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cripplecharacters · 8 months

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How should you write/draw burn survivors? I know this isn't a drawing blog but I don't know of one that I could ask this question to.

Hello!

I'm not a burn survivor myself, so I'll mostly talk about facial differences/visible disability in general and link some stuff made by burn survivors.

First thing, I think it's important to remember that being a burn survivor changes a lot of things - not only appearance. Very important part is the psychological one, but I'm not a burn survivor so I will just let the resources linked below speak.

From the physical aspect, burns can also come with: chronic pain, limited range of motion due to scarring, tightened skin, problems with regulating temperature, itching, skin irritation, and even different nutritional needs during the initial healing process.

There is also specific everyday care associated with burns - something you basically never see in fiction. That could be things like occupational therapy, physical therapy, skincare (like heavy moisturizing and scar massaging), wearing sunblock, wearing splints, or stretching to prevent contractures or tightness.

There are also different types of burns and they (unsurprisingly) differ from each other - for example, electrical burns have a much higher rate of amputation than any other type. Chemical burns can cause eye issues. A burn caused by a fire in a closed space might result in a brain injury due to the lack of oxygen. A much larger portion of people than you (probably) assume have survived burn injuries as small children, and if they were young enough they might not even remember the event at all, unlike older people who might be very affected by the trauma.

Experiences of a person with 80% body surface burns, a person with quadruple amputations from an electrical burn, a person with a facial burn, and a person burnt very recently will be different from someone who has a 5% body surface 2nd degree burn in a spot that’s usually hidden, who has lived with their burn for a decade - despite them all being burn survivors.

When it comes to more thorough research, I recommend going through Phoenix Society’s and Face Equality International’s websites to learn more about both real burn survivor’s perspectives, and face equality as a social justice topic. I think the 3rd link (see below) puts it very well when talking about burn survivors being represented in fiction:

“Most likely, these characters were not created by someone with lived experience. The result is an increasingly garbled game of telephone [...] To avoid contributing to this false narrative, embrace research as part of the process. Explore interviews, first-person accounts, and articles from reliable sources.”

I personally think that the links below should be mandatory reading for writing not only burn survivors, not only people with facial differences, but visibly disabled people in general - because the treatment we get is often so similar the advice still holds up just fine. And if you don't plan on writing any of these, you should still read them to see how prevalent of a problem ableism in media is.

Lise Deguire's Hey Hollywood - scars don't make you evil.

Face Equality International's International Media Standard on Disfigurement.

Niki Averton's Tips for Writing about Burn Survivors.

The main sentiment that you will read from basically any first-hand source is that if you're writing the burn survivor to be either:

evil (just throw the whole character away. please.)

a guy with the "World's Saddest Most Tragic Backstory Ever and It's So Sad and Tragic" (because he revealed he has a scar.)

a helpless victim who is there to be The Helpless Victim

...then you're already doing it wrong and need to make some major changes.

From our blog's reblogs and posts, you might want to look at tips for writing a visibly different/disabled character and tips on drawing people with facial differences. Neither are specific to burn survivors but cover the topic of visible disability and facial differences.

Now for tips on drawing burn survivors (that weren't included in the last link);

Reference real people. 99.9% drawings of burn survivors seem to go through the same "increasingly garbled game of telephone" that Niki Averton mentions with how burn survivors are written, in that the newer the drawing, the less in common it has with how real people with burns look like because people reference from each other and none of them ever think to actually check if their depiction is accurate. If you just google "burn survivor" you will very quickly notice that burn survivors don't have that damn red overlay layer put on top of their skin. It just doesn't look like that, and basic research (aka Google Images search) will tell you that - and still, people color a hand with bright red and think that's how it looks like (it doesn't).

In the same vein, maybe don't just draw an able-bodied person and then put some scarring on top (or maybe do exactly that. No burn scar and no burn survivor is the same, and there are people that fit what I just described... but hear me out for a second). Think about how scars interact with their features - do they have both of their ears? Do they still have all of their hair? Do they only have parts of their eyebrow? Do they have all of their fingers? Can they move the same as before their burn, or are their scars limiting their joints? How did their body react to the post-burn hypermetabolism? Lots to think about. Take into account what type and thickness of burns your character has.

Ditch the mask trope. Just ditch it. There's no need to cover your character's scar from the world unless you as the author think it requires to be hidden, is too scary to show, or other ableist trope that seems to always come up with drawings of visibly disabled people, especially burn survivors. The one exception I will mention is a transparent face orthosis/mask (TFO) that facial burn survivors might wear while awaiting a skin graft early after their injury. But as the name suggests, it's transparent and doesn't work for the awful "ohh scary facial difference better cover it up and only reveal it in some hyper dramatic scene!!" trope because you can see right through it. (I will also mention that TFOs are a very modern thing. Your medieval burn survivor wouldn't be wearing one.)

No "body horror", no "gore" tags or trigger warnings or whatever. That's a human being. If you feel the need to warn your followers before they see a disabled person existing, you're better off not drawing them.

Some last notes;

Throughout this ask I used the term "burn survivor" rather than "burn victim" because that is, to my knowledge, the general community preferred phrase. Individual opinions will differ (because no group is a monolith) but "burn survivor" is generally the safest term to use and probably the best if talking about a fictional character.

Similarly, I used "facial difference" rather than "disfigurement". Just as the above, opinions will differ on what is the best to use but I personally, as someone with facial asymmetry and a cranial nerve disorder, heavily prefer the term "facial difference" over "disfigurement". (I am in this case The Individual Opinion Differing because you can notice that in the links above, facial difference and disfigurement are used interchangeably. The general community uses both, some people have specific preferences. I'm some people.) When talking about a fictional character, "facial difference", "visible difference" and "disfigurement" are all probably fine. Just stay away from calling a person "deformed".

mod Sasza

#anonymous #mod sasza #face difference #writing advice #writeblr #writing disabled characters #writing tips #writing resources #writing guide #art reference #burn survivor representation

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bunnyboysrus · 3 months

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Of Monsters and Omegas

I read this a/b/o thing a while ago, I don't even know who the original was by I can't find it again y-y

but it had a thing I'd never seen in a/b/o before, with an idea of an alpha, claim biting another alpha and turning them into an omega (talked to a friend and it turns out this is a thing that has been written about more than once, im just out of touch and its not even friday) and it was an amazing story, super well written, I just personally didn't like the ending cause I'm the #1 advocate for brat readers and not the biggest fan of crybabies or the total pheromone brainwashing that people write for omegas that make them do the complete opposite of what they would normally do, I'd like to think they have more resistance to the chemicals than that albeit at the cost of some physical and psychological pain. so im writing my own, thingy, with a different ending.

18+ Minors DNI - 6.3k words Content Warnings: stalking, obsession, death, fighting, violence, blood, torture(?), kidnapping, noncon touching, suggestive, gangs, some degradation, reader is referred to as 'princess' gender neutrally (im new to this so if theres anything i forgot pls let me know)

The heavy sounds of flesh hitting flesh echoed against the stone walls of the alleyway concealing the battered figures of the people fighting within it. One person lay dazed and immobile on the ground already, followed shortly by a second body, this one out cold before he even hit the ground. The last two fighters standing were locked in a desperate grapple, and despite having been beset upon by three assholes at once, the would-be victim who had been pulled into the alley on their way home from a long day of college classes gains the upper hand for the third and final time. Your muscles burn as you grunt and send the last assailant flying into the hard brick wall, one final crack ringing through the tight, dark space as they slide down the wall onto the dirty ground, right into an unfortunately placed puddle of dumpster juice. They leave a splatter of blood on the stone where the back of their head split on the stained grit.

Blood drips from the knuckles of the hand you run through the sweaty hair slicked to your forehead as you stoop and pick up your backpack from where it had been tossed to the side. You spot a wallet on the ground, knocked out of someone's pocket at some point during the fight, and pocket the cash from that too, for the inconvenience. These scumbags were lucky they weren't dead, yet, anyway. For this? They'd probably be killed within the week once you gave their ID's to your older sister.

You continue on your way back home, wiping the blood off your knuckles and face with the sleeve of your coat as you go.

Why those grunts had seemingly staked you out was beyond you, other than the obvious reason of being a member of their gang's most vicious and historied rival. Your family was a notorious one, a family business dealing mostly in drugs but with a few spare hands in money laundering and data gathering. You were fully aware that what your family did was illegal in a dozen different ways, but it was what you had grown up in, it was what paid for your lavish lifestyle, so who were you to be judgmental? Besides, to compromise within a morally gray area, you know your family prefers to keep things as bloodless as possible, less clean up and attention that way. As a fresh adult who was only in your second year of college however, you were ignorant to most of those details, and chose to be so. You understood why your family didn't want to involve you just yet, and you didn't care to dig into it, the longer you could go with less responsibilities, the better. So, for now, you were content to stay in the dark and live your carefree, well-funded life.

Of course, that didn't mean you were naive or anything. You know very well that you were in constant danger of being attacked or killed, even as you lived a perfectly normal college life. So, as any self-respecting alpha would, you worked out intensely and routinely, to the point of being intimidating even to other alphas. Running into a few punks here and there was nothing to you, even when they came in groups like they had today.

The remaining smears of blood on your knuckles have dried into a crust by the time you get home. Once you've kicked off your shoes at the door, you hide the gory evidence of your altercation in your coat pockets as you step into the living room of your family's manor. Your sisters, Nina, the youngest, and Esme, older than you but younger than your brothers, Leon and Silas, are sitting on the couch closest to the TV, a drama of some sort playing as they shared a bowl of strawberries. Nina beams at you from the couch.

"Hey! How was your day?"

Nina was still in high school, which in your opinion was way worse than college, so the fact that she still had the spunk and energy to greet you so enthusiastically warmed your heart. You smile back at her as you head for the stairs.

"It was pretty good, I finally finished that project so now I don't have to stay late at the library anymore."

"That's great! That means you'll be home early enough to watch Cats of Heaven with me!"

"I should have enough time for that, sure." You chuckle. You had no clue what that was, but if you had to guess, knowing your sister it was the newest silly cartoon that she had become infatuated with. At least she wasn't trying to get you to watch the insufferable dramas that she liked to watch with Leon and Esme, like what was on now, but you would never admit to your siblings how corny you thought those kinds of shows were. You could only hope Cats of Heaven was something more entertaining than the standard soap operas you'd observed.

"There's pizza in the kitchen." Esme calls to you as you start up the stairs.

Ah, so Leon isn't home yet. The oldest of your siblings was the one who normally cooked, more often than even your mother. You call back an acknowledgement before jogging up the stairs to your room. After cleaning yourself of the day's grime, and the blood of course, you change clothes and trot back downstairs, heading for the kitchen to obtain some of the aforementioned pizza. Getting past the group project you'd been working on for the past three months meant more free time after school for the immediate future, and you were all too keen to relax with your family, even if it meant slogging through a show that was potentially horrendous.

You pad back into the living room, already halfway through one of the five slices of cheesy divinity on your plate. You were just sitting down between Esme and Nina when the sound of keys in the front foyer made you all perk up.

"I thought they weren't coming back for another few days?" Esme voices the question on all of your minds, 'they' being your parents and oldest brother, who had left on a business trip a little under a week ago.

"Maybe they finished work early and wanted it to be a surprise." Nina suggests happily, as the sound of footsteps in the hallway grows closer. You're hit with a sudden wave of apprehension at the same time as Esme, both of you standing abruptly to move in front of your youngest sister as a crowd of strangers step into the room with shameless casualness. Leading them, is an imposing alpha man with ink black hair tied at the nape of his neck and burning red eyes so piercing it almost made you shiver to be caught in their gaze. Almost.

The only thing that overpowered the rising fear was anger.

You sprint directly for the leader, arm pulled back for a haymaker, but some beta grunt gets in your way and takes the blow. It's clear from the confidence with which he steps in that he was unprepared for the force behind the fist, and ends up on his face on the floor, dead to the world. The first swing immediately spurs the others into action, and they surge around their leader to subdue you. It turns out to be a much harder endeavor than any of them anticipate, even when one lackey throws themself onto your back to weigh down your movement, you move as though the weight wasn't there at all, ramming backwards and crushing the brave idiot and one other against the wall. You're about to make another lunge for the leader, who has so far been lounging in an insufferably smug manner against the wall, watching the fight but not bothering to get involved, when you hear a shrill scream behind you that stops you cold.

You turn back to see Nina trapped in the arms of a muscly thug, and Esme thrashing on the ground at her feet, held down by two others. Your rage surges and you move to attack their captors, but the momentary distraction caused by your little sister's distress is all the time that's needed for three more men to jump on you and drag you to the ground. It takes 5 people altogether to hold you down as you curse and struggle against their hold trying to reach your sisters.

The leader of the home invasion chuckles condescendingly as he finally moves from his spot against the wall and walks closer, kneeling down by your face, a tight smile on his face that holds no amusement.

"You're just as feisty as ever, second youngest. I've heard all about your track record in fights, your unbroken win streak was so intimidating that I thought for sure it'd take more than that to subdue you. I'm a little disappointed."

"Fuck you!!!" It's all you can manage to spit out amongst your fury and exhaustion; normally you'd be able to throw off even five people, at least enough to get an arm free to strike out, but you were already worn out from your earlier fight. That, and a literal glob of spit that lands splat dab against the side of the assault leader's nose; damn, so close to hitting him in the eye.

The room goes cold and still, the thugs surrounding you and your siblings seem to take in a collective breath of anxiety, looking nervously to their leader for his reaction. To their surprise, he simply stares down intensely at the struggling alpha on the floor as he wipes the spit off his cheek... and licks it off his thumb.

"Oh, are you sure that's smart? You might not care about your own compromised position... but you care about theirs, right?" He glances over to the men holding down your sisters and in response to an unspoken signal, they draw knives and hold them menacingly against their throats. Esme growls furiously, but Nina screams again in fear as tears pour down her cheeks.

"Stop! Stop it, don't terrorize them! You're here for me, right?! Then just take me outside and beat me to death if that's what you want but leave them alone!!!" You still sound enraged, but even you are aware of the fear that leaks into your voice.

"Aww, worried for your sisters? Me too." The faux amusement in the alpha leader's voice is gone now, replaced with a cold fury chilling enough to send a zing of worry into your spine. The leader grabs a fistful of your hair in a painfully tight grip as he pulls your head up, his other hand spinning a set of keys around his finger. Your blood runs cold when you zero in on the plastic pink dolphin hanging on the ring.

Those are your mother's keys.

"You seem to think I'm here because you put a few grunts into the hospital. You're mistaken." The alpha tilts his head as his eyes pierce into yours, searching, but for what, you don't know. "You aren't aware of what your brother's been up to, are you?"

"You'll have to be more specific; I have two." You huff, trying not to stare too obviously at the dolphin, trying desperately not to think of what it might mean of your mother's fate for this asshole to be holding those keys.

"Silas." The alpha says icily, speaking the name like a curse.

Warily, you shake your head, the clawed grip on your head barely allowing the movement. "No, I'm not aware of anything my brothers and parents are involved in."

"That's unfortunate... But I'm already aware of that. It's cute, honestly, did they think leaving you out of the loop would keep you safe and uninvolved?" He gives your hair a sharp tug, eliciting a hiss from the fuming alpha. "All it did was make you the perfect tool for revenge."

"What the fuck are you even talking about you piece of shi-" The leader slams your face into the ground, and although the floor is carpeted, it only buffers the brunt force so much. When the leader lifts your head back up, your nose is dripping blood.

"I'm talking now. Unless you want me to kill your sisters in front of you, you'll shut the fuck up and listen like a good little bitch."

A growl rumbles through you which is met with another face first kiss into the floor, but the alpha doesn't signal anything to the thugs holding your sisters.

"Listen well, as I won't repeat myself. Silas kidnapped my sister, and I can only assume he claimed her. That, or he killed her, but I doubt it. Your mother was helping him to keep them both hidden, and to her credit she refused to sell him out, no matter how much we hurt her." The spinning of the keys stops abruptly as the leader catches them in his palm before dangling them in front of you. "I guess she didn't stop to think about what that choice might mean for her other children, left so innocent and unaware at home, alone. Maybe she had a favorite?"

Your blood runs cold as you take in the intruder's words. You had never been particularly close with Silas, hell, none of your siblings were. He had always been very distant with his siblings, while the rest of you went on to be incredibly close with one another, leaving Silas as the odd one out. That wasn't to say you hadn't all at some point tried to get closer with him, he had simply always made it clear he had no interest. This was probably also fueled by the coddling you had all observed from your mother; Silas had always been her golden boy, incapable of wrongdoing.

"I had no idea... None of us did." You can only hope the sincerity is clear in your voice and face; you genuinely had no idea your brother had done such a thing or was even capable of doing such. If the kidnapping was fueled by anything other than the feud between your families... The thought made you sick.

The leader considers your words, his chilling gaze never wavering in the slightest from yours.

"I believe you. From what I gather, based on what we were able to discern from the phone we took from your mother, she and he were the only ones in on it."

Your relief is short lived when a cruel, mirthless smirk creeps over the leader's face. There's a sudden sting in the side of your neck, you barely have time to register the pinch of pain before darkness rushes into your vision from all sides.

"However... That doesn't alleviate you of the consequences."

A sudden splash of cold drags you unwillingly out of the darkness. You open your eyes, gasping, taking in the dirty, gray stone, the puddle surrounding you; you're no longer in your living room. You now find yourself somewhere dark and cemented on all sides, the cold dampness pervading the space the kind that only comes from being underground. The only illumination comes from a single bare bulb swinging on a frayed wire over your head, the light it casts only making the space feel more unnerving.

Looming over you, face cast eerily in the darkness clumping up around the edges of the bulb's dingy light, is the leader of the home invasion. His red eyes are black in the shadow, but still alight with something cruel and mocking. He has a bucket in his hand, empty save for the last few drops of water clinging to the lip, the rest of it covering you.

"Good morning, princess. Sleep well?"

It's just the two of you, alone. No guards, no thugs, no sign of your sisters. You process this information a split second before you register the weight clamped down around your arms and waist, metal rattling loudly through the small space when you try to lunge for him, only to be stopped short by a chain attached to the wall behind you. You twist your arms violently, feeling the bite of handcuffs digging into your wrists, chains pulling taught where they're wrapped around your waist. Your captor laughs at your efforts.

It's when you growl in response to the taunting laughter that you feel more metal on your face. A muzzle. You can't suppress the fury thrashing around in your chest like a wild animal, growing more and more violent the more humiliation is piled on. The abduction, the laughter, the restraints, the muzzle. You kick and pull and yank and spit and snarl, don't stop even when the metal bites and blood makes your skin slippery against the cuffs.

"Aww, throwing a tantrum now? Cute." The words are barely enough warning before you're shoved onto your back, arms grinding painfully between the restrains and the dirty floor.

Your captor straddles you, his weight keeping your body pressed flat to the ground while one hand settles into the curve of your throat and squeezes. His palm presses lightly into your airway at the same time that his thumb rubs slow, pensive circles in the dip between your neck and collar. You shiver apprehensively when it brushes over the scent gland in your neck.

"I already told you I don't know where your sister is. Fucking kill me already so you can get even, just don't hurt my sisters. They're not involved!"

"Second time you've asked me to kill you... you seem quite keen on it." He smirks. "Unfortunately, you're all involved by virtue of simply being a part of that family. I know none of you are stupid enough to be completely ignorant to your family's doings."

Another growl bubbles up in your throat, only to be choked into silence when your captor tightens his grip around your neck.

"You know, I've thought for a while now that the older you've gotten, the less happy you've looked. The worst time, was right after your high school graduation, it was like the last of your light had left your eyes." His smile softens into something pitying, bordering on sympathetic even, but all you feel is chills running up and down your spine. "You always used to be so carefree, and spirited, it was crushing to see you looking so worn down and sad. It took me a while to realize what was killing the happy you I love so much."

The hands around your neck loosen as the leader leans down, hips shifting against your crotch as he moves, completely unbothered by the water soaking into his pants. He brings his face to your ear, lips grazing against the shell of it.

"Don't you think trying so hard to posture around like a big tough alpha is exhausting? I know it is, I know intimately the sort of shit we go through to come out on top as the strongest, the worthiest... But that struggle never suited you, did it? You've always seemed too sweet for it to me, more like an omega than an alpha."

You can't help but take the opportunity to thrust your head forward and slam it into your captor's face, forcing him back into his upright position. Ignoring the stalker shit this guy was just babbling was difficult, but you decided to skip it for now since honestly you didn't really wanna hear the details...

"You've gotta be shitting me, I've sent hundreds of you losers to the hospital and the grave since I was a middle schooler. If you're seriously trying to compare me to an omega, then I know you're full of it and just trying to piss me off."

He raises an eyebrow, surprisingly not retaliating against the bonk to his head, not yet at least.

"So, what would you call the manicures you get monthly with your sister?"

"I call that self-care and spending time with my sister. Fighting off all your fuckin' grunts wears my hands out and I'm not fond of scars. I deserve a relaxing hand massage for the trouble of beating your thugs up every week."

"And the mall trips where you spend hundreds on clothes which you follow up with a trip to that quaint little bakery where you always get a strawberry cream cake? That doesn't strike you as omega-ish?"

"Go to hell. For one thing, it's insanely creepy that you know all that, and for another, you're stereotyping like a motherfucker. Alphas aren't all meatheads that do nothing but eat raw steak, jerk off and work out, and all omegas aren't valley preps that do nothing but shop and primp. People who think like you are what's wrong with society."

The leader's deep red eyes stare intensely into your face for an eerily long moment before the corners of his lips twitch. At first its imperceptible, and while he clearly fights to keep a straight face, he can't keep down the chuckles bubbling out of his throat for long. He throws his head back in a burst of full body laughter, the least cruel sound he's made since you met him. When he finally manages to calm himself, the leader beams down at you as he wipes a tear out of his eye.

"My god... You're so fucking cute. Do you even hear yourself? You're only proving my point. You're meant to be pampered and taken care of, sheltered and safe from petty street fights and laborious expectations of strength and intimidation. You look so much cuter and happier getting your nails done than you do working out and swaggering around trying to be impressive and domineering."

This conversation had already been creepy since it started, but this was starting to genuinely unnerve you. You try to lean your head further away from the alpha on top of you, but he grabs the front of your muzzle, dragging you closer.

"Don't run away now tough guy. I thought a big bad alpha like you wasn't scared. How's it feel to be the one on bottom? Feeling threatened by the idea of someone putting you in your place? Scared?" He drags his tongue across the thin bars of the muzzle, his breath ghosting over your lips.

"What do you want from me?" You finally manage to ask, despite the tightness in your throat. As much as you expect to dread the answer, you can't stand any more of the back and forth while you wait in suspense for torture, for death, for something. Something other than whatever it is about this whole exchange that is making this guy so rock hard. You're trying to ignore it but, you've been feeling the unmistakable prod of this weirdo's boner against your crotch for almost the whole time you've been speaking.

"Still waiting on me to kill you? Knowing how proud you are, I bet you'd prefer death over what I have planned for you." The freak on top of you chuckles, his voice lowering to a husk as he leans down and nuzzles his nose into the crook between your neck and shoulder, inhaling deeply. "You smell so sweet even now, for an alpha...~ You'll smell even better soon."

Before you can ask what the hell he's talking about, you feel a kitten lick against your neck that makes you freeze. It's light at first, but quickly turns into broad strokes of his tongue and open mouth kisses from shoulder to jaw, wet and insistent.

No way. Nowaynowaynowaynoway. Obviously, no one is incapable of being sexually assaulted but it rarely ever happened to alphas, they weren't exactly the cute, easy targets creeps normally went for. It had never even been a passing concern for you up until now.

"Hey! Are you fucking-gh...!" You choke on your words when a sharp sting pulses through your neck. A heartbeat later, a deep and agonizing burning sensation starts to spread through your veins, up into your head where the white-hot burn is so blaring that it clouds your vision with spots, and down into your chest where your heart starts pounding against your ribs like it's trying to claw its way out. You can only gasp soundlessly as pain like you've never experienced rips through you, tearing screams from your lungs that die before they can even leave your throat, coming out only as gasping whimpers. It's after you feel a second bite and the pain is redoubled that you finally manage to shriek out loud, a sound so visceral and so unlike any sound or scream you've ever made that it doesn't even sound like you.

When he bites into your scent gland for a third time, the pressure building behind your eyes from the pain and the lightheadedness of screaming without pause for breath snaps. You can feel yourself losing consciousness again, and this time you couldn't be more grateful for it.

Your return to the waking world is much slower this time. Whereas before you were yanked out of the darkness with a splash of cold water, this time you find yourself wading through it, a lake of sludge thicker than cold syrup, and it was just as sticky and unpleasant as you imagine such a thing would be. Despite what feels like physical pounds of exhaustion weighing them down, you manage to drag your eyes open.

You feel cold and damp all over, a fresh drop of sweat rolling down your neck. A full body ache that sinks deep into your bones covers you; you feel like you're made of glass, fragile, weak and sore.

A strip of dim, greyed light is shining on the ceiling over your head; its all you can focus on as your awareness swims to the surface and clambers out of the heavy lake still trying to drag it down. You shift and lift one of your arms out from under the thick blanket covering you and notice gauze wrapped around your wrist. A small, delicate gasp to your side makes you turn your head. Nina is sitting in a chair by your bedside, clutching your other hand tightly between hers.

"You're awake! Y-You were sleeping so long I thought you'd never..." She sniffles, holding your hand to her cheek as hot tears drip onto your wrist. You slowly turn your hand to press your palm against her cheek, smiling softly.

"It's okay Nina, I'm alive, it's alright." Your voice is barely more than a croak, scratching painfully out of your throat. Nina grabs a cup of water from a bedside table and gently helps you take a few sips. When you've managed to drain the whole cup, you lay back in the bed with a wearied sigh.

"What happened? I thought for sure I was dying, I..." You trail off, thinking back to the odd conversation you'd had with the alpha who had led your home's invasion. Your head is pounding, and you feel so weak, like you're just waking up from the worst part of a flu, still feeling traces of a fever in the heat trapped in your blankets and the sweat clinging to your skin. A growl from the window pulls your attention away from your condition.

"That motherfucker... He did something to you." Esme is leaning against the frame of the large window casting the gray light over the ceiling a few feet away from where you and Nina are sitting, a cigarette crushed in half in her hand. You can't help but be faintly alarmed at the sight of it; Nina had expressly forbidden Esme from smoking, and she hadn't been caught with a cigarette in over a year. To see her with one in front of Nina, and for Nina to not be making any fuss over it, means something is seriously wrong. A distant rumble punctuates the tense silence that falls over you all, and you notice that the slim strip of sky visible through the partially parted curtains over the window is blotted out with storm gray.

"Did what to me?" You press. Your sisters exchange a look that is far too loaded to discern anything from other than Nina's palpable concern and Esme's frustration. You quickly get tired of waiting for one of them to tell you what is going on.

"Will one of you please tell me what is making you both look at me like I've caught some kind of fatal disease?" You huff, anxiety bleeding into your words. Nina glances one more time to Esme, who adamantly refuses to look away from the window as she throws down her ruined cigarette and retrieves a new one.

"You... Er, well you were... claimed. By Emil." Nina says quietly, staring down at her hands in her lap rather than you.

You stare at her blankly. What she's saying makes sense objectively, but you can't make sense of what it could have to do with you. Claiming was something exclusively done between alphas and omegas. You almost want to laugh and call it absurd, when you remember the sharp, burning pain of something piercing your neck. You shiver as you recall that the pain had been sourced in the same area as your scent gland. Your hand slowly, shakily, reaches up to press two probing fingers to your neck. Pain pulses faintly through you again when the tips of your fingers find gauze wrapped around it.

The weakness pervading your entire body, the nervousness underlying all of the other emotions swirling in your gut, the foreign sensation settled in your lower abdomen... Somehow, you know instinctively what it all means before your sister even says it.

"He bitched you. You're an omega now." Esme's voice has dropped to a low, hard to hear octave. You almost want to believe you imagined what you just heard, but you know deep down that what she says is true. The despair must show on your face, as Nina grabs your hand again, squeezing it tightly between both of hers.

"I-It'll be okay...! Emil is actually very nice, and he's genuinely-" She's cut off by the sharp slam of Esme's fist against the wall.

"Bullshit! Don't even start Nina. He bitched you and he expects you to roll over and be happy about it, but I say fuck that!" She snarls, her new cigarette meeting the same fate as its predecessor as she crushes it in her fist and throws it to the ground. "He's gone on and on at us trying to prove that this is all somehow what's best for you, but he just sounds deranged! He's a sick, obsessive freak, and he wants you to-!"

The sound of a door opening stops her short, and all three siblings jerk around to look at the newcomer entering through the door on the far side of the room from the bed. A woman in scrub pants and a sweater glowers down at all three siblings, looking supremely exhausted.

"You two, you were told you would only be allowed in if you didn't cause trouble. Are you distressing the patient right after they wake up?" She asks in a cold, droning voice.

Nina and Esme exchange defeated, worried glances before Nina speaks up.

"N-No ma'am, we weren't trying to be disruptive we were just-"

"Overwhelming someone coming out of a physically taxing ordeal that left them comatose for almost two weeks." She interjects dryly. "Come on, visitation's over, both of you out."

You expect your sisters to argue, to tell her off for expecting them to leave you alone and insist on staying with you, but to your shock your sisters resignedly stand up and head for the door. Once they've both shuffled out, the nurse (?) shuts the door behind them and trudges over to you. You flinch away from her touch, but she grabs you in firm but gentle hands, holding you still as she looks you over.

"I expected you to stay out for a few more days, but you're one tough little cookie. How are you feeling?"

Bewildered but too shell shocked to question, you answer the questions she asks you as she goes about taking your temperature and blood pressure. One impromptu physical later, she steps away from your bed with a satisfied nod.

"Alright, it looks like your recovery is progressing better than expected. You'll probably be up and about like nothing happened within a few days." You listen to her ramble about your condition before you can bring yourself to ask.

"What happened to me? Is... Is what my sister said true? Am I an omega?"

The nurse goes silent. The pitying look she gives you is all the confirmation you need.

"You should go back to sleep for now. Your body probably still feels very weak. Food will be brought to you shortly but try not to stress yourself out in the meantime." It's all she says before she hurries to the door, shutting your questions down with a firm slam. You scramble to your feet, swaying violently as soon as you try to stand. You power through it, holding down a lurching sensation akin to being on the verge of throwing up as you stagger to the door and wrench at the knob. Locked.

Fear and worry overtake you as you start slamming your hands and body into the door, though what you're trying to accomplish, not even you know. You're too weak to even stand, let alone break down a door, and before long, cold rushes into your limbs and you find yourself sliding down onto the floor, trembling and barely keeping down the bile crawling up your throat. You curl up into a ball and close your eyes.

When you awake for the third time, you don't feel nearly as ill. The ache in your limbs is still there, a mild constant, but it doesn't feel as debilitating as it did before. As you are in the middle of waking, you feel a cool hand brushing through your hair, and smell a sweet scent around you that puts you at ease. You can't help but lean your face into the hand petting you as your eyes slowly open. Snuggled against you, both arms wrapped securely around you... is that fucking freak.

You jerk away from the home invasion leader's hand, pulling him out of what looks like a deep reverie as you scramble to the side of the bed farthest from him. He smiles at you in amusement as he sits up, leaning his cheek against a fist propped on his knee.

"Good morning, princess. How are you feeling?"

You rub your hand over your neck, now free of gauze, feeling the bite marks in your skin in hyper-detail.

"You fucking... y-you, what did you do...?!" You demand, your voice a slightly higher pitch than you recall it being and shaking.

He chuckles like this was exactly what he was expecting, looking at you with a coy condescension that makes your skin crawl.

"I helped you; the first step to setting up our beautiful romance was making you an omega so I could care for you without any power struggles getting in the way. I'm not saying I look down on alphas having relationships with other alphas, but it just wasn't for me." His grin broadens as he crawls closer to you, closing the distance you'd put between you. You try to back up further, but he corners you against the headboard, arms caging you in on either side. He leans his head down, you shrink into yourself as he does but its not far enough, and his cheek brushes yours as he licks up the side of your neck. When his tongue glides over the bites on your neck, a shudder runs through you unbidden. A sudden rush of wetness between your legs shocks you to a frozen standstill. The freak looming over you takes a deep inhale, shuddering in ecstasy.

"I was right... You smell so much sweeter like this!" He presses against you, one knee parting your legs as one of his hands rubs the burning heat between your thighs. You reach to grab his wrist and pull it away, but his free hand catches yours and holds it down. The uncomfortable wetness gets worse as a heat purrs through your core, goaded by his touching.

You feel a foreign sensation crawling through your brain, sickeningly warm and disorienting. It urges you to pull your hands away, spread yourself open willingly before the alpha in front of you. It promises bliss in submission, ecstasy in relinquishing control to someone bigger and stronger than you, someone who could protect and ravish you-

A jolt runs through you as your captor's hand drifts up to dip underneath the waistband of your pants, his face lifting up from your neck to direct his affections to your lips. His attempt to take a kiss is stopped short violently by a fist slamming into his nose. He falls backwards off the side of the bed with an undignified yelp, curling up on the floor for an agonizing moment to hold his face as blood rushes between his fingers.

"W-What the hell... Aren't you...?"

"GO TO HELL YOU UGLY FREAK!!!" The panic you feel is pushed down, rage swallowing it entirely. The alpha on the floor quickly backs up as you get to your feet, fists clenched and shaking in fury.

"But I claimed you...! You can't-"

"I don't give a shit what you did! Did you seriously think I'd tolerate you touching me?! Get the hell OUT!!!!!" You scream loud enough to make your voice hoarse in your already aching throat, grabbing anything you can to hurl at him. Pillows and plastic cups chase him out as he scrambles back to the door, muttering a promise to visit again once you're in a better mood. A pillow smacks into the door with alarming force in the spot where his head had been just a split second earlier. As for the idea of you ever being in any mood that would make you tolerate being in his presence...

Fat chance of that.

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stardustizuku · 2 months

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I’ve recently been thinking on why there’s people who interpret Kuro in such a drastically different way.

And something I notice is that you can easily tell how someone experiences the series, based on what they think of the GWA.

The way you interpret the Green Witch Arc is indicative of of how you have been interpreting the story so far, and how you’ll interpret it going forward

Generally, there’s two interpretations:

1.- The Reaction Ciel had to the mustard gas, are his true feelings coming afloat

2.- The Reaction Ciel had to the mustard gas, isn’t how he feels.

The first interpretation (and I’m really not trying to be mean about it this time) comes from a very, uhm, shall I call it Teenage-Like? mindset of how pain and trauma works.

I call it Teenage-Like, because I’ve seen it in mostly literature aimed at teenagers, be it fanfics or YA. It comes from an inability for teenagers to actually voice how they feel towards their parents. A helpless feeling of being ignored.

I don’t wanna point fingers but this is the basis of a lot of Self Harm tendencies (physical, emotional, psychological, or others like EDs or digital self harm) come from. A need for people to notice you are in pain. But because you feel like you cannot voice it yourself (or don’t deserve it, it can vary) you start to lash out. Put yourself in higher risks, to have someone find out there is something wrong with you.

So the moment the main character finally breaks down, or has a moment of weakness, it’s interpreted as someone finally being truthful.

This is how Ciel’s reaction is interpreted by the first half.

The mustard gas is simply a trigger of pain, that causes all of Ciel to unravel. He’s in pain right now, cause he’s always in pain. He’s avoidant to Sebastian, cause he’s always been scared of him. He doesn’t trust him. He doesn’t trust adults. Finny is the only one who actually cares.

This makes the fact that Sebastian ,essentially, slapped him to get him to react, come off as cruel.

The boy is finally being honest, and you just tell him he’s being childish? Horrible.

Obviously, that’s not my interpretation.

Okay so, what happens once you’re not a teenager? Once you don’t have an adult figure to take care of you? What happens once you start avoiding telling your parents the pain you’re in, not because you think they won’t care, but because they’ll care too much and get worried and you don’t want them to get worried?

You start to realize pain is not the end of the world.

While, when being a teenager, getting sick meant someone gets to take care of you and maybe notice you aren’t okay, as an adult getting sick potentially means - not going to work. Which means your won’t have money to buy food, which means you’ll probably go hungry.

So getting sick becomes less of a way to get away from the responsibilities you have, and more of a burden.

That’s why you’ll see, in media aimed at adults,mental breakdown less depicted as an opportunity to be honest, and more of a sickness that needs to be healed.

You can have a more honest and truthful conversation, while you are sound of mind. There’s no power dynamic between friends, like it would with adult figures and children. So this song and dance, isn’t necessary.

You don’t have to be sick to be understood. And your friends will rather try to help you, than understand you when you’re suffering. That’s the nature of adult relationships.

This is more or less the framing that comes from Ciel’s breakdown (in the second interpretation).

The Mustard Gas isn’t showing Ciel’s true nature - it’s showing Ciel at his most vulnerable. This means, not in his sound mind.

Saying things he normally wouldn’t, hurting people he normally would hold close, and clinging to people he generally would never try to get close to.

Simply put, it isn’t just “a bit of pain to make him unravel” but a “Ciel is getting psychologically tortured by a weapon used for chemical warfare”.

He’s past being honest. He’s having such a severe reaction, that he cannot function. He’s being tortured and broken, to the point he is no longer himself.

He isn’t being “truthful” he’s scared.

And fear can make you do things that, in your sound mind, you would never do.

The point is that, Ciel isn’t saying what he truly feels or being “honest”. It’s him scared out of his mind, saying everything and anything to make the fear stop.

And the biggest proof is how he treats Sebastian.

The fact that Ciel asks Sebastian to “go away” or “not come near” is perhaps the most glaring reason as to how badly this Gas messed with him.

I’ve said this before but to Ciel, Sebastian is a lifeline. He’s the only tool he has for his revenge. The thing that, even after he lost r!Ciel, he was willing to sacrifice it all to achieve.

And at this point in time, Sebastian is also the only emotional anchor Ciel has.

As far back as the second episode, Ciel has asked Sebastian to stay. Even when he’s having flashbacks, even when he’s having an episode. In fact, Sebastian leaving him is a great source of anxiety - since as seen in BoC in the Asthma Scene, without him Ciel feels powerless enough to die.

He feels more protected with him, because he KNOWS Sebastian will protect him and that Sebastian will follow his orders.

Again going with the analogy of a dog - He feels more comfortable having the chained beast by his bed, simply bcs others are trying to hurt him and the beast won’t eat him right now.

So him asking Sebastian to go away, is throwing away his biggest safety net for a surrogate for r!Ciel, just means he’s reverting to the mentality he had during the cult.

If Sebastian is constantly telling him “it’s okay, they can’t hurt you anymore, you’re outside the cage, you can do what you WANT”

Ciel clinging to Finny is him going “no, im staying in the cage bcs at least the cage is familiar”

And no matter what the first camp tells you, staying in the cage, trapped inside your pain ISNT the healthy option.

(We could argue Ciel’s need for revenge rather than healing is also unhealthy, but no one in the second camp would even call Ciel anything other than a villain in someone else’s story)

So, Sebastian slapping him and going “no, that’s not what you want”, isn’t as cruel as it would be in the first interpretation. Because as we see, he’s right. That’s not what Ciel wants. And it’s proved by the next scene where Sebastian talks to Ciel about what he truly wants.

Rather than Sebastian telling Ciel to “get over it”, it’s closest to a “snap out of it, something’s wrong”

This is further proved by the fact that, Sebastian first instinct isn’t to scare him. He does back away, he does try to wait and gently coax him. But Ciel literally cannot reason with him.

That small but significant difference in interpretation has wildly different outcomes in how you perceive both, the characters and the story.

If you pick the first, you’re reading Sebastian as an enemy. Someone who does not respect Ciel. You see his attempt to eat Ciel’s soul as a breach of trust, and proof that he doesn’t care for him.

But if you pick the second option, you see Sebastian as an ally. Someone who’s running out of time and ways to save Ciel. His actions, while crass, ultimately help Ciel. What he was trying to do, was help.

Yana, very clearly, wanted the second interpretation. However, I cannot, in good conscience, tell you it’s the only interpretation. People are free to pick and chose how they read the text, irrelevant of how little of the actual text they’re reading.

But I will say, picking the first is symbolic of a less mature way of thinking. Common on those who like to infantilize trauma and trauma responses. It’s the easy, safe and comforting way of reading the text. As I said, it’s common in those who want their pain to be acknowledged.

That reading of Kuro is one that speak to me, that you’re not really ready to confront pain. And someone with that mentality, is not someone who’s reading of the text I find particularly interesting. Sure, you can share it, I’ll never stop you, but know you’re speaking to me in an entirely different language. You’re interpreting the text so differently, that I don’t think it’s even the same text anymore.

Again, you’re essentially writing analysis on fanfiction. And I’m not all too interested in dissecting your own trauma sloppily painted over British Aesthetic.

#kuroshitsuji #black butler #sebaciel #this is a bit less refined than both the Twitter thread i wrote and other essays #but I had to share my thoughts on this

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sprout-fics · 9 months

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I feel like Ghost would be an alpha who isn’t super in your face if you’re an omega. He is more of a silent presence, lingering there, ready when needed. The first to bring things for a nest, the first to detect when something is off with his omega. Just nowhere near as domineering as he’s sometimes represented in Omegaverse. Dominant in scenarios, yes, but not domineering.

So I'm actually going back to my forced designation switch alpha Ghost for this, (despite saying I wouldn't revisit it) because the more I think about this the more I really want to incorporate it into this story.

TW: Similarities to conversion therapy, details of canonical sexual assault

I think, if we're considering Ghost as an omega prior to his forced transition, he absolutely remembers what it was like to deal with that. He likely hid it from his family, given his father's abuse, so as to not cause more harm to himself. So he understands Reader when she admits she purposefully concealed herself for quite some time due to biases in the military. An omega, and a woman? To say the chances are stacked against her is an understatement.

I also think this allows him a unique perspective. He knows what it's like to hide heats, to always be on edge around alphas, to watch your back all the time and to be ashamed of who you were born as. He picks up the subtleties in you, is the first to whiff out a pre-heat, to notice the alarmed spike in your scent. It makes him all the more protective over you, knowing the evil that's out there that threatens you because of your designation. Yet he doesn't become overbearing, because he also understands that the presence of a heavy-handed alpha might make you nervous, on edge given your prior experiences with alphas. He knows that too, have lived a life before this similar to your own. It makes him a better alpha, not only because he's receptive, sympathetic to his omega mates, but because he's lived it.

I think Ghost has a very complicated relationship with his status as an alpha, and with sex in general. He's comfortable where he is now with the team, but only because they are fully aware of what has happened to him, and as a result know how to handle him when it becomes too much, when he remembers Roba, the torture, the fact that he used to be different.

Becoming an Alpha was in some ways a relief for Ghost. He didn't have to struggle anymore with concealing himself, with potentially losing his service if he was revealed. Some would say he's better for it, can now be the perfect example of a lethal soldier because of his alpha status

But it was at a wicked cost.

It came at the cost of his autonomy, his dignity, it came with pain and trauma and horrifying flashbacks that continue to haunt him. It fundamentally changed him, emotionally, psychologically, and physically. Even after Simon escaped and put an end to Roba it wasn't over. His body changed, reformed itself. He grew taller, stronger, bulkier, more muscular. He had to get used to not being at home in his body, to instincts that were unfamiliar and overwhelming. He was suddenly dealt with as an entirely different person while he was dealing with the aftermath of his trauma, the grief of losing his entire family, the erasure of his identity in order to survive.

I think that's where the team comes in as well. Price was there for Simon in the immediate aftermath of his transition, helped him through the newness of being an alpha. When Simon's first rut came, he was borderline uncontrollable- brain chemical haywire, rebelling against themselves in a vain effort to revert back to their original omega state, competing with the the alpha instincts to rut, chase, breed. In my personal interpretation, with was Price who acted as a partner for Simon during this time, as Simon could not be trusted with an omega partner. He was fully aware of Simon's trauma, like had dealt with traumatized soldiers before, had the experience of being an alpha, and had...other experience to bring to the table as well. He coaxed Simon through his rut and as a result the two formed a deep trust with each other that extended far beyond the realm of camaraderie and friendship, and eventually led to more romantic implications

Then comes Soap, this rebellious spitfire omega who has concealed his designation and by all appearances is an alpha just like Price and Simon. We knows how this story goes. Ghost slowly falls for Johnny, doesn't act on it, yearns and pines in angst over how he could possibly dream of Johnny accepting him, and how he could possibly be a good alpha to him. Johnny wriggles his way into Simon's heart anyways, knocks on his soul and carves inside inch by inch, and Ghost slowly lets him, until at last Simon finds out he can be a good alpha, and that all it took was one feisty omega sergeant to tell him that

Ghost, at least in this story, still struggles with these things. They never quite leave him. He's extremely hesitant to spend his ruts with anyone other than Soap, and takes a significant amount of time to allow himself to be intimate with Price and Gaz. For you, he refuses your assistance for his ruts for the first few cycles, too nervous about hurting you despite how much he wants you. Soap has to coax him into it, has to teach him he's okay, that he is not his abusers, and stays with you both the first few times you are intimate with each other as Simon slowly works through this particular aspect of his trauma. It takes time, but Ghost finds he can be a good alpha to you too, that his forced switch and the consequences of it do not define him.

Holy SHIT that was a long answer. I just wrote an essay. Apologies, I've been thinking a lot about this concept, and despite the heart breaking details of it, I think it adds a deeply fascinating aspect to Ghost's character in this AU that fits within the realm of his existing canonical trauma. Thank you so so much for letting me ramble.

#alpha ghost #omega ghost #cod omegaverse

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quixoticanarchy · 6 months

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Because my latest accidental interest is chemical weapons, and because all my interests end up infected with a Tolkien angle, I present to you this: the Nazgûl attacks as interpreted as a form of chemical warfare.

This lines up well both with the Nazgûl ability to inflict fear on a mass scale and with the impacts of the Black Breath. People don't necessarily know what they're facing or what's happening to them, but both the experience and even the threat of it are terrifying. It also allows the obvious evocation of WWI gas warfare, though not, say, accompanied by the physical effects of chlorine or mustard. The Black Breath has both psychological and physiological effects which require medical treatment, and this description I think could be applied essentially unchanged to instances of chemical warfare:

At length even the stout-hearted would fling themselves to the ground as the hidden menace passed over them, or they would stand, letting their weapons fall from nerveless hands while into their minds a blackness came, and they thought no more of war, but only of hiding and of crawling, and of death.

I also think it would be fun if athelas (which treats the Black Breath) was a member of the nightshade family (which includes sources of natural atropine, which can treat the effects of exposure to certain chemical agents). This would put the Black Breath in the second generation of chemical agents, maybe a type of organophosphate nerve gas

#nerve gas while not actually used in wwii did carry a lot of weight just via the fear/threat of its use #since you don't get all the physical burning/asphyxiation/blindness symptoms of wwi agents i suggest the black breath is either #a ''riot control'' level incapacitant or a military weapon level nerve gas. at such concentrations that it doesnt kill instantly per se #tolkien #lotr #nazgûl #chemical warfare #skravler

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lafemmemacabre · 10 months

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Trying to find a physiological source for a psychiatric/psychological condition won't make ableist/saneist pieces of shit respect it or the people who're diagnosed with it.

Signed, literally every single chronically ill or otherwise physically disabled person. They do NOT care. Chronically ill people can have genetic testing proving our mutations and such and they'll still tell us it's all in our heads and if we Just Put Our Minds To It, we'd be cured... Of shit such as diabetes or multiple sclerosis.

The only thing able-bodied psychiatrized people are achieving by trying to claim physicality in their conditions just for a sense of validation is; yet again, speaking over physically disabled people; yet again, not allowing us to have even the tiniest spotlight within discussions of disability.

You're not going to convince bigots of your worth if they've already decided you're not worth shit. Their hatred of you as someone whose mind doesn't work like the norm, isn't logical. It's both ideological and disgust-based. They decided to hate you first, and found reasons to justify it later.

This especially won't work in your favor if you're appealing to them by trying to approximate yourself to a population they also despise as much as, if not more than, your own.

Newsflash, bigots aren't typically fond of people whose bodies are outside the norm. The more visible the difference in bodies, the more they hate the people who inhabit them.

If you ever managed to convince them that "Hey, actually my mental illness has a physical source!", it won't get you compassion, it'll get you further disgust. If you're gonna bring physicality into it, for your own sake, at least do it for conditions in which that's actually relevant instead of insisting on promoting debunked "science" (e.g. "depression is a chemical imbalance in the brain...").

#disability #chronic illness

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alwaysbewoke · 3 months

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Kenya Appling's dream of having a child was shattered when, just four months after her wedding in September 2021, she was diagnosed with uterine #cancer. At the age of 42, she underwent a hysterectomy, chemotherapy, and radiation treatment, which left her devastated and unable to conceive. Appling believes her cancer was caused by the chemical hair straighteners she had used regularly since childhood. She is among a growing number of #Blackwomen who have filed lawsuits against companies like #LOreal and #Revlon, alleging that their chemical hair straighteners have caused them irreparable harm and infertility. Research from the National Institutes of Health and Boston University has indicated an increased risk of uterine cancer associated with these products, although they have not definitively proven causation. More than 90% of the affected women have had hysterectomies, while others have undergone myomectomy procedures to remove uterine tumors or fibroids. L'Oréal and Revlon have declined to comment and are seeking to dismiss the lawsuits. The increased awareness of the potential dangers of these products provides little solace to women like Bree-Shawna Watts, who underwent a hysterectomy after being diagnosed with uterine cancer. Black women are disproportionately affected, and uterine cancer is projected to become the third most common cancer among women by 2040. Experts call for stricter regulation and labeling of these products, given the potential risks, especially to Black women. Many affected women hope their lawsuits will lead to greater awareness and accountability while shedding light on the physical and psychological trauma of cancer and its treatment.

damn

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max1461 · 3 months

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Interesting, whether a field is obsoletable is not the same as whether it's reducible. Chemistry is reducible to physics, and with enough computation power, is in theory obsoletable by it. But biology isn't, because you even though biological processes are reducible to physical ones, you can't know which ones organisms the actually use without checking. You can't know which animals exist without checking. But you can in principle figure out which chemical compounds can be made and what their properties will be using a pure physical calculation. Psychology is obsoletable by neuroscience but none of the humanities are. Astronomy is not obsoletable by physics. In general having a strong "stamp-collecting" component makes you less obsoletable.

#navel gazing

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cryptotheism · 1 year

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Isn't it possible the alchemists did go thru a mental transformation while doing the physical transformation and just not write it down? Similar to how the Roman's didn't write down you needed to use seawater for cement because it just seemed so obvious to them?

Damn near every alchemist in medieval Europe was a Christian. Meditation and experimentation on alchemical theories makes one think quite a bit about the structure of reality. You're exploring God's creation! It's hard for that to NOT have some sort of spiritual or reflective angle.

BUT

portraying historical alchemy as if it was 50/50 chemicals/psychology is just dead wrong. Alchemists we're not concerned in the least with psychology or self-betterment.

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delimeful · 3 months

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let my mind reset (6)

warnings: angst, brainwashing, torture, psychological conditioning, references to injury/gore/death, harmful surgical implants, they are really going through it now, lmk if i missed any

Where the hours had passed slowly before, now they seemed to slip by all too fast. Every spare moment Roman had was spent in anxious anticipation of the next session and all that came with it.

He had never seen something like the haze used on a person before. Crav’n were invulnerable to it, and he’d only ever witnessed his aunt use it briefly on one of the local fauna once, a harmless and finicky tree-dwelling species about the size of his hand.

(Roman remembered the way Marta had compelled the little creature to pace back and forth, from place to place, wearing its will away until there wasn’t any hesitation between order and action. Then, she’d sent it walking into the nearby pond.

He remembered the way its survival instinct had set in late, the way it began to thrash, and still Marta didn’t call it back. He remembered feeling relieved when his mother stepped in and put a stop to the demonstration, scooping the poor beast from its fate with disapproval etched firmly in the set of her shoulders.

He didn’t remember if the creature had lived through the withdrawal, afterwards.)

Virgil was far from a simple animal, though, and despite Roman’s half-formed nightmares, he didn’t mindlessly succumb to the influence of the drug the first time it was forced on him, nor the second or the third.

In fact, every time the other Humans entered his cell with that unsettling green canister, he seemed just as panicked as Roman, if not more, putting up as much of a fight as he could with a battered body and a wrung out mind. No matter how they tutted or scolded, the other Humans still couldn’t get the mask on him until Roux had him forcibly subdued, which was a tiny victory in itself.

That didn’t stop the drug from taking its toll each and every time.

As horrible as it sounded, the worst part was that the effects weren't painful or malicious in nature. At least that would have been easier to fight against; a logical, instinctive response to being hurt.

No, it was far more insidious than that. The haze dulled pain. First, the physical: it eased away the stiffness of sore muscles and the burning of shocked nerves, leaving only a pleasant numbness behind. Then, the mental: it stalled the production of stressful chemical compounds, replacing them with whatever was needed to trick the victim’s mind into believing they were happy, relaxed, pliable.

Roman had never seen Virgil so unwound, so carefree, and he hated how unnatural the behavior seemed on the Human. It was a miserable experience, finally seeing him without the hunted slant to his posture, and feeling sickened by the sight.

What was worse was watching it wear off.

As though a switch had been thrown in reverse, Virgil would be plagued by a creeping, unrelenting sense of panic and dread, pacing around his cell frantically until a sudden hypersensitivity to touch left him crumpled in one spot, breathing harsh and pained.

Time after time, he was shown exactly how painful withdrawal from even a few doses was, until he was left bracing for it well before the next session had even begun.

“The last guys who had me would have killed for something like this,” Virgil said, nearly panting as he laid out on his back. He had his fingers pressed against his neck, feeling his pulse. His heart was racing so hard that Roman could see the veins pulsing eerily under the skin. A heavy spike of adrenaline, unprompted by anything tangible. “Bet she has at least a few people stashed away just to drain for easy cash.”

He spoke more, like this. Out of turn, about topics that were morbid and pessimistic, as though the thoughts were tumbling free of his mind without his permission. Roman never let his negative reactions to the more grim topics go beyond his ears flickering back; it wasn’t like he had the room or right to judge. They didn’t have very many reasons to be optimistic. Besides, he’d realized early on that the more worked up Roman got, the worse Virgil got in turn.

He still didn’t know the exact details of how Dren harvesting worked, and he was fairly sure he was better off for it. The very idea of setting an entire person aside for something like that was reprehensible, and therefore entirely possible for Marta.

“She said she… she gets rid of Humans that don’t break,” he replied after a moment, the words tumbling freely from him for once. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she tried to turn a profit from it.”

He’d been trying to match the distant, dry tone Virgil had used, but he must have missed the mark, because the Human stiffened, and drew his hand back from Roman’s grasp to press it harshly against his eyes.

Belatedly, Roman realized what he’d just implied. Virgil was one of those Humans trying not to break, was at this very moment barely clinging to his composure, and he’d just been informed he was stuck between two horrific fates worse than death. “I didn’t mean—,”

“‘S alright,” Virgil interrupted, voice rough with exhaustion. “It’s not like I didn’t know. It makes me feel a little better, honestly.”

Roman stared at him, bewildered and still slightly aghast at his own stupidity, and Virgil shifted a few fingers to peer back with one eye.

“At least some Humans didn’t fall for it, y’know? At least some of them got out in their own way,” he continued, a thin thread of hopelessness tangled up in the words. “I was starting to wonder if the rest of space was right. If we were all just destined to be monsters with the right motivation.”

Roman should have been more alarmed at the implication that Virgil felt close to succumbing, that he was nearer than he’d ever wanted to be to a Human on the brink of falling under someone else’s blatantly malignant control, but all he could feel was a painful sympathy.

“You’re not a monster,” he said, and then, more firmly— “Humans aren’t monsters.”

Virgil’s eye widened slightly, gaze intent in a way that would have made Roman bristle in the past.

“They’re just people. They can do good or bad, just like anyone else. And sure, these guys are— they’re not doing good.” A pause, and Roman forced himself to meet Virgil’s stare. “But you have. You saved Patton, and you tried to save me, and you’re— you’re not a monster. You’re a good friend.”

Virgil buried his face back in his elbow and was quiet for a long moment.

“…You’re not so bad yourself.”

—

Roman hadn’t expected Marta to show up in person, not with how much she had delegated to her brainwashed underlings thus far, but arrive she did.

“Don’t fret, ghiva’al,” she crooned to him, passing by his cell with the lightest clink of her claws dragged against the bars. “I’m here to meet your little pet, not you.”

“Don’t—,” call me that, call him that, he wanted to snarl, but his throat closed up so sharply that it sounded a little like he’d choked.

Marta made her stilted croaking laugh, sparing him a glance that might have been pitying if it had bothered to reach her cold, empty eyes. “You always did struggle with words when emotional, didn’t you? Not nearly as well spoken as your mother. What a shame to see that hasn’t changed.”

There was a sharp clacking as an aggressive shudder ran through Roman’s scales, but he still couldn’t find his voice. Not even when Marta moved on to grip the bars of Virgil’s cell, her attention shifting to the Human where he stood warily in the center of the cage.

Roman had learned more than he’d ever thought he would about Human body language over the past few weeks. He knew from the slight sway to Virgil’s every shift that the Human was drained, likely barely keeping his feet.

Still, he was upright to face Marta, his height advantage allowing him to look down at her, and that was better than being crumpled on the ground at her feet. Little victories were all they had now, and they clung to each and every one.

Roux wasn’t there, Roman realized with a jolt, and the knowledge was enough to drag his mind into overdrive, a sudden double-edged hope springing to life in his chest.

Virgil must have already realized, because the way he held himself shifted into something taut and coiled, like he was preparing to lunge forward at the first opportunity, weak or not.

“Back of the cell,” Marta commanded, voice turned brisk and blunt in a way it hadn’t been with Roman. Like she was speaking to a beast instead of a person.

Virgil didn’t move, barely deigned to acknowledge the words beyond a brief flicker of his pupils upwards.

Marta waited, letting the silence stretch for a brief moment, and then clicked her teeth together in a mild reprimand. “The hard way, then.”

Despite her apparent annoyance, the words held a sort of anticipatory delight, and Roman felt the thick tar of dread slide under his scales as he watched her slide a small, triangular remote from a pouch at her side.

When she pressed the button in the center of it, she was looking at Roman.

It was Virgil who went rigid and fell.

Despite knowing it would undercut every lie he’d tried to sell about how little he cared, despite the fact that he was playing right into her claws, Roman couldn’t help but rush to the bars separating them, a shout of horror catching in his chest.

The Human hit the ground hard but stayed chillingly frozen, with every muscle locked into hard lines. He didn’t make a sound until Marta shifted her thumb away from the button, the motion somehow allowing him to finally go limp like a puppet with strings cut.

“Virgil!” Roman managed, though the sound of it was nearly lost in the sudden loudness of the Human’s gasping breaths. He hadn’t been breathing before, Roman realized with a terrified shock.

Whatever Marta was doing, it hadn’t countered Virgil’s natural stubbornness, and he climbed back to his feet with less staggering than Roman would have expected.

His gaze caught on the tremor to Virgil’s hands, the shuddering of his pulse, and he understood. Adrenaline.

The fight or flight instinct, Virgil had called it while talking with Patton. Roman had seen him choose to fight once, at their very first meeting, but even that couldn’t compare to the speed and ferocity of the way the Human lunged now.

Marta didn’t flinch back when he made loud, skull-rattling contact with the bars, but she didn’t blink, either, keeping her eyes firmly locked on Virgil as she pressed the button once more.

Instead of letting him drop, however, she reached out and seized him by the face, claws digging in on either cheek and holding tightly.

Virgil couldn’t so much as flinch away from the pain, and Roman slammed his arm against the door of his own cell with force, furious at his own helplessness.

Marta released the trigger again, and this time, every gasping inhale Virgil took was dosed with her haze. He tried to jerk back, but it was far faster acting straight from the source, and he had barely a moment before his expression dropped to something hollow and smooth, his desperate strength wavering and then extinguishing like a flame with nothing left to burn.

“Down,” Marta commanded, releasing her grip, and Virgil stood in place for a few long heartbeats before his legs collapsed underneath him.

She waved a hand absently down at him, still scattering her haze thick in the air. “There you go. It feels so much better when you listen, doesn’t it?”

Virgil twitched, a ripple of discontent crossing his face, but didn’t respond. He was shaking relentlessly now, his entire body trembling in a way that had Roman deeply concerned.

“You’re safe with me,” Marta lied, reaching down to glide the palm of her hand over the side of Virgil’s face. “You’re only safe with me. Everyone else wants to hurt you, but I’ll make the pain go away. Always do as I say, okay?”

Virgil didn’t move away, even as her rough skin caught on the wounds her claws had left only moments ago. His breathing grew wispier, slower, until he appeared almost calm, his eyes dazed and distant.

“Let’s try this again,” Marta straightened, and when her hand left Virgil’s cheek, he strained after it for a handful of seconds. “Back of the cell.”

Virgil climbed back to his feet, and Roman closed his eyes as the Human quietly began shuffling across his stretch of cell. He felt all of six winters old again, watching his aunt lead something fuzzy and helpless back and forth, closer and closer to the water’s edge.

“Good. Now, heel.” More shuffling, wordless as a corpse.

How long did he have before Virgil took his own plunge?

—

It took longer than before for Virgil to regain coherence, afterwards.

Roman knew the moment he’d come back to himself, because the soft grip around his hand had instantly vanished, yanked away so sharply that he’d barely registered the movement before Virgil was up on his feet and backing away.

“Virgil,” he tried, and the Human shook his head, the motion harsh, his hands lifting up to grip roughly at his hair in a distressed motion Roman had only ever caught glimpses of back on the ship.

He’d continued to retreat until he hit the furthest corner of the cell, where he slid down and curled in on himself, utterly unreceptive to any of Roman’s stilted calls. Roman caught his expression crumpling into a miserable grimace before he buried his face in his knees and hid that away too.

The silence stretched.

If there were some right words to say here, Roman couldn’t find them. Even if he did, he undoubtedly wouldn’t be able to say them. The helplessness sheared against his scales like rough sand, but how could he allow himself to wallow in it when he at least still had his mind, his existence still unarguably his own?

Freshly taunted by the knowledge that he didn’t have even that much, Virgil remained still and taut and quiet in the furthest reaches of his cell for what felt like a very long time.

When he did finally stir, Roman was appalled to see the faint streaks on his face where his tears had washed away the sweat and grime.

Patton had described Human weeping as arrhythmic vocalizations, much like Ampens, but with a physical manifestation as well. Roman hadn’t known that Humans could cry silently, like a pup gone still and quiet in the face of danger, with only the barest hitching of breath to indicate distress.

The expression on Virgil now was creased into firm lines, but it didn’t seem agonized or crumbling at the edges. Rather, as he climbed to his face, he seemed to hold the same bitter resolution Roman had seen in him a few times before: during the tail end of their first meeting, and after the fight with the raiders, both times when he’d thought he was about to be left alone again.

“Roman,” he started, and then worked his jaw tersely, once, twice. Rather than continue, he held out a hand, palm-up in silent offering.

Things had changed a lot over the course of their captivity, Roman reflected as he reached out and set his own hand in the Human’s grasp with barely a shred of hesitation. It felt like second nature by now, to reach out and cling on whenever his stomach was roiling with stress.

Virgil watched him for a moment longer, and then wrapped his fingers around Roman’s hand and drew closer, slowly pulling his arm up until he had positioned Roman’s claws just above the skin of his neck.

“This,” Virgil said, each word resolute, “is the best place to sever if you want to kill a Human quickly.”

The words took a dull, ringing moment to sink in, but once they did, Roman jerked back sharply. “Virgil, what—?”

For the first time, Virgil held on, keeping his hand pinned in place with ease even as he had to grip the bars with his other hand to remain upright. Roman could see the way the Human’s pulse fluttered under the skin, a heartbeat racing visibly exactly where Virgil had indicated.

“It’s important. You need to know,” Virgil insisted, and lifted their joined hands higher, to his temple. “Head wounds bleed a lot. Gashes up here are valuable because the blood runs down and drips into their eyes, which will work pretty well as a distraction—,”

“Stop it!” Roman demanded, yanking harder as his panic increased. “I’m not going to— stop talking like that! I don’t need to know how to hurt you!”

At the start of their voyage, Roman would have done just about anything for information like this, anything to feel safe on his own ship again. So why was he learning it only now, when each word and accompanying gesture made him feel ill and rotted down to the tip of his tail?

“It’s not— Roman, it’s not about me,” Virgil said, frustration seeping into his voice. He let Roman drag his hand away from his face, but still didn’t let go. “It’s about them.”

Roman wasn’t sure he believed that. “I don’t need to kill anyone. They’re brainwashed, this is Marta’s fault! I know the truth, now.”

Virgil shook his head, ghosted the fingers of his free hand over his implant scar with a distant, sickened expression. “It’s not that simple. I don’t want guilt to be the reason— Look. If it’s them or you, I want it to be you. I want you to make sure it’s you.”

And what if it's me or you? Roman thought, but the words lodged firmly in his chest until he could barely breathe around them.

“They all made their choice,” Virgil continued once it became clear that Roman wouldn’t respond. “They’ve kept making that choice, every time. You have to want to survive, too, okay?”

Mutely, Roman nodded, trying to ignore the creeping sense of horror. He pulled Virgil’s hand back towards himself, fumbled for speech for a long moment before finding the words and hoping they didn’t feel like a betrayal when spoken aloud.

“The underbelly,” he started, and Virgil’s expression— shut down. Every hint of body language went flat like stone, and just as unyielding.

“No.” The word was final, a sentence all its own, and Roman scowled mulishly.

“But—!”

“Roman.” Virgil lifted his other arm over so that he was clasping Roman’s hand between both of his own. “You’re the only one left, right? You told me that.”

The thought was still a wound-like pang in his chest, even after all this time. “Yes,” he admitted. “But, even still—,”

“No way. I don’t want to hear it, man. There’s nobody I would be willing to use it on, anyhow.” Virgil kept his gaze locked firmly on a point past Roman’s shoulder, but his shoulders were set, his voice steadfast.

There was no point arguing. Not now, when the both of them were one wrong move from collapse.

“Okay,” Roman finally said, and forced himself not to protest when Virgil reclaimed the position of lecturer. It was a struggle not to wince away with each gory anecdote, a full guide on the quickest ways to make the Human body stop functioning or even turn on itself.

“Gut wounds are slow to kill, but they can be painful enough to debilitate. There are vulnerable organs here, below the rib cage, and damage to them is difficult to treat without surgery if the wound is severe enough…”

Still, he held himself at attention, did his best to memorize every word.

If Virgil wouldn’t accept knowledge about Roman’s own vulnerabilities as a gift of equal exchange, Roman would simply have to treasure this information with the same dedication that he applied to the rest of their small crew.

After all, knowing all the individual weak points of a Human would make it that much easier for him to protect each and every single part of Virgil.

Virgil wasn’t going to die. Not here, and certainly not by Roman’s own claws. Not if Roman had anything to say about it.

#sanders sides fic #wibar #lmmr #let my mind reset #ts virgil #ts roman #humans are deathworlders #my writing #writing #sanders sides #space au

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