#near-drowning

[lifewithaview]

Charlotte Best in Tidelands (2018) Orphans of L'Attente

E2

Cal's near-drowning is noticed by the Tidelanders, and by Corey; Adrielle gives Lamar and Dylan orders; Rosa tries to tie up a loose end.

[whump-me]

Whumptober Day 14: Water Inhalation

This is a standalone story in my original Mind Games universe, a modern-day sci-fi/fantasy thriller setting about ordinary humans with superhuman abilities and the people who want to use or destroy them. Full description in my Whumptober masterpost, which is linked in my pinned post.

This story contains: minor whump, reluctant whumper, near-drowning

Words: 2200

---

He had hoped his turn would never come, but of course it did. The line inexorably crept forward as he watched the others flail and thrash and choke, as the floor grew wet with water the others splashed out of the trough or coughed up. And then there was no one ahead of him anymore, and he was standing in the center of the room. His partner for the exercise knelt between him and the metal trough. Better to think of her that way, as a faceless temporary partner. Better not to think of her by her designation, or remember the joke they had shyly shared last night, or the way she had given him the apple from her lunch a week ago.

She faced the trough, with its cloudy water that was filthy by now with blood and vomit. Her head was bowed. With her back to him, he couldn’t see her face. He was grateful for that.

Everyone who had already gone through the exercise was standing against the far wall, wet and shaking. They stood as spread out as they could get, keeping a wary distance between one another. Some looked away, arms wrapped around themselves. Some cried silently, wiping their eyes with furtive motions as they glanced over toward the gray-uniformed guards by the door, hoping not to be noticed. Some stared stoically straight ahead at each pair who came after them, like they had something to prove.

He looked over his shoulder. There were only a few more who hadn’t gone yet. They watched with pale faces, looking away at first, only for their eyes to keep coming back to the two of them as they stood in the center. That was where he had been a moment ago. That was what he had done. He had tried not to look, but he couldn’t help it.

Anyway, even if he hadn’t looked, he would still have heard the sounds. The splashes and burbles. The vomiting. The crying, afterward—sometimes from the one who had been held under, sometimes from the one who had held them under.

Fear radiated from the people still waiting their turn. He tightened his stomach as if the fear were his own. A thicker, more complex stew of emotions came off the ones who had already gone. Some were still caught in the grip of terror. Others radiated a low, droning despair. Still others simmered with a dark anger he didn’t fully understand.

The instructors kept telling him his empathic gifts would be useful once he was a full PERI operative. It sure didn’t feel useful now. His own nerves were enough to make him want to vomit all by themselves. Why couldn’t the scientists who had made him have given something else—anything else? Pyrokinesis. Psychic healing. One of the cool unique abilities, like the girl who could fill anything metal she touched with an electric charge. He would even have settled for being just one more telepath if it meant he didn’t have to feel all of this.

He knew it didn’t work that way, of course. The abilities they developed were a matter of chance. It didn’t mean anything about them personally if they had a defensive ability when they wanted to fight, or an offensive ability when fighting made them sick, or even an ability weaker than anyone else in their cohort. Their genetics had been carefully planned, as much as these things could be planned. They all had the Enhanced gene, of course, which was what let them develop an ability in the first place. Any embryos without the gene had been discarded. And their DNA had been handpicked from the strongest Enhanced subjects the Psi Enhancement Research Initiative had in their possession. But these things could only be controlled so far.

That had been reassuring to him at five years old, when their training had started in earnest and he had been jealous of the ones who could do big, flashy things like move objects with their minds or shoot giant balls of fire across the room. It was less reassuring to him now, at twelve, with the next phase of their training starting. If the days to come were anything like today, this phase would involve a lot less of the simple jealousies and triumphs he had grown used to absorbing from the others, and a lot more fear.

They were all forbidden to use their abilities in this room. But of course, that only applied to the ones whose powers could be controlled. The ones who could send their partner flying across the room with their mind, bringing a quick end to the exercise. Or seal off their lungs so they wouldn’t need to breathe. Or turn the water to steam before their partner could shove them under. He couldn’t do anything about his empathy, and it didn’t give him an advantage here, so the instructors didn’t care.

Dr. Okamura, the instructor for today, blew her whistle. He had already grown to loathe that sound. “Go,” she snapped, a sharp command.

A wave of sick fear flowed off his partner and into him. He clamped his lips shut to stop the bile from escaping as he gripped her head with both hands and shoved her under the water.

Her fear changed to something sharper and stronger and more basic. It was no longer the terror of anticipation. It was an animal struggle for survival.

She flailed against him, bucking her head hard against his hands. A year ago, he wouldn’t have been able to hold her under. But the instructors had picked him out for extra strength training, and now he was as strong as just about any of the rest of them.

Maybe this was why they had done that. So that he could do this when the time came.

He understood the point of the exercise. The instructors had explained it thoroughly. It was to train them to survive attempts on their life, to fight when necessary, to kill when necessary. And it was to train them to endure pain and fear. As PERI operatives, they would have to do all of that.

But he couldn’t think about that distant future. Right now, all he wanted was to get through training. To get through this day. To get through the next few seconds.

His partner’s struggles weakened. Dr. Okamura hadn’t blown the whistle again yet, but he must have held her under long enough. Maybe Dr. Okamura had blown the whistle, and he just hadn’t heard it, distracted by the flailing and the choking and the splashing and the fear.

Yes, she had blown the whistle. She must have.

He let go.

Water surged out of the trough as his partner’s head broke the surface. The filthy liquid soaked his shoes. She choked, and gagged, and expelled a stream of water onto the floor. Her face was streaked with snot and tears.

Dr. Okamura fixed him with a glare. “The instructions are to hold your partner under the water until I blow the whistle.”

“I thought you did,” he said, but his voice was weak, because now he wasn’t sure of that at all.

“She could have stayed under longer,” said Dr. Okamura. “Isn’t that right?” The question wasn’t directed at him.

His partner let out a few more bubbling coughs, then answered with a shaky nod.

“Do it again,” Dr. Okamura ordered. Again, the piercing alarm of the whistle sliced through the air.

His partner looked up at him, eyes pleading. Why had she done that? What did she expect him to do—say no? That would get them both a yellow mark on their file, if they were lucky. A red mark if they weren’t. Too many yellow marks meant extra training. Too many red marks meant recycling.

He tangled his fingers in her slimy wet hair and shoved her under again.

Worse than her thrashing, worse than the distorted burbling and choking sounds she made, were the emotions radiating off her. The terror locked his arms in place until he wasn’t sure he would be able to release her even after the whistle blew. It made his stomach churn until he thought he might vomit before she did. Maybe before he let her up. Maybe all over the back of her neck.

And underneath the terror was the beginning of something else. Something sharp. Anger at him? But this wasn’t his fault. At Dr. Okamura? But there was no sense hating the instructors. It wouldn’t make a difference. And anyway, the instructors were only teaching them everything they would need to know for when they were full operatives.

If being a full operative was anything like this, he wasn’t anywhere near ready. The thought made him want to throw up, even more than the terror filling the room did. He needed a lot more training before he would be ready for that.

He needed this.

The whistle blew. His hands released. His body went boneless as he took a step back.

When his partner was done coughing up water, she stood slowly. Her hands hung at her side, shaking. When she turned to face him, her eyes were expressionless. Her mouth was a flat line.

“I’m sorry,” he said under his breath.

A spike of anger shot off her, directly into his squishy center. She said nothing as she turned away.

“Apologies are not appropriate,” Dr. Okamura admonished, fixing him with a reproachful stare. “Thank your partner instead, if you must speak. You’re helping each other with an important phase of your training.”

She didn’t thank him. He hadn’t thought she would.

“Well done,” said Dr. Okamura. “Next time, I expect you to wait for the whistle on the first attempt. If I have to correct you on this again, it will mean a yellow mark on your file.”

He nodded wordlessly.

“Now switch positions,” Dr. Okamura said.

He knelt in front of the trough. Sticky, slimy water soaked into the knees of his pants. A sharp, foul smell rose from the trough.

The whistle blew. Her fingers grasped his hair hard enough that he thought she might yank it from his scalp. Instead, she shoved him under in a sharp and vicious motion, almost too fast for him to draw in one last deep breath.

He tried not to fight. There was no sense in it—he knew he’d be under until the whistle blew. But his body took over, and he thrashed uselessly against her grip.

Her grip was unyielding as she held him under. Stronger than he had expected. Her touch had always been gentle before. But she had probably gotten the same extra strength training as him. Maybe she hadn’t expected him to be so strong, either.

She kept on holding him under. His lungs burned. He shook his head, trying to signal that he’d had enough, that he couldn’t it do anymore, that she had to let him up. Her grip didn’t falter.

Even though he understood, it still felt like a betrayal.

Dull horror radiated from her as she shoved his head deeper down. But under that, her spiky anger grew and seethed. And out of that angry sea came a sharp pop of something worse than his own panic, worse than the burning in his lungs, worse than his body’s growing conviction that he was going to die here.

Pleasure.

Some part of her was enjoying getting her revenge on him.

He knew why they had to do this. So did she. Even so, he doubted she would ever offer him her apple again again. And if she did, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to take it. Not after remembering that sharp pop of dark pleasure.

As his body thought, a small, disconnected part of his mind wondered—Was that the point?

Most of the instructors didn’t have Enhanced abilities. But everyone in his cohort did, and their powers grew stronger by the year. What if they decided they didn’t want to train anymore? Before long, they might be too strong for the instructors to control. If they worked together.

If they knew they could trust each other.

But how could he trust anyone who had done this to him? No matter how much he understood the necessity of the exercise, his body insisted, deep in his bones, that the hands holding down belonged to the enemy.

The instructors wanted them to be enemies. The instructors needed them to be enemies.

The realization popped to life in his mind all at once, like the harsh dorm light flicking on in the morning, like the sharp burst of pleasure he had felt from his partner.

And then the distorted sound of the whistle reached him. The hands holding him down released. His thoughts evaporated in a burst of sheer relief that he was alive.

He looked up at his partner’s expressionless face. And for a second, he hated her.

---

Tagged: @cakeinthevoid @gala1981

Ask to be added or removed from my Whumptober 2023 taglist.

[viva-la-whump]

Febuwhump Day 25

@febuwhump

Set some time after Day 12

WATERBOARDING

“We know you got the money," the first debt collector said as the second one lifted Mayday’s head out of the horse trough. “How else could you fix up this shack. Now tell us where it is!”

“I,” Mayday sputtered, raking in a breath, “I already told you. It was–”

But before he could finish, or suck in another breath, his head was dunked back into the water. He struggled fruitlessly, the two men easily holding him down. Thirty seconds. A minute. Two minutes.

When they hauled him out again, after almost three minutes, they dropped him to the ground, weak as a kitten, fighting between coughing out water and breathing as deeply as he could.

“I don’t want to hear any more of your excuses! Now tell me!”

BANG!

The shot came out of nowhere, dropping the second debt collector like a stone. The first man instantly crouched down behind the trough, pulling out his gun and looking around for the shooter. But he never saw the man standing at one of the windows in the house before another shot rang out that made sure he never saw anything again.

Crosshair slowly limped his way downstairs and across the yard to where Mayday still lay, breathing deeply, his whole body shaking. The dog beat him to the man, whining and licking his face. 

“You sure took your time,” the bearded man said, fending off the worried canine.

“There isn’t exactly a clear view from the house,” Crosshair said. “And there’s not much light to see by. Would you rather I take a hasty shot and risk shooting you?”

Mayday smirked at his friend’s dark humor. “I don’t think you could miss if you tried,” he said. “I’ve never seen anyone with an aim like yours.”

“Well, I’d rather not take that risk if you don’t mind.”

Using his rifle as a makeshift cane, Crosshair steadied himself before reaching down and grabbing Mayday’s hand to help haul him up.

“Let’s get you back inside before you break that leg again,” Mayday said, taking Crosshair’s arm and putting it over his shoulders before the skinny man could fall over.

“What about the bodies?” Crosshair asked.

“I’ll make an anonymous donation to the undertaker in the morning. Right now, I just want to sleep.”

“No arguments here.”

[kalira]

Floundering Fortune

Written for @whumptober day 14! (prompt 2: Water Inhalation prompt 3: “Just hold on.”)

T; 2.2k Kei & Sho, Toshi

Kei has never before had any reason to regret that he never learned to swim; he wouldn't have expected that even his nightmare (beloved) children would give him cause to do so. But today. . .

[incognitopolls]

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[crystallizsch]

okay hi so listen hear me out

sea snake is a bit too obvious (and too boring)

so i made him based on some kind of lionfish??? (bc something something venomous marine animal) also with a LOT of creative liberties i made with how the fish looks like

let’s also give his fins some rips and tears here and there bc what are the implications of that??? that’s for you 🫵 to decide

anyways chat i lowkey dont know what i was doing

i had no other thoughts but haha funny snake man i turn into fish

[whumpypepsigal]

Outer Banks s04e08: “It's okay, just breathe.”

[longreads]

I Nearly Died Drowning. Here’s What it’s Like to Survive.

Maggie Slepian knew she shouldn’t have been on the water that day, but she wanted to keep up—she wanted to belong.

I knew then that I didn’t want my last few minutes to be full of sadness and regret. If I wasn’t going to survive this, I didn’t want my final thoughts to be berating myself for a bad choice.

It’s OK, I thought. You didn’t mean for this to happen. You are going to die and you should just be grateful for the time you had.

The heavy, black ache in my chest fully replaced the burn. I forced myself to keep my eyes open and watch the sunbeams like I’d seen a thousand times before, when I’d been underwater by choice and could come up for air when I wanted.

Read the full feature at Longreads. 

[cherrirui-official]

Uhm uhm uhhh INCREDIBLY self indulgent Trolls Au that's centered around John Dory and Bruce called Beach Bros bc I like them and I think there should be more content surrounding them as a duo *looks at you with my big wet eyes*

EXTREMELY short explanation + design refs under the cut! CW for mentions of drowning

There's a lot I got planned for it but for now the basics is that after I'd say around 8-10 years after Brozone split up, John Dory received the postcard that Bruce sent him. Now bc JD believed none of the other trolls were alive (since he went back after all the pop trolls escaped Bergen Town and found the Troll Tree empty) JD was ECSTATIC to find out that at least one of his brothers was still alive and immediately began searching for Bruce. Took him about a couple of days but eventually JD managed to locate Vacay Island!

And then almost drowned while crossing the waters... On Bruce's fucking wedding day.

After that ordeal, JD decides to live with Bruce and Brandi on Vacay Island!

Again there's a LOT more to it but it's late and I am extremely tired, I'm gonna go to sleep lol. ALSO if y'all have any questions abt the au, feel free to ask! I'd be more than happy to answer them as best as I can :] !!!!

(also while making designs for them I accidentally made JD look much younger than Bruce I think, oops 😔)

[whump-galaxy]

The whumpee waking up in some kind of glass tank that’s slowly filling with an unknown liquid. They panic as it shows no sign of slowing, reaching their knees, then chest, then neck. They float to the top of the tank, breathing in precious breaths before they’re completely submerged.

[notfeelingverywell]

near-drowning is such a good whump trope, not just on its own but also for what comes after

convulsive coughing or vomiting water after being pulled out

violent shivering and/or hypothermia (or concern about potential hypothermia)

bruised or cracked ribs from CPR

rapid breathing and heart-rate for hours afterwards, even if their body is tired and achy

Exhaustion and chest pain - they're limp, lethargic, but still needy for touch and comfort

Chest infections settling in their lungs from the cold and the dirty water they inhaled

Lingering trauma about the event- nightmares of sinking, panic attacks in darkness, nervousness around water, claustrophobia

[seabeck]

I used to be scared of seeing bears in the woods but then I got over it because black bears are terrified of humans. The animals you should be scared of in the woods are river otters (cute but bigger and stronger than they seem) and grouse because they’ll jump out from under foot and scare the piss out of you.

[whump-me]

Whumptober Day 4: "You in there?"

This is a standalone story in my original Mind Games universe, a modern-day sci-fi/fantasy thriller setting about ordinary humans with superhuman abilities and the people who want to use or destroy them. Full description in my Whumptober masterpost, which is linked in my pinned post.

This story contains: defiant whumpee, torture, blood, electric shocks, near-drowning, guilt, car accident mentions, suicidal thoughts mentions, forced to watch, death whump

Words: 4100

---

Without the rough rope binding him to the chair, Emory would have collapsed to the dirty concrete floor a long time ago. As it was, his chest ached with the effort of keeping himself upright. Or maybe it was the effort of keeping himself breathing.

Hot, thick blood spilled out from half a dozen different places, matting his pants to his legs as it dried, hardening on his bare chest and pulling at the skin. The smell of it made him gag every time he inhaled. One more reason it would be easier to just… stop.

But he didn’t have that option. His stubborn body, and his even more stubborn mind, were conspiring with his torturer to keep him alive through the pain no matter what.

The torturer leaned down. With two fingers, he tilted Emory’s chin up. Their eyes met. The torturer’s piercing blue gaze drilled all past his the pain of his body, all the way down into his soul.

“Are you still in there?” he asked, more like he was curious than anything else. “Is there anything left of you?”

in answer, Emory spat in the torturer’s face.

The torturer’s face darkened. He wiped the spit from his cheek with his sleeve. He dropped Emory’s chin and straightened. Emory’s chin fell heavily to his chest.

“More, then,” said the torturer, and stepped back. “Very well. I can keep going as long as I have to.”

What would it be this time? The knives? The lighter? The cattle prod? Emory’s whole body tensed in dread.

It would be so much easier if the torturer had any questions for him but that one.

He longed to give in. His exhausted body ached to give in. But he couldn’t do it, any more than he could force himself to stop breathing. What the torturer wanted from him was for his mind to give up, shut off, retreat. For him to be nothing but a shell, cracked and bleeding, with only blood and instincts inside.

That was something Emory couldn’t fake.

He was stronger than he had ever thought he was. He wished he weren’t.

He had never imagined he had this much defiance in him. He was a cliche of a weakling professor, all his strength in his mind and none in his body. He couldn’t even lift a grocery bag if it had more than a couple of cans in it. Adam used to tease him about it, about how he was perpetuating all the stereotypes about intellectuals by living up to them.

It wasn’t just his physical weakness. He was mild-mannered to a fault. Adam used to say that if someone walked up and punched Emory in the face, Emory would apologize for getting in the way of his attacker’s hand. Did all your suppressed rage go into your power? he had asked. Adam wasn’t Enhanced—he had no power of his own. He was endlessly curious about the genetic quirk that made Emory who was.

But that guess had been off the mark. Emory had no suppressed rage. If someone punched him in the face, he would probably not only apologize, but genuinely feel sorry. You should be angry about this, Adam had told him more than once—when he was passed over for a position that should have been his, when his sister never repaid the five-figure loan he had given her. You should learn to stand up for yourself.

But it wasn’t about being afraid to stand up for himself. Even when he knew he should feel angry, he just… didn’t. It wasn’t how he was built. He just wanted his relationships with everyone to run smoothly, even if that meant accepting the occasional injustice.

And yet here he was, spitting in his torturer’s face.

The torturer picked up the cattle prod. So that was what it would be, then.

Emory closed his eyes and pictured Adam. Adam telling him to be strong. Adam waiting for him to come home.

The thought of Adam was a blessing and a curse. If not for the way it bolstered him, maybe he would have given his torturer what he wanted by now.

The torturer jabbed the prongs into Emory’s exposed side. His muscles went rigid as the shock ripped through him. Emory didn’t think it should have been able to deliver a shock that strong. Maybe the man had modified it. Or maybe Emory had underestimated what an electric shock would feel like, to the extent that he had thought about it at all before waking up in this room.

The sound he made wasn’t even a proper scream. He had used all those up hours ago. It was a series of staccato moans. Even to his own ears, he barely sounded human.

The torturer withdrew the cattle prod. Emory gulped in the air as he sagged forward against the ropes. Breathing hurt. But his body persisted in doing it anyway.

His relief lasted less than two full breaths. Then the torturer touched the cattle prod to his other side, and his body convulsed against the ropes again. The scratchy rope dug into his chest, drawing blood.

Another moment of relief. Another few gasping breaths. Then another jab with the pod. And another. And another.

Until the small burn scars started overlapping with one another. Until he couldn’t open his lungs enough to draw a little breath. Until his muscles twitched uncontrollably even when the prongs weren’t touching him.

Sweat poured down his chest. He couldn’t lift his head. How long before his body hit the limit of what it could endure? How long before his mind was swallowed by the pain, obliterated like the torturer wanted?

Please, let it be soon.

The torturer set the cattle prod carefully down in the corner. Once more, he leaned down and grasped Emory’s chin between his fingers. Once more, their eyes met. “Are you still in there?”

Emory could tell from the disappointment in the torturer’s eyes that he already knew the answer.

He was still here.

Neither of them would get to end this yet.

“If you get what you want?” Emory gasped, “what use will I even be to you? You want me to work for you, don’t you? To join your little black ops project? I can’t take orders if there’s nothing left of me.”

“We don’t need your mind,” said the torturer. He tightened his grip on Emory’s chin. “We need your ability.”

“My mind controls my ability, dumbass.” Again, he marveled at himself as if from afar. Before this room, he didn’t think he had ever said the word dumbass in his life. Adam would have been proud of him.

“We’ve looked into the incident on file involving your power,” said the torturer. “Your intellect doesn’t control it. Your instincts do. That much was clear from the evidence.”

He closed his eyes at that. He didn’t like to think about what he had done before he knew what his power was, let alone how to control it. He still saw the faces of the dead in his mind almost every night before he went to sleep.

Adam was wrong about his suppressed rage. He didn’t have any of that. He truly didn’t. But fear… fear was another story. Emory was anxious, skittish, a walking stereotype in that way as well as all the others. Emory was, deep down, a giant coward.

All it had taken to trigger his power back then was a big enough shock, a rush of adrenaline into his system. A car rear-ending him from behind, shoving him sideways into the divider. A split second of panic, of I’m going to die—

He almost had. But not from the accident. It had taken a year of physical therapy to recover from the injuries his doctors had never been able to explain.

Five other people on the road that day had never gotten that chance.

He opened his eyes and held the torturer’s gaze. “If you read those files,” he said, “then you should know what happens if I don’t maintain extremely strict control.”

Control over his power. Control over his self. Fear didn’t master him anymore. He couldn’t afford it.

“I can’t choose what I take apart,” he continued. “Including myself.”

“That’s all right,” the torturer said, releasing his chin. “We only need to use you once.”

What target did they have in mind for him? Blowing up some military base on foreign soil? Assassinating some high-level government official? Whatever it was, the torturer’s casual tone told him he wouldn’t be coming back from it.

The torturer dragged something out of the corner and set it in front of the chair. It was a bucket full of oily-looking water. Emory stared into his own blood-streaked reflection and wished he hadn’t learned to keep such a tight grip on his own fear. Disappearing into a whirling storm of panic might have been a mercy.

The torturer tipped the chair forward. The man’s hands caught him halfway down, and lowered his head into the bucket.

Water filled his nose. It filled his mouth, tasting of mud and oil. The oil was smooth and bitter on his tongue. He coughed, and retched, and thrashed against the torturer’s grip. The rope and the torturer’s hands held him tight.

He imagined Adam’s hands holding him instead.

When his lungs spasmed and tried to draw in water, the torturer hauled him up and set the chair upright again. Emory vomited water and bile down his burned chest, and wished the torturer had left him under just one moment longer.

Again, the fingers under his chin, his head tilted up, the torturer’s voice. “Are you in there?”

He let out a sound that was half laugh, half sob. A few last dribbles of water spilled out from his lips.

Yes, he was still here.

However much he wished he wasn’t.

“There’s nothing left for you but pain, you know.” The torturer’s voice was low, almost gentle. “What are you holding on for? Wouldn’t it be easier to just let it go?”

What was he holding on for? Sheer stubbornness, maybe—a stubbornness he hadn’t known he had in him, or the cursed strength of will that kept his power from spiraling out of control. He had learned that strength of will because the only alternative would have been to take his own life before he could take anyone else’s again. He had absorbed the lessons too deeply. He couldn’t relinquish that strength now.

But a different answer came to him as he choked and wept and tried to tug his chin free. It came in the form of a softly rounded face with hair hanging into his warm brown eyes.

It was Adam.

Of course it was. He hadn’t learned that strength of will alone.

At first, Adam had been just another face in the hospital support group during those first dark months. Then he had been the gentle voice on the phone, calling him up to make sure he was okay just because he had been quieter in the group that day than usual. He had been the pair of hands helping Emory down the stairs when his legs forgot months’ worth of progress from physical therapy and gave out on him.

And then, finally, he had been the first person Emory had confided in about what had really happened that night.

He hadn’t expected Adam to believe him. He hadn’t counted on Adam’s long-standing attraction to scientists and researchers and wimpy professor types. Adam had once dated someone who worked for some shadowy government organization that studied people like him. Maybe did more than study. Adam had left him the day he had gone into his files and read about the vivisections and secret breeding programs.

Adam was the one who had taught him the word Enhanced.

But Adam had given him something more important than a name for what he was. Adam had helped him forgive himself. And Adam had helped him learn control, so it would never happen again.

Adam was the answer to where he had found this maddening core of inner strength. Adam was out there waiting for him. He had to survive this, for Adam’s sake. And as long as Adam was out there, he had enough strength to endure.

“Adam,” he whispered, his voice rough from coughing up water.

The torturer released his chin.

Emory’s head drooped, but not before he saw the torturer give him a small, condescending smile. “Ah,” he said, like he had just been waiting to hear that name. “Are you ready to see him now?”

“What—” Emory began.

The torturer’s voice cut him off as he spoke into a walkie-talkie. “Bring him in.”

The door opened. Two guards marched in. Between them, they half-lead, half-dragged a spitting, snarling figure.

The figure’s face was bruised. His clothes were torn into many places to count, and blood leaked out from the torn places. His hair hung into his face, obscuring his features.

But Emory would have recognized the sound of Adam’s furious cursing anywhere.

Even as bruised and bleeding as Adam was, the guards still let out annoyed grunts at the effort it took to hold him. Adam wasn’t a wimpy intellectual stereotype himself. He just liked men who were. He was warm; he was gentle; but that wasn’t all he was.

Emory had no doubt he had given their captors a run for their money.

But here he was anyway, as helpless as Emory.

Adam looked up. Their eyes met.

When Adam saw him, he struggled against the guards with renewed strength. He let out another string of curses.

Emory just hung his head. “You don’t want him,” he said. “He’s not like me.”

“We know,” the torturer said. “We know everything about you, which means we know all about him. We know he was involved with one of our researchers a few years back. We know he’s the one who helped you recover from the incident.”

A pause. The torturer’s eyes glinted with cold light.

“And we know that when you have nothing left, he’s the one turn to. We’ve been saving him for this moment.”

“For what moment, you butchering bastards?” Adam spat, and Emory knew he was picturing the files he had seen on his ex’s computer.

“For the moment when Emory would have no resources of his own left to call on,” said the torturer. “For the moment when he would call out to you.” He turned back to Emory, stroking one finger down his wet and bloodstained cheek. “That means we’re finally making progress with you. I’ve peeled away the rest of your strength, little by little. Only one thing remains to take from you.”

Adam closed his eyes. “He means he’s going to kill me.” His voice was tight with anger, not the panic Emory would have felt in his position. “He’s going to kill me, and he’s going to make you watch.”

Even in the grip of the fear that clutched Emory then, he still maintained his control. The storm didn’t build inside him. Adam’s lessons had stuck that well.

“It won’t work.” His voice wasn’t fierce and furious like Adam’s. He sounded weak and defeated. Whatever impulse had led him to spit in the torturer’s face, it was long gone.

The torturer was right. There was finally nothing left to take from him.

Almost nothing.

“Keep him alive,” Emory said desperately. “Keep him alive, and I’ll do whatever you want. Isn’t that better for you? Wouldn’t you rather have full control of my power?”

“No,” Adam said, shaking his head desperately. “No, don’t you dare work for them, you know what they do…”

The torturer shook his head. “Too risky,” he said. “You could turn on us at any moment, if you’re left in full control of your faculties. Also, your power is at its strongest when your instincts take control.”

“I can learn to make it stronger without losing control.” Emory was begging now. So much for that well of inner strength he had resented when he had thought would never run dry. “And I won’t try anything. If I were going to do that, don’t you think I would have done it the second you stepped into this room?”

He had considered it. He could have taken the man apart molecule by molecule before he had said a word. But he hadn’t, because even though his fear didn’t master him, he was still a coward.

He had known that if he took the torturer apart, someone else would come, and someone else after that.

He hadn’t known how many he could take apart before they found a way to shut him down.

He hadn’t wanted to find out.

He had been afraid.

And so he had endured, and endured, and endured.

If he hadn’t, maybe Adam wouldn’t be standing in front of him right now, furious and bleeding and about to die. But he couldn’t change the choice he had made. He couldn’t change the kind of man he was.

“Please—” Emory said, and hated the whining in his voice. He hated it more than he had hated the strength that wouldn’t just let him give in.

Was the torturer right?

Was Adam really the only source of his strength? Had it never really been his at all?

Before he could finish the thought, before he could voice the rest of his plea, the torturer pulled out one of the knives he had used to draw long, slow lines of pain across Emory’s body. He thrust the blade into Adam’s chest.

Not through the heart. That would have been too quick. He slid it off to the side, into Adam’s left lung.

Emory should have known he would make it slow.

Adam jerked against the guards’ grip. He let out a wet, wheezing gasp. Blood trickled from his lips, down onto his torn clothes, and from there onto the dirty floor.

The torturer wiped the knife down with a cloth and tucked it away. He didn’t watch Adam, as if Adam’s slow death was beneath his notice. Instead, he focused intently on Emory’s face.

The guards, expressionless, held Adam’s dying body up.

“Adam—Adam, I’m sorry—” Emory cut himself off. His apologies were useless. What was there for him to say?

Adam shook his head. Telling Emory there was no need to apologize? Telling him his apologies were too little, too late? There was no way to know. Adam choked and gasped and gurgled, like he was trying to get a message out. But nothing intelligible came from his throat.

His eyes held Emory’s, like he was trying to silently impart that same message. But Emory didn’t know what he was trying to say.

All he saw was the warmth in Adam’s eyes slowly cooling, a dying fire, a dying man.

Emory didn’t know how long it took for Adam’s gasping breaths to quiet, for his twitches to still, for him to go limp in the guards’ arms. It felt like it took a hundred years. It felt like it happened in an instant.

The guards dropped Adam’s limp form onto the floor. Adam’s empty eyes stared up at the ceiling. There was no warmth left there anymore. There was nothing.

Emory’s throat was sore, like he had been pleading all that time, or screaming. He thought maybe he had been.

At last, the torturer stirred. He grasped Emory’s chin, and gently tilted his face away from Adam and up toward his eyes. “Are you still in there?” he asked again.

For the first time, Emory understood how the torturer might get what he wanted. He understood how the pain could be so bad that his mind would simply give up and slip away. All he wanted was to let his sorrow swallow him, to pull him under until he drowned.

But the torturer had been right about him. Without Adam, what was there holding him here? Without Adam, where was his strength?

Oblivion called to him. Before, he had longed to hear that call, but it had eluded him. Now he couldn’t imagine not answering. There was nothing holding him here. Not anymore.

And the longer he thought about Adam’s body, lying there empty at his feet, the more his fear grew. It wasn’t the fear he had grown used to living with. It wasn’t even the fear that kept him from attacking the torturer when he had first entered the room. This was the old panic. This was a hurricane sweeping the ground out from under him, battering him with its rains, twisting him in its winds.

Without Adam, he didn’t know which way was up. Without Adam, he didn’t know how to have control.

From the smile on the torturer’s face, he knew the torturer could see it.

He grasped for the last shreds of his control. The torturer must have been wrong. Adam couldn’t have been the only source of his strength. He wasn’t that weak.

He closed his eyes. Took a deep breath.

And found the eye of the hurricane.

He saw the storm, and felt it, like it was a physical force. The battering, blinding fear of a life without Adam there to guide him and ground him and warm him. A life in the hands of his captors, a life of only pain and more pain.

The strength of his fear had made him despair, once. It had made him think, in those first dark months, of ending his life before something like the accident could happen again.

The torturer had been right, but also wrong. Adam had never been the only source of his strength.

He had been strong before he had ever met Adam.

He had learned one form of control. He had mastered his fear, and mastered his power. He had learned to see them both through impenetrable glass. He had weakened them until he couldn’t feel the force of them battering at his walls anymore.

But there was another type of strength. Another type of control. He could see it now, from where he stood in the eye of the hurricane.

He had never considered using it. Had never considered exploring the depths of what his power could do. The risks were too great.

But now…

Now, as the torturer had said, he only needed to do it once.

Maybe the torturer was right. Maybe oblivion was inevitable.

But he would make it the oblivion of his choosing.

He began with the torturer. He found the spaces within the man’s cells, where one molecule joined to another. Fear slipped inside those places. Fear of a world without Adam in it. Fear of the cattle prod, and the knife, and the bucket of water. Fear of disappearing like the torturer wanted, and fear of continuing to exist.

The torturer opened his mouth to scream.

Then he blew away on a nonexistent wind, and was gone.

The guards ran for the door. They never made it.

Now that the fear was loose, Emory couldn’t call it back. The chain reaction demanded to spread. The last time he had felt this, he had tried with everything in him to hold it back, and it hadn’t been enough. He had barely survived. Five others hadn’t been as lucky as him.

This time, he sat back in the eye of the hurricane, and he let it do whatever it wanted.

It spread through the walls, dissolving the bright light above him, turning to the ropes holding him to a fine gray dust. It spread through Adam’s body, returning him to the earth in a matter of instants.

And it spread into him.

Last time, he had barely held it back enough to save his own life. Now, with the momentum it already had, it was impossible to keep it out of his own body.

But he didn’t want to.

He would embrace the oblivion the torturer had wanted so badly for him. As long as he could take this place down with him.

Maybe he had some rage in him after all.

“Ask your question now,” he spat. “While you’re at it, ask yourself the same question. Are you still in there?”

There was nothing left of the torturer to answer.

A second later, there was nothing left of Emory, either.

---

Tagged: @cakeinthevoid @gala1981

Ask to be added or removed from my Whumptober 2023 taglist.

[nature-wants-you-dead]

Whumpee pinned down by wreckage, at least one broken leg, as the water slowly starts rising.

[jasmines-library]

Can you do a Winchester brothers (mostly Dean) x sister reader where she is captured but they tie her to an anchor and drown her and the boys have to save her and bring her back to life

Sounds of Someday

WHUMPTOBER DAY 24: Prompt: “I thought they were with you?”

Fandom: Supernatural.

Summary: the request pretty much says it all. When you and your brothers split up during an unusual hunt, you get caught and become part of a witch’s ritual, which ends with your life slipping away and your brothers struggling to reach you as you are dragged away.

Warnings: Drowning, blood, capturing, character death.

Word count: 2.3k

Note: thank you so much for requesting anon! This was really fun to write. I hope you don’t mind that I included it in my whumptober series, I thought it fit interestingly with todays prompt!

MAST ERLIST ⛤ WHUMPTOBER WORKS

🕸 ⋆ ⁶𖤐⁶ ࣪⋆🕸

You and your brothers weren’t sure what you were hunting. There was no pattern- nothing set in stone to follow and every time you thought you had latched onto something in the lore, it would change unpredictably to something that contradicted what you’d just believed. At first, you thought it was a vampire. It had appeared out of nowhere, slinking in from the darkness. But then people started to go missing and the bodies were being discovered in strange ways: with nasty scratches, dark bruises or completely torn to shreds. Then, Sam led you on to believe it a spirit, looking to extract some sort of revenge. But you weren’t sure. Nothing was linear and it was making your head spin just thinking about it.

The town you were hunting in was quaint residence in the centre of Minnesota. It was surrounded by woodland and was fairly isolated from the rest of the world around it, making it the perfect stomping ground. It honestly surprised you that this place hadn’t cropped up before.

Your feet had begun to ache as you trudged slowly through the pine needles behind your brothers. You had a backpack slung over your shoulder which rattled as you hauled it higher up on your back. You had been walking for ages, training behind your older brothers who, given the fact they were much taller than you had managed to move at a much faster pace, having to take less steps due to their long strides. Sam had insisted that you stake out the woods in chance of finding something hidden nearby, but the area was vast and the three of you were yet to find anything in the hours of walking behind you. The sun had begun to dip below the horizon too, making it increasingly hard to gage your surroundings and keep your bearings.

“We should split up.” Sam said suddenly as you came to a fork in the path. It broke the silence that had gradually settled over you once you had run out of things to talk about.

Dean furrowed his brow. “What? Are you stupid, Sam?”

The tallest Winchester sighed deeply and slowed his pace to a stop. “We’re not going to find anything if we all huddle together. It’s getting dark and our best shot at finding something is if we split up.”

“That’s exactly my point, Sam. It’s getting dark and we don’t know what’s out there. Besides, there’s no way y/n is going out there on her own-“

“Y/n is old enough to go back to the motel alone-“

You scoffed, cutting him off with a stern look. “Do I get a say in this?”

“Y/n-“

“Dean.”

“You know we don’t like it when you go off alone-“

“I’m not a child, Dean. I can take care of myself.”

Your eldest brother let out a relenting sigh after shared an unspoken glance with Sam. The two of them had a habit of doing that. “Fine. But if you’re not back here within the hour then you’re in deep shit.”

You grinned, turning to head down the middle path.

“And y/n-“ Dean called out to you. You glanced back at him over your shoulder. “Keep your phone on.”

You nodded and made your way down the trail. Dean didn’t move for a while. Something nagged at him, so he stood as you wandered off into the trees, watching you with careful eyes. Little did he know that he wasn’t the only one watching you.

~

You had been walking for sometime. Too long. The woods had thickened and the darkness made it impossibly hard to tell the path ahead from the path you’d just taken. As much as you didn’t want to admit it, you were lost. And to make matters worse you hadn’t even found anything useful. You had considered messaging Dean for help; but that would involve admitting that you were wrong and you knew that if you did that you wouldn’t hear the end of it. You were reluctant, but when you reached into your pocket to pull out the device, you found that it was missing. You then considered turning back, you knew something was wrong and it was nearing an hour since you had left and were due to rendezvous with your brothers, so you would be able to reach them without worrying them…but that was when it caught your eye.

Dangling limply from a brunch, a piece of blood-splattered cloth hung. It was fresh, still dripping blood onto the muddy ground below it. It looked as though it had snagged on a branch. You reached out to collect it in between your fingers, turning it over slowly as your examined it. When you went to pocket it, there was a loud snap of a branch to your left.

Almost mechanically you had dropped the cloth and replaced it with the cool hilt of your pistol. You were on high alert, searching for the source of the sound. Then came other to your right. And then behind you.

You were surrounded.

You didn’t know where to direct your attention, whipping around to find your best course of action. But whoever or whatever was tailing you was smart and clearly outnumbered you.

Someone tackled you from the side, forcing you to the ground with a sickening thud. You screamed, startled. Delivering an upwards kick, you tried to throw the woman off of you, but her grip was firm as she rolled on top of you, pinning your wrists above your head and straddling your waist. There was another pair of hands working a rope around your feet and other around your hands. You tried to squirm, kick and scream, but a harsh slap left you disorientated as a gag was forced around your mouth.

~

Sam came to a halt at the rendezvous point. He was a few minutes late and was met with an antsy looking Dean, who was pacing and constantly glancing at the time displayed on his phone screen. Sam could see the gun he had loosely planted in his jean pocket.

Dean turned at the sound of footsteps approaching, but he was in no way revived. In fact the sight made his chest constrict. Sam was alone.

“Where is she?” Dean demanded, crossing the space between him and his younger brother in two large strides.

Sam furrowed his brow. “I thought she was with you?”

“No.” Dean fumbled in his pocket to bring up your contact number. “She texted me. She said she had found you and that she was gonna…”

Dean trailed off when Sam flashed up his screen to reveal an identical message. They had been played.

“Son of a bitch.”

“You think she did this?” Sam asked. It wasn’t something entirely out of character for you. You would often trick your brothers into getting what you wanted, or simply just for some peace and quiet.

“I-“

All ideas were cut short at the sound of a shrill scream, that caused both brother’s hearts to falter. Your scream. They would recognise your voice in a crowd of a thousand. Neither of them wasted any time as they darted towards the sound.

~

You had managed to make out three of them as they began to drag you through the woods over bumps. The pine needles gathered in your hair and clung to your clothes to poke at your skin. You knew that your brothers would realise quickly that something was wrong. It was hardwired into them. But one of them was doing something with your phone which you could only assume she had managed to snatch from your pocket somewhere along your trek.

You could only watch as they dragged you into a clearing. You were grateful when the upturned roots morphed into grass. The lake glistened under the moonlight and the start sky. It was the type of serene scene that you and your brothers would pull up at and sit on the roof of the Impala just to revel in the quiet. The thought only made the situation seem even sicker. When the women hauled you onto a dock, you sensed two more people lingering nearby. One of them held a weighted book and the other a set of chains fastened to what looked like some sort of anchor.

Your eyes flew open when the realisation hit you like a ton of bricks. They were witches. And you were part of their spell. You tried to dig the heels of your boots into the wooden slats and scrabble away, but one of them landed a kick to your stomach and dragged you closer again, hauling you up onto your feet and holding you tightly in their grasp.

One raised your hand, biting into it with a silver dagger and then squeezing it into a chalice. You’re screamed and bit into the gag. Then they began to chant. Old, foreign words that rang throughout your ears. But nothing stayed. Your mind was too hazy as your blood dribbled out of the wound. After the final word had been spoken, one of the male witches snatched you away and pushed you towards the edge of the dock. The water was dark and endless below you and you tried to teeter away from the edge but you were in a vulnerable position and with one wicked smirk and another chorus of chanting, you were sent tumbling over the edge and into the water. But not before you hear the faintest whisper of your name carried across in the wind.

~

There’s something irresistably poetic about drowning. You weren’t sure if it was the way that time slows to nothing the moment your body it’s the icy water, or the way that it was so quiet under the surface, but there was something about it.

Well, that was until you watched the bubbles escape from your mouth and your nose, rising up to the surface and the dissipating. You tried to kick the binds way, flailing to gain some traction on the water and pull yourself up the the surface so that you could take a desperate gasp of air, but the binds rendered you powerless as the anchor dragged you down down down into inky nothingness. Your lungs burned as you struggled to retain what precious air you had left in your lungs, jerking and twisting to try and get free, but the struggling left you tired and soon the last of the air rose from your mouth. The water assaulted your eyes too, blurring your vision even through there wasn’t much to see besides the white light of the moon above.

Somewhere above your there was a loud splash as Dean delved deep into the water, scrambling after you. He had watched in horror as your body pummelled off the side. He didn’t think he could urge is legs to go any faster as he ran next to Sam who helped him make quick work of taking down the witches. Once the odds had been evened Dean took the plunge after you.

His body nearly went into shock against the stabbing of the cold, but he paid no mind to it as he watched your body sink at an alarming rate. Your hair drifted around you like a halo as he urged his body forwards to catch up with you.

Somehow he managed to wrap a calloused hand around yours. He pulled you to his chest, palling at your stillness, and fumbled to release you from the anchor. Once the heavy weight was gone, he gave one hard kick after pushing your body so that it could drift to the surface, following closely behind and ignoring the burn in his chest.

When his head broke the surface the took a huge, spluttering gulp of air, sucking it in greedily. But you didn’t move. You didn’t squirm to keep yourself afloat, your chest rise and fall, you didn’t even blink.

Dean was then paddling his way over you you, lifting your body so that Sam, who was clinging to the edge of the dock with an outstretched hand could pull you into land.

“Come on!” He urged, gripping you under the armpits and pulling you back onto try land. Dean was inches behind, silently praying that you would be okay. But your heart had stopped.

“No. No no no.” Dean cried at your stillness. “Come on y/n. You don’t get to do this to us.”

He hovered over you, locking his hands in place to begin CPR.

“Come on, sweetheart.” He pleaded, breathing into your mouth. He could feel the resistance in your lungs. His chest tightened further.

“Dean-“ Sam’s voice wavered as he laid a hand on his shoulders.

“No. Shut up Sammy.” He shook his head and blinked away the tears and he pressed harder against your chest, winching at the sound of them splintering beneath the force of his compressions. “She’s fine. She’s fine.”

“Dean…”

You sat up abruptly, heaving a wet cough as you keeled over expelled the water from your lungs. Dean patted your back to help. Everything hurt, your head, your joints, your lungs.

“That’s it, kid. Let it all out.”

“They… they-“ you tried to speak, but your voice was horse and scared so it came out more like a whimper. You took in deep breaths.

Dean cradled you to his chest, rocking you back and fourth in his arms as you sobbed, shivering from the cold and the shock.

“You’re okay, kid.” Sam tried to reassure you.

“We’re here y/n. We will always protect you, no matter what. And as long as you are here, we will always keep you safe. I promise.”

<- DAY 23 ⛤ DAY 25 ->

🕸 ⋆ ⁶𖤐⁶ ࣪⋆🕸

Taglist:

@deans-spinster-witch

@senjoritanana

@amaryllis23

[bucksboobs]

Crocomom AU where after years of arguing with young Luffy, Garp comes up with a compromise: Luffy can be a pirate only if he aims to become a Warlord of the Sea. So, Garp is like “Well if you’re going to be a Warlord you’re going to have to do it by climbing the ranks so I’m putting you with the only one of them I think could do right by you: Sir Crocodile.” And that’s how Mister 0.5 joins Baroque Works.