#but right now Any strong emotion is still ridiculously close to triggering panic attacks

[mejomonster]

I hate panic attacks

[babybluebanshee]

Seared With Scars - Chapter 7 (Mystery Nerds AU)

Previous Chapter

“When it comes to controlling human beings, there is no better instrument than lies. Because, you see, humans live by belief. And beliefs can be manipulated.”

- Michael Ende

---

Ivan knew it was almost time. 

He rose from his cot, standing to his full height, and stretched a little. No sense in being stiff and achy for what was soon going to happen. 

He looked again at the newspaper clipping, still clasped tightly in his fist, as if it were an extension of himself. He supposed, in a way, that’s what it was. It displayed what Ivan truly wanted and strived for, all the reasons he was still alive. True, those reasons could very well spell his death later on, but he’d had plenty of time to come to terms with that. 

But for now, all that mattered was the culmination of tonight’s endeavors with Stanford Pines.

The thought of Dr. Pines made his jaw clench involuntarily. Ivan wanted very badly to blame him as the cause of all this. After all, he was the one who summoned that triangular abomination into their world, offered up his hand and mind to forces he couldn’t hope to understand or control. Had a hand in everything Ivan holding dear inching ever closer to destruction. 

He wanted to hate Dr. Pines. It would have been so much easier.

He’d tried to force himself to, assailing him with a pipe and fists and kicks, trying to work his body up into a frothing rage, something that had never been hard for him when his plans were stymied by a foolish man who had almost ruined everything. 

He’d tried emotional manipulation, which had proven even more effective than attacking him bodily. He’d actually shocked himself a bit with how easy it was to watch devastation slowly inch into a man’s already-weakened frame, the desperate crumbling of his resolve play out on his face like a beautifully choreographed dance. 

It was the closest he’d come to truly hating Dr. Pines all night. The rush of satisfaction, the sick glee that came with knowing that he’d finally dealt a blow strong enough to chip away at the other man’s defenses, bring him low enough that he’d do anything Ivan asked. 

A part of him delighted in the suffering he’d foisted on another human being, and it almost completely eclipsed the part of him that should be horrified by that. 

But this unsettling sadism flared out quickly, no matter what he did. Try as he might, he could not bring himself to hate Dr. Pines. After all, if he hadn’t summoned that triangular monster, someone else would have. The demon was crafty that way, full of silver-tongued promises and flattery, and it took a strong will to resist him. 

It would have been so much easier to just hate Dr. Pines. But Ivan knew he couldn’t.

He couldn’t blame Dr. Pines entirely. He was a weak human, the same as all the others. He wasn’t the first idiot to be tricked by the demon. But, if tonight went well, he could be the last. 

Tonight would put an end to this distraction. No one - not Dr. Pines, not his brother, not Dr. Bergstrum, and certainly not Fiddleford McGucket - would stand in the way of him and his army any longer. He was going to end this, and then send that demon back to whatever hellish dimension he’d crawled out from. 

His hands were far too stained to even think about looking back now. 

The sound of rustling paper caught his attention, and he looked back down the clipping. It fluttering in his trembling hand. Ivan took a moment to breathe deeply, willing the tremors to cease.

Anger that a few stupid people could throw everything he’d worked so hard for in jeopardy.

Fear that all this would not be enough in the end.

Exhaustion, for he’d been at this fight for some time indeed.

And, worst of all, guilt. He felt guilty for so many things: the lying, the subterfuge, the torture - for, yes, he admitted to himself that what he’d done to Dr. Pines was torture, plain and simple. 

This hurricane of emotion roiled away in his stomach, making him feel sick. 

Oh, it would just be so much easier if he just hated Dr. Pines. 

He seemed to remember feeling this way many times before. 

Fortunately, he also knew how to make it stop.

The memory gun sat on the floor by his cot. He reached down and picked it up. He twisted the dial a few times, not even having to look at the screen to know that the words “PAIN” flickered on the screen in bright green letters. 

Ivan took one last glance at the newspaper clipping, one last glance at the sad young boy staring into the camera. For a brief moment, it felt as if the boy was staring directly at Ivan, beseechingly, brokenly. Ivan exhaled slowly, then tucked the clipping into his sleeve. 

Then he put the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger. 

And all that was left was the hate for Dr. Pines. It flowed through him, like an angry, flooded river, ready to swallow everything in its path. 

It came so easily.

He felt better. 

----

To the outsider observer, their little group looked utterly ridiculous, and Fiddleford knew it. 

There was Stan, who just fifteen minutes ago had given Fiddleford a brutally honest and insightful dressing down through a haze of cigarette smoke, covertly slipping a pair of highly illegal, suspiciously-stained brass knuckles into his pocket. 

There was Helen, a baseball bat Stan had given her slung over her shoulder as nonchalantly as if it were a trusted walking stick. Like they were all about to go on a Sunday drive, and not on a rescue mission.

There was Ed, still dressed in his Society robes, who’d politely turned down a crossbow when Stan offered it to him. “I’ve never even been target shooting,” he’d told them. “I wouldn’t even know how to hold that thing right.”

And then there was Fiddleford himself, with nothing more than a knapsack slung over his shoulder. True, the knapsack held a very important bargaining chip for him, but he kept that to himself for the time being. 

Yes, they were an odd assortment with a frankly deranged quest in mind. If he hadn’t lived through all the events leading up to this moment in time, he would have laughed. But he knew better. 

Ivan had to be stopped. The Society needed to be reigned in. Ford needed their help. And they were going to make sure that happened. 

Fiddleford began to open the door to the front seat, but Stan suddenly barked, “You’re in the back with Helen. Matthews is up here with me.”

Fiddleford arched an eyebrow, then looked back to Dr. Matthews. The older man was staring back in confusion, his hand hovering over the handle to open the door behind the passenger seat. Fiddleford saw that Helen had already slid into the seat behind Stan’s, her face stony and serious, gaze so firm on the headrest in front of her, it looked like she was trying to bore a hole in it. 

When Dr. Matthews turned his head to look at her, possibly expecting her to say something to Stan about how it wasn’t a big deal if he sat near her, things were fine, nothing was wrong, she didn’t meet his gaze. She didn’t utter a single word. She simply lowered her head a little and stared at her feet. 

With a sad sigh, Matthews took his hand away from the handle and walked to the front seat. Fiddleford stepped away to let him pass, then ducked back to slide into the backseat. As he did, he caught a glimpse of Stan’s face. Whereas Helen was regarding Matthews like she was trying to pretend he wasn’t there, Stan settled that steely, fiery gaze on the doctor, and didn’t stop watching him until he had ducked into the front seat and was safely buckled in. 

Fiddleford supposed that Stan’s distrust was understandable. Not only did Stan have a decade’s worth of experience with people it was incredibly foolish to trust, but there was also Helen to consider. As the car sputtered to life around them and eased forward, Fiddleford stole a glance at her from the corner of his eye. He had no idea what she and Stan had talked about after she’d retreated to the porch, but whatever it was had left her quiet and pensive. Even now, her gaze was focused outside, her chin resting on her hand. 

For the entire time it took them to gather their supplies and get out the door, Stan had been very unsubtly planting himself between Helen and Dr. Matthews. Every time the older man got too close to her for Stan’s liking, he’d shove himself up next to her, like a protective, bulky wall, until Matthews got the hint and moved away. Stan clearly blamed Matthews for causing Helen’s panic attack, and he seemed determined to keep Matthews at arm’s length from her. 

Fiddleford would have found it noble if Stan hadn't insisted on bringing her along. 

When he saw Stan handing her the bat before they left the house, he’d almost balked, demanded to know why Stan thought it was a good idea to hand a person who’d just thrown up in the sink and nearly hyperventilated a weapon and invite her along on a potentially dangerous mission. 

Then he’d caught a look at Helen’s face - mouth set in a determined line, shoulders squared, fist clenched tight enough around the grip of the bat to make her knuckles turn white. She was a woman with a mission.

Still, he’d tried to open his mouth to say something, anything. After all, he didn’t want her to be hurt anymore than Stan did, and unlike Stan, he knew that an exhausted and vulnerable person tended to be the one who was hurt the most in situations like these. 

It was like she’d read his mind. As soon as his mouth was open and a breath of speech had escaped him, Helen’s head snapped in his direction, and Fiddleford had actually taken a step back. Her eyes were full of an angry fire, hot and intense, ready to burn down anything that stood in her way, him included. 

He’d quickly snapped his mouth shut, but nothing about Helen being here sat right with him. She should be resting. Even the bat currently resting against her leg didn’t do much to assuage his concerns. 

A bump in the road jostled Fiddleford from his thoughts, and he realized that they had left the uneven dirt road of the woods, and onto the paved streets of town. The only light around them was the dusty yellow of the streetlamps. The only sound was the vague road noise around them. Fiddleford looked at the clock set in Stan’s dash. It was five minute to two. 

“Take a left at the next stop sign, then keep going straight until you hit Huckabone Street,” Matthews said suddenly, voice tight and quiet, slicing through the silence like an arrow shot by a quivering hand. As they passed under one of the streetlamps, Fiddleford saw his Adam’s apple bob in a nervous gulp.

“You’re not even going to tell us where we’re going?” Helen asked. Fiddleford looked over at her, surprised not only that she’d finally spoken, but at the sheer amount of venom behind the words. 

“I figured it would be easier if I just gave directions to the man who’s only lived here for a couple of months,” Matthews replied. There was an odd playfulness in his tone, like he was trying to joke with Helen, ignore the tension between them and just get back to the professional friendship they’d had as colleagues. 

From Helen’s face, Fiddleford suspected the effort was in vain. She just let out a derisive sigh through her nose.

Matthews turned quickly in his seat, the leather groaning beneath him. Fiddleford felt Helen start beside him. Stan’s hand tightened on the steering wheel as his shoulders tensed up, ready to fight. 

“Helen, look,” Matthews said, pleadingly, “I’m sorry. I can’t even begin to say it enough.” His eyes were watery and slightly puffy in the weak light. “I’ll never be able to fully fix what I’ve done. I thought I was doing the right thing-”

“You never bothered to see if that’s what I wanted,” Helen replied, more quietly, but still with rage bubbling just below the surface.

“I know that,” Matthews replied. “I thought the Society...at the time, I thought they could help you. Before tonight, I thought that it would do you good. It was so hard, watching you suffer and knowing there was nothing I could do…” 

Matthews trailed off, his eyes once again gaining that distant sadness, like he was one million miles away from them in the blink of an eye. After a moment, he gave his head a hard shake, and continued, “If I had known this was what Ivan was planning, I never would have given him that key. What you and your friends have been through is my fault, and I’m going to do as much as I can to make it up to you.”

Helen didn’t answer him right away, but she did finally turn to meet his gaze. Stony silence hung oppressively between them.

Helen’s face was totally unreadable. She seemed to be studying Matthews, searching his face. For what, Fiddleford couldn’t rightly say. 

Whatever it was, she seemed to find it. A small smile tugged at her lips, and she finally said, “Damn right you are, Edward Matthews.”

Matthews’ shoulders slumped as he returned the smile.

“You can start,” Helen continued, “by taking my shift on Tuesday. I’m gonna need an extended vacation after all this is over.”

“You say that like I’m not gonna take Tuesday off to recuperate from all this,” Matthews joked back.

“This is a bad week to be Simon,” Helen said, shaking her head.

“Simon?” Fiddleford asked before he could stop himself. Helen and Matthews turned their gazes on him almost like they’d forgotten he was there.

“Simon McBride. He’s the other doctor at the hospital. He’s in Miami for the weekend, at his parents’ condo,” Helen replied. Her brow furrowed in thought before she mumbled, “He’s gonna be so confused when he gets back.”

Matthews chuckled a bit, and even Fiddleford couldn’t help but smile a little. It was nice to see Helen be able to talk like this again to someone she obviously had a great deal of respect for, and who obviously cared about her a lot. 

Then his gaze moved up to Stan in the driver’s seat. His grip on the steering wheel had not lessened. The tension had not left his shoulders. His jaw was still set rigidly. Fiddleford wished he could tell what he was thinking. Seeing him looking so on edge made him anxious, and that was not something he needed to deal with, given what they were going to try and do.

Stan finally spoke up and said, “Alright, Doc, we’re coming up on Huckabone. Now what?”

Matthews turned from Helen to look out the windshield, then said, “Kill your headlights and pull up along the curb. We’ll have to walk the last block.”

Stan gave him an incredulous look as he said, “Pardon me?”

“Ed, all that’s down here is the history museum,” Helen said. 

The words “history museum” hit Fiddleford like a brick to his face. His nose was suddenly filled with the scent of dust and mildew. Chanting flooded his ears, drowning out whatever the others were saying. And before his eyes…

His footsteps echoed across the cold stone floor, as he drew closer to the trembling young man. “Don’t be afraid,” he said. He reached out a hand, and laced it through ashen fingers. They fluttered against his grip like a baby bird. “I promise, it won’t hurt. It’ll be over before you know it.”

The young man looked up at him, his filmy red right eye focused intently on the bulb of the gun pressed to his forehead. After a moment, the young man gulped and said, “I trust you, sir.”

Fiddleford inhaled sharply as the memory ended and he was flung back into reality. Stan had parked the car, away from any street lamps or overhead lights from stores. The dark and the quiet smothered him like a down quilt drawn tight around his face. 

His small gasp for air had drawn the attention of the others, and they watched him cautiously as he took a few deep breaths. His lungs ached, like he’d been underwater and holding in air for hours. 

“You okay, Fidds?” Stan asked. He’d unbuckled his seatbelt to twist in his seat, arm slung around the headrest. Fiddleford noticed that, now that he was focused on him, the tension was totally gone from Stan’s body. 

Fiddelford merely nodded, taking another deep breath before he began to speak. “Matthews is right,” he finally said. “I remember the history museum. It’s our base.”

“How do you hide a memory-wiping cult in a public museum?” Helen asked.

“The best way to hide something,” Fiddelford responded, “is camouflage.” 

Stan and Helen glanced at each other quizzically.

“There’s a false wall in the building,” Fiddleford explained. “Ivan found it, and thought it’d be the perfect place to conduct the Society - perform the ritual, store the memories, that sort of thing.”

“Wow, who could have foreseen that a shady group that wiped people’s memories run by a guy who insisted they do it in secrecy in a musty basement would ever turn into something sinister,” Stan said flatly. 

Fiddleford shot him a withering glance before saying, “At the time, I agreed with him simply because I was running out of places to put the memories. At least down there, we had storage. But as time went on and more and more people asked to join us, we decided to hold the meetings there too.”

“It was good to protect our privacy,” Matthews added. “Some of the members preferred to hide behind the hoods and the anonymity. Not many people want to give up their secrets lightly.”

“Yep, not in the slightest bit creepy,” Stan muttered again.

“Do you have a point, by chance?” Fiddleford asked, .

“Two, actually,” Stan replied. “First, if you really looked at all this weirdness and didn’t think it was the most unsettling shit ever, you have even less foresight than I thought.”

“Noted,” Fiddleford grumbled back. “Anything else?”

“Second, because this is the most unsettling shit I’ve ever come across, and because these people have already proven themselves to be desperate and dangerous, I’m starting to think just busting Ford out isn’t going to be enough.”

“What do you mean?” Matthews asked. 

“He means,” Helen said, nodding her head in the direction of her baseball bat, “that these will help us get Ford out, but we need a guarantee that they won’t retaliate.”

Fiddleford decided it was time to reveal his ace in the hole. “I might have a way of doing that,” he said, flipping open his knapsack to reveal the memory gun.  

Helen, Stan, and Matthews looked down at it like he’d just revealed a loaded pistol to them. 

“I brought it with me in case Ivan proved to be troublesome,” Fiddleford continued. “But Stan and Helen have a point - desperate people will do crazy things. I hope it won’t come to that, but if things get out of hand...I will use the memory gun on my followers.”

Matthews’ face fell in devastation. “Sir, are you...are you really prepared to do that?” he asked quietly. “To bring yourself down to Ivan’s level like that?”

The question hurt, but not for the reason that Matthews probably thought it did. The thing about it was, Fiddleford wasn’t bringing himself down to Ivan’s level with what he had planned. 

Ivan had already lowered himself to Fiddleford’s level. 

What Ivan had perverted the Society into was never what Fiddleford had intended, but his intentions no longer mattered. Fiddleford wasn’t sure if they ever did. After all, what had his intentions been? To keep people ignorant? To give them a place to hide away from their fear, to forever be victim to it? 

What, in the end, had the group ever succeeded in doing, under his direction? If tonight was anything to go by, it had only succeeded in creating people who were so afraid of what they didn’t understand, that they didn’t just want to forget it anymore. They wanted to destroy it. 

As selfish as Ivan’s motives were, all he’d really done was take the core tenants of the Society to their logical extremes. If he hadn’t done that, someone else would have. Fiddleford had provided all the groundwork needed for the Society to be turned into something dark and dangerous. All it had required was the right demagogue to complete the transformation. 

Fiddleford brought his eyes up to meet Matthews’, and said, “There’s this philosphy I learned about in college called the paradox of tolerance. It basically means that, if tolerance doesn’t have its limits, it’s eventually seized and destroyed by the intolerant. So the only way to make sure that doesn’t happen, is by being intolerant of intolerance.”

He looked down at the gun in his lap. Even in the thick blanket of darkness, it glistened like a living thing. Even though he had boasted upon this device’s creation that it was lightweight and sleek, easy to hide in the sleeve of a robe with no trouble, it felt thirty pounds heavier now. It was a testament to all he’d done, everything he’d caused, and to all that he was determined to make right. 

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes to keep Ivan from hurting anyone else,” he said firmly. “And I will break my own rules to do it.”

He looked into the faces of the three people surrounding him. Matthews’ face was still raw with emotion, like his entire world was crashing down around him. 

Helen’s face was unreadable as she studied Fiddleford’s face intently. He fought hard to keep from squirming under that intense gaze. 

Stan, however, gave Fiddleford a small smile. It brought a warmth to Fiddleford’s chest that only strengthened his resolve. He hoped Stan realized how much he’d done to finally make Fiddleford see the truth about what needed to be done. 

“Alright,” he finally said, his words strong and firm in the dark, quiet car. “Let’s go.”

The others nodded, and slowly began to get out of the car. Fiddleford closed the knapsack, clutched it tightly to his side, and flung open his door into the cold, damp February night.

---

Darryl’s knife glinted in the weak light as it sliced through the last set of ropes, around Ford’s right wrist. He flexed his left hand a bit, forcing blood to start pulsing through it again, ignoring the raw skin where the ropes had bitten into his skin and left angry red marks. 

He could worry about the pain later. He focused, picturing a large foot squashing down the pain bubbling up inside him, squashing it down until it was nothing more than a dull blip on his brain’s radar.

Finally, the ropes gave with a satisfying snap. Darryl tucked his knife back into his boot. He began throwing the ropes off and said, “Do you think you can walk?”

Ford didn’t respond, just waited until the ropes had landed on the floor with a dull thud, then grabbed the arms of the chair with his shaking hands. With  all the power in his quivering arms, forced himself to stand.

He barely had a moment to realize that that had been a huge mistake, swaying dangerously as soon as his hands left the support of the chair. Darryl dove to catch him, wrapping two strong arms protectively around his chest to keep him from falling. 

“I’m okay, I’m okay,” Ford muttered, despite the shrieking warnings from the back of his brain saying no, he was not okay, he couldn’t do this. His vision swam for a moment. His head feeling like it was going to explode. The shaky breath he drew felt like a hot knife being driven into his side. 

He shoved it all back into the dark corners of his thoughts where they belonged. 

“Here,” Darryl said gently, guiding Ford’s right arm around his shoulders. Using his free hand, he put a firm hand on Ford’s left side, just below his ribs to avoid hitting any broken ones. “Just lean on me, Dr. Pines,” he said. He gave Ford’s right hand an encouraging squeeze.

“Please, after all that’s happened, call me Ford,” Ford replied, smiling a bit despite himself. 

“I’ll call you ‘Long, Tall Sally’, if you want,” Darryl replied. “But I’ll do it once we get out of here.” He chewed his lower lip for a moment, then added, “This is gonna hurt, I won’t lie. I’ll try to go slow, but I can’t guarantee anything.”

“I’ll be okay,” Ford lied. Even just standing here made him ache in ways he didn’t even think possible. But he wasn’t going to let Darryl know that. He simply gritted his teeth and concentrated on that mental image of a foot stamping down. 

Darryl gave a crisp nod and said, “Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

Darryl began moving them towards the door, and instantly, Ford felt a shot of pain up his side. He clenched his teeth harder, balling his free hand into a fist by his side, willing the pain to fade, or at least lessen. After about thirty seconds, it did, though not by much. As Darryl reached the door to Ford’s prison, his side still throbbed dully. He ignored it as Darryl eased the door open. It gave one soft creak, but did no more to give away their position. 

Fluidly, like a cat, Darryl ducked them both out of the room. Despite everything, Ford took the opportunity to look around, and was frankly amazed at what he saw. 

Before them was a short, stone hallway. It was like something out of a medieval castle, lit by torches and lined with tapestries, all in brilliant red with a crossed out eye stitched into them. A few other doors were scattered about. Occasionally, the hallway dipped into an alcove, where stone statues of hooded figures with their arms lovingly outstretched stood, silent and imposing. 

How had Fiddleford managed to do all this in the span of a few months?

Pain suddenly exploded in Ford’s side, nearly making him lose his footing and take Darryl down with him. He could practically feel the broken bones somewhere inside him shifting and stabbing at him, tearing soft tissue and threatening to make him bleed. For a brief moment, he was crippled by the imagine of one of his ribs slicing through his lung, and choking slowly on his own blood. 

Goddamit, Sixer, stop being so morbid and focus!

The voice echoed from a small, forgotten place in Ford’s mind. In his panicked state, his first thought was that this was Bill, mocking him from his mindscape, but then the voice barked out again. You ain’t dying yet, Sixer. Now get moving!

This wasn’t Bill. It couldn’t be. It was gruffer, but kinder. Encouraging, supportive, and certainly not putting up with his melodramatic bullshit. 

Stan. 

That voice could only be Stan’s.

As his senses flooded back to him, Ford slapped his hand over his mouth and pressed hard. The shrieks of agony that wanted to erupt from within him came out now as mere strained grunts. He screwed his eyes shut against the pain. He ground his teeth together to have something, anything else to focus on. He begged whatever deity was watching all this that the pain would pass. 

It will, Sixer, Stan’s voice said. I promise it will. 

Finally, after several agonizing seconds, it did.

Ford took his trembling hand away from his mouth, and only then realized that Darryl had stopped moving and was watching him. He shifted his gaze over to him, and watched Darryl mouth, “Okay?”

Ford nodded, taking in heavy, quick breaths. He still shook, though now it was less from the pain and more from the unrelenting terror of knowing that, no matter what they did, there was always more pain to come. Ford allowed himself only a moment of hopelessness, unsure if he would be able to make it. He’d never known such pain in his life. There was no direction his body could shift where more wasn’t waiting for him. The hallway might as well have been an endless, dark cave, with nothing but a sheer drop waiting for them at the end. 

But then he felt that encouraging squeeze from Darryl again, and the black stain was gone. He looked over, and saw that Darryl had set his lips in a determined line. Strangely enough, Ford was once again reminded of his father, and the only concrete memory he had of his father talking about his time during the war. 

Whenever he and Stan had come home from school with blackened eyes and bloodied noses and ripped clothes and broken glasses, Stan almost always seemed to have it worse than Ford. His shiner was always worse. His nose always gushed harder. He’d once come home with an entire sleeve of his shirt missing. But one could tell by looking at his busted-up knuckles that, while Stan had gotten the brunt of things, he gave as good as he got. 

One day, their mother, her voice harried and exhausted had sat Stan down and asked why. Why did he always get the brunt of this. Why did he act like a common street thug whenever these boys did this?

Stan didn’t looked her in the eye, but he said, “‘Cause they’d just beat up Ford worse if I didn’t.”

And before their mother could even open her mouth to respond, their father had said, “You don’t leave a man behind, Caryn. Leave him be.”

Dad hadn’t even been upset about having to buy Ford another pair of glasses after that. 

It was obvious that Darryl subscribed to that same dogma. Even when it’s hopeless, you don’t leave a man behind. 

As they worked their way further down the hall, Ford realized that they were heading towards a curtain, hung in an archway ahead of them. It was a dark red, the color of blood. He tried not to think too hard about that as he forced himself to keep taking step after step. 

The sound of footsteps echoed around them. Ford realized quickly that they were coming from the direction of the curtain. Someone was coming.

Darryl stopped moving, his eyes darting like a trapped animal, looking for a place to hide. He turned his head towards a statute slightly behind them on the right. He tugged Ford back towards it and stooped down to fit them both behind it. The fit was tight, and Ford fought not to give a gasp of pain as a rib stabbed maliciously inside him, but at least it was dark and well out of the line of sight of anyone coming down the hall. 

Not that that helped still the wild pounding of his heart. This close, Ford could feel that Darryl’s heartbeat was very much the same. 

The footsteps drew closer, and Ford began to hear voices along with them.

“...just be grateful when this whole thing is over with,” said a gruff, masculine voice. “Having that six-fingered weirdo here gives me the creeps.”

To Ford’s shock, the voice of an older woman answered the man. “At least no one is looking at you like you’re some kind of failure.” He heard her give a frustrated huff. “Still can’t believe that little bitch did this to my face.”

“It’ll heal, Louise.”

Louise? Wait, the grandmotherly secretary from the hospital? That Louise?

“How the hell am I supposed to explain it to my husband, huh? Between Helen and that oaf who was with her, I look like I’ve been in a bar fight.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of something. You are a pretty dern good liar after all.”

Louise let out a small giggle. He’d never have believed that something so small, dainty, and innocent-sounding could ever send an unsettled chill down his spine. 

“You’d make a girl blush, Leroy Muggins,” she said, as casually as if they were exchanging pleasant small talk.

Leroy Muggins? As in Sheriff Leroy Muggins? The sheriff was in on this?

“‘Sides,” Muggins continued, “at least you got a few good hits in on the grimy one. When I saw him at Helen’s, he looked pretty rough.”

“Serves him right for hitting a lady. I should have given Helen a few good ones too. Never did like that uppity little tramp much…”

“Well, don’t you fret too much, alright? If everything goes the way Ivan wants tonight, you’ll get plenty of chances to pay them back…”

The voices faded as the two figures walked on, and Ford heard a door close. They must have gone into a different room. 

Ford and Darryl stood there for another full minute before either moved a muscle. 

This wasn’t just a group of frightened townsfolk anymore. The Society was out for blood, and their reach was deep enough that the medical community and law enforcement were involved. 

When Darryl finally seemed to snap back to life, he turned his head and looked Ford directly in the eye. The message in them was clear, for it was the exact same thing that was now screaming in Ford’s brain.

They needed to move faster. 

Slowly, Darryl edged them back out into the hall from behind the statue, and eventually reached the curtain at the end of the hall. Darryl lifted it back, less than an inch, checking the room that lay beyond. He let it drop back, then gave Ford’s hand another reassuring squeeze. It must have been all clear on the other side. 

In one fluid motion, Darryl parted the curtain and walked them through. They were now in some kind of open, circular chamber. In the middle of the room was a chair, with straps on the arms. Less than a foot away from it was a pedastal, upon which sat an orante box. The bulb of a memory gun, the large one that Ford had seen Ivan weilding earlier, glinted in the weak light. 

The sight of it made Ford shudder, and he forced himself to look away, pushing down the roiling nausea that flared up in the pit of his stomach. 

“Almost there,” Darryl said in a low whisper. He was taking Ford in the direction of another curtain, at the foot of a small set of stairs, set between two stone pillars. 

 A sense of inexplicable relief washed over him. He didn’t know how much farther they had to go, but knowing that beyond those curtains was “almost there”, out of this living nightmare he’d spent the last several hours in, away from the pain and the torture, was enough to dull every aching part of him for a moment. 

Then the curtain began to rustle. 

He felt Darryl’s body tense up against him in fear. Darryl whipped his head around sharply, doubtlessly looking for another place to hide. 

There was none. 

Ford’s heart began to beat wildly against his broken ribs. He wanted to scream. He wanted to cry. There was no way they could have come this far only for it all to amount to nothing.

The curtain parted, and Darryl took a tentative step back, clutching Ford tighter to him that ever before.

And through the curtain stepped Stan, looking around at the bizarre scene in front of him. Helen followed shortly after, looking just as confused. She was carrying a baseball bat.

Ford didn’t think before he let out a raspy, “Guys?”

Stan’s head whipped in their direction, and the confusion gave way to pure shock, like he was looking at a very familiar ghost.

“Ford?” he said quietly.

“Yeah…” Ford ground out in response.

“Holy shit, Ford!” Before Ford could say anything else, his brother was upon him, pulling him close to him in a tight hug. 

Ford’s eyes welled up instantly. He hadn’t realized how much he’d been needing this, the strong, loving support of his twin. He thought back to that morning, now seeming like a lifetime ago - Stan’s hand on his back to soothe away his anxiety, his gravelly voice offering soothing platitudes and nonsense to ease his guilt, his warm smile making him feel like everything would be okay. 

He’d been genuinely afraid that he’d never get to experience any of that again. He buried his face against into the crook of his brother’s neck and let out a strangled sob.

“Hey, Sixer, hey, it’s okay,” Stan said. “We’re gonna get you out of here.”

Ford wanted to say something, but Stan shifted his arm, and suddenly his broken ribs were stabbing at him again. Ford pulled his head out of Stan’s shoulder and gave a weak cry of pain. He managed to say, “Stan…” in a strained whisper before it was swallowed up in a desperate gasp for air. 

Stan pulled his arm away immediately and began babbling, “Oh god, Ford, I’m so sorry. You’re gonna be okay, alright? We’re gonna get you outta here. You’ll be okay, pal, you’ll be okay.”

“Oh my god, Ford, what did they do to you?” Helen’s worried voice reached him, and Ford managed to pull his head back up enough to see her practically running to close the distance between her and the brothers. Behind her was Fiddleford and Dr. Matthews, from the hospital. Ford didn’t have time to ask what he was doing there before Stan stepped off to Ford’s unsupported side to let Helen in closer to him.

“How the hell did you guys get here?” Darryl asked incredulously. 

Helen and Stan seemed to realize in that moment that Darryl was there, and turned to take him in - his mouth hanging agape, his eyes wide. 

“Darryl? The fuck are you doing here?” Stan asked, his voice practically climbing an octave in shock.

“You know what,” Helen finally said, sounding so very tired, “I’m not even surprised.”

A brief look of sheepishness flashed across Darryl’s face. He composed himself quickly, though, and said, “He’s in pretty bad shape, Doc. We need to get him out of here.”

“What’s the damage?” Helen asked, clearly trying to keep her gaze analytical and objective, to force herself into doctor mode. But Ford could see the concern in her eyes, that maternal warmth that had let Ford know, from the moment he met her, that she was someone he could trust. It was clear she wanted to embrace him just as much and as hard as Stan did. Instead, she merely reached out a hand and stroked it quickly, but lovingly, through his hair. She winced a bit when her finger got caught slightly where it was matted with blood.

Ford leaned into her touch, not even caring how silly it made him look. He was past that. 

“Blow to the back of the head, broken ribs. ” Darryl replied. “He’s been having trouble breathing, so I’m thinking one of them is getting close to his lungs. We need to get him to the hospital before we got a real mess on our hands.”

Helen nodded, her eyes watery behind her glasses. “Let’s get you out of here,” she said, voice strained. 

“I’ll help Darryl support him, Stan,” said Dr. Matthews, coming up to Stan’s side. “We need you at the front.”

Stan didn’t move, and gave Matthews a look that could have frozen molten steel. Ford felt his brother’s grip around his waist tightened protectively.

“Stan, he’s right,” Helen said. “You’re the semi-professional boxer. If we run into any trouble, we’ll need you to do what you do best.”

That finally seemed to get Stan to relent, and he gently helped Doctor Matthews arch Ford’s arm over his shoulders. Ford noticed that, throughout the entire maneuver, Stan never took his steely gaze off Matthews, even for an instant. They began to move toward the steps.

“Let’s hurry and get back up into the museum,” Fiddleford suddenly said from his position at the bottom of the stairs. He was pulling back the curtain, and frantically looking beyond them, clutching a knapsack close to his side. 

The museum? They were under the museum? Had Fiddleford been that close to him this entire time and Ford hadn’t even realized it? All he had to do was come into town and come to the museum, and he could have spared his friends this horrible night?

Fiddleford wouldn’t have been targeted by a mad cultist with a mysterious but dangerous agenda. 

Stan wouldn’t have a series of angry-looking stitches trailed down his temple.

Helen wouldn’t have had her very sense of peace and privacy violated.

Darryl wouldn’t having to risk his life for someone who’d caused him nothing but misery.

Once again, if he’d just been a better person, none of this would have happened. 

A wave of pain that had nothing to do with broken ribs crashed over him as his eyes welled up again.Before he had a chance to think about it, Ford murmured, “I’m so sorry, guys. Th-this is all my fault.”

“Shut up, Ford,” Stan said firmly. “Just shut up. You’ve got nothing to apologize for, you hear me?”

“He’s right,” Helen added gently, “This isn’t anyone’s fault but Ivan’s.”

“If it wasn’t for me, Ivan wouldn’t even be a problem,” Ford countered miserably. “This entire night, i-it’s my fault...I’m sorry…”

His eyes drifted shut as the tears trailed down. He was just so tired, not just physically, but mentally. He was tired of being the one who dragged everyone else through emotional hell because he was too much of a short-sighted ass to see beyond what he wanted, how he was feeling in that moment. Even when he tried to make things right, all he did was fuck it all up worse.

He heard footsteps approach him, soft and tentative, but determined. Then he felt two hands reach out and cup his face. A calloused hand gently wiped the two streaks of tears away. “Aw, hush,” Fiddleford’s kind voice said. 

When Ford opened his eyes, he didn’t know what he expected to find in Fiddleford’s expression - distrust, fear, maybe even anger. The way they’d left things at the start of all this, Ford really wouldn’t have been surprised by any of them. 

What he was greeted with instead was the soft, sweet smile of his dearest friend in the whole world.

That damn smile. It had always been like concentrated sunshine, something that always made Ford feel better when they were in school together, even at his most frustrated, his most lonely, his most afraid.

The effect hadn’t changed. 

“There’s no need for talk like that,” Fiddleford replied. Before Ford could say anything back, Fiddleford had moved his hands from Ford’s face, and wrapped his arms around his neck, in a small hug. “We both made mistakes,” he muttered into Ford’s shoulder. “At least you owned up to yours and tried to fix them. I hope, when we get you out of here, that you’ll let me do the same for you.” 

Ford couldn’t find it in himself to respond, so he just nodded. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Stan and Helen, watching the two. They both wore relieved smiles. 

After holding Ford for a another few seconds, Fiddleford pulled away, and said, “Back up we go.”

That seemed to spur the rest of the group on, and Helen and Stan started down the stairs, Fiddleford following shortly after. Darryl and Dr. Matthews began gently guiding Ford toward them. 

“Y’all never did answer my question,” Darryl said. “How the heck did you get here? I wasn’t exactly planning on running into any friendly faces.”

“You can thank Ed for that,” Helen replied. “Without him, we never would have gotten this far.”

A voice from the shadows suddenly boomed, “How fortunate for all of us, indeed.”

Everyone froze, only for an instant. Then in a dizzying flurry of red, almost a dozen hooded figures emerged from the shadows and descended upon them. 

One collided with Fiddleford’s back and slammed him into the ground. Stan and Helen were blindsided by two more figures and knocked the rest of the way down the stairs, landing in a tangled heap just inches from the curtain that lead to their freedom. Ford watched as they tried to kick and throw punches, but another pair of figures leapt into the fray and added more weight on them both. One even jerked the bat from Helen’s hands and tossed it away. It landed with a clatter on the stone floor, at least fifty yards away.

The support at Ford’s right was suddenly wrenched away, and Darryl only let out a shout of surprise as a robed figure wrapped an arm around his neck in a chokehold, and began wrestling him to the floor. 

Only Ford and Dr. Matthews were left standing, and he knew this old man wouldn’t stand a chance against feral cultists out for blood. He was just about to tell Matthews to run, to do something to protect himself, when suddenly he felt his left arm being wrenched backwards. He gasped as it popped in protest, pulled back further than he ever thought possible. The pain struck him like a bullet to the chest, and all he could do was let out a strangled gasp as he was forced to his knees. 

“Be a good boy and stay down, interloper,” he heard Matthews hiss at him, “or I’ll dislocate it right now.”

Through the pain, something clicked in Ford’s mind - the angry words, the voice that sounded minutes from snapping, the hands that gripped him like a vice. 

Dr. Matthews was the follower who’d been with him when he first woke up. 

Ford heard Helen yell, “Ed, what the hell are you doing?!”

Almost overlapping her, Ford heard Stan practically scream, “Matthews, get your goddamn hands off him, or I swear to God I’ll-”

The voice from the shadows rang out again. “Not to point out the obvious, but there’s not much you can do, Stanley.” 

Ford lifted his head, heavy and trembling on his shoulders, towards the source of the voice, and from the shadows emerged Blind Ivan, seamlessly as if he’d melted into reality from the inky blackness. On his face was a satisfied smile. Ford felt his heart fall to his shoes.

This had been Ivan’s plan all along. 

He’d used Matthews to lure Stan, Helen, and Fiddleford here. 

Matthews had been working against them from the beginning.

And now Ivan had all the pieces he needed.

The realization hadn’t seemed to dawn on Stan, and he spat, “You’re not gonna be looking so smug once I knock back your goons, cueball! When I get my hands on you, you’re gonna wish all I’ll do is kill you!”

Ivan didn’t respond. He just snapped his fingers. 

At the sound, Matthews reared back his foot, and brought it down sharply on the back of Ford’s knee. It gave with a sickening crunch, like a piece of rotted wood being split by an axe.

A roar of agony was ripped from Ford’s lungs, and he lost his balance completely. He hit the cold stone roughly on his side, and he let out another, tighter scream of pain as he landed squarely on a broken rib. Matthews brought his foot back down roughly on Ford’s back, applying just enough pressure to make Ford fearful to even breathe, for fear that Matthews would start grinding his heel into more of his broken bones.

Ford let his head fall limply to the floor, and looked to his friends. They all stared, in dumbstruck horror, between him and Matthews. 

There was nothing any of them could do to help him.

They’d lost.

“Now then,” Ivan said. “I believe it’s time we got down to business.”

[overdrivels]

Imagine: Reaper discovers his family

Can I just run an idea through? I’m a little stuck in a rut with my requests, so I’m just trying to churn stuff out to get through it. (Tomorrow’s the last day of our batizado and after that I’m on holiday, so YESSSS.) This is incredibly self-indulgent and I just--ugh, it’d be cute and tragic all at once.

So, this idea has been beaten to death, but a Reaper who finds out he has a daughter with the reader:

Reaper doesn’t even know what happened to you, shamefully, he didn’t bother finding out until now when he accidentally stumbled upon the file. Living in Los Angeles. Single. Dependent: one daughter. Eleven years old.

The file could not have been deleted fast enough. His fingers shook, and the cooling dread filtered through him at the implication, urging him to do something about this. But years of fighting and dealing with his baser emotions allowed him to shift his focus back toward logic.  

First thing’s first. He was no computer genius, but even he knew that deleting the data would not be so simple. The moment this memory card was uploaded onto the system, it must’ve already been replicated into the backup databases. Nothing short of deleting the snapshots and destroying the disks they were on would suffice. He could always ask Sombra, but there’s no doubt she’d look at the data, piece everything together, and find out about you and what—who—you bore.

Reaper clenched his fists against the holographic keyboard and hung his head.

“Gabriel!” He could hear your voice echo in his head clear as day. “Come on, let’s go.” Your hard determined eyes that softened only for him. “Together.” The routine squeeze of your hand around his whenever he needed the assurance—he never told you, but you always knew somehow.

“Sombra.”

The woman’s delighting laugh echoed around him. “Already on it, Gabe.”

“The cameras, too,” he growled, slightly annoyed that she already knows, but at the same time, relieved at her quick work. He always liked people who took initiative. Like you when you first asked for his time. He didn’t know whether you were mocking him or being incredibly stupid—dating your superior was a violation of some code of conduct and to that end, you even made a transfer in order to keep the relationship alive.

Reaper couldn’t admit it to you when he was Gabriel Reyes—he was too proud for that and pretended that it was more of a pain than anything, but your actions touched him and made him feel wanted—that you would go through the trouble of accommodating him, staying up late to see him, going through great lengths to keep the relationship a secret, everything you’ve sacrificed that he slowly lost sight of. He couldn’t even begin to apologize enough for that and now for leaving you alone with a daughter that could possibly be his.

And then Reaper watches you from a distance for a few days. He is nervous as fuck. But he sees that you’re happy. Weary, but happy. You’ve aged quite a bit since the last time, but it’s still you and that’s when he realizes that he still cares about you. He still gets that squeeze in his chest that makes him a little breathless when he sees you smiling softly, and then it’s almost a full blown heart attack when he sees you’re smiling at your daughter. A precious eleven year old with curly, dark hair in a french braid across her hairline that vaguely reminds him of his mother. She’s a spritely little one with a bit of an attitude, but she helps you around the house and listens to you, and that’s just cute.

This man couldn’t be any fucking prouder than when he saw his daughter throw a punch at a bully. He almost went in to defend the little tyke, but when he sees her show off her prowess, he stays back and watches, ridiculously impressed. You trained the kid well. 

It is only a few days, but he’s already attached. It’s not hard to remember how much he cared about you, not with the way that you’re so domestic in all the ways that you couldn’t be when you were a part of Overwatch. He very much liked capable people, too. 

But then, part of his mission is to kill the Overwatch agents, and he could only chalk his weird stalking up to surveillance. The higher ups give him the next batch of agents to kill and your name is there. He has a team with him, too, because it’s an Overwatch agent--Talon doesn’t take chances. 

He doesn’t want to, but can’t make his attachments known. He can’t plead with them, he can’t do anything--he tried to call it off, saying it was unnecessary to kill an ex-agent  with a child--who in their right mind would rejoin Overwatch when they had another life on the line? You’re no threat.

Everyone is dispatched anyway. You’re just another name on the list to them. They attack your house in the dead of the night, and Reaper is very conflicted--he could’ve warned you and made you flee or tried harder to make them stop, but he couldn’t have his cover blown--his plans are bigger than this. But fuck, his plans didn’t include you. It never included you--and that realization forced him to make up his mind. 

It’s too bad you’re already in action, having felt something was wrong that night. You hid your daughter in a closet, and you’re already waiting for these operatives. While you didn’t have any lethal weapons, you had ample experience with disarming people. It was a strange specialty of yours.

He thinks that he could just stay back and pretend that he’s not there. (Well, he took care of an operative or two to lighten your load before they bursted into your room.) You seemed to be holding out pretty well. It was a wonderful sight to behold--he wasn’t leaving you out to dry, and he would jump in if anything happened, but you were doing well and he remembered that he really did enjoy watching you fight and just be so strong.

But then your daughter tumbles out of the closet when some wayward Talon agent slams into it. She’s frightened, but silent, scrambling to get back into the closet where you had told her to stay. But the moment she made her appearance, the whole world stops for everyone else.

A small cry escapes the young girl’s mouth as she attempted to return to her designated safe spot. But that sound forced the world back into motion—a Talon agent, in his panic, took aim at her.

You smashed a knee into the one you’re currently engaged with, scrambling to her. Reaper surged into the room, mist rising and swarming, anger and fear mingling. He could see the agent’s finger like it’s in slow motion, slowly pulling the trigger.

You threw yourself over your daughter, who clung to you immediately. The shot fired, once. Twice.

“Ughn!”

“Mama!?”

It never hit. You whipped you head around just in time to see a wall of black mist congeal and solidify into a person, a person with gaping holes in his chest that was rapidly closing.

“Re-Reaper, s-sir! What--?”

The poor agent’s voice was strangled as the mist shot out to consume him and toss him out the room. The other agent’s head popped up from where you had left him, stretching his neck, only to get treated in the same way as his colleague. The door was slammed shut—not that it would’ve done much against any normal person, but the lock on it certainly helped.

You held your breath and your shaking daughter, eyes never leaving the figure before you. You were distinctly aware of the way your little girl was simultaneously trying to see the situation and hide herself from it, but you held her fast to your chest.

The man turned slowly, revealing his bone mask and combat gear to you. He knew he was a gruesome sight to behold, and he shouldn’t, but he’s already this far and he just had to make sure that you’re okay.

Something in your chest seized, and you held your breath, a tingle running up and down your neck when he turned. This person seemed familiar, held himself in a way that called to your memories. Someone you knew. Someone…

“...Gabriel?” 

You didn’t even know where that came from, the name just slipped out of your lips. Both the man and your daughter stiffened, and for the second time tonight, time stopped. 

Did you know? Did really know? Reaper didn’t know what to say, there’s really nothing he could say to you. But a quick sweep over you at least relieved some of his fears. She’s safe. You’re safe. That’s all that mattered.

But apparently something inside him thought otherwise and forced him to hold his hands up. Now that he’s here, he had to resist the urge to cross them—this position made him feel ridiculously vulnerable, especially under your skeptical gaze, but he should probably get his point across.

“Leave. It’s not safe here anymore,” he rasped.

Reaper left right after that, but not before taking one final look back. He sees dis daughter up close and it hits him hard just how much she looks like him and how you look at him like you’re angry and relieved and tired all at once. He definitely feels guilty about this, but he needed to get rid of the agents at your door, and maybe after that’s done and he reports that you’re ‘dead’, he could maybe sit down and explain everything to you. 

[beyondthetemples-ooc]

.....there is a huge, huge part of me wondering if what everyone was telling me was a panic attack was actually a panic attack.

Or.... meltdown? imean i’ve been seriously, genuinely wondering if i’m autistic. I need to talk to someone and ask. Because...

I think I might actually be autistic, because:

I run my life on a plane of logic.

I don’t communicate and connect with other people about things very well at all, certainly not face-to-face.

I communicate in weird nonverbal ways that other people don’t seem to get, but it’s not like I’m trying to be weird or mimick animals or anything, it just made more sense to me to use? (Could also be an extreme form of polyglot-ism expressing itself, but I don’t think linguists usually have to resort to hissing when something hurts them because they don’t have mental access to words at that point.)

I use social scripting to interact with almost everyone but friends, even at work.

Outside of friends, even on Tumblr, sending my typical three-part-welcome message to new followers on any blog but my personal (welcome, I’d like to Rp any time, if you need anything tagged let me know), I have to sit for awhile and put the words in the right order. It has taken me 40 minutes to put those in order.

I’m very good at writing descriptively and social interactions for my characters, but not in person? Not when I know I’m writing to communicate with an actual person, unless they’re a friend and I don’t have to expend the energy Communicating Perfectly??? what?????? is??????? that about??????????

I think I’ve been using echolalia my whole life (I quote things to myself when I’m happy, or to make myself feel better, always have, and used to quote Teen Titans to other people too), but I got better at disguising quotes as “my own words” because my stepmother emotionally abused me when I talked about Teen Titans too much. (I also repeat parts of questions people ask me as a way of processing what they’re asking, to help form my answer.)

I even use quotes and phrases from things when I’m writing because I don’t know how to say it otherwise??? (Most often with comic!Raven....)

I don’t do well with changes in plans. At all. Ever. Especially when it’s day-of. I have to withdraw and do something to completely “reset” my brain when it happens, to get myself out of the shut-down “nevermind i don’t want to do anything dealing with this is too much,, let me BREATHE” sort of mindset. (This is a thing that might be ADD and might be autism, but the level with which I have to “reset”, I think, is beyond what ADD psychologists say is “normal” for ADD.)

^ I’m generally a very emotionally calm, stable person. Like, ridiculously so. Most of the time I just don’t have emotions assigned to things that other people assign emotion to. (Even things that I know other people have extreme reactions to. Someone dies? I’m sorry they won’t be around anymore, but everyone dies eventually and I’m okay with that. I’m sorry if this makes me a bad person, but I don’t cry at funerals, I just get overwhelmed with the pressure of everyone else’s emotions. I’m sorry for you and I truly do ache for your loss, but don’t feel any emotion about the death myself. Unless I really, really love someone, which... fuck, I cried over my canary, but not my grandfather? who i wasn’t very close to tbh and disliked his stubborn streak of feistiness because it was Too Mush For Me, but... idunno the funeral made me sick for a WEEK with empathic overwhelming, but I’m okay with Mary’s death now because, well, my emotions aren’t as strongly tied to things like Pure Presence as other peoples’.)

And despite that, when my stepmother tells me “I’m going to pick you up from work” when I already had a bus pass (which doesn’t expire so it’s not like I wasted resources), even though it would be nice to get home in 15 minutes instead of 45 after work, I still get frustrated an annoyed and go “okaaay... a little notice ahead of time would be nice, now I have to re-adjust myself for the whole day.” i’m emotionally stable as hell, yet stupid little changes in plan like that really annoy me.

I’m touch-dominant, I experience the world through my HANDS. Apparently that’s a thing autistic people experience more than neurotypical.

Constantly stimming (hard to distinguish from ADD fidgeting, but I do it because it’s stimuli that helps me better process things, not because I have energy that I need to use.)

Teen Titans for me fits the exact definition of a Special Interest.

I am definitely hyperempathic. (Psychic empathy versus conceptual empathy, but reactively empathic to the sensations as well.)

I’m disconnected from my own emotions.

I cannot communicate my emotions well, I cannot recognize them, I cannot understand them. I am utter SHIT at actually EXPRESSING my emotions. I’m not emotive. When I try, people misread my facial expressions CONSTANTLY. (I looked at my father confused, and he told me not to glare at him.)

I’m not very good at reading facial expressions beyond the general Happy/Sad/Angry/Afraid. (I thought I Was, but it turns out I misread them half the time. I use books and the physical things they describe to learn “Oh, raised brows doesn’t always mean interest, it might mean disbelief if her lips are tight too”. Again: disconnection from emotions and expressing them.)

I don’t process visual information well, if i process it at ALL. I have 20/15 vision according to the last optometrist I saw, and my vision is just fine according to the DMV (when I got my temps license, again), but I struggle to recognize letters and call them by name, not because I don’t know it, but it takes me twice or three times as long to figure out what that visual information means? I can read very well and comprehend it extremely well, but when it’s not organized in a language I know: I struggle to process what letters are which.

And, I mean, I can, and I do, but I have to tell everyone in my life, parents and job and friends: “I don’t See Things the way you do, literally do not SEE and PROCESS them. I have very good vision, but my brain doesn’t process visual information, so if there’s a way I can notice this by touching it or hearing a different sound, that will work a lot better than relying on seeing things to notice it. Because I probably won’t.”

I think I’m communicating well, but my mother and girlfriend are the only people who consistently understand my words well in person.

I actually do rock and move my hands/arms when I’m really excited. (I’m okay at restraining it, but it’s much nicer to be able to express myself in “weird” kinetic ways. Again: touch-dominant, kinetic expression is part of that, but touch-dominant might be an autistic thing, and I don’t know anymore, and that’s frustrating.)

(( I remember doing the actual hand-flapping thing at age 8 or 10, when I asked someone at ALP if he watched Teen Titans. And he said the only good character was Cyborg... no, Raven. And I was excited, because nobody else I knew liked Raven best! I was sitting seiza-style but started bouncing on my knees while pumping my hands, and smiling at him. He got really weirded out and shifted away from me, because we were all sitting on the floor in a crowd of sorts and he probably would’ve gone to the other side of the room if he could, now that I think about it... but, I always remember that, and when I got older I realized my reaction was Abnormal. i always associated it with Strong Emotions, but now I’m wondering, why do strong emotions make me move like that, and other people do other things entirely? that’s the only way i can express emotions that deep sometimes, kinetic motion. what if it’s because i’m autistic?))

I become completely nonverbal when I’m overstimulated, emotional, processing something big, constantly processing something and then another then another, and I very often actually don’t have the energy to speak. (It takes me a lot of energy to ask a customer “What?” sometimes if I didn’t catch their full order. I have literally blinked at people because I couldn’t even say THAT, and hoped they’d understand.)

I know I speak bluntly when I AM verbal, but putting things to words is all I have energy for. I could rephrase things to be more diplomatic, but fearing my stepmother is the only time it ever seems worth it. (I speak bluntly and honestly because A, I feel things bluntly and honestly and I see no point in rephrasing to redress what I think/feel, I just say literally, and I do mean literal-literally, what I’m thinking. I don’t do the “ulterior motives” thing. I don’t understand, at all, when people say they said something just because they were angry or excited. Like... why? What??? How did those words get put together when they’re not true???? it’s foreign concept to me, completely.)

I get overstimulated in general, badly BADLY overstimulated, and shut down completely. (I experience “shutdown” exactly as autistic people have described it, more times in my life than I care to remember. This happens most often with empathy and emotion, but also in crowds/presences/too much activity or noise or even TALKING.)

That “panic attack” also could have... been a meltdown if this is really a thing. Because it sounds like a panic attack, but I didn’t want help, I just wanted to be hide in the corner and be left alone and I wanted everything to STOP.

Because when I’m lucid, I look at my life objectively, and I really, really do not think I have anxiety. Or should have had a panic attack.

...I mean... when it happened, my phobia had been triggered time and time again in the preceeding weeks, because one household family member after the other had the stomach flu. Two even got it twice. and when you’re an empath it is damn hard to block out the sensations and feel sick too, no matter how loud I blast my music. I existed at home in a constant state of “don’t breathe here, wash your hands twice like they do in hospitals, iron shields not just shadows, hurry in and hurry out to reduce exposure, open windows, ignore it and cast it away that is not yours to feel, breathe, breathe, breathe.” Purposefully high-alert and constantly defensive (determined, not afraid), but not total-breakdown-justifying anxiety...

But this was not the first year it’s happened, nor second and probably not even the third -- and my phobia was much, MUCH worse (AND empathy, thus doubly bad at coping with feeling what the sick/v*ing people are feeling), the two times it happened when I was 14-18.

The phobia-triggering alone triggered less anxiety than before, because I could cope with it, and I had the tools to better cope with both phobia-anxiety and miserable-empathy.

Outside that, I’m not prone to anxiety, I only become anxious about normal life things (re: not General Anxiety Disorder, just Specific Anxiety Disorder aka My Phobia, and severe Financial Anxiety because fucking hell people I’m only 24 and extremely frugal and borderline “stingy” and STILL 3000+ in debt, but my coping mechanism is HEALTHY-- you know, seeking better jobs even if I hate them, walking dogs, and saving money like hell whenever i can. You know: proactively FIXING the PROBLEM.)

And when I AM Anxious, it is controllable, if I can find a solution.

But if it’s anxiety like I felt over potentially losing my job due to health-related call-offs every month and bus routes, aka things I already do my absolute best to control: It self-feeds because every time I solution-seek, there is no solution.

And often, it’s far more FRUSTRATION than anxiety.

So, like... I don’t have “anxiety disorder”. I don’t have General Anxiety about things that don’t logically WARRANT it. I just have a very strong, atypical REACTION to anxiety, and sometimes get overstimulated by feeling my own emotion, and either have to withdraw from it, or shut down.

gods i really need to talk to someone about this because it would explain a LOT about what’s wrong with me and what’s “Abnormal” about me in the world and i’d really, really like to know what’s ADD, what’s from Emotional Abuse, and what’s possible-autism, thanks... ;;;;