#child of whumper

[ashintheairlikesnow]

I Can't Cross O'er: An Interlude

CW: Captivity, child of whumper POV, blood, referenced whipping, magical whumpee, siren whump. For @amonthofwhump Tropeathon Day 4: Monster! Monster!

Bones in the Ocean Masterlist

-

Six years ago

A door shut, clicking into place, just down the hall. Carefully hidden inside one of the seven bedrooms in this wing of the house, Ford and his sister Nathalie waited, listening, as the man in the hallway took a deep breath. “By God,” The man muttered. “What a voice he has.”

Nathalie tried to peek around Ford's arm. “Is he-”

“Sssshhh.” Ford swatted at Nathalie without looking at her, and she swatted back.

“Like an angel…” The man continued, not realizing he had an audience - if currently a distracted one. “An absolute angel. The way he sings..."

Nathalie poked Ford right in his ticklish side with one finger, jabbing roughly. "Ford-"

"I said sssshh!"

"Don’t you dare tell me to shush, Guilford,” Nathalie hissed.

Ford looked at her, and whatever she saw on his face made the momentary triumph of mocking him with his hated full first name drain from hers. She laid a hand on his arm, then, awkwardly patting, whispering, “I’m sorry. I'm so sorry, Ford, I didn't mean it-"

“Don’t ever call me his name,” Ford said, but his voice was weak. Like always since his mother died, he felt tears rise unbidden and had to fight them back below. “Please, please don’t.”

“I didn’t mean it,” Nathalie whispered. Her eyes were huge and sad in the light that filtered in through the gauzy curtains across the room. “I really didn’t. I’m sorry, Ford. You’re not like him at all. I promise you're not."

He found a smile for her, just to watch the way her shoulders, which had hunched up, relaxed again. “It’s… it’s all right.” There was another sound, and Ford turned back, trying to peek through a crack in the door they were hidden just behind again. He couldn’t quite see the man, but he could hear him still muttering to himself. Thankfully, the Lord Fellswooth spoke to himself loudly enough that he hadn’t overheard them and realized he was being spied on by two of Lord Wentworth’s children. 

Or grandchildren.

Or... prisoners.

Whoever they really were to him.

Seconds passed, and Ford could see in his mind the way the tall, strikingly thin Lord Fellswooth must be patting down his shirt, checking for wrinkles or any detail out of place. He’d been a fussy one at supper earlier, the sort to surreptitiously check the tines of his fork over before taking a single bite, as if checking for a smudge or a bit of tarnish he might make a barbed comment about. He was probably running quick fingers through his hair to get the little curl of salt-and-pepper over his forehead just so - he’d done that over and over since he’d come to meet with Lord Wentworth, as if it were some sort of compulsion rather than simple vanity. 

Ford’s teeth worried at his lower lip as he listened to Fellswooth take a deep breath, murmur it was only a business call, of course, Theresa, that’s all, as if he were rehearsing his lines for a play, before he turned to leave. The two children eased back and away so no hint of them might be seen as he went past them - Ford's eyebrows knitted in confusion at a spot of bright red he saw on the Lord's cheek, smeared like he'd rubbed open a wound. The Lord's steps were nearly soundless thanks to the plush gold-threaded rug that ran the length of the hall all the way to the grand staircase that would take him right out the front door.

The butler met him there. 

Mr. Keller was chilly sometimes but Ford mostly found him kind. His voice filtered up the stairs as he let Lord Fellswooth know his horse was saddled and waiting for him just outside. Mr. Keller had been around forever, he was very old and soon to retire, Father- the man who made them call him Father, anyway - said. He’d made mistakes, sometimes… more often lately.

There had been some sort of trouble with Mr. Keller writing letters that made no sense, begging for rescue from employment, that had led to some distant relations coming to the door last month, worried for his health. 

Father had assured them all was well, and after speaking to Mr. Keller over a few days, the cousins or whoever had gone away again. Mr. Keller had been... different, ever since, but still mostly kind to the children.

Ford’s father read all Mr. Keller’s letters now before he sent them, and he’d put out an advert and told his very important friends he was looking for a new butler, that Mr. Keller was ready to step down and have a well-earned rest. 

If he didn't just get thrown in the pond with the monster, like Ford's real father had been. 

Once Fellswooth was safely gone, Ford eased out into the hall, the well-oiled hinges moving in perfect silence as he swung open the door. Nathalie was on his heels, creeping just behind him. They made their silent way towards the door that the fussy Lord had just come out of.

Ford paused just a foot away and turned to look at his sister over his shoulder, putting a finger to his lips.

Nathalie nodded, solemnly. Like Ford, she still wore a black armband, the sign of mourning after their mother’s death the year before. At ten, her face was losing the child’s roundness and thinning out. She looked like their mother had, more every year, and sometimes it hurt Ford to look at her at all. It would be six more years before their father would want to start looking into marrying her off, which meant only four years until marriage might happen for Ford.

The thought terrified him.

Ford had become a part of his father’s grasping ambitions only a month after Mother died, when she could no longer protect her children from Lord Wentworth’s plans for his family. Ever since, he’d been subjected to endless lectures on business ventures he didn’t care about overseas, tutored for hours every day on how to convince other nobles to speak to his father about those business ventures, or selling land, or… whatever it was that Guilford Wentworth wanted from them. All those lessons, in the end, centered around learning how to lie - or how to bring the aristocrats and royalty to meet with his father and his father’s awful creature.

Alongside all that unwanted education had been a rise in the careless, constant violence that had already dogged him all his life. He was not good enough at the skills Lord Wentworth wanted him to learn. He did not lie so easily, he did not care about colonies and copper mines a thousand miles across the sea. And he paid for not caring with bruises like the ones he wore even now, always and only in places that his clothing might hide.

Nathalie, though, wore no bruises, and neither did the twins. He’d done what he could to protect them all the way his mother had once tried to protect him. If he were married, though, especially if he were married to someone with more money or land and he had to go live with her family, he couldn’t keep Guilford’s anger on him any longer. 

It would turn on his sister, until she was found a husband - and then it would finally turn on the twins, who had never known violence and would have no one to keep them safe any longer

What if whoever was picked for his sister’s husband was cruel, too? What if his own wife turned out to be some terrible witch, like Guilford Wentworth, just with hair ribbons? He’d rather die than be married, but he knew enough about his father’s monster by now to know that it wouldn’t matter what he wanted, when the time came.

He’d want whatever he was told to want, once the monster sang its hideous song. He'd be a dutiful, loving husband, or he'd be a dutiful loving son, or he'd have his throat torn open and turn to bones in the bottom of the pond in the garden, just like his real father.

Ford closed his fingers slowly around the doorknob, turning it as quietly as he could before he gently pushed the door open so he and Nathalie could peek inside.

They had come to peek at the monster. 

The awful thing looked handsome and harmless. It perched along the edge of a heavy mahogany desk, leaning against it and looking away, towards the window, one hand over its mouth. Jet-black hair fell wavy, as if it had only just dried after a swim in the ocean, over beautiful eyes and curled around its ears. Its hair was all mussed up, as if it’d been grabbed at and pulled on, but the creature didn’t seem to notice. 

It looked, with the last of the sunset’s yellowed light shining on its warm brown skin, like a sort of perfectly sculptured mockery of a human man, the most beautiful one Ford had ever seen in his life. It was only a trick, of course - it was more of a demon.

Ford had seen its real face when it killed his real father, a mouth that opened too wide and was full of hideous sharp teeth.

It wore some sort of loose robe that fell off one shoulder. It was covered in embroidered flowers in white against the shining pale blue fabric and tied at the waist. Its arms were crossed in front of itself and it hunched over, just slightly. The markings like tattoos that began just under his jaw on one side disappeared into the neckline where it lay over the thing’s collarbone and then reappeared along one delicately formed wrist, running all the way into its palm and over its long, elegant fingers. One of its legs was marked, too. When Ford looked at the monster’s feet, he could see one was covered in the same markings all the way to the very end of its toes. 

“It's done, for now,” The monster said to no one, its voice soft. It spoke like a melody, a rumbling bass that could just as easily soar to tenor. Ford had taken singing lessons, for a while. He was hopelessly rubbish at it. 

The twins, though, were good. And the monster sang like heaven. 

There was a pause. 

“Done,” It repeated, dropping to a whisper. Its voice cracked and broke this time, rasping. There was a horrible sorrow and anger in the lines of its beautiful face. “For now." Its voice rasped, suddenly, went rough-edged like it was talking around something blocking its throat. "Until the next, and the next, and the next…” 

When it looked to the window, towards the sunset, the light glimmered along trails of shimmering wetness that ran down its cheek. Its body shook, and it dropped its head into its hands, letting out a wretched, shuddering sob.

He’d seen this thing murder his real father, sing him into the pond in the garden and then rip out his throat and stain the water red while Ford had watched, unseen, his own hands clamped tight over his mouth beneath his wide, nearly bulging eyes. He had been screaming, desperately muffling the sound, until he’d run for his mother, and discovered that she… she wasn’t the same either, anymore.

She hadn't died for years after, but really she had been mostly dead already, as soon as his real father was. 

Once the monster sang to you, he took whatever he wanted of you away, and only left what was useful for the family. Which just meant useful for Lord Wentworth, which Ford’s real father hadn't been any longer.

The monster had taken from Ford’s mother even the memory of his true father. No one had cared enough to bother to take it from Ford, or Nathalie. No one listened when they insisted their father was someone else, someone no one in the house even knew had ever existed any longer. The twins had only been babies, and they wouldn’t remember anyway.

Weeping or not, it wasn’t a person, and Ford steeled himself against how much it hurt to watch the thing cry. It might weep like a man, and look like one, but Ford had seen it kill on command.

The creature turned away toward the window, its back now to the children spying on it from the doorway. Ford and Nathalie both inhaled sharply as the robe it wore slipped a little, dipping low enough to show that it was bleeding.

Ford felt something cold and shivery-sick dip in his stomach as he saw stripes of torn-open skin smeared in a horrible too-bright red just above its shoulder blades and down its back, disappearing beneath the shining black satin, only to still show through in spots here and there that seemed to stick to its skin. The blue robe turned the blood soaking through it purple, a sickly color that made Ford think he might be sick all over the floor.

There was-

There was so much blood.

Ford’s throat suddenly felt like it might close all on its own, and he jerked in a hissed breath. He felt sick just looking at it, too bright and too red. His stomach flipped and twisted, his heart racing its way up his throat as if it might come flying out his mouth. 

There was blood on the floor, spattered on the wall by the window. It looked like a murder had been done, and yet Lord Fellswooth and the monster had been alone, and only the monster wore wounds.

What had Lord Fellswooth done to it? 

Fellswooth had lifted his upper lip in a sneer just looking at how dusty Ford had been when he’d returned from the afternoon ride on his favorite horse. He’d run fingers over the washbasin stand checking for specks of dust Mr. Keller and the other servants might have missed. He’d shuddered just walking in the front door when the stable boy’s wolfhound had tried to lick at his palm.

What sort of man who could be so fussy as all that could tear the monster’s back to shreds and simply leave his blood running down his body to drip to the floor as he stood by the window?

How badly must all those wounds hurt? 

Not that Ford cared, or anything. It was a murderous monster creature his false father used to enthrall and get what he wanted out of everyone who came near him. It wasn’t even human, it spent almost all its time in water hiding under the surface, coming out only when Lord Wentworth summoned it. Ford didn’t care about it at all.

But…

But that didn’t mean he thought it should bleed like that.

Even monstrous animals were only animals, after all, and this might be a creature of murder but did it need to suffer for that? For someone else's fun?

The monster, standing before the window staring out at the setting sun, began to sing to itself. Unlike the song they’d heard before when it was alone with Lord Fellswooth, this song was neither strident nor even very loud - it was a private song, one it sang only for itself. Its perfect voice did not swell or even rise much. Instead, each note seemed like a sidestep to the last, a winding staircase of melody that it wrapped around itself like a kind of blanket. 

Ford caught his breath, listening. He could almost hear where a harmony should be, if there had been more of those… things… singing at once. Maybe this had been a song it sang with its own family, if it had had one. 

Did monsters have mothers, like men did? They must. Everything living had a mother at one point or another, didn’t it? 

The song was his pain, Ford realized. Winding and circling itself, neverending, a river even monsters would drown in when they never found shore. It was the creature's way of crying, beyond human tears. It wept, by the window, in a way that stole Ford's breath and made him want to weep alongside it.

“He’s so pretty,” Nathalie breathed, just beside him, her own wide eyes shining with tears. Her voice was too loud but his own felt too caught in his throat to shush her again. “He’s so pretty, Ford, isn’t he?”

The monster’s voice cut off all at once.

It spun around to see the two children who had - without realizing it - leaned further and slid the door a little more open. Ford’s heart dropped to his knees as those fathomless dark eyes locked on his. He and Nathalie both gasped as they fell under the thing's direct regard.

“Oh, no,” He whispered. "Nathalie-"

The monster opened its mouth in a snarl as it pulled its robe so tightly around itself nearly none of its skin could be seen any longer. Ford and Nathalie both froze at the sight of row after row of razor-sharp pointed teeth as it bared them.

“Go!” It snapped, in a voice that was not human, that spoke the human tongue in a roar and with a mouth not made for it. “Go away from me! Now!"

Ford's heart was in his throat "We're-... w-we're sorry-"

"Fear the monster your father keeps more than death itself and get away from me!”

The last was a shrieking command, not a song but a singular deafening note. Ford felt himself turning before he could even breathe. The command took effortless hold and he grabbed Nathalie's hand.

Get away from me.

The children could never have done anything but obey.

They fled shouting their fear of the monster, half-falling down the stairs and racing outside until Mr. Keller, who had seen Fellswooth off, caught them in his arms. Both of them burst into tears, there, while the stableboy and the groomsman stared surreptitiously in confusion. Mr. Keller held them, and shushed them, and finally took them to the stables in the hopes that he could calm their tears before Lord Wentworth overheard.

Inside, Guilford Wentworth’s monster sagged and then sank to the floor, his knees simply giving way until they touched the rug beneath him. He bent over until his forehead brushed the fibrous cloth, and he wept again.

This time, he wept in silence. 

-

Taglist: @grizzlie70 @burtlederp @finder-of-rings @theelvishcowgirl @whump-for-all-and-all-for-whump @bloodinkandashes @squishablesunbeam @mj-or-say10 @apokolyps @wildfaewhump @shrimpwritings @there-will-always-be-blood @latenightcupsofcoffee@angelsproject

[distracted-obsessions]

Ok, but imagine Villain/Henchman/Assassin Whumpee being found by the heroes while they raided Supervillain Whumper's lair and they take Whumpee into custody. They don't handcuff Whumpee because they aren't fighting back (either too injured or in shock) but as they lead Whumpee out of the lair, Whumpee stops.

"Did you find them?"

"Find who?"

Whumpee pulls away from them and goes deeper into the lair. Every time the heroes grab them, they get more and more distressed, saying that they can't leave. They won't leave. After a minute, they start screaming out a name that the heroes don't recognize.

Just as one of the heroes goes to knock Whumpee out, they see a child crawl out from under the stairs and run straight for Whumpee who drops to their knees and hugs the child tightly, shushing their cries and whispering soft, comforting words. "Shh, it's ok. Mommy/Daddy is here. I'm ok. We're ok. it's ok. Shh."

[rosieposey-torturedpoet]

Okay, so this is really random: but I see a lot of like 'inexperienced' Whumpees who are the weakest/youngest out of the group

But like what if the youngest is the one everyone fears, I mean they're in the group for a reason

Picture this very specific scenario: The team is captured by Whumper and they are all taken to the same room, chained up to keep them from running or trying anything: and here comes Whumpee (a teenager that's like half the size of everyone in the room) with these insanely complicated locks, maybe they're wearing a straight jacket, with multiple guards while the rest of the team got one or two

Because if you think about it, younger people would have to work harder to prove their strength and 'worth' to the team. There has to be a reason for them to stay on the team

However my personal favorite of this trope is that the youngest is just so unpredictable; not only are they talented/wise beyond their years but you truly never know what they'll do next with all the talent they harbor

Maybe Whumper hates them because at least he can fall into this rythme with the rest of the team and learn their habits: but he physically can't do that for youngest because there is no routine or habit to fall back onto

Maybe they mastered a rare magic form at a young age, or were trained as a soldier

Then think of the CARETAKING OPPROTUNITIES?? A parental Caretaker that shows Whumpee what it's like to be a kid, who worry about they're little reckless living death wish 24/7, and give them a mom/dad that they deserve

I just love young, anti-hero, vigilante Whumpees who have seen so much and learned so many things at such a young age, to the point where they are constantly on the verge of villain because of their genuine desensitization to it all

Which causes everyone to be at least a little afraid of youngest, in some sense of the word

[whumperer-86]

Sorry !! I've been away for a while now I'm back to post new whump

The Fiery Priest S02EP01

Fainted, Collapsed, Drug overdose from bullies

[mintflavouredwhump]

An eldest child whumpee who is always forced to be the 'role model' of their younger siblings while bearing the brunt of their parents' anger and expectations.

[defire]

Dance of Death masterlist

I'm so excited, I just released this on Amazon as well!

It's a dark gaslamp fantasy with a gradually building whump plot, in short--When an impudent young noble tries to protect her friends, her enemies come together to take her down. But she has no idea exactly how far they'll go to erase her sense of self.

Due to Tumblr's content guidelines, this version will be non-NSFW because the protagonist is a teenager. For the canon version:

You can find Dance of Death on Amazon for $0.99 :) and AO3 for the chapter-by chapter canon.

Let me know if you want to be tagged as I upload chapters!

Content warnings for this book are:

Institutionalized slavery, fantasy racism, child abuse, intimate whumper, humiliation, whipping, caning, ptsd, magical torture, suicide, more specific content warnings per chapter

Chapter 1: Low Expectations

Chapter 2: Oh You Shouldn't Have

Chapter 3: So Cozy

Chapter 4: The Stiletto

Chapter 5: She Said What

Chapter 6: A Bit of a Temper

Chapter 7: Totally Not Blackmail

Chapter 8: I Smell a Lawsuit

Chapter 9: We All Fall Down

Chapter 10: Horizons

Chapter 11: Druid Justice

Chapter 12: Warren Raizden

Chapter 13: Ostensibly Torture

Chapter 14: Generous Accommodations

Chapter 15: What Choice Do We Have

Chapter 16: You Lost Him

Chapter 17: What a Fucking Morning

Chapter 18: Hurt feelings

Chapter 19: Unskilled Labor

Chapter 20: Solutions to Slavery

Chapter 21: My Crimes

Chapter 22: Secrets

Chapter 23: A Bad Feeling

Chapter 24: Trickery By Capitulation

Chapter 25: Slavery Is Getting Old

Chapter 26: Slavery Is Wrong

[in case you're wondering, these chapter titles are what Nife would sarcastically name them]

Chapter 27: Clever Lies

Chapter 28: Striker Being Very Impolite

Chapter 29: Fun Times

Chapter 30: A Rather Unpleasant Night

Chapter 31: The Rare Gift of Literacy

Chapter 32: Striker's Other Other Psychopathic Side and Other Problems

Chapter 33: I Feel So Wanted

Chapter 34: The Worst Day of my Life

Chapter 35: Breakdancing and Other Fun

Chapter 36: The Finger of Death

Epilogue

Taglist: @tildeathiwillwrite @mimostic @fleur-a-whump @a-n-j-a-maria

[the-broken-pen]

Six months ago, when the protagonist had first appeared in the middle of the villain’s compound, scrawny and half feral, the villain hadn’t thought much of it.

And then it happened again.

And again.

The villain thought something of it.

“Let me work with you,” they had begged. The villain was almost certain the protagonist was homeless. “Please, I have powers, I can—”

The villain said yes.

Maybe it had been whatever remnants were left of the villain’s stupid heart. Maybe it was the chocolate donut they had that morning. Maybe it was the desperation coming off the protagonist in waves.

Maybe they were just bored.

They paid it no mind.

The protagonist did have powers, but they were minor. The kind you see in small children, the first in a bloodline to mutate powers. Their great grand children would wield enough power to level buildings, be heroes and villains and everything in between. But for now, they sat in preschool classrooms and summoned the tiniest spark of flame.

The protagonist, trembling like a fawn, sweat slicking their brow, seemed to be one of those children. Albeit an older version.

Not useless, exactly. They had a startling affinity for picking locks—which explained the ability to get into the villain’s compound—a willingness to fight anyone, and a lack of fear. But they weren’t exactly the most useful sidekick the villain could have picked.

The villain wouldn’t trade them for anyone else, though.

Their stupid, half dead heart, it seemed, cared for the protagonist.

So, when the hero set out to kill the protagonist, the villain knew they would do anything to keep them safe.

They caught the hero’s hand, twisting to shove them backwards a step, and they felt rather than saw the protagonist wince.

“Violent today, aren’t we?”

The hero was seething, and it unsettled something in the villain. The hero was unstable, yes. But the villain had never seen them try to kill someone before; they hadn’t even considered the hero might try.

They dodged another blow, the hero’s power blasting apart a building behind them. Their spine prickled, and they dropped to avoid the next hit.

“Just itching to go to prison for homicide, hm?”

When the hero didn’t even attempt to respond to their half-assed banter, the villain’s gut roiled.

“Protagonist,” they said between breaths. “Leave. Now.”

“No.”

They managed to throw the hero to the ground, risking a glance at the protagonist. They were covered in dust, supersuit dirty and torn across one calf, but their feet remained planted, shoulders set. “You heard me. Go back to the compound—“

The protagonist’s eyes widened, and the villain knew they had turned away for too long.

The villain went down hard, ears ringing, as the hero shook out their fist.

“Stop it,” the protagonist’s voice cracked. They took a step forward, wavering like they weren’t sure if they should run or fight.

“Go,” the villain coughed, and the protagonist flinched. They rolled onto their back, struggling to stand as the hero’s power flickered dangerously.

The villain knew, innately, that the next hit would kill them.

The villain sucked in a painful breath.

The hero lunged.

And the protagonist, voice wrecked with fear, screamed, “Dad.”

The villain’s heart stuttered.

There was a flash of light.

In front of them, panting for air like they would never get enough, was the protagonist. The hero’s fist was planted against their chest still, and the villain could tell it had been a death blow. Anyone, even the villain, wouldn’t have survived.

And yet—

The protagonist stood, unharmed.

“Dad,” they said again, and the hero didn’t quite flinch, but it was close. “Stop.”

The silence was deafening.

Something in the hero’s jaw tightened.

“Move,” the hero said lowly. The protagonist didn’t falter.

“No.”

“Don’t make me say it again.”

“What exactly will you do to me if I don’t listen,” the protagonist gave a sharp laugh. “Hit me? You tried that already.”

The hero sucked in a breath.

“I am your—“

“You are my nothing,” the protagonist corrected. “Certainly not my father. You lost that right when I was eight.”

The villain managed to push themselves to their feet.

“That was stupid,” the villain murmured, but it didn’t have any heat to it. “You couldn’t have known that would work. You had no idea if you could survive a hit like that.”

The protagonist very pointedly did not turn around, shoulders tense.

“I did,” their voice was strained. “He lost the right to fatherhood when I was eight, remember?”

The hero didn’t say anything, but the villain thought that might have been shame creeping its way across their face.

Oh.

Oh.

The hero—

The villain had been harboring the child of the most powerful being on the planet for six months. A child the hero had tried to kill, or at the very least, hurt.

Their heart stuttered.

They had been harboring the most powerful being on the planet, their mind corrected. A drop of blood slid its way down their spine. Power grew with every generation, and with the hero already so powerful, any child they had would be something close to a god.

“You said you had mild telekinesis,” the villain said numbly. The protagonist half turned to look over their shoulder, eyes shiny.

“My mom,” the protagonist. “I got it from her. The rest…”

From the hero.

The protagonist scanned the villain’s face.

They were searching for signs of violence, the villain realized. The protagonist wasn’t afraid of the hero anymore; no, the protagonist had seen the worst they could do. But somehow, the protagonist had begun to care for the villain. And they were terrified the villain—the person they trusted the most—was going to hurt them over a secret. The villain could see it all, scrawled across the protagonist’s face clear as day.

The villain was going to kill the hero. Painfully.

“Protagonist,” the villain kept their voice even. Gentle. Slow. “I’m not mad. And I’m not going to hurt you.” Their eyes slipped past to the protagonist to the hero.

“Him, however, I will be.”

The protagonist worried their lip between their teeth, and the villain watched as their power—their true power—sparked along their shoulder blades.

The villain stepped forwards—

“Don’t,” it was little more than a whisper.

The villain stopped.

The protagonist slid in front of the villain once more. “Just,” they raised a hand, as if taking a moment to choose their next words. “Stay.”

The villain stayed.

When the protagonist’s attention turned back to the hero, it was bloodthirsty. It spoke of war, and hatred, and revenge.

“You’re going to leave,” the protagonist’s voice was sharp enough to cut skin. “And you aren’t going to come back. I don’t care if it’s because you don’t want to, or because you know that if you do, I will kill you and I’ll like it—you won’t come back.”

The hero swallowed.

“The city needs me.”

“You are a plague to this city, and I am ridding it of you. Get. Out.”

The hero stumbled a step backwards, as if they had been hit. Their expression twisted.

“You wouldn’t.”

“I would,” the protagonist seethed.

They all knew the protagonist meant it.

The hero was halfway down the block, news vans and reporters scrambling their way onto the scene with cameras raised, when the protagonist called after them.

“Oh, and Dad?” The cameras snapped to them, and the protagonist grinned. It was vicious—it looked like the villain’s. “Parents who abuse their children don’t get to be heroes. Especially not you.”

They waited a beat, two, three.

The press exploded.

Above the din, power crackling around them, the protagonist mouthed two words.

“I win.”

[whumpluv]

defiant whumpee who acts like an absolute brat─blowing raspberries, going "i can't hear you la la la la!" when whumper is trying to speak, mimicking everything they say in a high-pitched voice. hey, they're gonna be tortured either way, might as well piss off whumper and have some fun while it happens.

[whumpinator]

Fun things to do with your tiny whumpee:

1: Tie a length of string around their arms and chest, then tease a cat with them. Let the cat bat them and bite them and scratch them, and constantly yank the string so they’re all tired and bruised :)

2: Put them in a blender. And let them sit in there, agonised that at any minute you could turn the blades on. (Even more fun with immortal whumpees)

3: keep them in an exhibit and every so often let a field trip of young unassuming toddlers handle them roughly, with sticky fingers, who squeal too loud, who pinch too hard and pull too far.

4: Same as above but this time with a bunch of Instagram influencers who would arguably be more pointedly cruel.

5: Use EMS! Bind a ring of metal around their midriff and stick them between two opposite magnets to leave them swinging helplessly in the air, vulnerable to any of your intentions!

6: Make them sit as a figure in a cake, getting cold on the soggy icing, feeling humiliated in a ridiculous costume.

Bonus round: Caretaker edition

7: build an ecosystem for the whumpee in a jar, that’s similar to their homeplace. Perfect for whumpees who feel safer in enclosed hidden spaces.

8: Give them a mobile toy train and set up tracks around the house so it can get to certain places faster.

9: Same as above, but instead with various ladders and slides.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

His Word Goes Forth

CW: Referenced past child abuse, some emeto references (brief, vague), some dissoci@tion towards the end, alcohol references, prostitution references. Just a whole load of references. But I am so excited to finally be able to write this chapter and introduce... Gilly's children.

Bones in the Ocean Masterlist

The Hotel Import, Grand Island, the Colonies

Guilford Wentworth the Fifth - who went by Ford and told everyone who didn’t already know his parentage that his name was Wilford Prose, simply a cousin to the illustrious Wentworth name - woke up to sunlight streaming in through the gauzy curtains, bright like daggers against his closed eyes.

He’d been meant to go to the symphony last night and make some sort of connection with a man whose properties his father admired, a man named Hogarth or something who owned too much land and not enough good common sense to know to avoid anything to do with the Wentworth businesses. Ford had been told to convince him a visit to the Continent would do him good, to stop by the Wentworth estate and meet the elder Guilford.

He’d been told to make many such meetings before, and usually he did as he was told. Ford had ceased to be treated as a child and had become just another tool in his father’s toolbox since his mother died and could no longer shield her children. He’d been good at it at first. 

But now… He was only eighteen and already he was tired of this.

And last night, he’d decided to let tired win the day.

Instead of making contact at the symphony, he’d instead allowed himself to be distracted by the promise of further liquor in a dark men’s club down the street, and spent his night in pursuit of new ways to forget his hated name.

He had succeeded, however briefly.

Unfortunately, the end result was that Ford woke up knowing his own name very well still, but with a headache that threatened to split him in two from temple to chin, a tongue that felt like cotton stuffed into his mouth, and a stomach that was either threatening to empty itself or ravenous for food and it couldn’t seem to decide which.

“Damn the sun,” He groaned, still feeling the ebb and swell of the liquor from the night before within him, stretching against the sheets. There was an ache in his hips that he enjoyed more than he disliked it, and when he tried to open one eye to look down at himself, there were marks of red from someone’s rouge, he thought, along the insides of his thighs. “... huh.”

Rubbing his face, he slowly sat up, squinting against the pain. There was a bottle with at least two good drinks left in it on the table next to the bed, and he drank it all, feeling it burn all the way down.It would help hold off the worst of the ache, though, at least until he could find somewhere darker to hide away from the daylight and a draught of laudanum to send him back to sleep.

Then, when he woke up once more, he’d need to come up with an excuse for why Hogarth Whoever wasn’t already boarding a ship for the Continent, to be swayed by his father’s monster like everyone else was.

That could wait, though. At least for however long it took to sleep off last night, both the alcohol and the pleasures that came with the darker bars and the seedier places in the city. Ocean air and warm nights made pleasures easy to find, and there were plenty of people who wanted money to eat more than they wanted their own virtue intact.

Ford had plenty of money.

Although even the money wasn’t really his.

He sighed, dropping back into the bed. There wasn’t anyone in the bed, although there had been when he went to sleep. Or passed out. Whichever it was that he’d done.

There’d been a young man, his own age - what was his name? It didn’t matter. None of their names mattered. Once they had coins in hand he could call them anything he wanted and they’d do anything they were told. Nothing there beside him now but empty space.

 When he laid his hand there, it was still warm.

“Damn,” He whispered, then checked the other side, where there had been a lovely woman. Had the two known each other? He couldn’t remember. Well, in any case, that space was equally emptied, and it wasn’t warm at all. 

She’d left long before the man had. 

“Well… double damn,” Ford said, voice a little rasping. One of his last clear memories had been shout-singing along with the sea shanties sung by the sailors come on shore to drink and whore with the rest. Had the young man been a sailor on leave? Might have been... “If he told me his name, I forgot it. I rather liked them.”

His eyes drifted closed again.

“Of course you did,” His sister’s voice came, warm as the ocean nearest the shore, dry as the desert wind, breaking through his thoughts. “You like them all, because you are an idiot with money and that makes them like you.”

Ford gasped, his heart half-stopped before his mind caught up and he realized she wasn’t actually in the bedroom, but out in the sitting area where he couldn’t see her - and more importantly, she couldn’t see him. Even so, he felt himself flush and yanked the blankets up to cover himself, sitting upright all at once.

“Nathalie! What in the gods’ names-”

He heard the rustle of the morning paper. “Good morning,” Nathalie said, without even the slightest change in tone. “How are you, dear beloved sister? Oh, I’m fine, Ford, thank you for asking. Did you just arrive, Natty? Why yes, Ford, I did, it is so lovely of you to ask after my health-”

“Fine, fine, Nathalie, I get it. Just-... hold on, let me dress and I’ll join you.” Ford snorted, reaching blindly towards the floor and grabbing at the first pieces of clothing he found there. The suit he’d been meant to wear to the symphony, now a wrinkled mess - but it wasn’t like his sister would care, or even as if it were the first time she’d seen him in disarray after a night wasted. He had to fight a swell of dizzy nausea as soon as he was on his feet, leaning against the wall and letting his fingers scrape the textured wallpaper there, a series of flowers in dim pastels against cream. “How did you get in here, anyway?”

“I asked at the desk if my brother was here carousing with whores,” Nathalie said. The paper rustled again as she turned the page, as if punctuating her sentence. “And the sweet young man at the desk informed me that you were, indeed, carousing with whores. I paid him to let me in and threw out the whore.”

Ford swallowed thickly, walking with slow, careful steps along the cool wooden floor to the doorway, his shirt half-buttoned and the linen a mess of wrinkles. “There were two.”

“Of course there were.” Nathalie set the paper down and turned to look at him. She looked like their mother - both Ford and Nathalie looked like her, thank any god who might have been responsible. They had her delicacy, her bright wide eyes. Nathalie looked the most like her, though. And now she turned their mother’s look of solemn, disappointed judgment on him just like she had. “There was only one when I arrived. I sent him away.”

“Hmph. I thought he was quite nice, I was hoping to seek him out again. I can’t recall if he told me his name, though.” He dropped into a chair at the little breakfast table she’d set herself up at, slumping against the hard wooden back and tipping his head back. The world swayed dangerously around him when he did.

“His name was Darren,” Nathalie said, and when he opened his eyes to look at her, he found that the disappointment had become the slightest hint of a smile at the corner of her mouth. “Darren Meander.”

“That… He cannot have been speaking true to you.”

“I don’t care if he was or wasn’t, it’s what he told me. There, now you have a name if you want to find him again.”

“Thank you. Why did you bother?”

“You get on better with the whores than you do with your own class,” Nathalie said, as if the answer were obvious. “And you’re going to seek them out anyway. Besides, I use you as proof positive to myself of something I have always known.”

“What…?” 

“That I, Lady Nathalie Wentworth, shall never marry, since any man of means or with a good family name may be as dissolute and pointless as you are.” She winked at him, and he might even have found it in himself to laugh if his stomach hadn’t twisted angrily at the thought. “I do enough picking up after you, I don’t think I am in need of any other man to deal with.”

“I’m sure you can find a pious man and get to him before he joins the priesthood,” Ford muttered, his face hot with guilt. She really did so often have to handle things for him, things he should have handled himself as the eldest.

Nathalie was younger than him, only just now sixteen, but she’d always seemed older, more second mother than sister some days. Maybe because, since their mother had died - when he was eleven and she was only nine - she’d done all the mothering of the twins, all the hiding them from the attention of their father, holding them in the night after nightmares or when the coastal storms raged. 

Ford’s job, back then, had been to take the brunt of his father’s anger, keep Guilford’s eyes - and his fists - on him, and only him. It had kept Nathalie and the twins safe, for years… until their lordly father had split them all apart and declared the twins were old enough for finishing school, Ford was ready to take over the business interests in the Colonies, and Nathalie was old enough to run her own household and prepare for marriage.

Still.

They were all still far, far away from their father, and therefore safe from his direct influence, his attention, and his damnable monster.

Still.

Ford sighed, watching a shivery little rainbow from the sun shining through a window just right bounce off the ceiling. “In any case, I’ve hardly caused enough trouble to cross the channel and find you. What are you doing here, anyway?”

Nathalie didn’t look up from the paper she was scanning, but she gestured at a carafe before her. It had freshly-brewed coffee that steamed as he poured it into a teacup, and he sighed happily at the first sip. She hummed. “I came to see you.”

“You’re meant to be up at Howe House.”

“I was up at Howe House. I’ve been supervising it for months. It’s nearly habitable, which is lovely, considering I’ve been habiting there amongst the dust and the mouse droppings all this time.” Nathalie finally set the paper down, crossing her arms on the table and looking Ford over. She was pristine, in a light-blue linen dress made for the hot island days, her hair pulled back in a chignon to keep it from suffocating the back of her neck. “Oh, Ford. You look awful.”

“I feel awful, thank you ever so much for noticing.” He drained the first cup of coffee and poured a second, his tongue flat and numb from the too-hot liquid. He didn’t care. “So if you were at Howe House, why aren’t you there now? It’s a four-day sail to get here from there, and you sent no warning-”

“I absolutely did send you a notice, you shattered teapot of a man. You just haven’t been home in a week, I checked when I arrived. Your servants haven’t seen you since last Wednesday and not a single one had a clue where to find you except your butler.”

“Yes, well, he’s the only one I told when I left that I was going to stay here.” Ford exhaled. His sister’s constant piercing stare wasn’t helping his headache even a little bit. His stomach turned over itself and he fought back the urge to simply be sick all over this lovely table and Nathalie’s lovely dress. “... I hate the house. I avoid it whenever I can.”

“Clearly.” Something in his sister’s bristling manner softened, a little. She reached out to lay a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry, Ford. I know this… wasn’t how we hoped it would be, when we were young.”

Ford laid a hand over hers. His fingers felt chilled and numb - hers, by contrast, felt bright and warm and full of life. “We thought we could go farther from him, that he wouldn’t follow us. But…”

That had been when their mother was alive, and they had thought they could bring her with. Neither of them said it. Both of them heard it, anyway, even unsaid.

Ford cleared his throat. “... but if this is what our father wants, we must help to build and maintain the Wentworth name and fortune.”

“I know.” She squeezed his arm, brief but firm, and then let go of him, glancing back down at the paper. “I know. And we are, however we hate our parts, we play them. For the twins, at least.”

“For the twins. They’ll… be out of school in a few years, and by then, maybe-”

“Maybe.” She cut him off. She poured herself a coffee, then, holding it in both hands. Her nails were bitten nearly to the quick, the one bad habit that had never been broken in her no matter their father’s rages. “I should tell you, Ford, this is not a social visit. I was… sent here to pick you up.”

“You were?” Ford sat up straighter, and felt a frisson of dread like an electric eel moving inside of him. “By-... Nathalie, not by-”

“Yes. By… our father.”

He swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “... why?”

She took in a breath, wincing and pressing one hand to her side as the mere expansion of her ribs pushed against the tightly-fitted bodice. The style of the times, for wealthy young women, and Ford had spent more than a few nights undoing laces of young ladies wondering if ‘style’ was just a pretty way to avoid saying suffocation. At least the lower class women he spent most of his time with were allowed to breathe. 

Nathalie’s voice was so soft it was nearly a whisper. “You were supposed to be packed and ready to go when I arrived, Ford. I was supposed to explain it to you on the ship.”

“... what?” He blinked.

"Father's letter to me made it clear I wasn't to tell you until we were underway, but-... but I meant to regardless, just-... I expected you to have seen my letter."

"... Ah." The mere mention of his father had made his stomach try to rise up in his throat again, and the idea of going back on a ship - the weeks of seasickness and then the week of land sickness afterward when he had to get used to being solid and still once again - made it much much worse. He had to swallow hard as bile rose and lean over, resting his forehead on the cool surface of the table and pressing one hand over his belly to try and calm it with the pressure. 

The morning breeze blew in through the windows, bringing the salt-scent of ocean air with it. There came with the welcome salt the faint hint of dead fish, a simple fact of life everyone tried to ignore. You got used to it. Ford had gotten used to it, in the end. But it didn’t help his stomach feel any better now, or stop his heart from racing. “Father sent you... to pick me up? I am to live at Howe House with you now?” He groaned against the tabletop without looking up. “That house is full of ghosts!”

“It is not.” Nathalie rolled her eyes. He could hear her shoe tapping impatiently under the table and her cup clatter against the saucer as she put it back down. “That’s an old wives’ tale, I’ve never met a single one and I’ve been living there for more than a year.”

“Yeah, because you aren’t the heir, they don’t loathe you like they do me.”

“There are no spirits haunting Howe House,” Nathalie said firmly. “And if there were, why would they hate you?”

“The same reason I have such hatred for myself, due to the blood in my veins! His blood!"

Oh, he’d spoken too loud. The pain in his head spiked with his voice's volume, and he had to close his eyes tightly and breathe in quick, shallow pants until it ebbed again. 

Nathalie was silent, but her hand laid on his back, then, rubbing gently up and down. Just like their mother had, when they were young and came to her with sickness. She gave him a moment or two of quiet, which... it helped, honestly. “You cannot help the circumstances of your birth,” She murmured. “And remember what Mother said."

"It is only blood," Ford muttered, mouth barely moving. "She had no idea how deep the ties of blood run."

"Yes she did. And... I understand, Ford, I wish as much as you that we could change our names and be gone, but you know we can’t."

"The twins need us."

"Yes. Besides, Father-”

“Why, why would Father even think of me? I’ve done everything I can to get him to forget me entirely, Nathalie!”

“Oh, is that what the drinking and whoring were about? Being easily forgotten?” Nathalie’s humor was sharp, but it never quite cut deep. He knew her too well for that, and she was still gentling herself for his sake. He made himself sit up and look over at her. There was something in the set of her face that had his nerves singing in worry. “Listen to me, Ford. You aren’t coming to stay at Howe House.”

“Well, he can’t have sent you to scold me about… this.” He gestured at the wreckage of the hotel suite around him, bottles emptied or half-emptied. It looked as though at least one of his guests the night before had left their shirt behind. Or maybe that was one of his, and it had been unpacked… He’d never seen it before, but that didn’t mean much. Ford’s clothing was bought according to his father’s specifications, he never knew of it until he was sent for tailoring. “He doesn’t even know about it.”

“You cannot be sure, but… no, no, it’s not about this.” She licked at her lips, looking uneasily over to the window. Outside, the sun shone in a perfect, cloudless blue sky. The sound of people going about their lives down there filtered up to them. “... Ford. He calls us. We have been summoned... home.”

His heart chilled at the word. "No."

"Yes." Nathalie exhaled, folding her hands in front of her. She looked everywhere but him, and he tried without success to follow her gaze. “He’s… sent for us, Ford. You know why. You know what that means.”

“Either of us, really.” His voice was a whisper, airless. The hotel suite around him seemed suddenly transparent, as if he weren’t even seated here within it. As if it were all a pretty fiction, a daydream he had at night with Wentworth Manor crowding ever closer, his father’s eyes everywhere searching for faults, always finding them. His father’s monster with teeth bared and loathing in its dreadful eyes. “It could be for either of us. You’re sixteen, I’m eighteen, it could-... it could be for you, or for me, it could be-”

“... I think it’s for you.” She took his hand in both of hers again, and this time she held on tight. They looked at each other, with their mother’s eyes, and Ford felt the wave of fear he had spent his time here on the islands trying to escape breaking over his head, to drag him under again. “I think Father has found you a wife.”

The sun shone. Birds sang. The ocean was a constant dull, reassuring roar just outside the window. Despite the heat, Ford shivered with a depthless chill and felt water closing over his head, drowning him in the dark with all his fears coming suddenly to life.

“How-” His voice broke.

He had to swallow down terror, just like he had done since he was a child, and straighten his shoulders. He had to tell himself the world was only a play, and he was only a part his father had imperfectly cast. He had to keep his own life at a distance, and not feel it, or he would feel too much. The world had too many sharp edges, and he must stand apart from them or be slashed to ribbons. “Nathalie-”

“Please,” Nathalie whispered. “Please don’t ask, Ford. Don't, I won't know the answer, none of us know."

“How long?”

She didn’t answer, only looked away. He could see the glimmer in her eyes, knew it for what it was. It made the world feel even more distance, as if he were adrift in a lifeboat, the tide carrying him away from his own body. The escape was a gift or a curse, and he didn't know which.

His mouth still moved, without his consent. Without his decree. It asked the question neither of them knew the answer to, the question that haunted every Guilford Wentworth but the first.

“After I’m married, Nathalie... after he has given me to his bride, and the monster has taken my mind and will from me... after he has me shut up in his house again..."

His voice felt like someone else's. His body was only a creation that carried blood to a new generation, to give his father more power. He was far, far away from it.

"Nathalie-"

"Please, Ford-"

"How long will he... let me live?”

-

Taglist: @grizzlie70 @burtlederp @finder-of-rings @theelvishcowgirl @whump-for-all-and-all-for-whump @bloodinkandashes @squishablesunbeam @mj-or-say10 @apokolyps @wildfaewhump @shrimpwritings @there-will-always-be-blood @latenightcupsofcoffee

[greatgigintheskiess]

Here's a little Hero/Villain whump prompt :P

Cw: Minor whumpee, Child whumpee, bruises, kidnapping, restraints

Everything was bathed in pitch black when Whumpee had opened their eyes. They sat on a cold ground, back against the wall and felt the bounds wrapped tightly around their thin wrists. With the smell of a basement rising into their nose, they wept quietly what only came out as a muffled whine as their mouth was covered by some thick tape. Whumpee tried to struggle helplessly and panic stricken had looked around, trying to recognize where they were right now.

They didn't remember much. Only that they had been knocked over by something, losing their consciousness right after. They had been on a mission with Hero and that was also the last thing they remembered. And Whumpee didn't know how long they had been here.

The noise of a heavy metal door opening with a loud creak and some steps coming closer suddenly echoed in the room, scaring the poor child only more.

A light from the hallway shining through the door blended Whumpee as their eyes had completely adjusted to the darkness and further muffled sounds mixed with sheer fear of the one that approached them. The dark silhouette kneeled down in front of Whumpee, ripping off the tape from their mouth to which they reacted in a whimper. A pair of eyes stared directly into the child's terrified face, studying them with a stoic glance. And only then Whumpee recognized them. It was Villain.

Another almost inaudible whine escaped the child's throat, when Villain grabbed their wrists. They knew what Villain was capable of. Hero had told them countless times how they had slaughtered so many innocent lives just for fun. They were ruthless, sadistic, pure evil.

During their training sessions, Whumpee remembered, Hero used to tell them these stories while they had beaten up the little defenseless child. Hero always said it was for their own good and only this way they could learn what it meant to be a true hero. No pain, no gain was their favorite saying that seemed to have burned into Whumpee's mind since.

And now they were in Villain's clenches and scared to the core. Whumpee already imagined how they would torture them while laughing viciously, only to kill them afterwards anyway. But then they felt the bounds on their wrists loosend, being cut through by Villain's knife.

As if that wasn't confusing enough, now followed something Whumpee had never expected to hear from their mouth.

"Have you eaten today, kid?"

After some hesitation Whumpee instinctly shook their head and Villain handed them some food afterwards. They stared a while at it, then again back at Villain who raised an eyebrow, indicating them to eat. Whumpee didn't take long and accepted the food silently, eating all up.

Villain watched them patiently without any other word. They winced though when Villain's fingers tucked under their chin, forcing the child to look at them. But instead of hurting them like Whumpee expected, they turned their face a bit to the side, revealing some dark bruises on the child's neck and shoulders.

"Did they do this to you?" Villain asked sternly but not mean or in any spiteful tone. Their voice sounded almost concerned. "Hero?"

Whumpee tried to avoid their look but failed as the fingers still held up their chin, making it impossible for them to turn away. But Villain knew the answer all along. They knew how Hero had treated Whumpee. And they knew exactly what Hero told the child about them. So their reaction was only justified.

The child nodded slightly and the hand finally let go off Whumpee's chin. And the next thing they felt confused them even more. Villain laid a soft blanket over their delicate shoulders, their hand resting gently on their back.

"Relax, kid, I ain't gonna hurt you." Villain added when Whumpee reacted with another flinch.

"Y-you don't?" Their voice quivered as their little body still shivered in a mix of cold and fear.

Villain didn't answer but helped the child getting up, giving them a bit of support on their shaky legs.

"But I don't understand... Hero used to tell me you're evil." Whumpee chirped confused, leaving Villain in right with their only assumption about them.

"Didn't you ever think that maybe they were the bad guy all the time?" Villain retorted. "And put all the blame on me?"

Whumpee didn't know what to say anymore.

Yes, it's true that Hero had always blamed Villain for their misery, making them the scapegoat. And Whumpee also had to learn that Villain is no one to trust, that they want to kill them whenever they crossed their ways.

But why did Villain act so caring now? Was this all just a trick? Hero wouldn't have lied to them, or would they?

Standing on wobbly legs Whumpee soon felt their strength giving in. They were so confused and too tired to think about this more. They just wanted to sleep. And as if Villain would've read their thoughts, they eventually lead the child to the door with their hand still resting on their back.

"C'mon, kiddo. You must be very exhausted. You can take my bed for tonight."

[another-whump-sideblog]

Fixing Tracy -- Failure

TWs in the tags

Masterlist

Tracy grabs the backpack and goes into the bedroom, locking the door behind her. She dumps the contents out onto the bed.

There are a few different ropes of different materials, a pair of handcuffs, a chain, and– Tracy has to rearrange it to figure out what it is– a straightjacket. Fuck, she hates Molly so much.

The main advantage to having this stuff is that Molly doesn't have it anymore. Not needing to worry about being restrained opens some options for Tracy. But… Molly still has the cattle prods… and she definitely keeps at least one pair of handcuffs in her pockets…

There's got to be a way for Tracy to use this stuff. Molly made a mistake, there’s got to be a way to take advantage of it!

She could try to restrain Molly. The worry with attempting to knock her out was that she wouldn’t be out of commision nearly long enough to allow Tracy to get the keys and cattle prods and get away, but if she could even just disorient Molly long enough to cuff her hands behind her back…

Oh, that’s perfect! It would work best if she could attack Molly from behind, but she’s unlikely to get a chance to. Molly is going to notice she left the restraints as soon as she calms down, she’s too smart not to.

She’ll probably come downstairs wielding her cattle prod, like she did when Tracy called her down to try and attack her…

Tracy doesn't get a chance to plan any further. She hears the door to the basement open and close.

Quickly, Tracy picks up a pair of handcuffs, unlocks the bedroom door, and rushes out. Molly had already been heading towards the bedroom, so Tracy is able to tackle her to the ground swiftly.

Through luck alone, Tracy is able to avoid getting shocked by the cattle prod held in Molly's hand, as Molly drops it in the fall. She goes to get the cattle prod in her other sleeve, but Tracy gets there first and tosses the cattle prod away. Last time she got her hands on one of them, it took too long to figure out how to use it, so she'll probably do better by just making sure Molly can't use them.

Molly makes a small, fearful sound. Tracy grabs her by the hair. She just needs to disorient Molly enough to get the handcuffs around her wrists. It'd be better to have them behind Molly's back, but that's not necessary. All she needs to do is slam Molly's head against the ground a few times… slam it hard… against the ground…

It always tastes like concrete. Why do concussions have a taste? Tracy imagines her brain bouncing around in her skull like jelly as her head is slammed against the wall over and over and ov–

Tracy only hesitates for a moment, but that's enough. Molly kicks Tracy in the stomach and throws her off, then quickly grabs the closer cattle prod.

The wind knocked out of her, Tracy struggles to catch her breath. That wasn't– every other time Tracy's failed it was because of Molly, but this time it was Tracy's own fault. Her plan would've worked, but she couldn't go through with it. Tears spring to her eyes.

"No!" Tracy wails. "No no no, what's wrong with me??"

Molly takes the handcuffs from Tracy's hands and tosses them aside. Then, after staring at Tracy for a moment, Molly kneels next to her and pulls her into a hug. Tracy can feel the cattle prod against her back, but it doesn't shock her.

"...It's okay. Just let it all out, dear."

Tracy doesn't have much of a choice, she can't stop herself. "I'm never going to see Alicia again! I'm never going to get to go outside without my ankles being cuffed together! I'm never getting out of here because I'm too weak and stupid and cowardly and useless and–"

"Hey, hey, you're not any of those things. Can you take some deep breaths for me?"

"I hate you!" Tracy screams.

"I know. You wouldn't refuse to breathe to spite me though, right? You're too smart for that. Can you follow my lead? In… and out… In… and out…"

Tracy doesn't want to, but Molly's right, she can't just refuse to breathe out of spite, and breathing intentionally off of Molly's rhythm would still be listening to and focusing on Molly's rhythm. So Tracy breathes. She can't tune Molly out no matter how hard she tries.

"There you go. I just don't want you to hyperventilate, but you can cry as long as you need to, okay? I'm here."

"I hate you." Tracy blubbers. "You're just like my parents, I hate you."

"That's better, I'd much rather you insult me than yourself. Better to lash out than to… lash in? Anyway… I'm here. I've got you."

"Stop saying that like it's comforting!"

"Right. I'll shut up. Just let me know if there's anything I can do to help, okay?"

"You can help by letting me go!" Tracy shoves Molly away harshly, even though losing the physical comfort feels like letting go of the only thing holding her together.

Thankfully, Molly doesn't retaliate. She gets up and gathers the restraints off of Tracy's bed and the handcuffs Molly tossed aside earlier and packs them all back into the backpack before setting it in it's customary corner. 

"My life is over!" Tracy howls, terror consuming her. She's never, ever getting out of here. This is the rest of her life. Even if a super easy opportunity to escape comes up, she won't be able to take it, because she's a weak, stupid, useless coward! This is the end! Her life is over!

Molly puts both of the cattle prods back up her sleeves. Even if she doesn't quite know why, she knows Tracy isn't going to fight any more today.

"Why don't you just kill me?? It would be exactly the same as this!!"

Molly grabs a blanket and drapes it over Tracy's shoulders, then sits next to her on the ground. Close, but not touching.

"I hate you! I hate you!" And yet, Tracy falls against Molly's side and lets Molly hold her.

"Do you want some water? Screaming always sounds therapeutic, but then your throat just hurts really bad…" Molly sounds like she's trying not to sound like she's been crying.

Tracy shakes her head. It doesn't matter, none of it matters. For all intents and purposes, Tracy is dead, and this is her afterlife. Escaping will be as difficult as bringing herself back to life through sheer force of will. Can she do that? Is that even possible?

"I promise it'll get better. It won't hurt this much forever, you'll settle in."

After such a dismal failure, what choice does Tracy have but to believe her?

Tag list: @whumpyourdamnpears @watermelons-dont-grow-on-trees

[littlebunnyo]

Imagine an tiny whumpee as a kindergartener class pet. He is manhandled roughly, Stripped and dressed up in doll clothes . The whumpee gets turned in an art project in the hands of these toddlers dipped in paint, covered in glitter, glue, snot and saliva by licked and put into mouths every single day. Maybe get an haircut inspire by a kid's artistic genius.

[rosetyler42]

I came up with a REALLY angsty idea: Been wanting to play around some with Bill and thought "Who of the family is most likely to make a deal with Bill?" Mavis, being the most naieve and trusting one with insecurities about her monstrosity and strong desire to be human seemed perfect....although Bill's blue hand flame would scare her for...obvious trauma reasons having lost a mom to fire.

Bonus: Protective parents. (Johnny would ALSO have heen fun to do! But...blergh.) Drac of course is HORRIFIED to see what Bill has almost talked his daughter into, and Ericka's basically trying to distract him Venkman-Style so no pact is sealed.

I know. I'm evil XD

Bonus Bill Line I didn't work in there: "Uh, Yeah, ya are. What? Your Scaredy-Bat DAD burned himself for that Sunflower woman AND getting your boyfriend back for ya. Aren't you supposed to be braver and more adventurous than him? Huh. Guess all that 'Just roll' stuff was all a lie, too?"

@lovelylivelyv @beanybat @black-ak9 @hotelt-resurrection @martin44444 @serial-serializednovelreader @wingingfromthezing @deathfangirl9 @chytag @kittyball23 @heartsong1994 @ebevkisk @morsobaby @unsung-idiot @cipher-club @genderqueer-bithing @howling-nightmare @nerdalmighty @candyheartedchy @dorykinny

[kabie-whump]

✧･ﾟRipe, About to Fall - Part 9 ✧･ﾟ

This is an 18+ slowish burn pet-whump story with added romance.

Title from ‘Liquid Smooth’ by Mitski

Series Description and Warnings

Masterlist, First, Previous

Chapter Summary: Athos has some guests over. Dramaaaa

Chapter Content: references to past child abuse, master/pet dynamics, betrayal, a lot of talk about whipping and branding but it doesn't happen onscreen, drug withdrawl/addiction

Onthyes does not belong to me. He was created by my wonderful gf @sapphicccici and I have kidnapped him.

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

“Have you learned your lesson?”

Ventis could barely understand what Athos was saying. The vial of nightspill - the one thing capable of ending his suffering - in his master’s hand captured all of his attention.

He rolled over to expose his arm, the sweat-damp covers twisting around him. He couldn’t remember when he’d been taken to bed. Probably some time after he started hallucinating and sobbing from pain in front of someone important. It’d been a while since then. A whole night, probably.  Athos smelled like fresh coffee and a crack in the curtains let in a sliver of orange light.

“Yes,” Ventis gasped. “Please, I’m sorry. Please make it stop.”

Athos’s expression softened, his hand going to stroke Ventis’s hair. “Oh, my poor little bird. You look a mess. Did you have a hard night without me next to you?”

Ventis nodded, not really aware of what he was agreeing with. “Please,” he whimpered. “It hurts. I need you.”

“Alright, darling. Only since you asked so nicely.”

Ventis sobbed with relief as Athos gently injected the nightspill into his veins. The pain drained away, replaced with a soothing numbness, and his world came back into focus. 

“Thank you, master,” Ventis gasped.

Athos just smiled as he unlocked and removed the cuff from Ventis’s wrist. A wave of static electricity escaped him with a buzzing sound, making the blankets stick to Ventis’s skin.

“I need you to be on your best behavior today, pet,” Athos said as Ventis found a glass of water on his bedside table and chugged it, soothing his painfully dry mouth. “I will be having some guests over for dinner. They are nobles from a kingdom north of here, and it is important to me that we impress them.”

Ventis nodded his understanding, wiping excess water from his mouth with his sleeve. “I’ll be good,” he assured Athos.

“I know you will do your best, darling. However, due to your lapse in behavior a few days ago I will have to enact some preventive measures. First, I expect complete silence from you. Tomorrow you will receive five lashes for every word I hear from you tonight. Understand?”

“Yes, master.”

“Second, you will be bound tonight. Not tightly enough to interfere with your duties, of course, but enough to serve as a reminder of your place here. I know you are not accustomed to working this way, but nonetheless I expect nothing but grace from you at all times.”

“I understand, master.”

“Good. I have some preparations to attend to, so I will leave you to gather yourself. The next time we see each other I expect silence.”

Ventis allows himself to sit quietly and enjoy the relief provided by the nightspill, a heavy weight squashing down his rebellious emotions. He had spent the last day and night in turmoil; hating Athos, mourning Onthyes, longing for freedom. But everything felt okay again now. He had been silly and irrational for wanting to run away with the first big strong guard to treat him like a person. He didn’t need any of that. He had everything he needed right here with Athos.

Ventis was able to relax into the long process of being prepared for the evening’s events. His hair was styled, his teeth, horns, and scales polished, his clothing carefully selected from a closet that took up an entire room of its own. 

The bindings that were put on him were more for show than anything else. A long, delicate golden chain spilled down from his collar and split to loop around each wrist, which were loosely bound together in front of his body in a similar fashion. His ankles were linked together as well by a chain that left enough room for him to walk slowly but not so much room that he could break into a run. He could probably break the chains if he really wanted to. 

“The master’s guests are here,” a maid poked her head into Ventis’s room to announce. “They’re in the sitting room.”

Ventis took one last look at himself in the mirror, unable to stop himself from smiling at the wave of pride in his beauty. The garment he wore left very little to the imagination as always. This one in particular was open in the back in a way that very clearly showed off the brand Athos had given him. It still looked bad, but not as bad as it had yesterday. 

The symbol had made a clean impression on his skin, clearly announcing exactly who Ventis belonged to.

“Alright. I’m going,” he said, savoring the last words he would speak that night. 

As Ventis made his way down to the main sitting room he could hear voices that made an uncomfortable itch tingle at his spine. He pushed the feeling aside. They sounded familiar, sure, but he was just being paranoid. 

Then he entered the sitting room. His eyes locked on to the two men sitting across from Athos instantly.

No. Gods no.

It had only been three years, but Theodore looked older. His form was bulkier, his horns were longer, and he appeared to be cultivating a beard that Ventis would love to tease him for in any other situation. 

Their shared father looked exactly the same. Tall. Powerful. Stone cold. 

Ventis had rarely seen the man express any emotion other than disappointment and the occasional flash of rage, but the moment that their eyes met something crossed his face that Ventis didn’t recognize.

“What is the meaning of this?” Father’s voice was carefully controlled, but it was echoed by an audible crack of thunder from outside - unusual considering that it was meant to be a completely clear day. The room dropped ten degrees in an instant. Suddenly Ventis was a little kid again, suppressing the urge to run and hide from his father’s wrath.

Athos turned around to look at Ventis and the grin on his face said everything. He’d planned this. This was a punishment. He’d called Ventis’s father and brother here just to humiliate him, and now he was basking in the chaos he’d caused. 

“I-”

“Five.”

Right. Five lashes per word. That conniving bastard.

Ventis shut his mouth but he couldn’t bring himself to move. His feet were rooted to the floor. He’d gotten to the point that he didn’t mind being exposed in front of others, but now that he stood in front of his father and his brother he was hyper-aware of every inch of bare skin. 

At least they seemed equally shocked and horrified. Theodore’s eyes were wide, his face bright red as he seemed unsure of where to look. Father was still struggling to contain himself. Raindrops began to thump against the windows.

“Don’t be shy, pet,” Athos said flippantly, turning back around to face his guests. “You know your place.”

Ventis wondered if he’d be able to break the window and throw himself out before someone stopped him. He might just be able to manage it. But instead he let his feet carry him to Athos, where he settled on the cushion on the floor in front of the man.

More thunder. Theodore failed at suppressing a strangled sound. Father had gone completely stone-faced.

Part of Ventis was glad that his father was seeing what he had become. I’m here because of you, he wanted to scream. I’m like this because you banished me. Now sit there and fucking face it.

Athos rested a hand on Ventis’s head, playing with his hair. “This is Ventis, my treasured companion,” he said proudly, pretending to be unaware of the tension that had fallen over the room. “Please, pay him no mind. You were telling me about your efforts to combat piracy on the northern coast?”

Ventis winced, seeing Father’s eyes widen at the use of his name. He hadn’t been going by Ventis before he was banished. 

Father took a single deep breath, composing himself. “Yes, I have put certain countermeasures in place to discourage piracy-”

“I apologize,” Theodore cut in. “Are we supposed to just ignore this?” He gestured towards Ventis.

“Theodore,” Father warned under his breath.

“Oh? Is there an issue here? Do people not have pets in your kingdom?” Athos was lying. There was no way he didn’t know what he was doing when he invited them here.

“This boy,” Father said disdainfully, “used to be my son and Theodore’s half-brother. But there is no issue, because he is no longer a member of our family. He is nothing to us.”

Ventis traced the intricate patterns on the carpet with his eyes.

“Ah, well, you know what they say. One man’s trash is another’s treasure.”

The topic was turned away from Ventis after that. He could almost tune them out and pretend like the two men in front of him were any other guests of Athos’s. 

Almost, but every time Father hummed in that one way he did when he was trying to pretend his conversation partner wasn’t boring him he had to suppress the urge to flinch. And every time Theodore gave in to his nervous compulsion to pick at his fingernails Ventis had to keep himself from reaching out and stopping him with a teasing, “You’ll ruin your manicure, brother.”

Dinner was ready not much later. Ventis took his usual place standing against the wall, a pitcher of wine in hand.

His stomach growled. He hadn’t been able to eat yesterday, the withdrawals tearing at his stomach with a ferocity that pushed him to turn down any food offered to him. A maid had brought him breakfast this morning, but he hadn’t eaten since then and he knew that he wouldn’t eat again unless Athos thought to offer him something. Dinners like this always made him feel like a dog waiting for its owner to drop table scraps.

Athos held up his empty glass, just slightly higher than would be considered casual, and Ventis rushed forward to fill it in an instant. He didn’t even have to pay attention to the man’s signals anymore. Serving him was second nature.

"I have never seen him so obedient before,” Father said, watching Ventis over his own glass.

Ventis tensed, but he finished filling Athos’s cup and stepped back silently. 

“Oh? Did he behave differently as a child?”

“There was a period of time in which I was convinced he was deaf. He never listened. What is your secret?”

Athos barked out a laugh. “It’s simple, really. Ventis serves me because he loves me. I give him everything he may ever want and he gives me his entire self. He belongs to me - body and mind - and he does so willingly because he knows no one else will ever treat him as well as I do. That combined with a heavy hand in punishment when the need arises does well at keeping him in line.”

An amused smirk pulls at the corner of Father’s lips. He knocked back the last sip of his wine, then gestured Ventis over. 

Ventis felt his heart sink with every step he took around the table to his father’s side. He studiously avoided eye contact as he filled the glass. 

Father’s hand shot out as Ventis began to step away, taking his wrist in a tight grip. 

Ventis gasped. He was eight and thirteen and sixteen and twenty all at once. He couldn’t meet his father’s eyes, but he could feel them boring into his face, picking out every single weakness.

“How does he punish you?” Father asked, his voice filled with a detached curiosity. 

Ventis glanced at Athos. He’d been ordered not to speak.

Athos waved a hand dismissively. “Don’t be rude, pet. Answer him.”

Satisfied with the permission, Ventis returned his attention to his father. “Lashes, mostly,” he admitted. “He has an enchanted whip. It doesn’t leave marks.”

Father released his grip on Ventis’s wrist and Ventis stepped back immediately, his heart pounding. 

“Sixty,” Athos muttered between bites of food.

No.

Ventis whipped his head around to look at him. “But you said-”

“Seventy-five.”

That shut him up. He should’ve known Athos would do this. The man had given him permission to speak, but he had not revoked the looming threat of punishment for it. 

The rest of the night went by without issue. Dinner was consumed and cleared away, drinks were poured in the parlor, and then Father and Theodore were saying their goodbyes. Ventis didn’t miss the long, loaded look Theodore sent him as they left, but he couldn’t ackowledge it. 

The air was tense as Ventis and Athos retired to the bedroom that night. Ventis had never felt so deeply betrayed by anyone before. He couldn’t even bear to look at Athos as he undressed and joined him under the thick blankets. 

“You may speak now,” Athos said, opening his arms for Ventis to lay on his chest.

Ventis settled against him but did not speak. It was probably another trick. Athos had said before that he shouldn’t speak for the entire night.

“It was an astounding coincidence - your father and brother being my guests tonight. Were you surprised?”

Ventis nodded.

“Words please, darling.”

It had to be a trick. He wasn’t falling for it.

“Ventis.” Athos gripped his chin, forcing eye contact. Ventis barely suppressed a whimper. “Why won’t you speak?”

It took a long moment of silence before realization dawned across Athos’s face. “I am being genuine. Your evening of silence is over now.”

Ventis just stared at him, wide eyed and confused.

“Speak, or I’ll double the number of lashes I owe you tomorrow.”

That did the trick. Ventis would much rather take an extra five or ten lashes than another seventy-five. “Yes, master,” he whispered. “I am sorry.”

“One hundred,” Athos said with a satisfied grin. 

--- Theodore’s POV ---

It had been satisfying to Theodore at first, finally seeing where his brother had ended up after all these years. It made sense that a dramatic attention whore like him would find himself on the arm of some rich narcissist. 

And it quelled any inkling of worry he may have had, any small fear that Jasper had ended up dead on the streets. No, he was fine - dressed up in gold and jewels and lounging at the feet of someone who would never see him suffer. It was a degrading position to be in, of course, but there are much worse fates to be had.

Theodore had never been as smart as Jasper (as Ventis? Athos had called him Ventis. Did he change his name?). But he was still smart enough to pick up the ever growing clues as the night went on. The golden chains on his throat, wrists, and ankles weren’t just jewlery. They were shackles. An angry burn in the shape of Athos’s personal crest stood out starkly against Ventis’s skin. And then there was the way Athos and Father had talked so casually about flogging him.

It made Theodore’s skin crawl, the blatant display of abuse coming from Athos. He and Jasper had always been rivals but they were never enemies. The hatred was there but it was impure, laced with jealousy and begrudging respect and the tiniest moments of adoration. How could father look into the face of what Athos was doing to Jasper with so little care?

Theodore tried to banish the evening from his mind as they said their goodbyes and boarded a carriage to their next destination. Father would be leaving in the morning, but Theodore was to spend the next month studying in Nimbria, living under the roof of the city’s captain of guard, Richard Ventura. He had a son, apparently. A man named Onthyes who was a few years older than Theodore and undoubtedly a good influence. 

He couldn’t let the revelation of what was happening to Jasper distract him from his duties here. After returning home he would be expected to finally take on a real political role in his kingdom. He needed to be ready. He couldn’t disappoint his father.

Onthyes was said to be disciplined and focused, a picture perfect eldest son and shoo-in for his father’s position someday. A man like him will surely help keep Theodore’s mind off of Jasper.

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

Next

@scp-1296 @sapphicccici @acer-gaysimpstuff @morning-star-whump @yeetmyskeet @rainydaywhump @sleepyiswhumping

[paingoes]

Crash Out

Superstition 

hi. this is personally my favorite part so far. hope u enjoy it too :)

(Content: drugs, bad trip, paranoia, psychosis, discussion of institutionalized child abuse and death, discussion of past abuse, blood, burns, guilt)

“Okay so we have to take it at the same time so our trips sync up.”

“I know. I’ve done it before.”

“How much are you gonna take?”

“We can just split it.”

“That seems like a lot.” 

Lorelai rotated the froot in her hand. She stabbed along the ring with the scout’s knife, revealing the soft green flesh within. The juice dripped down onto her arm. She resisted the urge to lick it up before they could agree on the dosage. 

“I think we split half. We can take more later if it’s not strong enough.” She worked the knife carefully through the half of it. She gave the quarter piece to Paris and took the other for herself. She stashed the unused half back into the cooler bag. 

“It’ll feel weird if you take more while you’re already tripping. Not pleasant.” He ate the piece he’d been given anyway. She took her own into her mouth. The texture was surprisingly gritty. Little seeds got caught in her teeth. It tasted salty and earthen. She set her timer.

“Okay, onset is an hour or so?” She glanced up at the orange sky. “We’ll be inside by then, probably. It’ll kick in just as it’s getting dark out. Spooky!”

=========

It was an entire hike just to reach the site. The main road was swarming with cop cars. Every other path was carved through the thick wood. In the darkening light, the edges of the dirt road blended in with the foliage. They saw several people passing through, just as lost as they were. Lorelai jumped as the bear trap caught on the raised heel of her boot, just missing her foot.

“Aaaaa?” She yelled softly, mostly in confusion. Paris bent down to undo it. 

“How did that miss you?” He squinted. The mechanism jammed shut again with a loud clanging noise. It was rusted in places, visibly worn down by the elements. He was surprised it still worked.

“Fast reflexes.” She unhappily examined the new dent in her shoes. 

The venue came into sight as the tree line withered. It was a large stone building — or it used to be. The walls were jagged and uneven at the top, the same shape as torn paper. The second story was gone, along with the ceiling.  Thick vines and lichen grew along the stone perimeter. Lorelai said they were fighting for dominance. It looked like the lichen was winning.

The inner walls weren’t faring any better. It seemed like there might have been plaster once, but all that remained now was stone. There were marks on the ground where other walls had been. Someone had long ago removed them to make more space to party. The only real structures inside were the DJ booth by the north wall and the bar on the east one. Where the ceiling had been before, there were now just rails that lights could hang from. 

It was dark when they approached — and the music had already started. People poured out onto the lawn and into the woods, drifting in and out of the fortress as they pleased. Security was lax and the walls were porous enough to facilitate the exchange.

His teeth hurt. The two of them did their traditional act, drifting in and out of each other’s spaces as the night progressed. Crowd anonymity was a wondrous thing. It made him tolerate the presence of other bodies in the space and the indignity of motion. The drugs helped with that too. Then they didn’t. 

He felt something slip away, some invisible measure of protection he could not name. Eyes, again. Of course there were. People were everywhere. Under the strobe, they all looked pale and corpselike. He remembered a story he had read a long time ago about the girl who only danced with the dead. He’d had his fair share of ghost stories; sailors loved shit like that, soldiers even more. 

He had not expected it to crawl. When he’d eaten the froot before, it had hit him all at once, and receded not too long after. It was fun, if a bit underwhelming. This high had creeped up so slowly that for the first two hours he did not even realize it had arrived. He imagined his own thoughts to be normal and uncontaminated. All it was was just unease and unease and the dead left there too. He thought he felt something shift just beneath his feet, but all that was there now was dirt. He was surer than anything that he was being watched, him specifically. He pulled off from the crowd and out through one of the jagged holes in the wall. Grass grew there. He walked without aim. 

There were enough people on the outskirts that he didn’t really feel like he was leaving the party, even as he drifted further and further from the building. He saw them all looking at him strangely as he passed; he would not learn until later he had been talking to himself the entire time. He would never learn what it was he had said. He ended up by the woods, still certain of something creeping and stalking and watching endlessly. Something was wrong. The dirt slipped out from beneath him and on purpose.

Something long and thin stuck out of the ground. He had thought it was a leg until he saw what it was attached to. It was top heavy, two legged, nearly furry with moss. The sign post was as overgrown as the building it described, but the letters were still readable beneath it. He stared up at it from where he was collapsed on the ground, reading it over and over and over again.

Beldam Institute. B-E-L-D-A-M I-N-S-T-I-T-U-T-E. He read it again, just to be sure. Beldam Institute.

“Oh fuck,” he muttered to himself, unknowingly interrupting the string of words he had already been muttering to himself.

He’d had his fair share of ghost stories; sailors loved shit like that, soldiers even more. Soldiers liked to think there was a life after death. They liked to think the people they killed would stay stuck there in the place where they had killed them, forever, their souls tethered to the earth and stood on display for all eternity. Tales of weeping ghosts and the undead children that searched endlessly for their murderers, reading to rend them limb from limb. Trapped together in the place where they had killed them, forever, their souls tethered to the earth and stood on display for all eternity. History couldn’t end, not really. History ate them all whole. The ground was heavy with bodies. 

“They buried them in the lawn the first few years,” Delta had admitted quietly, at the end of a long night, after Paris had spent hours prodding. It was the most he would ever say about it and the last time Paris would ever ask. “They had to stop, though. They ran out of space.”

His hand brushed up against something dry and brittle and thin like finger bones.

=========

“Whoa, whoa, buddy.” There were hands on his shoulders, trying unsuccessfully to stop him from flailing. Some douche with a tie wrapped around his forehead was trying to be helpful. He heard his own voice, but he couldn’t make out the words. His throat was hoarse and painful. 

“Here. Smell.” The dude held up a small piece of chalky material.

“Getthefuckoffme-“ Paris rasped. His hands were bloodied, somehow.

“You’re okay,” He pressed the chalk up to his own nose, taking a deep inhale, showing it was safe. Paris crawled back a few inches, breathing still irregular, fingers still twitching. The dude offered the chemical back up. Paris reluctantly hit it. The headrush was immediate, overpowering.

“Fuck.” He fell back onto the dirt. There was soil under his nails and furrows in the ground. 

“What’d he take?” A girl’s voice asked. He didn’t realize she’d been standing there. She was leaning back again the sign, totally oblivious to its meaning.

“This is a fucking mass grave,” Paris yelled, or tried to. His voice broke. “The bones are pushing up. Look!”

“That’s a stick.”

Paris collapsed flat on his back again, covering his eyes.

Only then did the two of them seem to notice the sign. The girl pushed off of it, clearing the view, studying the lettering.

“Hang on, I gotta look something up,” the dude said. The clearing was briefly lit in ghostly blue as he pulled out his phone. He typed slowly and methodically. Paris knew from experience that he was having trouble seeing the screen just a few inches from his face.

“Oh. Huh. Yeah, that’s what it is.” He nodded, looking perturbed. “I’d probably trip out if I saw some shit like that too, man. That’s wacky.”

Another set of footsteps approached without rhythm.

“I’m tripping balls,” Lorelai said. She had the gait of a baby deer. “Lol, is this where the party is?”

“Is this your man?” The girl asked.

“We’re all working through our feelings about institutionalization together,” the dude explained, “Your friend is having what we call a hard time.”

“What?” Lorelai collapsed down onto the mound just beside him. She pulled his head into her lap, combing her fingers through his hair. He wrapped his arms around her waist, totally helpless to do anything else.

“Beldam Institute. Where Delta went. It’s where they make them,” he muttered.

“Are you serious?”

They showed her the e-ncyclopedia page. Her jaw dropped.

“Wow. Oh my god, what are the odds? And they throw parties here? That’s…in very poor taste? Wow. What the hell. Wow.” She shook her head. He worried for a second she was getting caught in a thought loop. He made a silent vow to never taste froot again.

Yet another set of footsteps approached. 

“You guys good over here?” A wavering voice asked. Keys jingled loudly. For an awful moment, he thought it was the cops.

“Are you two the organizers?” Lorelai asked, “Why did you throw a rave where a bunch of children got tortured?”

“You’re talking about the Institute? I’m so glad you asked,” The other’s voice was slick, “We did a whole thesis on it. It’s a transformative project. We’re revitalize the space and making a statement on its history. All our proceeds go to our mutual aid fund for marginalized groups. We do it in the spirit of resisting imperial order.”

“Their bodies are still buried in the yard,” Paris muttered.

“What did he say?”

“He said their bodies are still buried in the yard,” the dude responded.

“That seems really fucked up,” the girl chimed in.

“We’ve been very conscientious about the whole thing,” the slick one responded, “I know it’s a lot to process, especially if one is, uh, open to the influences. Not exactly a pleasant trip environment. But that’s history for you.”

“Is he gonna be okay?” The girl asked.

“Yeah, he’s just sensitive.” Lorelai twirled his hair between her fingers. “I wonder if there was a basement?”

“There was,” the wavering one confirmed, “It was mostly cleared out by the time we got here. Very hush-hush. But we salvaged some stuff for the archive.”

Far away, the music changed. Lorelai shook his shoulder gently.

“Get up. I wanna dance.” Her voice was all swimmy. He can’t tell if the interference was on her part or his. She dragged him out of the woods and back onto the floor.

Despite how awkwardly she had stumbled, how failing her walk seemed to be, she danced with a surprisingly fluidity even in her drugged state. The air itself was fluid, heady, warm. He danced with her, quite sure she had never once looked like this before, that she never would again. The shaking in his own body stopped and the headache replaced it. All of it was dull and distant. There were whispers at the edge of it. Maenad, they warned.

Very abruptly, she dropped to her knees.

“Oh fuck,” she clutched her head, “I can see it.”

Paris half led, half carried her outside of the walls. She collapsed down on the dirt, looking all around her. Paris pulled the fur hat off her head. It was slick with sweat.

“Oh my god, I felt it. I think I saw the face of it. It was everywhere I looked. I could feel all the misery trapped inside of the walls.”

For a minute, he swore he could make out a skull and crossbones inside of her pupils. He hated froot. She looked terrifying.

He twisted the bottle open and held out both of her arms. The water poured over her exposed skin, bringing her temperature back down. She closed her eyes.

“More,” she said.

He poured the water over her forehead, letting it run down her face, smudging her makeup. She pulled her hair back in a bun. He poured the water down her neck. She gave a ticklish giggle.

“Oh, god,” she said, totally lost. He pushed the bottle into her hands. She poured the rest of it all down her throat.

===========

In spite of everything, the afterglow was incredible. They’d made it back to the room in one piece. He understood what the guides had meant about the aura. Everything felt soft and glowing. It wasn’t euphoric, nor to the point of mania. Just pleasant and calm. 

He could tell Lorelai felt it too, all smiles in the ship, even more after she showered. They both needed it badly, even without the time spent in the woods. The smell of smoke and alcohol had clung heavily to both of them. He washed the dirt out of his hair, his own blood from beneath his fingernails. The motel’s soap was scented lavender; he was sure he wouldn’t have noticed it before, but in the moment everything felt novel.

She’d crawled onto his chest when he laid down again, angling the phone so they both could watch. Some animated thing he couldn’t pay attention to. The colors were more vivid than they were probably meant to be. All he could focus on was her hair, the way the curls sprung back into place when he played with them. She nuzzled her face into his shoulder.

“Are you upset about Delta?”

Her voice was sleepy and entirely innocent. It was such a fucked up thing to ask when his walls are down. He’d been trying so hard to avoid it. She was a surgeon sometimes.

“I…feel bad that he died,” Paris admitted, “I don’t think it was my fault the way it happened. I didn’t know. But he was my responsibility. And I-” 

He cut himself off. It took him a while to find the words.

“…I don’t know. I hope it was quick. I hope he didn’t suffer.”

The image of Delta chained up and alone while that ship was going down flooded his mind. He squeezed her hand tighter.

Lorelai hummed, “You said it was a rebel attack? Did they say which one?”

“Their guess was Galatea.”

“Hm. Do you think he was the target? It seems a little terroristic for their taste otherwise.”

“They shouldn’t have known about him. All the intelligence just listed him as machinery for a reason. There was nothing in writing to indicate that he was alive.” He’d never had to write any of it himself, but he did read over the field reports. The opacity they achieved was impressive. Critical temperature reached. Damage to internals. Improvised shutdown. There was no good way to talk about it.

“You really didn’t have a file on him?” She clearly found this difficult to believe.

“His doctor did. It was carryover from the institute. It didn’t make it into imperial record. Not mine, anyway.”

“…It just seems like an odd thing for them to do.” There was nothing short of reverence in her voice when she spoke of the resistance. She was struggling reconcile the two thoughts. She had liked Delta a lot. He could see her there, trying to reconcile a lot of things.

==========

She’d had to track them down the next morning — and after that, she’d had to bribe — but she secured one of the large albums they had rescued from the basement. She flipped through the pages as she sat in the passenger seat. Most of it was typed, but a lot of it was written, and all of it was in thick and outdated Latin that she struggled to decipher even as a native speaker. It was the pictures she was really focused on, though.

In some of the photos, it just looked like a normal boarding school. The kids were lined up in rows or going about their day. There were photos of the classrooms and the yard. The next page over, there were photos of the laboratory and the operating room. There were straps visible on the table and along the chairs. 

In the training section, the pictures of the students were spliced indiscriminately with the pictures of their victims. Violence marked the both of them. On their victims, burns covered every inch of their skin. Their bodies were twisted at odd angles like they were toys bent out of shape. They wore bags over their head and chains around their ankles. 

On the students, the injuries were more subtle. Schoolyard incidents. Short circuits. Disciplinary infractions. Some of the worst ones showed scars tracing up and down their limbs, disappearing beneath the fabric of their uniform. In some, the scars were in the shape of flames. Some were shaped like vines. Most commonly, they were shape of electric discharge. Eyes and fingers were missing, even in the otherwise calm shots. 

“Oh.” Lorelai let out a soft sigh. “That’s him, isn’t it?”

She plucked the photo out from the plastic lining, bringing it up into the light. She held it so that Paris could see. 

The picture was taken on the side of a hill. The terrain was marked by large scorch marks. A giant dead thing laid in the center of it, the arc of its long neck spiraling out of sight behind the mass of its body. Several kids surrounded it, some crawling over it, others bent down and poking at it. They were all dressed for safari. One of them stood off to the side of the corpse’s thick tree-trunk legs. His hair hung in a long braid down his back, nearly sweeping the ground. His hand was wrapped tight with gauze. Delta couldn’t have been more than ten years old. There was the same frightful intensity behind his eyes, even back then. He was staring straight into the camera.

“Yeah.” Paris looked away from it. “That’s him.”

There were no other photos of him in the album.

…………

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