#pisiform

[keydekyie]

most (possibly all? I'm not sure tho) animals with paw pads actually have this pad, including dogs! It's related to a bone in the wrist called the pisiform bone, marked below with 11 (this bone is very small in humans compared to other apes). The bone forms an important attachment point for various tendons in the arm, and the carpal pad not only helps with stopping and descending slopes, it also cushions the pisiform bone on impacts.

why do cats have an extra bean on their wrist... what is if for..

[wurds-fur-nurds]

Vorticellapistiformology noun | \ vȯr-tə-ˌsel-ə-ˌpist-ə-ˌfȯrm-ə-lə-jē \

1. The study and classification of structural similarities and interactions among seemingly unrelated forms in nature, specifically examining parallels between the morphology of vorticellae (bell-shaped, ciliate protozoa), pistols (mechanical devices designed for propelling projectiles), and pisiforms (small, pea-shaped bones found in the wrist). 2. A branch of biomimicry and comparative anatomy that investigates functional convergences between organisms and human-made objects, with particular focus on the evolutionary adaptations that lead to the development of similar structures for entirely different purposes in biology and engineering.

Example: "Through his deep dive into vorticellapistiformology, Dr. Alton discovered surprising similarities in the pivot points of pistols and the contractile stalks of vorticellae."

[pepsinister]

tw: broken frontal bone tw: broken left parietal bone tw: broken right parietal bone tw: broken left temporal bone tw: broken right temporal bone tw: broken occipital bone tw: broken sphenoid bone tw: broken ethmoid bone tw: broken mandible tw: broken left maxilla tw: broken right maxilla tw: broken left palantine bone tw: broken right palantine bone tw: broken left zygomatic bone tw: broken right zygomatic bone tw: broken left nasal bone tw: broken right nasal bone tw: broken left lacrimal bone tw: broken right lacrimal bone tw: broken vomer tw: broken left nasal conchae tw: broken right nasal conchae tw: broken left malleus tw: broken right malleus tw: broken left incus tw: broken right incus tw: broken left stapes tw: broken right stapes tw: broken hyoid tw: broken left scapula tw: broken right scapula tw: broken left clavicle tw: broken right clavicle tw: broken sternum tw: broken left rib 1 tw: broken left rib 2 tw: broken left rib 3 tw: broken left rib 4 tw: broken left rib 5 tw: broken left rib 6 tw: broken left rib 7 tw: broken left rib 8 tw: broken left rib 9 tw: broken left rib 10 tw: broken left rib 11 tw: broken left rib 12 tw: broken right rib 1 tw: broken right rib 2 tw: broken right rib 3 tw: broken right rib 4

tw: broken right rib 5 tw: broken right rib 6 tw: broken right rib 7 tw: broken right rib 8 tw: broken right rib 9 tw: broken right rib 10 tw: broken right rib 11 tw: broken right rib 12 tw: broken cervical vertebra 1 tw: broken cervical vertebra 2 tw: broken cervical vertebra 3 tw: broken cervical vertebra 4 tw: broken cervical vertebra 5 tw: broken cervical vertebra 6 tw: broken cervical vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 1 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 2 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 3 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 4 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 5 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 6 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 8 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 9 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 10 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 11 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 12 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 1 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 2 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 3 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 4 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 5 tw: broken sacrum tw: broken coccyx tw: broken left humerus tw: broken right humerus tw: broken left radius tw: broken right radius tw: broken left ulna tw: broken right ulna tw: broken left scaphoid bone tw: broken right scaphoid bone tw: broken left lunate bone tw: broken right lunate bone tw: broken left triquetral bone tw: broken right triquetral bone tw: broken left pisiform bone

tw: broken right pisiform bone tw: broken left trapezium tw: broken right trapezium tw: broken left trapezoid bone tw: broken right trapezoid bone tw: broken left capitate bone tw: broken right capitate bone tw: broken left hamate bone tw: broken right hamate bone tw: broken left metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5 tw: broken left innominate bone tw: broken right innominate bone tw: broken left femur tw: broken right femur

tw: broken left patella tw: broken right patella tw: broken left tibia tw: broken right tibia tw: broken left fibula tw: broken right fibula tw: broken left calcaneus tw: broken right calcaneus tw: broken left talus tw: broken right talus tw: broken left navicular bone tw: broken right navicular bone tw: broken left medial cuneiform bone tw: broken right medial cuneiform bone tw: broken left intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken right intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken left lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken right lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken left cuboid bone tw: broken right cuboid bone tw: broken left metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5

tw: bruising

just had a bad accident

[stealingyourbones]

I didn’t know that pisiform removal was a thing. Thanks for leading me down a rabbit hole of case study papers and surgery videos.

The Hyoid bone is fully free floating and not connected to any other bone, while the pisiform bone rests on top of the triquetrum bone akin to a kneecap, it acts as a joint with the triquetrum and helps in preventing the triquetrum from dislocating itself. It’s funky like that. (For those not knowing where the that is, it’s at the lowest part of the wrist at the pinkie side of the hand)

Not only does it just keep parts of your bones in place, it’s also connected to a few other things!! (You didn’t ask for this but but I now wish to share knowledge so bare with me)

It’s connected to a muscle that lets you curl in the lowest joint of your pinkie where your hand meets your palm.

It’s also connected to the transverse carpal ligament. The ligament stretches from the far side of your pinkie to the far side of your thumb. It creates what the cool kids call the Carpal Tunnel. It lays overtop a shit ton of tendons that move the rest of your fingers and the beloathed median nerve. (Making a lil tunnel between your bones n ligament!) If your median nerve is pinched by this muscle, you experience the joys of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome.

Last thing it’s connected to is a very thin forearm muscle that assists in moving your wrist up n down and side to side!

All in all, it adds a bunch of stability to the outside of your wrist!

That was a bit of a ramble but yeah! That sucker do be connected to a bunch of things. Not only to another bone but a bunch of other ligaments and muscles :D

What’s your favorite bone?

Ooooo i have to go with the Hyoid bone. It’s located in your neck and it’s the only bone not connected to another bone! It’s got muscle, ligaments, and tissues that hold it in place instead! Gotta love me unique bone structures :)

[chobani-flip]

@bucktommypositivityweek

prompt: what they love most about each other (yeah, idk... i just realised that this was happening like an hour ago? i was wondering why so many fics had a similar theme today... oh well... im not sure what this is, but it definitely is. enjoy?)

--

so there's this line that buck heard at a wedding once. it was while he was working as a bartender in peru, and this american couple who'd met in the bar he worked at during his shift decided to get married there.

and Sex-on-the-Beach-Easy-On-The-Cranberry-Juice said to Dark-And-Stormy: "how do i love thee, let me count the ways"

which made buck look up from where he'd been mixing up a margarita because: thee? really? but then Sex-on-the-Beach-Easy-On-The-Cranberry-Juice went on to list a truly ridiculous list of attributes which made buck sigh a little wistfully and wonder what it was like to have someone to love like that.

(who'd love you back)

he thought he'd found it with abby, but well...

and with taylor he sometimes lay awake at night rolling the words over on his tongue like bobby taught him you should do with wine, to actually have a chance at tasting some of the insane things the labels promise. but back then how do i love thee, let me count the ways always left a vague fuzziness all over his mouth, all grippy tannin.

(they weren't right for each other, buck knew that now. maybe they could have worked if they'd met sooner, or later, but not then.)

"evan?"

"hmmm?"

"the seatbelt?"

oh. slowly, buck blinked at tommy through the warm cabin light. he'd had just the mai tai at the bar, but it'd been a while since he'd had anything besides an occassional beer and he could feel the alcohol hitting him more than usual.

it made the interior of tommy's car blur just a little as he turned his head to reach for the seatbelt. it made him grin wide and stupid into tommy's lovely face as he smiled his crow's feet smile with his eyes and turned the key in the ignition.

a single sure turn of the wrist. buck loved tommy's hands. big. wide. and big. and the bone, the one that stuck out a little at the wrist. the one that hen smacked him for laughing at it for the hundredth time when he was helping her learn anatomy with flashcards. pisiform bone. buck loved it too.

"you ok?" "i like your hands"

they didn't speak at once, but tommy had barely finished his question when buck began his confession so it was very nearly the same thing. tommy threw his own hand a slightly bemused look before reaching for the gearshift and changing gear.

because tommy drove manual. buck loved to watch the muscles of his legs contract and release in perfect synchronicity as he released the clutch and stepped on the gas.

he wore jeans tonight for their meet-up with hen and karen. buck loved how they fit around his thighs, made him kinda wanna bite them.

and then move up and taste his hipbones again, and bury his nose in the hair at the base of tommy's cock and suck at the sensitive skin of his balls and-

"evan, you know i love to hear you talk but i really need you to shut up now. im glad you like how tight my jeans are but they're really fucking tight."

buck blinked a little faster at being brought back from his daydream, licked his dry lips and realized the sudden absence of sound vibrating his vocal cords.

huh.

tommy was throwing him little looks in between checking the side mirrors, smiling, maybe a little bit in disbelief. buck loved the way his upper lip grew thinner the wider he smiled. he also loved to bite on the fuller bottom lip.

how do i love thee, let me count the ways

buck bit his own lip to keep from grinning and, with the aftertaste of rum and sugar smooth at the back of his throat, went on with his list.

[deadboyfriendd]

Sovereign Creatures: The Triumph Of Death

Summary: You plan on reanimating your lover piece by piece, today, you are in search of his eyes.

Warnings: Fem!Reader, Mermaid reader, Plague Doctor!Steve Harrington, based off of The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw, period appropriate violence, gore, blood, self mutilation, surgical instruments

My content is 18+ Minors DNI

The bezoar sits encased in a glass cloche, its ruminating pulse the only thing to remind you that he was once alive, too– and that he may be alive again one day. 

The bezoar of your dead lover– a bolus of broken-off teeth and snarled hairs, fingernails, caked dirt, curds of mummified gray, colored glass. Over it all, a lettering of fine blue veins, like an alphabet that only muscle can decode – incubated his dwindling consciousness. You dreamed of the day this organ would pulsate behind flesh once more. 

You knew nothing of his pilot existence, where he learned his kindness. You did not know of the life he lived with a mother and father, where he learned to speak and run, where he felt the weight of the earth in all of its glory. Where the warmth of the sunburn overcomes the sting and the weight of existence is a beautiful one to bear. 

Instead you knew of his last existence. This one stunk with the morosity of being reanimated but never fully alive again. You’d wondered if his first death had been as painful as his last, even though you knew it would be foolish to assume that it hadn’t. Creatures of his nature rarely harbored peace in death. The weight of this existence was bruising– crushing, even. 

You knew this existence would be beautiful– almost as beautiful as he had been.

Your boy would be beautiful again, made in the image of your own ideal of it. 

Your finger traced over his notes, scared to smudge to ink despite its age. You felt the embossing against the parchment and tried to feel his hands against your fingers like reeds, blood flowing under his skin in its inky black beauty and pulsating through the ruminants of his inkwell heart. 

The study felt more like yours than his own now, though he had inhabited it for years before your existence. You were merely a vessel for his findings. A piece plucked and carved from this rib of his essence. A slave to the bezoar behind a glass cloche. 

It still pulsated its erratic song in a fleshy waltz. You looked for the hum of his voice beneath it, not quite able to remember its exact pitch. You listen to it again and again, the mellow drone of it a backing that fills your studies. Sometimes you listened for a whisper, sometimes you listened for permission to continue. 

There were more pieces of you covering this place than there were pieces of him, it felt like. You could no longer differentiate your books interwoven with his on the shelves– the lines between your handwriting and his becoming one blurred entity, the line where your being ended and the pieced-together formations of where his new being began intertwined as one desolate, threadbare creature. 

The human hands can be differentiated by the presence of an opposable thumb, made different from the other phalanges marked by the absence of the middle phalanx… the metacarpal is the connecting factor to the smaller subset of carpals within the wrist. 

This you knew was his writing, and you were thankful in the beginning for how thorough he had been in his studies. You allowed yourself the pleasure of feeling the ridges of his writing:

Trapezoid, trapezium, capitate, hamate, scaphoid, lunate, triquetrum, pisiform. 

You try to feel them in your own wrists, try to feel the sutures in bone and the roll of ligament over them. You tried to feel the feeling of being alive once more, differentiating it from what– you weren’t quite certain. You tried to remember a time in which he had been alive. 

“That’s it.” He would have whispered to you, through a velveteen smile, his own gentle fingers wrapped delicately around your wrists– feeling the roll of ligament over bone the way you tried to feel now, “So Long To Pinkie, Here Comes The Thumb.” 

Scaphoid, lunate, triquetrum, pisiform, hamate, capitate, trapezoid, trapezium.  You jotted down alongside his writing. 

His hands were one of the few things remaining after the day of the saints– your body seethed like the embers that remained of him. You watched them settle low against the glass in their formaldehyde home and wished desperately that you could pull one out to cradle your face just once– the way he had. 

You wished that you could trail your fingers over the hills and valleys of the soft plush of his hands in search of the canyons between his fingers in which yours would seek solace just once more. You wished to feel his thumb run rivers across the crest of your lip, pilling downward over the plush and settle in the crevice between there and your chin. Just once do you wish to  feel warmth behind flesh. 

It had been years, now. More than you could remember. 

His existence, the way he was before the only remnants of him you had were his studies, seemed blurry now– a far off memory in which you could not quite soft through. But you remembered the warmth that radiated from him like the sun. You do not remember who he was, yet the remnants of his previous existence consumed your entirety. 

The violence in which he gave his life for you no longer stings, but fills you with a hot, blinding anger.

His existence was violent and painful, manufactured to be that way, yet nonetheless beautiful. Sometimes you believe he does not want to live again, but you are selfish. You will show him that there is existence without pain. 

You press tender fingers, cold and aching against the glass cloche. A promise to him that you will return in due time. That you will come bearing gifts. That you will hold each other once more. 

The air is clammy this time of year, salty on your tongue when you inhale and chilled from the sea air. The cobblestone is right beneath your feet, and you walk with more caution than you typically would during the day. A fire burns in the distance, woolen-cloaked bodies stand around it in a horde in silence, staring into its molten nucleus. Humans were like that, you found, drawn to warmth. Maybe you had lost your edge. Maybe the frailty of humanity was contagious. 

Maybe a part of him had stayed human. 

He had been drawn to it as a moth to a gas lamp, quick to release his body to her thrashing, ravenous hands. Had the fire been the cause? Or, perhaps, the warmth in which death held him delicately between her fingers. He had held you the same way. You would hold him that way again. 

The first doctor was one that he was close to in his reanimated life; they had been brothers in death, harvested and reanimated at the hands of The Saints. They had passed years of orphaned childhood by playing kill the pig– a sickening game it was, even to you. Swine to slaughter, children for sacrificial youth. The saints plucked pieces from their bodies like ripened fruit, replaced them with other displaced pieces, ugly shows in sick theaters under the guise of ritualism for the other children to watch– until there were no remnants of them to be left. A quilt of leftover parts and shells of children that once were and would never be again. 

The woods that congregate like hooded men at the mouth of where river meets ocean are deep. His house is hidden deeper within them, not unlike your own, a dry thatched roof and stone walls. Solitary, with sea salt tears brimming cobblestone eyes. Yet, somehow warmer than yours. It felt like the depths of the ocean in which you resided. The part of you that human-adjacent held it close to you. 

His name is Edward. It was one of the few things he kept for himself in his old life, along with his eyes. When you would ask why, he would say:

“The Saints preferred colored eyes, my dear.” 

You’d figured that was why you were searching for your own pair now. Green, like the moss that covers the dirt in a spongy expanse in the spring.

You knock on the door and he is warm in greeting– almost as warm as it is within his house. 

“Ah, you’re here for them.”

There is a code in the way the plague doctors speak, they are warm to each other, but speak around the visceral topics of what they are actually doing. The world still feared them. In your bluntness, you had still not mastered the art. 

“The eyes, yes.” 

His back is to you. Even with his figure cloaked, you can see the misshapenness flex and roll beneath a linen sea. There is a tincture clinking as the jars bounce off of another in a song as he picks each one up and examines it– contents dancing formaldehyde dances. He is a creature in his own respect. You feel a solidarity to him despite the sovereigness to your creation. 

Your hands were not warm, not like his were. Skin rubbery and catching along itself in a tacky half-dryness as you reach to your back. Scales lay there, green and blue like the refraction of abalone. Sharp against any flesh that dare come close. The skin there is raised where you had done this before. 

It stings less for this time, but the dull ache pulsates beneath the skin where the pockets still remain. Your fingers bleed from the grip, and a deep blood seeps from the wounds like outstretched arms that reach for the scale. 

There is an infatuation that resides within the plague doctors with your existence. These pieces of you had proven incredibly valuable to them in the past. 

A book on the shelf calls to you– bound in leather and charred to an inky blackness around the edges. Necromantia. 

An old magic. Older than your lifetime. 

“What will that cost me?” You asked, Edward, who, in turn, pulls the book from the shelf. 

“We will settle that in time.”

You aren’t quite sure what it means, regardless, you tuck the book into your cloak– near your chest. It ruminates its own pulse, respires its own breaths– much like the bezoar. 

“You know,” he begins, eyes somber and black against the golden glow of the fire light, “the saints had a way of resurrecting us, of sorts… bringing us to life without actually killing us–”

“Rebirth without death.”

“Yes, so it was.” His eyes have become pits, swirling blackness of eternal oblivion. A rift in the seams of this world that points you toward his damnation. 

They had only been children. 

“I know this may be difficult to hear,” He says, voice low– you cannot tell if it for preservation of your emotions or for caution of violence, “but it may be best to let the dead be dead.” 

You assumed his resentment towards the saints was a mirror reflection of Steven’s. A fiery hatred that burned like embers deep within his chest– the lifeblood in which kept him alive for so long. He fed off of this hatred, he burned his own body to ash in search of it. He wanted The Saints dead– so much that he would offer himself to this hatred, too. 

This resentment burned in your throat tonight. It burned in choking sobs and hot tears that rolled down your rubbery flesh. It clouded your vision as you splayed ocular nerves. It burned your nose in tandem with preserving fluids. It burned in your chest as you took a step back, admiring his beauty in anatomical pieces. 

He isn’t dead. Just incomplete.

You should let him be dead, but the pulsating of the bezoar pleads to stay alive. 

When he opens borrowed eyes again, would he resent you too?

[treedaddymcpuffpuff]

WIP Whenever

I can’t remember who I was tagged by, but here you go. Next chapter of Beneath Miles of Stone

It is strange to see him interact with the table.

He is so different here, with his.. business associates? 

Stoic, controlled, barely able to raise a lip in good nature while everyone else laughs heartily. 

The tension that boils off of him is thick, suffocating, and she wonders if she is the only one who notices the switch in his temperament. 

She rests her fingers, lightly, on his left wrist, just below the leather band of his watch, and he looks at her, hard and lightless.

This is that other part of him that scares her, makes her bottom lip quiver and her gaze cast down to avoid his dilated black eyes.

She releases his wrist, remembering the way it easily assisted in pulling a trigger to end many lives - full, rich lives with abundant stories and futures cut short. 

She doesn’t hold his gaze long enough to notice him soften for her.

Winston catches her unnerved glance, and she recalls his cockney, rich voice that night in the hotel room: “The problem is not what he will do to you, it’s what he will do to protect you.”

It’s easy to believe, especially when she watches Iosef’s hands shake hard enough to make wine capsize over the rim of his glass as John glares him down. 

Some fear-driven, forgotten part of her that’s crafted from survival instinct tells her she should be afraid of him, though. 

Everyone else in this room is - on some level. The respect held for him - that not even Viggo and Winston get - is testament to that. 

But he’s still just John, isn’t he? John, who learned how to cuddle for her and John who kisses her on the forehead and tickles her. John who helps older ladies load luggage into their car and who seems to be adored by most everyone he knows.

Adoration, fear? He gives her whiplash.

She’s staring way too much at her hands, so she looks up and focuses on the crystal table centerpiece instead. 

John reaches his fingers out to hers, attempting some version of soft and timid. 

She lets him rest a heavy thumbprint on her pisiform, already feeling too much like an asshole for never letting herself resist fearing and doubting him.

Tagging @lilspookymeh @sweetwolfcupcake and @thewhumpcaretaker

[anxiousgaypanicking]

Begging For Your Body

Intruality (Remus x Patton) Prompt: Intruality with soft!dom Patton and bottom Remus. The main plot of this would be that maybe Remus was feeling down, having intrusive thoughts (as he does), specifically about his body image, and Patton is there to comfort him and love up on him <3. Kinks are praise, grinding, begging (from the dom perspective, (ex: "Please, Please let me make you feel good, baby?"), overstimulation, multiple orgasms, and a lot of pet names-) Warnings: sex, overstimulation, grinding A request from my AO3

Remus stares at himself in the cracked mirror before him, dressed in just his boxers.

He doesn't often have problems with his body - physical insecurities were more often relayed to Virgil or Roman - but as his eyes dance over his bony frame, he doesn't feel great about it. He's unhealthily thin (no doubt from his avoidance of any food with proper nutrients), bones protruding ever ridge and crevice. From his ribs, to his hips, to his prominent pisiforms. He was disgusting

Physically; he was disgusting, physically.

Remus's thin fingers pull at his equally thin hair, coating his digits in grease and sticky substances. No wonder no one wants to touch him.

His hands travel downwards, over his sharp jaw and nose, his sunken eyes, and his chapped lips, before carding over his spikey mustache. He must be so uncomfortable to kiss.

And then even further down, his hairy chest, arms, legs; there was even a thick trail of hair down to his boxers, where he was just as hairy underneath them. Of course he wouldn't be cuddled with; he'd probably make his companion itch like hell.

He frowns, deep and unsettlingly. Regardless of his expressions, he looked unnerving.

Smiling? Psychotic. Frowning? Murderous. Neutral? Wide-eyed and crazy, unable to stand still.

Remus's hands ball into fists at his sides, as he's filled with the impulsive urge to drive his hand through his mirror and smash it until it's nothing but a blood-covered mess on his grimy floor, and his hand was so unrecognizable that he wouldn't have to worry about his jagged nails or hitchhikers thumb.

Before he can act on his impulses though, there's a knock on his door.

"Remus," Patton gently speaks through it, followed by a couple seconds of silence. There's a pause, before Patton softly continues "Remus... are you alright?"

"No," Remus answers, quick and honest, before biting his tongue hard enough to taste metal in his mouth. He's almost embarrassed by the vulnerability in his answer, and so adds "I'm demented, remember?" in order to make it seem like a typical crazy comment.

Unfortunately, Patton can see right through him, and his door is being slowly pushed open as Patton steps inside, shutting it behind him.

"I don't mean to intrude," Patton begins, as his eyes flicker over Remus's bare body before quickly looking away, flushing as he realizes Remus is almost entirely stripped down, "but we could... I could feel your negativity pulsing through the mindscape."

Remus huffs. "God forbid I do anything."

Immediately, Patton is waving his hands wildly. "No- no!" he exclaims, attempting to overcompensation for the misconception. "That's not- it's not your fault. Well, it is your fault, but you're feeling, and that's okay! It's okay to feel, and it's okay to feel bad." Patton sucks in a deep breath, pulling his hands close to his chest, keeping his palms clasped together. "I just... wanted to come offer support, and hopefully help you feel better. If you'd be willing to let me, of course."

"You don't even know what's wrong."

Remus's words aren't accusatory; they're just blunt, though they make Patton shift his weight back and forth.

"I'd like to," Patton expresses, voice quiet. "Let me help."

Remus stares at Patton, expression unreadable, before his lips crack into a smile, splitting down the chapped lines and sending a slight stinging pain over his mouth.

"Fine," he replies, turning to face Patton fully. "Why the hell not? It'll give me something to do, at least."

Patton approaches him slowly, reminding Remus that the two of them are vaguely the same height, though wildly different in terms of anatomy. Patton was fuller-figured, with big strong arms and a nice full stomach. He was healthy, if not over-indulgent, in such a way that Remus would love the idea of burying his face into Patton's soft tummy.

He sneaks a glance at himself in the mirror; his own stomach is practically nonexistent. There's no definition. His ribs stick out further than his gut does, which has him poking his torso as he thinks about the fact he's barrel-chested.

Patton's own hand comes to grab Remus's, pulling it away from his body and holding it down by their hips.

"What's going on, honey?" Patton then asks, voice quiet and focused. He's watching Remus with his wide, baby-blue eyes. Patton's eyelashes are long and blonde. Remus's eyelashes are partially ripped out, and the rest clumped with day-old mascara. Remus is almost surprised Patton isn't recoiling as he observes Remus's features up close.

"I'm horrifying," comes Remus's honest response, voice surprisingly measured despite his overwhelming urge to shriek.

Patton looks a bit confused at the vagueness, and as he entwines their other hands - squeezing both of Remus's palms softly - he prompts "how so?"

Remus looks down at his body, feeling the underside of his chin press into his neck.

"Look at me," comes Remus's bitter response. "I'm even more disgusting to look at than I am to listen to."

"Oh," Patton breathes, face falling into a sad, sympathetic frown. "Oh, honey. Remus. That's not true in the slightest." One of Patton's big, soft hands comes to cup Remus's jagged jaw, thumbing over his cheek. "You're not disgusting to look at, nor listen to."

Remus shrugs. "You can say that. Doesn't mean it's true."

"Oh, darling," Patton sighs. "You poor thing. You poor, poor thing, and your sad thoughts." Both of Patton's hands slide up Remus's arms, and come to cup his face. Patton pushes their foreheads together, just resting against Remus for a few moments, before quietly asking "what can I do to help?"

Remus shrugs again, staying silent - an abnormality for him.

Patton just holds him for a second, before quietly suggesting "what if... we did something more on your level."

Pulling away slightly, Remus raises an eyebrow as he gets a good look at Patton's flushed face, watching curiously as Patton tugs at the collar of his polo, before undoing the cardigan around his shoulders and letting it drop to the floor.

"Maybe... maybe I'm just being influenced by your room," Patton begins, gulping as his eyes scan over Remus's body once more, more... hungry this time, "but I want to show you just how wonderful your body is. Will you let me show you? Please, baby?"

Remus just stares at him, mouth agape. Despite the self deprecation creeping into his mind, Remus can't help but lick his lips, never one to pass up on a sexual opportunity, especially one that Patton initiates.

"Please?" Patton begs, moving closer to Remus, reaching out with one hand while the other undoes his belt. "Please, let me show you how beautiful you are. Please, honey?"

As Patton fumbles with his belt and drops it, he pulls their bodies together, cupping Remus's cheek to guide their mouths close as their fronts press against each other. Remus can feel Patton panting against his lips, wanting and pleading, staring at Remus with wide, but genuine eyes, while waiting for a verbal answer. And as Remus's hands find Patton's waist, he finally nods.

"Do whatever you want," Remus replies, and he means it.

Patton kisses him needily, surprisingly cute in the way he holds to Remus, keeping him close by his hips and grinding his khakis against Remus's boxers. His thumbs rub over Remus's prominent hip bones, before sliding up his thin waist and holding tight to his ribs, just caressing each inch of skin that he can reach so long as they're so close.

"You're beautiful," Patton breathes against Remus's lips when he breaks away to take a breath. He slowly rolls his hips against Remus's, and shivers when Remus's bony hands squeeze his sides. "You feel beautiful."

"Feeling and looking are two different things."

"You look beautiful too, baby," Patton is quick to assure him, kissing Remus again and openly moaning into his mouth as he grinds their fronts together, making Remus break away this time to let out a nasally moan of his own, Patton confidently continuing to rub their bodies against each other.

"Just walking inside your room- just seeing you so... bare... had me all worked up," Patton gasps, frotting harder against Remus.

Remus wants to retort with 'it shouldn't have,' or even make fun of Patton for being so mindfully perverted, but he can't muster up the ability to say anything. Anything other than "I'm... I'm not completely bare."

That has Patton pulling away, and immediately Remus wants to grab and hold him and yank him back, keeping Patton forcefully close to him. Luckily though, Patton's eyes immediately fall towards Remus's boxers.

"You're right," Patton affirms, before he fiddles with the waistband of his own pants. "How about you get fully bare for me then, love? Can you do that? We can match."

As he speaks, Patton lets his pants and boxers fall to the floor, and his shirt follows shortly after. His plump, soft, and hairy body is fully on display for Remus to see. The amount of hair he has over his legs, chest, and even down his stomach has Remus perking up a bit. Sure, Patton has a noticeable amount of arm hair, but it's rather light and can blend in with his skin. However, the hair down the rest of his body was a bit darker, and definitely more noticeable, and Remus finds himself attracted to it.

Slowly, Remus shuffles out of his boxers, before letting Patton draw his body closer once more.

"Look at you," Patton coos, sliding his big hands over Remus's lean frame. "Why, you're quite un-bare-able."

Remus can't help but snort shortly before he's caught up in another kiss, and being guided backwards by Patton until they reach Remus's bed, where Patton's pulling away in order to properly lift Remus up and lay him back against the sticky sheets.

"Let me make you feel good," Patton pleads, crawling over Remus. "Pretty please, baby? Can I? I'll make you feel so, so good, until all of those bad thoughts are out of your head."

Remus finds himself feeling a bit flustered for once as Patton begs to make him feel good. It's a combination of the genuine pleading and the pure desperation oozing from Patton's mouth; he's being so vulnerable and so intent on giving into his urges - his own impulses to use and please Remus as he sees fit.

Spreading his legs, Remus watches as Patton easily slots his thighs beneath Patton's own, lifting Remus's legs up slightly.

Bending down to kiss Remus again, Patton is firm and sweet, but needy all the same. Remus tries to rationalize this is just his room affecting Patton tenfold - he is more susceptible to influences than others - but there's something so earnest about Patton's desire for Remus that it seems as though it's coming from his own volition.

While kissing Remus, Patton's hand blindly reaches for a bottle of lube, and after some clumsy waving and feeling around one of Remus's messy drawers, he finds one.

Pulling away, Patton makes sure to carefully coat his fingers in the substance, and then rubs it properly against his fingers, giving it a few moments to warm it up while kissing over Remus's body to help him relax.

Softly, Patton praises "you're so beautiful," as his lips trail down Remus's stomach.

"Every part of you," he continues, as he moves back up, kissing over Remus's nipples and then over his prominent collarbone. "You look so gorgeous, whether dressed up in your normal clothes, or dressed down on the bed for me. Please, Remus, please. I need you so bad."

Patton's fingers push against Remus's hole without warning, before they slowly slide into him.

Patton stretches him open gingerly, careful with each movement of his fingers, though he's not surprised in the slightest at just how easily Remus spreads around the digits. Honestly, stretching Remus open was less of a precaution, and more so just to ease them both into this, especially considering Remus's current mental state. 

Patton fingers him for just a few moments, until he sees Remus relax slightly against the bed, before he pulls the digits out. 

"Can we have sex, honey?" Patton asks, though he's already in the process of spreading lube over his shaft, coating his cock fully in the substance and stroking himself slow to the sight of Remus laying so obediently before him. "Pretty please, with a cherry on top?" 

Remus bites his lip at the display, before shrugging slightly. "Yeah, whatever. We can- you can do whatever you want." 

Patton pouts slightly at the answer, though he knows Remus is being genuine. And so, he takes a moment to lean forward, peppering kisses over Remus's face, insisting "I want a clear yes or no, sweetheart. Please?"

And at first, Remus just whines. "You already know the answer. I would never turn sex down!"

"Yes or no, baby," Patton responds, urging Remus to be clear and pick one or the other.

And this prompting doesn't stop until finally Remus is groaning out a "yes, of course!" sounding almost annoyed with how caring Patton is, and yet flushing nonetheless, as being treated so sweetly was admittedly an abnormality for him.

Patton massages his hips. "Good boy! So good, willing to let me take such good care of you," Patton coos, as his hands slide down Remus's thighs, before gently spreading them apart. "You're such a good listener. Such a good, pretty boy."

Lining up with Remus's hole, Patton takes his sweet time pushing into the former, letting Remus feel every inch and vein of his cock as it slides inside of him. All while Patton repeatedly kisses Remus's lips, breathily whispering "you're taking me so well," and "you feel so, so good," in between his own quiet groans. As his hips press flush against Remus's, cock buried fully inside of him, Patton moans "you're so good for me." 

"You're so pretty, too," he then adds, as his lips softly press to Remus's cheek. "So pretty normally, and so pretty stretched around my cock."

Remus takes in a sharp breath, but only says "you're weird. You're being weird." He moves his forearm over his eyes, attempting to obscure his face. "You're a freak, and you... you have bad taste!"

Patton chuckles, before shushing Remus. "Don't be so judgemental," he murmurs, rather playful. "Really, you're just... you're beautiful." Patton's fingers wiggle between Remus's own, grasping his hand before guiding his arm away from Remus's face, and pinning it instead to the bed beside his face. Then, he's pressing their heads together affectionately, kissing Remus's cheek before rubbing the sides of their face together, his blonde facial hair rubbing against Remus's skin, with Remus's itchy brown facial hair returning the favor.

It's only then that Patton's hips start to move.

Remus lets out a breathy moan as he feels Patton's shaft shift inside of him, legs instinctively moving to wrap tightly around Patton's wide waist. But still, he continues to self-deprecate.

"You're biased," Remus huffs, feeling Patton's hand squeeze his. "I'm not beautiful; you just have low standards."

His arguments make him sound like a broken record; his attempts at convincing Patton that he's wrong for liking him - despite that being the opposite of what he wants - feeble.

However, Patton just trails kisses over Remus's face, drifting from his cheek, to his jaw, to his earlobe, which he hovers over after a brief peck. Patton's warm breath fans over the side of Remus's face. In Remus's ear, Patton lowers his voice, and whispers "I disagree."

He pulls away, letting his lips drag across the side of Remus's countenance, before he looks into Remus's eyes.

"I disagree," he repeats, glasses sliding part way down his nose. "I don't believe that, and I don't want you to believe that either. Can you be a good boy for me, honey?" Patton rocks his hips slightly, his shaft sliding out partway, before thrusting hard back into Remus. "Just focus on the cock inside of you, baby; ignore those nasty thoughts in your head. All you have to do is lay here and look pretty, doll, and you're already more than accomplishing that!"

Remus quiets down, not responding with anything more than a moan. But before he gets the chance to articulate a response, Patton's already slow thrusts still entirely.

When Remus opens his mouth to complain, he's quickly interrupted.

"The kinder you are to yourself, the faster I'll go," Patton explains, voice firm and affectionate. "I know you like it rough, baby, and I'm willing to give it to you that way, but only if you let yourself feel good. Only if you can say nice things about your pretty body and beautiful sounds. Can you do that baby? Say nice things about yourself? Please, darling, please, let me hear you be a good, obedient boy and do as you're told." Patton kisses Remus briefly, before adding "and if you listen, I'll make sure to pound you into the mattress until you can't think at all." 

Breath trembling, Remus mumbles something incoherent, but it's not a refusal. More so a slight resignation.

So, Patton smiles, and offers Remus some simple encouragement.

"Go on, honey," Patton urges, rolling his hips against Remus's own, providing him with the bare minimum amount of friction. "You should be talking about how pretty you are, how good you feel, and how much you love feeling good." Patton's lips stretch into a cheeky grin. "You know, affirmations are proven to work wonders. Surely, the more you say you're pretty, the more you'll believe it!"

Patton leans closer, as if sharing a secret, before he continues "especially the parts about making you feel good. I'll make you feel better the nicer you are to yourself. That's a good trade off, right? Can't my precious baby boy say a good thing about himself?"

Patton's hips still, further enticing Remus to say something nice about himself.

Remus stammers, almost frustrated with Patton's teasing torture, before managing "I... I have eyes." Upon receiving a look from Patton - a raised eyebrow, as if asking Remus 'Is that it?' Clearing his throat, Remus clarifies "I have pretty eyes. Pretty red eyes."

Immediately, Patton kisses his face, praising him for being so good and specific. He does have pretty red eyes! What a good boy! And his starts thrust back up again, speedy and rough as his cock pushes deeper and deeper into Remus's ass. 

“Good boys are honest,” Patton pants in between thrusts and kisses, “and you do have pretty eyes! They’re gorgeous; I could stare into them all day long if you’d sit still long enough to let me.” His words are teasing, and he follows them up by nipping at Remus’s neck.

While he squeezes Remus’s hand with his own, his free palm slides down to hold one of Remus’s thighs, pulling Remus’s hips at an angle that allows him to thrust deeper, before going “say something else What else do you like about yourself?” and this time - after seeing the reward it gave him - Remus has much less hesitation.

“I have a well-groomed mustache,” he exclaims, starting a rather slurred list, “my fashion choices are unique, I’m good at art-”

“And you’re so, so pretty,” Patton emphasizes, smiling happily at Remus’s self-directed compliments. He sounds breathy as he speaks, a bit winded from how intensely he’s fucking into Remus, but tries to keep himself from slowing down. “Keep going, my pretty boy.”

But Remus is much less interested in answering, too focused on pleasure to care much about nitpicking himself to find something desirable among the mess, and so half-heartedly claims “I have a nice cock,” attempting to say anything that’d constitute as a compliment, solely so he can get more pleasure, only for Patton’s big hand to wrap suddenly around his shaft.

As Remus gasps, Patton starts stroking him torturously slowly, but it makes Remus feel so incredibly good anyway.

“You’re right, dear,” Patton says, voice soft, “you do have a nice cock. Nice to touch. Nice to stroke. Nice to squeeze.”

His hand squeezes around the base of Remus’s cock, and he watches as Remus tries to buck his hips, craving more of his touch. However, he’s unable to move far due to his thighs wrapped around Patton’s wide waist, and with Patton’s cock shoved deep inside of him.

“Go faster!” Patton begs, though it’s unclear whether he’s talking about Patton’s hips or his hand.

Patton shushes him quietly. “I’ll speed up when you say something nice. What else can you compliment, hm? Your gorgeous chest? Your pretty legs?” Patton’s voice trails off for a moment, before remerging with newfound delight as he leans back, saying “or, what about the fact the outline of my cock looks wonderful when pressed deep inside of you!”

With their fronts no longer pressed together, Remus - upon sitting up on his elbows - is able to stare wide-eyed at the noticeable bulge when Patton’s big cock thrusts into him.

Remus cries out in pleasure, falling back onto the mattress with a pathetic noise, moaning shamelessly about how hot that visual is.

Laughing softly, Patton kisses Remus’s chest. “Can you make a compliment out of this, love? Say something nice about yourself so I can go faster? Come on, my good boy, I know you can think of one. You’re so creative and interesting with your words.”

Pre spills out of Remus’s cock, and onto Patton’s hand, though it’s hardly noticeable as it’s quickly swept up and quickly rubbed back along Remus’s shaft.

Half-coherent, and overwhelmed with warmth, Remus stammers “I love how- how thin I am! So I can- fuck -see your cock inside of me!”

“Good boy! My good boy.”

Patton’s hand speeds up in tune with his thrusts, pounding and pushing Remus closer and closer to the edge, until his thighs are squeezing tightly around Patton’s midsection as his head falls back with a cry. His orgasm crashes into him hard and fast, and he comes over Patton’s hand and his own chest, with Patton working him through it, praises spilling out of his mouth.

Patton slows for a few minutes, giving Remus time to catch his breath, as the latter goes limp against the sheets, but speeds up after. His hand slowly touches Remus’s cock, gently working it back up.

Remus whines out of confusion.

“I need to come too, silly,” Patton simply explains, smiling warmly. “And you’re just so pretty when you come. Your orgasm face is so perfect. I want to come to that sight, but I wasn’t close enough to do so this time. So… you’ll just have to come again!” Patton properly gives Remus’s cock a few strokes, feeling the limp shaft slowly harden in his palm. “That’s okay, right, baby?”

Moaning at the idea, Remus nods immediately. Another orgasm sounds amazing, and Patton’s still thrusting into him anyway. So, Remus wills away his refractory period (best he can, anyway, by just telling himself under his breath to hurry up and get hard again), and represses an overstimulated whimper as Patton begins stroking him with more fervor.

As Patton touches his cock, the tip of his own shaft suddenly slams into Remus’s prostate, causing a sudden moan to be ripped from Remus’s throat, back arching off the bed.

Panting, Patton whimpers “I feel so good, honey. I feel so- so good using your body. Such a pretty body. So, so amazing.” He’s breathy and stammering, a pink flush overtaking his round cheeks and spreading down the length of his chest. His blonde hair is slicked against his forehead. And truthfully, Remus thinks Patton’s pretty.

And, well, if someone this gorgeous thinks Remus is attractive, then, it must be true to some extent!

All the pleasure Remus is receiving is just so much more intense now that he’s already had one orgasm. Furthermore, he feels overly blissful and delightfully braindead as both post-orgasm fuzziness and pr-second-orgasm excitement consumes him. He can’t possibly think negative thoughts when he’s so distracted by how good he’s feeling!

Patton tightens his hold on Remus’s hand, and on Remus’s hip, holding him tight as he thrusts directly into Remus’s prostate.

“So good,” Patton praises, on a loop, "so, so good. So, so pretty."

Visibly, Patton looks as though he might finish at any given second; whimpers spill from his lips, and sweat gleams as it rolls down his red face. He’s very clearly pleasured, and Remus moans as he feels his second orgasm quickly building.

“I’m so, so close,” Patton groans, kissing over Remus’s jawline as he strokes Remus’s cock messily. “Please, come for me. Let me see you come for me, baby. Please.”

Voice quivering, and sounding as though he might cry if denied the privilege, Patton begs Remus to finish. And though Remus could probably bite back his orgasm for another minute or two, he doesn’t even bother trying, instead letting his head fall back with a moan of his own as he reaches his orgasm.

Once again, he comes over Patton’s hand and his own body, except this time Patton’s grunting out an obscenity under his breath and finishing inside of Remus. They come at the same time.

Patton fucks Remus through his orgasm, before panting above him, leaving Remus a mess of oversensitivity and fullness. The room is filled with the sounds of heavy breathing, before Patton kissing Remus gently.

“Good job, baby,” Patton murmurs, as he keeps their faces pressed together. “Good boy.” 

Then, Patton's pulling out, making Remus whine.

Feeling the semen pour out of him, and drench the bed between his legs, Remus can’t help but squirm, but quickly stills himself when Patton starts to scoot himself further back on the bed. Curiously, Remus stares at him, watching as he leans down so that his head is between Remus’s legs, before grinning and cursing when Patton wordlessly takes Remus’s cock into his mouth, big, blue eyes staring up at Remus as he does so.

Moaning weakly, Remus struggles to keep himself semi-upright, but doesn’t want to miss out on this view.

Patton’s tongue licks over his limp shaft until it begins to slowly harden, Remus tangling his hands in Patton’s curly hair, giving him gentle - or, his version of gentle - affection, while watching Patton lovingly go down on him, determined to milk a third orgasm from Remus’s spent cock.

Remus lets Patton enjoy the intimacy, though his impulses tell him to push Patton away. He’s too sensitive; every touch or caress of his body feels so intense, but he doesn’t move an inch. Patton’s mouth feels deceivingly good around his slick shaft, and though Remus’s body is trembling with oversensitivity, he wants this just as much as Patton does. To go mindless. To be completely pleasured. He is so, so pretty, after all, and he deserves to come a third time just for looking so good. 

Ultimately, Remus submits wholeheartedly, with lazy moans spilling steadily from his mouth.

His overworked cock is a twitching mess in Patton’s mouth, though Remus doubts it’s leaking anymore, his balls already emptied of their fill.

His hands tug at Patton’s hair, crying out Patton’s name with a broken voice followed by multiple swears. Patton flushes, swallowing around Remus’s cock, bobbing his head steadily until Remus is shuddering, pushing Patton’s head down and coming once more, a few beads of come spilling from his slit, though they’re hardly noticeable as they splash against Patton’s tongue.

Finally, Remus goes limp against the sheets, letting himself fall against the mattress with heavy breaths and eyes closed as Patton crawls over him.

Remus peeks at Patton when he feels a finger brush his thin brown hair from his face.

“You’re pretty,” Patton says, voice barely above a whisper.

Remus stares at him, before snickering, before laughing outright. With a surprising amount of strength, Remus pushes Patton onto the bed next to him, and curls up against his squishy chest.

“You can tell me I’m pretty while we cuddle,” Remus states, the come smeared over his abdomen being rubbed against Patton’s stomach and the blankets between them. Remus’s bony hands dig into Patton’s stomach, squeezing him tight. “Just hold me.”

He can feel Patton’s excitement in the way his body is immediately gathered up into Patton’s arms, and cradled firmly, with Patton continuing to whisper soft affection into the air until Remus can’t help but feel relaxed and content in his own right.

His last thought before drifting off is just how perfectly his body fits against Patton’s. 

[secret-bug-pain-blog]

@febuwhump Day 24 - "I'm doing this because I care about you."

To anyone looking at this from the Dungeon Meshi tag - if you're anime-only, HERE THERE BE SPOILERS! If you've read the manga, the MAJOR spoilers are for Chapter 28 - plus a scattering of spoilers for later. This is a scene rewrite! Like the first time we've posted "just canon but from a different POV" also! We are counting internal monologue for that dialogue, and we are having Fun with it.

Watch your step, and we hope you enjoy.

From the instant that Marcille draws the first line of dragon's blood, she knows that she's gone too far to back out now.

There's a dreadful, solid certainty lodged in her chest as she brings her staff down, again and again. An awful sort of knowing, of

It's a unique kind of draining. Mana sickness is one thing, but this is another. Each line draws at something deep, deep inside of her soul, drawing more from her than she ever thought a spell could drain. She wants, so badly that it hurts, a sharp, desperate need for this to work. She dips her staff's handle in dragon's blood again, and she ignored the awful feeling of being bled to the bone. She's only ever theorized about dark magic before, never put it into practice herself - every line feels wrong, sickly, diseased, her staff scraping along the flagstones and funneling awful vibrations into her hands.

Every line she draws feels like a wretched, sickly sort of pain. Like picking at a wound that's only halfway scabbed over, half-clotted blood clinging to her fingernails as she picks at where her skin meets a gash, and scraping off the tiny, disgusting pieces of not-quite-scab onto a piece of paper. It's the worst thing she's ever done, and she hates it, every step of it, with a bubbling sense of revulsion that it feels like she'll never be clean of.

If she doesn't do this, then Falin will be dead. And Marcille doesn't want to live in a world where that's true.

She doesn't know how many runes it'll take, really. She knows the pattern, and that's enough - she just has to finish it. One rune, then another. She doesn't need to know how long.

The world, for what feels like a long time, is just her and the runes.

One, then the next. The future doesn't matter. The past is gone. She inks rune after rune in rotting, thickening blood, pausing to re-ink her staff when it runs dry. The only thing that matters is the next rune in the sequence, and it doesn't matter how long it takes. She has a thousand years to live ahead of her, a thousand years to spend doing anything she wants - she doesn't care how many of them she has to spend doing this, if it gives her Falin back. One rune, then the next.

Marcille reaches to dip her staff in dragon's blood a last time, and stops.

The circle is done.

Marcille is already horribly, horribly tired.

More than tired, really. Exhausted, a bone-deep ache in her chest like she's worked out a muscle she never knew that she had. She feels like she's on the brink of passing out, staring down at a circle of dragonblood runes that she's worn her staff's handle down to fraying roots from. The purpose in her chest that was so strong barely a minute ago is fading, flickering. Fatigue knocks into her like a truck, and she's swaying on her feet, struggling to cling on to consciousness.

She knows, more than she's ever known anything before, that she has to finish this.

She thinks of Falin, and she steels her will to move forward.

Pelvis, femur, humerus. Twelve rib bones, easy to tell apart. The vertebrae, the hands and feet - calcaneus, metatarsal, metacarpal. Eight carpal bones in the wrist, hamate, triquetrum, pisiform, lumate, trapezoid, trapezium, capitate, scaphoid. Falin's wrist bones are shorter than hers, shaped different in a way that's both subtle and the most obvious thing in the world. It's all she can do not to stop and stare at them, hypnotized by the broken remains of her friend - tallman bones, white and clean, so unfamiliar compared to Falin's soft frame, so much like the ones she's already seen buried.

She doesn't know what she'll do if Falin's soul has already left her body. She can't allow herself to entertain the idea of it. Falin will live, because she has to live, because she needs to- because Marcille can't let her die.

She lowers her staff, and she starts to chant.

She's doing this because she cares about her. Because she can't live without her. Because the very idea of trying to go on without Falin, after all this effort to find her, after all this effort to bring her back, is poison on her tongue, fire in her veins, a sickly death in the pit of her stomach. She's doing this because she cares about her, because she wants to talk to her again, because she wants to talk with her, to eat with her, to sit shoulder to shoulder with her as she talks about magic again.

She's doing this because she cares about Falin, so badly that it feels like her heart's started to rip itself apart in her ribcage - because she wants her back, because she wants to talk to her again, because she needs to hold her hand again and press her palm against her cheek and tangle her lanky, bony body around her soft tallman chest and hold her so tight that nothing else exists in the world. She's doing this because she needs Falin, with such strength that it nearly feels like she's drowning in her own skin with every moment she's away from her. She wants, so badly that she can barely keep herself from crumpling on the spot under the sheer weight of it.

Falin. Falin. Falin.

She chants her name in her head with every repetition of the spell, wanting, hoping, begging for this to work. The drain feels like she's cut a hole in her very soul, like she's bleeding out her lips with every word she speaks, like she's slicing holes in the vessel that holds all of her being. Falin, Falin, Falin - her soul to her body, the dragon's flesh to her bones, anything to make her whole again, anything to make her well again, anything.

She draws from the well, again and again, driving herself on sheer, desperate desire. Falin, a silent cry beneath the chorus of the spell. Falin, a desperate wish whispered into the darkness of the dungeon. Falin, Falin, Falin, she cries out, again and again, blind and deaf but for the runes carved into the stone. Falin, Falin, Falin, Falin, Falin-

Marcille is more exhausted than she ever has been, more exhausted than she ever knew was possible to be- she tastes bitter blood on her tongue as she chants. She draws from the well deep inside of herself, draws until it's dry and then beyond that, desperation and need driving her on and on and on. Falin, Falin- she digs deeper, deeper, past the well and into the ground beneath. She wants, she wants, she wants-

"Falin..." she starts. The words flicker on her tongue, abruptly uncertain and unclear. She knew what she was saying only a second ago, but now she struggles to put anything to words. The chant fades out, the words leaving her tongue - she can't remember why she was chanting them anymore, can't remember what she was doing. Her limbs feel weak, bowing under her body's weight, her willpower abruptly draining. Her fingers loosen on her staff, suddenly void of all drive they once possessed. She looks down, bleary-eyed, at rusty red runes drawn for a purpose she can't quite remember, and for a moment, there is nothing to her thoughts but the dull echo of a desire nearly entirely devoured.

And then she is unconscious, and she thinks no more.

[cult-of-the-lamb-fan]

tw: broken frontal bone tw: broken left parietal bone tw: broken right parietal bone tw: broken left temporal bone tw: broken right temporal bone tw: broken occipital bone tw: broken sphenoid bone tw: broken ethmoid bone tw: broken mandible tw: broken left maxilla tw: broken right maxilla tw: broken left palantine bone tw: broken right palantine bone tw: broken left zygomatic bone tw: broken right zygomatic bone tw: broken left nasal bone tw: broken right nasal bone tw: broken left lacrimal bone tw: broken right lacrimal bone tw: broken vomer tw: broken left nasal conchae tw: broken right nasal conchae tw: broken left malleus tw: broken right malleus tw: broken left incus tw: broken right incus tw: broken left stapes tw: broken right stapes tw: broken hyoid tw: broken left scapula tw: broken right scapula tw: broken left clavicle tw: broken right clavicle tw: broken sternum tw: broken left rib 1 tw: broken left rib 2 tw: broken left rib 3 tw: broken left rib 4 tw: broken left rib 5 tw: broken left rib 6 tw: broken left rib 7 tw: broken left rib 8 tw: broken left rib 9 tw: broken left rib 10 tw: broken left rib 11 tw: broken left rib 12 tw: broken right rib 1 tw: broken right rib 2 tw: broken right rib 3 tw: broken right rib 4

tw: broken right rib 5 tw: broken right rib 6 tw: broken right rib 7 tw: broken right rib 8 tw: broken right rib 9 tw: broken right rib 10 tw: broken right rib 11 tw: broken right rib 12 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 1 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 2 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 3 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 4 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 5 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 6 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 1 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 2 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 3 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 4 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 5 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 6 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 8 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 9 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 10 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 11 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 12 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 1 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 2 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 3 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 4 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 5 tw: broken sacrum tw: broken coccyx tw: broken left humerus tw: broken right humerus tw: broken left radius tw: broken right radius tw: broken left ulna tw: broken right ulna tw: broken left scaphoid bone tw: broken right scaphoid bone tw: broken left lunate bone tw: broken right lunate bone tw: broken left triquetral bone tw: broken right triquetral bone tw: broken left pisiform bone

tw: broken right pisiform bone tw: broken left trapezium tw: broken right trapezium tw: broken left trapezoid bone tw: broken right trapezoid bone tw: broken left capitate bone tw: broken right capitate bone tw: broken left hamate bone tw: broken right hamate bone tw: broken left metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5 tw: broken left innominate bone tw: broken right innominate bone tw: broken left femur tw: broken right femur

tw: broken left patella tw: broken right patella tw: broken left tibia tw: broken right tibia tw: broken left fibula tw: broken right fibula tw: broken left calcaneus tw: broken right calcaneus tw: broken left talus tw: broken right talus tw: broken left navicular bone tw: broken right navicular bone tw: broken left medial cuneiform bone tw: broken right medial cuneiform bone tw: broken left intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken right intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken left lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken right lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken left cuboid bone tw: broken right cuboid bone tw: broken left metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5

tw: bruising

just had an accident

i'm okay

wha

[radioactiveradley]

It’s SPOOKY SCARY SKELETONS MONTH

So let’s talk about yer bones! Yeah, that’s right, Captian Holt. I said –

An adult has (roughly) 206 bones (I say ‘roughly’! You can have non-pathological anatomical variation, such as lumbarised sacral vertebrae (an extra bone in your back) or accessory sesamoids like the flabella (a little bone at the back of the knee!))

A newborn has (roughly) 300 bones

That's a big difference! Almost 100 bones of difference! Where do they go?

Well, you see - as you get older, every time you come into the hospital we steal more of your bones...

Just kidding.

...Or am I

As an embryo, your skeleton is completely composed of cartilage. This gradually ossifies as you age, until, as an adult, you have a full skeleton, with only the interactive portions of joints being capped with hyaline cartilage.

[Paediatric normal whole leg radiograph, showing epiphyseal plates around the head of the femur, the femoral condyles, the proximal tibia, the distal tibia and the lateral malleoli that can mimic fractures. Courtesy of radiopaedia]

See all those weird blobs? Those are bones in the process of fusing together! The transverse lines that could be mistaken for fractures are actually epiphyseal plates – hyaline cartilage bridges between the shaft of a bone and what will become its tip, which don't attenuate x-rays, and thus appear black on our radiographs! This is where bone growth occurs - the cartilage forms a sort of template matrix that then ossifies into bone.

Compare our paediatric radiograph to the AP knee radiographs of an adult with no visible pathology:

[Adult normal AP knee radiographs, showing fully fused bones. Courtesy of radiopaedia]

See how all those ragged pieces have joined up? That’s endochondral ossification, BABY!

This is how we can figure out the age of a paediatric service user from their bones! Certain bones form at different times.

Let’s check out the carpal bones – all those fiddly little bones in your wrist! Anyone who’s binged Hatecrimes MD – sorry, House MD as often as I have will know the classic acronym for remembering the names of these bones. Moving thumb side to pinkie side, we have…

Scared (Scaphoid - red)

Lovers (Lunate - dark blue)

Hate (Hamate - green)

To (Triquetrum - yellow)

Try (Trapezium - orange)

The (Trapezoid - light blue)

Coolest (Capitate - purple)

Positions (Pisiform - pink)

[Normal adult wrist radiograph, shown with and without coloured carpal bones. Courtesy of radiopaedia.]

But did you know that these bones form at different times?

The Capitate ossifies at 1-3 months

The Hamate ossifies at 2-4 months

The Triquetrum ossifies at 2-3 years

The Lunate ossifies at 2-4 years

The Scaphoid, Trapezium and Trapezoid ossify at 4-6 years

And the Pisiform ossifies at 8-12 years

So, I can look at this picture, and tell you that this child is approximately 3 years old, because their Capitate and Hamate have ossified, and their Triquetrum is just visible, starting to ossify below the thumb (circled!)

[Normal wrist radiograph of a paediatric patient, triquetral ossification centre circled. Courtesy of Radiopaedia.]

Your bones continue to form and fuse until you reach about 25! Your olecranon (the bump of your elbow) starts to ossify at 6-11 years, and fuses at 13-16 years! We can look at the base of your fifth metatarsal to age afab folks who are approx. 10 and amab folks who are approx. 12, as this bone fuses in the 2-4 years following these ages! The medial end of the clavicle can be used to assess your age from approximately 18-22, and your facial bones continue to ossify into adulthood! How cool is that?

If you’re over 25, fret not – there’s still plenty of funky stuff happening to your bones. But we’ll get into all of that next time, when we take a look at the function of osteoblasts and osteoclasts and explore all the cool little jobs that your bones perform within your body - it's more than you might think! So, tune in next time for more Bone facts...

And thank you for reading!

[gunsblazingg]

tw: broken frontal bone tw: broken left parietal bone tw: broken right parietal bone tw: broken left temporal bone tw: broken right temporal bone tw: broken occipital bone tw: broken sphenoid bone tw: broken ethmoid bone tw: broken mandible tw: broken left maxilla tw: broken right maxilla tw: broken left palantine bone tw: broken right palantine bone tw: broken left zygomatic bone tw: broken right zygomatic bone tw: broken left nasal bone tw: broken right nasal bone tw: broken left lacrimal bone tw: broken right lacrimal bone tw: broken vomer tw: broken left nasal conchae tw: broken right nasal conchae tw: broken left malleus tw: broken right malleus tw: broken left incus tw: broken right incus tw: broken left stapes tw: broken right stapes tw: broken hyoid tw: broken left scapula tw: broken right scapula tw: broken left clavicle tw: broken right clavicle tw: broken sternum tw: broken left rib 1 tw: broken left rib 2 tw: broken left rib 3 tw: broken left rib 4 tw: broken left rib 5 tw: broken left rib 6 tw: broken left rib 7 tw: broken left rib 8 tw: broken left rib 9 tw: broken left rib 10 tw: broken left rib 11 tw: broken left rib 12 tw: broken right rib 1 tw: broken right rib 2 tw: broken right rib 3 tw: broken right rib 4

tw: broken right rib 5 tw: broken right rib 6 tw: broken right rib 7 tw: broken right rib 8 tw: broken right rib 9 tw: broken right rib 10 tw: broken right rib 11 tw: broken right rib 12 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 1 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 2 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 3 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 4 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 5 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 6 tw: broken cerivcal vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 1 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 2 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 3 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 4 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 5 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 6 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 7 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 8 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 9 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 10 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 11 tw: broken thoracic vertebra 12 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 1 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 2 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 3 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 4 tw: broken lumbar vertebra 5 tw: broken sacrum tw: broken coccyx tw: broken left humerus tw: broken right humerus tw: broken left radius tw: broken right radius tw: broken left ulna tw: broken right ulna tw: broken left scaphoid bone tw: broken right scaphoid bone tw: broken left lunate bone tw: broken right lunate bone tw: broken left triquetral bone tw: broken right triquetral bone tw: broken left pisiform bone

tw: broken right pisiform bone tw: broken left trapezium tw: broken right trapezium tw: broken left trapezoid bone tw: broken right trapezoid bone tw: broken left capitate bone tw: broken right capitate bone tw: broken left hamate bone tw: broken right hamate bone tw: broken left metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken left metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 1 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 2 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 3 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 4 bone tw: broken right metacarpal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 5 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5 tw: broken left innominate bone tw: broken right innominate bone tw: broken left femur tw: broken right femur

tw: broken left patella tw: broken right patella tw: broken left tibia tw: broken right tibia tw: broken left fibula tw: broken right fibula tw: broken left calcaneus tw: broken right calcaneus tw: broken left talus tw: broken right talus tw: broken left navicular bone tw: broken right navicular bone tw: broken left medial cuneiform bone tw: broken right medial cuneiform bone tw: broken left intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken right intermediate cuneiform bone tw: broken left lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken right lateral cuneiform bone tw: broken left cuboid bone tw: broken right cuboid bone tw: broken left metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken left metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 1 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 2 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 3 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 4 bone tw: broken right metatarsal 5 bone tw: broken left proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken left proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 1 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 2 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 3 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 4 tw: broken right proximal phalanx 5 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken left intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 1 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 2 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 3 tw: broken right intermediate phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 1 tw: broken left distal phalanx 2 tw: broken left distal phalanx 3 tw: broken left distal phalanx 4 tw: broken left distal phalanx 5 tw: broken right distal phalanx 1 tw: broken right distal phalanx 2 tw: broken right distal phalanx 3 tw: broken right distal phalanx 4 tw: broken right distal phalanx 5

tw: bruising

just had an accident

…Are you even alive???

[justkidneying]

The Bones of the Wrist vs. the Ankle

A lot of people (even med students) get confused about the various bones of the wrist and the ankle. There's a lot of them, so it's fair. But, there are a lot of similarities that I'm gonna talk about real quick.

The view above is looking down on the dorsal side of the hand and foot. You can see that the toes and fingers would be at the top of the image if I wasn't too lazy to draw them. Both toes and fingers are made of phalanges. There are three phalanges for digits two through five. For the first digit (thumb and hallux), there are only two phalanges.

The next bones are the metatarsals (foot) and metacarpals (hand). There are five for both the hand and foot. A neat fact is that the anatomical midline of the hand is the third finger, while for the foot it is the second toe. This means the interosseous muscles pull or push the digits away or towards this midline.

Next we have the tarsal and carpal bones. There are seven tarsal bones in the foot, and eight carpal bones in the hand (you can't see the pisiform in the drawing, as it is only on the palmar side). These are stuck pretty close together with a lot of ligaments, but they do move a bit. The subtalar joint with the calcaneus bone (the calcaneus is your heel bone) is one of the important joints.

Finally, you get to the leg and forearm bones. You might notice that only the radius and tibia actually articulate with the carpals and tarsals, respectively. The fibula and ulna are just hanging out on the side, not bearing any weight. The radius only touches the lunate and scaphoid bones. This is one reason why you want to punch with the second and third knuckles, as they have a direct connection to the radius, making your fist more stable.

The main ankle joint is the tibiotalar joint, which is held in place by a lot of ligaments. The fibula is also connected to the talus via the anterior and posterior talofibular ligaments. When someone sprains their ankle, most of the time the anterior talofibular ligament is what is damaged (people call it the ATF - "always tears first," for a reason!). You know the big knobs on the side of your ankle? Those are the lateral and medical malleolus. It's the ends of your fibula and tibia. These are important clinical landmarks.

Anyways, kind of a boring post, but I saw a few people getting confused between carpals, tarsals, and metacarpals, so I decided I would try my best to spread some knowledge.

[strangebiology]

Hello! Really enjoy your blog and am looking forward to your book. I’ve got a maybe odd question, my friend had one of her pisiform bones removed recently and is wanting to clean it and turn it into jewelry for herself. (The other will likely be removed later this year when the other hand gets operated on). We’ve been trying to figure out the best way to clean/whiten the bone that won’t soften it, and keep it from smelling. I’m reading hydrogen peroxide is recommended, but seeing different percentages and ratios. I wanted to ask if you’ve got resources you’d recommend or a method you’ve found reliable?

Hello! Congrats to your friend for getting to keep them!

(As I've written about before for PBS Newshour, yes, that's generally legal!)

Human bones would follow the same bone-cleaning guides as non-human animal bones of course. There are many guides online, such as this one from Jake's Bone Blog. Note that whitening is just one part of the cleaning process, but if there's no soft tissue on it at all, or even maybe just a tiny bit, and it's not greasy, you can whiten.

Regarding peroxide percentages, I'm not sure I can specify a number other than "not too much." Many people use half water, half 3% peroxide, the common type from the drug store, for a 1.5% solution. Put it with the bone in a clear container with no metal in it. Sunlight oxidizes peroxide so it will whiten faster(which is why you store it in the dark, you don't want it getting used up until you're ready to use it.) Also, with a clear container, you can more easily check on the bone and see how it's doing.

Personally, I have gotten impatient and just mixed water and food-grade peroxide. (which means that it's used in the food industry to dilute and then clean food packaging, !NOT! that you can eat it--do not consume peroxide!) I have never had a problem doing that as long as I keep an eye on it. If you just have a few small bones it's not worth ordering that much peroxide though, so go with the drugstore stuff. That said, I don't personally think you have to dilute 3% peroxide for a tiny bone because you don't have to fill up a big bucket. Just check on it a few times a day.

Note that it may be done whitening before it looks done because while wet, it looks kind of yellow and greasy. So, when it looks almost done, take it out and dry it, and you might find it's ready to go. If not, soak some more. Generally, bones are not super-duper white in a natural state, so a little bit of cream color is ok for a long-lasting specimen.

Good luck!

[sanguinaryrot]

I realize this is only really relevant to me, the single Kienböck's-having vexilography enthusiast on the planet, but making art and graphics has always been a good way for me to handle stress. So i present: The Keinböck's Disease Awareness Flag.

Kienböck's Disease is avascular necrosis of the lunate bone, or bone death because of lack of blood flow in one of the eight bones in your wrist called the lunate. This causes pain, stiffness, swelling, and decreased range of motion and grip strength. There is no cure, but treatments to alleviate pain and pressure in the wrist include radial shortening (fracturing and shortening the radius bone of the arm) or a Proximal Row Carpectomy (removing three wrist bones.) Out of every 100,000 people who have their wrists scanned, around 7 will have Kienböck’s Disease.

the eight stripes represent the eight bones in your wrist: the hamate, capitate, trapezoid, trapezium, scaphoid, lunate, triquetrum, and pisiform bones. The sixth stripe is the lunate, which is red to represent the inflammation, chronic pain, and stiffness associated with the disorder.