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#as i take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends
dk-thrive · 1 year
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And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap
And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
— Linda Pastan, from “I Am Learning to Abandon the World” PM/AM: New and Selected Poems (W. W. Norton & Company; October 17, 1982) (via Read a Little Poetry)
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thedancemostofall · 9 months
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Learning to Abandon the World
by Linda Pastan
I am learning to abandon the world before it can abandon me. Already I have given up the moon and snow, closing my shades against the claims of white. And the world has taken my father, my friends. I have given up melodic lines of hills, moving to a flat, tuneless landscape. And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
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I am learning to abandon the world before it can abandon me. Already I have given up the moon and snow, closing my shades against the claims of white. And the world has taken my father, my friends. I have given up melodic lines of hills, moving to a flat, tuneless landscape. And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
Linda Pastan, “I Am Learning to Abandon the World” from PM/AM: New and Selected Poems (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982
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firstfullmoon · 3 years
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I am learning to abandon the world before it can abandon me. Already I have given up the moon and snow, closing my shades against the claims of white. And the world has taken my father, my friends. I have given up melodic lines of hills, moving to a flat, tuneless landscape. And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
— Linda Pastan, “I Am Learning To Abandon the World”
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ashintheairlikesnow · 3 years
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hmmm can vampires get sick? maybe sick vampire chris thinking Jake is gonna pull out or file down his fangs? or just thinking Jake’s gonna hurt him?
CW: Sick whumpee, vampire whumpee, blood drinking, vague implications of past sadistic/creepy whumper, dehumanization, vague tooth/mouth whump (nothing direct, but aftermath)
Sort of a sequel to this piece, part of the Vampire Chris AU
"What hurts?" He keeps his voice low, and carefully doesn't hesitate before he lays a hand over the vampire's forehead. Of course it feels lukewarm, room temperature, but he still goes through the motions of feeling for a fever. It's muscle-memory, instinct, and he keeps forgetting Chris is dead.
He has been dead for a long time, if his occasional comments on what sounds like Prohibition are true.
"Bones," Chris whimpers, twisting where he lays in Jake's bed. There's a bright flush in his cheeks from the blood he'd drained from the two men who broke into the house. Those odd eyes glitter, overbright. "My... m'bones hurt, Jake."
His mouth opens, pulling air in over his tongue and down his throat in soft pants, and Jake is reminded that vampires don't sweat. Not the same way, anyway, although with enough blood they can, in thin sheens of pink-tinged liquid that are even more alarming than their tears.
His fangs are visible this way, razor-sharp canines that come down further than the rest of his teeth, a brighter white than all the others from being pulled and regrowing so many times.
Jake swallows against his nervousness, brushing hair away from the vampire's forehead. His slit pupils are dilated, taking up too much of the iris, and he tells himself that Chris is as scared as he is of the instincts that drive him, barely understands them.
Vampires aren't animals - but when they don't understand themselves, they act like it sometimes.
"Do you think maybe those guys were on something? Like, a drug maybe?" He pets through Chris's hair, fingercombing his hair, and watches Chris's eyes flutter closed.
It's hard not to feel more than a little reassured not having to look at them any longer. Which makes him feel guilty, considering this not-a-kid kid just beat up people for hurting him.
Killed them, his brain whispers. Killed them like he could kill you.
"May, maybe," Chris mumbles, and pants again.
His gums seem oddly dark, where normally they're pale, and Jake frowns. He wishes now he knew more about vampire physiology, that he'd paid more attention in class when they took the safety courses on how to avoid them.
There's not exactly a class on caring for one - not unless you can afford to purchase them outright.
"Well, when you were-... uh, before you found us... did you ever feel like this?"
Chris's eyes blink slowly back open and he nods. "Sometimes. My, my, my, my-... someone would, um, take something before, before the party, and I'd..." He groans and shudders. Jake can see the pain move through his body as he trembles nearly violently. "I'd feel like, like, like this after... for hours..."
"Okay. So... probably you just have to let this get worked out of your system, right? Or... is there a medicine?"
"No... just... just drink more." Chris looks up at him, eyes so wide and sad and scared and hurting, and grabs onto his wrist with one hand. Those cool fingers are never not a little startling, colder than the air around them, than the rest of his body.
Vampires have poor circulation, Jake knows, even when they're filled up on a fresh meal. He's seen Chris heal his own wounds before with his tongue, had him explain that they don't heal on their own with time if they're on hands or feet.
"Chris-"
"You, you, you, you-... can, um, you can take my teeth after. You can. I'll hold still. I'll, I'll be good." Chris's plea is barely a whisper.
His nails, which must have been a little too long when he was killed and turned, dig painfully into Jake's wrist in his desperation.
"I'll be so, so, so so so so good, Jake. So good for you, and then, you can, you you you can take my teeth-... Sir always liked it, it makes me me me cry, we we cry blood, Sir liked to take photos of it-"
"Sssshhhh. Hush, Chris." Jake's mind races. There are others in the house, but-... he can't ask them to give up blood to Chris. They've already taken over cleaning the blood up from the hardwood floor. Nat's already dealt with talking to the cops and the EMTs and the coroner before the bodies were taken away. They already handled hiding Chris in a false-backed closet while Jake was interviewed by police officers who looked interested and excited,, not disturbed.
It's not every day you see a vampire attack, after all.
Mostly they're under control, kept on leashes and muzzled like dangerous dogs, the property of rich celebrities looking for novelty in a world where they already have everything. The few ferals are killed pretty fast.
Or so everyone says.
Jake is starting to wonder if there are more vampires out there than he knows about.
The cops had even insisted on checking the attic, as if Chris was a bat they might find hanging upside down. That had been ridiculous, but it's not like Jake could say he knew better without being asked how he knew so much about them in the first place.
Oh, because we keep one like a stray fucking puppy. That wouldn't go over well.
He feels a little woozy from the adrenaline crash, and still aches from the bruised ribs where he was kicked around. His mouth aches from the duct tape they'd put over it, and he'd got a hell of a rash starting around his wrists. He's so exhausted he might collapse.
But... Chris really did show up right on time, and maybe saved his life.
Chris pulls Jake's wrist to his face, nuzzles into the inside of it against the pale blue veins that show through the thin skin. Jake shudders at the feeling, swallowing back a low-level disgust.
He wonders how old the teenager really is - he wonders that all the time.
"You c-can have my teeth, after," Chris whispers, lips moving against Jake's skin. "You can keep them. Sir used to, to, to keep them in a box and show m-me. Just, please, please help me feel better, Jake, please... It won't hurt."
Jake closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. "If it'll help... fine. But I'm not taking your teeth. They're yours."
"Thank you," Chris breathes out. "That's, that's, that's okay. I can still fix it for you. Thank you, Jake." His fangs slip back into Jake's skin as easily as a heated knife through warm butter.
The venom hits his bloodstream before the pain hits his nerves, and Jake feels himself slump over, head falling onto Chris's shoulder as all his limbs go dead.
It almost feels good, as his ribs stop aching, and the bruises stop throbbing on his skin. He can see why rich people love it as a party drug. You could drift in this place of perfect no-pain for a long, long time.
He feels only the wet movement of Chris's tongue, the shift of his fangs, the soft pressure of the other teeth pushing down. Chris purrs softly, drinking his blood like a kitten lapping milk.
It goes on and on, and for one terrifying second Jake thinks he's not going to stop until he's dead.
"Ch-... Chris-"
Those fangs slip suddenly out of his skin, the wet cool tongue licks rough over his wounds - closing them instantly.
The venom slowly fades, the aches and pains settling back into his body. Jake groans, feeling weak and exhausted.
Chris has to push him up off his shoulder, with unnatural strength moving him to lay on his side on the bed. Jake can barely keep his eyes open.
Chris, leaning over him, could rip his throat out and he couldn't even raise a hand to try and defend himself right now. Jake sees the body of the first dead robber behind his eyelids, the expression of horror written in eternal rictus in his expression, the blood down his shirt and puddled beneath him on the floor. The other man, fighting until he stopped, slumping until Chris had drained him to death.
"I feel better," Chris whispers, kneading at Jake's shirt briefly. "I, I, I feel so much better. Go to, um, go to sleep, Jake. I'll fix it so you're safe."
Jake can't even begin to understand what that means before he's already slid into something more like unconsciousness than actual sleep. The world around him simply goes black, and the last thing he feels is Chris pulling a blanket up to his chin.
The last thing he hears is those soft padding footsteps leaving the room.
When he wakes, he finds two fangs, pristine white with bloodied roots, sitting in a washcloth next to where his head lays on the pillow. he finds a pair of small pliers on the bathroom sink, with droplets of red around them.
The sun is shining outside the window, a bird singing loud enough to drive a drillbit into his head, and Chris is curled up asleep in the dark at the back of a closet, mouth slightly open.
Jake stares down at the empty spots where his fangs should be, and wonders if he's grateful, or horrified.
-
@burtlederp @finder-of-rings @endless-whump @astrobly @newandfiguringitout @doveotions @pretty-face-breaker @gonna-feel-that-tomorrow @boxboysandotherwhump @oops-its-whump @cubeswhump @whump-tr0pes @downriver914 @whumptywhumpdump @whumpiary @orchidscript @nonsensical-whump @outofangband
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Pup
You can find the Halloween request post  here :3
Thank you for the request @namjin-fangirling-again​, I hope you like it, even if it’s not particularly cracky but it’s still funny(at least in my eyes)   Request; “  werewolf. Jungkook. Make it extra fluffy and crack ”
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Jeon Jeongguk x reader Genre; Fluff and humour. Werewolf au Warnings; Adult language and topics . JK’s dick is mentioned multiple times because i have no self control Word count; 1.5k
Summary; Every full moon you lock Jeongguk in a cell ready for his animal side to take over his mind and body.  But little does he know that he’s not the big bad wolf he thinks he is.
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The full moon; the lifeforce and also the bane of every werewolf. 
Even though werewolves have been able to switch between wolf and human form at will for centuries now, the full moon still reigns over their bodies and forces them to be in wolf form. In the city, it's a nuisance but nothing terribly bad, most city wolves tend to simply spend the moon hours in their homes watching TV or sleeping it off. Those in the country have it easier; most meet in groups to run and play, take advantage of their wolves natural abilities. But there's a select handful of werewolves that are still affected by the moon like their ancestors; these unfortunate souls lose all grasp on their humanity the moment the full moon makes an appearance and are only aware of themselves again once the sun rises the following morning.
Jeon Jeongguk is one of those poor unfortunate souls and you are the only one that has seen him during these hours in a long time.
"Can't you just leave me here this time?" He complained as you chained the cell he was inside shut. Despite what Hollywood says; werewolves cannot break through thick metal chains during moon hours, they've never been able to either. Though there was that one time Jeongguk snapped his steering wheel a couple of months ago in the midst of a traffic jam leading up to moon hours. But that was purely a mix of stress at the thought of potentially being caught outside once he lost his humanity and his big ol' veiny arms thanks to his daily gym sessions. (We won't go into how hot you found his strength at that moment because that's another story entirely with a different rating and subject matter).
"I'm not leaving you here all night alone." You scoffed settling in your usual beanbag opposite the barred door of his cell and pulling the blanket at your feet around you. "You're lucky you don't feel the cold as much, it's fucking freezing in here."
"You say that every month." He chuckled laying down on the futon with one bare arm behind his head.
"It's the truth. We pay all that money for this room and they can't even install a heating system? We've been robbed, Guk."
"Whatever you say, babe."
You just hummed through your pout and took a few moments to take in his naked muscled form on display for your eyes and your eyes only - it was actually so that he didn't wreck his clothes when the shift happened but you liked to pretend it was all for your viewing pleasure. "How you feeling?"
"Fine, got a while left yet." That had you perking up in your seat. Sensing your movement, Jeongguk looked over at you unimpressed. "No."
"What? I didn't say anything!"
"Every single month you complain about being cold and then ask me to warm you up." He deadpanned.
"As you should, you're my boyfriend." You huffed dramatically.
"We're not having sex this close to moon hours,"
"But..." The look he gave you made you slouch sulkily into your blanket. "It would be fine."
"I'm not risking it. If my timing is off and the moon rises while you're in here... I don't want to even think about what I'd do to you. I love you too much to risk your safety just to get my dick wet."
"I've never felt unsafe around you during moon hours."
"You've never been around me during moon hours without these bars between us." At least, that's what he thought.
*
You didn't need a window to know when the full moon was beginning to make its appearance, all you needed was Jeongguk's groan of displeasure and you knew.
You straightened up from slouching against the wall playing on your phone to peer over at where Jeongguk was curled up with his arms bracketing his head. As much as you knew he wasn't in any pain during the transformation, you knew he hated every second of it. For the first few minutes, he always without fail tried to fight the change and grasped at his humanity in his mind but it never worked. His animal counterpart always rose up, taking over his mind first before too ruling his body.
The change from beginning to end never took more than five minutes; once his wolf was in charge the physical changes happened almost in a blink of an eye.
"Jungoo!" You cooed flinging the blanket off of your body to crawl over and unlock the gate. A pair of amber eyes peered at you, unfocused at first due to the change but in moments recognition set in and you had a lapful of wolf. Well, lapful is a bit generous honestly.
At any other time, Jeongguk's wolf was a fully grown majestic creature with sleek deep brown verging on black fur. But during moon hours Jeongguk's wolf was...well...a puppy. A tiny little ball of fluffy chocolate brown and you were the only one that knew about it.
"Hey puppy," Your hands rubbed over the little wriggling form on your thighs, scratching and rubbing his tiny body while he yipped and panted excitedly at the attention. "Hm, what shall we do today?" He barked at you, an almost squeak of a sound that had you cackling. If Jeongguk knew what happened to him during moon hours he would never look you in the eye again, he'd be so embarrassed of the fact his most instinctual form was a baby, an adorable little wolf pup that never left your side even to eat. Though to be honest, pretty much all of your friends knew that he loved to be babied and looked after, especially by you and would always choose you over anyone else even before you started dating. So it wouldn't surprise anyone to find out but he sure as hell would never live it down.
Just like all other full moons since the first one with Jeongguk three years ago, you spent the whole time playing and cuddling with his ickle wolfie, and moon hours are the only time that phrase isn't a euphemism- he had begged you to stop calling his dick 'ickle wolfie' multiple times but you always refused.
Before you knew it, your alarm was going off telling you that the sun was due to rise at any moment. "Better get back in there, Jungoo." You sighed wiping the pizza crumbs off of his muzzle. He looked up at you and whined sensing what was coming. "I'll miss you too, little one but we'll be able to play again together before you know it." He made vaguely distressed crying sounds the whole time you carried him into the cell and placed him gently onto the futon. He tried to clamber back into your arms but you quickly backed away after pressing a kiss to his fluffy little head. "Stay still, Guk will never let me come with him again if he wakes outside of the cell." The pup watched you back out of the cell and lock the door before he ran over to the bars and yipped at you.
Jeongguk woke like he did every sunrise after moon hours, curled up against the bars with your hand stroking through his hair. He made a sort of grunting sound signalling he was back to his normal self and earned a hair ruffle in return that had him swatting your hand away. While he reorientated himself you got up and removed the lock and chain from the door to return it to its home on the wall.
A sudden exhale left his lungs when you plopped down onto his naked lap and cuddled up to his chest.
"Did you feed me pizza again?" He questioned after figuring out what the taste lingering on his tongue was.
"Puppy loves pizza."
"You love pizza." He chuckled finally wrapping his arms around your waist to hold you tight.
"And you love me which means puppy loves me therefore by default, puppy loves pizza."
"Really wish you'd stop calling my wolf a puppy."
"The cutest puppy ever."
"Whatever you say, babe." Jeongguk laughed and pressed a kiss to your head so you straightened up instead of leaning on his shoulder.
"So, I'm still cold." You grinned mischievously while wiggling your eyebrows suggestively at him.
"You feel pretty warm to me." He teased, sliding his hands underneath the t-shirt and hoody on your torso to touch the warm skin of your waist.
"I'd like to be a lot warmer. And naked. And attached to you by our genitals." Jeongguk burst into laughter at your wording, something beyond fond and loving in his eyes as he admired your serious expression.
"You say the weirdest shit, sweetheart."
"Hm, I do but it works for you. I can feel ickle wolfie rising his head to play!" You sniggered wiggling on his lap.
"Pavlovian response to sunrise after moon hours. You've trained me to be ready for sex. You never should've taken that psychology course with Joon-hyung."
"Shut up and get me naked, wolf boy."
"Whatever you want, I live only to please you, my love!" Was his dramatic and very sarcastic response even if he was already lifting you up as he got to his knees ready to throw you onto the futon and give you exactly what you wanted.
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marcopolorules · 3 years
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Estoy aprendiendo a abandonar el mundo⠀ antes de que él pueda abandonarme a mí.⠀ Ya he renunciado a la luna⠀ y a la nieve, cerrando mis persianas⠀ a los reclamos de lo blanco.⠀ Y el mundo se ha llevado⠀ a mi padre, mis amigos.⠀ He renunciado a las líneas melódicas de las colinas,⠀ trasladándome a un paisaje plano, mudo.⠀ Y cada noche renuncio a mi cuerpo⠀ miembro a miembro en sentido ascendente⠀ a través de mis huesos hacia el corazón.⠀ Pero llega la mañana, con breves⠀ aplazamientos en la forma de café y el canto de los pájaros.⠀ Al otro lado de la ventana un árbol⠀ que hasta hace unos instantes no era más que una sombra⠀ recupera sus ramas hoja a hoja.⠀ Y mientras yo recupero mi cuerpo⠀ el sol apoya su cálido hocico en mi regazo⠀ como para enmendar el daño ocasionado.⠀ ⠀ I AM LEARNING TO ABANDON THE WORLD⠀ I am learning to abandon the world⠀ before it can abandon me.⠀ Already I have given up the moon⠀ and snow, closing my shades⠀ against the claims of white.⠀ And the world has taken⠀ my father, my friends.⠀ I have given up melodic lines of hills,⠀ moving to a flat, tuneless landscape.⠀ And every night I give my body up⠀ limb by limb, working upwards⠀ across bone, towards the heart.⠀ But morning comes with small⠀ reprieves of coffee and birdsong.⠀ A tree outside the window⠀ which was simply shadow moments ago⠀ takes back its branches twig⠀ by leafy twig.⠀ And as I take my body back⠀ the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap⠀ as if to make amends.⠀ ⠀ Linda Pastan⠀ & Kyle Dunn @__kyledunn__ (artist)⠀⠀ ⠀⠀ ⠀⠀ #portraitpainting #acrylicart #acrylicpaint #acrylicpainting #acrylique #acrylicpainter #acryliconpanel #acrylicpaints #acrylicpaintings #contemporaryart #contemporaryartist #contemporarypainting #contemporarypainter #contemporarypaintings #contemporarypaintings #contemporary_art #contemporarypainters #contemporaryfigurativeart #newcontemporary #modernart #modernpainting #artgallery #contemporaryartgallery #figurative #figurativeart #figurativepainting #figurativeportrait #vagabondwho #marcopolorules #kyledunn https://www.instagram.com/p/CTU6ajnD8hX/?utm_medium=tumblr
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apoemaday · 4 years
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I Am Learning to Abandon the World
by Linda Pastan
I am learning to abandon the world before it can abandon me. Already I have given up the moon and snow, closing my shades against the claims of white. And the world has taken my father, my friends. I have given up melodic lines of hills, moving to a flat, tuneless landscape. And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
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naorisososo · 4 years
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Night Driving
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Headlights flashed by every few minutes, as cars passed on my left side. The road was narrow, desperately clinging to the side of a rocky mountain face, and there was only a weak guardrail separating them from falling to their doom.
The thought popped into my head every time. I couldn’t help it. But I knew better. Plus, I convinced myself some time ago that I wasn’t the only one with dark thoughts like this. It’s what made me normal. Relatable, almost.
The map that sat on the dashboard flapped like the wings of a bird wishing to fly, but it was tucked away where it would remain flightless. The folded pages of the map were my guide to an escape. A relief from reality. There was a location in the middle of the national park I was driving to that was circled with thick, red ink. The smell made me lightheaded for a moment, but I reluctantly put the cap back on. Again, relatable thoughts.
The shapes of the clouds above had slowly melted away into nothingness, as the sun set behind the tall wall of pine trees that bordered the long, winding road I drove upon. It was almost pretty - the way the oranges melted into a raspberry purple hue, finally giving way into the dark midnight tone, as sparkles of stars twinkled above.
A splatter hit the windshield, as a bug met its end. I frowned, taking a moment to roll up my window before turning on the windshield wipers, hoping the fluid would remove its dead carcass from my view. A few dozen wipes would suffice before rolling down the windows again, letting the fresh air fill the cabin of the car. Why do we call it fresh air? This is the same air that the dinosaurs used to fart in, right?
The car in front of mine must be slowing down because their brake lights painted my hands and the passenger seat beside me red with caution. Don’t slow down. Go faster. No one would miss you if you just happened to crash into the car in front of you. Maybe that’s a bit too harsh. Oh well.
I slowed myself behind them, resting my hand against the cold frame of the window, tapping my fingers to some unknown beat. I couldn’t see anything else in front of that car since we were on a curve, but I was surprised there was any reason at all to slow down. It’s not like there would be traffic. At least, not where I was heading.
They opened their door, as their hazard lights clicked on. I watched as they scratched their head, slamming their door shut, and shouting at their useless car. I adjusted the angle of my rear-view mirror, checking to see there was no other car behind. I must have pushed too hard, as the mirror snapped off of its holder. I sighed, looking down at the cheap feature. Must be what I get for purchasing the first car I came across. I tossed it in the back seat, listening to the soft thud and bounce of it hitting the leather seat then coming to rest on the floor.
A few more minutes passed, as two cars slowly passed us by, staring curiously at the man who stood in front of his car, bent over, pretending to know what he was looking at as he fumbled with the guts of his car. One car was overly cautious, giving the man and his car plenty of room, almost rubbing up against the guardrail before centering their car back on the road. I tapped my fingernails against the dashboard, leaning my cheek impatiently on my other fist. I had places to be. Well, places to get lost in, would be more accurate. Couldn’t he have picked a better time to have his car breakdown? 
I honked.
The man quickly shot up, hitting the underside of his hood. He peeked his head out from behind, glaring at me, as I flashed my brights to further annoy him.
“Go around then, smart ass!” he shouted, flipping the bird at me. 
What a brilliant idea.
I shifted into reverse, being sure to give Mr. Repairman plenty of space, before slowly driving into the other lane of traffic. I smiled, flashing pearly whites in his direction, as I drove past. Neither of us saw what was coming.
The loud music echoed along the rocky surface, as a group of teenagers sang along to whatever song was popular on the radio at the time. They had just come back from skinny dipping in the lakes of the great national park that was just a few miles up the road. Their breaths stank with alcohol, as the high school quarterback sat in the driver’s seat while his girlfriend sat beside him, being egged on by their classmates in the backseat to give him a blowjob while he drove. 
“I’ll do it if you do it!” her best friend teased from the backseat, as she looked over her own boyfriend, kissing him playfully on the cheek.
“You hear that, buddy! We’re about to get lucky!” his teammate said, roughly patting the driver’s shoulder, as he slid his hand down his girlfriend’s backside, feeling the curve of her ass in his grasp, giving it a tight squeeze that caused her to giggle with glee.
The girlfriend in the passenger seat chewed softly on the tip of her thumb, as she looked at her curly haired football boyfriend who just looked so delicious earlier that afternoon in the water. 
Of course they made out and did other stuff, but a blowjob while driving? How exhilarating!
“Come on, baby, don’t be shy,” the driver offered, taking one hand off of the steering wheel to rub her left thigh. His fingers only inches away from something that grew wetter by the minute.
“Oh, alright...but this doesn’t leave the group! Promise?!” she huffed, looking at the duo in the backseat before giggling softly. “You must want me really bad, huh, babe?” she asked, leaning over the center console, and admiring the bulge she could see underneath his colorful chino shorts.
She placed her hand on top of the bulge, applying friction to excite him before undoing his waistband, and sliding him inside of her mouth.
He bit his lip, rolling his eyes back, only closing his eyes for a moment before coming around the curve to see my car driving around the parked car.
He cursed, quickly slamming on the breaks and swerving to avoid me, only to slam into the parked car instead.
The screech pierced my eardrums, as I swerved to the left to avoid their car that seemingly came out of nowhere, and off I went - through the guardrail and over the edge of the road.
The quarterback slowly lifted his head from the steering wheel, seeing his own blood dripping off of it. The windshield was completely shattered from the collision, and it took him a moment to see past the cracks of glass to notice the man pinned between the cars.
“Fuck! No, no, no…” he began to mutter to himself, as he tried to lift himself up out of the car, only to feel the weight of something in his lap.
He looked down to see a bloody mess.
His girlfriend’s face had tears streaming down her cheeks, with her lips pressed against the base of his cock. Her mangled neck looked heinous in the moonlight, as he now began to feel the pain radiate from his groin. Blood soaked through his shorts and into the leather car seat, as he pushed her off of him, only to realize his dick was still inside her messy muzzle.
He screamed with agony, as the initial shock dissipated, allowing the pain to fully greet him.
I fell.
Well, tumbled would be more accurate. It all happened so quickly that when I woke up, I had to remember what occurred just moments ago.
The coffee that had kept me warm during my drive was now in puddles on the ceiling of the car. What a hell of stain. 
So much for those godforsaken guardrails. They didn’t really guard anyone, did they?
I couldn’t feel anything below my waist, and the glass shards in my arms weren’t probably great for my health either. I didn’t bother pulling any of them out. There was enough blood all over me anyway. But I did spot a hole that I could try and pull myself out of. Emphasis on try.
I was way heavier than I remembered, as I slowly dragged myself up through the hole with my forearms, feeling the shards of glass dig deeper into my skin. It felt like my hands had fallen asleep and I felt millions of little pins and needles, but they weren’t pins and needles. No, it was glass.
Mr. Repairman was smart enough to put on his emergency brakes just in case his car decided to roll away from him. This maintained the traction his car had, as the highschoolers swerved, slamming him from behind, into the grill of his car.
He laid across the engine, whispering something about fixing his car, as his head just nodded repetitively - as if stuck in a loop. As the last bits of breath escaped his lips, bubbles of blood popped, splattering across the warm, dusty plastic of the battery.
The map got its wish. It flew alright. Flapping during the free-fall, the burst of wind picking it up and carrying it out of the opposite window into the cold night air. Gravity soon took its toll, pushing it down towards the carnage below, intermittently hitting a branch before ultimately landing just a few feet away from the wreck.
I couldn’t pull myself any farther. I just laid there, torso sticking out of the crumbled car, cursing my broken and twisted legs for betraying me too early. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.
I was going to smile and strike up a conversation about the weather with the clerk at the entrance booth of the national park. I was going to ask about the best place to park, only to take a wrong turn and veer off onto a dirt road. I was going to leave the keys in the seat of my car, and wander off into the woods.
Someone would maybe discover my body a few days later, as they hiked through, seeing my bright red shoes sticking out of the leafy debris that lay scattered across the forest floor. There was to be a mysterious fog surrounding them, adding more mystery to my death. But no. 
Now I’m destined to die confined by this wretched car that was to be my last purchase. The headlights hummed softly, stretching their beams out past the trunks that surrounded me, almost pitying me before dimming to their own death.
Fuck. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. This is unfamiliar. This is unplanned. How unsophisticated. Now the only thing left of me will be the skid marks I left upon the road several stories above me.
What a shame.
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This post was inspired by this writing prompt I found!
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sian22redux · 5 years
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A Puppy in the Family
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So yes fellow crazy baseball fans, I know you’ve been watching closely--have guessed that my Cleveland’s loss to Boston means @theycallmebecca gets a fic. This time I didn’t need to ask for a prompt--I know what she would like:  a sequel to He Followed Me Home.  
So here it is.. more adventures of Fenway and Dodger and Chris and Y/N..this time from a slightly different point of view. Grin. Hope you enjoy.  This is part 1 of 2.. no warnings--just tooth rotting fluff.  Shout out to Twitter’s Thoughts of Dog for inspiration.
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March 2020
 Today is a wonderful day.  
 All days are, of course-- even the ones that are wet and drizzly, forcing us to sit patiently inside watching the raindrops race down the windowpane.  But today is a particularly extra super specially wonderful day.  
Because Chris is coming home.  
Our ‘dad’, our protector, chief Frisbee tosser and best roughhouser is finally coming back.  That thing that happens in hoomans’ ‘wurk’ had come round again.  A ‘script’ arrived.   I do not know how this pile of wonderfully new smelling paper can magic Chris away, but it does.  Almost every time it arrives.  After the pats and hugs and snuffles Y/N will pour a glass of wine and mope, snuggle with us on the big white couch, marking little x’s on the calender (that evil thing with V-E-T scrawled across it) and then she will go about our usual day routine: breakfast kibble and a quick walk on Lorel drive, her leaving us to go to ‘wurk’, long snoozles for Dodger and I, then staring at the door til my eyes go wobbly; more snoozles after we play fight a bit and then finally she is back!  
Y/N is home!  Dinner kibble comes and then pats and play time and then bed.  
This has happened for three lines of x’s before this wondrous day arrived.  
Y/N is so excited.  She has primped us both.  Brushed me til my coat shone glossy black, trimmed Dodger’s nails and brushed the dust out of his fur, even sort of brushed the house.  She wiped and tidied and walked around with the noisy ‘coom so we knew it was important.
(Dodger doesn’t like it—he hates the loud whoosing noise-- but I stood and waved my tail because she said “Good boy” and “Chris is coming home” and I don’t want to look less than my best.)    
We wait while Y/N primps herself (her dress and shiny lips are nice) and then it happens.
We hear a big engine car and the door whines open and he is there!  Chris! Chris!  I am so happy I can’t help but bark and not mind that Dodger is always faster than I am.  He leaps up to put his paws on Chris’s chest, barking “Hi, Hi, Hi,” leaping like a kangaroo, and Chris is answering ‘Hey there dude,” and laughing at the licks and I am very careful not to knock them over and so proud when I get the big strong pats.  
“Good boy, Fenway.  Good boy. Missed you too. big guy!”
Chris sees me! I wiggle my whole body in ecstasy until it knocks over the umbrella stand and his suitcase.  Oopsie.  sometimes I forget that I am BIG.  
Then it is Y/N’s turn.  She gets kisses and duper hugs..the ones that lift you right off the ground because our Chris is super strong and super excited to be back with his partner once again.  
There’s a bit more of greet time for us and then it’s greet time for them, though as welcome rituals go it’s kind of odd.  There is no sniffing of tushies, or zooming around for play or licking muzzles but there is lots and lots of talking and kissing and talking and kissing and sprawling on the giant couch and glasses of wine on the low wood caw-fee table that I have to be extra careful to not bump over.
“Fenway, pal..watch out!”  
Oops—sorry.  I was only showing off my new squeaky hotdog.  
Dodger and I sit at their feet and send happy thoughts their way and eventually Chris stands up, and carries Y/N into the bedroom and I start to rise but Chris says ‘Stay.”
Whine.  
I want to be with them too.  
<No you don’t,> says Dodger, flopped over on his side and heaving a contented sigh.
<Why not?>
<They’re doing it again.>
<Doing what?>
<Mating.  They’ll be there a while.>
Oh.  Right. Dodger has explained this.  Hoomans, unlike dogs, do not usually joyously couple underneath the sun. They’re shy.  And slow.  They take ages with it and honestly sometimes I worry that it must not work because they do it all the time.  
Sometimes Chris and Y/N aren’t that shy and do it where we are.  On the couch. In the kitchen. In the swimming pool.  Dodger takes this time to snoozle more but I usually just lie there and thump my tail to be encouraging.
It must be tiring for Y/N to be in heat so much.
<You’re not a bitch.  What would you know about that?>  Dodger chuckles at me, tongue lolling and pale eyebrow raised.  
I frown, puzzling it through.  < Jenna the Bichon at the park said so.  And I think it is right because sometimes they sleep right after.>
<Good point.>  Dodger lazily scratches at his chin. <And Y/N doesn’t run around as much as Chris.  She must be tuckered all the time. 
I stare at the blond wood of the latched and bolted door (it’s firm, I checked), alert to intruders or harm but nothing seems amiss. A few high-pitched giddy squeals come from the bedroom but Dodger just rolls over and goes to sleep.
<They’re fine, Fenway.  Get some sleep yourself.>
I do, and dream of pats and empty laps and ice cream cones.
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<Gooob morning!!> I bark to Chris and Y/N the next day when they drag themselves blearily out into the super toasty sun streaming through the windows.  
Dodger as usual is silent but stretching ready for a race.  Me--my toes are a tippy tappin’ and  I am jumping, so excited to see them there, so unable to contain all the love the world inside one BIG but furry body.   All I can do is bark <I love you.>  again and again and again, while sending all the happy thoughts.  
“Hey, hey.. hold up Fenway.”  Chris opens the backyard door.  I bounce outside.  The air is clean (no fires) and the sun is warm and Chris is back! Oh happy day! I snap at a yellow moth and almost catch it; mark my tree after Dodger goes on his, and trot around the yard, sniffing all the whiffling smells—grass and pool water and leafy moldy goodness.
Y/N comes outside with sleep shirt on and two cups of coffee.  Chris tosses Dodger’s new red ball far as the fire corner  <Goob morning> I bark again hoping the ball will come to me.  Yes!! Chris notices!!  I Proudly Catch it and trot over and drop it at his feet.  Y/N comes back out with a little pot of honey, a jug of coffee cream and two cross-haunts.  Mmmmmmm. Flaky buttery goodness.  I want really bad but I am trying to be extra good, so I make myself join the chase.
We fly back and forth and back and forth until Chris says “Enough!”  and so I stretch out on the cool patio, lay my head on Y/N’s bare feet to keep them warm. This gets a tummy scritch (my mastery plan has worked) and so Dodger noses in, leans against Chris’s legs. <Pat me, please> he yips, twice, then Chris laughs and calls him jealous—scritching him perfectly behind the ears.
Chris’s big strong hands are good at scritching.
For a little while we all snoozle just there in a heap (Chris is ‘still jet-laggy’ says Y/N) but when I open one eye there is more kissing going on.  
<Dodger, do you notice it?>  I whisper quietly.
<Notice what?>
<She smells different.>
Dodger, more experienced with the world than I—he is a whole year older--turns over on his back, ear drooping crookedly, looking up to the ‘ounge chair and taking an experimental sniff.  “Nope. What does it smell like?”
I do a deep long sniff, just like when we ride in the car with the windows down and I am eating the wind. “Happy.  New kind of.  Sugary good.”
He turns toward Y/N and tries again, holding longer on the in.  <Oh,> he yips. <She’s expecting   Good nose Fenway.>
Expecting?  As in PUPPIES?!  I sit right up in shock.  <You can smell it?!>
<Of course,” says Dodger, rolling over to keep his patch of sun.  <It’s like when Suki  smelled Mrs. Wilson’s cancer.>
 Oh.   Suki is a very pretty Maltese who lives just up the street.  She knew her mom was sick and was very sad and brave before she was happy again because Mrs. Wilson is ok.
I think it was all the helping hugs that Suki gave.
I give another whiff, luxuriating in the Happy and then the kissing stops.  Chris pulls Y/N up---says the magic words ‘More BREAKFAST’ and so I leap--follow them inside- sniffing carefully toward Y/N’s back.  Happy definitely.  New and Sweet and Rainbow Magic Sprinkles.  
I excitedly wag my tail and bump her leg but she laughs, puts her hands on her hips and misunderstands.  “Fenway you are not getting another breakfast.”
<No> I bark, <Expecting!!>
I jump in my excitement, tapping my feets but she just laughs and reaches for more cross-haunts and jam (Jam!!!).  I have to be extra good behaviour and not jump up to steal. Sometimes I can’t help myself—I am technically still a puppy too: Dodger says its no big deal so long as I am mostly good.
Speaking of Good, I inch close to her chair and take another sniff, resting my snout in her lap.   Still Happy. Still New.  This is good, very good, and so I burrow deeper, thumping my tail on the floor, super happy for them both.  
“Fenway, I can’t eat with you there.”
I put a paw upon Y/N’s leg, trying to get closer to that wondrous smell!  HAPPY!   She holds her pastry high, laughing as I take another whiff, but then I’m taking too much room, too excited to remember I am BIG.   
“Fenway? What is up with you?  Go sit!”  
I don’t listen.   I am too happy (and inches from the Jam!).  I miss Dodger’s warning bark and then Chris is there, frowning down, shoving my nose away and in the hard voice he says.  “Fenway, No!! Bed!”
I have a sad.  I follow his finger to my bed and flop down on cushy foam, tucking my tail as far under as it can go.  Sorry dad. Sorry.    
Dodger comes and waits patiently until I am released.  
<I don’t think they understand,> I sigh mournfully.
<No,> says Dodger, <but they will when she changes shape.  Be patient.>
Patient!?  That is the hardest thing of all.  I sigh and watch them eat.  There is talking of parks and parties and ‘pearances, all the usual breakfast stuff.  Tick tick tick.  Finally a walk is called and I am on my best behaviour; carrying along my leash because outside is larger than you think and I don’t want them to get lost.
<Y/N is expecting puppies!>  I bark excitedly to Chris (who still doesn’t seem to hear) as we turn right at the gate.   This takes us to the Bermans.  Their little hoomans are my frens—they like to play with rainbow spheres and mark the road with chalk and give me water out of the green garden snake.  Dodgers trots at full speed and I waddle on behind,  past the scary blue mailbox (are there cats lurking there?), past the red STOP sign to the Kindle’s yard.
Oh boy.  My little brain is whirly with anxiety.  First I think hooman puppies would be good but now I wonder if they will be like Mrs. Kindle’s.  Running and shrieking and pulling tails.  Trying to jump on my back.  Yikes.
<Will the puppies be good?>  I yip to Dodger when I catch him up.  
He cocks his head and Thinks. <Puppy. Hoomans mostly only have just one. It will be busy and smelly at first but eventually it will be like being in ‘Chussets. 
My ears perk up.  ‘Chussets.  <Really?>  
I have been three times.  The plane ride is kinda scary but there are miles of trees and a giant green.  An extra Lion for Dodger and squeaky hotdog for me.  Chasing ball with cousins and extra special Pats from MomLisa.  She’s the alpha alpha female.  
Very fair and kind.  
(She didn’t even scold my excited piddling when Chris and Y/N came back from their ‘moon trip.)
<Not the moon Fenway, honeymoon,> grins Dodger, <The party after The Wedding.> 
Ah The Wedding.  I was so proud.  Y/N and her friends got cleaned and dressed and buffed all sparkly. Chris got nervous but then sleek and clean.  Even Dodger and I had a groomer come.  The feathers on my tail were so very shiny. Carly looked pretty and Shanna too.  Ethan was super proud to walk between us and hold the fancy leashes.
I was very, very good.  
I walked between all the smiley happy people remembering to not steal, not jumping up because it startles them when I put my paws upon their shoulders.  Once, in the long, boring talking part, Chris cried a little and I stood up to go rescue him but Dodger woofed <stay> and explained it all.
<Hoomans sometimes cry from happiness.>  
They do?   I think this is weird but then I think it must be like when I piddle joyously.  They can’t help it--it just leaks out.
There was music and people and Snacks.  So many, many Snacks.  Our Secret Mission worked. Dodger and I convinced nearly every single guest that we had not eaten in several weeks.
(I didn’t like the salmon.  I barfed it into a handy pot.)
Even if Chris and Y/N didn’t have a lot of time for us so many others did. Ardeejjj, Chris’s good good fren knows exactly where to scritch; Miles and Stella and Ethan chased us through the chairs and out onto the lawns.  Tara took me for a needed walk (I can only cross my legs so long).  It was perfect.
On the ‘moon afterward we stayed in ‘Chussets for 4 rows of x’s.  So long, soooo long,  but we were at Carly’s house and it was super fun as always.  Miles and Stella and Ethan made sure we weren’t too sad.  Played tag and toss and chase until I had to flop down in the sun and bake.  
(My coat shines more if I am careful to bask enough.)
I guess a new people puppy in the family will be fun but still I worry.  Y/N’s smell gets stronger and stronger but strangely they still don’t understand.  It’s xasperating.   I have a huge snootful of Happy-New and I worry if I will be good enough.  
Will the puppy like me?  Will I knock them over even when I am duper careful?  
<Relax.> says Dodger and I am sure he’s right (year older!) but this morning I feel so angsty I steal a yogurt lid from the trash.  Chris doesn’t quite understand and so I have no choice but to evade him spectacularly.  
It works.  When we are done both of us are smiling.
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Tagging: @nomadicpixel @arizonapoppy @heather-lynn @pegasusdragontiger
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dk-thrive · 3 years
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And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends.
I am learning to abandon the world before it can abandon me. Already I have given up the moon and snow, closing my shades against the claims of white. And the world has taken my father, my friends. I have given up melodic lines of hills, moving to a flat, tuneless landscape. And every night I give my body up limb by limb, working upwards across bone, towards the heart. But morning comes with small reprieves of coffee and birdsong. A tree outside the window which was simply shadow moments ago takes back its branches twig by leafy twig. And as I take my body back the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap as if to make amends. — Linda Pastan, “I Am Learning to Abandon the World” from PM/AM: New and Selected Poems (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982). (via Alive on All Channels)
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splendidlyimperfect · 4 years
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Chapters: 1 | 2 Fandom: The Witcher Rating: Teen and Up Audiences Relationships: Geralt/Jaskier
Inspired by this gorgeous art by @kayivy​!
Jaskier follows the injured wolf into the woods and helps patch up its wounds.
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It doesn’t take long to find the wolf.
“Look,” Jaskier says, holding his hands up in surrender as he slowly approaches it. “I’m just trying to help you. It’s the least I can do for you saving those people, but honestly, I can’t do much for you if you bite my hands off.”
The wolf, which stands nearly half Jaskier’s height and is bleeding heavily where the crossbow bolt is sticking out of its leg, bares its teeth and snarls at him.
“Oh, knock it off,” Jaskier grumbles irritably. “I’ve been growled at plenty; you don’t scare me.” Jaskier takes another slow step closer to it. “I’m not going to hurt you.” It growls and backs up again, whining when it puts pressure on its injured paw.
Jaskier stops, putting his hands on his hips and looking around the forest. They’re in a sort of clearing, far enough from the road that nobody will find Jaskier’s body if the wolf decides to eat him. Which isn’t the end of the world, he supposes, since the only thing that will miss him is Buttercup.
He turns back to the wolf and sighs. “Come on,” he says, holding out his hand. “You’re going to bleed out if you don’t let me help you, and I know you’re smarter than that.”
Continue reading on AO3
The wolf rumbles, baring sharp teeth that could easily tear Jaskier apart. Its ears flick flat back against its head, and it barks at him, sharp and low.
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” Jaskier mutters. The wolf responds with another low growl, but it doesn’t sound quite as enthusiastic this time around.
Jaskier eyes it carefully, then shuffles off his travel pack and digs around inside until he finds some dried venison he picked up a while back. The wolf’s ears prick up at the scent.
“Aha,” Jaskier says, shuffling forward and holding out the venison. “Hungry?” He’s only a few feet away from the wolf at this point, and even though he knows he should be petrified, he’s mostly just relieved that the wolf is okay.
It stares at him uncertainly for a little while, and eventually Jaskier’s legs start to cramp up. He sets his pack down on the forest floor, tugs out his kit of bandages and sutures, then sits cross-legged on top of the pack to protect himself from the snow. The wolf watches him warily but doesn’t move. Several minutes go by, and eventually Jaskier starts to hum.
The wolf’s ears immediately flick toward him. “Oh, you like that, huh?” Jaskier says. It makes a sound that’s almost a huff, and Jaskier laughs. “If I sing for you, will you let me help you?”
He starts into a silly song about flowers that he’d written a few weeks prior – nothing special, but the melody is soft and soothing. The wolf tilts its head to the side, studying Jaskier with an unusual intensity. The uncomfortable, familiar feeling surfaces again, but Jaskier ignores it.
The wolf takes a careful step forward, limping on its injured paw, and Jaskier sits as still as he can while continuing to sing. It moves closer, and by the time Jaskier’s at the second verse, it’s sitting close enough for him to reach out and touch it.
Up close, Jaskier can see that the wolf is male, and he’s clearly been in some battles. There are scars across his muzzle and one of his ears has a piece missing, making him look oddly asymmetrical. His amber eyes are wide and serious as he studies Jaskier.  
“Good boy,” Jaskier murmurs, holding out the venison. The wolf sniffs at it and then slowly, carefully accepts the food. “There you go.” The wolf devours the venison within seconds and then, to Jaskier’s surprise, moves right up to him, sniffing him and nosing at his hands. “Oh, so now you want to be friends,” Jaskier says, laughing. “I don’t have anything else. Let me look at your leg first, then I’ll go find us something to eat.”
To his surprise, the wolf headbutts him gently, then lays down in front of him, legs outstretched. “Why aren’t you afraid of me?” Jaskier murmurs, slowly moving his hand to the wolf’s head and running gentle fingers through his fur. “Actually, the better question is, why aren’t I afraid of you?”
The wolf whines. “Hm, you’re right,” Jaskier says, moving his hand down through the wolf’s fur until he’s touching right above the crossbow bolt. “I’ve dealt with scarier. I had a friend for a while that growled worse than you, and I wasn’t scared of him, either; he’d never hurt anyone. Well, not humans, anyways, unless they deserved it – like those three, on the road. Mostly he hunted monsters. I once saw him take down a wyvern…”
Jaskier keeps talking, keeping his voice low and soft, and breathes a sigh of relief when the wolf slowly relaxes under his touch. His fingers are close enough to the crossbow bolt that he can feel the blood now, sticky under his fingers, and he fumbles around in his pack for a bandage with his other hand.
“Now, don’t you dare bite me,” he cautions, staring into the wolf’s amber eyes. “Ready?” To his surprise, the wolf responds with a soft woof. Jaskier takes a deep breath, sends a quiet prayer to Melitele, and then pulls the crossbow bolt out in one swift motion.
The wolf whines in pain but stays surprisingly still. Jaskier quickly tosses the bolt aside and presses the bandage to the wound, wrapping it around the wolf’s leg and holding it tight to stem the bleeding.
“Shhh,” he murmurs, bringing his other hand up to stroke the wolf’s head. “You’re all right. Good boy.” He runs his fingers through the soft fur, making quiet, soothing noises, and after a minute he peels the bandage back to inspect the damage. “Well, I don’t think I can suture it,” he says, happy to see that the bleeding has slowed. “But it should heal just fine if I bandage it up. You’re being very brave. If I’d been shot with a crossbow – well, I was one time, and it wasn’t pretty. First of all, Geralt was pissed, which is really rich, coming from him.” Jaskier tugs another bandage from the pack and slowly starts to wrap it around the first. “He’s an idiot.”
The wolf makes a puzzled sound and Jaskier sighs. “He is,” he insists. “Always charging headfirst into things without thinking about how much it scares other people. And then the one time I tried to help him, he yelled at me, then wouldn’t talk to me for a week. This, after I spent what, six years stitching him up and bandaging his wounds, he couldn’t just say thank you Jaskier, you’re so helpful, what would I do without a lovely friend like you in my travels?”
The wolf tilts his head and makes a noise that almost sounds apologetic, and Jaskier laughs. Then he ties off the bandage and inspects his handiwork.
“Better?” The wolf sniffs at the bandage and then, to Jaskier’s surprise, makes a pleased sound and licks his hand. “You’re welcome.”
They sit in silence for a bit, and Jaskier keeps running his fingers through the soft fur behind the wolf’s ears. As the sun starts to dip down in the sky, the wind picks up, biting through Jaskier’s cloak and dragging tiny flakes of snow down from the sky.
“Bollocks,” Jaskier mutters, staring up at the white specks drifting down around them. He sighs, looking down at the wolf, who has shifted forward and nearly has his head in Jaskier’s lap. “I could be sleeping in a real bed right now, you know,” Jaskier comments. The wolf huffs. “And eating a warm meal.”
Jaskier hesitates, looking back toward the path to town. Technically, his debt is repaid. The wolf is safe. He could leave now and walk to the inn, take a hot bath, have some drinks, play a few songs, and sleep on a mattress instead of the ground.
As if he knows what Jaskier is thinking, the wolf whines, low and sad. “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Jaskier says, frowning as the wolf stares up at him. “You’ll be just fine out here in the cold, whereas I will freeze to death in the middle of a forest with nobody to find my body. It would be tragic.”
He doesn’t mention that he has a tent in his pack, and a bedroll, and that he’s spent the better part of the last six months sleeping outdoors, even when the night air is so cold that his eyelashes freeze together.
The wolf slowly pushes himself to his feet, limping away from Jaskier. For a second, Jaskier thinks he’s leaving, but when he approaches the rock face nearby, he turns back and looks at Jaskier expectantly. Jaskier looks back one last time at the path to the road, then sighs and stands, packing up his things and following the wolf.
There’s a cave in the side of the cliff. The entrance is small enough to block out most of the wind and snow, and it’s just barely big enough to fit the two of them. “This is cozy,” Jaskier comments, squeezing himself in and looking around. “Not nearly as nice as silk sheets, but I suppose it will have to do. Can’t leave you out here with an injured leg, can I?”
The wolf sits down on his haunches, looking very pleased with itself, while Jaskier digs in his pack and gets out his bedroll and blanket. There’s not enough room to light a fire, but once he’s down to his sleep shirt and trousers and under the furs, it’s warm enough to be tolerable.
As soon as Jaskier settles down, the wolf moves to the entrance of the cave, turning several times as best he can with his injured leg. Eventually he plops down on the ground with his back to Jaskier, tucking his tail around him and staring out into the night.
“You’d better not eat me while I’m sleeping,” Jaskier mutters, giving the wolf’s back a stern look. There’s a quiet rumble that almost sounds like an agreement, and Jaskier yawns, cuddling deeper into his furs.
It doesn’t take long for him to fall asleep, protected by the wolf and listening to the sound of the wind.
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dzamie-oc · 4 years
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14: Tree
Oliver walked through his yard, listening to the grass swishing under his shoes. Atop his head was perched Flint, a small dragoness; the spring sun danced brilliantly off of her iridescent, silvery scales. Around the middle of the grassy area, the man crouched to set down what he was carrying: a gildenbark sapling, a shovel, a few long, wooden stakes, some twine, and a rubber mallet. Flint hopped off as well, then picked up one of the stakes in her mouth and swung it around like a sword. Oliver laughed and picked up the shovel, planting its tip in the ground.
"Ah, it's not even planted, and already our little tree has a little guardian!" he said, digging out a shovelful of dirt and grass, "though I bet it'll be hard to dig with a stick in your mouth."
Oliver lifted the shovel, and by the time he was almost about to push it back into the dirt, there was a little ball of scales in the way, devoid of stick. "Why didn't you say so?" Flint demanded, "leave the digging to me! I'm gonna make a hole for for the biggest and bestest tree!"
While tiny clawfuls of dirt flew out of the slowly growing hole, Oliver set about hammering the stakes into the ground around it. He watched the little dragon ruin the luster of her scales with enthusiastic abandon for a short bit after, then reached in and scooped her up in his hands, her little forelegs still kicking in the air. "Alright, that's enough. We don't want to bury all of the tree, just the roots." He set her back down in the grass, and she immediately locked her jaws around the mallet, dragging it around to defend the shiny tree. The human watched her take a lap or two, then stood the gildenbark up in the hole, filling it in after and tying it to the supporting stakes. While he stood back to admire his work, Flint bumped into him.
"Alright little lady, time to head in for a bath."
In retaliation to this dastardly threat, the dragoness turned, flared her wings out, and stared at him as hard as she could. "You don't want to give me a bath," Flint insisted, "I actually have a whole nother hour to run and play."
It was relaxing, staring into her shining, golden eyes. Concerningly so, even. "Flint, what did I say about that?"
Flint sighed and rolled her eyes as they dimmed back to yellow. "People's minds are their own, and only change them with their permission or my life is in danger,” she droned. She pouted all the way to the tub, and later denied allegations of purring while Oliver scrubbed her scales.
---
On a warm summer day, Oliver and Flint relaxed in the yard behind their building. Over the years, they had expanded their home upwards, and dedicated much of the lower floor to their family business. Flint’s wings were coming in nicely, and the multicolored sheen on her scales was proving to be more than just hatchling coloration. As he sat in his chair, Oliver pointed that out about her, and Flint happily shimmied back and forth, causing the near-illusory colors to ripple and pulse along her body. A little carefree and reckless, the growing dragoness let out a yelp when she nearly shimmied herself into the young gildenbark tree. She glared at it in mock anger for daring to impede her strutting her stuff, then peered closer.
“Hey Dad, how come our tree’s bark looks like this?” She tilted her head to the side. “It’s flakier than most others, even aside from its weird color. Pretty, though...”
Oliver slipped a bookmark into his book and stood up to walk over to her. Some light scratching by her horns drew a smile to her face. “It’s a gildenbark tree, Flint. It’s how they got their name.” He reached out to the tree and snapped off a bit of the bark, a thin, golden flake, as though he’d pried some gold leaf off of some rich guy’s outfit, and handed it to his adoptive daughter. “They actually used to be outlawed around here, until a few decades ago when the current set of coins really took off. Too many times someone had passed off some gildenbark bark as real gold and made off with a bunch of valuable stuff in trade.”
Flint turned the bark in her paw, watching it shimmer in the sunlight. “I think it’d look pretty good on me. Like, little golden sparkles on my scales, or maybe something around my eyes.” She snorted and accidentally blew the bark right out of her grip. After a series of missed swipes and one dive that was as unsuccessful as it was ungraceful, the dragoness picked it up again and traced a mask shape around her eyes. “Y’know, to help customers know where to look, so we don’t get any more who think my tail or around there is what puts them under. Plus, I’d look super cute.”
“You already look super cute.”
Flint rolled her yellow eyes. “Yeah, but you’re my dad. I think that makes you, like, contractually obligated by Ancient Dad Law to say stuff like that.” She reached out and snapped off some more of the looser bits of bark, holding them in her paw and dropping down to balance on three.
“Ah yes, that law. It has a rider that makes me keep a subscription to that parenting magazine that never really helped with a little thoughtwyrm hatchling,” Oliver said, walking back to his chair to fold it and retrieve his book, “but more importantly, you know what else it says?”
“No, what?” Flint mentally braced herself against the inevitable pun.
“It says that it’s nearly sundown on a school night, which means it’s bathtime for a growing young dragoness.” He beckoned her onward, back indoors.
His daughter stopped and stared at him, her golden eyes glowing softly in the evening light. “Actually, it would be a better idea to give me the leftover chicken instead, and not have that bath.”
Oliver glanced her way, saw her eyes, and turned back to the house. “Flint, don’t make me say it...” he warned.
Flint groaned. “Yeah, yeah, minds and consent. Still, the chicken?”
“That’s tomorrow’s lunch, as a soup. Now come on, before it gets dark,” he said, and on hearing the dragon groan, “look, unless you want me to pick you up and dunk you like a hatchling, and I think neither of us really want you thrashing all over the place like you used to.”
The next day, Flint surprised her friends by not only being the sole dragon at school - that was rather usual for her - but also having some golden specks in patterns around her eyes and along her muzzle.
---
Flint swept her tail along the ground, dutifully pushing the red-orange leaves into a pile. With her height, she had taken to sleeping outside most of the year, but the autumn chill would soon chase her back indoors. Her favorite homemade scale polish decorated her white claws with gold that caught and danced in the light. She reached for another bag, only to find the box empty; in two steps, she was by the rear porch, carefully taking the bag offered by the man wrapped in a blanket and reclining in a chair.
“Really, Dad, you didn’t have to come out for this,” she insisted, scooping a paw full of leaves into the bag, “I don’t want you catching a cold because of me.”
“Nonsense, Flint, this is practically a tradition,” Oliver called back in a much weaker voice - not only was age straining him, but as she grew, so did her voice. “You do all the work gathering up the leaves, and I stand around pretending to be useful. I mean, providing moral support.”
“Dad!”
Oliver laughed, slowly, then looked up at the mostly barren branches, a few stubborn leaves still hanging on. “Do you remember way back when we first planted this tree? You’ve always been its little defender.”
The dragoness tied off the last bag, then walked over to lay around her father in a half-circle of iridescent, white scales. “Only what you’ve told me of it. A sword of one of those little stakes to keep it upright, digging the hole all by myself...”
“Tell you the truth, my little ball of scales, I’m not sure you understood what a tree was back then.”
“I probably did. Just not how long it would take to make.” Flint pricked her head up, then peered through a window inside. “Oh, Dad, Nurse Chai is calling for you. I think your bath is ready.”
With a smile and a defiant laugh, Oliver crossed his arms. “Now? I think I’ll spend some more time with my favorite daughter, thank you very much.”
“Only daughter. And c’mon, you know you’ve gotta get it done before we go to sleep.”
“You’ll have to force me to depart.”
A mischievous smirk stretched across the dragoness’s muzzle. She winked, and the one open eye soon blazed a brilliant gold. “Why, father, is that permission?” Flint closed her eyes, poked her tongue out just a bit, and giggled. “Come on, you can admire the tree you’ve grown any day. You’ve gotta keep clean, especially after last June.”
After a bit more lighthearted back-and-forth, Oliver finally got up and shuffled in, leaving Flint to curl up in the yard. She wrapped her long body around the trunk of the tree, encircling gold in silver, and rested her head on a pillow Oliver had had made for her years before, with a cartoon image of her hypnotizing a client. She shut her eyes, and soon began to dream. She purred in her sleep while her mind showed her visions of her and Oliver resting in its shade, of kissing a cute human girl, hidden by the leaves around them, and of a small dragoness valiantly defending her big human while he constructed a brilliant, gold tree.
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I Am Learning to Abandon the World
BY LINDA PASTAN
I am learning to abandon the world
before it can abandon me.
Already I have given up the moon
and snow, closing my shades
against the claims of white.
And the world has taken
my father, my friends.
I have given up melodic lines of hills,
moving to a flat, tuneless landscape.
And every night I give my body up
limb by limb, working upwards
across bone, towards the heart.
But morning comes with small
reprieves of coffee and birdsong.
A tree outside the window
which was simply shadow moments ago
takes back its branches twig
by leafy twig.
And as I take my body back
the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap
as if to make amends.
(iPhone 8; Abandoned corner store; Pike County)
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thefredricus · 5 years
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New Year Surprise (☆▽☆)
I hope you’re all having a lovely New Year’s eve! I have something special for you all tonight: My very first Ripto fanfic! (<-- Link!)
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This is the daruma doll that I made a promise to at the beginning of 2018. The promise was to write and publish a fanfiction before New Year’s. I originally planned to write for another fandom, but things happened, yet I decided that I didn’t want to break the promise I made to myself and burn the daruma doll.
However, I decided to split the story in two chapters. The first one was just published and ready for some reading! The second one is on its way and will be posted later this week. I’m so excited to share this with you all! <3 
You can either read it below the cut, or go to AO3 and read it there!
Year of the Dinosaur
The sun scorched the cloudless azure sky. Waves were seen lapping against a non-existent shore along the horizon, as non-existent trees reflected in the mirage. But the heat was real. The sand that stung their eyes and nostrils was real. The hunger, thirst and fatigue -- they were all real. The outskirts of Skelos Badlands at solar zenith showed no mercy to the broken duo. Ripto ran a sleeve over his brow to wipe off a disgusting lump of sweat and dust. He wasn’t accustomed to the feel of a new set of scars and still open wounds that ran across his face. Not only did they ache, but they made him feel hideous, even though he hadn’t dared to look at his own reflection since that night. That fateful night… He quickly shook himself out of his stupor.
“Gulp! Is that mountains I see over there? Or is it just another hallucination, like the time you tried to drink from that oasis and ended up with a mouthful of dry sand,” Ripto spat between chapped lips.
The massive quadruped grunted guiltily under Ripto’s frame as he walked and looked away, embarrassed.
“Well, it’d better be! I mean, how far could that bonehead have gone? Crush can’t go more than five minutes without food, we’d have found him dead by now-”
Ripto’s last words echoed out in rough coughs that left the small, wounded dinosaur gasp for air. He clenched his chest with both arms and bent forward in a sickly bark. Reflexively, he reached for one of Gulp’s horns for support, but he crabbed nothing but air and fell forward, rolling off his companion’s muzzle and into the sand below. He felt panic build in his stomach, climbing up his chest, oozing in his throat like acid that ate away everything.
Is this where it was all going to end? Did he escape one hell just to get flung into another?
Ripto’s thoughts were caught short when he felt a tender touch against his forehead and a breeze of warm air that brushed his skin, leaving him with momentary comfort. Gulp hummed softly and kept nuzzling his master, ever so gently. Ripto exhaled slowly, lifting his hands to his companion's face, pressing his forehead against the gentle giant.
“At least I can count on you,” he whispered, more to himself than anyone.
Struggling to get out from the molten lava and grasp whatever debris he could find was an ordeal in itself. Feeling every part of his being burn like a thousand suns on top of that would have been too much, if he wouldn’t have been so excruciatingly headstrong -- and if he wouldn’t have had some help from a certain green dinosaur who pulled him out from the burning inferno and who stayed at his side to nurture him back to as close as what health could be, given the circumstances. After Avalar was reclaimed, with the help of a filthy dragon no less, all dinosaurs were banned to the deserts and crags of Skelos. Whatever vapor Ripto ended up in there and then, finding Crush seemed like a good idea at the time. Better to reunite the trio, he thought. Better wallow in each others’ company, he though. But right now he was not sure if he could even think at all. His head was spinning, his mouth was as arid as the endless dunes surrounding him and his delusions blended seamlessly into reality.
“Are those mountains real, Gulp?” Ripto persuaded, even though they seemed to be miles away.
He could feel the big dinosaur’s snout lifting him up. Slump, the fallen king lay across his servant’s face. The weight of his heavy head and his agonies left him incapable of sitting up. His vision blurred as he faded away.
“Gulp... Take us there.”
***
Ripto’s consciousness returned along with a throbbing headache against his temples. He wasn’t entirely sure if he was seeing double when he opened his eyes, his pupils nothing but sharp slits in the brightness. The sun stood seemingly lower on the sky now, however, and with the sinking sun a cold night would follow. The thought of him staying alive for that long gave him a little bit of comfort. Just then, Gulp stopped abruptly and nodded a gesture, Ripto nearly getting flung off in the process.
“Gah! W-what are you doing, you-”
The irate dinosaur locked eyes with his servant, who now gestured enthusiastically with eyes and eyebrows for his master to turn his head. Having no choice, unless he wanted to get shook off again, he spun his horned head around, the rest of his body still laying flat on Gulp’s snout. Ripto’s eyes grew big in surprise, as his gaze met a large cavern protruding from a vertical crag in the sandy dunes. Partly because the crag was indeed not a mirage but a real, hard mineral formation, and partly because it was coated in a much familiar scent. Ripto sniffed the air. Ungraciously he slumped off Gulp’s wide muzzle and continued sleuthing, ignoring the grains of sand that got stuck in his nostrils and mouth. It smelled stale. It smelled of dinosaur. It smelled of flesh and blood. Ripto wobbled forward.
“Crush? No more hiding, we crossed this god-forsaken desert only to-”
Stale. Crush wasn’t famous for smelling of roses, that was for sure, but… this smelled wrong. It smelled of death. And when a dinosaur of Ripto’s size scented death, it ran. But there was nowhere for him to flee.
It all happened very fast when the lava lizard attacked.
All Ripto could see was a blur of sharp teeth plunging towards him, like an extension of the gaping maw in the rock itself. He wasn’t sure if it was deeply rooted survival instinct or sheer luck that made his body move on its own, throwing itself to the side and dodging his assaulter’s deadly strike. Stuck face-down in the sand, all Ripto could hear was a bone-chilling snarl that sent shivers down his thin frame. The noise eventually died out and a minute of silence followed. Or perhaps it was less than a second. Ripto couldn’t tell. Maybe it was an hour. Just as he was about to get up and shake it off as another hallucination, a heavy foot dug itself into the back of his head, forcing him harder down into the ground. One of the predator’s curved claws clicked against Ripto’s horn, once, twice. The helpless dinosaur felt the grip tighten around him. And then--
The pressure lifted in the fraction of a second, followed by a guttural roar and a blow that shook the earth around him. Yanking his head from the ground, Ripto realized that Gulp had rammed into the lava lizard head first, making use of his body mass and sharp horns to force their attacker off balance. The lava lizard scrambled back onto its feet as quickly as it had fallen, and it wasn’t quite until now that Ripto realized how massive this creature was; a monstrous biped standing a good three meters over the ground, with rough scales draped in a deep burgundy making it look like it just climbed out from the depths of hell. From its forehead grew a twisted horn, much like Ripto’s own. To complete the nightmarish image, its long jaws housed a jumbled mess of fangs and tusks. Ripto could only imagine how much of him there would have been left had the attack succeeded. Seeing Gulp and the lava lizard at a standoff was truly like witnessing a clash of giants. Ripto couldn’t help but feeling very small and insignificant. More so than usual.
Empty handed with his magic scepter long lost, he was helpless against this adversary. So he resorted to doing the only thing he was good at.
“Gulp! Finish it off! Kill it! KILL IT!”
Gulp didn’t need any second command to motivate him further. He swung his horned head into the side of the lava lizard once more, except this time the creature came prepared for his onslaught. With nimble hands, it grasped Gulp by the jaws and bit down his neck, more to catch the quadruped off guard than to do lethal harm. Gulp roared and shook his head frantically, foam flying from the edges of his mouth.
“Behind you, BEHI--!”
Ripto’s cries were in vain, as the massive red lizard shifted and chomped down on Gulp’s back, away from his victim’s reach, and sunk his hellish teeth deep into the green dinosaur’s rind. Gulp’s roars turned into howls that shattered the dead silence of the desert. Using all of its strength, the predatory dinosaur took advantage of the moment and pushed Gulp onto his side. Gulp flailed with his clumsy legs in the air, kicking someone who was out of reach, his mouth foaming and eyes tearing. The lava lizard slowly released his bite with a shrilling wheeze, fresh blood running between tusks and fangs, dripping down on Gulp’s leafy green skin.
Ripto couldn’t look away. Being a predatory dinosaur himself, he knew what was coming next. His companion’s vulnerable underbelly was dangerously exposed for the lava lizard and it would only take moments before a chunk of flesh would be pulled from his chest. Gulp would be eaten alive and Ripto would stand there and watch. Until the lava lizard wanted dessert.
There was really nothing but one option at this point. Ripto inhaled through his nose, puffing himself up like a bird ready to fend off a much bigger rival, and let out the loudest and most fearsome war cry he could ever muster. Then he leapt forward as nimbly and fast as he could, ignoring the tough resistance of sand and grain under his feet, dashing towards Gulp, up over his fallen body and jumped -- claws out, fangs bared -- against his enemy.
When Ripto fell into the pool of lava in Winter Tundra, he remembered that the impact had hurt a bit. But the actual sinking had strangely enough not been that intensely painful as one would imagine. That said, it wasn’t by any means a pleasant experience. His whole body was assaulted with what felt like a million needles that pricked him just at the surface, never truly going under the skin but still causing him plenty of discomfort. The suffocating, however, felt oddly… nice. Relieving, in a way. It felt like a warm hug that embraced him from the inside. He didn’t panic. His mind just slowly wandered off. He didn’t think of the dragon that did this to him. Nor did he think about how small and insignificant he was. Sinking into the lava, he felt bigger, somehow. Maybe even stronger. He couldn’t remember for how long he drifted, lost in oblivion, until all those millions of needles all at once decided to
PIERCE HIS SKIN.
Ripto gasped and filled his lungs with the dusty desert air. But it felt like his lungs never filled up completely. The lava lizard had seen the small dinosaur’s attack miles away, and simply snapped at Ripto, locking him shut in his jaws. Pointed teeth chewed Ripto’s skin and that warm, familiar feeling bubbled up inside of him. But that was only for a second. The lava lizard spun around and flung Ripto effortlessly, but with great force, into the crag horn first. Ripto’s mind went black the moment his head hit the rock.
***
When Ripto woke up again, the air was quite cool. So was the cavern floor he found himself laying on. The contrast from the searing heat was relieving and the air felt much easier to breathe. Ripto’s mind begun wandering back, but his body was still paralyzed, spread out in the darkness of wherever he was. After a minute or so of doing nothing, Ripto had found himself to have let out a monotonous moan ever since he woke, which he ended with a masked cough. Self-aware, but still laying flat on his back with limbs spread out, he scanned what parts he could of his surroundings with half-closed eyes. All he could see was naked rock hidden in the faint light. He slowly turned himself over in an attempt to sit, but vertigo got him immediately and the tiny dinosaur slumped back on the ground nose first. Ow. Something stung him. He opened his eyes and gently raised his head. Some sort of sticky twig was stuck to his delicate snout. He shook his head fast, but that only made him dizzier and the little branch only seemed only to attach more.
“Argh, what the-!”
Furiously, he clawed at his own face in an attempt to free himself of the nuisance. That’s when he noticed that the twig was covered in -- what he assumed to be -- tiny thorns. More enraged than his energy levels should allow, he grabbed the twig from his face with both hands and ripped it off like an old, glued up band aid. Ripto grunted out loud and grinned in anguish, his eyes tearing up. He threw the prickly branch as long as he could muster, only to notice that it was still attached to his hand after the throw.
“Oh, come ON!”
After shaking his hand frantically up and down and back and forth, the little piece of plant finally let go and soundlessly hit the cavern floor. Ripto used his free hand to rub his eyes while cussing under his breath. Blinking back his focus, still a bit wobbly, he tried to regain his balance. It was when he scanned his new home once more that he noticed something odd at the center of the room, a faint shimmer and a very familiar fragrance. Spreading his eyes wider, slit pupils dilating, he had to stare for a good moment to make sure his senses didn’t betray him. There was a smooth depression in the rock which almost looked like it was handmade, and it seemed to be filled with clear, fresh--
“Water!”
Ripto waited no longer. Endless days of thirst with nothing to quench himself but dry, rough sand caught up with him and before he knew it, he plunged himself at the water source, stuffing his whole face into the craggy bowl, not drinking but rather devouring the water inside. He even swallowed gulps through his nose, but he didn’t care, he wasn’t going to stop until every last drop was gone. He would soon find out, however, that the container was somehow refilling itself from the bottom through a pipe-like tunnel that went through the stone, where it must have originated in a freshwater spring, like an oasis. Grabbing the rocky water bowl with both hands, he pulled his head up from the much needed drink and gasped for air, as he caught up in the moment and forgot that dinosaurs can’t breathe underwater. Then he just stood there, silently staring at the water surface, watching as the liquid slowly filled up the small basin. That was the first time in a very long time he had seen his own reflection. He couldn’t tell if the reflected image looking back at him was distorted because of the bubbling water gurgling up from within the depths of the cave. Every part of him seemed to boil, bubbles rising up from under the surface, as if they tried to break free from inside of his skin. A part of his jawline had ripped open, revealing his red gum and sharp teeth beneath. His eyes looked more like dull, scratched up glass beads than real organs. The crooked tip of his horn was missing. The point where it had broken cried brown tears of dried blood.
As the water came flowing back, so did Ripto’s senses and his body woke anew, piece by piece. With it returned the aching of his head, torso and limbs, and the painful memories that accompanied every part. He could feel a distinct stabbing in his chest and with it came the memory of almost being bitten in half by a giant monster. Ripto clenched his small chest with his hand. And noticed-- that it was sticky. Blood? No, this wasn’t it. Looking at his fingers, sniffing, then carefully licking the alien substance with the tip of his forked tongue, he figured it must be some sort of sap. Gasping, he took another look into the water mirror. The tip of his horn was also clogged with the brownish glue, different from the streaks of dried blood that ran down along it. It was almost as if it had been applied there deliberately. Ripto turned around, touching all over his small frame with quick, clawed fingers. There, another lump of sap on his right shoulder, and, oh, it was even on his back too, at the place where the lava lizard’s teeth had pierced his skin. There was even some on his kneecaps and elbows, easily noticeable through his torn attires. Dancing around the room in this curious manner, Ripto misplaced his foot on something that made a cracking noise.
“Ow! What on- YEAGH!”
He had stepped on the prickly twig that was stuck in his face just before he had found the water. Skipping up and down on one foot while swearing excessively, he tried to pull off the unrelenting plant now attached to the underside of one of his feet. While doing so, he noticed that the surface of the cavern floor wasn’t all cold stone. There were leaves. Plenty of them. A pile of it was arranged as bedding, which Ripto must have woken up on. After having forced off the prickly brush and sent it flying a good few meters, Ripto brought one of the leaves up close to his nose and sniffed it. Its scent had a distinguished familiarity to the twig and sap. Could this be-
“Catbat claw?”
Ripto raised an eyebrow. He was indeed familiar with this plant. Dinosaurs, critters and humans alike had used this brushy desert plant as a medical complement since the beginning of time. It grew sparse and only in inhabitable places, but he remember that they always kept some at home when he was a child. It was named after those pesky animals because the thorns were needle sharp and slightly curved and once they got hold of you, they wouldn’t let go. The thorns of course didn’t possess any medical properties, but the leaves did wonders as pain relievers, and the sap could be used to help stop bleeding and speed up the coagulation process. Furthermore, it covered up the smell of blood which could attract other, bigger monsters.
The handmade water basin and leaf bed, the roomy cavern, the Catbat claw -- Someone had saved Ripto and brought him here. Someone was nursing him back to health. But who? Had Crush found him? Ripto looked up. The cavern was dark, but he could still make out a rugged ceiling. Had his horn not be broken off at the top, he would have barely been able to stand straight in the innermost corner of the cavity where he woke up. Past the water bowl in the center of the room, the cave widened as well as the ceiling got higher, but it was still much to small for Crush, or Gulp for that matter, to fit. Besides, Ripto though, Crush was dumb as a doornail. He would never know about the Catbat claw, or be able to apply it as delicately with those huge hands of his. Crush was good at crushing, not nursing, or cooking, or anything at all for that matter.
“And it’s all because of him I’m in this awful mess,” Ripto whispered to himself through clenched teeth.
The thought escaped him immediately as a scraping noise could be heard from the cave’s entrance. Ripto flinched and quickly looked in the sound’s direction. The light outside was dim and cold, and whatever source illuminated the outside world just barely made it possible to distinguish the outlines of the cavern mouth. He stood still for a good few moments. Then the noise stopped. Ripto’s heart pounded fast against his tiny ribcage, and despite trying to stay unnoticable with teeth tightly pressed together, heavy breathing from his nose would betray him. But silence had laid a blanket over the cave and that perked Ripto’s curiosity. Slowly, he tiptoed towards the entrance gap of the cave. He stuck his nose out first, then carefully the rest of his face, eyes deadly focused forward, as if balancing on a tightrope over a canyon. The air against his face hit him as chilly, but not freezing. He cautiously examined his surroundings. Instead of seeing desert sand or dusty, empty plains ahead and around him like he thought he would, he saw more vertical rocks to each side. His gaze climbed down the rock’s surface. There were even more rocks, and it went on for as far as his vision could reach. The air lay completely still and the silence bounced between the high cliff walls. Was he truly up in the mountains, the very mountains he thought he had seen before while on Gulp’s back? Then he looked up. It was night. He didn’t see the moon. But he saw a vast sea of stars. Ripto had always enjoyed nighttime with the twinkling and sparkling of millions and billions little stars. But this was something else entirely. The stars here were drowning the black vastness of the universe, illuminating the sky with whites and yellows, blues and reds. He could hardly even make out any common constellations, because between every zodiac there were countless tiny specks merging into one another, making the ocean of stars more like one enormous celestial body. It was mesmerizing. He may have felt very small that night, but he also felt very alive.
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lxiewrites · 6 years
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It was warm.
The soft, well-worn sheets cocooning him held the warmth of his body that now held him in a comforting embrace. Burying his face in the pillow he inhaled the smell of clean laundry, missing the usual scent of musk and mint. He groped his hand under the covers to find the soft t-shirt, bringing it to his nose and the familiar smell filling his chest with even more gooey warmth. It was a pity to leave such a nice bed but he really did miss sleeping next to his heater of a boyfriend. When he was there he didn’t have to worry about leaving the warmth as much as it pulling him back in and laying on top of him.
‘Lance, don’t make me say your full name,’ Keith would threaten, squirming in his boyfriend’s grasp.
‘That only works on me once a month, babe,’ he replied, chuckling.
Whatever he missed his boyfriend.
Getting up Keith stretched, tamping down a shudder, as he grabbed the marker off the table to check off the previous day’s square, circling the dark circle in the corner for the current day. About six days until their shared statistics test and thirteen before their dinner with Hunk and Shay. Three more months and three more circled moons before the end of the semester and he could finally meet Lance’s family.
Pulling over a sweatshirt, not bothering with actual pants, he grabbed Lance’s keys and took his beat-up blue car to make the thirty-minute drive to the storage unit they rented out.
The sun’s rays didn’t even kiss the sky yet. Still a dark navy blue dotted with stars. Lance always told him to come when it was light out--it would be a lesser chance of being hurt-- but Keith felt more comforted this way. He catches the tail end of the transformation and could right away come in and hold him in his arms, instead of Lance waiting for him hours later.
Lance was always worried he would hurt him but how else could Keith show him that he trusted him?
He pulled off to park on the street and walked to their designated storage unit. The entire plot eerily quiet as his steps echoed on the concrete.
He unlocked the unit and scrolled the metal door up, up, up to check up on his werewolf boyfriend and possibly go back to the car to finish his book while he waited for the transformation--
An icy, cold drop of fear dropped down into his stomach, rippling out and making him shiver as he took in the sight of broken chains and a broken wall. Licking his lips, he tried to remain calm and tried to think of places in a semi-abandoned area that a feral werewolf still high on the full moon would go. 
Lance always told him in his beast form he would revert back to natural instincts and search out things that were familiar. Yet their shared covers were still in a rumpled bed on the floor of the unit. Were the scents not strong enough? Did Lance try to find his way back to find him?
Keith’s mouth firmed into a tight line. He needed to find him before anyone else did. He reached up to close the door when a warm huff of air blew his hair from the nape of his neck.
Turning around was Lance in his werewolf form. An enormous wolf who’s snout reached his shoulders on all fours. A laughing smile replaced with a sharp-toothed snarl and a bad attitude. His coat a rich, silky-soft looking chestnut brown that he wanted to run his fingers through without the fear of them being chomped off were raised in defense. The only familiar-- human-- thing about him were his eyes. His beautiful blue eyes that were blown wide and frantically looking from him to the flimsy bunker. Confused, angry, and hungry. 
‘My Ma always said there were three types of werewolves,’ Lance mused, playing with their laced hands. ‘Cursed, blessed, and born.’
Hot breath wafted over his face, blowing back his bangs with the slightly metallic smell of blood.
‘I was cursed,’ he confessed softly. ‘Bitten when I was out late playing, ‘bout five or so. It was very bad. Not a neat bite. Very bloody.’
Lance barked at him. A loud jarring sound that made him take a half a step back. Lance narrowed in on the action, eyes slitting in the perverse thrill of fleeing prey. At closer inspection, Keith could see traces of blood around his muzzle.
‘When I fully turned I was really feral. I couldn’t be controlled, like, at all. But!’ Lance chirped cheerfully, free hand waving a finger in the air like some know-it-all professor. ‘Mi Mamá had a secret weapon.’
Lance barked again, teeth snapping and sharp, hindquarters leaning back to ready himself for an attack. The werewolf growled, drool dropping off his jaw front paws lurching forw--
“Leandro Alejandro Núñez Cuesta Espinosa!”
Lance tilted his head towards him, foreheads touching. His bright smile and bright eyes taking up the entirety of Keith’s world. ‘She would always say my full name.’
Fur started dripping off of him in clumps. Chestnut fur revealing a deeper shade of brown, claws elongating to piano fingers. His muzzle shrinking and shedding fur until it littered the concrete. Growling turning into stifled screams of pain as Lance’s wolf features were forcibly turned human.
Keith ended up falling backward on the ground with an armful of his naked boyfriend on his lap, whimpering in pain as the forced change stretched and crushed his bones and muscle. Stiffening as the residual pain flared its way down his spine, gasping into the crook of Keith’s neck.
Keith hugged his boyfriend close, warm palms rubbing up and down his shuddering muscles whispering his name over and over again.
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