#religious torture

[francy-sketches]

Whenever people talk about lack of media literacy they always bring up people who think a character doing bad things=the author endorsing said bad things which are very annoying but I feel like we're ignoring the opposite, equally annoying side of the discourse who think if you criticize the inclusion/depiction of dark/sensitive topics in any way it’s bc you’re a dumb baby who can’t separate fiction from reality. and it's like no I know I’m not supposed to clap and cheer at violence against women I’m criticizing how much of it there is. Idiot

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

Ok but I’m still gagged by the choice of the white dress covered in her spilled ink for the TTPD set.

The way it’s almost certainly meant to reference a wedding gown just like the music video and how that ties into the narrative of TTPD in general.

The way so many of these songs are about how she’s been wronged and how she’s angry.

The striking image of her floating around on stage unleashing her anger in Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me, or her collapsed on the platform in Down Bad begging to be beamed back up to the space ship. Very much giving dying on the altar waiting for the proof (in both meanings). She’s the jilted lover and the runaway bride. She’s the old widow who goes to the stone everyday and she’s the girl heading towards a shotgun wedding if she keeps this up. She's the unhappily married woman whose life is turned upside down by a man beyond her reach, with the chasm between them widening the longer the set goes on. And then!!! she's taken away (held back?) by the nurses at the asylum -- the crazy wife being committed for hysteria!!! (Actually I don't know what order that comes in in the set -- I'm going to have to find better videos.)

She said that the TTPD set is Female Rage: The Musical, and a lot of that is "I'm pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free." She sacrificed her youth to her demons and to people who never had her best interest at heart. She sacrificed her youth to bad actors who wanted to ruin her. She sacrificed her youth to men who traded promises of commitment for their own safety.

So to see that all symbolized in the white gown, saying "I love you, it's ruining my life," is so powerful. By the time we get to "The Smallest Man," she's covered up in the band (or army dress?) uniform, those dreams finally dead and buried, marching to her own memorial service. They all finally kill her, and her dreams of her future.

IT'S A LOT. A LOT A LOT A LOT.

[deservedgrace]

It's fascinating the way people will see like... a ritual they're unfamiliar with as the weird, bad thing and not whatever drove it as the weird, bad thing.

My resurrection eggs post is floating around again and I've gotten dozens of responses in the past few hours that range from "hey op what the fuck" to "oh god this unlocked memories" to "yeah yeah the resurrection eggs we've all seen them", but I am so unused to having 0 justifications or defenses (so far) on a post that's getting this amount of response. And don't get me wrong, I'm glad people are seeing the horror of them because they are fucked up and they are disturbing.

However, I am struck by like... the eggs specifically are not the traumatizing part. It is a manifestation of the trauma of the crucifixion and talking about these details of torture with children AND placing the blame for said torture on them. The eggs are bad because they're a culmination of an attempt to make it as interactive (and therefore inescapable) as they can for kids, but the eggs themselves were not the traumatizing thing.

And I can't help but think about how different the response would be if I had just made a post about the crucifixion and how it's fucked up that it's taught to kids and it was going around like this. The justifications that would likely pop up. The defenses. The dismissal of how fucked up it is because it's been so normalized.

A few people have said things along the lines of "oh wow I thought my experience was bad but at least it wasn't THIS" and like, my aim with bringing up the eggs wasn't to be like "I had a uniquely traumatizing and fucked up experience." It was really to discuss just how far the desire some people have to express this to children goes, that they'd go as far as making torture a cute little engaging activity. That's disturbing to me, but the thing that traumatized me wasn't the eggs; it was learning about details of torture way too young and being told that I was personally responsible for it, that I personally was so deplorable and evil that I deserved to be tortured and an innocent person took my place instead. The eggs were just a vehicle for it.

[heckitall]

God, I Have Some Questions

Back - Next

-

;w;

so it begins...

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masterpost

[blotomical]

hi woe.begone fandom

i can't interact much with you all until I've caught up with the newest material : ( Currently on episode 108. See you in like 2 weeks unless I saw off my arm before I get there Here's a Hunter for you in the meantime. As a treat

[viviandarkbloombartylusversion]

I need Regulus Black to have a cross burned and branded onto his back

[greenliar]

TW: BLOOD

I can feel

The discomfort in your seat

And in your head it's worse

[yourlocalabomination]

The Lang brothers really said: “The Cosmic God of Time and Space, a Eldritch Horror who is fuelled by tormenting people - a being capable of driving his lessers into insanity within seconds and able to trap them into a torturous eternity………is a furry”.

And as iconic as that is….huh?

[draculovemp3]

Is this thing on . Can anyone hear me

[whumpy-writings]

The Sacrifice

Here's one of my stories from the 2024 edition of @zineofgid! It takes place in the same world as Blood of Magic, which I swear I'm going to get back to writing at some point.

CW: ritualized torture, human sacrifice, shackles, rope, knives, fire, vomiting, death wish

Tomas had quit fighting weeks ago. He sat with his back against the cold stone wall, his arms shackled above him. His back ached from the lashes the priests had blessed him with yesterday. Tomas closed his eyes as his breath caught in his throat. He wanted to go home. He wanted to be back in the palace, where he had never been hurt. But he was the Sacrifice. His pain was the only thing that ensured the favor of the gods. 

Tomas had been only seven years old when he had realized what would happen to him. It had been the spring equinox and, as was the tradition every year, the Sacrifice was brought in. Tomas was afraid of him. His hair was long, his beard unkempt, and his naked body was covered in scars.

As the Sacrifice was led to the altar, he met Tomas's eyes. Tomas took a step back. 

"Papa?" he whispered, tugging on the king's sleeve. His father looked down at him. "Why does that man look like you?"

The king stiffened. He didn't reply for several long moments. Then he sighed. "He's my brother."

Tomas frowned. "Then why is he being hurt? I thought royalty was supposed to be treated good."

His father rested a hand on his head. "It's a great honor for him. As the eldest, it is his duty to appease the gods. We are all grateful for his sacrifice."

Tomas thought it over. "Papa, I'm the eldest, right?"

"Yes."

"Does-does that mean that I have to appease the gods too?"

His father knelt down and wrapped him in a bone-crushing hug. "Not yet."

A key scraped in the lock to his cell. Tomas snapped his eyes open as Ebbe entered the room. He was the head priest. Or rather, the head torturer. Tomas cringed back against the wall. 

"Today is the summer solstice. A special day." Ebbe grabbed Tomas's wrist and unlocked the shackle. Tomas started to shake. When the shackles were off, he was hurt.

"Mercy," Tomas whispered as Ebbe unlocked the other shackle. 

Ebbe ignored him, instead grabbing his arm and pulling him roughly to his feet. Tomas cried out. Ebbe was shorter than him by a good couple inches, but Tomas had grown weak during his tenure as the Sacrifice. He didn't have the energy to struggle as Ebbe dragged him out of the cell and through the halls of the temple.

His entire body ached. His back most of all, but his legs and his arms too. Tomas didn't know how he could take twenty more years of this. He had only been here for six months, and already he had begged for death more times than he could count. 

Ebbe led him outside. The first rays of dawn were just touching the horizon, illuminating the harsh rocky landscape. The other priests were already assembled. Ebbe shoved Tomas to his knees. 

"The gods demand that we pay recompense for the sins of our ancestors," he said solemnly. Tomas whimpered. "Our ancestors tortured and killed the god Ogdar, despite his having carved the mighty fjords and stolen fire from the sky for us. The gods sought vengeance. Our people were almost destroyed. But the king offered his eldest son as an offering to the gods. He had him tortured and killed in the same way as Ogdar. The gods accepted this sacrifice and stopped their destruction. However, they required more than just one sacrifice." Ebbe fisted his fingers in Tomas's hair and he gasped in pain. "Ogdar was a god, he was to have lived for millennia. The death of one short-lived human could never equal his death. Therefore, they demanded that every generation the king give his eldest son up to serve as a living Sacrifice. Only by his blood would the cycle of the seasons keep spinning. Only by his blood would the gods be satisfied." 

"Only by his blood," the priests chanted. Ebbe held the blade of his knife against Tomas's chest. Then he pressed down and Tomas bit his lip to keep from screaming. Hot blood ran down his chest. 

"Today is the day of the midnight sun. Today is the day when the gods are closest to us. We will pay them homage."

The priests moved forward. They grabbed Tomas's arms and pulled him toward what looked like a pyre. 

"No! Please no, please no!" Tomas babbled as they dragged him forward. He tried to lock his knees, tried to dig his heels into the ground, but they were too strong. They threw him onto the pyre. Wood scraped across his naked skin. Tomas tried to get to his feet but then knees were pressing into his back. 

"Let me go!" he screamed as they tied his hands behind his back with coarse ropes. They secured his ankles as well, tying them to one of the heavy logs. Tomas lay on his belly as panic consumed him.

"As the sun rises," Ebbe said, "so do the flames of our penitence." Tomas's eyes widened as a torch was brought toward the pyre. He tried to scramble back, but only succeeded in tearing the skin of his torso against the rough wood. 

The torch licked at the pyre. A spark caught and Tomas watched in horror as the fire slowly spread toward him.

"Help!" he screamed. "Please!" The scent of smoke reached his nose. "You'll kill me!"

Ebbe snorted, his face bored. "You'll live, Sacrifice."

The fire was only a foot away from him now. It was getting faster. Tomas shrieked as an ember landed on his cheek. He curled up as best he could to protect his face. Then the flames were on him. Tomas had never felt such pain in his life. His scream didn't even sound human. The fire bit the skin of his back. He was burning alive. He let out another scream but choked on smoke. His vision blurred. 

Then water doused him. He gasped in relief as the priests dumped bucket after bucket on the fire. Someone cut through the bounds around his ankles. They picked him up and Tomas shrieked at the pressure on his burned skin. But then he was being handed down off the pyre, and he had never been more grateful in his life.

"Thank you, thank you," he said, even though the priest had just dumped him unceremoniously on the ground. 

Ebbe stepped into view. "Kneel," he said. Tomas struggled to his knees, the pain from the burns making his vision spin. Ebbe walked behind him. "Excellent," he said. Tomas didn't even realize he had a whip until it cracked against his ruined back. He fell to the ground with a cry of anguish. Another lash hit him.

"I said to kneel, Sacrifice."

Tomas cowered on the ground. His entire body shook as the pain from his back radiated out. The whip cracked above his head.

"Kneel!"

Tomas couldn't move. His vision darkened. Then another lash struck his back and he blacked out.

He came to as someone was bandaging his wounds. Their hands were brisk but gentle. 

Tomas's tongue was thick in his mouth. "Is-is it over?" he choked out, a small flicker of hope in his chest. 

"No."

Tomas choked on a sob. He pressed his face against the grass as the priest continued treating his back.

"He's ready."

Two priests hauled Tomas to his feet and dragged him to kneel in front of Ebbe. He dug his fingers into the grass as he wept. They had seen him cry more times than he could count. 

"Please just kill me," Tomas begged. He pressed his forehead against the ground in supplication. "Please."

Ebbe knelt down. He grasped Tomas's chin and raised his head. Ebbe's eyes were cold. "I cannot take that which belongs to the gods. You are the Sacrifice, and you shall be until the next Sacrifice is ready to take your place. I will not let you die until that point." Tomas's shoulders shook as he sobbed. Ebbe sighed. "You are weaker than your uncle before you. He didn't start begging for death until five years in."

Tomas curled in on himself. He had always been weak. His parents had known his fate, so they had decided to pamper him as a child. He had wanted for nothing. They thought they had been doing him a kindness. But since he had known a life without pain, the pain he experienced now was even worse.

"Feed and water him," Ebbe said with a wave of his hand. "We have much more to do and the day is still young." 

Tomas stared at the ground as his vision blurred with tears. They tortured him, but they always stopped right before his body broke. They gave him food and water, they let him sleep. Part of him had hoped that they would mess up, make a mistake that killed him. But that wouldn't happen. He lived to suffer.

Tomas flinched as a priest crouched down in front of him. 

"Breakfast," he said. Tomas looked up. It was Herron, one of the acolytes. A torturer in training. Tomas's hands shook, but he took the offered bowl of porridge. 

"I don't know why you bother," he muttered. "I'm just gonna puke it all up when you start hurting me again."

Herron sighed. "You need your strength. Please, eat."

Tomas cringed, but he took his spoon and mechanically shoveled a bite of porridge into his mouth. It was bland and almost cold. He forced himself to swallow. He ate slowly. 

"You'll have a break after today," Herron said lowly, so low Tomas almost missed it. He froze with his spoon in the air. "You'll have a month to rest and recover. You just have to get through today."

Tomas's heart pounded in his chest. He'd only been given a couple of days spared from torture since he'd been here. A whole month? 

"Please don't lie to me," Tomas whispered. 

"I'm not—"

"Is he done?" Ebbe called.

Something like anger flashed in Herron's eyes, but it was gone so fast that Tomas must have imagined it.

"Almost!" Herron called back. He turned toward Tomas. "It's true," he whispered. "I wouldn't lie to you."

Tomas shoveled another spoonful into his mouth. He wanted to believe Herron, but he wasn't that naïve. Not anymore.

"I'm done," he said, setting his bowl on the ground.

Herron nodded and picked up the bowl. Tomas wrapped his arms around himself as Herron walked away. 

He didn't fight as a priest dragged him to his feet. He stumbled as the priest led him back into the temple. His stomach twisted. He knew where they were going. To the altar. 

They entered the sanctuary and Tomas let out a sob. The hunk of stone at the center had metal rings attached to the sides. Shackles were hanging from them. Two priests lifted him up onto the altar. Tomas was shaking so hard it took them several tries to get him into position to secure the shackles. 

The familiar metal clamped around his wrists. Tomas whimpered as his ankles were secured as well. He was spread out, naked and fully exposed. Ebbe approached with a dagger in his hand. 

"As Ogdar's blood was spilled, we spill the blood of the king's son. May it quench the thirst of the gods." Ebbe pressed the blade against Tomas's cheek. "Ogdar carved the fjords, we carve your flesh." Ebbe pressed down and dragged the dagger across Tomas's cheek. He was sobbing now, the tears stinging the fresh cut. Hot blood trickled down his face. Ebbe cut the other cheek. Tomas couldn't breathe. He took in one gasping breath after another, but it was like his lungs couldn't take any air. Ebbe was still carving at his cheek.

"I mark you with the runes of Ogdar," Ebbe said. Tomas's stomach roiled. He was going to be sick. Ebbe moved the dagger from his cheek. Then he started on Tomas's chest. Tomas retched. Ebbe's face wrinkled in disgust. "You're pathetic," he said with a sneer. He dug the dagger into Tomas's skin. He screamed. He could feel the knife against his rib.

He flailed around desperately. Ebbe cursed. Tomas couldn't think of anything except escape. He strained against the shackles. Something snapped in his hand and his vision whited out. Then hands were on him, holding him down to the altar.

"Let me go!" he shrieked. "Let me go!"

Someone backhanded him across the face. Blood filled his mouth and he choked. Then a knife stabbed into his thigh, pinning him to the stone. Pain exploded through his leg. Another knife stabbed into his other leg. Tomas fell into darkness.

He awoke slowly. He groaned as pain returned to his body. Tomas opened his eyes. His head spun, but he forced himself to look down at his body. Two daggers were still embedded in his thighs. 

"You're awake." Herron stood at the side of the altar. Tomas trembled, then cried out as the movement made the daggers shift in his legs. "Hush, be still." Herron rested a hand on Tomas's shoulder. "The priests are conferring right now. They don't know if your body can take the rest of the ritual."

Tomas closed his eyes as they stung with tears. He was just so, so tired. Death would be a mercy. Or at least it would be an end to the pain.

"I don't want to hurt anymore," Tomas whispered.

"I know," Herron murmured. "I know. The bastards have no understanding of the scriptures. Instead they subscribe to senseless cruelty."

Tomas wrinkled his brow as he attempted to make sense of that. But then a wave of dizziness and nausea swept over him.

He tried to breathe through the pain as he waited for the priests. His heart pounded in his chest, and each beat seemed to set a fresh wave of pain through his body. It was an eternity.

"The gods have spoken," Ebbe finally approached the altar. "They are satisfied with the Sacrifice's performance. The ritual is complete." Tomas let out a sob of relief. He didn't struggle as Ebbe lifted his head up and poured a liquid into his mouth. "Sleep," he commanded. "We will tend your wounds."

The drugged tea pulled at Tomas's mind and his muscles slackened. His eyes drifted closed, and his last thought was gratitude that he wouldn't feel the knives being removed.

"Welcome back." Herron sat in a chair next to Tomas's bed. "We almost lost you. You were asleep for three days."

Tomas winced. He opened his mouth to reply, but was hit by a fit of coughing. Herron helped him drink some water.

"Thank you," Tomas croaked. Herron nodded. Then he grabbed Tomas by the shoulders and pulled him in for a hug. He was so warm. Tomas's hands shook but he wrapped his arms around Herron. He buried his face in his shoulder as silent tears dripped down his cheeks.

"Nobody's going to hurt you. You're going to be okay." 

Tomas wanted to believe him. He really did. But hope wasn't an option. Not for the Sacrifice. 

Tagging the Blood of Magic taglist: @thecyrulik @whump-cravings @teamwhump @ceph-the-ghost-writer @whumpsday @thecitythatdoesntsleep @whumpcreations @whumpworld

[wettbewerberrr]

considering making some tiny changes to Exdee's lore and whether or not I want c!Dream to never take off his mask after prison I don't love the idea of him being more disfigured than I already planned, but I'm not a fan of post-prison era either

[if-you-soul]

being a soul fan in this fandom is harder than being a US marine

[spaceacerat]

Spent so many childhood years thinking about concepts of afterlife and religion, call that a baby philosophy problem

[ro-sham-no]

Sam’s wall breaks, and he won’t stop screaming.

it's his birthday so you KNOW i had to whump my boy

It’s been two days and fifteen hours and Sam won’t stop screaming. 

Blood droplets fly out of his mouth with wracking coughs as he chokes on hurried inhales, mucosal spit gumming up his trachea.

It’s been two days and sixteen hours and Sam won’t stop screaming.

The only times he’s been silent in the last two days and seventeen hours is when he’s unconscious. The first bout - four hours and twenty-three minutes of silence - Dean’d just clocked him in the jaw when it was clear Sam was going to scream himself into involuntary suffocation - diaphragm and abdominal muscles locking up from the abuse. Dean knocked him unconscious for those four hours and twenty-three minutes, after six hours of his weeping and gnashing of teeth.

By the time he had woken up, Dean had shots of sedative and they were two hours into a twenty-eight-hour drive to Bobby’s - if nothing else, Dean’s efficient. Sam didn’t take notice.

And if the sounds he won’t stop making can be described as screaming, then the sounds he makes when Dean has to touch him while he’s awake can only be described as a death wail. Wailing and scrambling to get away from Dean with a fervor that earns them both violent shades of bruises.

It’s been two days and twenty hours and Sam won’t stop screaming.

During the drive, whenever Sam’s anguish would escalate back into hair-tearing, along with beating his fists against his arms and thighs and threatening to bash his head into the windows of the Impala, Dean would pull over to force another dose of sedative into him. 

The sounds he makes while Dean tries to subdue him… Well, even in the most remote location on their route, Dean was afraid the farmer whose house they could just barely see in the distance would be able to hear. It had to have been at least three miles away, with how flat the land was, and Dean was still worried that someone would hear. 

Sam won’t stop screaming, and his screams are deafening- except when he’s unconscious, from the shots Dean gives him, the screaming is just in Dean’s mind. A haunting kind of tinnitus that rings in Dean’s ears, just as nauseating as the real deal, but a touch less heartbreaking.

He only allows himself to sleep for the first few hours of Sam being down for the count, despite the catatonic state that seemed to have taken over him. Dean wasn’t about to risk Sam waking up without him. They sleep together in the car, in the weeds and the bramble off of back roads, hidden from view. Baby’s paint has never been so scratched up.

It’s been two days and twenty-three hours and Sam won’t stop screaming.

They’ve been at Bobby’s for the last twenty-four of those, trying to hold back on the sedative, because god knows they can’t keep it up forever or Sam’s heart is liable to just straight up quit, so they’ve been rationing it. Walking the nerve-wracking line between acceptable amounts of incomprehensible human suffering and causing an overdose that could just kill Sam, for good this time.

On the 72nd hour - that’s two days and twenty-four hours, or three days and zero hours, or 4,230 minutes and zero seconds, or 259,200 seconds and -

It’s been three days and zero hours, and Sam is awake, but he stops screaming.

And on the third day he will be raised…

Dean rushes over to check on him, but Sam is still breathing, heart still beating, body still holding itself upright, and he’s stopped screaming.

Now, though, two lines of salty tears trail down his face. For all his hysteric shrieking over the last three days, through all the rocking and swaying and the occasional distinct syllable of “no” over and over again, he hadn’t actually shed a tear, until now.

It’s been three days and zero hours and Sam’s tears are silent. 

He’s staring far off into the distance - into the wall that’s four feet in front of him - and he is silent. Even his gasps are inaudible. No sniffling, not a single huff or quiver of breath. Just tears.

It’s been three days and zero hours and two minutes and both Dean and Bobby are in the room now, staring at Sam with undisguised fear-horror-confusion. 

They stare at him and he begins to shake. Lightly, at first, but it grows. It always grows. Sam is silent, and he’s shaking, and his eyes stream tears with the consistency of a downpour, and Dean moves back in front of him. He’d stepped away to yell for Bobby out the door when it looked like Sam would live after his abrupt descent into silence. Dean steps back in front of him and reaches out to touch Sammy, and now Sam’s not silent. A three-minute silence and now it’s broken by Sam scrambling backward with a gasp that’s really more of an inhaled moan of fear, hastening back so far that he pushes off of the bed he’d been sitting on.

He crashes to the floor, out of Dean’s reach even as the man leaps forward with a cry of, “Sam!”

But Sam’s flight had been too fast, so he crashed to the ground and has now fallen silent again, but Dean can’t tell if there are still tears because Sam has wedged himself into a ball in the crease between the floor and the wall, form-fitting his back and ass over the baseboards hard enough to bruise. He’s hiding his face in his knees, still trembling, but still silent, so Dean can’t tell if the tears have stopped. He isn’t sure if that would be better or worse.

Because now it’s been three days and five minutes, and Sam’s curled up in sublimation. 

He’s crammed against the wall, his knees are up in front of him, spread only far enough to shove his head between them - but down quite far, uncomfortably so, contorted - but his hands aren’t curled up like the rest of him. Instead, his hands are held out around his legs, stretched around them and then upward, palms out like he’s receiving something sacred. Or like he’s giving it away.

It’s been three days and six minutes and Sam is trembling in sublimation.

The room is silent, Dean and Bobby don’t know what to do, but he isn’t hurting himself and he isn’t screaming so they wait him out.

It’s been three days and thirty minutes, by the time anything happens.

At first, Bobby thinks it’s the creaks of his house. At first, Dean thinks it’s the creaks of his soul. They’re both wrong, they realize, as the sound is actually coming from Sam, but it reverberates in such a way that it’s equally loud from every corner of the room. Dean wonders, faintly and somewhat hysterically, when Sam learned ventriloquy. 

It’s a low but resounding utterance, indistinguishable at first, but becoming more distinct with every syllable, losing its eerie ambience and beginning to actually come from Sam as its focal point. Whatever Sam is saying, deep into his chest in a tone that aches, becomes clearer, but neither of the other two men can understand it.

Sam’s palms are still held up in front of his shins. His head is still shoved between his knees, and he’s still trembling. He finishes his recitation but doesn’t fall silent. Instead, he switches to a language that Dean realizes with a jolt that he can understand the words, seconds before Bobby realizes it, too. 

“Pater noster, qui es in שְׁאוֹל, sanctificetur nomen tuum. Adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua, sicut in שְׁאוֹל et in terra.”

A sickening aura falls over the room as both lucid men hear the exceptions to the otherwise familiar prayer. “On earth, as it is in שְׁאוֹל,” Sam had said. Sheol, the subterranean final resting place. The pit. “The place of no return, the land of utter darkness and deep shadow.” 

Hell.

Our Father who art in the pit of utter death and darkness…

It’s been three days and one hour by the time Sam finishes his contritions. 

By then, he’d recited that first chant in the same unknown language twice more, alternating it with the Latin rendition of the Lord’s prayer.

Hallowed be thy name…

Dean has a gnawing, sinking feeling in his gut that he knows exactly what that other language is.

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in שְׁאוֹל, the deep shadow.

The cadence, the tone; they’re the same. Distorted by the foreign, guttural tones of the other language, but they cut through Dean with the same taste. Sam is repeating the same thing over and over again, just in alternating tongues. The familiar Latin combined with the unfamiliar, grating timbre of the other. 

The repugnant language of the wretched Divine.

Those accursed, winged beasts, just like the one his brother, his Sammy has been locked up with for an earth-year. And who knows what that timeline looked like, in the depths? Nothing sears in your mind quite like the crushing realization that virtually no real time has passed when you return from it, Dean remembers. The rock constantly lodged in the base of Dean's chest, taking up space where his lungs are supposed to go, which screams out, your pain was never real.

Did time distort further the further down you went in hell? Was Dean’s 40-year stint a mere blink in the face of the time Sam had been locked up with that thing that did this to him?

The only reason Dean’s stomach isn’t on the floor in front of him is because his stomach is empty, the pervasive ache of the last few days locking it up tight. Sam has been screaming and Dean hasn't been eating, but he's never been less hungry in his life.

It’s been three days and one hour and Dean’s been crying for every single second of them.

The wailing and screaming had gouged at him, in that way little baby's cries gouge at unsuspecting figures passing by, striking that deep, maternal cord within them. The same way little toddler-Sam’s cries had always gouged at Dean. The same way, too, that not-so-little teenaged Sam’s sniffles into his pillow that he thought were muffled had always gouged at Dean. 

If the screams had been gouging at him, this reverent recitation was gutting him. Viscerally, like a fish being pulled sharply off of a too-big hook that it had somehow managed to swallow down too far. Catch and release turned into a pitiful horror.

But it’s been three days and one hour, now, and Sam’s finished his latest round of the Lord’s prayer - Latin this time - and he’s fallen silent again.

His hands are still held out, despite how bad it must make his shoulders and wrists ache with the tension of his stillness. Before Dean can think to do anything, though, Sam continues, but he breaks the pattern. Instead, his voice is much shakier now, and he starts to plead, the only term applicable to the tone of voice Sam has taken on: wretched, and full of supplication. Pleading, in Latin still,

“Elohim, Messiah - Please take this temptation from me. Please, as you have so graciously promised, benevolent Savior, tempt me not with this Sin of the Flesh. I am too weak, Father. This temptation is too great and I cannot bear it.

Temptation? Father?

The formal tone rankles. The self-deprecation vexes. The use of Father to refer to the most foul being to ever walk above and below the earth seethes and horrifies. Dean is rankled. Dean is vexed. Dean seethes, and he is horrified.

“Take Him from my sight, יהוה, keep me away from His fraternal presence, please, Lord. Balm though He is to my soul, grateful though I am for this offering, I am too weak to refrain from Sin.”

Fraternal? Sin?

“I would naught but bastardize this precious gift, and thine hand wilt be forced against me, as thou shalt flay me apart; dissect me to make penance for my transgressions. I do not wish this, Father, so please: Take Him from me, do not allow my wretched Sin to pervade in thine realm.”

Just because Dean’s stomach is empty doesn’t mean it isn’t trying valiantly to make an appearance. At the word “fraternal,” Bobby had started pushing him out the door. Stunned, Dean hadn’t fought back. There’s bile on Bobby’s hardwood floor outside the bedroom Sam and Bobby were still in.

Sam spoke as if Dean’s presence was the temptation, one too great to bear. And he spoke as if to God, but Dean knew better, he knew where Sam had been. Where Dean let him go. No gods to be seen, not there. What Sin had Lucifer contrived between them, to make Sam pay penance for? What occurred between them for Sam to be… Flayed alive. Dissected. 

Dean’s not stupid enough to believe that's anything but literal.

Bobby swings the door mostly-closed just in time for Sam to finish his pleas and lower his arms.

It’s been three days and one hour and ten minutes, and Sam raises his head.

Dean watches through the crack in the door, concealed in the darkness of the hallway. He’s holding his breath and he’s not sure he’ll ever forgive himself for not rushing right back to Sam's side. But something is holding him back, and he doesn’t want to name it. 

(Fraternal… Sin?)

Sam raises his head but keeps his eyes scrunched shut - tears and snot are dripping down his face, which is a blotchy red but somehow still pallid with fear. He’s shaking worse than before as he straightened his back out, sitting up and letting his legs fold down so he’s cross-legged. Not relaxed, but no longer contorted. Finally, he releases a shaky breath and opens his eyes, pointing down at the floor.

Bobby shifts his weight purposefully and Sam’s eyes fly to him with a wild flinch of fear. It hangs in the air uncomfortably long before he recognizes the man in the room with him, and he lets out a sob of what Dean hopes is relief.

He quickly bows his head and shifts up onto his knees in a simple prayer position, hands pressed together in a booklet of gratitude as he sobs out, “Thank you, Messiah, Morningstar. Thank you.”

Then, with a big sigh, he allows himself to look back at Bobby, but his gaze is clinical, observing. He whispers, through his hitching, wet breaths, “He did it. I can't believe he did it. He’s gone. I don’t have to do it again, not yet.”

Sam’s face crumples as he’s hysterical with relief, and Dean’s clawing his own arms raw and bloody outside the door, desperate to get to the crying baby and soothe it, desperate to kiss toddler-Sam’s scraped knees, desperate to tell teenage-Sam that nothing will ever change the way Dean feels about him, despite whatever darkness he seems to think is inside of him. But still, he’s held back by that unspeakable Sin between them. Lucifer didn’t contrive it, Dean knows that. He holds himself back.

Bobby speaks up then, gruff and wary, “Don’t have to do what, yet?”

Sam startles before finally, really looking at Bobby like he’s a human on the same plane of existence as him, not like he’s a mildly interesting fixture on a non-existent wall.

“Nothing, don’t worry about it, Bobby. It’s good to see you,” Sam cracks a smile, and it encapsulates one thousand shades of grief.

Sam continues quieter, once again to himself, “I wish it wasn’t like this. I’m sorry. So, so sorry. But you’re not Him, so it’s fine, it’s fine…”

Bobby squints at him long and hard, eyeing his more relaxed posture and at least somewhat lucid speech - odd though it may be - before he glances at the crack in the door and gives a tiny eyebrow raise that says, get your ass in here.

Dean slowly cracks the door open and calls out to his baby brother, just as he comes into view, “Sammy?”

His reaction is violent. If Sam was pallid before, he’s now a putrid shade of green, face twisting up in horror as he shakes his head, wringing his hands and mumbling out at first, devolving quickly into yells into the aether, into the corners of the room, “No! No, no- please, you promised, no-”

He collapses into himself on the floor, half hidden behind the bed, putting it between him and Dean. The trembling returns with moans and cries incessantly pouring out of Sam’s mouth as he buries his head in his hands, gripping at his face and whatever hair is in reach with too much force, wailing out a constant stream of no, no, no!

Dean takes an involuntary step forward into the room, drawn in by that maternal wretchedness. Desperate, always desperate, to comfort his baby brother. 

When his boot sounds on the carpet - muted but oh-so-loud to Sam’s ears - the cries lose their shape, hiccupping wails of no quickly becoming unintelligible and increasingly frantic, building and building until it can only be described as a howling scream.

It’s been three days and one hour and fifteen minutes, and Sam won’t stop screaming.

[badaziraphaletakes]

Today's catch, fresh from TikTok

Okay this one actually hit one of my pressure points.

(Content warning for hell and religious trauma and so forth).

This is the thing I'm most afraid of. That Crowley running off to Alpha Centauri wouldn't mean he would die.

Huh, I hear you say?

Well, you see, there's a fate much worse than death. The book of revelation says that "Satan's angels" will be tortured forever in a lake of fire after the second coming.

Cheery.

Now, that book doesn't appear to be the sourcebook heaven's working from (though they certainly have followed it pretty closely thus far). So Idk if that's what Aziracrow think is going to happen to Crowley if heaven lose the great war. (Side note: I have no idea what hell's plan is if they win, but I'm sure it isn't pretty, lol. But I digress.)

But it is POSSIBLE that throwing the demons into the eternal lake of fire is part of the Metatron's plan/"the Great Plan". It is possible Aziraphale thinks that's what's going to happen to Crowley.

It's possible that Azi thinks Crowley hates heaven so much that he is risking the possibility of eternal torture to turn them down, and thinks that he, Azi, is the only one who can possibly save Crowley from that. I am HAUNTED by the thought that Aziraphale thinks that if he doesn't succeed in stopping the Second Coming, that Crowley will be thrown into the lake of fire forever. That's gut-wrenching.

I hope, for Azi's sake, that he thinks that "all" that will happen to Crowley if he fails to reform heaven is that Crowley will die. That's bad enough. The other thing is simply too horrible to imagine.

The thought that Azi has spent the past 6000 years dreading Crowley being tortured forever, and thinks Crowley turned down a chance to escape from that.

That thought makes me physically sick.*

All this is to say, their being immortal (side note that they're not *completely* immortal - they can die by hellfire/holy water respectively, and some angels and demons died in the Great War, and, as discussed, it seems like a safe bet that when the universe melts, Crowley will die) doesn't mean they have a greater chance of being safe and happy together.

In fact, pretty much the opposite is true: being immortal means the kind of fate they could suffer is (literally) INFINITELY worse. It would make Azi having to go back to heaven to try to arrange a good outcome for Crowley even more necessary.

Okay I've traumatized everyone enough for today. This has been a lovely tour of my fundamentalist childhood and subsequent extended mental breakdown. Have a lovely evening.

_____________________________________________

* I have to hope it's not this. Because personally I don't think Crowley would let Azi think that, even at his most angry. (The thought of Crowley letting Azi walk away thinking he preferred death to going back to heaven with him, rather than pointing out to Azi that the offer to go back to heaven was a trap and he was going to wind up dead either way, was bad enough as it is - my God! Seeing that absolutely gutted me.) And I don't think Crowley would have risked their ever associating *at all* if Azi falling meant he would potentially be tortured forever too.

[wolfythewitch]

I hear you like biblical characters who are also sad/tragic little men

Have you considered:

Abraham, one of the most depressing main characters in the Bible?

Consider, people historically misread this character to make him more exemplary, but according to the text:

1. Early in his arc we see some big wins for him; he gets God on his side, he learns to be confident in himself and in his internal sense of justice, so much so that at the crucial moment before Sodom and Gomorrah, God tests whether Abraham's loyalty is stronger than his sense of justice, and Abraham passes with flying colors. He castigates God's plan as despicable, profane, a gross miscarriage of justice from an apparently unjust being who deigns to call themself the judge of the universe—and does not become an Abrahamakebab (seriously it's like Odysseus challenging Athena levels of chutzpah)

2. God promises him everything including that he'll inherit the promised land and see his children fill the land

3. God tests him again and tells him to sacrifice Isaac, and Abraham absolutely beefs it. If you read the text closely, it really emphasizes how close Abraham and Isaac are, and God is really careful to emphasize and remind Abraham of this fact. What happens? Abraham and Isaac go up the mountain together. And then at the climactic moment? It's not God who intervenes, but an angel (before this point it's always God, always personal). And then Abraham (alone) descends the mountain. Not Abraham and Isaac, just Abraham. We never again see Abraham and Isaac in the same place until Abraham's funeral (not even to set up Isaac and Rivka; he sends a servant for that! Also the funniest part of the bible; Isaac's so hot Rivka falls off her camel). Sarah leaves him and returns to her ancestral land (we know this because Abraham has to travel to her land when she dies, while Isaac lives in the same region as Sarah). And God never again speaks to Abraham, and in fact doesn't speak directly to anyone ever again until Moses kills the overseer and then comes upon the burning bush, 400 years later. Abraham certainly doesn't live to inherit the promised land or see his children fill it.

Man rises to the highest of highs, and then through his own doing, loses his son, his wife, his God, his legacy, and his pride.

May I propose instead: King Saul