#completely ignoring the fact that the drawing was of a WEREWOLF and it was VENT ART

[captain-crowfish]

"What a blatant attempt to demonize and vilify Boxtrolls, all in the name of some twisted, anti-cardboard agenda. As if we don't have enough of this false rhetoric nonsense polluting our media landscape already. What, do you, so called "artists" think you're being politically correct by portraying Boxtrolls as these grotesque, monstrous creatures? 😒 It's nothing but a cheap ploy to appeal to the basest instincts of their cheese-eating, imperialist audience.

And the way they've chosen to depict this poor creature: all twisted and distorted, with those haunting, soulless yellow eyes, it's just a blatant attempt to strip away the inherent dignity and worth of our fellow sentient beings, my family. As if they're nothing more than mindless, savage beasts to be feared. Reported."

[perpetually-jungshook]

Without You: Bloodstone (Part 21)

Genre: AU, bts!werewolf, fantasy, angst

Warnings: language, violence, suggestive content

Word Count: 2.3k

Summary: Werewolves, contrary to popular belief, are usually gentle creatures. Except for a very specific set of circumstances, they would never hurt a human (on purpose). The few unfortunate times when mistakes were made put a permanent dark mark on the beasts and people began labeling them as monsters. What the human population failed to recognize was the fact that they were protecting us from something much more sinister. Luckily, a few survived and the gene was passed down hereditarily until one day finding its way to me… in the form of my best friend.

Link to: Storyboard (reference pictures) | General lore post | Intimacy lore post Prologue | Previous | Masterlist | Next

Loyalty is often as blind as justice should be, as unstable as a lightning storm ought to be, and as misplaced as an opinion in the truth.

Chapter 21:

“Pull them apart,” Munhee commands and I vaguely register the fact that Hoseok transforms, his human body morphing into a massive ochre wolf. The sounds of the struggle are muffled beyond the pain in my arm, furiously throbbing and stinging like needles are being pushed into every exposed inch of skin where Jimin bit me. More snarls and growls, then a whimper.

“I can’t lift you by myself,” Munhee’s voice is obviously strained and stressed, even to my distracted ears. A cloth presses on my forearm. “Hold this down. I’ll be right back. Don’t move.”

It’s not like I can move or would want to anyway…

With my eyelids squeezed closed, I can’t see, but I can feel the blood starting to crust on my shirt, on the makeshift cloth bandage too, though it’s still slick and hot against my skin. New pain blossoms with every desperate beat of my heart.

It’s simultaneously an instant and an eternity before Munhee comes back. I vaguely register her prying my arm away from my chest.

“This will hurt for a second,” she informs me.

It hurts for much more than a second.

She practically has to wrestle me to keep my body still. What she’s doing, I have no idea. But after a minute or two the pain starts to fade and I become aware of a constant whimpering sound. Thankfully, it doesn’t seem to be coming from me. My eyelids flutter open. Hoseok paces in front of Jungkook, both still in their werewolf forms. The coffee colored creature is nowhere to be seen. Threat gone, my gaze slides to Munhee. Her hands hover over my wounded… where’d the bite go? Dark scar tissue perforates my sink, but it’s stopped stinging. Blood is no longer gushing and, while the area throbs, I can’t help but be amazed.

A small pile of dried bright yellow flowers sits beside Munhee and a pastel pink flame flickers in her palms, engulfing my forearm. The longer she treats the area with what I can only assume is some kind of healing magic, the more the tension starts to fade from my body, though my senses are still somewhat on alert. Mechanically, she drops one of her hands to pick up a few of the flowers, crushing them, and opens her fingers to reveal a more vibrant pink flame.

“Let me know when you think you can stand,” her voice is quiet, strained, but authoritative. And I forget what she says almost immediately as one of her palms brushes my skin. It feels similar to an ice burn. I try not to move, going rigid, afraid that I’ll touch her and worsen the pain.

As soon as I can breathe again, I can’t help myself. “Where’s Jimin?”

“Don’t worry about him right now.”

My mind swims. How can I not worry about him? He attacked me.

“Let’s go inside so you can rest,” the pink fire extinguishes as Munhee gets up and offers me a hand. “I’ll have to treat you again in a few hours to make sure everything stays closed- Hoseok, get the Calendulas. You can leave them on the table.”

I take her hand and find myself on unsteady feet. The ground where I’d been lying is speckled with blood. My clothes are a mess too, stained and torn. As I put weight on my left leg, my hip aches and I want to ask if Munhee can help me fix that as well, but I don’t want to be a bother.

I stumble a bit as I take the first few steps, prompting Jungkook to inch forward, but for some reason he stops, looking unsure. His lupine ears flick back, then swivel forward, weight shifting inconsistently.

The most confusing part is his eyes have flooded with amber, and yet the instinct to protect me seems uncannily absent, like there’s something stopping him.

“Come on,” Munhee prompts, offering me her arm. Even walking away provokes no response from Jungkook beyond a small whine.

She takes me down into the bunker, leading me to a room in the hallway on the right. Opening the first door, I’m immediately hit with the subtle smell of dust. This room hasn’t been opened in a while, though the cool air coming in through the vents prevents the scents from being overpowering.

Munhee helps me take a seat on the bare mattress. Her voice is breathy, probably from the effort of supporting most of my weight, “Okay, let me go get some sheets. You stay here.”

As soon as I’m alone, a perplexing thought leaves me a little uneasy. Why hadn’t she taken me to Jungkook’s room?

A muffled thud catches my attention. It’s quickly followed by another. Then a wail. The sound is difficult to describe: too animalistic to be human, yet too human to be inhuman. It chills me to the bone, a more metaphorical ice burn. I scoot back on the mattress until I’m in the corner of the room, the furthest point from the noise. On the other side of the wall- where the sounds are coming from- is Jimin’s room, so whatever is making those thuds… that wail… Curling in on myself, I put my hands over my ears, trying to use my thoughts to drown out the ever advancing, creeping sense of anticipatory fear. At least I have some control over their direction.

Why had Jimin bitten me? I thought werewolves weren’t supposed to draw blood or hurt humans. Why was Jungkook acting funny? Isn’t he supposed to want to help me? It’s frustrating, to say the least.

Munhee comes back a few minutes later with a pillow and a stack of blankets, “How are you f-?”

Another thud interrupts her.

She turns to look toward the source, “Maybe I should take you to a different room. Jimin might start to get antsy.”

So is Jimin hitting the wall? Had they locked him in his room? They? Who’s “they?” Hoseok and Jungkook had still been outside after Jimin disappeared. An image of my raven haired friend flashes to the front of my mind.

“Why can’t I stay with Jungkook?”

The question is small in volume, but weighs on me heavily. I feel like I might already know the answer.

“Things are about to get a little complicated,” Munhee sighs quietly as she places the pillow beside me on the bed and wraps a blanket around my shoulders, likely buying time while she thinks. “Don’t make assumptions about what I’m going to say. Alright?”

I nod my response.

“Jungkook might not want to see you for a while,” she says quietly, ignoring the next thud against the opposite wall. “Because Jimin just… imprinted on you.”

The sounds speed up in succession, then comes another haunting wail. She ignores it, so I ignore it too.

“Imprinted? But isn’t that only after the first transformation-?” I cut myself off, remembering what Taehyung said about a second kind of imprint. Intimate bonding. A million and one questions pop into my mind, but I’m much too tired to ask even one of them. “Never mind.”

Munhee’s expression becomes sympathetic, “Don’t worry, Eun. Everything will be alright. Why don’t you rest for a while? Then I’ll come help you get cleaned up and- and we’ll talk about what comes next.”

I feel sick, nauseous and I nod at her comments on principle. She excuses herself as the thudding against the wall gets more and more consistent. It eventually stops and I drift off into a restless sleep.

I’m woken up by a knock on the door. The part of me that isn’t completely alert yet wonders if it’s Jungkook. Maybe Namjoon. More likely? Munhee.

It’s the latter. She’s holding a tray. My eyes are too blurry to see what’s exactly on it. Had I been crying? No, they sting. Dry. Dehydrated maybe. My whole body aches, particularly my right arm.

“I’ve brought some water and soup. You need to eat it,” her tone is blunt, business as usual. I sit up as she places the tray on the night stand. There’s a sticky, bad taste in my mouth. Where’s Jungkook? She doesn’t wait for me to reply, probably noticing the untouched stack of sheets and deducing that I’d slept on the bare mattress. “Up please. I’ll make your bed.”

I’m still a little unsteady on my feet, so I take the easy way out and sit on the concrete floor, carefully lowering the tray into my lap. Only after a few bites do I realize it’s cream of broccoli. A few more bites and I remember that Jungkook “might not want to see me.”

The thudding is noticeably absent.

Munhee works efficiently, but quietly, making me feel a little bit awkward. I decide to not ask questions. I’m still far too exhausted to be curious. She said we would talk about it, so I’ll wait patiently. For now. She steps back, sheets crisply tucked and blanket spread on top, everything completely free of wrinkles and creases. Almost like magic. I try to smile at my own joke, but it only makes me feel worse.

“How was the soup?”

“Good. Thanks.”

“Seokjin made it,” Munhee says as she offers me a hand. I take it and we both sit on the edge of the bed. I leave the tray and empty bowl on the floor.

“Please tell him I said thank you too.”

I realize my statement implies that I won’t be speaking to Seokjin in order to tell him myself. This makes sense, because if he’s going to act anything like Hoseok did- avoiding me, leaving me practically for dead if Munhee hadn’t been there- then I can’t expect much in terms of courtesy.

It perplexes me though. Is an intimate bond so different than an imprint? The other wolves weren’t this actively evasive when I first arrived at the bunker with Jungkook. Granted, they gave me space to not aggravate my friend, but that’s different. Now, they seem almost repulsed.

“I’ve been thinking about how to explain…” Munhee pauses to laugh, “Lord I feel like I’m about to give you The Talk. Alright. First, I want to say that an intimate bond doesn’t necessarily mean sexual intimacy.”

When Taehyung had talked about it, that meaning had been implied with his playful suggestiveness, but I’ll be the first to admit that it hadn’t even crossed my mind in relation to Jimin. Now it hits me like a punch to the stomach and all the anxiety that I should have been feeling earlier surrounds me like murky water. I try to fight off the sensation of drowning.

“I probably should’ve explained this earlier, but the reason the werewolves don’t like human blood is if they ingest it, they will form the secondary imprint on the human. It can only happen once per wolf.”

It makes sense then, why they would avoid me when I’m on my period. An instinctual thing to protect themselves. Not rudeness.

“You’ve also probably noticed, they get more antsy? Excited? When a female around them is ovulating. I’ve seen Taehyung hover around you a satellite. I’m sure you saw it too. It’s a natural thing,” Munhee gestures vaguely and for the first time, I see a light pink tint dust her cheeks. “Well now that Jimin is, ah, bonded to you, that behavior is going to get more intense.”

More intense? The smallest bit of fear permeates through me. Jimin hardly pays any attention to me, except when it’s negative or critical. Would he start hovering? Demanding attention? Not in the soft, flirty manner in which Taehyung does it, but in the harsh, blunt way he usually acts? The fear slowly simmers into dread.

Munhee’s eyebrows knit slightly, “You okay? You’re usually so full of questions.”

I try to swallow around a lump in my throat.

“Only one for now. Am I in danger?”

She sighs lightly, “That depends.”

“On what?”

“What the source is,” her gaze drops to her lap. “Demons? No. You’re just as safe as you were yesterday.”

So not very safe at all…

“From losing Jungkook and the other boys as close friends? Possibly. Like with the initial imprint, it’ll take a while to integrate you back into pack life normally without everyone being on edge. Will Jimin be putting you in danger? That, I’m not sure.”

Her vague statements do nothing to ease my nervousness, but it’s not like I can undo anything. I’ll just have to live with it and figure things out as I go. On the bright side, at least I’m not dying of blood loss anymore.

“What would you suggest I do? Stay put?” I ask as I draw my right hand inside the sleeve, poking my thumbs through a few of the crusty, blood soaked tears.

Munhee lets out a small, softly cynical laugh, “That’s a second question. You only said one.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be. For now, stay in here. I’ve had them secure Jimin in his room. If you want to clean up, I can go get you a complementary welcome kit.”

She’s trying to be funny. I attempt a laugh to be polite, though it comes out sounding hollow.

“Seriously though, I’ll get your clothes and other personal belongings from Jungkook’s room,” Munhee says as she places a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Then we can heal you up again to make sure everything is in order. Just sit tight.”

Sit tight. Waiting. Isn’t that all I ever do?

✩✩✩♔✩✩✩

A/N: Sorry for the long wait. Been super busy~ Thanks for understanding. I’ll be concentrating namely on Bloodstone now when I have the time, so parts should come out more frequently.

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