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Moth and Taxidermist

Augusnippets day 4: amputation | degloving | vivisection

Word count: 497

Trigger warnings: violence, injury (exposed bone, collapsed lung), blood, implied/referenced vivisection

——————(0)——————

Karmic fights, he swears. The moment he’s certain that the hostages have been freed, those viscera-stinking shadows slinking back to—to his father, he attacks. This man hasn’t seen him since he was small; he has no idea how quick Karmic is, how sharp his claws are. If he can strike first, fast, then—

At the same time his hand swipes a chunk out of the side of his father’s face and neck, there’s a familiar pain piercing his chest.

His father had demonstrated what his bloodmist could do to someone if they breathed it in, during the ‘negotiations’ that led to Karmic going with him. It felt like Brier had punched him in the solar plexus, any breath-based magic immediately beyond him as he wheezed for breath, except it went on and on until a negligent wave of his father’s hand let him breathe fully again. It had not been a fucking pleasure, to say the least.

It is still not a fucking pleasure.

He stumbles, and that’s his undoing. One moment, he’s looking at the pale mandible his claws exposed; the next, pure black floods his vision as shadows knock him flat on his back, punching whatever air he has left out of him. He tries jackknifing back up, but can’t—the shadows have stayed, keeping him pinned down.

The swears that pour out of his mouth come loud and vehement, courtesy of his father as he heals Karmic’s lungs.

There’s a sigh as his father walks into view. Shadows are vanishing from his cheek, leaving him unblemished. “It’s the brain you have to worry about, little one,” he says.

“Fuck the shit off,” Karmic spits.

“Our brains are our only fatal weakness,” his father continues, ignoring him. “Everything else is restorable, but if we lose the organ that knows how to restore things, that means our death. Make sure to adjust your defensive combat to account for this, yes?”

“Oh, so that means your ears are full of shit, too! Makes sense, since you’re not fucking listening!”

“We’re not worrying about brains today, though,” his father says, still going on. His hand goes up, pointer finger aimed at Karmic, eyes narrowing. “We’re worrying about that crutch in your chest.”

Karmic has enough time to register his father’s finger turning black before it blurs, and there’s a ripping sound. Too late he realizes that his clothes have been sliced open larynx to navel; too late the words ‘crutch in his chest’ click together with why his torso is free of shadows;

too late he knows what his father is about to do to him.

"No," he says.

“Yes,” his father counters, kneeling gracefully. “Your heart is what killed you last time. I was happy to supply my own, but you should’ve learned how to replace it ages ago. We’re fixing that now.”

He smiles. It’s a lovely, loving, terrifying smile. “Don’t worry. I’ll be with you the whole time.”

The first guiding cut slides over Karmic’s sternum.

Break Rocks; Breaktime

Augusnippets day 5: drunk caretaking | concussed caretaking | feverish caretaking

Word count: 495

Trigger warnings: implied/referenced vomiting, injury, minor blood, implied/referenced slavery

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“Wakey wakey, eggs ‘n bakey!” Brier chirped quietly.

With a jolt, Karmic finally came to, eyes snapping open wide and pupils … probably slitted to nothingness, since she couldn’t see them. His thin sleep cocoon raced away in a rush of frost, but his instinctive attack stopped, the consequences of how he’d twitched catching up. He didn’t do anything so loud as groan or curse, but his face said everything about how heavily he regretted waking up.

“Brier,” he said after a strained moment. He was starting to categorize all the bumps and scrapes he had—she saw his fingers flex subtly, then a cascade up his limbs as he made sure all his joints were in working order. She also saw when he got to his twisted ankle, judging from his obvious wince.

“Hi, Karmic!” Brier murmured. “Checked you for internal, spinal injuries, you’re good. No breaks in your ankle, just sprained. No lumps on your head. Your pupils are the same size, too! You’re not gonna vomit or kill the sun, right?”

“No,” Karmic said, rolling his shoulders, then stared sulkily at his turtleneck, which was slightly torn, spattered with blood, and covered in rock dust. His gaze flickered over to Brier for a split second. “Fun fact about your head, though.”

“I think I slammed head-first into the ground,” Brier admitted. Nothing else would make ol’ reliable earth damage her so much. The concussion would go away in two days, sure, but it was impressive that she was concussed at all. “We got off lucky.”

(A sprawled, unmoving form; blood seeping into the river. Yes, they’d been lucky.)

“I’ll say,” Karmic muttered, now staring up the slope they’d tumbled down. “How did we get down here? And how am I …?”

“… Um. The metal mage could conjure magic-canceling shackles,” Brier said. One of her hands curled into a fist. “Another slammed you with a sleep spell instantly after.”

“Fuck,” Karmic spat. His hand aborted a movement towards his deep, obvious eyebags.

“We’ll fix it,” Brier said. Hopefully they could. A weakness to sleep spells because of lack of sleep aside, those eyebags really weren’t healthy. “The teleporter tried grabbing you when you dropped. And I ….”

(A burn, starbursting and charred on the side of a pale neck. Nightmares, hostility; a newfound hatred for small, locked places.)

“That’s a telling skill range,” she said. “So I threw a boulder. And accidentally caused a little rockslide.”

“A little rockslide, she says,” Karmic mocked, fingers ghosting up to make sure the collar of his turtleneck was intact. “Those fucking slavers”—his lips peeled back to reveal fangs—“better be alive.”

“Waiting for the guard to pick’em up!” Brier confirmed, pointing at three lumps of rock, then turned her sway at the motion into a turn, presenting her back. “Up! I’ll be your legs, you’ll be my brain.”

There was a mutinous pause. Then arms circled her neck—she hefted him up, wavered, then started walking.

Philosophical Incident

Augusnippets day 6: car accident | plane crash | shipwreck

Word count: 500

Trigger warnings: minor injury, minor blood

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“Cass. Cass! Cassie!”

Cassander let his head loll to the side. “What,” he deigned to answer.

“Don’t ‘what’ me, ya goth fuck!” Mag snapped. “Stop contemplating the secrets of the universe and tell me if it’s because yer being you or because yer head got fucking cracked open!”

Ugh, he was so loud. “If now isn’t the time for philosophy,” Cassander posited, “when is?” The road was nice and level, warm from the sun. It was a good day for cloud-watching. In all honesty, laying here and staring up at the blue sounded like a much better deal than having to sit up and contend with any injuries he definitely had.

“When yer magic-forsaken road rash hasn’t maybe sheared off important bits of your fucking circle tattoos! Have I mentioned lately that those’re fucking suicidal? Have I mentioned that I don’t like being, oh, I dunno, stabbed or burned or exploded?”

“If my spell circles were going to explode,” Cassander said, “they would’ve done it already.” They did have a point, though. Hells. If any of his circles were affected, if his clothes hadn’t protected his skin enough … he was going to have to do so many touch-ups, he just knew it.

Alright. Time to get up, aaand there was the pain. Mostly duller pain, though—he was going to have a helluva set of bruises later.

“Any goose egg-type feelings?” Mag asked, squinting at him. “Can’t check your pupils—dizziness, amnesia, anything?”

“Oh, I hate having to reimburse people,” Cassander muttered, eyeing what had once been their car. Well, it was still recognizably a car, if you liked your cars crumpled like an accordion. At least the top was open, and they both knew how to fall when they got thrown forward and out.

“Cassander!”

“No concussion symptoms, just bruises and minor cuts.” What had made it through his clothing hadn’t seemed to touch his tattoos yet, thankfully. “You’re going to be the one paying back the rental. This is on you and your horrific driving. I didn’t think it was possible to hate cars even more than I did before.”

Mag sputtered, before leveling an accusing finger at him. “Take the wheel, then, if ya hate my driving so much!” he said.

“No,” Cassander said, flat and immediate. “I would rather die. I almost did die, actually.” It was either endure Mag’s idea of road safety, or willingly put on a siphoning cuff to provide magic for the engine. He’d like to sleep at night, thanks, instead of scrubbing his wrists raw from the nightmares.

All of Mag’s fight left him, his shoulders sagging. “Right,” they muttered, looking at a vaguely bloody rip in Cassander’s pants.

Cassander instantly made an affronted sound. “Stop looking like a kicked puppy; I know what I signed up for, or else I wouldn’t have gotten in a car with you again.”

“Right,” Mag said again, lips quirking a little; he held out a hand. “Well, let’s figure out how’ta get outta this mess.”

Try, Try Again

Augusnippets day 7: waterboarding | drowning | choking

Word count: 498

Trigger warnings: child abuse, depictions of drowning, symptoms like vomiting(?)

——————(0)——————

Aristaeus only realizes that the hand in his hair has yanked him up when he’s choking on air for long, agonizing seconds. Water in his lungs, water in his stomach—all of it comes spluttering out, dragging pain behind it like yanking hooks along his esophagus. He heaves, and he is wretched—

“I remain convinced that you are not taking this seriously, morseling.”

—and he has failed. Again.

The hand in his hair tightens, just a bit; in response, all his breathing cuts off for a terrifying moment, before in a great rush, water floods out his mouth and nose, splattering into the river. The force of it makes him grasp at the shingle around him in weak, desperate movements, but when he can finally inhale, it comes clean, free of any damp rattle in his lungs, though it rasps in his abused throat. Teacher is merciful, even after his many failures.

“I am,” Aristaeus croaks, “I swear, I am.” His next words are practiced, and resonate with the scorching, acidic mass rooted deep into his chest: “This is within nature, so it is within mine.”

He cuts it off there, as he’s learned. Anything more sounds like begging to Teacher—the divine, even pale, reaching imitations like him, do not beg, as Teacher says.

“And yet,” Teacher says, “the lesson remains unlearned.”

Her hand in his hair pulls him back, back, back, and his breath shudders as the arch of his spine lets him meet Her eyes, pebbles for irises surrounded by mossy sclera. Her face is set in statuesque, forbidding disapproval, as always.

No mouth is needed to speak the tongue of the gods, only a will to be heard, and so Her lips remain sealed as She proclaims, “You will stay under for as long as it takes for you to learn how to breathe.”

The sentence nearly makes his hands fly up (to grasp at her hand and plead? To rip it from his head?); he stills them, and they hover somewhere above his knees. He knows She doesn’t mean what they’ve been doing so far. The notion makes him start trembling.

“Teacher, I am mortal. Prolonged drowning will kill me,” he says. She needs the reminder, occasionally—their existences are so far apart. Maybe ….

“It will not be drowning if you are breathing,” Teacher says, implacable. “I can expel water from your body in the river as easily as out of it. You will learn, splinterling, or you will stay.”

Aristaeus knows it’s coming. It doesn’t make the push forward into the water any less jarring, or the shingle wrapping around him to keep him under any less frightening. Her hand is still in his hair—he is trapped utterly in Her power, and it’s a cold comfort to know he won’t die, no matter how painful.

As he breathes in, tries to convert the water to magic he can sustain himself on, fails again, and starts to seize, he hopes he’ll learn Her lesson quickly.

Another Good Day

Augusnippets day 8: reunion | found family | friends

Word count: 500

Trigger warnings: none

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“Honey, we’re ho-ome!” Brier trills, and doesn’t dodge the cloth snapped at the back of her head.

“Who are you talking to, there’s no one inside,” Yolotli grumbles, probably rolling their eyes. They start trundling forward; Brier steps aside in a practiced motion so her toes don’t get crushed.

“Maybe I’m talking to the house, Li-li! It’s my baby, I built it with my own two hands!” Brier says, stepping in after Yolotli. Rui, Piri, and Tal trudge quietly in her wake, with Karmic bringing up the rear guard—always so protective, especially of the young lives living under their roof.

“And I designed, wired, and warded it with my own two hands,” Yolotli deadpans, reaching under their chair for the bag there and depositing it on the dinner table as they go past it. “I am this house’s genetic donor just as much as you are.”

“And I furbished and powered this house with my own two hands,” Karmic drawls, gently settling Sor into a cat hammock. “My goodness, Brier, stop hogging all the credit of this designer baby for yourself.”

“Is that how babies work?” Ruika says, apparently still with enough energy to have interest in their conversation, instead of immediately flopping into his bed. Tal, at least, is going that direction—beelining for the shower first, though; good, his body would thank him for it later.

“Nice try, firefly,” Sym says, somehow managing to talk clearly around the bag handles in her mouth. She spits them out once she’d dragged the bag next to Yolotli’s, and continues: “None of these three are going to feel comfortable explaining that to you until you’re at least thirteen, so you’re in for a wait.”

Ruika’s eyes glisten, bottom lip wobbling tragically.

Sym only snorts. “Not even if you make that face, Rui.”

Ruika’s attempt to make his face even sadder is interrupted by Karmic casually ruffling his hair as he passes by. “You can improve your ‘woe is me’ face while you’re doing cooldown stretches,” Karmic says. “Follow along with what Piri’s doing.”

Piri glances up from the pretzel-like contortion she’s pulled her body into, and grins. “It’ll be fun, Ruika!” she chirps. “I don’t bite. Well, I don’t bite friends.”

Ruika stares at her for a long moment, then slowly turns to Karmic and very seriously says, “I think I might die.”

Brier bursts into giggles at that. “You don’t have to follow her completely!” she says, taking out another stack of containers from the picnic basket and setting them in the sink. “Just go as best as you can! You already did cooldowns at the park—this is just to kill time until you get your turn in the shower.”

Ruika pulls a face, but heaves a great sigh and edges around Piri’s toothy smile at his approach, plopping down and eyeing how she’s twisted herself with some trepidation.

Brier turns away, hides her dopey expression as she starts running the water. As the house sings of warmth, she hums along.

Hare and Kit

Augusnippets day 9: hypothermia | overheating | dehydration

Word count: 496

Trigger warnings: implied/referenced death, description of corpses, implied/referenced child death

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“You,” Archaios says, “are not just shivering from pain, are you.”

The child, predictably, shivers in response.

“Fuck,” Archaios says, and picks up speed. “Look, in my defense, you were getting shredded from the inside-out by curse energy, I had other things on my mind! Like keeping you un-shredded! I forgot that humans are—squishy! Don’t like being cold! Fuck!”

Because he’s reveled in blizzards before, only to come across blanched, stiff corpses, squirreled in little snow-dens that they thought would save them. He’s tried to save ones that were still breathing by feeding on their cold, hoping that drawing it away would help keep them warm. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t.

“I hate doing that on children, you know?” he murmurs into the child’s forehead. “It’s filthy, feeding from the young. And you shouldn’t have to be so close to death, anyways. You should—”

Be with your parents, laughing and loved, free of curse marks, not small and alone. Be warm.

Too many things this child should have instead of some inhuman hermit that came upon them by happenstance; it all crowds Archaios’ throat and clogs there.

His next step echoes, warps; his own wards welcome him as he slows his run into the cave to a purposeful stride. He has pelts stored away, despite his best efforts to foist everything he hunts on humans that actually need it. Humans always bundle themselves up in the cold, surely those will help.

He has two pelts … well, one is a cloak. He wraps that first around the child, then the second, until only the child’s pale face and baby wisps of their white hair show. Then—and this is the hard part—he sits back until only a comforting hand is touching the swaddled child.

“Fenn always told me my skin was icy,” he tells them. “I don’t think holding you will help, no matter how it’ll make me feel better. But ….”

He’s bundled up the child, stopped touching them with his cold hands. Is there anything else? How will he know this is helping? How soon? He’s always known his knowledge on humans is essentially a dark, unknown chasm, but never has it yawned deeper, faced with a child he must save.

“Maybe,” he starts, then looks at the black marks crawling up the child’s cheeks, and stops. Bringing this child to humans, to anyone that knows better, will only get them killed.

Then a realization clicks, followed by his heart dropping.

“Fire,” Archaios says. “You need fire. Except I … I don’t know how to light one.”

He’s never really needed it—he needs cold, not heat. And he’s never committed to saving a cold victim like this child, so he’s never thought of it before.

Wait, no. He has.

He sighs and heaves himself up. “I hope Tiana forgives me,” he mutters. “And you. For using a practice meant to invite ambient magic to light funeral pyres for you.”

He goes to find sticks.

At the Hook (Line, Sinker)

Augusnippets day 10: execution | fake execution | begging for mercy

Word count: 499

Trigger warnings: description of death, implied/referenced panic attack

——————(0)——————

Mag knows his face goes pale when he sees the man waiting for them, the thick, wicked hook in the ceiling. The assistant holding rope in a telling noose.

They absolutely don’t care if this man’s reputation is being used to frighten them into obedience. Either that’s the case, or talking will buy Cassander time to scrounge up a miracle to let them escape, or they’re both fucking dead.

“Please,” he whispers; louder: “Please, no, I don’t, I don’t—! Not like this, fuck, not like this!”

“Not like this?” the man—Marcus? Marius? Martin?—says, an easy smile spreading across his face. “That can be arranged. There are plenty of ways to—”

“What do you want?” Mag interrupts, because they really don’t want to know all the horrible ways maybe-Marcus has found to kill people. He already knows this man would see him hung slowly, death by strangulation instead of a broken neck. “What do you want?! I’ll do anything!”

They want to yank the words back as soon as they leave—it’s too much to give. But maybe-Marius wouldn’t accept anything less, anyways.

“Are you sure?” maybe-Martin says, nearly pouting. “I’ve been wanting to see what a destroying angel will do to someone. It eases up while it’s liquefying your liver—what does the anticipation do to you, feeling better but knowing you’ll die?”

“No! Fuck no! Please, I said I’ll do anything, please!”

“Oh, calm down. I can think of some ways to use a thief as famous as you, if you’re willing to do anything.”

Mag’s heart leaps in relief; his first guess was right. “Yes! Yes, I’ll do whatever—!”

“What about him, though?”

And back down their heart went into dread.

“He’s my partner,” Mag says, not looking at where Cassander was forced to kneel beside him. “He’ll do whatever you want, too.”

Play along, they think, please play along, don’t act out and ruin this, it might be our only chance.

“Of course, yes,” Marcus(?) says. His smile widens, goes sadistic and ugly. “But I want to hear him beg for it.”

Fuck, we’re dead.

Because the keyword with Cassander is proud. He’d fought every step of the way here, to the point that he was more heavily restrained than Mag now. He never apologized or said he was wrong. He’d spit defiance to someone holding a knife to his throat.

A tense pause. Then:

“Please,” Cassander grit out.

Marius(?) raises a brow. “Go on,” he prompts.

“Please,” Cassander says again. Then, picking up speed: “Please, please, please, please, áni, áni, áni—”

He cuts off. The only sound is his frantic breathing.

Mag tries his best to keep from gaping, because what the fuck, while picking over the last word. What was that, another language? Ahni? Ahani?

… No. He’s saying áni. Because that’s Áléen.

“Please what?” fucking Martin(?) is saying.

The answering jumble of syllables is foreign to Mag, but apparently it convinces the motherfucker.

“Well, then,” he says. “Here’s what you’re going to do.”

@augusnippets Path of Hurt

Day 10: execution/fake execution/begging for mercy

CW: minor whumpee, mock execution, government corruption, abuse of power, imprisonment, framed for a crime, future captivity

Itzal (he/him)

Word count: 756 (a bit longer but I couldn't resist)

The Champion taglist: @emmettland , @ostensiblywhump , @scoundrelwithboba

They don't listen when he says he hasn't killed anyone. When they shove the gag into his mouth and secure the strap at the back of his neck, Itzal realizes they're not going to listen to anything he has to say.

He doesn't want to die.

It didn't make sense. There wasn't a trial. No evidence given that tied him to the supposed death of whatever unnamed Lapis guard they mentioned.

Only twenty-four hours between Itzal getting brought down to this prison and learning they were going to kill him.

‘ “Rebels don't get trials,” ’ they had said, sneering laughs lapping up the tiefling's terror.

He cursed them. Would've trashed and clawed up his cell had the shackles at his wrists not held him down. Would've tormented the guards with illusions had his magic not been suppressed. All he had were his words and he used them. Such fragile pride they had that they'd waste time and resources to silence a seventeen year old vandal who dared to insult them.

Itzal's anger spat until they gagged him.

He realizes now part of that anger had been fueled by denial. Armored guards clutch his bound arms as they drag him towards the courtyard, and dread clutches his gut.

He's going to die.

He tries so hard to fight. Bucks at the grasping hands until their grip is hard enough to bruise. Lashes out with his horns until one guard grabs one to force his head still. The blindfold around his head is wet with tears he failed not to shed.

He should’ve been more careful. Should've picked a safer, less public spot for his last graffiti run. Should've went home when his mother told him to and wait for a different day. 

His mother's face flashes into Itzal's mind. His father's. His little sister's. 

What's going to happen to them?

He won't even get to say goodbye. 

The screech of a metal door opening preceeds a waft of warmth as the sunlight hits his skin. The Crescentine sun is always harsh in the summer. The guards force Itzal to his knees in the dirt, latching the chains to a bolt in the ground so he couldn't stand. Couldn't flee. He balls his hands into fists to hide how much he's shaking. 

“Itzal Azarola,” a voice booms from behind. “For the crimes of treason, accomplice to murder of a government official, defacement of government property, government slander, and resisting arrest, you have been sentenced to death under orders from the Cerulean Constellate.”

Treason?

It doesn't seem real. It can't be real. This has to be a nightmare. He'll wake up home in his bed and be safe.

There's more noises. A rifle being loaded. His heart hammering in his chest. 

He will wake up soon. He doesn't want to die.

A click of the safety being released. A muffled sob escaping his lips.

He doesn't want to die.

“Fire!”

HE DOESN'T WANT TO DIE!

A trigger being pulled. 

A deafening blast sends him reeling, all other sound drowns under the piercing ring in his ears. His head throbs. His body collapses. He hopes it'll be quick. He hopes it'll be over before he feels it. He-

He's still alive.

The pain of a bullet tearing through his organs doesn't come. No smell of blood or burning flesh. The world still dark under a blindfold he can still feel on his face. Itzal is still alive.

More hands grab him. The chain is released from the ground and he is being carried away. His legs drag uselessly. His muscles feel like gelatin. His mind in a fog.

Why?

He should feel relief but instead there's a void. Nausea burning up his throat he has no choice but to force down because he's still gagged. 

What's happening?

Was there a mistake? Is he actually dead and his thoughts now are from his ghost trying to cling to life? Where are they taking him? He still can't see. No one's saying anything. What're they going to do to him now?

They drop him on hard stone. “Is this the one you wanted, Lady Matar?”

The blindfold is removed. There's a woman standing in front of Itzal. Short red hair and red eyes. Cloaked in the luxurious vestments of the Constellate. Lady Matar. High Martinet Scarlet Matar.

The master of judicial law stares down at the young tiefling, drinking in the tears on his face.

The way she smiles at him is the most terrifying thing he's ever seen.

“Yes. I will be taking him now.”