable again as she gets the usual resources, always tucked in the same section of the bathroom’s cabinet: a cold compress, a box low-grade painkillers and Elise’s favourite strawberry-flavoured cough syrup.

When Xander soon peeks his head through the doorway, she gives him a finger in front of a smile. He nods.

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It’s a lot more difficult to tell when Leo doesn’t feel fine, compared to Elise’s candour on the topic; but Camilla is a caring big sister and she has little trouble doing so, no matter how hard her little brother tries to push through discomfort for the sake of both his teenage pride and his altruistic wish not to disturb neither Xander nor she.

What’s truly more difficult with Leo is letting himself get vulnerable around someone else, even if that someone is his own older sister with a motherly approach to life. Still, this is merely a hurdle, not a dead-set end to her quest.

What works best with Leo is helping him from a distance – and it works in a similar way to examine him. He’s a lot stiffer when feeling ill or exhausted, so to remedy to this, she leaves painkillers and a hot bottle in his bedroom, right next to his lamp on his bedside table. If his eyes are glassy and his gaze is mussed, she makes sure the curtains are closed and all light is dim.

It’s not often that Leo acknowledges all of those silent hints, but when he does, he flops on her lap when she’s reading on the sofa, here for a pat or a quiet hug – but only once he isn’t contagious anymore, she’s noticed.

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Very much to Camilla’s dismay, Hinoka can get very careless with herself. She goes fast and hard, all the time, in both her studies and her favourite sports; and what must happens, happens, more time than Camilla could count.

Today finds them once again in this very situation: Hinoka sitting on the bench of a changing room in her gymnasium of choice, a bleeding wound on her leg and a big scrape on the other, and Camilla kneeling in front of her, a first-aid kit next to her and her cleaned hands near the injuries.

“You need to be more careful, darling,” she chides her again with a smile tugging at her lips.

“One day, I guess,” Hinoka sighs. “But you gotta admit, that was impressive, right? Shun was gawking at me, that was awesome!”

She chuckles, despite the ugly wound in front of her. It’s shallow, as it often is, but it’s still bleeding a bunch and she has to compress it until she’s stemmed the flow of it.

“It’s going to sting.”

The scrape is also shallow, so she cleans it, bandages it and calls it a day.

“It’s no big deal!”

Finally, with the wound tamed, she does the same for it.

“Thank you so much, Camilla,” Hinoka tells her with the brightest smile, and her heart swells at it always does.

Perhaps someday, she won’t need to dress wounds to have intimacy with her…

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Hinoka has a little brother just as intense as her, who just so happens to be Leo’s classmate. Camilla doesn’t know him nearly as much as her crush, let alone her own siblings, but she’s starting to see who Takumi is and how he reacts to things.

Just like Leo, he doesn’t like being dependant nor needing help; but unlike Leo, he tends to lash out at people asking if he needs a hand, rather than coldly turning it down with a tilted head. Takumi thinks being harsher is a good way to protect himself from harm, which has annoyed Leo for quite a long time (for understandable reasons); but lately, she’s noticed he hasn’t been as aggressive and on the defence lately.

This is why she’s only half surprised to see him standing in front of her, an uneasy expression on his face, split between pain and shame.

“Uhm… Can I ask you something, Camilla?”

“Of course, dear. What do you need from me?”

“Can you…” He passes a hand through his hair, grunts to himself and, beet red, spits out, “can you check out my ankle?”

“No problem. Why don’t you sit down?”

With a nod, Takumi limps to the nearest chair. The unease on his face doesn’t let up by the time she’s knelt in front of him and she chooses to ignore it, opting to focus on his request.

Camilla has no trouble finding the hurting ankle: it’s already fairly round and has gone blue. This is, without a doubt, a bad sprain; no wonder why the poor boy has been so uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry in advance,” she tells him with as gentle as a tone as she can.

She softly presses on the injury – and it immediately causes him to scream in blanching pain.

“It’s definitively sprained,” she concludes, this time out loud. “Someone needs to bring you to the hospital. Do you want me to call Ryoma or Hinoka?”

She gets back up, her phone already halfway in her hand, while he brushes tears from his eyes (oh, this must’ve been a terrible, terrible pain she inflicted on him…).

“Hinoka, please.”

She puts a hand on his shoulder and, as soon as he looks back at her, she gives him a smile.

“Don’t worry, it’ll be all good. I promise you.”

Takumi nods again, slightly more relaxed under her touch.

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If Leo is hesitant to letting himself get examined as it’d require him to be vulnerable in front of someone else, then Xander is downright allergic to the very idea of someone caring for him, at least not without being able to give something back in return.

As such, the very few times she must step up and do an examination, it’s always a first step deal, a sort of gauging as to ease the work of the doctor who’ll she bring Xander to; because first-hand experience with dealing with her serial workaholic of an older brother has given her the highest empathy for the men and women who’ll have to deal with him next.

Camilla often has to step up when the winter holidays near and Xander catches something from either his students or one of their siblings (more often than not Elise, who tends to be a very effective healthy carrier against her will), and this morning is one of those times. Luckily for her and very painfully so for her brother, his exhaustion is pinning him in place, and it’s easy for her to get the upper hand.

Just his rattling cough would’ve been enough to deduce he isn’t fit for work, but she still takes the time to go through all of the signs. His skin is too hot to the touch, shivers and goosebumps adorning it. His dark rings are deeper than usual. His face is pale yet flushed red in places. His eyes are slightly unfocused and have trouble remaining open for long periods of times.

“It’s more than a cold, my dear brother,” she tells him with cold water flowing through her words.

“That’s what I suspected,” he muffles a cough inside his elbow. “I’ll go to the doctor later. Don’t worry about me, Cami—”

“Don’t be silly,” she interrupts him, fondness melting its way through the ice, “you can barely move, let alone drive a car. I’ll bring you there.”

“But—”

“No buts. You’ll let me take the reigns until you feel up to it again.”

Xander sighs, wheezing, but a smile tugs at his lips.

“Who else would I trust with such a duty?”

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With Hinoka’s compliance in a dastard conspiracy, Xander decides to bring her not to a regular doctor, as she’d have expected, but a workmate of his. According to him, it’s the quickest solution, as unlike Dr Plegia, he isn’t nearly as demanded; and also, with how fast the twisting of her wrist happened, he didn’t want to risk it.

And this is how she’s finding herself in her own living room, sitting on the armchair, her forearm in the hands of someone whom she’s only seen when fetching Xander from the infirmary at his workplace. The doctor himself is quite the charming young man too, chestnut hair and brown eyes, a lab coat perfectly sitting on his slender frame – if she wasn’t committed to Hinoka, she’d have perhaps entertained him even more.

Truth be told, it’s quite the bizarre experience, to be the one examined and not the other way around, yet it’s so far not been as unpleasant as she was afraid it’d turn out being: not only is the doctor a pleasant man to be around, Xander is also with her and watching over her, so she has no concern whatsoever that doesn’t involve the pain in her wrist.

“It’s not as bad as I suspected it to be,” the doctor announces after minutes of silence. “It’s a light sprain, so as long as you keep it in place, it should be fine within a week. I’d still suggest you get it examined at a hospital if the pain gets worse or doesn’t subdue by next week.”

“Thank you very much, Doctor,” she replies, holding her pained wrist in her other hand.

“If I go back to my office, I can get you a brace for your wrist.”

“Don’t bother yourself with that, Jun, we’ll be fine,” Xander interjects. “We’re already beyond grateful you went out of your way for us.”

Noticing the doctor remains unconvinced despite the honest explanation, she adds,

“My brother is right, we already have a brace at home. You’ve done your job.”

“If you say so, then I’ll now take my leave. Have a nice day, Xander, Camilla.”

“Have a nice day as well, Doctor.”

They both watch him leave the house, his suitcase in hand, and silence comes back to their little home.

She exchanges a knowing look with her brother dearest. Xander speaks up first.

“I’ll get you our family brace.”

“Before you do so, can I ask you something very quick?”

“Of course, go ahead.”

“Why him in particular? Was Dr Plegia this busy?”

“It’s so rare you need to see a doctor, I figured you’d want the best option out there; and Jun seemed to me like the best of both worlds.”

“Good call,” Camilla admits with another smile.

“I’ll be right back.”

She watches him exit the living room and go up the stairs.

[whumpapalooza]

Nether Marauders, part 1

FEBUWHUMP DAY 2, ALT PROMPT 7: Blindfolded

Happy day 2 of @febuwhump! Here's an alternate prompt!

(Space Interns Masterpost)

(Next)

They were called the Nether Marauders, and now Brando knew why. The helmet they placed upon him obscured his eyes, and he could see only darkness – like the vast nethers outside the starcraft.

The pirates had boarded Aegis undetected. Brando only came upon them by happenstance, and he had been so stunned by their appearance that they overcame him.

The third punch to the stomach winded him so much that he barely noticed as someone tied his wrists together. He was pushed to his knees, and hands on his shoulders kept him from rising.

Then a woman stood in front of him, her expression severe. She held the helmet – an invention made by the pirate crew, Brando had heard. “Make a sound, and we give our captain the signal to blow this whole fucking craft to smithereens,” she said. Then she lowered the helmet onto Brando’s head.

It clamped around his skull and began to hum. Brando’s vision darkened.

Once Brando was totally blind, the pirates forced him to his feet and pushed him back into his lab.

“Remember…” The lady pirate’s whisper made Brando’s hair stand on end. “Not a sound out of you.”

And the door slid closed behind her.

Brando waited in darkness, with only the hum of Aegis’s engine to comfort him as the pirates infiltrated his beloved craft.