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ceilidho · 11 months ago

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exit, no entry wound joe bear graves x reader; part 1 (3.8k)

Local time at destination: 0500 hours.

And then the world rushes back to him like the culmination of a terrible dream.

Bear wakes up in another rosebush outside the front steps of the local library worse for wear. Blinking out of sleep-crusted eyes, shapes diverging in blurry unfocus before slipping back into material objects. A bench. A door. The thorny stems of roses already on their way out, already depetalling, the ground below covered in a thin layer of them. One petal even sticking to his cheek when he pulls himself off the ground, wincing at the branches that crunch around him, that tug against his skin and clothes.

His clothes smell of cheap liquor. Gin. Bourbon. It hurts to open his eyes, to sit up.

“Morning, sunshine,” someone says. He remembers hearing it in his dream too.

He looks to the source of his awakening, blanching when he notices the man staring at him.

Rip sits on the other side of the bushes on his haunches, looking deeply unimpressed. Hair slicked back for a change. “This what you get up to when I’m gone?”

Bear doesn’t respond. He struggles to his feet instead, hangover only just creeping in. Still drunk, to an extent. His knees threaten to buckle under him, forcing him to lay a hand flat on the wall to keep himself upright. One foot in front of the other. The walk home feels endless in the hour before dawn, hardly any light to guide him.

“Pretty pathetic shit, Bear,” the man says, trailing along behind him. Not quite mockingly, but bordering on it. “Getting piss drunk and passing out in a bush? Really? C’mon, man. You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me.”

There’s no sense in responding, Bear knows that now. No sense in even turning around to look. One foot in front of the other. Stumbling home alone under the cloak of night, dawn just around the corner; terrified that one day he’ll have to see it—the sun coming over the mountains, over the horizon.

It’s been less than a year. He hasn’t yet made his amends with God. Forgiveness sits outside of him. Not quite the right time to let it in. Maybe that time passed a long time ago, a small aperture that shuttered closed at the approach of his eyes. He missed it sometime between killing a boy and losing his mind.

A man cannot hold himself up on the scaffolding of the world alone. There has to be something beneath him. There is no sense in repeating the horrors of the world back to him; he’s already lived them. He’s got something of a Midas touch for death.

The months have been long since the divorce was finalised, since Lena left for good, since Buckley died, since Rip—since it all went down. If he thinks about it for too long, it seems like a nightmare that he woke up from still mad about; a nightmare he had no choice but to drink himself into a stupor over to escape. That’s the reality of the world.

“You know, Bear, you’re not the one that’s fuckin’ dead,” Rip spits as he follows behind, matching Bear’s stumbling gait stride for stride. “So you can stop acting like it.”

There’s a truth in Rip’s words and it leaves him feeling nauseous. There’s also a kink in his neck and a headache threatening to split his forehead open. In the belly of him, he has a truth that says that the firmament of heaven is beyond his reach. When he looks up and the sky is void of coruscating light, the meagre stars like an exit with no entry wound, it doesn’t surprise him. Of course there wouldn’t be anything there.

On a good day, his heart feels like it’s weathered a siege.

“So she left you! It’s time to fuckin’ move on. Go to a bar—I mean, you already are, so step one done—and pick someone up. Go on Christian Mingle or something. You keep living your life like this and you’re going to wind up killing yourself. And then the fuck good that’ll do?”

It takes everything in him to not turn around and do something rash. Only the nausea keeps him from making any sudden movements. Even if he were to turn around and do something, his knees would probably buckle under him. Probably throw up the contents of his stomach. Not much in there either. It rumbles when he thinks that, clenching at the thought of food. Then it twists, the nausea returning.

One foot in front of the other. The walk home takes twice as long, his whole body aching.

“Heard you almost quit. Wouldn’t be the worst idea you ever had. Let Buddha take over—he’s earned it. Get yourself a nice piece of land in fuckin’…Montana or something. Couple cows, maybe some chicken—you could get a dog, Christ. You look like a guy who’d have a dog. Why don’t you have a dog, actually? You would’ve told me if you didn’t like dogs, so it’s not that.”

His forehead is greasy when he touches it to rub his head. Body secreting poison in his sleep. Oily. The corners of his lips crack when he yawns. It’s not like he’s never thought about a dog, about having something to care for, another living thing in his house.

But—

(“Bear? …I don’t think we should have a child.”)

What he wants often falls to the wayside, slides off him like a glancing blow.

Her old, familiar shape appears at the sudden loss of a dream: one where Lena’s gaze lingers on him long enough to burn; but then it is the sun.

Bear watches dawn break. Sunday morning. In a different life, he would’ve squinted into the light of a new day and closed his eyes against it, curling into the slighter body tucked into his chest for another hour of rest. Felt the rise and fall of her chest. Woken up to a hot mouth on his cock or fingers curling in his chest hair, petal lips seeking him out. Church after that, showering off the remnants of their morning, solemn in their pews with their chests still holding the laughter of an hour previous. Light as air, as a feather.

He won’t go to church today; hasn’t in months. Not with the guilt of missing it the week before trailing after him, each missed week compounding month after month. The cracks in his faith webbing. Splintering out like stepping on the lake when it freezes over in the winter, crunching under his boot until he holds his place. Conscious that it could break under his feet.

“I grew up with a dog,” Bear finally responds, voice hoarse. First thing he’s said since last call at the bar.

“Yeah. Figures. What kind?”

“Black lab. We called her Daisy.”

It’s another lifetime ago. Still living in his parent’s house, Daisy curled by his dad’s feet, her favourite spot to sleep. Television playing at a low volume, mom at the kitchen table doing her crossword, ink bleeding into the side of her hand. It’s been a long time since Bear buried all of them. He’s buried countless people since.

“What—can’t get another? One and done? That’s how everything works for you?”

Teeth raze across his skin again. Trust Rip to always cut to the quick. Finally back in his neighbourhood at least, the street empty apart from the cars parked in their driveways or along the sidewalk. Bear’s stomach rumbles something fierce now, entreating him to eat. Worse than hunger is how he’d kill for a glass of water though. Anything to settle his head.

“Haven’t wanted a dog,” Bear grumbles, then clears his throat.

“Yeah, you have,” Rip scoffs. Bear hears him kick a rock, sending it skidding across the asphalt.

“Fuck off.”

Heart silicified in his chest, composed of fossilised shells and rocks and bones. It feels heavy in his chest.

He turns down the street leading to his house.

“Gotta let someone else in, Bear. Girl, dog—whatever. You can’t keep this up forever or it’ll kill you.”

When he turns around at the door, fishing in his pocket for his keys, the sidewalk beyond his house is empty.

(So a man lies down and rises not again; till the heavens are no more he will not awake or be roused out of his sleep.)

Every Friday like clockwork, Bear stops at the diner down the street for a coffee and a slice of cherry pie before heading to the bar.

Today is like any other. He leaves the house with only his keys and wallet and walks the long twenty minutes to the diner. Every time he fights the urge to drive, but there has to be something holding him in place. A reason not to throw it all away.

It’s never completely empty when he shows up, but it’s never full either. His seat at the back of the room is open as usual, like they put up a sign before he comes ambling down the street that says Reserved for Joe Graves and then pluck it away before he opens the door. It’d be nice if that were the case. Nice to have something just for him for a change. The thought comes with its accompanying pang of shame. Desire is a dangerous thing; anything he’s ever wanted has come at him with sharpened teeth, clamping down on his leg and ripping through the flesh. Bear trap for old Bear.

He slides into the booth and waits for someone to notice him. Never bothers to flag someone down—if it’s ten minutes or even half an hour before he’s served, that’s fine by him.

“Hiya,” a clear voice says to his right, pulling him away from staring through the blinds out the window. “Can I get you something to drink? Coffee, tea?”

The face Bear turns to meet is pleasant, smiling. Wide and untroubled. It’s not a face he recognizes though, despite months coming to this diner and becoming familiar with the staff. If he had to guess, he’d bet she only started a few days ago, maybe a week at most. She still has the sparkle of someone who hasn’t had the goodness beaten out of them yet.

“Coffee,” he says, his own smile strained. “And a slice of pie.”

“Sure—we have key lime, blueberry, apple—”

“Cherry,” he interrupts, not letting her build steam. The wick in his chest burns too low for any conversation. The quick flicker of her brow makes the shame in his chest swell again. Forgive me sitting on his lips, unsaid. I’m sorry, I don’t know why I do this.

She nods and scurries off to the back, skirt swishing with her movements. Bear notices only because his eyes get stuck there, somewhere between the curves of her hips and the roundness of her ass. When he realizes where he’s let his mind wander, he pulls it back, flattening his lips into a hard line. Any sort of indulgence feels wrong, a taking that shouldn’t be taken. He hasn’t even begun to pay penance for all the damage he’s wrought.

It’s only on her way back that Bear notices the small bump protruding from under her apron. His mouth goes dry. When she reaches him again, he wordlessly accepts the cup of coffee and her reassurance that the pie will be out in just a minute. For a moment, he can hardly meet her gaze, eyes locked on the gentle curve of her belly, caught off guard in a way he hasn’t been in months.

The first thought with any clarity is, what is she doing working here? A crummy diner on a Friday night. Down the street from an even sleazier pub. His second thought is to look outside at the poorly lit stretch of road and think that this is no place for a pregnant woman to be alone. He recognizes each car in the parking lot save one, likely hers. Drove herself here with the expectation of driving herself home at the end of the night.

If it had been Lena—well, he never would’ve let it be Lena, but if it had been, Bear can’t imagine letting his pregnant wife drive herself home in the middle of the night. Can hardly stomach the thought.

She’s not Lena though, so he has no right.

She’s gone before he has time to say anything else, skirt swishing behind her. It catches his eye again. When he tears his gaze away for a second time, he swallows back the metallic taste of self-loathing. It curdles in his mouth. It’s the sign telling him to stop coveting, stop looking out into the world and wondering what he can take. It’s his hamartia, his fatal flaw; thinking himself above the reproach of God. Thinking that he can kill, fuck, curse, and stray farther and farther from the light only to find his way back in the dark.

The bell above the door rings when someone else comes in and Bear tenses. His shoulders only relax when two older women step in and head to a table.

He watches as she picks up a plate from the pass-through window and heads back towards him. When she places it in front of him, he draws a deep breath in, trying to catch more than just the aroma of fresh baked cherries.

“Here we go…one slice of cherry pie, straight out of the oven.”

“Thanks, honey,” Bear rumbles, smile finally meeting his eyes.

“No trouble. The guys in the back said they make it special for you. Joe, right?”

That gets him to levy her with the full weight of his attention. The thought of her asking about him. “I go by Bear.”

“Oh. Alright, Bear.” She twists the word around in her mouth and seems to find it satisfying. “I think I’ve heard your name before. You were—I mean, you’re part of Pastor Adams’ parish, right?”

He clears his throat, cutting off the triangle point of his pie with the side of his fork. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Me too,” she confides, voice a low whisper. A secret between strangers. She doesn’t glance around though, doesn’t bother to draw out the ruse. “Or, I was, anyway. Haven’t been to service in awhile. I, um…I remember you. From a year or so back. You and your—um…you and your wife used to always sit up at the front.”

The fork scrapes against the plate. “Ex-wife.”

He catches her wince from the corner of his eye. “Oh. Sorry. You just—” She doesn’t have to say it. The slight dip of her eyes tells him all he has to know, and besides, it’s his own fault for still wearing the ring. Even with the paperwork signed and dated, even with Lena in another state now, starting a new life without him, the thought of taking it off makes him break out in a cold sweat.

“It’s not—” Bear starts before giving up. He curls his fingers into a fist on the table.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s fine. Not a big deal.”

She fidgets in the silence. Bear can’t bring himself to break it or make the atmosphere less oppressive. He tenses under it, the ache in his low back worsening. These days, he always aches. Nerve damage, a disc on the verge of slipping, an old ankle injury that flares up whenever he goes running. A ghost that follows him from haunt to haunt. The ring on his finger is just another old ache.

“So, uh—” he clears his throat, nodding to her belly. “Your first?”

It’s inappropriate, hardly his place to ask. Incredibly intrusive for someone he’s met for the first time, a stranger just trying to do her job and serve him coffee and pie before he goes off to drink himself half to death again at the dive bar down the road.

Still, he asks.

Only the faintest wrinkle of her nose betrays any embarrassment. “Oh. Yeah. First one.”

“Congratulations.” It’s sincere. The envy in his gut is old, but it’s a manageable pain.

“Thanks,” she says, with a small, private smile, hand resting absently under her belly. “I’m excited. I’m only a couple months along, but, uh…it’s been a journey. Just me and baby against the world, you know.”

That stops him in his tracks. Screws up the whole course of his evening because suddenly the sound of the bell over the door jingling doesn’t draw his attention away. It stays fixed on the smiling girl to his right that just opened her mouth and said something unacceptable.

“Where’s the dad?” he asks, far too bluntly.

She shrugs. “Somewhere. Didn’t stick around long enough to tell me where. It’s fine though—I’ve got my little peanut. That’s all that matters.”

“You told him and he left?”

The pie sits cooling in front of Bear as a pit in his stomach opens up. It’s a terrible, empty hole that holds truths like the fallibility of the body and the good shouldering the burdens of the world.

He only regrets being so direct when her lip quivers, a little motion that betrays her until she wrests control over her face again. “It’s not his fault. I don’t think he was—well…you know, it was a surprise.”

“That’s—” he struggles to find his words, “—that’s not right.”

Again, she shrugs. “That’s life.”

Bear feels his eyes go hard. A coldness settles under his skin.

In the deep, dark gut of him, only anger lives. He spends his days questioning why God has allowed everything else in his life to fall apart, has allowed countless other people to die, but refuses, for reasons unbeknownst to him, to kill him. He’s given him enough opportunity and enough reason.

The answer he circles back to time and again is the same. An eye for an eye. Divine wrath. The litany of his sins could be sung until the end of time and there’d still be more to sing. It’s only right that there would be consequences for him.

The rage that simmers in his blood now is twofold. It begins with the sharp pang of injustice, of witnessing a punishment meted out to someone innocent. The girl standing by the booth he’s shoved himself into, almost too small for a man of his size, cannot be deserving of the same punishment that he’s brought upon himself. She has never killed. The babe in her belly has never killed. The two of them should never have to meet at the point of two paths converging with the likes of someone like Bear and proceed down the same road together.

Then it sinks into a familiar territory. A place at the core of him where righteousness gives way to envy, as it always does. After what he's been through, the thought of someone having everything that he's always desperately wanted handed to them on a silver platter and then sending it back leaves him feeling a bit off-kilter. Not quite right.

“Bear?” Her voice breaks the silence. When he blinks, concerned eyes stare down at him, brows furrowed. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” he rasps, dragging a hand down his face. Shaking it off. “Sorry, I—got lost in my head. Sorry.”

“That’s alright,” she says, again gentle in her voice and smile. “Easy place to get lost in, isn’t it?”

He makes a sound in acknowledgment. Drags the silence out. Her mouth twists shy under his scrutiny.

“Anyway, I have a few other tables to get to, if you don’t mind. Enjoy your pie. I’ll check on you in a bit.”

He eats his slice of pie in silence as she leaves, eyes following her to her next table. Rage still sizzles under his fingertips. It makes his hands shake, old nerve damage and anger problems.

It’s like a gun punch to think of her all on her own. It’s not right. For someone like him, well, it’s—deserved, earned. Inevitable, even. Every step taking him further away from grace, from its light. No one who knows his story would think otherwise.

She’s a pretty thing though, this new waitress. Too tired, the bags under her eyes testament to that, no matter how well she hides them with makeup. Slightly puffy anyway, maybe from a lack of sleep or too many tears. His stomach aches at the thought. It must have come as a shock, the bottom of her world dropping out from under her when the baby’s father took off. Dragged away from the church not through her own doing, but the fault of another. Not her shame to bear, and yet.

He forces the pie down. Bites that taste like nothing,

Bear hears the lilt of her voice from two tables over. “Refill on your coffee, hun?”

A supplicant sits in his place as he sips his coffee. The hour slips by into the next and it starts to come together in his mind. Why he's been forced down this long road alone, why God hasn't struck him down yet despite every terrible thing he's done. His eyes follow her flit across the diner, the light seeming to bend around her like a halation.

When Bear looks across the room at her, he thinks, Lord, do not think I am waiting patiently for your hands. Every part of me trembles with anxiety.

(O Lord, show me I can fall apart together again; but not just yet.)

He stays until the last customer has finally left, waiting for her to come back to his table with an apologetic smile. When she does, Bear hands her his empty plate, watching her take a step back when he scoots out of the booth, rising to his full height. He makes note of the way her eyes round as they follow him up. Taller than her, unsurprisingly. Surprising though, the way her bottom lip droops just the slightest bit.

“Is it just you closing up?” he asks, voice a tad too gruff. He clears his throat again, looking around for anyone else.

“Well, the chef’s cleaning up in the back, but, uh—” she looks around the diner, conspicuously empty apart from the two of them. “Yeah. Just me.”

Bear gestures with his chin towards the door. “I’ll wait ‘till you’re done, then walk you to your car.”

“Oh, Joe—”

“Bear,” he corrects.

“Bear,” she amends, fingers twisting together now. He relishes the sound of it on her lips. “You don’t have to. I’m used to it, honestly. I know I just started here, but I’ve done closes before, you know.”

“I’ll wait outside.” A statement now. Stubborn. He’s always been a bit mulish, hard to shake off.

He can tell the second she relents, shoulders slumping. “Alright. I shouldn’t be too long…you can leave if you get bored though. Won’t blame you.”

He fights the urge to tilt her head up by the chin to make her meet his eyes. Just barely restrains himself.

Leaning against a tree out front, he twirls the ring around his finger as he watches her clean up. For the first time in a long time, he slips it off.

#ceil writing #joe bear graves #six (2017)#joe graves #six #big bear

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seat-safety-switch · 2 years ago

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“Everything’s in the cloud now,” I shout at the hot air balloonist over the sound of the burners. Sun glints off my snub-nose .38. “I was never smart enough to be a hacker before.”

Phineas Fogg looks behind him. "Uh-uh," I gently scold, and shake the gun for emphasis. "That went overboard a long time ago." He looks glumly over the edge of the basket, hoping to see his Passenger Removal Blackjack. It's a a desperate hope, one that it was simply misplaced by me, rather than yote parabolically into a nearby state fair from 8,000 feet. "Now drive."

"Fucking Missouri," he spits, and he's right. In any other state, this would be a felony. Balloonists are like gods there, unimpeachable even by law enforcement. Here, the gods meet mortals, and they don't like it.

We float higher and higher as he works what I have determined to be a crude throttle. The fire is beautiful, but I know that I cannot allow myself to be distracted by the purging of hydrocarbons. These balloony-types are crafty, having fought their way out of the vicious canvas wars of their disgusting home country. I know that if I take my eyes off the prize for one second, he'll try something.

Indeed he does. We pass briefly over an attractive red-and-white circus tent, itself an overinflated artifact of a bygone age of freaks. My unwilling travelling companion takes the opportunity to leap out of the basket, falling hundreds of feet. He bursts through the roof of the tent, landing squarely in a conveniently-placed bale of hay. Figures, I grunt to myself, but then I notice that he's not moving. No doubt the Barnum Bros have gotten themselves a cost-cutting MBA, who has decided that rocks painted like hay is sufficient enough to convince the rubes that the elephants are eating well and treated well, in equal measure.

I have caught myself in quite the pickle, I realize, as I look at the crude array of burners, levers, strings, springs, and apertures that lay before me. Saturday morning cartoons have taught me that this contraption operates the balloon's height, but its exact nature is unclear to me. Safe for the moment, I decide to take advantage of the surprising-but-welcome solitude and meditate on the issue, sitting cross-legged in the bottom of the basket and pivoting my thoughts towards the eternal expanse of human ingenuity. Carburetors of my youth come unbidden to my mind's eye on this vision quest, and soon I have discovered the common ancestor of this gas-burping nightmare and my precious Plymouth Volare's single-barrel, ethanol-rotted Ball & Ball.

Opening my eyes, it is very clear to me now what I must do. I floor the fucker. An enormous wall of flame bursts from the burners, singing my eyebrows. I laugh, and rise into the sky. Up there, in the clouds, the banks dwell. I am coming for them.

#best of

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o-cinnamonstickz · 6 months ago

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Chelley Week - Day 6 & 7 : AU/Heartbeat & Nightmare

This may be cheating.. and also not Chelley.. but I do have an AU that deals with both of these topics.

This is a scene from my “Arteries of an AI” AU. This AU focuses on GLaDOS and Chell developing a mother-daughter like relationship after a toddler Chell is found wandering aimlessly within the walls of Aperture, miraculously surviving the neurotoxin attack. GLaDOS, impressed by the sheer luck and curiosity of this child, takes Chell in with the intentions of raising her up to be a ruthless, biological, killing machine. Key word: intentions..

If there was one thing the Genetic Lifeform and Disc Operating System miscalculated, it would have to be how dangerously vital it was to be a nurturing vessel… and If this meant groundbreaking research for the sake of furthering Science, she supposed that implementing a heartbeat into her chest to soothe the nightmare stricken toddler would just have to do for now… for Science.. of course.

#chelley week 2024 #Portal #Portal 2 #Portal AU #GLaDOS #Chell #chell portal #portal Chell #GLaDOS portal #portal GLaDOS #Arteries of an AI #Arteries of an AI AU #AOAAI AU #Adopts a child for science

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zuzuelectricbugaloo · 1 month ago

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Color Spectrum Duo Origins Part 1: The Cannibal Hymn

Word count: 1,121

Rating: Teen

Romantic relationships: None

Cw: Cannibalism of deceased monster remains, death, murder, allusions to programming and coding abuse for Killer, emotional detachment and numbness per Stage 2 and Stage 3, minor species dysphoria

Synopsis: A meat (not) cute between Killer and Color

There’s a visceral crunch, flesh and oozing blood squelching around the knife violently stabbing into his victim until the dusting monster is an unidentifiable mess of broken, bloody bones and shredded limbs in the snow.

His chest elevates and compresses, pants visible in the cold air with every expeditious inhale for breath he doesn’t need. His mana thrums in his body, joints sparking with agitated magic, the powder blue color a sharp juxtaposition of the sanguine staining the snow, his clothes, and the mutilated corpse by his unlaced shoes stained cherry red.

Corroded determination oozes out his sockets to the pulse of freshly acquired LV burning through his leylines, liquid heat scorching his marrow. The heavy stench of iron and copper burn through his nasal aperture and flood his mouth with the forbidden taste.

“Wow, you really let Toriel have it.”

Chara floated in his periphery, revering the gore and remains of what was once a lovely, pristine white coat shaping a warm, friendly monster.

Now there’s nothing but a mutilated corpse slowly dusting away, abandoned and alone in the middle of Snowdin forest, in a bloodbath of his own design.

“We better head back before the “Boss” calls, huh?” Chara hummed. They spun in the air, idly kicking their legs as they aerially circumvented his skull. “Think he’ll let you eat this time?”

Killer wipes his blade on the component of his shorts not stained red. He shrugged.

Chara frowned from his nonverbal replication. “Seriously? I’m pretty sure you haven’t eaten since the massacre in one of Starboy’s AUs and all you do is shrug?”

Despite the hollowness in his chest, a grin tugs at the corner of his mouth when he shrugs again. He hoists his blade up to his sockets and flips it over. Noting with dissatisfaction that it’s still stained.

Killer brings the knife up to his mouth. His oral orifice tingles and sparks into a construct, his now evoked tongue sliding passed his parted jaw to lick his sullied blade clean, the taste of copper flooding his senses.

Chara’s face scrunches up like they’d swallowed something sour.

“Okay, ew.”

He thought it was impressive how a dead human could be so full of shit. “Don’t really have any wipes in my inventory,” Killer reminded them, “And licking blood ain’t the worst thing I’ve done.”

“No, but it’s the grossest. And why resort to cannibalism now?”

“Not cannibalism.” Killer pointed to their target-shaped Soul. “We’re not human or monster anymore, right? So, technically, not cannibalism.”

Despite their ostensibly permanent smile, Chara’s hooded eyes and pursed brows were decidedly unimpressed.

A sense of foreboding trickled down his spine when their lifeless, red-slitted eyes brightened.

“Hey, if you’re so hungry,” the smile on that cherubic face convulsed into a dark, convoluted sneer. “Why don’t you eat? I mean, who knows when you’ll get the chance again, right?”

He knew to Obey a Command when he heard one. Thinly veiled threats masked by saccharine inquiries. It was par the course from his owners.

”Oh yeah,” he muttered, hollow. When was the last time he ate? His body ached and his bones rattled with exhaustion.

Nightmare feasted on emotions. He didn’t need tangible sustenance like Killer.

The crimson mass of flesh in the snow melted slowly, unable to dust completely with his magic preventing it from doing so just yet.

Killer eyed an indiscernible piece next to his sneaker.

He knew it was wrong. That this was stooping too low even for him.

And yet he feels nothing when he crouches down. He feels nothing when he scoops a piece of torn flesh from the bloodied snow and hoists the verboten meat to his maw.

He feels nothing when the stench of decay floods his nasal aperture, tastes the chewy bitterness of forbidden Red flooding his mouth with the taste of copper and his sharpened cuspids tear apart the tough sinew of muscles until they shred like easily feasted ribbons that melt on his tongue, magic into magic.

Maybe he should feel something, violating the corpse of the former Queen of Monsters who embodied the very Trait of Kindness. He smashes apart bones and marrow alike, feasts on her heart, the tiny, inverted heart he’d prevented from discombobulating completely with his Determination, and swallows it, swallows her, and swallows her magic to aliment his own. He’d taken a life and dishonored it in the worst way imaginable, and he feels nothing.

Stealing from the dead to live on their hearts and magic for his own damned Soul.

And yet, he is devoid of life.

It tasted awful, it brought him no joy, the taste filled his mouth with acid.

Yet he feels nothing. Food is food. He will die without it.

He will die if he disobeys a Command.

“Damn Sansy,” Chara whistled, high and impressed. “You’re a freak, but I never thought you were a freak!”

No, Sans would never do this.

His claws tore apart an arm, ripping the muscles and sinews and steadfastly ignoring the fresh splash of blood that splattered his skull.

But he was not Sans.

Killer grinned, teeth sharp and wide and stained crimson when his stare leveled onto Chara. “Sans is dead, and I’m his tomb.” He titled his skull back and tossed another piece into his mouth. “I’m the Killer.”

Sans lived lifetimes ago. Now, there is only Killer in this purgatory. Like the ancient King Unas, a blood-thirsty devourer.

Snap!

The sound of a camera shutter going off has Killer’s body tensing and whipping his skull around to the source of the noise.

There in the distance, a skeleton with polychromatic fire pouring out the cracks in their skull gapes at Killer with their singular eyelight. Their camera nearly falls to the snow in their shock if it weren’t for the strap around their neck keeping it in place.

Killer can smell the shock, the sweet tangy scent of fear pouring off of them the longer they hold their gaze.

“Uhhhhhh…” The skeleton froze. They both stared at each other. The silence is a heavy, tangible thing, nothing but the dead and wind to fill the void. “…Hi?”

Killer’s neck cracks from the sharp, abrupt tilt he does to fling his skull to the side. His grin widens when the uncomfortable sound provokes a grimace from the monster.

“Hello.” His Soul spins, swarming and buzzing and shifting and unable to determine the proper threat level before him.

Determination surges. It sparks in his claws and surges out like minuscule bolts of lighting into a sanguine blade in his palm. It burns him from the inside out, onyx rivers of tinged sanguine oozing out his grinning mouth and voided sockets.

“Goodbye.”

Killer lunged.

#color sans #killer sans #color spectrum duo #zuzudrabbles #my writing #let me know if I miss a tag #or need to up the rating from teen to mature #idk #allusion and nod to Utterance 274 from the Myrian Litheim translation of The Cannibal Hymn #oh also if I need to fix anything #like Killer’s personality #got any facts wrong #let me know and I will edit it appropriately

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ariariari-freehounreal · 7 months ago

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Tw: Violence. Sad, kinda dark shit. Mental unwellness. Body image. Self esteem issues. Fatphobia. Uhhh. Language?

I’ve had this idea of, after portal 2, Chell goes up to the surface and is met with a world occupied by combine.

She finds a city or just general occupied settlement, naively expecting compassion or help from other humans. Humans must be better. [I think Chell is very optimistic, despite her bluntness and stoic nature, which is why she’s so determined, because she has a lot of hope.]

But they aren’t better. And she’s treated like just another citizen. Probably worse, because she can’t talk. Maybe she even becomes like a black sheep and other citizens blame things on her so that she gets in trouble instead of them.

There’s so many ideas I have with this augh.

Ex 1: When Chell first arrives, and is first attacked by the combine, they grab her by her hair so she won’t get away before beating the shit outta her. This ends up massively affecting her self image and she buzzes her hair because she feels like it makes her too vulnerable. (Bonus if it makes her feel like her femininity is a weakness) (extra bonus if she lets her hair grow out when she goes back to GLaDOS because through building their relationship she’s able to regain some of her self confidence)

Ex 2: Chell has extra ptsd now and is very not okay with being touched or cornered/loomed over (bonus if she has nightmares and ends up going to GLaDOS for comfort and they’re awkward and sad and gay) (or if Wheatley is there he says something that triggers her and he doesn’t understand why she’s upset bc no one told him and GLaDOS explains it to him and he apologizes to her and is sweet and kind)

Ex 3: The reason Chell comes back to aperture is bc she’s been fatally injured or was intentionally neglected [probably widespread famine up there] and GLaDOS is like

You little shit‼️ wtf go away die somewhere else‼️ ughh…[then she gayly nurses her back to health and over time they build a healthier bond] [bonus if maybe GLaDOS is able to do some retrieval mission for Wheatley or something] [it’s so unrealistic but him being stranded in space makes me so sad]

ALSO side note but this idea makes me so joyous

So like I hc that if Chell was healthy and eating normally and shit she probably would be chubby and in GLaDOS care she gains weight bc she’s actually being cared for and fed right and she’s happier and healing [bonus science cooperation points if she has self esteem issues about it bc she doesn’t really understand beauty standards as a concept, but understands that as far as she can remember <being like…the events of portal 1 and 2> Fatness has always been equated to wrongness and ugliness and being generally bad so she associates her gaining weight with her being ugly and she has to unlearn that internalized fatphobia]

Okay I’m done ranting I’m actually so insane bye lol

#portal #portal 2 #chell #chell portal #wheatley #glados #chell x glados #chelldos #chell x wheatley #chelley #yayyy #sorry this is probably so strange and incomprehensible my portal autism is just off the walls today

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bee-rosmyth-art · 1 year ago

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Resting her chin against his chest- just below the bright cartoon-green of Ellie's clip- she breathed, tasted static electricity and sunshine. The lightbridge sound in his chest, the Aperture logo on his shirt and the bright stratosphere-blue behind his closed, contented eyes, the trick place at the nape of his neck and his terrors and his twitches- maybe these were his scars, like the pale lines across her shins and her arms were hers, the twisted skin on her back and her nightmares and her protective coldness and her fears, but none of it had any power to hurt her tonight. If he reminded her of That Place it was only with a wry sort of wonder, an amazement that the two of them could have come out of that horror as intact as they were, to have salvaged so much from so little worth saving and to have still managed somehow to arrive here, this dark, starry place of safety, the warm amber light glimmering through the trees, the sound of crickets and his hands, warm in hers, against her shoulders.

- Blue Sky, Chapter 11: The Oracle

Written by Wafflestories

#blue sky fanfic #blue sky portal #chelley #chell portal #wheatley portal #chell #wheatley #portal #portal 2 #artists on tumblr #illustration #my art #digital art #oh we are so back baby #very excited for the next chapters

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internetskiff · 8 months ago

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While I personally prefer the industrial aesthetic of Portal 2, it's kinda hard to deny that Portal 1's BTS areas had a sort of vibe to them that is unlike Portal 2's take on it. The industrial areas from Portal 1 are basically a hell of nonsensical technology. It's hilarious, it seems like GLaDOS rebuilding the place from scratch after her awakening somehow made it arguably LESS of a nightmare. I mean, just look at this.

That's not so bad? OK. It gets worse. Why did Aperture have these devices.

What do these pistons even DO they're just here to crush people and smudge up the ceilings with MOLD. Did they put these here so the janitors would always have massive stains on the ceiling they would have to clean (or, more than likely, die trying)?????????

Some of these areas look like they wouldn't even be TRAVERSABLE unless they just handed portal guns out willy nilly.

You know you've fucked up when the homicidal robot is more generous with catwalk placement than whatever termite mound of construction workers that had to pile on top of eachother to build all of this. The only areas I'd argue look even remotely hospitable are the offices, which actually do look kinda cozy, but you'd probably end up getting squashed by a stray piston before you could even GET there.

Y'know Chell is pretty formidable but I think who we really need to fear is whoever the hell worked maintenance before the incident because if you can survive this building-sized tetanus-infested oven I'm pretty sure not even the fuckin Combine would be much of an issue for you. "Oh yeah I had to dodge like 10 pistons in order to get to Turret Manufacturing" like JESUS CHRIST.

#portal #portal 2 #aperture science #GLaDOS #rambling #yes i know it's probably just a result of portal's extremely brief development cycle but considering the canon #it's probably not unreasonable to assume the building was just like this #it's also 10 times funnier than assuming it was actually a lot more traversable than portal 1 makes it seem

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tiffanyelectricity · 2 months ago

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"Wahee, te cakeede isuru padoo dabura?"

~Klonoa can't wake up from the nightmares of Aperture Science, could this truly be his reality?~

Wherever you discovered me from, be it Portal, Klonoa or other media I create fanwork of, I want to say thanks for enjoying what I make, and I'm glad to have met so many great people!

Made this Crossover AU as a way of saying thanks combining two things I very much enjoy!

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mychlapci · 3 months ago

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Nocturnal emissions ft ageswap Prowl As mechlings of his age tend to still get nightmares and wet dreams, imagine one night, after being thoroughly exhausted from datawork, Prowl goes to recharge with a frazzled processor.

He decided that he'd defrag it in the morning, since his specs takes about four times as long as a normal mech's processor to clean, so doing it that late at night would just result in more sleep lost. Ratchet spotted the early signs of a workaholic, and took it upon himself to drill the importance of a good night's rest into Prowl. After all, sleep is a very integral part of a young mech's development!

But as he recharges, his glitchy processor, with no conscious mind awake to make sense of the running sims, which cannot be turned off, start dumping the jumbled results into his subconscious brain. And before he knew it, Prowl is caught in the throes of his first wet dream.

In his dream, he comes to in his little bunk, confused as to why it was still dark all around him. When he tries to stand up, something pounces on his face, causing him to fall back onto the pillow with a startled squeak. He couldn't see what it was, but the shape and texture was so very familiar.

Prowl's collection of stuffies are rather diverse, you see. Some of them are just big enough to fill his palms when lined together, usually in the shape of a ball, like a plush DragonQuest slime or fuzzy mechanoid urchin soft toy. Some are about as long as his forearms, just the right size for him to cuddle to his chest and bury his faceplates into. These are things like his teddy ironbear, his stuffed turbofox, his floppy gel octopus, and his tuxedo cybercat. Then lastly, we have the jumbo plushies, which are almost the size of a bolster. He has maybe two of these, one being a large pink rabbit and another is a cybertronian sized IKEA python.

His optics covered and his doorwings trapped under the blanket, he struggles in the dark, trying to get whatever fuzzy stuffie off his face. But the moment he gets a good grip on the toy, the rest of them decide to join the fray, the jumbo plushies doing most of the work to restrain and pin him.

Panicking, Prowl tries his best to thrash under the blanket, but only succeeds in turning himself over, arms and legs still pinned together by soft but firm appendages. Whatever that was on his face lets go, but a tail quickly wraps around his eyes, blindfolding him. When he tries to engage his doorwing sensors, fuzzy little paws start molesting his very sensitive hinges and rubbing all over the smooth plating, effectively rendering them useless as his senses are distracted by the soothing pets and arousing stimulation.

Helpless and caught, Prowl tries to call for help, only for a blob of fur to stuff itself into his mouth, muffling his cries. There are more plush limbs teasing him and rutting their various textured coverings all over his body now, filling his senses with delicious friction in all of his erogenous zones. After a few breems of whimpering, his instincts finally give and his plating opens up against his volition, exposing his soaked array to the dark of the room.

Immediately, small little cottonmesh paws zero in on his pulsing node and leaky spike, driving him wild with pleasure. He can only moan when he feels one of the ball plushes pressing up against the entrance to his valve, becoming sopping wet as it soaks up all of his gushing juices.

It rubs against his valvelips for a bit, rotating and pressing onto the squishy protoform, spreading and massaging the entrance. Then it starts pushing in, the soft body providing no resistance as it stuffa itself up his valve, the involuntary squeezing only helping to guide it upwards deeper and deeper into him. Prowl squeals behind his gag when he feels it press up against the aperture of his gestation chamber. Before he could get used to the pressure, another ball of fluff presses against his pussy.

The stimulation on his anterior node and little cocklet continues as the stuffies travel up his valve one by one. It's so humiliating to be taken like this, but at the same time, a traitorous part of him doesn't want to stop.

With each successive deposit, the plushies gett larger and larger, and eventually, the non-blob shaped toys are stuffing themselves into his pussy, their much larger size pressing against all of the others in the back of his valve. It's becoming such a tight squeeze in there, his ceiling node feels like it's basically being tortured with pleasure. He'a getting close to an overload.

Teary and drooling, Prowl is no longer struggling, and is instead trying to rut against the bedding and the plush toys plastered all over his needy and charged frame now, mindlessly chasing his orgasm. His pussy is so full now, it wouldn't take much more before a hard shove into the contents of his valve forces his cervical entrance open.

And whem it finally does, he cums himself awake in his real bunk, groggy but horny, clutching his favourite cybercat to his panting chest. He sits up to find that the bedding around his hips have been soaked from his sonambulistic squirting.

Extremely embarrassed, he sees to changing his bedsheets immediately, praying that no one finds out about his mishap. The twins, being early risers themselves, catch him in the act of accessing the laundry room so early in the cycle, of course.

Once they've trapped their little cadet between them and teased a confession out of him, they scoop him up and pepper him with reassuring kisses, telling him that it's normal for mechlings like him to experience such things as he weeps from his stressful recharge flux. Once all washed up, Prowl gets taken back to the twins' quarters, where he finally gets to defrag properly and go back to sleep in between his mentors, burying his face into the soft fur of an innocent, inanimate plush toy in their embrace-🔌

ouhh Prowl having silly sex dreams about plushies is so fun. Fuzzy little bodies rubbing up against his needy valve and spike, making him twitch and convulse in his bed… He wakes up in soaked sheets, his spike and valve have squirted quite the mess all over his legs, and he’s so embarrassed…

I bet that next time this happens, Sunny and Sides would love to be there to watch their trainee squirm…

#valveplug #texty #dubcon #sommophilia #kind of #i guess #ageswap au #scheduled

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ninadove · 2 months ago

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Nina reads Dracula 🦇

September 17th

OK HERE WE GO I AM MENTALLY PREPARED TO LEARN ABOUT LUCY’S DEA —

Lucy Westenra's Diary.

Nevermind that. Guess I’ll have to do it all over again.

Four days and nights of peace. I am getting so strong again that I hardly know myself. It is as if I had passed through some long nightmare, and had just awakened to see the beautiful sunshine and feel the fresh air of the morning around me. I have a dim half-remembrance of long, anxious times of waiting and fearing; darkness in which there was not even the pain of hope to make present distress more poignant: and then long spells of oblivion, and the rising back to life as a diver coming up through a great press of water.

The pain of hope alright…

To-night Dr. Van Helsing is going away, as he has to be for a day in Amsterdam. But I need not be watched; I am well enough to be left alone.

‘Cause here we go, go, go again 🎶

Thank God for mother's sake, and dear Arthur's, and for all our friends who have been so kind! I shall not even feel the change, for last night Dr. Van Helsing slept in his chair a lot of the time. I found him asleep twice when I awoke; but I did not fear to go to sleep again, although the boughs or bats or something napped almost angrily against the window-panes.

EVERYONE. IS TRYING. SO HARD.

Anyways BACK TO RENFIELD:

Suddenly the door was burst open, and in rushed my patient, with his face distorted with passion. I was thunderstruck, for such a thing as a patient getting of his own accord into the Superintendent's study is almost unknown.

Right. But he did escape the facility itself twice, including once with your complicity. So maybe the safety protocols need a liiittle bit of reassessing here.

Without an instant's pause he made straight at me. He had a dinner-knife in his hand, and, as I saw he was dangerous, I tried to keep the table between us. He was too quick and too strong for me, however; for before I could get my balance he had struck at me and cut my left wrist rather severely.

FIGHT!!!!! FIGHT!!!!! FIGHT!!!!! FIGHT!!!!

He was lying on his belly on the floor licking up, like a dog, the blood which had fallen from my wounded wrist. He was easily secured, and, to my surprise, went with the attendants quite placidly, simply repeating over and over again: "The blood is the life! The blood is the life!"

Renfield’s DYI Guide to Vampirism: now available in a bookstore near you!

I cannot afford to lose blood just at present;

This is a terrifying and strangely sweet thought and I will be reusing this turn of phrase.

Happily Van Helsing has not summoned me, so I need not forego my sleep; to-night I could not well do without it.

Telegram, Van Helsing, Antwerp, to Seward, Carfax. Do not fail to be at Hillingham to-night.

Now that’s what I call comedic timing.

Anyways back to… Lucy again… Oh…

I write this and leave it to be seen, so that no one may by any chance get into trouble through me. This is an exact record of what took place to-night. I feel I am dying of weakness, and have barely strength to write, but it must be done if I die in the doing.

Talk about an emotional roller-coaster.

Presently the door opened, and mother looked in; seeing by my moving that I was not asleep, came in, and sat by me. She said to me even more sweetly and softly than her wont:—

"I was uneasy about you, darling, and came in to see that you were all right."

I feared she might catch cold sitting there, and asked her to come in and sleep with me, so she came into bed, and lay down beside me;

SEE WHAT I MEANT LAST TIME. Yes Ms Westenra is dying but she still wants to watch over her little girl! Yes Lucy is a grown adult but she still needs her mum! It’s all about love

After a while there was the low howl again out in the shrubbery, and shortly after there was a crash at the window, and a lot of broken glass was hurled on the floor. The window blind blew back with the wind that rushed in, and in the aperture of the broken panes there was the head of a great, gaunt grey wolf. Mother cried out in a fright, and struggled up into a sitting posture, and clutched wildly at anything that would help her. Amongst other things, she clutched the wreath of flowers that Dr. Van Helsing insisted on my wearing round my neck, and tore it away from me. For a second or two she sat up, pointing at the wolf, and there was a strange and horrible gurgling in her throat; then she fell over—as if struck with lightning, and her head hit my forehead and made me dizzy for a moment or two. The room and all round seemed to spin round. I kept my eyes fixed on the window, but the wolf drew his head back, and a whole myriad of little specks seemed to come blowing in through the broken window, and wheeling and circling round like the pillar of dust that travellers describe when there is a simoon in the desert.

OK OK not to (surprisingly) turn into your local Mrs Westenra Defender™ but. But. If this exact ordeal happened to you and you did not have the benefit of knowing the lore, would your natural conclusion not be that the flowers attracted the wolf? Because that sure as Hell would be mine.

I tried to stir, but there was some spell upon me, and dear mother's poor body, which seemed to grow cold already—for her dear heart had ceased to beat—weighed me down; and I remembered no more for a while.

WAIT SHE’S DEAD????? WHAT ARE WE BLAMING HER FOR EXACTLY????? SHE FUCKING DIED

The maids shrieked, and then went in a body to the dining-room; and I laid what flowers I had on my dear mother's breast. When they were there I remembered what Dr. Van Helsing had told me, but I didn't like to remove them, and, besides, I would have some of the servants to sit up with me now.

I WAS TOLD LUCY’S MUM THREW THE FLOWERS AWAY AND THAT DIRECTLY CAUSED HER DEATH. THAT COULD NOT BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH. WHAT HAPPENED

My heart sank when I saw what had happened. They all four lay helpless on the floor, breathing heavily. The decanter of sherry was on the table half full, but there was a queer, acrid smell about. I was suspicious, and examined the decanter. It smelt of laudanum, and looking on the sideboard, I found that the bottle which mother's doctor uses for her—oh! did use—was empty. What am I to do? what am I to do? I am back in the room with mother. I cannot leave her, and I am alone, save for the sleeping servants, whom some one has drugged. Alone with the dead! I dare not go out, for I can hear the low howl of the wolf through the broken window.

WHO WHAT AND HOW

The air seems full of specks, floating and circling in the draught from the window, and the lights burn blue and dim. What am I to do? God shield me from harm this night! I shall hide this paper in my breast, where they shall find it when they come to lay me out. My dear mother gone! It is time that I go too. Good-bye, dear Arthur, if I should not survive this night. God keep you, dear, and God help me!

LUCY NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO —

Letter, Mina Harker to Lucy Westenra (Unopened by her.)

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO

My dearest Lucy,—It seems an age since I heard from you, or indeed since I wrote. You will pardon me, I know, for all my faults when you have read all my budget of news.

Why don’t you twist the knife even deeper Bram.

Well, I got my husband back all right;

A little bit of light in this God-forsaken world

'My dears, I want to drink your health and prosperity; and may every blessing attend you both. I know you both from children, and have, with love and pride, seen you grow up. Now I want you to make your home here with me. I have left to me neither chick nor child; all are gone, and in my will I have left you everything.' I cried, Lucy dear, as Jonathan and the old man clasped hands. Our evening was a very, very happy one.

And twist the knife deeper he did.

So here we are, installed in this beautiful old house, and from both my bedroom and the drawing-room I can see the great elms of the cathedral close, with their great black stems standing out against the old yellow stone of the cathedral and I can hear the rooks overhead cawing and cawing and chattering and gossiping all day, after the manner of rooks—and humans.

Windows! Parallels and contrasts!! Something monstrous VS something divine and most of all human!!! I’m fine this is fine we’re all fine —

How is your dear mother getting on?

ALRIGHT BRAM THAT’S ENOUGH TWISTING.

and Jonathan wants looking after still.

🥺🥹 (<- Hanging on by a thread)

And now I have told you my news, let me ask yours. When are you to be married, and where, and who is to perform the ceremony, and what are you to wear, and is it to be a public or a private wedding? Tell me all about it, dear; tell me all about everything, for there is nothing which interests you which will not be dear to me. Jonathan asks me to send his 'respectful duty,' but I do not think that is good enough from the junior partner of the important firm Hawkins & Harker; and so, as you love me, and he loves me, and I love you with all the moods and tenses of the verb, I send you simply his 'love' instead. Good-bye, my dearest Lucy, and all blessings on you.

Yours,

MINA HARKER.

(Thread snapped)

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#dracula #dracula daily #nina reads dracula #lucy westenra #ms westenra #john seward #r.m. renfield #jonathan harker #mina harker #jonmina #abraham van helsing

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