#head injury tw

[mickules]

Parallel Lines

---

I do wonder sometimes, if neither of them had become 'Brothers', how they might have fared better. . .

Taka, obviously, would not have been as vulnerable to Celeste's machinations had he not been mourning his Kyoudai. . .

But Mondo? Perhaps without the boon of his new hard won friendship with Taka, he might not have had the confidence to agree so soon to help with Chihiro's training. Deeply unsettled and antsy, newly preoccupied that his worst secret will be revealed, he may have stalled just long enough to have avoided that tragedy.

Did their bond become their millstone?

[gildead]

ref sheet for the recent umbrella event.

[pastelcatnip-x3]

My HC for Spud without his bucket (this is based on my hc of him being a failed hybrid don't ask me where I got that)

He’d probably only take it off when sleeping or showering or whatever, and keep it on as much as he can. I think he’d usually have occasional headaches but they’d get way worse without the bucket. They'd go away eventually but I feel like in-game Spud has only been like this for a year at most.

[realmackross]

Time: April 25th, directly following this thread. Content Warnings: head injury tw, unsanitary tw, surgery tw

"The who's who of who's that? Is poised for the attack. But my bare hands paved their paths. You don't get to tell me about sad." - Taylor Swift

It was as if a movie was playing out in the streets of Wicked’s Rest near a shady dance club in the middle of the night. Two enemies facing off against one another with the goal of death in mind for both parties. And though Mackenzie hadn’t wanted to go there, hadn’t wanted to face the death of another living, breathing human being – even if it had been Jade, she was right where she didn’t want to be. Blow after blow threatening the feral creature to come out until it finally did. Until Mackenzie Ross no longer had any physical control over her body. But she could see it all happening. Could remember every action taken on her part as well as Jade’s.

Flip. Stab. Stab again. Stab. Stab. Stab. Blade grinding through rotting flesh and bone. Sawing back and forth until the smaller blade wouldn’t do the trick anymore. Mackenzie’s hazy eyes had watched every move while her hands frantically grabbed and scratched and pulled trying desperately, not to get free. Not to save herself from the fight. No, trying to get to Jade’s brain. Food was the only thing on the zombies mind, while the real Mackenzie Ross felt trapped in a prison. Only when she felt the skin to tendons and muscle to bone back to muscle and tendons and skin pop lose from the rest of her torso did the zombie and the woman inside let out a loud awkward moan. One screaming in frustration because it couldn’t get the food it needed and the other trapped knowing that something horrible had just happened to her body.

It was when Jade finally removed herself from the equation, that the zombie found herself thrashing around, pinned to the ground with the sword that had severed her leg. But if it wanted to survive; if Mackenzie was to survive, then food would need to be found and fast. And that meant only one option…

Grunting and moaning and arms thrashing, the zombie latched onto a nearby dumpster. With grimy fingers barely gripping onto the green, metal lip, she tugged and rolled, managing to find enough strength to pull herself sideways; the sword cutting more of her body until it had loosened from the ground below and released the rabid creature; the hilt giving it enough weight to fall sideways and out of the dead flesh it had once been secured in.

Now, to find food, but like something from The Walking Dead, the zombie could only crawl forward leaving a trail of thick sludge in her wake. Lucky for her though, there had been living, breathing human beings that were stumbling out of Dance Macabre. Some had even smelled of fresh blood – blood bags made from the unsuspecting tourists visiting Wicked’s Rest for spring break; enough for a vampire to get a hit, but not enough to have them be on the next MISSING poster around town. Mackenzie had seen it at her job way too many times, but tonight it would be in her favor.

“Oh my fuck! What the hell is this ugly ass thing crawling around?!” Mackenzie could hear every word, but had no control to tell anyone to run. Instead, she found herself moving closer and closer to the curious, drunk bystanders. Two to be exact, who had found a sick sort of pleasure in taking out their own personal means of torture on her as they danced around, took photos, and threw things at her. But the joke was soon on them, when she reached out and sank her teeth into the leg of the OG heckler, yanking him down with extreme force, before crawling up his body, while he screamed, and when she had met him face to face, the zombie made his brutish features into something unrecognizable before consuming his brain.

It was the beginning of starting to feel a smidge like a human again, but the heckler’s friend had decided to grab Jade’s sword in his drunken bravery. Just like his friend though, it didn’t fare well. And before he could hack off any other part of the zombie, she was soon feasting on his corpse as well. Another jolt of humanity soon hitting her, allowing Mackenzie the chance to escape from the openness of the back street of Dance Macabre and behind the dumpster that had lended its services earlier. But with each passing moment and the awareness that was starting to come back, the more the twenty-five year old could once again feel and understand. It wasn’t just a movie playing out in front of her that she could only see and have no sort of control of. No, now she was starting to fully process everything that had happened and when she finally looked down to see her right leg was completely missing, Mackenzie let out a blood curdling scream that she was sure would even give the banshees a run for their money.

She was weak and her body was still fighting against her need to be human, longing for more flesh and brain matter, but Mackenzie knew she couldn’t remain out in the open. The sun would be coming up soon, and she had to get somewhere safe. At least until she could figure out how to get help. She was stranded and a quiet panic was beginning to set in.

And then she remembered her phone!

It was in her pocket…

The pocket that was now missing.

Letting her head fall back against the brick wall she had been leaning up against, Mackenzie closed her eyes and started to sob. Once again, she was in a situation she hadn’t wanted to be in, but more importantly, despite the way they had poked and prodded at her, Mackenzie had killed two more innocent people – and that, in itself, was enough to make her heart break.

The noise of the door opening to the back of the club had peaked Mackenzie’s attention as she heard someone getting closer. Sucking in a deep breath and holding it out of fear, she closed her eyes tightly praying whoever it was that they didn’t find her, but the trail of blood and mess she had made in her feral state didn’t exactly scream subtle. And when she thought the coast had been clear from the lack of noise, Mackenzie opened her eyes to find her co-worker staring down at her, “Oh Honey…”

The twenty-five year old looked down at the ground ashamed and on the verge of a breakdown, when Daisy, a fellow undead that Mackenzie had become friends with, kneeled down and examined her, “I’m gonna get you home okay?”

It had taken everything within Mackenzie not to break down, and if the shaking of her body hadn’t been enough, the scared and defeated zombie was quiet the entire way home as she stared pitifully at her missing limb that would take at least two more brains to start the regrowth process. Followed by the decision to hermit inside her house for the next several days, until she would have to get groceries and she would have to answer the twenty plus missed calls from Elora and her friends. 

[actress4him]

Whumptober 2023 - Day 1 - Querencia

This is the next chapter of Querencia, directly following Park Day!

Taglist: @darthsutrich , @inky-whump , @painful-pooch , @pigeonwhumps , @bookworm2107

Previous | Next | Masterlist

No. 1: “But now this room is spinning while I’m trying just to fill in all the gaps.” | “How many fingers am I holding up?”

Contains: dude whump, lady whump, team whump, superheroes and villains, head injuries, unconsciousness, kidnapping, restraints, noncon drugging, referenced homelessness, implied torture, death mention

.

.

Liliana is first aware of a sharp headache in her temple. Waking up with a headache is hardly unusual, she’s used to sleeping on asphalt and hard-packed dirt with not enough food or water in her system. But something in her gut is screaming wrong, something that makes her open her eyes instead of rolling over and trying to go back to sleep past the pain like usual. 

She’s not in an alleyway. She’s also not in her new room at the warehouse. She doesn’t know where she is, which has her immediately sitting up, though she regrets it when her head pounds and the unfamiliar room sways around her. Squeezing her eyes shut again, she puts a hand to the side of her head and waits for everything to settle.

“Lili! You’re awake! Are you okay?”

Blinking, she looks for the source of the voice. It’s Nari, sitting a few feet away with Jamil, a smear of dried blood across her upper lip. And Alex…he’s lying nearby, and looks like he’s asleep. Or…unconscious? She refuses to think of the third option. 

“I’m…I’m okay, just…” She pulls her hand down into her lap quickly. “H-headache. What, what happened? Where are we, i-i-is…is A-alex okay?”

“He’s unconscious,” Jamil responds, looking over at him anxiously. “Like you were. Hopefully he’ll wake up soon.”

“We’re not really sure what happened.” Nari shifts, and Liliana’s eyes are drawn to the handcuffs linking her right wrist to the chain link that makes up one wall of the ‘room’ they’re in. Something about that isn’t right, but her mind is swirling too much to pinpoint what it is yet. “Um…last we remember was being in the car and…hitting something, maybe? And swerving off the road. Then we woke up here.”

Right. The car wreck, she remembers that now. “I-I-I think…I think I h-heard people…talking. I don’t, um, don’t remember w-what they said.”

“Well, we all know that we make enemies in our line of work.” Nari drops her voice low, as if someone might be listening. “And this has to be about that. But…the question is, how did they know it was us?”

“I told you, it has to be Luna.” Jamil doesn’t sound like himself. He sounds small, and scared, like he did right after waking up from being mind controlled. “We knew she was going to pull something like this sooner or later.”

Liliana’s eyes dart around the room, trying to decide what type of building they’re in, even though she’s sure Nari and Jamil have gone over all those possibilities already. It seems like a storage area of some kind, though the part they’re in has been cleared out. The walls are concrete block, other than the one that’s chain link fence with a door in the center. Through the fencing she can see stacks of boxes, and maybe another area like the one they’re in, too. It’s hard to tell for sure in the dim lighting. 

“W-wait, where’s…?” She twists, looking behind her, making sure she hasn’t missed him somewhere. Her ribs twinge, even more of them sore now than the one she’d healed. “Where’s Quinn?”

The expressions that come over both Nari and Jamil’s faces put an immediate knot in her stomach. They don’t get a chance to answer, though, because it’s at that moment that Alex groans and begins to stir. He’s handcuffed to the fencing, too, and so is Jamil. She’s the only one not restrained. Maybe they figured she didn’t look like a threat. They’d be right about that.

“Alex, dude! You had me worried, are you okay?”

Nari nudges Jamil with her elbow. “Give him a second to wake up, Jay.”

Groaning again, Alex scrubs at his stubbled face with his free hand. “Man, my head. I must have gotten hit with something big.”

“How many fingers am I holding up?” 

Letting his arm flop back to the ground, he picks up his head and squints at Nari. “Three.”

She nods and drops her own hand. “Yep. You’ll be okay. Just take it easy for now.”

“Um…” Alex rolls his head from side to side and tugs at his restraints a little. “Why are we in a dungeon and why am I handcuffed?”

Jamil lifts his shoulders up toward his ears. “We…got kidnapped?”

“What? How did somebody manage that?” He’s still pulling at his trapped wrist. “Wait, better question, why can’t I break the handcuffs?”

“Same reason I can’t.” Nari jingles her own set with a frustrated huff, and it finally clicks with Liliana why her being restrained felt so weird. They’re made of metal. Nari should be able to bend those to her will with little thought or effort. 

“They’ve apparently done something to our powers,” Jamil explains. “I can’t replicate or anything, either. I don’t know if it’s something in the room, or if they drugged us, or what.”

“Great.” 

Nari turns a thoughtful look on her. “If it’s drugs, I wonder if they gave it to you, too, Lili. I mean…most people don’t even know that you’re a part of the team, much less what you do.”

“Luna knows,” Jamil mumbles.

“I could, um…I c-could try healing someone? Alex’s head, m-maybe?”

“Guys!” Everyone’s attention turns back to Alex. “Where’s Quinn?”

Those same expressions are back. Jamil runs his free hand nervously through his curls, and Nari stares down at her lap. Liliana automatically starts fidgeting with her gloves without even knowing what’s going on. 

“We don’t know.” Nari’s voice is never that quiet and unsure. “He, um…he wasn’t here when we woke up. We haven’t seen or heard anything about him.”

Everything falls silent. The severity and terror of the situation is finally sinking in for Liliana, making her stomach churn. 

Is he hurt? Is he dead? Are they doing something horrible to him right this very second? Who are these people, and what do they want from them? And how are they going to get out of here if none of the heroes can use their powers? 

“I’m…I’m sure he’s okay,” Nari begins tentatively. “He’s…the leader, they probably…just…”

A loud, strangled scream tears down the hallway and echoes through the room.

[oliver--fox]

Forest Battles- Emilio & Oliver

TIMING: Current

LOCATION: The Woods

PARTIES: @oliver–fox & @mortemoppetere

SUMMARY: Oliver attempts to get rid of a withercap and runs into a mind-controlled Emilio. They fight, and while the withercap is destroyed; both come out of the encounter with injuries

CONTENT WARNINGS: Head Injury TW

Oliver had noticed that something was��off about parts of the forest lately. There were patches of dead grass and other plants that were too far apart from each other to be the work of drought or animal-related (or.. worm-related for that matter). It was almost as if something came, sat down, pulled all the life force of the plants around it; and then moved on. It made Oliver nervous about what this could mean for his trees. Instant death wasn’t something that he could try to course-correct. He had heard about a creature that caused this, a Withercap. Oliver knew it wouldn’t care where it was getting its nutrients from, and the thought of losing any of his trees to it made him feel vaguely nauseous. He had never run into one directly, but he had heard enough stories to know that they were bad news. So here he was, trying to follow the trail of death before him. It reminded him of the old fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel,  that he had been read as a child. He could only hope that it didn’t have the same ending. 

It was lucky, Oliver supposed, that it only took about an hour or two for him to spot the Withercap. It was fortunate that its purple body stood out against this forest’s floor. Oliver was crouched down, mentally walking through his options when he heard a stick crack behind him. He whirled around, one hand on the ground in case he needed to bring up roots, and one on the pocket knife tucked into his pocket. Oliver raised an eyebrow when he realized he recognized the person behind him. “Emilio?” He asked quietly, confusion apparent on his face. “What are you doing here?” They were nowhere near the typical path after all. 

—

It was a hunt that had brought him out into the woods. Not his usual fare — he tended to stick more to spawns and wights these days unless he was tracking a specific vampire — but certainly something worth noting. Withercaps were something he knew about only in the vaguest of senses. His knowledge of fae was more scattered than his knowledge of the undead, or even beasts usually reserved for rangers. He’d been on a few hunts with wardens in the past, provided assists and helping hands, but he didn’t typically go at it on his own. But… the withercaps were a problem, and Emilio didn’t know any wardens anymore. He didn’t trust the ones who hung out in the hunter bar in town, didn’t really like going there. When there was a problem, he preferred to take it on himself. And usually, that was fine.

Usually. 

The issue, of course, arose when he got a little too close to the withercap. If he were a warden, he would have been fine. They were immune to shit like this, designed to be the ones taking them out. But as a slayer? Emilio was vulnerable. And the withercap, who probably wasn’t smart but must have had enough intelligence to recognize a decent puppet when it saw one, took full advantage. 

A lot of things melted away when the withercap’s control took hold. Emilio knew who he was, still, but he felt a little distant from it. It wasn’t important, didn’t matter half as much as the withercap. He had to protect this thing, had to make sure it got all the nutrients it needed from the plants. He’d been patrolling for it when he got the signal to come back, had returned as quickly as his bad leg would let him to find someone crouched over it. Immediately, his defenses rose. He let a knife drop into his hand, gripping the hilt of it tightly. He recognized the guy, he realized — it was the florist, the one who knew Levi (and, by extension, Teddy). Emilio tilted his chin up, eyes a little… blanker than usual. “Oliver,” he said flatly. “Can’t let you do that.”

—

Uh oh. This wasn’t the Emilio that Oliver had seen when the other was picking up flowers. Something was off about his demeanor and his eyes…Oliver had a feeling that the other must have been put under the Withercap’s spell. He had heard about what it could do to others but hadn’t expected to see it in action today. Oliver stood up quickly, taking a few steps to the right. Oliver glanced over his shoulder; the Withercap was only a few feet away. If he had played his cards right, he could have potentially just taken care of it with a few hits. However, now the situation got a whole lot more complicated. Oliver had a feeling that Levi wouldn’t be thrilled if Teddy’s partner got injured, and Oliver wasn’t looking to have Levi become a sort of enemy. His eyes flicked to the knife that Emilio was holding. Was that the only weapon the other had? Oliver knew that he wasn’t a fae because his internal alarm hadn’t gone off, but he didn’t know a whole lot about him; what if the withercap was able to control him to use whatever powers he had, if any?

“Do you plan to use the knife to stop me?” Oliver asked, deciding that it was a way to at least know what other weapons the other may have. “It is doing nothing but hurting the other plants, it needs to be taken care of.” Oliver said, hoping that his words would be heard but also knowing that the chances were minuscule that they would break through the brainwashing. “I don’t want to hurt you.” He bit the inside of his cheek, as he took the pocket knife out of his pocket. Oliver was really hoping to not have to use it, but he thought it was best to have it out just in case.

—

Oliver stepped away from the withercap, and Emilio relaxed, but only barely. He was still a little too close. It’d be better if he left the area entirely, better if he was nowhere near the little thing so it could feed properly. It had to be allowed to eat its fill. Emilio had no semblance of why this was important, only that it was. He knew that the withercap couldn’t be harmed, knew that he had to fight off anyone who intended to stop it eating. He didn’t need to know why. (If he were thinking a little more clearly, he might have seen some comparison between that and the way he used to think about hunting, back when his mother pulled every string and he was a knife who stood like a man. Maybe he was better like this; maybe something born a weapon was always meant to stay a weapon, even when it had a heartbeat and air in its lungs.) 

“If I have to,” Emilio replied, and he meant it. He’d do what it took to keep Oliver from harming the withercap, even if it meant slitting his throat. (He didn’t want to do that. Did he? Oliver knew Levi, knew Teddy. Emilio didn’t want to hurt him. But he would. He knew he would. What he wanted had never been as important as what he had to do.) “It’s being taken care of. I’m taking care of it.” Not in the way Oliver meant, of course. He knew what Oliver meant when he spoke of ‘taking care’ of the withercap; it was the same thing Emilio meant when he spoke of ‘taking care’ of spawn, or ghouls, or undead killers that needed to be stopped. But the withercap wasn’t any of those things. The withercap was something Emilio needed to protect, because he was supposed to. That was all he really knew. 

He let out an amused half snort at Oliver’s words. I don’t want to hurt you. “I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” he replied, eyes darting down to the pocket knife. How sharp was it, he wondered? Emilio kept his blades religiously sharpened, made sure they could slice through anything. Was Oliver the same? He figured he was about to find out. He took a step towards the other man, aiming to plant himself between him and the withercap. “You can leave, you know. I won’t stop you if you leave. Doesn’t have to go like this.”

— 

Oliver sighed at Emilio’s response. So this wasn’t going to be something that ended easily it seemed. He had figured it would be difficult, but their conversations had confirmed it. Oliver had dealt with people being mind-controlled before, but usually, if he was trying to get them to break through it, he knew the person. He would have a way to try and break through. That wasn’t the case here. He knew very little about Emilio and couldn’t exactly say ‘What would Teddy think?’ Because Oliver didn’t know Teddy, not enough to feel confident in saying anything about them. Oliver hadn’t been around Teddy in nearly a decade, and even then it had only been for a few moments. The worst thing was, that Oliver could almost feel Emilio’s bloodlust in protecting the withercap. Emilio was not a small person, and Oliver would have to be careful otherwise things could go very wrong in this situation. He wasn’t really trying to die today. 

“You’re not taking care of it.” Oliver muttered, more to himself than to Emilio. He was sure that in Emilio’s mind, he was doing nothing wrong. In fact, Oliver was sure he tended to sound almost the same when he was talking about his trees. At the other’s snort, Oliver couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. He was well aware that he didn’t exactly give off a threatening aura, which was typically a good thing with what he did. Oliver enjoyed being someone who could easily hide in a crowd, someone that others felt safe coming to. But was Emilio so cocky that he didn’t see Oliver as a threat even when he held a knife? That was something that Oliver could potentially work with. The real question would be if he could get away from this without having to use his powers. Oliver didn’t think so, but maybe the gods would be on his side and Emilio wouldn’t remember anything about this whole encounter once the brainwashing lifted. 

“I can’t leave” Oliver frowned, shaking his head. That would be the easiest thing, wouldn’t it, but Oliver knew that he would regret it if he left and he also didn’t want to leave Emilio stuck here under its influence for who knew how long. Oliver's eyes darted between Emilio and the Withercap and the ground. What could he do to incapacitate either one? Olive wasn’t sure that he could bind Emilio in a way that he wouldn’t be able to get out of before he was able to take out the Withercap, and the same could be said about the Withercap; where as soon as anything happened to it, once he did anything Emilio would be on the attack. He didn’t know enough about the Withercap’s makeup to be able to one-shot it. His eyes widened a fraction as an idea came to him. It wouldn’t end it with one hit, but it would at least weaken the creature; at least he was pretty sure. Oliver dropped to the ground, hand placed down on the dirt. His eyes glowed gold as a root came up, wrapping around the Withercap before tossing it about 15ft in the air towards the right. It just needed to hit the ground, and then it wouldn’t take much else to finish it off. Oliver kept his knife up towards Emilio in the hand that wasn’t on the ground, eyes fading back to normal as the root retreated, for now. 

—

In any given situation, at any given time, there was always some part of Emilio that hoped things would end in a fight. He yearned for the familiarity that came with trading blows, ached for the comfort of bruises. More than Spanish, and certainly more than English, violence had always been the language in which he felt most at ease. He couldn’t comprehend the conflicted look on Oliver’s face, couldn’t understand the way he suddenly felt such a strong desire to protect a thing he’d come out here with the intention of killing, but he knew the knife in Oliver’s hand intimately. He knew what it would feel like going in, knew it would hurt just as badly coming out. He knew he’d take that pain head on, accept it without thinking if it meant the withercap would be safe and secure. He didn’t think he needed to know anything else.

Except… he might have liked to know that Oliver was fae. He was assuming fae, at least, because the way he moved the plants looked pretty similar to the way Teagan moved the water. He could’ve been a spellcaster — that might have explained how he knew Levi a little better — but Emilio thought fae fit a little easier with the natural feel of his abilities. It didn’t matter much in the moment, though. What mattered, more than anything else, was the way the withercap flew up into the air. It was going to hit the ground; it was going to be damaged. Emilio couldn’t allow a thing like that to happen.

If he saw the knife in Oliver’s hand, he paid no attention to it. He surged forward quicker than he should have, his bad leg screaming at the movement. His knee trembled, threatened to buckle under his weight, but Emilio moved around the pain anyway. The drive to protect the withercap was more important than his own wellbeing, more important than anything else even if he had no concept as to why it mattered so much. 

He tried to move around Oliver, intent on diving to catch the withercap before it could hit the ground. It wouldn’t save it from damage entirely — he wasn’t sure anything could do that, given how far Oliver had flung it — but he might be able to spare it the kind of damage that might kill it. That was what was most important now. It mattered more than the pain in his bad knee and Oliver’s knife combined. 

—

If there was one positive aspect of being around someone who was brainwashed, it was that they tended to get easily distracted by the thing they were brainwashed about. That was why when Emilio went to charge after the withercap, when he was no longer focused on Oliver, it gave Oliver the opening he needed. Oliver moved, staying crouched and lunging forward to catch Emilio by the legs and bring both of them to the ground. He had dropped his knife, not wanting to accidentally stab the other in the tussle. Oliver hoped he didn’t come to regret that choice. He was hoping he could quickly finish up with Emilio, grab the knife, and then run over to the creature and then everything would be over. 

The hit to the ground wasn’t that bad, not enough to knock the wind out of him which was nice. Better than the fights he had gotten in that had happened over concrete. Oliver kept his arms wrapped around the other’s legs, eyes focused on the withercap as it fell through the sky and hit the ground with a ‘thwack’. The creature let out a screech, which told Oliver that he had been right about it not being enough for a one-hit kill. It did mean that it was injured now though, which was a win. “Sorry about this” Oliver said quietly, glancing over at Emilio as he moved one arm to place his hand on the ground so roots came up from beneath them, wrapping around Emilio to hold him in place. Oliver knew that these wouldn’t hold him for long, but he didn’t need that long. He also felt more comfortable using more defensive moves than offensive in this situation. Sure, he could easily punch Emilio to try and knock him out, but he wasn’t really interested in pissing Levi off. 

Once the binds were in place, Oliver jumped up. He had been expecting some side-effect for using his powers. Using two bigger attacks in a row was always harder for him, but he had been hoping for a headache, or a nosebleed-something that he could shake off. But no, instead he got hit by a wave of dizziness. He stumbled for a moment, shaking his head until his vision stopped being doubled before darting for the knife. Cursing at himself, he was aware that it had just cost him precious seconds; time that he didn’t have. 

—

Had he been more in his right mind, Emilio wouldn’t have let Oliver out of his sight for a moment. After all, he knew better than to take his eyes off his opponent, and that was what Oliver was, in this moment. But the withercap’s influence had its claws deep in the slayer’s mind, and his attention was focused on protecting the mushroom-like creature from whatever threatened it. In this moment, with it falling towards the ground at rapid speed, the most prevalent threat was gravity. It was enough for Emilio’s training to go out the proverbial window, enough for him to turn away from Oliver in the interest of protecting the withercap. 

And that was enough for Oliver to take his legs out from beneath him. The pain that jolted up from his bad knee was a distant thing, the sort that would be remembered with a vengeance only after the withercap’s influence left him. In the moment, of course, the withercap’s influence was stronger, and Emilio thrashed wildly in Oliver’s grip. His legs kicked out, trying desperately to free themselves before the withercap hit the ground. There was little use to the fight, though; even if he could have gotten free, he wouldn’t have made it to the creature before it hit the ground. Emilio wasn’t half as fast as he used to be, and he was nowhere near as quick as gravity. The withercap hit the ground with a screech, and Emilio let out a cry of his own as if it was him who’d made impact with the dirt. The sound quickly morphed into a growl as his struggles increased; he needed to get to the withercap before Oliver did, needed to make sure it was okay. 

Roots rose up from the ground, binding the slayer in place even as he thrashed. For a brief moment, panic cut through the withercap’s influence. He’d never done well with being restrained, was worse at it after the experience of being tied up in Caleb’s basement while the guy was busy being possessed by a demon. But the memory was a brief one, quickly replaced by the withercap’s pleas for help. In some ways, the mind control was beneficial to him here; being sent into one of his ‘states’ in the middle of the woods was hardly Emilio’s idea of fun. 

He shifted in the roots enough to grab the knife he’d dropped when Oliver dropped him. He kept his blades sharp — sharp enough to make quick work of the roots securing him to the forest floor. The aches and pains of the fall were forgotten as he rose to his feet. Oliver was fumbling for a blade, and Emilio knew exactly what he’d do once he got it. He didn’t want to kill the guy, but he knew he couldn’t risk the withercap, either. As quickly as he could manage, he moved towards Oliver, kicking the knife away from him and delivering a punch to his stomach in a single move. All he really needed to do was incapacitate him. Then he could pick up the withercap and go somewhere else, and it would be fine. Oliver wouldn’t follow. He was sure of it.

—

Stupid, stupid, stupid How could Oliver have messed up the timing? Or at least not made sure to kick the other's knife away further before he tied him up. He should have made the roots tighter before he released his hold on them, anything to slow the other down. Lots of shoulds, not enough had’s.  Instead, he had fucked up and let the other have an opening. Oliver let out a quiet “fuck” when his knife was kicked away, followed by a quick intake grunt of pain when he felt the punch hit his stomach. He coughed, trying to regain the air in his lungs. That was going to be an annoying bruise in the morning. Oliver stayed on his feet, refusing to go down for something as stupid as a punch. He had been through enough of those before that it wouldn’t take him down as easily as it may have when he was younger. It certainly didn’t help that Emilio wasn’t exactly weak, but Oliver swallowed down the bile that rose with the impact to his stomach.

There had been a small part of Oliver that thought that maybe, maybe the Withercap’s hold on the other would have weakened when it was injured. Instead, it seemed that it had only made the hold stronger. “Would you just, fuckin, stop?” Oliver said tightly. He needed to come up with another plan. Oliver wasn’t confident that he could have another big attack and stay on his feet long enough to get to the Withercap and he didn’t want to place all his bets on another gravity fall. With his luck, the thing would survive and have Emilio carry it elsewhere. Oliver had clocked that Emilio seemed to have a bad leg, so he would probably beat him in a foot race to the creature; but again, did Oliver want to place all his eggs in one basket? Not really. What he needed to do was incapacitate the other long enough so that he could take care of the withercap, but with his knife now out of reach, his options were limited. 

Oliver turned slightly, before kicking his leg out to hit the other's weak leg. Just to get the other off balance, before he followed it with a punch from below to hit Emilio’s chin. He just needed the other to stop moving for a couple of minutes. That’s all he needed. 

—

The punch was effective, though not to the extent he’d been hoping for. He’d been shooting to take Oliver down to the ground, been hoping to knock him off balance. Emilio wasn’t unaware of his own weaknesses; he knew he was at a disadvantage in the race to arrive to the withercap first. If he didn’t knock Oliver down, force him to spend a few precious seconds getting back to his feet, there wasn’t a chance in hell that Emilio could reach the withercap before Oliver. And if Oliver got there first, he was going to kill it. Emilio couldn’t let that happen, even if he had no semblance as to why it was such an unimaginable thing. There was no emotional attachment to the creature, nothing in his mind telling him that there was some reason its protection was necessary; he only knew that he was to do what it requested of him. And right now, it requested protection.

The laugh he let out at Oliver’s question was harsh, sharpened to a point like a blade. “You walk away now, and I won’t follow. That’s how you make me stop.” There was a hint of desperation to it, a hint of pleading. Emilio didn’t particularly want to fight Oliver. He had no problem with the guy, even liked him a little. But he couldn’t stand back and let him kill the withercap. He couldn’t allow this thing, with its indescribable hold over him, be harmed any more than it already had. This was his job, and he’d do it. 

It wasn’t particularly surprising when Oliver zeroed in on the bad leg. Everyone always did, sooner or later. In a fight, it was smart to go for your enemy’s weak points, and Emilio had a bright and glaring one hanging uselessly off his body. Knowing that the leg would be targeted didn’t stop the pain that shot through the limb when it was, of course; it was as harsh and as violent as it always was, sending shockwaves of pain through his body and momentarily covering the world in static. Without the withercap’s influence, it would have been enough to take him out, at least for a moment.

With the influence, though, his body fought through it.

It wasn’t the kind of thing that anyone would consider advisable, the way he moved. His leg screamed out in protest, trembling beneath the weight he forced it to hold. He pulled a knife from his pocket, shooting forward with it. In the back of his mind, he drew on old injuries of his own. A knife to the lower abdomen, below the belly button, was a more superficial wound than people seemed to assume it was. There was nothing of import in the area; all the parts that mattered were a little higher up. A knife to the shoulder ricked hitting a bundle of nerves or veins that might see the target damaged permanently or find them in danger of bleeding out; the calves carried the same risk. Anything too superficial wouldn’t slow Oliver down the way Emilio needed to. But that spot beneath the belly button, a spot where Emilio himself had taken more than a few blades… that’d do the trick. He knew from experience that it would hurt like hell; he also knew from experience that Oliver would be fine, after.

So he drove the knife in and he stumbled back, moving towards the withercap again. 

—

Sometimes, Oliver thought life would be much easier if he decided not to be a good person. He could easily walk away from this interaction, and was pretty positive that Emilio was honest that he wouldn’t follow him; not when the withercap still had its claws in his mind. Oliver could leave, probably still find somewhere to grab some food and then relax at home. However, Oliver knew that doing all that wasn’t something he would ever be able to stomach. His eyes met the other and gave a gentle shake of his head “I can’t, sorry.” He wasn’t sorry about not leaving, but he did feel apologetic about how the two of them were fighting. It almost didn’t feel fair to be doing it against someone who was under the control of something else. Oliver didn’t want to cause Emilio pain when it was really the withercap’s fault. However, that didn’t make Oliver feel any better when the knife entered his lower abdomen. He cursed, hands fidgeting towards the blade as he heard the words of an old friend repeated in his mind ‘Never remove whatever you’ve been stabbed with’. It had been said over drinks, where Benjamin; who was in his final year of med school had been recounting a recent incident he had encountered at the hospital. What Oliver wouldn’t do for a drink and to maybe return to a bit of a simpler time. 

Oliver was bent over, hands sprayed around the knife; blood pounding in his ears as it also worked to coat his shirt around the wound. His brain worked to go through the next possible steps. There weren’t very many that he could think of, none that ended with both Oliver and Emilio still conscious at least. His eyes tracked the other as they moved closer to the withercap, and he took a deep breath; feeling his lungs fill up before letting out slowly. He dropped down to the ground, grunting in pain as his stomach flared with pain at the movement. He laid his free hand on the ground and focused as roots rose; working to wrap around Emilio’s ankles and trip him up and pull him to the ground. Oliver kept his concentration up as he walked over, not wanting a repeat of last time. He carefully moved, but was almost relieved to see that the fall had, finally, knocked the other out. He tapped the other’s cheek, just to make sure, before releasing the hold on the roots. 

Oliver’s vision darkened momentarily as he stood up; a mix of a head rush and the overuse of his powers. At this point, he couldn’t tell what was from the fight and what wasn’t. The blood he could taste on his lips was from his nose was new though. He moved towards the withercap, refusing to waste time by trying to bring the knife that he had lost. Even though Benjamin’s warning played in his ears, he pulled the knife out of his abdomen; using it to stab the withercap. Doing so caused a new wave of pain to wash over him, and he nearly toppled over; almost missing the withercap completely. He had to blink several times to have the two withercaps in front of him return to just one. Oliver stabbed it several times until he was sure it was dead, and maybe one or two more times after that. He sat there for a few moments after, just catching his breath. Oliver's eyes fell back on Emilio and he sighed before standing again; groaning as he did. It wouldn’t be fair to just leave the guy there after all. 

He moved, using the same knife to cut Emilio out of the roots before carefully dragging him to a nearby tree to rest against. Oliver would have much rather carried the guy, but he wasn’t confident that he wouldn’t pass out and he didn’t want to cause more injuries for the other if he could help it. He wiped the knife on his jeans before leaving it next to Emilio. It had been his after all. Oliver closed his eyes, hand over his wound. It didn’t feel too deep, but he also knew that his healing powers hadn’t been as effective as they once had been. Oliver was pretty sure he had a sewing kit at home that he could use to fix it, but looking at Emilio’s sleeping form also reminded him about the possible pain that he had coming from Levi about the whole situation. Maybe if he got to them first, then Levi would understand. Oliver also felt like Levi probably had some first aid stuff at their house. Oliver hissed as he stood again, before making his way out of the area; using the trees for support as he did. 

—

Oliver doubled over just as Emilio had intended for him to. The churning of guilt in his gut was faint, farther away than it would have been without the withercap’s control wrapped around him. He wasted a few seconds to pat Oliver on the shoulder and murmur, “Just a flesh wound. Be fine when the bleeding stops,” before turning back towards the withercap. He needed to scoop it up and get out of here now, before Oliver recovered. He could carry it off into the woods someplace, far away from anyone else and where it would have plenty of sustenance. He could stay with it for as long as it needed him to. Teddy would worry, but it’d be fine. The withercap was important. Emilio had to make sure no one else came around looking to kill it. 

So focused on this mantra of protect, protect, protect, he didn’t recognize the way Oliver was moving behind him. He’d figured the other man, with no stake left in the fight and his blood coating his hands, would give in pretty quickly now. The withercap would be moved; Emilio would leave with it. Oliver could go home, slap a bandage on that wound, and go about his day. He wasn’t expecting more roots to tangle him up, wasn’t expecting the ground to rise to meet him. He twisted and flailed, but it was too late. His head smacked against the hard ground, and everything faded into black.

He was utterly unaware of the withercap’s death; the hold broke the moment the creature died, but without consciousness allowing him to feel it, Emilio wouldn’t know until awakening. He was unaware, too, of Oliver cutting away the roots that bound him or of the way the other man moved his unconscious form into a more comfortable position. Had he been awake for it, he might have insisted it an unnecessary action to take. Out cold, though, he was uncharacteristically pliable, his face far more relaxed than it was capable of being when he was the one in control of its muscles. 

By the time he finally woke up, the sun had started to set and Oliver was long gone. His head ached, his bad leg screamed in protest of the careless way he’d used it during the fight. His mouth felt dry, body ached. He remembered the fight, but felt as if he’d been watching it rather than participating. Wincing, he forced himself to his feet, glancing down at the blood on his hands. Shit. He made a mental note to buy Oliver a drink or something in apology, stretching his back. In the meantime… he needed a drink himself. Maybe ten. Collecting his knife, Emilio sighed and headed home.

[eggvlyn]

commission work!

[IMAGE ID: A troll man named Augustus is kneeling down with his blazer jacket slung over his left shoulder while looking at a dead body in a dark messy alley way. Augustus has grayish purple skin, light ash blond hair, and has a large muscular body type. He has grey curved horns, brown eyes, and scarification on his forearms that depict maui hooks with the rope scarring around his forearms. His fists have protrusions covered in metal with fresh blood splattered on them. He is wearing a stained white button up with a amour vest, grey slacks, and goggles.  END ID]  

[mewintheflesh-2]

Writing depicting blood and major head injury under the cut!

Hi :)

One of the many writings of which I will never post the full version of

[raccoon-in-a-dumpster]

here's some evan doodles! ooogh he loves his stuffies

[nerdyqueerandjewish]

You know how I mentioned my death anxiety a few days ago because people keep dying? Just found out my stepmom’s brother unexpectedly died and he was in his mid 40s. He hit his head and got a concussion, and went to take a nap, and that was it. Which�� sounds peaceful at least, but still makes me so anxious because my partner is still recovering from his tbi and it is one of those things that could happen to anyone

[mickules]

An alternate epilogue for A House Made of Cards

A Breach of Trust might be @phantomrose96 's best known mp100 fanfic, but A House Made of Cards is such a solid punch to the gut, I often find myself returning to it. The slowly mounting dread when you realise exactly what is being going on, just enough to haunt you, and your imagination supplies the rest.

But, I'm a baby, and because where the fic leaves off is agonising, I had to indulge in a little alternate post-script, exploring a different possibility.

The actual fic is not so kind . . .

[gildead]

Gold tried to finish the soup. He really did.

But with how his stomach (or lack thereof) was at the moment, there was only so much he could take. At the very least, it gave him an excuse to slip off to one of the bathrooms within the dam.

He doesn't know how long he's been staring at his own reflection in that mirror, trying to recognize himself in the sunken features and deep dark bags under his eyes. His sleeves quake as he grips the sink with them, trying to stop himself from shaking. Even in his clothes, he's still so cold.

Cautiously, Gold raises a sleeve to the top of his head.

It's weird, really. He's never considered himself a vain person in life or death, even when spending half an hour in the morning trying to get his bangs to frame his face perfectly. Now, with only the faintest hint of black stubble peeking through pale scalp, he feels exposed. Like something less than human. Sure, he could put his hat on and act like nothing's changed, but even then the sensation of cotton and canvas against bare skin feels utterly wrong.

Not to mention the giant, inflamed ugly scar spanning across his head from where Wesker opened his brain up. The damn thing's taking ages to close up and scab over, and it itches.

He regrets even looking at himself. Even humoring the idea of seeing the damage done to him with his own sockets. People are going to notice he's slipped off at this point. They're probably going to check on him any moment now. Ask him if he's doing okay, as if the answer wasn't an obvious no--

The tears start coming. And they don't stop coming.

[nugget-creates-things]

‼️TW: BLOOD & HEAD INJURY‼️

Hehe OC Angst :)

[lietwice]

wishlist thing. amnesia threads.

specifically, threads where garak has amnesia for whatever reason, and is extremely disturbed when he attempts to lie and obfuscate and it's immediately picked up on by the pretty doctor treating him.

if he loses his memories of the last few years, then he assumes he's still an agent, and therefore has no real connections with anyone. imagine his shock to discover that he has friends and a genuine relationship, and that these people know him well enough to predict what he's going to do, when he slips right into his 'i'm a spy and just woke up in an unfamiliar, potentially enemy location' mode. he'll be so annoyed that none of his tricks work!!!

[oftatteredwings]

⸻  LUKE PASQUALINO. HE/HIM / have you ever heard of SORRY FOR PARTY ROCKING by lmfao, well, it describes MATTEO ‘MATTY’ DE LUCA to a tee! the thirty-one year-old, and PARTY PLANNER was spotted browsing through the stalls at portobello road market last sunday, do you know them? would you say HE is more cocky or more FUN-LOVING instead? anyway, they remind me of hiding a hangover behind a pair of sunnies, a phone that never stops pinging, lazy sundays with a takeaway and the faint scent of cypress & grapevine jo malone cologne, maybe you’ll bump into them soon!

time in notting hill ; 5 years.

tw: accident, head injury, death, drugs

ABOUT.

Name: Matteo De Luca Nicknames: Matty Age: Thirty-one Date of Birth: 27th August 1991 Birthplace: Sicily, Italy Occupation: Party Planner Romantic/sexual orientation: Panromantic/pansexual

Matteo grew up as an only child in Sicily, Italy, doted on by his parents and basically running riot because they let him. It was clear from the word go that he was never going to be a quiet child.

By the time he was eight and he was making quite the same for himself ( not in a good way either ), his father had picked up a new job, which meant a move a little further north, heading to London.

He wasn’t a fan of their new home, but within the space of a year he was making more of an effort to speak fluent English and finally beginning to make friends. Unsure how to go about that at first, his birthday party turned into something that drew the kids in. Even at nine, he had big plans, plans that only got bigger by the year. It was a surprise to no one when it turned into his career after school.

When he reached high school and his later years, he very quickly became known as the one to go to if you wanted a good time. Especially so when he hit sixth form.

He also seemed to be very good at leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. Homes, school, relationships... attempted ones at least. He wasn’t too good at sticking around. The term man-whore could have been coined with Matty in mind.

Destruction became disaster when he was twenty and one party got completely out of hand, his partner at the time tripped and fell on a marble flight of stairs, splitting their head open and passing away four hours later.

He tuned out after that for a while.

Parties may have been his thing, but they were where he lost himself, intoxicated and drug fuelled, out all night long and barely ever sleeping.

It took a couple of years to find himself again. With the help of a few people he’d known during primary school that he happened to bump into again.

Now’s he’s back to full positivity, spending his days organising amazing parties for people, adults and children alike; spending his nights hopping in and out of strangers beds —- so maybe not full positivity. He doesn’t have it in him just yet to move on from what happened, at least not with his heart.

WANTED CONNECTIONS.

- primary school friends that helped him out. - fwb/hook-ups/one night stands. - party clients. - good friends. - partying friends.

[actress4him]

Whumptober 2023 - Day 22 - Modern Brumaria

This is probably the future of the Soldier Boy AU, or any other universe with gang!Kamaria. Also it's much longer than my other Whumptober fills because I'd already been working on it before Whumptober. Bruno belongs to Izzy and is used with her blessing!

Taglist: @painful-pooch , @sssunshinebreeze

Masterlist

No. 22: Vehicular Accident

Contains: lady whump, broken bones, dislocation, mild gore, head injury, referenced panic attack, referenced trauma, hospital mention, kidnapping mention, delirium, whipping mention, romance

.

.

This day has completely sucked. Well, it started out normally enough, but then she’d been triggered in the grocery store of all places when she saw a bald white man who reminded her of Roderick. And trying to hold the panic inside because she was in public just made the fallout ten times worse when she finally gave in. Always does, as Bruno likes to point out. Never stops her, though, she’s too stubborn for her own good - another bit of Bruno wisdom that he needs to turn on himself.

He and Shadi have tried their best to make the rest of the afternoon not suck, they really have. But come evening, Kamaria is still feeling off. She needs air. She needs to just not think for a while, which is what she tells her husband as she slips into her leather jacket and boots and straps her knife to her hip. 

“Be careful, love.” He kisses her forehead, then her cheek, concern etched into his handsome features. “And call if you need anything.”

“I will.” She’s not sure who looks more pitiful, Bruno or Shadi, as they watch her reach for the door. She gives one a smile and one a scratch behind the ear, then heads to the garage. 

The rumble of her bike underneath her automatically eases a little of the tension in her shoulders. Driving it far too fast, zipping around curves and past cars with the landscape flying by in too much of a blur to decipher, is even better. All of her concentration has to go into handling the bike. She doesn’t have any time to think about anything else. 

Once she’s way out of town and her mind isn’t so much of a swirling mess, she slows down and sits up straighter, raising her visor so that the wind can hit her skin. It’s nearing dark, and the roads out here are practically empty. Her thoughts slowly move back toward the grocery store, to Roderick and the feeling of being caught doing something she shouldn’t be that had overwhelmed her in that moment, but it doesn’t bring the same buzzing sensation beneath her skin as earlier. 

What would the real Roderick actually think, if he could see her living this life, going out and buying groceries whenever she needs them instead of living off of stolen goods, peaceful and happy with a husband and two dogs and a house of their own and absolutely no one to punish them for their mistakes?

He’d hate it, that’s for sure. But he’s not around anymore, so what he thinks doesn’t matter.

She’s getting closer to being ready to go back home, but before she’s made up her mind to actually turn around, a rumble of thunder sounds above the motorcycle‘s engine. Kamaria glances up at the sky. While she was lost in thought, dark clouds had rolled in, looming heavily overhead. 

Guess that’s my cue.

Checking for oncoming traffic, she U-turns and starts back toward home, picking up her speed just a bit. Fat drops of rain plop loudly onto her helmet. Within seconds, they’ve turned smaller and more and more frequent, until she’s being pelted in the face and has to use one hand to slam her visor back shut. The road is already soaked, so she keeps her pace around the speed limit. 

A few minutes into the trip, headlights are reflecting in her mirrors. They’re too bright to see what kind of car it is, but whoever’s driving is clearly impatient, coming up close behind her and hovering. Kamaria just rolls her eyes and resists the urge to slow down even more. There’s no one else anywhere around, just the two of them, the wet road, and the trees, so it’s not like they can’t pass her if they’re that desperate. 

Which they do, though not before tailing her long enough to make sure she understands their aggravation. Engine revving, the car pulls into the oncoming lane and comes flying by. She doesn’t even have time to react to slow down and let them get back into the lane. Just before they’ve fully passed her, they swerve back over, clipping the front of her bike with their back bumper. 

Her front wheel immediately dives to the side. She jerks the handlebars hard back into place, but there’s not enough traction on the slippery road. In the blink of an eye she’s spinning out, careening toward the edge of the road and the trees. 

The motorcycle tips as it reaches the grass. Her leg hits the ground first, pinned underneath the body of the bike, followed swiftly by the rest of her, head rattling inside her helmet as it slams into the pavement. That’s not the end of it, though. The bike is falling, dragging her with it, off the side of the road and down the steep embankment. It slams into a tree and she finally tumbles free from it, but by then it’s too late. She can’t stop. She’s rolling, violently, hitting trees, flipping, and rolling some more, everything a blur of brown and green and pain. Somewhere along the way she loses her helmet. 

By the time she comes to a stop, she’s lost consciousness, as well.

…

It’s unclear how much time has passed when she wakes. She’s barely even aware that she was unconscious at all, only that she opens her eyes to a dark canopy of trees overhead and rain dripping in her face. Wincing and blinking it away, she tries to turn her head to the side and is met with blinding pain shooting streaks of lightning through her vision. 

It takes a moment before she can see straight and breathe again. Moving very, very slowly this time, she cranes her neck to look back up the hill toward the road…the road that isn’t in sight at all. She fell a long way. She can’t see her bike, either, so she can only hope that it’s somewhere up top, still visible to passersby. 

Coaxing the arm that hurts the least into motion, she fumbles for her pocket. Empty. No phone, of course, that would make this far too easy. 

Okay, she needs to take stock of her body. Obviously her head is in bad shape, she probably hit it on a tree after losing her helmet. With the same hand, she reaches up and gently prods a wet, sticky patch on the back of her skull, gritting her teeth at the pain that responds. 

The arm she’s using is in a familiar bit of pain, itself, though it takes more thought than it should to pinpoint why. Dislocated shoulder. Of course, that was to be expected. Her shoulders have been dislocated so many times in her life that it takes very little to do it again. The other arm is worse, though, it feels broken. With a bit of support from the dislocated left arm, she picks up the right so that she can see it, holding her breath against the pain. 

Oh. Yep, that’s definitely broken. In a bloody, something is sticking out through her jacket sleeve kind of way. Right. She carefully sets it back down. There’s nothing she can do about it right now. 

Her left hip hurts, too, where she landed on it when the bike tipped, but she doesn’t bother trying to move it or look at it. As far as she can tell, those few things are the worst. Everything else on her hurts, but it feels like scrapes and bruises, not broken bones. 

It’s been a really long time since she was in this amount of pain. She isn’t used to it anymore. But that doesn’t really matter, does it? Not when she’s stuck in the bottom of a gulley with no phone and no one who knows where to find her. She highly doubts that the car stuck around to call for help. She needs to pull herself out of this situation, just like the old days, which means she’s going to have to embrace the pain again. 

Slowly, though. This is one of the worst head injuries she’s ever had, and if she gets too eager she’ll just knock herself back out. 

Inch by inch, Kamaria pushes herself up onto her left hand and the unbroken part of her right arm, stopping to breathe through her teeth and let the forest swirl around her after every movement. With one last heave, she’s sitting upright, clutching the sides of her head and squeezing her eyes shut. 

Halfway there. Now she just needs to stand. 

Her right leg seems to be in fairly decent shape - minus the long, bloody scrape she can now see on her thigh that tore right through her jeans - so she puts most of her weight onto it. She’s trying to move slowly, but it’s leaving her in awkward positions and she keeps almost losing her balance. Part of her wants to give up and collapse. Somehow, though, with the support of a nearby tree, she fights through the dizziness and pain and makes it to her feet. 

It’s a really, really long way up to the road.

Her first step onto her left leg is nearly her only step. Fire shoots through her hip, she instinctively jerks in response, and her vision fills with lightning again. But she manages to fall into the tree trunk and stay upright, clinging desperately and gritting her teeth until the worst of it passes.

She has to do this. No one is coming to help her. Not because there’s no one who cares, not anymore, but Bruno won’t have any idea where to find her once he realizes that something is wrong. It’s all up to her.

With that in mind, she pushes onward, keeping her weight off a hip that’s likely broken as much as she can, and grabbing onto branches and trunks whenever they’re available to pull herself along. They aren’t available nearly as often as she needs. 

But she’s dealt with worse than this before, right? She can’t think of any specific examples at the moment, but that’s probably just the concussion messing with her. There was the stabbing incident. That didn’t involve broken bones or head injuries, but it did involve a lot of blood loss and trying to get back to base without passing out. She survived that, she can survive this, too. She has to. Back then, all the incentive she had for making it was continuing her path of revenge. Now she has a husband, a home, a real life and someone who loves her and needs her as much as she does him. She can’t let him down. 

Each step is agony. Her vision cuts in and out, her whole body throbbing. She has no idea how far she’s actually made it, only that it seems like the road should be much, much closer by now than it actually is. It doesn’t look like it’s gotten any closer at all. Maybe that’s just the rain pouring down her face messing with her perception, though. 

She takes another step, reaches for a branch hanging just in front of her. It’s farther than it looks, though. Her fingers just brush the leaves as her foot slips on the mud and wet brush beneath her, and suddenly she’s falling. 

She feels every bit of pain when her body hits the ground, but she’s unconscious before she has the chance to scream.

…

She’s been gone too long. 

Bruno tries to give her the space she needs on days like this, he really does, which is why he didn’t protest her going out on her own or start worrying too much when the rain began. Even when the rain kept pouring and there was still no sign of her, he reasoned that she must have found someplace to stop and wait it out. 

But she didn’t call. Didn’t text. And when he finally gave in and texted her, checking in just to make sure she was alright, she didn’t answer. Never even opened the text, in fact. 

Which would make sense if she had given up on waiting out the rain and happened to be riding at the time. But she still didn’t come home. 

Bruno looks over at Dante, who’s watching him pace the house with growing concern, and punches her name on his phone screen. There’s silence in the speaker for a couple of seconds, then the generic voicemail message that Kamaria never bothers to change drones to life. 

He pulls the phone away from his ear and stares at it. Her phone is off. Why would her phone be off? Even when they need alone time, they always keep themselves available, knowing their spouse will respect their needs unless it’s an emergency. It doesn’t make sense for her to have turned her phone off. 

Something is wrong. 

Without delaying any further, Bruno snatches his jacket from the closet and goes to his own motorcycle in the garage. He has no idea where Kamaria went on her ride. Just from their house there are two choices of directions to go, and from there it branches off into infinite possibilities. 

But he doesn’t care. He’s going to find her. 

…

Kamaria drifts in and out of consciousness. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knows she needs to get up and move, but she can’t really remember why. Everything hurts. She doesn’t want to move, she just wants to keep lying here until maybe the pain gets a little more bearable. 

So she lets herself burrow back into the darkness. When she wakes again, she’s struck with a sudden sense of urgency. She can’t just lie here. She has to get up, her father will be waiting on her to return. He doesn’t care about missions gone wrong, he just cares about obeying orders to perfection, and she’s already late. She’ll get whipped for this. Ten lashes for each hour she was missing. How many hours has it already been? She has to get up, she has to make it back. 

She tries to move, and passes out in a wave of pain through her skull.

The next time that she finds herself staring up at the canopy of trees, she has no idea where she is or how she got there. She’s wet, and she hurts. Must have been Roderick again. He probably beat and waterboarded her. She can’t remember what it was she did wrong this time, but chances are it doesn’t matter, anyway. Their ideas of punishable offenses are usually things she can’t avoid no matter how hard she tries. 

Her last thought before losing consciousness again is, I want Bruno.

…

As he rides, Bruno calls the local hospital and police station, just in case. No one has seen or heard anything about a black woman with green eyes and a large scar across her face named Kamaria Stenberg. 

He goes from fretting that she may have gotten into a wreck to wondering if somehow she’s been taken again. Kane shouldn’t have any way to get to her, right? And none of his cronies should have a reason to want to take her, they were just following orders the first time. Then again, maybe one of them is holding a grudge, or enjoyed having her in their clutches a little too much. Or maybe it’s someone from her old life, animosity among gang members dies hard and there were plenty of people back then that wanted to get their hands on her. Yeah, they’ve moved states to get away from all of that, but that doesn’t mean anything. If someone really wanted to track her down, they could.

He’s sick to his stomach, thinking of all the possibilities as he forges on through the pounding rain. It’s been hours. Her phone is still going straight to voicemail. The two-lane stretch of road he’s currently riding is one he knows she frequents, but he’s gone all the way down it without any more sign of her than any other street he’s been on. He turns at the end, riding around a few more blocks with his heart in his throat before heading back up that same road, back toward town.

There’s a skidmark on this side. He’d noticed it out of the corner of his eye coming past the first time, but it’s not like they’re uncommon. This time he pays more attention, though, slowing down as he reaches it. It, because there’s only one. Not two, like a car, but one single mark. Like from a motorcycle. 

Bruno pulls over quickly, punching the button for his hazard lights, and tugs off his helmet as he climbs off the bike. Running over to the mark, he follows its trajectory with his eyes first, then his feet. It’s probably nothing. He’s trying not to get his hopes up and also fighting back dread at the same time. 

But then he stands with the toes of his boots hanging off the edge of the pavement and looks down the embankment, and he sees the large rivet that something left behind as it skidded through the mud. He sees bark missing off the bottom of a large tree trunk, like something smashed into it at top speed. 

He’s moving again almost before his mind has caught on, slipping and sliding to the tree line. He wants it to be her as desperately as he wishes that it’s not. Then he sees it, just a couple of yards past the first smashed tree - a motorcycle, lying on its side. He doesn’t have to see it up close to know it’s hers. But he goes over anyway, as fast as the uneven terrain will let him, eyes darting around the area. 

She’s not there. It’s her bike, like he knew it was, and it’s scratched and dented from its fall, but there’s no Kamaria to be seen. No sign that she was ever even there.

Could she have gotten up, walked away from a crash like this? But then he would have passed her on the way somewhere, right? And he’s already confirmed she hasn’t been to the hospital. 

Or maybe his second fear was correct. Maybe a wreck was just the start of it, just the method someone used to grab her, and that’s why she’s not here now. 

Fingers buried in his hair and chest heaving, he takes a few steps back and looks around wildly. “Kamaria!” His voice echoes through the trees, down into the hollow below. “Kamaria!”

…

Someone’s calling her name. It must be her mom. She’s really, really tired, she must have stayed out too late again, playing in the creek in the woods behind their house. She didn’t mean to make her mom worry.

“Coming, Mama,” she mumbles, trying to find the energy to get up. Her head hurts really bad. She doesn’t remember why. Mama will make it better, though, she always does. She’ll probably give her some of the pink medicine that’s supposed to taste like cotton candy, and plenty of kisses. 

Kamaria is about to fall back asleep, thinking of her mom’s kisses, when another noise jolts her back awake. Leaves are crunching and branches shaking somewhere above her, like someone or something is sliding down the hill toward her. Automatically her hand moves to grope for a knife at her hip, but comes away empty. She tries the other side - nothing there, either. Maybe there’s one in her boot, but she can’t make her body bend to check. Why is she out on a mission without all of her knives? If she was stupid enough to lose them all, and even her gun, then she deserves for whoever or whatever this is to get her. 

“Kamaria? Kamaria!”

She still doesn’t know who it is until his face appears above her, fear carved into his handsome features. “Bruno,” she breathes, a smile spreading across her face. “What’re…you doing…here?”

“Looking for you.” His hands cup her cheeks, and wow, they’re so warm. He needs to keep doing that. She didn’t know how cold her face was before now. “You’re gonna be okay now. I’m gonna get you help.”

She hums a little as he pulls his phone from his pocket and punches buttons with his thumb. “Better not…let my mom see you. She says…she says ‘m not allowed t’ have…t’ have a boyfriend. ‘Til I’m thirty.”

He holds the phone up to his ear, looking down at her with a strange look on his face that she doesn’t quite get. “Wait until she hears I married you.”

He starts talking to someone on the phone and it’s a lot for her to follow, so she just stares up at the trees and enjoys the one hand that’s still on her cheek. It stopped raining at some point. It was raining earlier, right? It’s nice that it stopped now, and that Bruno’s here. 

“Kamaria? Love?” The hand is patting her cheek now. “Open your eyes for me, love. I need you to stay awake.”

She didn’t realize she’d closed them. Wrinkling her nose, she whines a little. “Tired.”

“I know you are, but you have to stay awake for now. The ambulance is on its way. Come on, open those gorgeous eyes for me.”

She complies, but gives him her best unamused expression. “My head hurts.”

He grows even more solemn. “I know. I found your helmet way up there somewhere. Can you tell me what else hurts? Your leg is scraped up pretty good.” She feels him gently lift her shirt. “Stomach is, too. I don’t see any concerning bruising on it, though I’ll bet you cracked a rib, at least.”

“Head,” she repeats, trying to think past that all-encompassing, throbbing pain to see what else there is. “Hip. Arm.” Almost as an afterthought she adds, “Shoulder.”

“No, I don’t want to move her.” He sounds like he’s talking to someone else. The person on the phone still, maybe. “Hip…” He carefully prods at both, eliciting a gasp and jerk from Kamaria when he touches the injured one. “Left hip. I’m guessing broken, based on the reaction, but could be dislocated. Left shoulder is definitely dislocated. And, uh…” Leaning over, he touches her hand, but quickly pulls back. “Right arm has an open fracture. Yeah, I’m staying on. How far out are they?” He listens for a moment, free hand coming back to rest on her cheek. “They need to hurry up. I’m worried this is more than just a concussion.”

She really wants to go to sleep. Now that Bruno is here, she feels much safer. Maybe now that he’s asked his questions he’ll let her nap.

“Stay with me, Kamaria.” His face is close to hers again. Eyes normally blue like the sky look more like storm clouds in the dim lighting.

“You’re…pretty.”

She somehow expects him to smile at that, but he just keeps looking at her with that worried expression and lightly strokes her hair. “Thank you. So are you.”

“Mean, though. Won’t let…me sleep. And…lost my knife. Can’t…stab you.” 

“We’ll find your knife. And if you try your best to stay awake until the doctor says it’s okay to sleep, then you can stab me all you want after, okay?”

“No,” she whines. She’d like to bury her face in his chest, but she can’t move. “No doctor. Hate doctors.”

“I know, love. But I’m afraid you have to go this time.”

“Will you come?” She doesn’t want to go alone. He just got here, and the doctor is scary.

“Of course I will. I wouldn’t leave you.”

“Can…Shadi come?” 

“Tell you what, I’ll check and see if she can come visit you while you’re there. Alright?”

Kamaria sighs and lets her eyes drift shut again. “‘kay.”

“Eyes open. Come on.” He pauses, turns his head a little. “I hear the sirens. They’re almost here. I’m gonna have to let them work on you to help you feel better, okay? But I’ll be right here the whole time. I’m not going anywhere.” Bending down, he presses a warm, gentle kiss to her forehead. “You’re gonna be okay. I promise.”

“Love you.”

“I love you, too, Kamaria.”