#child endangerment cw

[probablybadrpgideas]

You’ve heard of “wall of fire”.

You’re heard of “wall of ice”

Now get ready for “wall of orphans”

#rpg #Roleplaying Game #D&D #fantasy #spell idea #I gues technically any spell can create an orphan #depending on context #child endangerment cw

[thedeafprophet]

would love to hear any other impressions you have of that story!

I enjoyed it! I still think Reunion was more fun, but thats probably down to particular tastes in the matter.

I actually really enjoyed the further insight into the servantry at The Palace which i was not expecting to get a look into. Similar to one of my fave aspects of The Bloody Wallpaper, I really just like learning about the day to day operation inside of these places. Also the like... casuality of the cage gardens and people working there made the horror of the place all the more strong. wow

Another thing I found interesting was the theme it, while maybe not introduced here, was the generational aspect when it comes to the themes of trauma with the red honey? The idea of children and a parents affect on them i'd say is just as much the theme of this ES as the trauma/horrors of war aspect are imo - perhaps you could argue they tie in together,

We see it with the in the old nursemaid laundry room,

"Children need love.....' "....They're all still searching for love, you know. One of them calls it romance, another calls it glory, but every one of them is looking in the wrong place. "

This is further brought up when we learn about the contaiminent from years ago (perhaps the bad batch referenced in the gift?) with the hive still troubled from it.

"Bee societies are complex. Trauma echoes through the generations."

Which i think ties in to the theme pretty directly....

And this all culiminates together with The Princes' memories - his mothers neglect as a child being what leads to his aims as a teen, which leads to the horrorible action in the war, and other gettings hurt, which leads to his own corruption and self pain. Its generational. The hive remembers.

The red honey ties into all of this, and serves as a representation for the way this will consume people. The honey that was given to children to keep them quiet.

While of course adults must be held accountable for the actions they make, we see through this that the palace's children had very, very little say into who they would become....

Which I suppose to say this all ties back around well into my underlying belief of a major them in the whole of the FL - the cycles of abuse and neglect.

All that is to say i have been given some good lore content and further things to think on, and will likely be incorporating the palaces staff and the cage gardens into my fics at some point.

and also fuck vicky. worst mom award goes to her.

#i have. many thoughts #um. yea XD #long post #asks #child endangerment cw #a crown of thorns #es spoilers

[emberoops]

like i was raised to say 'murder is bad' but i was also raised a child soldier and my divine nature sorta compels me to think that specific murders are kinda cool, actually.

#for those confused as to how i was both - i lived a double life. literally. #anyways #child cw #child endangerment cw #child soldier cw

[pyreshe]

thinking again about livvy in the g.rishaverse,,

alina first meets her in the little palace, this little whisp of a girl in a red kefta that has flame embroidery curling up the sleeves, who holds her hands and welcomes her home. later, she'll come talk to aleksandr in the war room and find the same little girl asleep in one of the chairs with his black cloak tucked around her as he explains that she has nightmares. they talk about how he wants the world to be safer to children like her and later, alina will remember this talk and realize what he actually meant by it. livvy asks to be part of the fight to protect her home and alina denies her- she is only ten years old and shouldn't have to fight people she once considered family. more than that, alina doesn't want to bury her.

a little under a year after the darkling is dead, she gets caught by druskelle and brought to the ice court to stand trial. mattias considers it madness; he was told they would be hunting witches, dangers to society, and instead what he sees is a terrified little girl who can't stop crying. at first he insists she is young enough that she can be reformed, but they laugh at him and he can't escape the horror and the wrongness of what they are doing. so he sneaks in and breaks livvy out and they flee by dog sled. when they get to ravka, they will surely kill him, but isn't that what he deserves for what he's done to olivia? a week into their journey they meet another young woman and she recognizes livvy, but she also knows a druskelle and their massive wolves when she sees them. she nearly kills mattias on the spot and would have if not for livvy's pleas for his safety. over the next few weeks on the run, mattias and nina grow closer. but nina still has to accuse him of being a slaver to save his life.

when livvy and nina are in ketterdam, they decide it's safer if livvy hides what she is while nina works to support them. predictably, livvy gets sick from not being regularly able to use her abilities. she goes from being a rising star in the little palace, a prodigy destined for greatness, to nina's sickly tag along, a girl she is caring for out of pity. jesper and kaz probably realize what she is after a few months for different reasons. in jesper's case, like is calling to like, and in kaz's case he just notices too much and comes to the right conclusion.

it's kaz's idea to bring livvy with when they free mattias from hellsgate, and her presence just manages to keep him from outright murdering nina. later, kaz will inform them that he knows that livvy is a grisha and that mattias saved her from the ice court, that he's going to help them break into it. mattias is reluctant, but livvy informs that she wants to do this. the money will help, but mostly she wants to hurt fjerda.

#idk what she's doing after the events of soc I'll read king of scars one day #✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ: ooc / [mothman vc] take me home country roads #slavery ment cw #child endangerment cw #ask to tag

[lasagnaprince]

man this douche really can't get over the goblin joke huh

#my running theory is that he's not actually dead #that's it #dndads #dungeons and daddies #dndads spoilers #dndads taylor swift #willy stampler #kozlik art #child endangerment #cw knife #cw violence

[tangledinink]

Chapter Fourteen of I'm Sorry, Teenage Mutant What Now? is up! Everyone has a great time and continues to experience emotions and situations. Raphael has an anxiety attack in a Chuck E. Cheese. Read it on ao3 or below the cut!

[ prev ]

When Donnie next woke up, they realized quickly that they were somewhere cold and dark, and, upon shifting slightly, also realized that they were incredibly sore.

“Ow,” he muttered dryly, and immediately, four (almost, mostly, kind of) familiar faces were moving into his field of vision.

“Guys, he’s awake!” Mikey gasped.

“Oh, thank god,��� Raph sighed.

“How you feeling, Dee?” April prodded gently, her brows pinched together with worry.

“Nasty,” he mumbled, beginning to sit up. “But it’s not that bad. Just sore.” It was worse with the movement, however, and he winced slightly. Ugh, whatever position he had been sleeping in had not helped. He realized vaguely that he was no longer wearing his hoodie or his backpack, and he wondered if his family had removed it or if it had been taken from him. 

“Whoa, hey, slow down, dude,” Leo scolded. “I’m, like, 80% sure you’ve got a concussion or something, and your back looks gross, so chill.”

“Oh, good, Leo isn’t falling anymore,” Donnie deadpanned, leaning back slightly and rolling his shoulders a bit. Ow. He kept doing it anyway. “How long was I out? What the hell happened? And where are we?”

“Not that long. You’ve kinda been in-and-out for the past, like… I dunno. Half hour,” Leo explained.

“Please don’t pass out again!” Mikey added.

“But, uhhh, I think we’re in a literal dungeon?” Leo added, looking around thoughtfully.

“We’ve been jailed? Oh joy,” Donnie sighed. “This is no fair. If I’m going to be thrown in prison, it should be for my scientific advancements…”

“Donnie, that’s not something you’re supposed to hope for--” Raph hissed.

“Did we get our asses kicked?”

“Okay, well, look at the bright side,” Leo said instead of answering. “You gave, like, at least three of the guys on the other side concussions, too! And they probably look just as fucked up as you do right now!”

A loss, then.

“Let me see.”

“See what? Your back?” April raised a brow. “I dunno if that’s a good--”

“It’s my back,” Donnie defended. “Let me see.”

April sighed deeply, rolling her eyes. “Okay, fine. Hang on, I’ll take a picture…”

Donnie shifted a bit to allow room for her to photograph, frowning to himself. He was quietly surprised that their phones hadn’t been confiscated when they got thrown in here, but he was sort of willing to bet that they wouldn’t have any service down here, wherever they were. He’d have to check later.

“Okay, here. See?”

He did see.

He did not like it. 

There were no lacerations or mangled bones or anything-- the injury really wasn’t that bad, all things considered, just horrendously bruised. That wasn’t really what bothered him. If someone showed him a picture of his own shoulders looking like that, all discolored and black and blue, it really wouldn’t be an issue. But they weren’t shoulders. Instead there was this plane of a vaguely leathery, flesh-like surface, gently bumped and freckled olive green-- not quite skin, but not exactly carapace like his brothers now had, either, just something in between, all dotted with little markings. His spine was clearly outlined, and, in this moment, darkened and mottled with bruising.

“Right. Thank you,” he said quickly, looking to the side and scowling. April sighed a bit, almost visibly resisted the urge to say ‘I told you so,’ and pocketed her phone again, settling back down beside him.

“You gotta be more careful, Don! You coulda been seriously hurt!” Raph pressed.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Donnie scoffed, rolling his eyes. “In the future, I’ll simply allow enemies to curbstomp our little brother! Silly me!”

“I would have been fine! You don’t have to protect me!” Mikey immediately protested.

“Look, hermano, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but apparently, literally all the rest of us have straight-up built-in body armor,” Leonardo said with an accusing gesture. “You don’t!”

Donnie bristled a bit, hunching his shoulders. Right. Of course.

Of course it would work this way.

Turtles. They were, apparently, literal fucking turtles, of all goddamn things, and so of course he would be the only one who didn’t have the signature feature that turtles usually had in the form of a hard shell. Of course he would be different and vulnerable. Why was he surprised? When didn’t things work out this way? Story of his goddamn life!

And it made sense, too! Wasn’t he the only one out of all of them who had ever been, like, actually injured? He had watched Mikey fall down three flights of cement stairs one time and pop up at the bottom with a thumbs up. Raph was basically an immovable object. And how many times had Leo wiped out on his skateboard with no consequences? Or, perhaps more pointedly-- how many times had Leo literally kicked his ass in martial arts tournaments? Admittedly, Donnie was still, generally speaking, hardier than the average high-schooler, but…

He was still the only one in the family to have ever broken a bone. The one who fell ill the most frequently. He was the only one who had ever cried and thrown up because the hems of his pants got wet and nasty, for god’s sake--

He vaguely remembered that Draxum guy from earlier, their so-called creator, claiming that they were experiments. He wondered what exactly his intention was, and if he would meet expectations if evaluated or if he would objectively be classed as a failure. Clearly there was a gap between himself and his siblings.

“Look, it’s fine, Don. We just don’t want you to get hurt,” Raph said, resting a hand on his uninjured shoulder. “Just… let us take the heavy hits, okay? That’s all.” 

“Fine,” Donnie muttered.

---

Donatello whined softly, burrowing his way further into his Dad’s arms, hanging onto fistfuls of his shirt. Yoshi sighed, idly running his hand up and down the child’s spine. 

“I know, Purple,” he hummed, adjusting his grip on the other slightly, rearranging the blankets they were all but nested in. “The medicine will start working soon.”

The child sniffled miserably, peeking up just enough to give their father a rueful look. “You lied,” he accused, and Yoshi couldn’t resist a tiny laugh at the amount of rage his six-year-old could manage to put into his eyes. 

“When did I lie?”

“You said that if I took the medicine I would feel better. And it was disgusting. And I still feel bad,” he whimpered petulantly, burying his face into his dad’s shirt once more, and Yoshi chuckled softly, stroking his shoulders.

“That was ten minutes ago, Purple. It takes a little bit longer than that.”

“That’s stupid.”

“Maybe a little.”

“I’m gonna invent better medicine that works right away.”

“I’m sure you could.”

Purple always got this way whenever he managed to pick up any sort of bug from their various classes or after-school activities. Given how many children he had, how busy they were, and the fact that he, too, worked with a bunch of germy kids, they were, quite frankly, blessed with how rarely they were brought to their knees by some virus or another. Yoshi had always attributed this to the whole ‘mutant super soldier’ thing, and considered himself lucky that he hardly ever had to deal with nastier things like strep throat or bronchitis. Thank god. He didn’t think his heart could take it, quite frankly. But there was still the occasional cold, flu, or stomach bug, and almost invariably, it was either himself or Donatello who ended up bringing it home when they did.

And every time, Purple would be so damn pathetic about it.

Yoshi did feel bad for him, really, each and every time, because he knew that his kid didn’t feel well and wasn’t able to do all the things he usually did, and that was distressing to him, but oh my lord, was he dramatic. He’d always whimper and whine and carry on like he was dying, even if he just had a cough and a small fever, clinging to his dad and refusing to walk anywhere. Now, snotty, hacking children were not exactly Yoshi’s favorite things to snuggle up with, but he would admit that, as he so rarely received any physical affection from his purplest child on a day-to-day basis, it was a little nice to have him so clingy now. Especially given that when he was ill, Donnie was much more inclined to lay around and watch Lou Jitsu movies rather than science and math documentaries, or, even worse, partake in activities such as attempting to rewire the house, as he was apt to do. This was by far Yoshi’s preference. And though he did wish Donnie could enjoy it properly, he wouldn’t sit here and pretend like he didn’t enjoy spending the day curled up in his bed with his child in his lap watching movies together (now that he had been assured by their pediatrician that it was just a bug…) Even if he was sure he was going to get sick, too. 

It should be noted however, that even in his feverish, clingy state, Donnie was still quite particular about exactly what touch was and was not okay, which was evidenced by him literally hissing at his twin brother when he snuck into the room and attempted to join the pair on the bed.

“Use your words, Purple One,” Yoshi hummed, even as he redirected Leonardo to the foot of his bed, giving the two children a wide berth. Donnie only grumbled in response, but given the fact that he was sick, Yoshi let it slide this time. He couldn’t help but always feeling so… sorry for Donnie like this. It always scared him a bit when he got sick, even once he was sure it was only something minor. Just another reason he relished being able to bundle him up and hold him close. “I don’t think Purple wants to be touched by anyone else right now, Blue.”

“When’s he gonna be done being sick?” Leo sighed loudly, flopping down over his father’s legs. “I’m bored. Mikey and Raph don’t play right.” 

“Since when? You love playing with Mikey and Raph.”

“Yeah, but I wanna play Hot Wheelz and Donnie is the best at that game!” He complained. “Mikey and Raph are playing ‘Ninja Horse Tea Party Orphanage’ and I don’t wanna play that!”

That did sound like the type of game those two would play.

“If you give him a day or two, I’m sure he will be ready to play Hot Wheelz then.” 

“But that’s so LONNGGG!” Leo groaned loudly, sulking. “Can’t you make him better faster?”

“No, Donatello has not invented the medicine that works right away yet. It’s on his to-do list,” Yoshi explained calmly, squeezing the purple child just the tiniest bit. 

“Can I invent it, then?”

“I’m sure you could try,” Yoshi said with a shrug. 

“I want him to get better. And not be sick,” Leo explained, just in case it wasn’t clear.

“That’s very nice, Blue.”

“I bet I could find out a way to fix him.”

“Oh? Are you going to be a doctor, then?”

Leo wrinkled his brow, scrunching up his mouth and considering this for a moment before he shook his head. “No. I’m gonna be an actor. Or a ninja. Or a magician. One of those.”

“Ah. Well, you know what would probably be helpful right now?”

“What?” Leo immediately questioned, his eyes lighting up slightly.

“If you got your brothers to help you draw some get-well cards for Purple. I bet Mikey would be excited to help you if you asked.”

Leo latched onto the new ‘task’ right away, over the moon to do something to be helpful for his brothers, like he always was. It was one of the easiest ways to distract him. “Okay!” He replied, jumping back down off the bed, scampering off to go and find his remaining siblings.

He was almost gone, in fact, when Yoshi sneezed.

Leo stopped short, whipping back around and gasping loudly, pointing an accusing finger.

“YOU SNEEZED!”

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“YOU DID! I HEARD YOU!” He shrieked, taking off down the hall. “Guys! GUYS! Dad sneezed! I heard him!”

“Dad sneezed!?”

“Code Green! This is a CODE GREEN!”

Yoshi sighed softly, his head flopping back down against the pillow. Leo came skidding back into the room a moment later, his eyes wide.

“DAD! Can we go to April’s house!?”

“What?” He scoffed. “No! April and her parents are not even home!”

“Yeah but we gotta QUARANTINE!”

“It was just one sneeze--”

“LEO! Leo, you gotta disinfect! I found Donnie’s hand sanitizer!”

“Hey,” Donnie picked up his head to whine.

This always happened.

“Donnie, you have to get better quick so you can take field notes! We need your research, okay!? You’re the only one who can spell ‘pathology!!!’”

Donnie mumbled in reply, laying his head back down, but gave a tiny thumb’s up before Leo went sprinting back out the room to re-join his healthy (for now) brothers. His other three boys never brought home sickness. But they always caught it when it came from him.

Well, at least they were not bored anymore.

---

April was having a bit of trouble keeping track of time now that they were in prison. 

She didn’t think they had actually been here that long, though she wasn’t exactly sure. She had long ago shut off her phone to conserve battery once they realized that they may be a while. Maybe 24 hours?... It was just that at first, when they still weren’t sure if Donnie was going to be okay or not, everything seemed to happen so fast. And now that they were all just cooped up here with nothing to do… everything happened so slow.

They had already formulated and executed multiple escape plans now, to no avail. They had attempted to teleport to freedom with the help of the yellow yokai, who April had recently begun referring to as “Mayhem,” but were sorely disappointed to find that the prison was teleport-proof. Leo had tried unsuccessfully to talk their way out. Raph made an effort to physically break them out, attempting to smash the bars that held them, but this too resulted in failure.

The only thing that really clued her into the passage of time was her and her brothers’ internal clocks. Donnie had gone down first, though his head injury may have had something to do with that. Mikey had followed shortly after, curling up with Raph’s flannel tucked under his head as a makeshift pillow, and then the oldest brother, too, eventually succumbed to sleep, until she and Leo were all that remained.

“Okay,” she whispered, keeping her voice low, careful not to wake anyone else up. “I’ll admit it. You were right.”

Leo hummed softly in response, and neither of them took their eyes off of Mikey, suspended peacefully in the air, just a few inches off the ground, a soft orange glow coming off of him in waves as he slumbered.

“It’s a little weird to watch,” she sighed, tilting her head slightly to the side. “Sort of spooky.”

“At least he’s getting some rest,” Leo mumbled, resting his head in a cradle of his arms and knees, all curled in on himself.

“Yeah,” April agreed, smiling a tiny bit. “We should probably try that too, huh?” She leaned over, just barely nudging Leo’s shoulder with her own.

He flinched, a visible shiver running up his spine as he immediately stiffened, pulling sharply away from the other. April frowned.

“Hey, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Leo muttered, drawing his arms even tighter around himself.

“You’re not hurt, are you? Because I swear to god, if you got hurt and didn’t tell anyone--”

“April, I’m fine!” He bit out, a bit sharper this time, hunching his shoulders. “I’m not hurt, okay? I just… I’m not in the mood to be touched right now.”

April’s brows pinched together.

“Leo…”

“Don’t ask me if I’m okay again,” he hissed.

“Alright.”

“I’m not.”

“Okay.”

“Obviously, I’m not!”

“That’s okay.”

“Everything is so fucked up,” he hissed, digging his nails into his arms, drawing his head down to his chest. “Jesus christ. This-- fuck. And I got us all stuck in here!”

“Leo, you didn’t get us stuck in here. It’s not your fault.”

“I did!” He insisted, and April could see a few tears lining his eyes before he squeezed them shut. “This was my stupid plan. And Donnie-- Donnie almost got really hurt, and Mikey could’ve gotten hurt, and-- and I couldn’t help at all. I couldn’t help him at all when he was panicking. I can always help! I’m supposed to be able to help him when he’s like that! And I-- I can’t even help my own brother because I look like a fucking freak now!”

“Leo, you’re not a freak. It’s gonna be okay.”

“It’s not!” He snapped, bristling. “It’s not going to be okay. Stop saying it’ll be okay. How is any of this okay!?”

April bit the insides of her cheek. She didn’t have a good answer.

“I hate this,” he hissed. “Everything feels fucking awful. I can’t walk right, I keep falling, everything feels swollen and clunky and I-- I miss my face. I miss my body. And it’s just gone. I didn’t even like my body to begin with!” He laughed ruefully, struggling to keep his voice quiet. “I didn’t even like what I had, and-- fuck, April, I was so fucking excited. I was so fucking excited to change it. I’ve been waiting since I was fucking five to change it. I didn’t even know what I wanted to change then! I just-- fuck. Dammit. We had-- we had an appointment--”

He paused just long enough to draw in a heaving, shuddering breath that shook his entire frame.

“God. I just. I thought-- I thought I was used to this. I thought! I thought that I knew what it was like, to be quote-unquote trapped in the wrong body or whatever the hell, and I thought-- and it sucked and now this is just. This is just a million times worse, April. And it’s still wrong. Now it’s just more wrong!” He hiccuped weakly. “We were gonna fix it. We were finally gonna start fixing it, like, for real fixing it. We had an appointment. And. And Dad was g-gonna take me, and now it’s-- it’s just so much worse. Everything is so fucking bad now.”

“I know,” she whispered. “... Maybe you still can. You guys could still change back! I mean,” she glanced down at the silver bracelet still circling Leo’s wrist. “... We don’t know for sure that they’re broken. Maybe you just have to… to turn them back on…”

Leo bit back a sob.

“But now I know it’s not real.”

April was almost relieved when Leo fell into her side, hiding his face against her to cry, because she wanted so, so desperately to grab him and hug him and hold him tight, but he had said he didn’t want to be touched. But now that he was curled up against her, she wrapped her arms around him, and they sat quietly for a while like that. 

It took a while, but eventually the sobs died out, and Leo just laid with his head in her lap, all wrung-out and tired. 

“I meant it, you know,” she whispered. Leo didn’t reply, but he glanced up at her.

“I don’t care if you guys are freaks or mutants or whatever,” she continued. “That doesn’t matter to me. You were already sort of freaks when I met you, anyway. You’re my brothers, alright? No matter what. Even if things change. I’m not going anywhere.”

Leo sniffled a bit, staring at her for a bit longer before his gaze fell back down, staring off into the middle distance, looking at nothing in particular except for the pale orange light that lit up the room.

“Do you think he’s dreaming?” Leo finally spoke again, his voice scratchy and raw as he watched his baby brother sleep.

“Probably,” April said, leaning her head back to rest against the wall. 

---

“Daddy! Daddy!”

His father looked up from the dishes he had been washing, turning off the faucet to instead greet his youngest as he came excitedly racing into the house.

“Ah! Hello, my son. How is skateboard practice going?”

“Good!” Mikey chirped, excitedly holding up one leg so that he could proudly show his father his bloody, scraped knees. “Look! I did a kickflip.”

Mikey watched as bright red blood dripped down his younger self’s leg, and he thought to himself,

“So you did,” Dad said, sighing softly. “Go sit at the table. I will get the first aid kit.”

How strange.

“I want the orange band-aids! With the stars!” He yelled from his seat in a pulled-out kitchen chair, leaning over to call out his demands down the hall.

This was one of his dreams. Mikey was sure of it. Well, not a dream, exactly. A memory. Both. A memory inside of a dream. 

“Ah, yes, of course. Orange for Orange,” Dad assured, returning to the kitchen with first-aid kit in tow.

But this one was different from the rest.

“That’s my life color!” Mikey said happily, settling in the chair, sitting properly so his dad could clean and bandage his wounds.

The perspective had changed.

He wasn’t up above anymore, watching his father and his memory down below.

He was right here. He was standing right here on the same level-- right next to his dad, watching him tend to his younger self. No more than a few inches away from him.

He could almost touch him.

He reached out to try.

“Dad…?”

Mikey woke up with a gasp, falling heavily onto the floor and immediately sitting stark upright, scrambling a bit and looking around wildly. Donnie and Raph were asleep, but he quickly spotted April and Leo huddled together in the corner, both seeming slightly startled by his sudden trip back to the waking world.

Thank god someone else was still up.

“Guys!” He bit out, near breathless. “Dad is here! I can feel it! He’s really close by and-- and I think he might be hurt.”

---

Yoshi was getting very tired of the taste of blood.

There was a time, back when he was young, within his first year in the Nexus, when he could actually find joy in it. There was a time when he would face down unbeatable odds and come out the other side victorious, and would feel pride at what he accomplished, and not worry about those on the other end of the equation. There were times, in fact, when he would beat other competitors to unconsciousness just so that he could turn around and lounge in the luxury box, above it all, with his girlfriend-not-girlfriend in his lap. Just so that she would be pleased with him. Just because he wanted her to be happy. More specifically, happy with him.

He was still tempted, even now, now that he had gotten tired of the taste. Tempted to want her to be happy. It was so much easier when she was happy. When she was upset, he would always be miserable, but when she was happy things had always been so good.

It would be so easy to sit here and pretend like he didn’t feel that way anymore; to simply wave a hand and call his younger self a fool and distance himself from him, as if he were someone else entirely. But it wouldn’t be true. No matter how much he was loath to admit it at times, that young man was still him, and every action and stupid decision he had ever made was his to hold and wear on his chest.

He didn’t like the way blood tasted anymore. He had gotten tired of the taste years and years ago, way before he had returned to the Battle Nexus, before he had even become a father, back when he couldn’t even begin to imagine his path leading in the direction it had, before he could even picture himself raising children--

(Though, god, hadn’t there been a time where he thought, ‘but if she really wanted them, if it was with her…?’)

But he still couldn’t so definitively say that he didn’t like her, and that was what really upset him. Here he was, slumped against a wall in an empty locker room, not completely convinced that he wasn’t bleeding out given the increasingly unsettling blotch of color beneath his skin climbing steadily up his abdomen and the tell-tale lightheadedness, and he still wasn’t sure. He would kill to be sure either way, which was almost funny, given how many times he had killed for her. But to this day he didn’t think he’d actually be able to decide when it came down to it.

He didn’t want to be here. He wanted, desperately, to leave. He had wanted so desperately to leave for years the last time he had been stuck here. He had tried to escape so many times-- but then again, there had been so many opportunities to run that he hadn’t taken… 

He missed his children. It wasn’t a matter of choosing between them. If it were a contest, he would choose his kids every single time, and this he knew for certain. That was the only reason he was here to begin with, after all.

But god. The emotions were all so much easier when they were apart. When he wasn’t around her, it was easy to remember all the reasons why they didn’t work, to remember all the ways she had hurt him and how awful things had been-- to pretend that nothing lingered between them, that he didn’t care about her anymore despite all his best efforts. But when they were face-to-face again?...

He hissed softly, letting his head fall back against the wall with a dull thunk. Everything felt fuzzier than he would like it to. Colder, too.

Jesus.

He had really been in love with her.

“To the left a little.”

“Like this?”

“Mmmm… no. Now that’s too far. Move it just a smidge back?… No, that’s a skoosh, I said a smidge-- ooh! Ooh, yes, perfect! Just like that, Muffin!”

“Okay, alright. Just like this. Can you pass me the nails, Bug?”

It had taken them hours to get all their things moved in, even with the movers, and to re-arrange everything that allowed space for both of their extensive wardrobes and shoe collections. Divvying up space in the bathroom alone had been a nightmare, despite the sheer size of it, and they had had to make a detour to drive to the nearest department store and invest in a storage cabinet that could house all their hair care products. And Yoshi had been so confident that he was completely capable of putting together their new bed frame by himself…

“Okay. It says we need part 3-E… It has… The little spinny part at the top, and, ah, the spiral bit…”

“I don’t see it.”

“Well, it has to be somewhere.”

“Cuddlekins, hon, didn’t we use that part earlier? To screw the two corners together?”

“What? No, that was part M. With the cross-y bit at the top.”

“But isn’t this one part M? See. Look. It’s the same as the picture here, isn’t it?”

“Shit…”

It had taken a bit longer than he had originally anticipated. But it had, eventually, gotten done, despite the blood, sweat, and tears that it had cost them, and was now hosting their new, California king-size mattress, an absurd number of blankets and sheets, and many, many throw pillows. The kitchen had been unpacked already, (the easiest job of the entire move, given that neither of them cooked,) the TV hooked up in the living room, and all the furniture arranged just so…

And thus they had embarked on the last leg of their journey. And the one, Yoshi was well aware, that his girlfriend was the most particular about.

Decorating. Or, as she might say, interior design.

All he had needed to be happy was a few of his favorite movie posters framed and mounted on the wall, and she was perfectly willing to comply, even adding a few of her own selections to the collection in the living room they now shared. After that, she had free reign-- and reign she did indeed do. Of course, they could have easily hired people to do all this for them, but it just wasn’t quite the same as handling it on their own like this. Maybe she wanted the control. Maybe he wanted the experience. But either way, here they were… and they had been at this for a while now.

“Alright,” Yoshi sighed, taking a step back into her waiting arms so that they could examine his handiwork together. “What do you think? Good?”

She hummed happily, leaning over to press a kiss against the side of his jaw. “You didn’t even do it crooked this time!” She teased. He snorted softly in response.

“Sassy,” he mumbled, even though he kissed her forehead in return.

“It’s perfect, Noodles. Doesn’t it just ribbon up the whole room together so handily?”

He laughed, giving a shrug. “Something like that.”

“It matches the couch throw!” She insisted.

“I still cannot believe you insist on keeping that thing.”

“I adore it! It was a gift from you!” She protested.

“It is ugly!” He laughed. “I don’t know why I thought it would be a good gift. I just wanted to get you something and it was the best thing I could find.”

“It’s not ugly! It’s precious,” she insisted, as if lovingly defending a child, slipping out from his arm so she could stroke it affectionately, smoothing it out over the couch and straightening its corners. “I love it, cuddlekins, really, it just has this certain… crinkum-crankum to it, you know?” She said with a fond sigh, glancing back over at the other. “Besides, you got it for me. It always reminds me of my handsome cuddlemuffin whenever I see it.” 

He chuckled, holding out an arm with an inviting gesture. She agreeably returned to his side, fitting easily under his arm, looping her own around his waist in turn and resting a hand on his hip. “If you say so,” he hummed, leaning his head against hers. “I do enjoy the painting. I like surrealism… It’s a bit like, uh, René Magritte, don’t you think?”

“If you say so,” she echoed, shooting him an almost mischievous grin, and he scoffed in response, still smiling.

“Okay. What is next? Anything you need, my darling lovebug, and I will handle it for you!” He declared boldly, pulling away in order to strike a dramatic pose, knowing it would elicit a snort of laughter in response. “I have at long last mastered the ancient art of hanging pictures on walls! Just say the word!”

She snorted softly, plucking the hammer from his hands, placing it to the side.

“Noodles, that was the last one.”

He blinked in surprise.

“The last one?”

“Yes. That was all.’

“Then… we are all done moving?”

“Mmm-hmmm.”

“We are moved in?”

“We are,” she confirmed, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, letting her body relax as she leaned into him-- trusting him to keep her steady and hold her up against him. He did.

“Then…” He paused a moment before a wide smile slowly, surely stretched itself across his face, his hands moving to rest on her waist. “This is officially our apartment.”

“Officially.” 

He grinned, the two of them swaying back and forth in the middle of the living room of their new penthouse apartment, rocking to the rhythm of nothing but the distant sound of the city as a backdrop. Their feet shuffled against the carpeted floor, echoing the motion of each other. He spent a bit of time just looking at her, memorizing how she looked in this moment and what joy looked like on her face and reminding himself that this person belonged to him, and he belonged to her, and now both of them belonged to this apartment, together, before he leaned in to close the close the gap between them. He could feel her smile against his lips.

Right now, Yoshi could not think of a single thing that he would want to change about his life. If things could stay exactly like this forever, then he would surely have everything he could ever need. For the first time ever, he thought, this is something I built for myself. He thought, this is something I choose. He thought that, for the first time ever, that he had finally found his person and his place in the universe. What more could he ask for than this, really? What more could he ask for than to be loved with no strings attached, with no expectations or traditions or sacrifice or ‘destiny’ tied to it?

This was perfect. Just the way it was. 

The moths in the painting he had hung for her stood a silent vigil over their celebration from their new perch.

---

Yoshi’s vision was fuzzy when he opened his eyes, so he closed them and tried again, repeating the process until the world came into shape around him. His body was sore, but, surprisingly, less sore than it had been lately. A quick glance around told him that he was in the Battle Nexus’s medical ward. He had been here many times in the past, though this was his first visit on his most recent tour. It was an odd place, equal parts necessary and ironically useless given the line of work of its clientele. Sparsely stocked and staffed, yet equipped for the most dire of emergencies all at once. 

He supposed he must have passed out, then. 

He winced a bit, looking to the left, catching sight of a Nexus Nurse, already busy with some other poor soul who had found themselves down here. A glance to the right, however, surprised him, and Big Mama looked up at the movement, immediately catching his eye and making her way to his bedside.

“Oh, Muffin!” She tsked sympathetically, a hand reaching out to cup his face. “Are you alright?”

His heart absolutely swelled. Quite frankly, his head was still spinning, all stuffed full of cotton, and he didn’t have the presence of mind required to feel disgusted with himself for how excited he was that she was here. How fucking thrilled he was to have her attention-- to have her eyes on him, let alone her skin. He forced a very weak laugh, waving her off her concerns. 

“I am fine!” He mumbled with a shaky grin, his voice slurring slightly as he tried to get his tongue to move properly in his mouth. “A little internal bleeding never hurt anyone…!”

And she smiled, actually smiled at him, patting his cheek gently. “Oh, of course you are. That’s my handsome, fearless warrior,” she cooed. Yoshi chuckled very softly.

She had always done this. Laughed at his stupid jokes, raved over even his dumbest of movies, and showered him endlessly in praise. And, admittedly, he had always loved it. He had always soaked up the attention. 

That was what scared him the most, really. The thought that, maybe, that was all this ever really was at the root of it all-- just him wanting someone to pay attention to him and give him compliments. Maybe that’s why things were like this; because of his own selfishness poisoning something good. Because he was too broken and greedy for anything else. Maybe moments like these were the most he could ever hope for, realistically, and he just had to accept that.

Her hand left, and he heard her move away. Pathetically enough, it broke his heart. He was dimly aware of her hailing down one of the nurses out of the corners of his vision. 

“Make sure he’s well enough to perform in tonight’s line-up, understand? I want him in tip-top shape as soon as possible. No jiggery-pokery or bafflegab or anything else. And fetch me if anything else happens with him, won’t you?...”

He sighed, letting his eyes slide shut again.

---

“Okay, Red, listen to me very closely, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I will be gone for three hours. Okay? Three hours. Do you know how long that is?”

“Uhm…”

“That is the whole Scooby Doo video tape played twice.”

Raph nodded a bit, his eyes wide. Right. Dad would be gone for two Scooby-Doo’s.

“I’m going to go get some more food and things for you and your brothers, and then I will come back.”

Raph blinked widely up at his dad. “More tuna?”

“Yes, I am going to try to find more tuna cans for you,” his dad assured. “But listen. Okay? This is very important. I need you to watch your little brothers while I am gone. Okay?”

Raph glanced back over at his three younger brothers, who were all still asleep in their respective boxes. He was the only one who had been rudely awakened by their father, much earlier than they would usually arise on their own, but he had been gifted a peppermint candy for his troubles, so he couldn’t be too upset about it. 

“If you’re quiet, they should sleep until I get back. But if they wake up, I left breakfast out for you all. Right over there where we usually eat. Remember how I’ve shown you how to help feed Orange?”

Raph nodded. He’d fed Mikey lots of times before, repeatedly begging his father to let him hold his littlest brother in his lap and give him his breakfast. He knew how.

“And make sure Purple does not eat all of Blue’s food.”

Raph frowned.

“But… Donnie’ll bite me…”

He heard his father sigh, very softly, under his breath.

“I have told him not to bite today, okay? But Blue needs to eat, too. And besides, you are very tough and brave, aren’t you, Raph?” He hummed, smiling a tiny bit, leaning over just enough to rub his son’s scaled head. Raph beamed at the praise, nodding excitedly. Tough and brave? Of course he was! He wasn’t afraid of Donnie! Even if he did bite really hard.

“Good boy,” he said. “The Scooby Doo tape is already in the TV. Purple will help you rewind it and play it again when it’s over, okay? So you boys can watch while I am gone.”

“Okay.”

“But you have to make sure none of your brothers wander off, okay? You have to stay right here in this tunnel the entire time I’m gone. Understood? No exploring. You must be sure to watch Mikey.”

“Okay.”

“Red?”

“I’ll watch, Daddy.”

“Good boy,” he said again. “And if I don’t come back before the timer starts beeping--” he gestured to the kitchen timer that lived by his bed. Raph wasn’t that great with numbers yet, but he recognized the “eight” at the front. “Then bring your brothers and come find me, okay? But not before the timer goes off. Understand? Only if you hear the timer beeping. Do you understand, Raph?”

“Yeah.”

“Repeat it back to me, please.”

“Uhm…” He chewed on his fingers, looking to the side and shuffling his feet a bit. “Uhm, if the time… beeps. I’ll come find you…”

“By yourself, or with your brothers?”

“With my brothers...”

“But not before the timer, okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” Their father sighed very deeply, leaning over and kissing his forehead. “I will be back soon, my son. Take good care of your brothers.” 

---

“Come ON.”

“Raph, stop. It’s not gonna work,” April sighed.

“It will if it knows what’s good for it!” He snapped, reeling back and throwing himself at the bars of their literal cage once more with a loud crash, the very walls shaking in response. “Come on! Open already!!!” 

“Raph--”

“We’ve gotta get outta here!” He hissed, his tail whipping behind him, and the sharp movement threw him off balance, nearly making him stumble to one side. Goddammit. He swore softly under his breath, bristling, the anger scratching underneath his (foreign, strange, uncomfortable) skin only pitching higher in response. They had already been here for-- what?! Two days? Three?! They were so close, and now they were just stuck here, completely vulnerable, completely at the mercy of an actual, literal crime boss--

“Raph. Stop,” April said again, firmer this time, reaching out to grab his arm. “You’re hurting yourself.”

Raph yanked his arm away from her, whipping around to look at her, growling, his lips drawn back over his fangs in a snarl. April didn’t flinch away or back off. Her hand chased after his.

That was almost worse, and Raph’s snarl almost immediately gave way to a cracked little half-sob. His body slumped slightly, unclenching tight muscles to instead wilt in exhaustion.

“I have to get us out of here…” he insisted weakly, looking away from her again, hiding from her eyes out of shame. He didn’t want to look at her. He didn’t want her to look at him. Jesus, what did he look like right now…? His clawed feet scraped against the ground beneath them. Earlier today he had accidentally stabbed Leo with one of the spikes of his shell after moving too fast and left a bruise. A fucking bruise.

Yeah, sure, fine. Maybe his brothers were freaks now. But he was even worse. He was a monster. A useless one.

He sobbed properly this time.

“Raph, it’s alright,” April tried to comfort, moving close enough to rest her hand on his arm, and looking at how tiny she was compared to him made him feel sick. He was pretty sure he could bite off her hand if he really wanted to. Even if he didn’t want to-- what if he still did somehow? “We’ll figure a way out of here--”

“It’s not alright!” He hissed, his chest tightening. “I have to fix this.”

“Raph, we’ll fix it together,” Mikey spoke up, almost cautiously moving to Raph’s other side. “I’m sure we can figure out--”

“No!” He snapped, and he hated to interrupt Mikey, and he felt bad as soon as he did it, but he couldn’t help it. He wasn’t-- panicking, exactly, but he was close to it. Next to it. “I’m-- I’m supposed to protect you guys, and I can’t even--”

“Raph, you don’t have to always protect us!” Mikey protested.

“But I want to!” Raph cried in protest. “I want to protect you guys, I wanna keep you safe, and I-- I didn’t! I’m supposed to take care of everyone! I’m supposed to be in charge when Dad isn’t here, and I-- all I did was bring us to some magic crime city, get us locked up like animals, and turned into mutants!--” He barked out a strained, teary laugh. “And I can’t even get us back out!”

A few tears tracked down his face. “Dad trusted me to take care of everyone when he wasn’t here and I just let him down.” He could feel the panic breathing hotly down his neck. “He’d be so disappointed in me--”

“Raph, stop.” Mikey hissed, his voice hard, so very much so that it quite nearly surprised Raph out of his spiral. 

“That’s not true at all,” his younger brother hissed, his own face kind of flushed and teary as well. “None of that is even your fault! And even if it was, I still wouldn’t care and neither would Dad! And you are protecting us! We’re all still here, aren’t we?” 

“More or less,” Leo mumbled softly, bitterly, and Raph looked ruefully down at his claws, shifting his joints closer and biting down a hiccup. Mikey glared.

“We are!” He insisted. “Look, we’re still the same people, even if we do look different now! Right? None of that other stuff matters so long as we stick together--”

“Mikey, stop it!” Donnie snapped, bristling a bit, his head jerking up so sharply that it was likely painful. “Just stop, okay!? Stop saying it doesn’t matter! Stop saying that we’re ‘still the same people on the inside,’ stop trying to find the dumb silver lining, okay!? Just admit that this sucks! Okay!? Just because you’re apparently all hunky-dory about being a fucking box turtle--”

“You think I like this?!” Now it was Mikey’s turn to snap, rounding on his siblings, his hands clenched into angry fists. “You think I’m happy about this!? Because I’m not, okay!? I hate it too! Does that make you feel better!? I’m fucking miserable. I hate this. I’m scared and I don’t know what’s going on and I’m really, really sick of falling over because I don’t even know how to walk anymore!”

Mikey sobbed loudly, plopping back down on his rear.

“I hate this,” he hiccuped weakly. “I hate it too. I’m just. I’m j-just… I’m trying my best…”

Another sob wretched itself from his throat as he buried his face in his arms.

For one long moment, quiet veiled the space.

Raphael was careful and calculated in his movements, taking care with the spikes and sharp edges of his body as he scooped his brother up in his arms, wrapping him up tight. Mikey wept, clinging to his brother in return.

“Sorry,” Raph mumbled, very softly.

Leo joined them quickly enough, burrowing in against his brothers’ side. “Me too,” he whispered.

Donnie didn’t join the embrace, but he did sit close by, hugging his legs to his chest and staring to the side, down to the ground. “Me… too,” he sighed, frowning a little, twitching uncomfortably. “... Sorry. This. This just really sucks.”

“It does suck,” Leo agreed.

“Yeah,” Raph mumbled.

“I keep dropping things b-because I-- I only have three fingers,” Mikey warbled softly.

“Me too,” Donnie admitted. “And I can’t really sleep, because I don’t know how to get comfortable anymore.”

“I keep accidentally biting my tongue,” Raph said.

“Every time I sit down, I crush my own tail under my ass, ‘cause I’m not used to it being there,” Leo confessed with a small laugh. “Isn’t that stupid?”

“My back hurts because of the shell. I’m just not used to it being there. It’s so heavy.”

“Everything smells so much stronger now. I hate it. It’s nauseating.”

“I still can’t figure out how to balance like this.”

“I just feel so stupid. How could we not know?”

“It’s all so overwhelming. I mean, just, everything. I can’t believe there’s so much that we forgot.”

“It seems so obvious now, looking back…”

“My skin is so thick now. It’s awful. I feel all swollen all the time, like I can’t bend any of my joints properly. I feel stiff.”

“If that guy made us, if we’re his ‘creations,’ experiments, then we’re not yokai, right? We’re something else. Mutants, I guess. Is there anyone else like us?”

“How did Dad even end up with us? What happened?”

“Do you think he’s a mutant, too? God. What else don’t we know? What else didn’t he tell us?”

“Do we still count as Hamatos? Are we Hamatos at all…? Do you think Ghost-Sensei knows?”

“I’m glad we know. I mean, mostly. We should know, but I just… part of me wishes we didn’t.”

“We can’t ever go back.”

“Our entire life was just, like, a lie. It was a trick. The whole time. And we fell for it. I can’t believe we all fell for it--”

“We just have to be different now.”

“We were always different, but at least before, we didn’t have to… to carry it. I don’t even know how I could even talk to people now. Even if we do fix the bracelets. How am I supposed to just talk to normal people when I’m in the back of my mind, like, ‘oh my god, they don’t know I’m a turtle’ the whole time?”

“I think I’m sort of glad Dad didn’t tell us. I mean. I’m upset, too, but I just… I dunno. Everything feels so complicated now.”

“I can’t believe we forgot.”

The longer they talked, all five of them bunched up together, the less tears there were, and eventually, during a moment of quiet, Mikey sighed, taking Raph’s big hand in his own smaller one.

“You hurt your knuckles,” he observed, noting the swollen, occasionally bloodied skin around the joints. Raph gave a very soft huff of laughter.

“Yeah, well, guess we match, then,” he said, though Mikey’s own knuckles were mostly healed by now, only bearing a few small scabs. Mikey smiled, just the tiniest bit, just for a second, before he sighed, laying his head back slightly. 

“I know this sucks,” Mikey mumbled. “... Like, it really, really sucks. But at least we’re still together. And that counts for something, doesn’t it? I think so long as we’re together, then we… we’ll be okay.”

Leo gave a wry smile, elbowing his brother ever-so-slightly. “Wow, Mikey, when did you get so wise?” He teased.

Mikey grinned, chuckling a bit and laying his head back again to stare at the ceiling, and then stare out the bars of the door that contained them. Raph sighed, his gaze following after his little brother’s, gazing out into the empty halfway. He had no idea why they were being kept here or what they were planning on doing with them. None of the guards would even speak with them. It was terrifying, if he was being honest.

But they had come here for a reason.

He believed what Mikey said. He did. If they were all together, they’d be okay. But that meant all of them.

“We’re gonna find Dad,” he finally said. “We are. And he’ll know how to help fix it. I know he will.”

---

“Raph.”

He wasn’t meaning to ignore his Dad. He wasn’t. He just--

“Raphael.” 

Mikey whined loudly, pulling against his older brother’s grasp, attempting to wriggle away from the iron grip Raph had on his wrist.

“Raphael.” This time, his father reached over, physically removing Raphael’s hands from his younger sibling. Mikey immediately went darting off, and Raph’s heart jumped up into his throat, his eyes growing wide.

“Dad--!”

“It’s okay, Red.”

“Dad, he’s too far!” He hissed, his voice strained with panic as he turned desperately to his father, grabbing at his pants leg. 

“No, he’s not. It’s okay, Raphael. Here. Look.”

He hoisted his child up in his arms with just a bit of effort, holding him up to his chest.

“See, my son? We can still see him from here.”

From up in his dad’s arms, Raph could watch Mikey throw himself into a pit of brightly colored foam balls with a squeal of excitement from across the play area. Leo wasn’t far off, immediately moving to join his little brother’s side, eager to show him all the blue balls he had collected. Dozens of other children scampered about nearby, clambering over play equipment and chasing one another. Raph frowned, grabbing fistfuls of his father’s shirt and fidgeting, chewing on his fingers nervously.

“What if he gets lost?”

“He won’t.”

“What if… there’s somethin’ dangerous?”

“There is nothing dangerous here, Raphael.”

“What if there is?” He pressed. “It’s big.”

“It’s okay, Red,” Dad soothed, readjusting his grip on his child, drawing him a bit closer. “I promise it is safe here.”

Raph looked down at the floor, clenching and unclenching his fists, the tiniest whine escaping from him. His father sighed softly.

“You have done a very good job looking after our family, Red,” he hummed, rocking them back and forth just the tiniest bit, idly swaying as he spoke. “But things are different now. Okay? Nothing here is going to hurt Michelangelo. And even if it did, I am right here to help. I am not going anywhere. I will not leave you alone. I swear I will take care of you and your brothers. Alright?”

Raph sniffled a bit, nodding the tiniest bit.

“If we are ever anywhere where it might be unsafe, I will tell you, okay? So you can watch out for your little brothers. Like when I tell you all to hold hands when we cross the street, right? Would that help?”

He nodded again, swallowing the lump in his throat as he laid his head down on his dad’s shoulder.

“Good,” he sighed, rubbing a few small circles along his back. “Do you want to go and play? There are lots of things here that I think you would like if you tried them. I think you’d have a lot of fun if you would let me handle looking after your brothers.”

Raph shook his head, burrowing further into his father’s embrace. He did want to go play, really. They had never been anywhere so cool before! They had been to the playground a few times now, but this was like a playground inside-- and they even had video games! And prizes! And he wanted to follow after his brothers, to stay close to them, but…

They kept going in opposite directions. And this place was so big and he couldn’t follow all of them, and, and--

“Okay. That’s fine,” Dad assured. “How about this? How about we sit and watch together for ten minutes, and then we can try going and playing something with one of your brothers. Do you think that would work, Raphael?”

Raph sucked in a deep, shaking breath, wiping at his eyes a bit before he finally nodded.

“Uh-huh.”

---

Though he had, in fact, performed in the Battle Nexus as scheduled that same evening, and then the following day as well, he was not actually ‘released,’ so to speak, from the infirmary until now, three-and-a-half blood transfusions later. Yoshi supposed he had no real complaints, given that the infirmary had actual beds in it to sleep upon, but the staff there were not exactly friendly, and he had quickly tired of being awakened at all hours of the night by other screaming patients. Not to mention that it was very awkward to share the same sleeping space with someone who’s leg you had recently broken in four different places…

But Big Mama had visited him each evening he was there. 

The guard escorting him was really a formality at this point, Yoshi suspected, and he almost dared to hope that he would be allowed to move freely through the Nexus in the near future. Surely Big Mama knew he would not try to run away with his children relying on her protection, right?

If he were permitted to wander without supervision, he might be able to corner a spectator and inquire about the current state of the Hidden City police’s hunt for Baron Draxum. He didn’t expect Big Mama would be informing him of such things, but if Draxum was apprehended, then there was a chance he might be able to find a way out of here and get himself back home, get those four remaining years like he had planned, or at least go visit his children and make sure they were okay… he hated that he had left without saying goodbye first, and had no doubt scared them with how he had disappeared.

 He had been researching for quite some time now, in between parenting and managing dojos, alternative sources for cloaking crystals. If he was able to pay for new ones, he could return Big Mama’s to her and perhaps argue to lighten his ‘sentence,’ or maybe even get out of it somehow. It was a long shot, but worth a try. Maybe this time could count towards that? He had had the crystals for ten years… did that mean he owed ten years time as a champion in return…? Ten years was still not as bad as a lifetime, assuming he lived through it all… 

He frowned as he calculated, shuffling his feet through the cold halls. 

The deal had still been worth it. He didn’t regret it. If a lifetime in the Battle Nexus was the price for his children’s lives in the world, then it was a price he was more than willing to pay.

He just regretted the pain he knew he inflicted on his family. It had always bothered him, sitting on his shoulder and hissing in his ear for the past ten years of his life. Every wonderful moment, every birthday, every movie night and dance recital and field trip, he still thought about it. Thought about how he would have to leave one day, and how it would hurt them. 

It was a shame. They deserved better than that. He had already done everything he could, even now, to prepare and to soften the inevitable blow as much as possible. Tucked away in the back of his nightstand back home, he already had hand-written cards for each of his sons’ college graduations, wedding days, and the birth of their first children, preparing for every scenario, just in case, since he knew he likely wouldn’t see most of them should they come to pass. He had had everything prepared, legally, for years now, so things would be taken care of in the event of his ‘death’ or ‘disappearance,’ and so that his children would have to shoulder as little of that burden as possible. He had invested in a hefty life insurance policy back when they were still in elementary school, ensuring that they would always be taken care of financially in his absence. 

He had even penned a letter, years and years ago, that could be delivered to his children once he was gone. He had been ready to die for a long time now.

But he still wasn’t prepared for how heavy the guilt would feel.

He, likewise, was not prepared for the shriek that pierced through the air a moment later as he passed by one of the dungeon’s many hallways, so sharp and sudden that he stumbled slightly.

“DAD!!!”

He absolutely froze in his tracks, his heart stopping still in his chest as he whipped around to face the familiar voice. His eyes widened so dramatically he was half afraid that they would fall from his head.“April!?” He cried, spluttering slightly. “Boys!?”

[ next ]

#cw: #description of injuries #(nothing gorey but there are some boo boos) #depiction of toxic/abusive relationships #depiction of what could be considered child neglect/endangerment? #that one is debatable but #i will warn anyway #sorrywhatnowau #sorrywhatnowau fanfic #sorrywhatnowau fic #rottmnt #rottmnt fanfic #rottmnt au #rottmnt human au #tmnt #tmnt human au #fidgetwing #fanfic #writing #tmnt fanfic #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the tmnt

[lordgrimwing]

Illness #03

Fëanor thinks he's saving his siblings.

Finarfin started crying. He flailed his little fists and wailed in frustration as he squirmed on the blanket his mother left him on. Indis usually carried the baby in a sling, but she'd injured her back last week and Finwë insisted she had to take things easy until she felt better. Finarfin did not like the new arrangement and fussed miserably most days until someone finally held him.

Indis closed her eyes. She stood in the kitchen, cleaning a chicken for the family's dinner, her hands greasy with the bird's fat. Maybe this time, if she just waited a few minutes, he would finally give up and come to terms with the new arrangement.

"I'll get him."

Indis turned around as the back door swung open. To her surprise, Fëanor came in from outside, bits of straw stuck to his overalls and hair. At fifteen, Finwë's son from his first marriage wasn't the easiest boy to get along with. He quarreled with his parents and the oldest children and was prone to flights of fancy that at times left his father grumbling about the state of his sanity. The last several days were particularly challenging. Despite all that, Indis could see how much he loved his littlest siblings, especially baby Finarfin.

Fëanor hurried through the kitchen and over to his little brother. She watched with a faint smile on her lips as he cued at the chunky baby and scooped him up in his arms, blanket and all. Finarfin quickly quieted as Fëanor bounced him across the room in his arms. 

“Thank you,” Indis said, but the pair were already out the door, the black-haired boy paying her no more attention now that he had the baby.  

She sighed and turned back to the chicken. 

***

Two hours later, with a stew simmering above the fire and the sun dipping down toward the trees, Indis opened the kitchen door and stepped outside in bare feet. 

“Lalwen!” She called.

Her youngest daughter went out earlier to see if any of the chicks hatched yet, but she suspected she’d gotten distracted playing with the animals or following her brother around as he did chores. Indis indulged the five-year-old and left her to whatever distraction she found (all the better if she was with Fëanor so she could help keep an eye on little Finarfin while their big brother worked), but it was time for her to come back inside and do her own chores. Finarfin was likely ready to nurse too.

“Lalwen!” She called again. “Fëanor!”

The yard was quiet.

She frowned. Finwë left a list of things for Fëanor to do while he took the next two oldest into town with him for the day to show them the finer points of selling horses. It was a long list. She’d looked at it while he scribbled instructions across a page from his leather-bound notebook and commented on the length. Her husband insisted it was about time his son learned more responsibility with managing his time, or else he’d always be falling behind and never make something of himself. He’d softened his voice after that and admitted these were mostly small projects around the homestead that always managed to be less important than something else but still needed to be wrapped up before the season changed. He assured her it was a reasonable day’s work for one person. 

“Fëanor!” She yelled, brow furrowing. 

He gave no answer.

She frowned, she stepped down into the dirt, the path to the barn so well worn that nothing grew in the tracks left by many feet. She walked into the barn. The air tasted thick with dust left from when Fëanor swept and refilled the hayloft. She sneezed. Beyond that sharp sound, the barn was silent, the horses turned out in the pasture further out in the clearing, and the broke yearlings in town and hopefully not coming back. She saw no sign of her children.

She turned away and went to the chicken coop. She thought perhaps she’d find Lalwen there, but there was no sign of her other than a hen with ruffled feathers irritably guarding her new chicks.

She hurried to the far side of the house next. There was a basic forge and blacksmithing shed used for repairing equipment when there wasn’t time to take broken things into town or when the damage was so mild it didn’t warrant a trip. Finwë mostly left that sort of thing to Fëanor once it became clear how eager the boy was to use the forge. Of all the places where he might get distracted and not heed his parents’ calls, the forge was most likely. 

A cat looked up from its perch on the paneless window and mewed when she entered but otherwise, the shack stood empty, the forge cold. 

Indis turned in a circle, surveying up to the tree line for any sign of the children. Worry began to simmer in her belly. She ran around the front of the house and found only more of nothing. She shouted and only her own voice answered, bounced back by the trees. 

There was no sign of Fëanor or Lalwen or Finarfin in the late afternoon light. The children had seemingly vanished. 

***

“I’m hungry,” Lalwen complained, kicking her bare feet against the dirt floor of the hunting shack in boredom. “Mama’s making soup. I want soup.”

Fëanor looked up from where he was trying to coax Finarfin into eating some of the hardtack gruel he’d boiled over a low fire in the rusted cast pan pot left in the shack. He’d swaddled the baby tightly in his blanket, but still, he squirmed and cried and refused to eat. “We don’t have soup tonight.”

He’d tried getting a cottontail rabbit with his sling when he filled the pan and his canteen in the nearby stream. He’d thought he’d catch something earlier, while they were riding on Annie. She was the gentlest of the mares, surefooted on the mountain, and let the kids ride her bareback whenever they wanted, but she didn’t foal the last three years and he knew he had to get her away too. She was outside now, tied with a long line to a tree near the stream so she could graze and drink.

He’d thought that from her back, Lalwen riding in front of him and Finarfin sleeping in a sling, hastily made from his blanket, on his back, he could hit a rabbit or a few of the plentiful squirrels that usually chittered in the trees this deep in the forest. He had good aim with his sling and a pouch full of stones, yet the small animals stayed frustratingly hidden. It wasn’t until he’d gone to the stream that he finally spotted a rabbit, her whiskers bouncing as she chewed on the lush plants bordering the water. He’d set the pan down silently, exchanging it for the leather cord and a medium-sized rock. He’d swung and thrown and he was sure his aim was true, but the rabbit, scared by some change in the wind or his small movement, fled away into the brush, leaving him again with nothing to feed the children or himself.

He shouted at the rabbit, cursed her keen senses, cursed her quick legs. Then, he fell to his knees, weeping and beating his frustration into the soft ground. This wasn’t how things should be going, he was better than this, he’d snuck away to go hunting with his sling dozens of times and never had such ill luck. Why did everything become so hard now?

 After a minute, he pulled the fractured bits of his pride together, collected the water, and hurried back to the shack, cursing himself for leaving the children alone for so long while he wallowed in self-pity.

So, no, Lalwen couldn’t have soup tonight, none of them could. The best he could do was crack open one of the old cans of hardtack left in the shack and boil a handful of biscuits until they were edible, stirring occasionally with a stick. The resulting gruel turned out as appealing as it was bland, but he made himself choke down three handfuls in hopes that that would convince his little sister to do more than prod the cooling sludge. It was still hot enough to hurt his throat as it went down. She did eventually take a tentative lick, only to make a face and throw it away in disgust. Even hungry Finarfin was turning his little nose up and refusing to let him put any in his mouth after the first try.

“I wanna go home,” Lalwen whined over the crying baby. “This isn’t fun anymore.”

“We can’t go home,” Fëanor said with sudden passion, clutching Finarfin tightly and smearing gruel across the blanket. His chest seized at even the thought of going back to what awaited them at the house. 

Finwë will do terrible things to them.

He flinched.

Lalwen looked at the fussing bundle in her brother’s arms. “Ara wants to go home, too."

"We can't." An air of desperation slipped into his tone. "It's just us now."

He took Findis and Fingolfin away with the yearlings.

The little girl frowned, her round face scrunching down in worry. "We’re lost?" She whispered, eyes growing wet. 

"No, no I know where we are," He said, moving Finarfin, still fusing, to one arm so he could open the other to Lalwen, inviting her to settle next to him. "We're going to be okay."

Keep them away, hidden, safe. Don't let anyone find them.

She snuggled into his side, tears quietly falling from her chin to make a damp spot on his shirt. She reached her hands out for the baby, and he gave him to her carefully, helping her wrap her arms around the bundled blanket. The baby squirmed and cried as he got jostled about. For some reason, Finarfin quieted when he looked up into her face. 

A worm of jealousy corkscrewed in him at the way his sister succeeded where he failed.

Horrible boy with horrible thoughts, his father’s voice mocked.

“I’m scared, Fëanor,” Lalwen admitted from the safety of her brother’s arms.

“Go to sleep,” He directed. “Everything will look better in the morning. We’ll go riding on Annie again.”

Outside, a horse whinnied. Annie, also wondering where her herdmates were, no doubt confused by why she was spending the night out here instead of in her comfortable stall. He leaned his head back against the rough wooden wall. Everything would look better in the morning. He closed his eyes.

Another horse whinnied.

His eyes shot open.

***

Finwë reined his horse to a stop next to the narrow stream. The missing horse, tied on a long rope that was just waiting to get tangled around her legs, came over to greet her herdmates. Just a bit further through the trees stood a dilapidated shack. Built by some bygone hunter, it saw too little use now to remain in good repair. Moss and vines grew over the sagging roof and walls. Darkness hid the holes chewed by rodents and rot that made the crumbling structure only nominally better than the open woods during a summer night like this.

“Stay here,” He ordered as he dismounted, Fingolfin following him down from his own gelding. “Get that mare untied and ready to go.”

“Okay,” The twelve-year-old murmured as his father strode quickly for the small hunting shack. 

Finwë could guess at what was in that shack. With his missing horse tied up outside, Fëanor must be inside, hiding from whatever he'd done this time. But if the children weren't with him or if they were hurt. . . 

Fingolfin didn’t need to see that.

They’d ridden hard across the mountain for many hours. The light was already fading when he got back from town, Findis and Fingolfin equal parts excited and worn out from the day’s labors. They’d expected dinner. Instead, they found Indis with four fresh horses saddled. She said Fëanor and the two youngest children disappeared several hours ago. She’d searched for them in the surrounding woods, going so far as to set loose two bloodhounds from the kennel and put them on the children’s scent, but even the dogs couldn’t find their trail. It was as though they disappeared into the mountain.

He took charge of the situation immediately. People in town might have suspected some kind of animal, a wild cat perhaps, got them, seeing as they live so far up the untamed mountain, but he knew these lands and more importantly, he knew his oldest son. There was something not quite right in Fëanor. He had no doubt that the insolent teen ran off with Lalwen and Finarfin. The only question, or at least the only one they needed answered as he directed Indis and Findis to follow the stream running past their home, was where. He’d taken Fingolfin and the two best horses and headed up the mountain, suspicions for why already heady on his mind.

The light was too low for tracking, so they rode to the places he thought Fëanor might hide the children: the ring of fallen trees, brought down for some forgotten reason decades ago, to which the boy used to sneak when to avoid chores; the thicket he’d found when he’d scrambled under the thorny bushes after a wounded rabbit and discovered no one else was willing to brave the thorns to make him come out; and many more such places, each taking the searchers further and further up the mountain in the waning light. Finally, they found Fëanor, and Finwë prayed to whoever would listen that Lalwen and Finarfin wouldn’t be far away.  

The shack itself looked quiet and deserted, but the lingering smell of woodsmoke assured him that this was where the runaway stopped. No sounds came from inside. The door was a flimsy, rotting thing, and it hung half broken from its hinges after he threw it open.

The horses whinnied behind him.

Inside, the shack was just as dark as the forest, but he could clearly see his missing children. The vice on his heart loosened. He wasn’t sure what he would have done if Fëanor had abandoned them somewhere, or hurt them. His two youngest were asleep, Finarfin in his sister’s arms, and both of them curled up against Fëanor’s side. Or they were, now the teen was scrambling to his feet, overalls falling off one shoulder, looking up at his father with wide eyes.

“Come here,” Finwë said from between clenched teeth as he stared down his son. 

Fëanor made no move, only looking at him from across the small room, chest heaving beneath his shirt.

Finwë reached out to grab his arm and pull him away from the children. His fingers brushed the shirt sleeve and Fëanor jerked away, stumbling back from him toward the opposite corner of the shack.

“Don’t touch me!” The teen screamed, his voice high and piercing. 

Finwë could deal with him later, all that mattered now was that he wasn’t standing over the small children. Finarfin, awoken by the noise, began to wail and twist in his blanket, causing Lalwen to stir. He crouched and reached out to scoop them up in his arms.

“You’re alright,” He hushed gently, soothing a hand down his daughter’s hair and then the soft fuzz on his youngest’s head. “Come to Papa.”

A flicker of movement from the corner of his eye. Then Fëanor threw himself against his shoulder, knocking him off balance. He fell back, grappling with the wiry teen.

“Don’t touch them!” Fëanor screamed. He kicked the back of Finwë’s knee, dropping his weight and pulling his father down with him.

They landed halfway out the door, Finwë on top.

“Pa?” Fingolfin called nervously from the other side of the shack, worried by the yells and sounds of fighting.

“Stop this,” Finwë snarled at the writhing boy under him. 

He was big enough to keep Fëanor down, but that wasn’t stopping him from trying his best to get up. The teen twisted his shoulders and bucked his hips, trying to throw the other off of him. All the while shrieking nearly unintelligible words, spittle flying from his lips. Finwë caught one of his hands as it clawed at his chest. The other hand scratched a painful line up his neck to his face before he caught it. Fëanor continued to struggle frantically.

“Pa?” Fingolfin said, his voice laced with fear as he rounded the edge of the shack, too worried to wait any longer.

Fëanor twisted to look at his brother. “He’s gonna hurt them!” He babbles, the force of his writhing weakening. “He’s gonna kill you all too! He’s gonna kill you all like Ma!”

The younger boy stood frozen in place, watching.

Taking advantage of his distraction and the way he’d half turned himself to face his brother, Finwë rose up and flipped him over the rest of the way, so he was lying on his stomach instead of his back. He sputtered on a mouthful of decomposing leaves and dirt. The screaming finally stopped, though now he could hear the two frightened children still inside. 

“Give me your boot lace,” Finwë said to Fingolfin as he knelt on Fëanor’s back to keep him down, pinning his hands above his head with one hand. The teen’s breath rattled out of his chest. Finarfin wailed from the shack. He held out his hand impatiently. “Now.”

Fingolfin sat down and obediently unlaced one boot. Trembling fingers made him fumble several times. As soon as he freed the long cord, he stood and brought it to his father, looking down at his wheezing brother with fear. Relieved of his burden, he drew back, loose boot scuffing in the dirt.

“Bring the horses up here,” Finwë directed him and he gladly fled back the way he came.

Finwë adjusted his grip, prepared for a fight as soon as he moved Fëanor’s hands so he could bind them behind his back. The fight, though, appeared to finally have gone out of him and he lay unresisting in his father’s hands. Deftly, he bound his arms tightly behind him before climbing off his back.

Fëanor gasped in a ragged breath and coughed.

Finwë stooped down and pulled the boy’s ankles toward his hands, securing them with a quick knot to keep him down. He did not trust him to not run the moment he was left alone. Satisfied the boy wouldn’t be going anywhere quickly like that, he walked back into the hunting shack.

“Papa!” Lalwen exclaimed, tears running down her face as she ran into his arms.

Finarfin cried where she left him in the bundled blanket, distressed by everything and no doubt hungry as he hadn’t eaten since noon. 

“There now,” He said, kneeling and holding her tightly to his chest, one hand coming up to cradle the back of her head. “I have you. Don’t cry, papa has you.”

She continued to cry, as any small child would after all that happened. 

“He said we have to go away and we would play and everything would be okay,” She said, hardly intelligible through the tears. “But he said we weren’t lost but you couldn’t find us. And I just wanna go home!” She wept.

He picked her up, her skinny legs automatically wrapping around his waist and arms clinging to his neck as she buried her face in his chest. He hushed her, keeping a hand on her back as he stepped over to Finarfin. He let go of her so he could scoop up the baby. He soothed both crying children until they both quieted, Finarfin even falling back to sleep despite his hunger. Only then did he go back outside.

Fingolfin waited with all three horses, the mare Fëanor stole wearing a makeshift rope halter and tied to the saddle horn of Fingolfin’s horse. They stood a few yards from his brother, still lying on his stomach, though he’d turned his head to breathe easier. His eyes kept flicking down to the older boy, clearly struggling to not stare at him. He looked up when his father appeared, his features relaxing when he saw his siblings.

“Lalwen, Finarfin,” He whispered in relief. 

“Let’s get going,” Finwë said gently, nodding at his son to get on his horse.

Fingolfin climbed up and looked down again at his older brother. “You aren’t,” He asked hesitantly. “Leaving Fëanor here?”

Finwë shook his head. “I’ll deal with him once you three are home and in bed.” He looked down at Lalwen. “You and Arafin are going to ride with Fingolfin.”

He handed the baby to Fingolfin and then lifted Lalwen up and sat her in front. Once she was settled, he helped the twelve-year-old turn the blanket into a sling so he could carry his little brother against his chest, leaving his hands free to guide the horse and steady his sister. 

Noticing the trepidatious look on his face, Finwë said, “Just focus on keeping them safe. We’ll go down the easy paths.”

The boy nodded.

Finwë turned and strode over to his eldest. He crouched and untied his feet. “Get up,” He said.

Fëanor refused, staying limp on the ground.

He grabbed the boy’s hair, laced with detritus from their struggle, and pulled his head up. “Get up or I will drag you.” He hissed.

Without a word, Fëanor twisted and worked his legs under himself so he was kneeling, face pressed against the ground. His back tensed and his shoulders twitched, but try as he might, he couldn’t raise his head. Finwë grabbed the back of his overalls and pulled him up enough for him to stand on shaking legs. The rich dirt had turned to mud on his face.

“Move,” He ordered, keeping a tight hold on his forearm and marching him over to his horse. 

Fëanor kept his shoulders hunched and eyes downcast, refusing to look at anyone.

Finwë mounted first, keeping hold of the loose end of the cord binding the teen so that he could not run away. Fëanor made no move to follow his father up.

“Come here,” He said, looking down on him. “Or I will drag you all the way home.”

With a jump, and a yank on the back of his overalls to pull him further, he had him draped over the front of the saddle, his legs dangling over one side and his head over the other. He wrapped the free end of the cord around the saddle horn to be sure Fëanor could not slip off and run away. The position looked uncomfortable, but he frankly did not care.

“Let’s go home,” He said to the others, nudging the horse into a bouncing walk.

***

Indis waited in one of the chairs by the fireplace. 

Finwë returned almost an hour ago with her tired children. She’d hugged and kissed all three of them, even Fingolfin, though he protested and complained that he hadn’t been lost. She knew it was only a token protest made by a boy who thought himself too old and grown up to need such reassurance from his mother but who still wanted it. She took them to their rooms and tucked them all into bed, hardly able to bring herself to look away from the two youngest. If only they were all still babes like Finarfin and she could hold them all in her arms again and never let them go. But they were too big for that now and she had to leave them in their bed to sleep. Even little Finarfin was so exhausted that he hardly stirred when he was set in his cradle. 

The fire cast its flickering light across the room.

Another shrill scream breaks the quiet night. The cry is faint, coming all the way from inside the barn, but still sharp enough to make her squeeze her eyes shut and rub at her temples. How she hated the sound. She hoped it would not be enough to wake the children from their needed sleep.

The backdoor opened. Finwë walked inside, his footsteps heavy, worn down by all that happened today. He paused for a moment when he noticed her waiting for him, then came over and sat across from her.

“How are they?” He asked, looking into the fire.

“Asleep,” She answered, looking at the stress lines around his eyes and mouth.

“How’s your back?”

“A little sore,” She said honestly. Running through the forest and then spending several hours on the back of a horse had not done her any favors. “But I’ll be alright.”

He nodded, his hands squeezed together in his lap. 

“And Fëanor?” She pushed. 

She’d seen him tied and slung over one of the horses when they got back. Silent and unmoving, apathetic to his family’s reunion. Finwë led the horses to the barn while she took her children inside. 

He leaned back in the chair, releasing a harsh breath. “He could have killed one of them.”

Her eyes widened. “He would never—” She began.

“He might,” Finwë interrupted, his voice rising with emotion. “Even if he did not mean to, he could have killed them. He has no idea what he’s doing. He’s in there,” He threw an accusing finger toward the barn, “screaming at nothing. He’s babbling nonsense and cannot see anything beyond his own delusional beliefs!”

She stared, wide-eyed. “He’s,” She could not go on.

“He’s mad,” The other supplied easily. “He hasn’t been right for years. We saw it! We saw it and let him be and now look at what he’s done. He’ll kill one of them next time. I know he will.” 

“But he loves them,” She protested weakly.

He stood and began to pace. “I’ve let this go on far enough. Your love for him stayed my hand time and time again when he showed this madness. My own love for him and his mother clouded my judgment too, but no longer. We were lucky today. He might have killed them. This will go no further.”

“What do you mean?” She pleaded, clasping his hand between hers and he walked by. “He’s our child.”

“He’s mad!” He spat but did not pull away. “He’s dangerous, and he cannot stay here. There is a place in Rawlings, a lunatic asylum, that will take him. We’ll go tomorrow.”

“No!” She said, standing to face him. “He is our child. You will not send him away to be minded by strangers. We are a family. We look after each other.” Her voice shook.

“Can’t you see how dangerous he is?” He said, taking her by the shoulders and holding her in place. “He is like a wild animal and it is only a matter of time before he strikes out again. We cannot trust him.”

She put a hand on his chest. “You cannot give up on him so quickly. There is a problem, yes, but we see it now and can watch for it so that next time it does not take up unprepared.”

His chest heaved beneath her hand.

“We cannot give up on him before we even try.”

He looked down and sighed. She knew he was calming down from the fierce emotion that had gripped him at the thought of his children being hurt.

“You’re right,” He sighed, shoulders slumping. “I am being hasty. I spent so much of this night worrying for Lalwen and Finarfin. I should not make such decisions while I’m like this. Thank you for speaking reason into me again.”

“Always,” She said tenderly, touching his cheek.

“We will sleep, and tomorrow I’ll see if he’s ready to be any more reasonable.” He took her hand in his, pulling it slowly from his face.

They walked together to their bedroom and changed into their night clothes. Under the covers, he held her close and buried his nose in her hair. She curled into his chest and tried to ignore the screams.

#cw: mental health disorder #cw: child abuse #cw: child endangerment #feanor #finwe #fingolfin #indis #finarfin #lalwen #house of finwe #the silmarillion #look #old gods au #grimwing writes

[kachawo]

What if Wei Ying turned out different? What if he had gone through much worse as a homeless child?

Heaven knows what his life was like before Jiang Fengmian found him, but it surely wasn't friendly. What if that changed him so much? The trauma ingraining itself into his brain that it becomes his main source of survival?

Yiling was a badly managed town, even the children saw that. And among the cultivation sects, none were really keen on investing their time and materials on withered soil, especially the nearest jurisdictions of Qishan Wen and Yunmeng Jiang.

That's why in Yiling, everything tagged crime can be stashed away, hidden into, escaped out of. Sects turn a blind eye to it, hell, even the previous Baron of the land didn't bother reclaiming Yiling because of its high crime rate.

It built itself up by blood money and fear, and with the Burial Mounds so close in vicinity it was much worse.

Anything and everything illegal was practically spoiled culture there.

Especially,

Especially slave traders, especially human trafficking. There was no authority to call upon, no one strong enough of a will to stop it. And so whenever Yiling hears the heart-dropping sound of golden bells chiming, the heavy hooves of a bull that carries with it a large wooden cage. They do nothing.

They can do nothing.

And there goes A-Ying, freshly orphaned, still getting a hang of wandering around the streets he would have to call his new home.

The first time it happened, his face got too close to the torch while he panicked. The large men and their ropes scared him too much and he wanted them to let go let go let go-

They didn't like how he moved around too much and tightened the noose around his neck, A-Ying suddenly couldn't breathe. He felt the bones of his weak throat cave on itself and it hurts. It hurts. It hurts. It hurt so bad. It made him thrash around the cage widely, using his remaining air to scream so violently that would have guaranteed his broken throat.

In his panic attack he hit his head on the splintered pole used as a torch on the corner of the cage they threw him in.

A-Ying didn't think he had the strength to scream about it, but apparently he did. He realized later that the graining sound against his ears were his blood-curdling cries, and that he couldn't feel the left side of his head.

They never took him, in the end. The slave traders complained loudly that he damaged himself and would be of no value. The large man who tied him up, held him by his hair and threw him out of the cage.

After that it was black.

You'd think that after that experience, Wei Ying would have known how to escape people like these then.

He should have died. He should have died a long time ago. When the slave traders lured him in with promise of a meal, when a drunk man mistook him for someone else and beat him with shattered wine jars, when a cultivator feigned kindness and Wei Ying took his hand--

A-Ying should have died when he was 5 when-

Wei Ying should have died when he was 7 when-

When-

It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. Someone stop it STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT STOPITSTOPITSTOPITSTOPITSTOPSTOPSTOP

He can't be blamed! He can't deal with it! The ringing in his head has made itself a home in his head a long time ago and at that point its been a part of his life.

He's half-blind, half-dying, half a body, full of scars.

Wei Ying can't be blamed.

So when a man comes to him, on a cold winter night calling his name-- he can't be blamed.

(That was used on him several times, several ways, at this point the whole world knows his name. Maybe they were never addressing him really? And it's just so his foolish brain responded to every call hoping it was a-niang or baba who came back to get him.--

Hoping. He was hoping. Such a silly thing to do these days.)

The man wore purple robes, was surrounded by many people with purple robes. One of them approached when he didn't respond.

Wei Ying was 11 by now, 12 almost, he couldn't be blamed.

The robes were different-- a dark royal hue, but it was the same color of the- the same- and the man was approaching him too quickly he-

A child was never supposed to go through this pain. Wei Ying wouldn't know this, but he couldn't be blamed. A small tooth-dagger was plunged into the cultivator's abdomen and the man shrieked--- he couldn't be blamed.

He ran and ran and ran, the man who called his name ran after. His feet didn't acquaint well with the cold solid ground, it burned his skin ironically, but he ran with only fear to power him.

The man grabbed him by the shoulder and said his name again-- Wei Ying couldn't hear anything amongst the rapid beating of his own heart. Couldn't see quite clearly, couldn't think quite straight, he feared.

Wei Ying couldn't have been blamed. When carriage wheels screeched to a halt but it was too late-- and the man in purple had to let go of him one way or another.

He didn't stay too long to see what happened to him. He just ran and ran and ran.

Until there was no ground to run on. Until Yiling was no longer seen. Until he felt the last of his breath stolen from him.

Wei Ying falls falls fall-

His eyes close on their own, they can't be blamed.

#mdzs #mdzs au #wwx #wei wuxian #wei ying #young wei ying #child wei ying #the horrifying experience of being a child in the streets #cw: child abuse #cw: child endangerment #i imagine if canon wwx turned out this way #he wouldn't be so keen to intimate touch #the pain and trauma that came with the action never fully left him #but at the same time he yearns for that kind of warmth #the type of touch that'll wait for his acceptance #but he just can't out of that fear #also in this au he's a non-cultivator

[ravenanimationz]

This goes with the last one-

Derek, Nightstar’s Fiancé, unfortunately is not safe either as a vampire. She did her best to stop herself, managing to keep herself from killing him, but not from injuring him. In his arms is their newborn daughter, Harmony. He managed to barely make it to the medic. He doesn’t blame Night, he knows just how desperate she was to stop… especially since she didn’t even try to dodge most attacks against her.

Uhhhh see if I can link commissions as well

#Nightstories tales of Ashborne #art #oc art #digital art #my art #cw: gore #gore #tw gore #child endangerment #tw child endangerment #eye gore #tw blood #blood #cw blood #tw eye trauma #tw eye gore #cw eye gore #cw eye trauma #tw bruising #bruises #cw bruises #vampire

[thedeafprophet]

i really do think about like. The way the princess talks about being 'raised' in the honey in Reunion and acts of it being a good thing really just fucks me up a little bit because

that was neglect! that was bad! that was active endangerment! that was horrible treatment towards a child! and the implication here is that she was raised that same way

and i dont know if thats geniuenly what she believes. or if its what she came to believe, and has to believe.

idk i have the inclination to go 'ha she was probably really creepy as a child too' but then i think about the actual reality of her growing up and its just. eugh. especially conjected with her adult actions of seeming to not want to be alone in what she is..

obviously none of it comes close to excusing what she does or became, but it paints such a tragic story.

#i have so many thoughts here about like. her. #yes im still annoyed someone called her one dimensional lmao #but i this all really ties into the cycles of abuse stuff here imo #list of fl characters of 'wish i could time travel and take past you away from the scenario' #im not normal about her #the captivating princess #es spoilers #child endangerment cw #infant endangerment cw #child neglect cw #please let me know if i need to be tagging anything else with these posts i am trying my best o7 #ask to tag

[chipsncookies]

Vampire Ingo and human Emmet) read from right to left👈

Comic about how Emmet discovers the otherworldly nature of his brother.

Cw: horror, mild gore, child endangerment (nothing permanent)

- they went to the playground, but emmet is less excited than before. Meanwhile ingo had so much fun

- whoever hit ingo was about to check on him, but after seeing that decided to get the hell out of there

- after that, emmet always holds ingo's hand and look both ways before crossing

- it took a while for ingo to process what happened and learn this is not normal

- emmet feels bad, but ingo remembers it fondly. His favourite was the swings.

- their family never know, but ingo required a bit more blood after the incident. He's not allowed to go out without family's supervision until years later

#horror #mild gore cw #child endangerment #pokemon #subway masters #vampire ingo human emmet au #chips's work

[pyreshe]

@3rgentnt - have you cooled off yet?

the bottom of the freezer is hard and the ice that once lined the bottom in spikes is now nothing more than a chilly puddle that's soaked through her shirt and sweater, but it's effective enough. the deep freeze had been confined enough that the fire had sputtered when first she'd been able to conjure it, sturdy enough in it's build that it didn't even pause at the heat. she'd started kicking frantically at the door, screaming for help, to be let out, asking why this was happening and was only ever awarded slim fragments of light and fresh air for her troubles. the door barely budged and whatever was put on top was far too heavy for her to lift.

livvy isn't sure how long it had been since she stopped kicking and then stopped screaming, opting instead for a fetal position on the metal floor and the pitch dark. it could have been hours, by now.

she figured the older girl would have left a while ago; the silence after her screams had been thick enough to cut with a knife. but allison's voice is muffled through the steel walls of the deep freeze, and she hears it none the less. something tears out of her mouth thats between a sob and a near hysterical laugh, but no words come out. just a few more kicks to the top of the freezer and sobs.

#3rgent #YELLS #kidnapping cw #child endangerment cw

[sweetpeaches666]

After watching Transformers: Superlink/Energon, I don't hate Kicker. I mean I was annoyed by him sometimes, but I didn't came to hate him. Kicker could have been writen better. Plus, considering his upbringing, he could have been worse. Kicker could had end up becoming a villain instead.

The character I actually hate is his father. Seriously, this man treated his son like a tool and becomes surprise when Kicker doesn't want to listen to him. He literally put his little son in space by himself while there was a high chance everything could have gone wrong.

And to a lesser extent, I also dislike Miranda since she allowed her husband to put their son in danger instead of threatening to leave Brian and take the kids with her.

#transformers #transformers superlink #tf superlink #transformers energon #tf energon #kicker jones #dr brian jones #tf miranda jones #cw child abuse #cw child endangerment

[asktrainerzoroark]

(cw for child abuse and endangerment below)

#pokeask #fuku zoroark #fuku's father #fuku's mother #pokeaskblog #pokemon askblog #pokemon ask blog #zoroark #cw child abuse #cw child endangerment

[darkfinch]

if you wish, and I am bracing already for what this might bring, tell us about rabbit as a child? (otherwise or as a palate cleanser, enquiring brits want to know how he takes his tea)

ALWAYS happy to talk about the beloved unhinged uncle <3

i’m glad you’re bracing! We’ll start here: one of Babusia’s friends kills an asshole for work, kills his mistress (who did NOT show up in the halfhearted recon and was NOT supposed to be there and WAS a surprise witness), and then finds a kid hiding under the bed while he's cleaning up.

a hundred and fifty utterances of the word "fuck" later, the kid’s dropped off very apologetically at Known Kid-Haver Babusia’s house. He doesn’t talk for a few months, but he Does eat his weight in soup, which is very encouraging. This is Rabbit, age 7.

he grows up as the youngest in the busiest era of Babusia’s kids (11 in the house at the same time, aaa, aaaaaaa; when he's 13 she takes in a few more, and he stops being the baby. 4 of these kids make it to 40).

he’s very shy and very quiet and is immediately involuntarily taken under the wing of a hot-headed dirty-blonde ten-year-old, who is impulsive and trouble-seeking and smug (and who, much later, has a :3-faced ringlet-ed gremlin baby). She beats people up for him. They're sparring partners. They do forbidden secret baby crime together (get infinite candy with this one simple hack: corner store thievery).

baby rabbit: is reigning hide-and-seek champion, is world’s tiniest survival-skills expert, is at his most confident when he’s telling you which plants would kill you if you ate them. Is a cat whisperer. Can mimic bird noises with terrifying accuracy. Is determined to be good enough to be Good Enough.

it’s widely known among the babusia kids that the first time you kill someone is half-test half-right of passage. It’s like, yeah, okay, Baba's decided you're ready to try this for Real (with a chaperone)—but also, some people are wired to be able to do this, and some just aren’t.

Quinn, for example, watches a couple of older kids come home throwing up and having night terrors about it, and then is himself completely fine. Quinn gets celebratory pie.

Rabbit, who knows Babusia tends to encourage the panickers into non-hitter lines of work—and who Knows she knows about how she got him, that she's maybe Expecting something from him—sneaks out to have his crisis in the privacy of the shed.

so: rabbit gets his pie, and gets a mentor, and gets to work, and he should probably not have done this, and like 12 years later he'll have a massive breakdown and build a cabin for himself in the middle of nowhere and be very normal about it :)

[quinn got his Tea Preferences from watching uncle rabbit with stars in his eyes, only quinn has like. tastebuds. restraint. the will to live. so imagine someone who uses three times the amount of leaves necessary and then steeps it until it's legally considered a health hazard, and then occasionally adds jam 4 flavour. that's rabbit. babusia shaking her head mournfully in the bg)

#finchtalks #thank u for asking abt him i have nothing good to say <3 #finch brand quinn lore #cw murder #cw child endangerment IDK DUDE IT FEELS LIKE IT NEEDS A TAG OR SOMETHING #CW WE'RE TRAINING BABIES TO DO A HOMICIDE #quinn has a cousin who had a full-blown crisis after his first job and babusia was like. have you considered being a wilderness educator <3 #and now he teaches kids how to build fires and make shelters and identify plants and everyone is v proud of him #like. there are options. but theres also an unspoken Vibe that being a hitter is What You Should Want #and rabbit doesnt want it. but he wants to want it. so he does it #finchlore

[blinkasaurus]

Okay okay I have something to say.

If you follow me you know I hate the CK S5 baby plot. I’m not ranting here about why. Lots of good reasons to hate it. But listen, here’s the thing.

1. They’ve decided to go the route of making CK an over the top karate soap opera, yeah?

2. We have now had MULTIPLE instances of Terry brooding over legacy and the future and the importance of the next generation, right?

3. Terry was shown giving veiled threats to Carmen and Johnny, and he now knows Carmen is expecting.

THEREFORE

4. As much as I HATE this baby plot and wish it had never existed (no I don’t care at all that it was foreshadowed; it’s cheap and assassinates at least two characters in one fell swoop, if not like five), if they are too cowardly to give us a “comically villainous Terry steals the baby” plot line, Jane the Virgin style, after setting it up this way, then they’re really missing an opportunity to make this show everything their twisted little minds seem to want it to be.

Just sayin’.

(Disclaimer that in addition to hating baby plots with the exception of shows that made it clear from the start we’d be getting them, I also hate child peril plots. Severely. But given where they seem to be taking the show, it really would be a shame if they didn’t just commit.)

#ck negativity #cobra kai season 5 #babygate 2022 #terry silver #johnny lawrence #carmen diaz #cw child endangerment #or something #but seriously if you’re gonna be that flippant with reproduction I guess the baby can be a weird plot pawn too #honestly eff this mess #go off I guess #Sands says #ck meta #maybe? not really meta just me complaining