torture, trauma, horror

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds

Blur [ First | Prev ]

The days pass in a blur.

Ari wakes to the electronic screech of her alarm, tends to Connor, and collapses back onto her bed or onto the floor beside his.

Connor cries through the night and Ari gets no sleep at all and she cries too, holding each breath until she’s sure she can let it out without making a sound to panic Connor.

The alarm wakes her, and it’s light, and Connor’s breathing like he’s dying, shallow and uneven. She rolls out of bed, back burning with phantom stripes, and staggers to his side. Checks the time, checks her notes. More morphine – if that’s really what’s in the hand-labeled bottles the Morgens give them – more water, more antibiotics.

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds -- skipping ahead slightly over a couple of things like meeting Alex, may or may not come back and fill in the gaps

No [ First | Prev | Next ]

There's a bed for Ari in Connor's room, but she uses it as little as she can. Mostly she gets her sleep in snatches, sitting on the bed beside Connor with his head against her leg, or sitting on the floor leaning back against the side of his bed.

It’s easier to sleep when she doesn’t mean to, when she lets it creep up on her instead of lying down and trying to force it. It’s also easier to make sure she doesn’t fall too deeply into sleep.

If she sleeps too deeply she might miss the alarm for Connor's meds. 

If she sleeps too deeply, she might dream too deeply, and the last thing Connor needs is to hear her screaming. He already thinks she’s in 17 with him half the time.

If she only lets herself doze, she jolts herself awake almost as soon as the nightmares start, or else they stay shallow and formless enough that she knows she’s dreaming.

‘Verse: Resistance AU: Chewtoy Timeline: Canada

Safe // Unsafe [Next]

The slightest thing makes her flinch. The sound of a mug being put down slightly carelessly. The sound of the door. Connor walking into the room. Connor getting annoyed on the phone. Connor moving too suddenly, or getting too close.

It’s like the escape never happened, and she’s still waiting for her alarm to wake her. Or for Riven to walk in the front door with cuffs for her swinging cheerily from his fingers.

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds

Fix Him [Prev | Next]

The soft click of the door makes Ariadne jump, and her flinch jostles Connor and makes him twitch. He tries to move his limbs and cries hoarse and Ari pats his cheek and hushes him “Shhh, shh, be still.”

Morgen is back, and dread curdles down the length of Ari’s spine.

Has she done something wrong already? Has she forgotten something? Is it time for the witch to rip what she wants out of Connor’s mind?

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds

Giving Water [Prev | Next]

The clean white bandages are jarring. Out of place. Almost obscene. Band-aids over mortal wounds. How can any amount of care start to touch the marks of punishment after punishment.

He's unresponsive, and it's strange to sit here with him when he's not even here to see her. What's the use of talking to him like this? She might as well talk to the walls.

But it's not as if she has other work to be doing. She won't be penalized for wasting time – this is what they want her to be doing. They said so.

So she talks to him. Meaningless, inane chatter, anything to fill the unsettling, unfamiliar silence. 

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds

Reunion [Prev | Next]

Taryn knocks before letting herself in. Milonas is on her feet and halfway to the door by the time Taryn has it open. 

She's dressed in the jeans she traveled in, plus a borrowed sweater that's a little too large for her frame. It conspires with the hollows under her eyes to make her look very thin and fragile.

Behind her the bed is made with military precision, a slight dent in the covers giving away where she was sitting. Her backpack leans against the foot of the bed, still packed, zip closed. 

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: The Resistance have rescued Connor from the feds

Necessary Care [Prev | Next]

Connor Thompson begs like Anders did, after Anders was saved from that woman’s nightmare basement. It’s a frantic rote repetition with no real thought behind it. His voice barely works, but it’s hard not to recognise “please, please, please.”

Once he’s still and in a bed, there are stretches when he’s quiet. Taryn has to listen – while she preps gauze and healing-infused ointment and more antibiotics – for the irregular gasp of his breathing to know he’s still alive.

He has at least stopped trying to scream, and stopped making those long cracking moans he was making before the morphine.

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: Ariadne has begged the Resistance to save Connor from the feds

Sunlight [ Prev | Next ]

Light.

Not the harsh white light of Interrogations – but just as blinding.

Yellow light too warm on flushed fever skin – too hot even as he's cold to the core –

– sunlight.

He didn't think he'd see sunlight again. 

Are they finally taking him outside to shoot him? 

Probably it's not real.

He saw – Taryn Morgen? And now a stranger, leaning close over him in his agony until her silhouette against the sun resolves into blurred features.

"Please, sir," he begs obediently – or tries. Cracked lips won't move from their bleeding grimace. His voice is a croak in his raw throat and then gone. 

Please stop. Please no more no more no more.

Her hand is soft, cupping his cheek. Her voice is soft too, so garbled by distance that the words are lost. 

"Please," again. If he can't understand the instruction, can't try to follow the prompt, then the reprieve will end and the torture will continue –

"Shhhh," says the stranger.

She holds water to his lips, and she is an angel of mercy. 

The pain is – less. Connor wonders if he's dying. 

He'd prefer to see someone he loves – like his mom – in his dying moments. Not this – stranger, probably interrogator –

He chokes on the water she’s giving him, and panics, and loses the world to agony.

When he has any thoughts again, she’s still there. Looking down at him, holding his head in her hands.

He moans, terrified, and she brings water to his lips again – wet cloth, so that only drops trickle across his lips and he cannot choke.

Mercy.

He tries to thank her, so that the mercy might last a few more minutes. She shushes him, hands soft on bruised skin. Her face is near, and far, and near again.

“You’re safe now,” she says, and that can’t be right, she must be a figment of his fevered, dying mind. A disjointed dream.

But god, he wants to believe in mercy, even just for a little while.

[Next]

Whumptober Day 8 : Everything Hurts And I'm Dying

‘Verse: Resistance Story: Chewtoy AU, co-author @whump-sprite Timeline: Connor is rescuing Ariadne

Everything Hurts And I'm Dying [ Prev | Next ]

Ariadne doesn't sleep. She lays there with her eyes closed and tries, but her breathing never evens out. Her grip on Connor's hand never loosens. Painful-looking twitches wrack her body, and dampness lingers in the corners of her eyes. 

"What do you need?" Connor asks her. "Don't – know," she forces out laboriously "-- sir." "Just Connor," Connor tells her grimly. He's not a sir to anyone anymore. She doesn't respond to that. He holds her hand, and she holds onto his fingers as if for dear life.