Pairing: Rennick x Caz | Rating: General Audiences | Genre: Fluff
Summary : It’s Christmas on our beloved and much-appreciated Beira D, and Rennick is stressed—as always—running at a full 180. But even our beloved old diva has his limits. Luckily, that old idiot has Caz.
Pairing: Rennick x Caz | Rating: General Audiences | Genre: Sad and fluff
Summary : Rennick is old and has seen much of the world, collecting beautiful memories along the way. Many of them are with Caz. But every person reaches their end eventually. And so does Rennick, who leaves this world in peace. Caz doesn’t quite know how he’s supposed to live without him. What awaits him is grief, memories — and one brief, sweet, yet painful reunion.
Summary : Just a sweet moment with the two of them cuddling together.
Heart Beneath the Steel
Pairing: Rennick x Caz | Rating: General Audiences | Genre:family Fluff
Summary :(Caz and Rennick are on vacation for a few weeks, and Caz is staying with Rennick during that time.) Rennick is looking after his two granddaughters this weekend, and Caz is tagging along. It’s going to be a great time, and Caz sees Rennick in a whole new light. And he’s thinking of his daughters, too.
In the eye of the storm
Pairing: Rennick x Caz | Rating: Mature | Genre:fluff, Lots of flirting
Summary: °°Before he can even begin to grasp a clear thought or calm his racing pulse, he feels Rennick’s light stubble against his ear again. Rennick leans in, his lips almost brushing the earlobe, and whispers with a dryness that sounds almost cruelly matter-of-fact: “Ye’re truly terrifyin’ easy tae knock aff balance, McLeary.”°°
The Labyrinth of Echoes
Pairing: Rennick x OC | Rating: General Audiences | Genre: Fluff, g/t, borrower
Summary : You don’t need to know the game Still Wakes the Deep to follow this story, because I’m definitely not following the canon. I’m doing my own thing here. (I'm just a huge Rennick - and g/t fan.) Expect lots of G/T fluff, slow burn, and a deep dive into the relationship between a Human and a Borrower. And this story is all about one such Borrower. He lives secretly within the walls of Rennick’s house. But what if the two of them meet and somehow become friends? Or even more interesting, a Borrower on an oil rig!
Cadal Oil: The Price of Inefficiency
TW : Vore, hard Vore, digestion, Fatal Vore
Summary: At the Cadal Oil Corporation, corporate inefficiency carries a drakonian price tag. Anyone who underperforms is immediately terminated. But at this ruthless high-seas empire, termination is not the end of a contract—it is the final, horrific disposal of your very existence.
Davey watched the uncontrollable, feverish trembling of the tiny figure on his palm, and a sharp pain shot through his chest. He saw the small, perfectly formed hands clutched protectively over the head and the shoulders hunched high, as if the little lad expected the very ceiling to cave in or a massive fist to crush him at any second.
The realization that he, Davey Rennick, a man who had spent his life taking pride in creating things with his hands, maintaining machinery, and protecting his family, was now the sole cause of this pure, naked mortal terror burned in his soul like glowing acid. He wasn't a hunter, damn it. He was a grandfather, a widower, a simple workman. Thoughts swirled in his mind: What kind of monster am I in his eyes? He looks at me and sees only death. I’m holding an entire life in my hand, a tiny, wonderful life, and I’m scaring it nearly to death just by being too big and too loud. He suddenly felt clumsy and monstrous, as if his mere dimensions were a crime against the creature's fragility. He didn’t want to be a monster, a nightmare stepping out of the shadows to steal small souls.
"There now... it's alright," Davey said at last, trying to control the massive resonance of his lungs until his voice was little more than a warm, gentle breath in the stillness of the living room. He lowered his massive arm with a slow, almost cinematic deliberation, taking agonizing care to avoid any jerky movements that might throw the little fellow off balance. "I’m putting ye down now, little yin. Back on the table. Nice and easy. Ye truly dinnae have to be feart anymore."
„I’m sorry... I’m right sorry for frichtenin' ye so."
Very slowly, with the extreme, almost painful precision of a crane operator lowering a ton-heavy load onto a swaying deck in the middle of a roaring North Sea gale, Davey began to lower his massive arm. Every muscle fiber in his shoulder and biceps was strained to the limit to make the downward motion as smooth and steady as humanly possible. He focused entirely on keeping his palm perfectly level, ensuring his tiny, trembling guest wouldn't lose his footing or feel as though he were sliding into a bottomless abyss. His huge, calloused fingers remained demonstratively splayed and motionless, careful not to create even the hint of a threatening gesture that could be mistaken for a grab.
As he guided his arm down inch by inch, Davey’s mind was pounding. Easy now, Davey. Keep yer breath shallow. Dinnae shake. If ye drap him now, ye’ll never forgive yersel'. He’s sae sma'... like a feather o' flesh an' blood. How’s he been bidin' here all these years while I was snorin' upstairs or sat here watchin' the box? He must think I’m a force o' nature. A walkin' mountain. A profound sense of humility washed over him. He, who had so often felt small and insignificant against the elements on the oil rig, was now the entire universe to this being, a dangerous, unpredictable universe.
When the outer edge of his hand finally touched the cool, solid surface of the dark wooden table, Davey stopped instantly. He pressed his palm firmly against the wood to form a stable bridge and remained in total stillness.
"There..." he whispered, so softly it barely carried over the hum of the fridge in the distant kitchen. His gaze rested on the tiny figure with a mixture of sadness and deep admiration. "Ye can go now, little yin. The way is clear. I’m no' hauldin' ye, I promise. Get ye back tae yer safety."
"Go on then, laddie," he thought,"The timber’s right there. Run back tae the shadows where big, clumsy fools like me cannae reach ye. I've gien ye a fricht ye’ll tell yer grandkids aboot, I suppose. 'The night the mountain caught me,' eh? Off ye go, I’ll no' move a muscle till ye're well clear, d'ye hear? I’m as still as a grave. Just... just ken that I'm right sorry for the way we met. Ye're a brave wee soul, so ye are. Go on now. Back tae the dark."
Fin hardly dared to open his eyelids even a tiny crack, so certain was he that the end was still imminent. But the world around him had suddenly gone still. He felt that the violent trembling and the swaying journey through the air had ceased; the vast, warm platform beneath him now lay as motionless as the Rock of Gibraltar. Cautiously, inch by inch, he lifted his head from the protective crook of his arms.
Directly before his knees lay the saving, dark expanse of the wooden table, stable, familiar, and within reach. Fin paused, his lungs full of the heavy air of the giant, smelling of tobacco and labor, and actually ventured to cast his gaze back one more time. He looked up into the colossal face of Davey Rennick. The giant was no longer staring at him as if he were an interesting insect or prey to be bagged; the hunting instinct had completely vanished from those gray-blue eyes. Instead, there was something in Davey’s gaze that shook Fin to his core: it was a deep, honest regret and a strange, lonely sadness that seemed as heavy as the oceans the giant always spoke of.
Fin was utterly stunned, his small mind searching desperately for an explanation for what was happening. The grim stories told in the hollow walls by the light of burning matches stated unequivocally that giants never, under any circumstances, released their prey. They taught that these beings were pointlessly cruel, that they took pleasure in the suffering of the Little People. But this giant here, this Davey, had not clenched his hand into a fist; he had opened it wide and flat like a bridge to freedom. He hadn't locked him in a stifling jar to watch him suffocate, and he hadn't let his massive fingers snap shut to carelessly crush him between skin and bone.
„Look at ye... ye're no' much bigger than a dram o' whisky, but ye've got the courage o' a lion."
Rennick watched Fin's eyes searching his own, and a sad, crooked smile touched the corners of his mouth.
"The timber's right there, little yin. I'm giein' ye yer life back. I've spent too long seein' things broken an' lost; I've nae desire tae add you tae the list. Go on now. Step off the meat an' onto the wood. Ye're safe. I'll bide here like a statue till ye're tucked away in yer cracks. Just... just mind yersel', eh? I'll leave a bit o' the shortbread oot tomorrow. No' as a trap, mind... just a peace offerin' between neighbors."
The astonishment, as deep and confusing as it was, lasted only a fleeting second before the relentless instinct for survival regained its full grip. Fin did not hesitate. In his mind, there was no room for gratitude or philosophical questions, there was only the primal urge to vanish into the shadows. With a powerful leap, he sprang from the warm, fleshy edge of the palm onto the cool, smooth wood of the tabletop. The sudden change of surface gave him a fresh surge of adrenaline.
Without looking back, without seeking the giant's gaze a single time more, he bolted. He was faster than he had ever been in his life; his small body was nothing more than a blur, a flickering shadow in the dim light. His tiny lungs burned with every frantic breath as he raced across the infinite expanse of the tabletop, reached the edge, and slid down the massive, turned wooden leg with the agility of an acrobat.
The moment his boots hit the thick carpet, he shot forward again. He ignored the pounding in his temples and the exhaustion in his limbs as he charged across the soft fibers toward the protective darkness beneath the heavy wardrobe at breakneck speed. Once there, his trembling but sure fingers gripped his rope. With the last of his strength, driven by the lingering image of that colossal hand at his back, he hauled himself up, climbing hand over hand with his eyes fixed upward, scaling the rough back panel of the furniture toward his safe haven in the heights.
With one final, desperate surge of strength, Fin pushed off from the ledge and slipped through the narrow crack in the wall, the familiar gateway to his hidden world. No sooner had the darkness of the crawlspace swallowed him than he ran on, driven by an adrenaline rush that completely clouded his mind. He stumbled deeper and deeper into the familiar yet now eerie labyrinth of dust, laths, and cold brick, turning corners in blind haste and crawling through well-known bottlenecks until he finally reached the safest, most secluded corner of his lair, a tiny niche behind the main beam, so narrow that no giant in the world could ever touch it with even a single finger.
There, he simply collapsed. His knees gave way, and he slid powerlessly down the rough wall until he sat on the floor. He pressed his narrow, trembling back firmly against the cold, unyielding masonry, as if seeking in the hardness of the stone the stability his own body was currently refusing him. His entire chest heaved in spasmodic gasps as he clawed greedily with an open mouth for the stale, dusty air.
Out in the living room, Davey Rennick sat motionless at his massive oak table for a long time, while the distant drone of the television had long since faded into a meaningless hum. He remained in a state of statue-like stillness, his gaze fixed unblinkingly on that empty spot where, just moments ago, the impossible had stood, that tiny, living miracle that had shaken the very foundations of his world.
Slowly, almost reverently, he raised his right hand and stared down at the empty palm. He could still imagine the delicate warmth of the tiny body and feel the frantic thudding of that miniature heart against his callouses. Then, he turned his head and looked toward the unremarkable shadow behind the cabinet, toward the spot where the little creature had vanished into the darkness of the wall. A strange, melancholic smile crept onto his lips, an expression his face hadn't worn in many years.
"Until tomorrow then... wee man," Davey murmured into the deep, now less oppressive silence of the house. His voice was nothing more than a gentle rumble, carrying no threat, sounding almost like a promise.
He didn't know if he would ever see the tiny figure with the coat and the rucksack again, or if his clumsy grasp had driven him away forever. But one thing was as certain to him that night as the tides of the North Sea: the thick, leaden wall of loneliness that had encased his house and his heart since his return from the rig had suffered a deep, incurable crack. It was a rift that no pent-up anger toward McLeary, no bitterness over Cadal, and no grueling shift on the Beira D could ever close again. In the stillness of his home, he was no longer alone; he shared his life with a secret, one so small it fit in the palm of his hand, yet large enough to change his entire world.
"Aye, Davey lad, Ye’ve gone an' found a flatmate, haven't ye? A brave wee soul eatin' yer mash and hidin' in yer bricks. Lord... imagine that. All this time, I thought the only thing movin' in these walls was the damp an' the rot. Run along then, little yin. Get ye tae sleep. I’ve gien ye enough o' a fricht for one lifetime. But I'll be here tomorrow. A hundred thousand welcomes tae ye. Ye've gien a lonely auld bear somethin' tae wake up for. An' that's more than all the oil in the North Sea could buy me."
Hours passed as the deep night wrapped the house in a leaden silence, but for Fin, the passage of time in the protective darkness of the wall felt viscous and sticky, like thick, black pitch. Every minute stretched into an eternity, in which the distant ticking of the wall clock in the living room echoed like a relentless hammer blow against the rafters.
He sat completely huddled on his small bed, a carefully constructed sleeping place made of soft, dried forest moss and fine scraps of fabric he had painstakingly gathered from beneath Davey’s wardrobe over the months. He held his knees pressed so tightly to his chest that his limbs ached, his arms wrapped around them like a lifesaving anchor in a stormy sea.
Although the panicked, frenetic thumping of his heart had gradually calmed, subsiding into a dull, steady rhythm echoing in his ears, a deafening, almost painful noise of swirling thoughts raged in his head. It was a chaotic storm of questions, doubts, and images: the giant’s colossal face, the warm light of the lamp, the smell of tobacco, and above all, that incomprehensible moment when the gigantic fingers had not crushed him, but had gently set him back down onto the wood of the table. The silence around him was deceptive, for inside him, his mother’s ancient warnings shrieked against the new, confusing reality he had only just survived.
Fin stared as if hypnotized at his own small hands, which appeared like pale shadows in the dim, ghostly light of his hiding place. He pressed them flat against his thighs, but the fine trembling that came from deep within simply wouldn't stop. It was as if the encounter had left a resonance in his bones that continued to vibrate incessantly.
Vividly, almost as if he were still standing up there in the light, he could feel the heat of Rennick’s palm on his skin: a foreign, overwhelming, and pulsing warmth that didn't come from a lifeless object, but from a living being unimaginably larger and more powerful than anything Fin had ever known in his small world. It was the heat of a volcano that had nearly consumed him.
"He let me go," he repeated over and over in his head, the words echoing through his thoughts like a mantra whose meaning he couldn't quite grasp.
It simply made no sense. Every fiber of his being, every lesson he had ever been taught, screamed against this fact. Everything Fin had learned about survival and the order of the world was built on the iron foundation of invisibility. A Borrower who was seen was lost, as certain as a falling stone hitting the ground. That was the supreme law, the only barrier between their people and extinction. Anyone discovered had to flee, far away, to a new house, to a new uncertainty, because the eye of a giant was a death sentence.
But Davey Rennick had broken this ancient, unshakable law. He had possessed the absolute, undivided power to end Fin’s entire tiny universe, all his dreams, his fears, and his future, with a single, casual squeeze of his massive fingers. He could have broken Fin like a dry twig without even trying. And yet, despite that overwhelming power, despite the perfect opportunity, he hadn't done it. He hadn't let the trap snap shut; instead, he had flung the gates of freedom wide open.
Fin looked back with a mixture of shudders and deep confusion to that moment when he had gathered the strength to look Davey directly in the eye. In the silence of his hiding place, the image stood before him as sharp as an engraving: he remembered the single, hot tear that had sprung from his own eyes and fallen directly onto Rennick’s massive, furrowed thumb, a tiny drop of despair on a plain of horn and skin. But above all, he remembered the giant’s gaze; it hadn't been hard or triumphant, but full of sadness, an almost humble, apologetic expression that didn't seem to fit that colossal frame at all.
"He called me by a name... well, he called me 'little yin'," Fin mused, absently stroking the fabric of the sleeve where the giant had just been gripping him. "And he said his own name. Davey Rennick. He introduced himself to me as if we were... as if we were equals."
Fin knew that name, of course. He had read it a thousand times on crumpled envelopes lying on the hallway table, had seen it on bills and official documents when he explored the surfaces by moonlight at night. But hearing the name directly from the giant’s mouth, in that deep, vibrating voice, had suddenly made him terrifyingly real. Davey was no longer just a nameless force of nature who made the house tremble with heavy steps or ruled over the furniture like a distant god. He was suddenly... a person. A lonely, profoundly exhausted person of flesh and blood, who struggled on the phone with electricians named McLeary, who cursed the cold, and who, during the long nights, gazed at the photos of his granddaughters with a wistfulness that Fin only truly understood now that he had seen the man's eyes. Fin realized that the giant wasn't just big, above all, he was alone, scarred by a longing for his family whom he clearly missed.
Fin felt a hollow pit in his stomach as he thought of his family, of his father’s stern lectures and his mother’s dire warnings. What would his father say if he knew what had happened tonight? He’d likely declare him stark raving mad, shouting that the poison of the giant’s world had clouded his mind. He would probably force him, before the sun even rose, to stuff his few belongings into his rucksack and leave this house forever, to start all over again somewhere in the cold, dangerous woods.
But Fin didn’t move. He looked around his little kingdom between the dusty wooden beams and the protective bricks. The walls were papered with the treasures of the past few years, small finds that each told a story of their own. This was his home. He had spent fifteen years here, growing up in these crawlspaces, and he knew the rhythms of this house better than the back of his own hand. He knew every specific creak of the floorboards Davey caused; he could tell by the sound of the footsteps whether the giant was tired, annoyed, or in a hurry. He had become a part of this building, as permanent as the nails in the beams.
Was it possible, he suddenly wondered, staring into the void, that the ancient legends and the terrifying stories of the Borrowers didn't tell the whole, unshakable truth? That they perhaps came from a time when fear was the only tool for survival? Was it conceivable that some giants weren't naturally blind with cruelty, but that their mere existence simply made them... big, loud, and incredibly clumsy toward a world they could barely perceive?
A dangerous, almost heretical little thought sprouted in Fin’s mind and took deep root. He was no longer just a nameless thief living like a ghost in the shadows, feeding on the crumbs of the Big People. Davey knew about him now. Davey had held him, had seen him breathe, and had heard him. The game of hide-and-seek that had defined his entire life was over in an instant. But in its place, no destruction had followed. Instead, something entirely new had emerged, something unsettling and, at the same time, fascinating: a connection.
Fin lay down very slowly on his side, the moss of his bed yielding softly under his weight. He stared with wide eyes into the deep, velvety darkness of the shaft, the hidden passage that led directly behind the living room wall. He didn't lie to himself: the fear was still there, a cold residual glow in his gut that wouldn't be extinguished so easily. The sheer, incomprehensible scale of Davey Rennick, the strength in his arms, and the way his voice made the very air tremble would likely intimidate him for the rest of his life. Yet, something fundamental had changed. The pure, paralyzing terror that had previously permeated him like a poison had lost its venomous sting. He was no longer the helpless victim waiting for the inevitable.
"You didn't crush me, Davey Rennick," Fin whispered into the dusty silence of the masonry, his words bouncing back like a soft echo from the cold bricks. "You had me in your power... and you opened your hand. You let me live."
On that momentous night, Fin found no true sleep. He only drifted in a shallow daze, his senses remaining sharpened. He listened intently to the vastness of the house until he caught the distant, now strangely peaceful sound of snoring from the giant’s bedroom. It no longer sounded like the threatening rumble of a storm, but like the steady rhythm of a sleeping mountain that posed no danger. Fin lay there, the blanket pulled up to his chin, and for the very first time in his fifteen-year existence, he didn't wonder with a racing heart how best to hide from the giant’s gaze or how to reach new supplies unseen. Instead, his thoughts circled around a question that both terrified him and filled him with a strange hope: he wondered what might happen if tomorrow morning, when the shadows grew short again, he found the courage once more to step out from the protective darkness of the wall.
Rennick's inner monologue and thoughts are written in italics.
Fin was in a state that could only be described as a thief’s seventh heaven. The paralyzing fear that had encased him like a suit of icy armor only minutes ago had given way to a delirious euphoria. With the seasoned resolve of a survivalist, he had locked every cautious thought, every one of his mother’s warnings, and every image of Davey’s heavy boots into a small, dark drawer in the back of his mind and metaphorically thrown away the key. He surrendered himself entirely to the moment and to this unbelievable feast spread out before him like the spoils of a victorious campaign.
He knelt right at the smooth, white rim of the porcelain plate, sleeves rolled up, and dug his hands deep into the still-lukewarm, creamy mashed potatoes. It felt almost sinful to feel the soft texture between his fingers as he fished out the best, butteriest chunks with hurried, greedy movements and shoved them into his mouth. His whole body trembled with excitement and satiation; the aroma of roasted onions and meat juices went to his head like heavy wine.
In this moment of total surrender, Fin’s greatest strength became his most dangerous weakness: his senses, which usually registered every speck of dust in the wind, were focused entirely on taste and smell. The numbing scent of the food enveloped him like a thick curtain, a cocoon of pleasure that made the outside world vanish. And so it was that his ears, usually so fine and highly sensitive, completely missed the faint, treacherous creak of the bedroom door upstairs, that characteristic stretching of old wood that normally would have signaled his immediate retreat.
Upstairs in the bedroom, sleep was no peaceful harbor for Davey; it was a restless sea of shadows and a gnawing conscience. He had tossed and turned, making the old bedframe groan under his weight, but the relentless discipline of the oil rig was etched deeper into his bones than he cared to admit. On the Beira D, disorder meant danger; you didn't leave a tool lying around, a hatch open, or chaos in your wake if you wanted even an hour of safe sleep. This deep-seated law of order burned like a warning fire in the back of his mind, refusing to let him rest.
With a deep, rattling sigh that sounded like a total surrender to insomnia, he finally stood up again. Dressed in nothing but a faded undershirt and pajama bottoms, he was barefoot.
Davey shuffled along the hallway and came to a halt in the broad doorframe of the living room. He paused, rubbing the hard heels of his hands so firmly over his burning eyelids beneath his glasses that he saw flashes of color. He was certain that the chronic lack of sleep, the salty North Sea air, and the immense psychological stress of the past few weeks were finally robbing him of his sanity. He blinked several times to clear the veil from his eyes.
But the image did not change. There, on the vast plain of his massive oak table, right in the middle of the remains of his dinner and surrounded by mountains of mashed potatoes, something was actually moving. It wasn't a shadow, a mirage, or a fat house spider, it was a tiny, living figure, busy at work in the dim light.
Davey froze, his breath hitching in his throat.
"Aw, hell," said his inner voice "I’ve finally cracked. I’m seein’ things now. Just a wee ghostie hauntin’ my mash..."
He squinted, leaning his heavy frame against the doorframe for support. "Aye, Davey lad, ye’ve stayed out on that water a month too long," his inner voice continues "Ye're lookin' right at a bleedin' fairy eatin' yer supper. Cadal’s finally driven ye 'round the bend, hasn't he? Ye’ve gone stark ravin’ mad, ye have."
It wasn't a mouse, even though the figure possessed a long, supple tail covered in fine, light-brown fur that twitched nervously over the rim of the plate. Nor was it a mere shadow cast by the flickering of the television. Before Davey’s disbelieving eyes, a tiny humanoid figure was busy at work, wearing a skillfully crafted little coat and carrying a miniature rucksack that already looked stuffed to the seams.
Davey caught his breath so abruptly it burned in his lungs. His heart, which just moments ago had beaten sluggishly and tiredly, suddenly hammered against his ribs with unforeseen force, but it wasn't fear that surged through him. It was a profound, sheer, and utterly incredulous wonder that washed over him like a wave. There, on his table, stood a tiny being with pointed, almost elfin ears that twitched alertly toward every sound, and a shock of tousled brown hair. He blinked once, twice, pressed his eyelids shut tight and snapped them open again, but the apparition didn't vanish into thin air. It remained real, tangible, and terrifyingly alive.
"Canna be..." his lips formed soundlessly, while his mind scrambled feverishly for a rational explanation and failed miserably. The old tales his grandmother used to tell about the "wee folk" living in the spaces between the world flashed through his mind, stories he had dismissed as nonsense decades ago.
Davey took a cautious step forward, his bare soles sinking deep into the soft pile of the carpet. Then another step. He moved now with a cat-like grace and a focus one would hardly have expected from a man of his massive stature after such a soul-crushing shift. Every fiber of his body was intent on not letting a single floorboard creak or causing a stray breeze. A desperate longing burned within him: he did not want to startle this creature into the darkness. He had to get closer; he had to capture every detail of this incredible being, if only to gain final certainty whether he had suffered some lingering damage on the rig and finally lost his mind.
"Easy now, Davey," his inner voive said to him. "Softly does it, ye big gowk. Dinnae fricht the wee soul away. If ye're crackit in the head, let's at least get a guid look at the madness before it skedaddles. Holy Mother... he's wearin' a wee jacket. A proper wee jacket! Aye, Rennick, ye’ve finally left the real world behind, haven't ye? Just you an' the piskies now."
Fin was still completely absorbed in salvaging the savory treasures from the plate. In his euphoria, he had cast aside all vigilance; he was no longer the cautious scout who flinched at every creak in the rafters, but a guest at an imperial banquet. As he chewed, he hummed softly and almost unconsciously, the melody of an old lullaby his mother had once sung to him in the safe depths of the old post office. It was a wistful, simple tune that now swayed to the rhythm of his jaw, filling the silence around him with a fragile, homely warmth.
He was utterly lost in his rapturous delight, intoxicated by the richness of the butter and the heaviness of the gravy clinging to his fingers. In this moment of abundance, danger no longer existed for him. He felt absolutely secure in the comfort of the familiar room, believing the giant to be sound asleep upstairs. It was a dangerous hubris that overtook him, a deceptive lightheartedness that made him believe he had outsmarted fate once and for all.
With his stomach full and the loot in his pockets, a feeling washed over him that he had rarely known in his harsh, meager life as a Borrower: he felt invincible.
Davey, however, had reached the edge of the table. He loomed there like a mountain shrouded in mist, his large eyes wide behind his glasses as he watched the tiny creature humming a tune over his leftovers. He didn't move a muscle, his massive hands trembling slightly by his sides.
"Lord above," whispered Davey’s inner voice, "He’s... he's singin'. The wee mannie is havin' a right proper ceilidh over ma mash. I cannae believe ma eyes. Is that a tune? Aye, it is. Sounds like somethin' ma ain mither used tae lilt when I was nobbut a bairn."
He leaned in just a fraction more, his heart thudding like a drum in his ears.
"Look at ye go, ye brave wee soul, Stuffin' yer pockets like there’s no tomorrow. If I’m mad, then it’s a braw kind o' madness. Aye, eat yer fill, lad. Better you havin' it than the bin. Just dinnae look up... dinnae look up an' see the great ugly beast glowerin' at ye."
Fin froze mid-motion. He went as rigid as if his entire body had instantaneously turned to stone, fingers still buried deep in the creamy mashed potatoes, a half-chewed morsel of bread still in his mouth. It wasn't a sudden creak of the floorboards or a careless cough that tore him from his trance and alerted his survival instincts. Rather, it was a subtle, physical shift in his immediate environment: the sudden, perceptible rise in air temperature from the giant’s body heat, and that very specific, unmistakable scent that clung to Davey like an invisible aura—a pungent blend of stale pipe tobacco, the chill of the sea, and the sharp, cheap detergent the old man had used for his laundry for years.
Davey, standing close enough for his shadow to swallow the entire plate, didn't move. He watched the tiny figure go still, his own heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs.
"Och, bugger, I’ve gone and frichted him. Look at ye... frozen solid like a wee statue. Poor wee soul’s heart must be loupin' oot his chest. Easy, laddie, I’m no' gonnae hurt ye. Just a tired auld fool lookin' at somethin' he cannae explain. Aye, ye've been livin' in ma walls all this time, haven't ye? Eatin' ma crumbs and listenin' tae ma gurnin'. Just dinnae run off into the dark just yet... give an auld man a minute tae see if he's truly lost his marbles or if ye're real flesh an' bone." Should he perhaps consider going to therapy because of this very persistent inner voice?
Yes.
Very slowly, with an agonizing delay as if his entire neck were made of rusty, unlubricated iron that threatened to snap at the slightest movement, Fin turned his head upward into the infinite heights.
There he was. The giant.
From this perspective, Davey’s face was titanic, an overwhelming landscape of deep furrows and skin that loomed over him like a mountain range of flesh. His eyes, shimmering in the gloom of the room like two vast, unfathomable gray-blue lakes, lay behind the thick lenses of his glasses, which reflected the light of the streetlamps in cold flashes. Davey was staring directly at him, his gaze locked onto the tiny figure, his mouth slightly agape.
Fin’s entire world came to a dead halt in that one cruel moment. The ticking of the wall clock, the distant hum of traffic outside in the streets of Glasgow, it all vanished into a numbing silence. The small, greasy breadcrumbs he had been clutching so greedily just moments ago suddenly felt heavy as boulders in his hands, as if they had been cast from lead. In the dark legends of his people, the horror stories whispered within the hollow walls, it was always said that giants struck at exactly this moment of discovery. That they would unleash a thundering, malicious laugh while bringing their massive hands crashing down to crush a Borrower like a nuisance of an insect.
But Davey didn't laugh. He made no sound, and not a single muscle in his massive face twitched with hostile intent. He simply looked... utterly stunned, as if he had seen a ghost that had stepped directly out of his deepest memories and into the light of reality.
Davey Rennick didnae say a single word; the air in his throat seemed to have frozen into glass. In his bone-weary mind, the chaotic, fragmented images of the last few months on the Beira D swirled like a violent storm, the deafening roar of the drills, the thick, pitch-black oil that clung to everything, and the creeping madness of isolation in the middle of the thundering North Sea. He wondered, with a heart full of bitterness and genuine fear, if this tiny, impossible apparition on his dining table was the final, irrefutable proof that the loneliness and stress had rotted his brain, and that he had finally lost his grip on reality. He did not move a muscle, hardly daring to blink for fear of shattering the delicate mirage, and simply stared down at the little creature with a mixture of awe and terror.
"God help me," he thought, "Is this it then? Have I finally gone 'round the bend? I’ve seen men crack on the rig afore—staring into the black water till the waves start talkin' back, but this... this is somethin' else entirely. A wee mannie. A proper wee mannie in a coat, eatin' ma supper like it’s his birthright."
He looked at Fin’s tiny, frozen form, and a pang of sorrow hit him through the fog of his exhaustion.
"If ye're a hallucination, ye're a cruel one, laddie. But if ye're real... Lord, if ye're real, then I haven't been alone in this big, drafty house after all. All those nights I sat here gurnin' into ma drink, were ye listenin' from the shadows? Were ye watchin' the auld bear mope about?"
He let out a breath so slow it was almost silent.
"Steady, Davey. Dinnae fricht the wee soul. Whether he’s flesh and bone or just the first sign o' the asylum, he’s the bonniest thing I’ve seen in five months o' grey steel and salt. Just keep breathin'... dinnae reach out... just let him be."
The leaden, unnatural silence that had settled over the table like a ton-heavy bell was more unbearable to Fin than any angry shout or thundering curse. The absence of an immediate reaction from the giant caused the uncertainty to swell immeasurably, until it filled every pore of his tiny body with cold horror.
Then, in a moment of ultimate tension, the paper-thin membrane of his hard-won self-control snapped. A shrill, almost unnaturally high-pitched sound of naked panic escaped Fin’s throat, a scream that sounded in his own ears like the signal for his doom. He spun around with a massive burst of effort, his boots skidding on the smooth ceramic of the plate, nearly losing his balance.
He ran.
His small, hand-stitched boots drummed a frantic, desperate rhythm against the polished, hard wood of the tabletop, which now felt as endless beneath his feet as a barren steppe. His arms flailed wildly in the air to maintain his momentum, while his entire focus was fixed solely on the saving edge of the table, looming before him like a cliff over an unknown sea. Every muscle in his legs burned with exertion, and his breath came in short, gasping heaves. In his mind, there was only this one, all-consuming escape plan: just a few more tiny inches to the precipice, the saving leap into the depths, and then, finally, the firm, shadowed floor beneath his feet…
Davey flinched as the tiny creature’s scream pierced the quiet of the room, a sound so sharp it made his own heart lurch in his chest.
"Aw, Christ! Nae, nae, laddie!" He saw the blur of movement, the tiny boots scrambling for purchase on the oak. "Wait! Dinnae loup! Ye'll break yer wee neck, ye daft soul! Stop! Just bide a wee second!" he pleaded, the thick Glasgow vowels trembling. "I’m no' huntin' ye! I’m no' a monster! Just... wheesht now, easy! Ye're gonnae hurt yersel' runnin' like a mad thing. Stay on the wood, mannie! Just stay on the wood!"
THUD.
The impact was so violent that Fin’s vision shattered into a thousand dancing points of light for a moment. He hadn't plunged over the edge into the safety of the void; instead, he had slammed into something that felt warm, slightly yielding, and yet as unshakeable as a cliff face. Dazed, he stumbled back several steps, arms flailing to keep from slipping on the smooth wood, and stared upward with wide, terrified eyes.
It wasn't a wall or an obstacle he had overlooked. It was Davey’s palm, a vast expanse of flesh and blood, crisscrossed with lines and calluses, blocking the path to freedom like a massive, insurmountable gate. Fin breathed in short, rattling gasps that sounded like the panting of a hunted animal in the sudden silence of the room; his entire body trembled so violently that his teeth chattered.
In his death throes of terror, he tried to find a way out, wanting to bolt to the left, but the world around him was suddenly set into a terrifying, coordinated motion. The giant was faster than Fin had ever thought possible. Before he could even blink or take another desperate step, two colossal, fleshy pillars, Davey’s massive thumb and forefinger, shot down from above and closed around his small shirt collar with terrifying precision and a firm grip.
"No! No, please don't!" Fin screamed at the top of his lungs, as panic crashed over him like an ice-cold tidal wave. His voice, usually so bright and clear, broke into a desperate sob as the unthinkable happened: he lost contact with the solid, familiar oak of the tabletop. The ground beneath his feet simply vanished, as if the entire gravity of the world had been suspended.
Davey hoisted him upward with a slow, almost frighteningly controlled movement until they stood face to face at direct, cruel eye level. Fin dangled there, kicking in mid-air, completely defenseless and at the giant’s mercy, as helpless as a tiny beetle snatched up by the wing by a cruel child. The rush of air from the movement whistled in his ears, and the height made his stomach press uncomfortably against his ribs.
In his sheer terror of death, he kicked his legs incessantly into the empty, supportless air, while his tiny fists, turned white from the effort, hammered furiously against the gigantic thumbnail. That nail was a vast, shimmering surface, as hard as horn, an invincible shield belonging to the titan.
"Let me go! You monster! Put me down right now!" he shrieked with a volume that threatened to tear his small throat apart, twisting desperately against the iron grip on his collar that choked him like a noose.
Davey flinched, his head recoiling slightly at the piercing, needle-sharp volume of the tiny man’s screams. He held his arm as steady as a crane, though the sight of the little creature struggling so violently made his chest ache with a sudden, heavy guilt.
"Och, stop it! Stop yer fechtin', ye wee rager! I’m no' a monster, ye daft wee thing! I’m tryin' tae keep ye from paintin' the floorboards wi' yer insides! Wheesht now, just wheesht! Ye're gonnae choke yersel' on yer ain sark if ye dinnae bide still, I’ve got ye by the scruff, aye, but I’m no' gonnae squeeze. Just look at me... look at ma face, laddie. Dae I look like I’m wantin' tae hurt ye? I’m just a tired auld man, an' ye’re the first bit o' magic I’ve seen since I left the Clyde. Just... just stop yer kickin' afore ye burst a vessel."
The fear was no longer just a feeling; it was an absolute, physical force that robbed Fin of his every breath. It was black, suffocating, and so dense that the entire world around him seemed to blur. In this cruel state of suspension, Fin saw Davey’s vast, infinite eye fixing upon him from a terrifying proximity, a gray-blue ocean of curiosity and a power that Fin could not even begin to comprehend.
He saw every single pore in the giant’s coarse skin, which from this perspective looked like gaping craters in a strange, uneven mountain landscape. He saw the fine, reddish veins in the white of the eyeball and felt the raw, untameable strength lurking in those massive fingers, which held him in the air with the ease of a blade of grass. His mind, now completely succumbed to panic, reeled through the most horrific stories of his childhood at breakneck speed: the grim warnings of the elders about the "Big Ones" who used Borrowers as curious playthings, locking them in jars until they suffocated, or simply crushing them carelessly between thumb and forefinger in a moment of boredom.
He squeezed his eyes shut with such force that colorful sparks ignited against his inner darkness, huddling his head deep between his narrow shoulders. He made himself as small and compact as possible, bracing for the all-deciding, devastating pain, ready for those fleshy, titanic fingers to simply squeeze and extinguish the tiny light of his existence forever and irrevocably.
He felt his minuscule heart hammering against his fragile ribs in a frenetic, almost painful rhythm, as if it wanted to burst from his chest before the "Great Death" arrived. In this terrible moment of absolute powerlessness, Davey Rennick was no longer the lonely, aging man who loved his granddaughters with touching tenderness or the weary sailor returned from the sea. He was primal fear personified, the nameless horror from the depths of Borrower legends, the relentless and unpredictable giant whose shadowy violence his mother had warned him about, time and time again, during those dark nights behind the wall.
Fin trembled so violently that the shaking of his body must have radiated all the way into Davey’s wrist. Perhaps it was this instinctive reaction of naked horror that gave the giant pause, for Fin felt the iron grip on his collar loosen ever so slightly, just enough so that the fabric no longer choked his throat and he could claw for breath again, but still firm enough that any thought of escape remained a pure illusion. He remained in this agonizing suspension, staring death in the face, while the hot, salty tears of despair flowed unceasingly down his cheeks and soaked into his collar.
"Dinnae greet... Shh... Everything's gonnae be alright, I've got ye," Davey murmured, a desperation rising in him that made his own throat tighten. He looked down at his own hands, those massive, calloused paws, scarred by decades of brutal labor on the oil rigs. The skin was coarse, the knuckles gnarled, and the stubborn dust of the machine halls still clung beneath his nails. Against this tiny, filigree creature that seemed as fragile as a butterfly's wings, his hands suddenly appeared to him as monstrous tools of destruction, made to bend steel but utterly unfit to protect life.
Davey felt the frantic, staccato vibration of the little man through his fingertips, and a wave of pure self-loathing washed over him.
"Lord, Davey, look at what ye’re daein'!" he cursed himself, "Ye're talkin' tae him like he’s a bairn, but tae him, ye’re a mountain shoutin' doun thunder. Ye’re frichtenin' the puir soul right oot o' his skin!"
He looked at the tiny hands clapped over the pointed ears and felt like the crudest monster in the world.
"Steady yer breath, man. Soften it... softer still. He thinks ye’re gonnae eat him or crush him for sport. Ye’ve spent yer life fixin' broken things on the rig, but if ye break this... if ye break this wee spark, ye’ll never forgive yersel'. Just get him doun. Get him tae level ground afore his heart gives oot entirely."
Davey felt helplessness sting his eyes with tears. He realized, with a sharp pang, that his well-intentioned words offered no comfort; on the contrary, they only seemed to worsen the little man’s agony. He was simply too big, his world too vast. His voice, even when dampened to a whisper, was a deafening bass to this being, and his grip, however careful he tried to be, remained a relentless prison of flesh and sinew.
In a sudden moment of clarity, he paused. He closed his eyes for a second and took one deep, conscious breath to tame the adrenaline in his own blood and force his trembling hands into stillness. Then, he raised his left hand and held it perfectly flat, like a giant, living plate, directly beneath the little man’s dangling legs.
With a level of concentration akin to when he repaired high-pressure gas lines on the Beira D, where every millimeter of movement was a matter of life or death, he opened the grip of his thumb and forefinger. He did it millimeter by millimeter, almost outside of time. Fin lost the support at his collar, fell a short, breathtaking distance through the air, and finally landed softly on the warm, pulsing "ground" of Davey’s wide-open palm.
Davey held his breath, his hand as steady as the bedrock of the Highlands, though his heart was thumping like a piston.
"There now... there ye go, Ye’re on solid ground now, laddie. See? I’ve let ye go. I’m no' hauldin' ye captive nae mair."
He kept his palm perfectly level, marveling at the tiny weight, no more than a handful of feathers, resting against his skin.
"Look at ye... ye’re sae small, I’m sorry for the fricht, truly I am. I’m just a muckle, clumsy auld bear. But ye're safe now. I’m no' gonnae close ma fist, I promise. Ye can just sit there a minute an' catch yer breath. We’re just two souls in the dark, you an' me. Nae need for mair tears, eh?"
It was an intoxicating, almost surreal sensation for Fin as the hard grip vanished, replaced by a surface that felt like a vast, unimaginably soft and living mattress. The impact was gentle, yet the sheer uncertainty kept him paralyzed. For a long, drawn-out moment, Fin simply remained motionless on all fours, his fingers instinctively seeking purchase in the deep, rugged furrows of Davey’s palm. It was as if he were crouching on the surface of a strange, pulsing planet.
He felt the immense heat radiating from the giant’s body, a glowing warmth that nearly enveloped him, momentarily driving away his own chill. But what was most impressive and terrifying at once was the massive, slow, and deep heartbeat thudding through the tissue of the palm directly into Fin’s own body. Each beat was like a muffled drum from the depths of the earth, a rhythmic tremor that brought home the sheer life force and scale of this man.
Davey hardly dared to breathe. He froze in place, his arm bent and fingers slightly curved to form a protective hollow, yet kept open enough to give the tiny being no reason to flee. He controlled every fiber of his musculature with an iron discipline perfected through years of heavy labor. He held his hand absolutely still, as steady as a rock in a storm, to grant the tiny miracle on his palm the first sense of security it was allowed to experience on this terrible night.
"See?" Davey whispered, so softly the words were barely more than a gentle breath brushing over his fingertips. He kept his gaze fixed on the tiny, trembling figure huddling in his palm with an intensity that was almost reverent. "No more prison, little yin. See? I’m... I’m just a tired, worn-out auld man. Nothin' more than an exhausted worker who’s been out on the sea far too lang. I'll no' hurt ye. I swear it tae ye."
Very slowly, and with a caution that tensed every fiber of his body, Fin lifted his head from the protective crook of his arms. His heart was still racing like a trapped bird's, and every instinct inside him screamed at him to run, to plunge into the depths and vanish into the saving darkness of the floorboard cracks. But the fleshy platform beneath him did not close into a dungeon again. The massive, calloused fingers remained stretched out flat and motionless, serving as both an invitation and a peace offering.
He forced himself to look up, far above the colossal hand and the massive arm, until he reached Davey’s face. And in that moment, something happened inside Fin that changed the world for him. For the first time since this horrific discovery, he no longer saw the faceless monster from the ghost stories of his childhood. He no longer saw the titan who could trample worlds. Instead, he looked directly into the eyes of the man who, evening after evening, gazed longingly at the crumpled photo of his granddaughters, eyes that, behind the thick lenses, no longer sparked with threat, but appeared gentle and drained. They were slightly moist, glistening in the pale light of the television, carrying an expression of deep, honest guilt, as if the giant were silently begging Fin’s forgiveness for his mere existence and the terror he had caused.
Davey felt the tiny weight shift as the boy looked up, and he held his breath, fearing even the rise and fall of his chest might startle the lad.
"That's it, laddie," he thought,"Look at me. Look at the auld bear. I'm no' the nightmare ye thought I was, am I? I've got eyes that ha'e seen too much salt an' too many lonely nights, just like yours. Aye... ye can see the shame in 'em, can't ye? I'm sorry I frichted ye. I'm sorry I'm so muckle an' you're so sma'."
He watched the tears in Fin's eyes.
"Aye, little mannie, We're both just tryin' tae get through the night, aren't we? You lookin' for yer supper, an' me lookin' for a reason tae keep gaun. Ye're brave... so incredibly brave. I’ve faced gales that could sink a tanker, but I dinnae think I’ve got half the courage you ha'e, standin' there on the hand o' a giant."
Rennick’s voice remained a colossal, deep bass tremor that shook not only the air in the room but Fin’s entire existence. Every syllable that rolled off the giant’s lips made Fin’s sensitive eardrums vibrate and sent physical shockwaves through his small chest. While Fin understood the words the man was trying so hard to whisper, they possessed no healing or calming effect on his traumatized mind in that moment. Instead, echoing in his head louder than any human sound, were the ancient, relentless warnings of his family, drummed into him since his first breath: Never trust a giant, no matter how friendly his face or how soft his tone may be. Once they have caught you, once their fingers have closed around you, the irrevocable end of your world has come.
He huddled in the center of the palm, not daring to take even the smallest step toward the fingertips. From his perspective, the path over the edge of this massive hand looked like a fatal plunge into a bottomless, black abyss from which there was no escape. He felt paralyzed, rooted in the absolute center of the giant's power, on an island of living flesh surrounded by a void that meant certain death.
"Please," Fin finally forced out with the last of his strength, his voice little more than a hoarse, brittle squeak that nearly died under the weight of naked terror. He lifted his head just a fraction, his eyes wide and glistening with tears. "Let... just let me go. I'll disappear forever. Please."
Davey froze solid as that tiny sound reached his ears. Hearing that voice, so unimaginably delicate, clear, and yet strained to the breaking point with naked mortal terror, made him swallow hard, as if a lump were wedged in his throat. It was one thing to see a small creature, but something else entirely to hear it speak, to have its distress given words. He stared down at his palm, where the tiny figure was trapped in a ceaseless tremor, a living, feeling being with its own thoughts and fears, one that had obviously lived beneath his very roof for a long time without him ever noticing.
Davey hardly dared to breathe; he held his breath so tightly his lungs began to burn, out of pure concern that a single gust of air from his nose might knock the little fellow over like a blade of grass in a gale. "I... I’m Davey," he finally managed to rasp, struggling to stifle the bass in his voice as much as possible, though it only made him sound more brittle and hoarse. "Davey Rennick. I bide here... well, I have for a lifetime, really."
But Fin did not answer. Every word from the giant was like a thunderclap to him, vibrating through bone and marrow. Instead of gathering courage, he only huddled deeper into the furrows of the palm, pulling his arms tight against his body and shielding his head with his hands, as if expecting the next devastating blow of fate at any second. To him, in this horrific moment, Davey Rennick was neither a lonely neighbor nor a potential friend, he was the largest, most terrifying hunter he had ever encountered in all his years within the walls. A predator of unimaginable proportions, and he, Fin, was sitting directly within its warm, pulsing fangs.
Davey felt the boy’s silence like a physical weight. He could see the tiny hands pressed against the head, trying to shut him out.
"God, Davey, ye’re a muckle, frightful beast tae him, aren't ye?" he thought,"Ye tell him yer name like that’s supposed tae mean somethin', but tae a wee soul like that, ye might as well be the storm itself brayin' in his ear. He’s no' lookin' for a pal, he’s lookin' for the axe tae fall."
He looked at the way Fin cowered in the lines of his skin.
"Look at ye, Davey Rennick. Big, clumsy, an' loud. Ye’ve spent yer life on rigs and ships where everything's heavy and hard, and now ye’re hauldin' a miracle and ye dinnae ken how tae speak withoot soundin' like a rockslide. Stop yer yammerin' and just get him doun. Words are nae good when the listener thinks ye’re gonnae eat him."
It was the seventh day since Fin’s last major inspection of the pantry, and hunger, a biting and relentless companion, had begun to slowly undermine his caution. In the world of the little people, hunger was a poor counselor; it made the limbs shaky and the mind reckless. The painstakingly gathered supplies in his hideout behind the chimney flue, a few dried bread crusts and the remains of an ancient spiced biscuit, had been consumed down to the very last crumb.
In broad daylight, while the pale Glasgow winter light bathed the kitchen in a merciless white, he stood on the vast, smooth expanse of the countertop, a tiny speck in the middle of a desert of Formica and tiles. With a look of deep concentration and his sharp needle-hook, he was in the middle of carving up the tough remains of a nearly petrified cube of cheese he had fished out from behind the toaster. His intense focus on the task made him forget the outside world for a fleeting moment.
But then, a sound shattered the tomb-like silence of the house, a sound he hadn't heard for five endless months.
Click.
It was the dry, metallic sound of a key being slid into the cylinder and turned with force.
Fin’s heart stopped completely for an agonizing second, only to begin hammering against his ribs in a frantic gallop. The heavy, complaining creak of the massive front door, which moved only reluctantly after all this time, echoed through the hallway like a clap of thunder, making the glasses in the cupboard rattle. Then followed the sound that Fin had so often yearned for in his dreams, but which now filled him with naked terror: the familiar, unmistakable, and now deeply frightening thud of heavy, sodden boots on the old floorboards.
"Panic!" screamed through Fin’s head like an alarm, drowning out every rational thought. He felt naked and defenseless on the vast, bright expanse of the countertop. The saving darkness of his bolt-hole behind the massive stainless-steel breadbox was impossibly far away in that moment, a distance that, under the eyes of a giant, felt like a mile. His gaze darted feverishly across the smooth surface, searching, almost pleading.
The only cover available to him was a lone, chunky ceramic mug with a chipped rim, which Davey had left dirty by the edge of the sink five months ago. The scent of dried coffee still clung to the porcelain like a heavy ghost. With a desperate leap, Fin lunged behind the cool material, pressing his back against the rounded wall of the mug and pulling his knees so tightly to his chest that he made himself as small as a living creature could possibly be. He tried to stifle his breath, to smother the pounding of his own heart that seemed to drum against the ceramic.
After endless seconds of paralysis, he dared to inch forward, millimeter by millimeter, until he could just peek past the jagged curve of the handle.
There, in the pale light of the hallway now flooding into the kitchen, he stood. Davey Rennick. He was still clutching the handle of the same heavy, dark blue duffel bag he had left with back in autumn. But the man lingering in the doorway was no longer the powerful, rumbling giant of Fin’s memory. He didn't just look older, he looked as if he had wandered through the deepest circles of a steel hell and back. His shoulders, massive from Fin’s perspective, hung low and lifeless. His clothes were covered in dark stains that smelled of oil and salt, and his face held an unhealthy, ashen pallor.
Davey loosened his grip and let the bag fall to the floor with a heavy, dull thud, a sound that sent a tremor like a distant earthquake through the floorboards. He braced himself with one hand against the doorframe and exhaled deeply, a heavy, rattling, and unsettling sound that came from the depths of his lungs and shook Fin to his core in his hiding place. It wasn't the huffing of an exhausted man; it was the sound of someone struggling against an invisible burden that threatened to crush him.
"Goddamn bastards..." Davey grunted into the empty room. His voice, which used to fill the hallway like an organ pipe, now sounded raw, thick, and almost broken, as if the salt wind and his own rage had sanded down his vocal cords.
With mechanical, joyless movements, he kicked off his heavy, mud-crusted boots and hung his oil-stained coat carelessly on the hook, where it dangled like a shed skin. He stepped deeper into the kitchen, his pace slow and shuffling. Fin felt the countertop tremble under the impact of each footfall until the giant finally leaned heavily against the sink, just inches away from Fin’s fragile porcelain sanctuary. Fin dug his fingers so tightly into the coarse fabric of his shirt that his knuckles ached, sending a desperate, silent prayer into the darkness that the giant wouldn't reach for the old mug.
Davey turned around and leaned the full weight of his massive back against the edge of the counter. The wood groaned and creaked under the burden, a deep moaning of the beams that vibrated right through Fin’s body. The giant stared blankly into the void; his eyes weren't just tired, they were bloodshot and underscored by deep, dark shadows.
"McLeary... you incompetent bastard," Davey cursed quietly to himself, letting his head hang. It was nothing like the thunderous roar Fin had witnessed during that phone call about Cadal; this time, it was a low murmur soaked in bitterness that sounded almost painful. "Should’ve never come to the Beira D. The electrician from hell... fiddling with the relays and bringing the police onto my own rig. And who has to clean up the whole mess in the end? Old Rennick, of course."
He shook his head slowly, almost rhythmically, as if he could shake off the images in his mind, and let out a long, shaky sigh that smelled of stale tobacco and exhaustion. "McLeary and his goddamn, big-talking mouth. If I get my hands on that man one more time, then..."
He cut himself off abruptly, as if he had realized mid-sentence that he didn't even possess the vital energy required to bring the curse to a proper end. Through the gap in the mug handle, Fin watched with wide, unbelieving eyes as Davey struggled to pull himself upright again. In that moment, the giant seemed terrifyingly fragile to Fin, like an ancient tree whose deep roots had been loosened in a storm of the century, threatening to topple at the next breath of wind.
Fin felt his own paralyzing fear give way to a completely new, strange kind of pity. For fifteen years, he had known Davey as the unshakeable, blustering protector of this house, a force of nature in flesh and blood. But this broken man standing there in the dim kitchen light, gasping for air, looked like a total stranger who just happened to be wearing the giant's clothes.
Davey turned away with a sluggish, almost painful lethargy to begin the long trek across the tiles toward the refrigerator. As he turned his back to the light of the low-hanging winter sun, Fin saw from his hiding place the deep, dark furrows of exhaustion carved like scars into the giant's nape. The skin there was reddened and raw, marked by the merciless lash of salt water and the stiff collar of his work suit. Every sinew in Davey’s neck seemed to tremble under an invisible weight, as if the mere effort of holding his head upright was almost too much for his battered body.
The giant was back; he had found his way home to his stone nest, yet the saving sense of security Fin had yearned for so longingly during the lonely weeks of the "Great Silence" suddenly felt entirely different than he had imagined. This was no triumphant return of a king to his realm.
Fin felt an oppressive tightness in his own chest as he watched the heavy, irregular steps, steps that no longer made the floor tremble with authority, but rather seemed to search desperately for a foothold. The thunder had indeed come home, filling the hollow walls once more with the familiar weight of a human presence, but the power had drained out of it. What had once sounded like the rumble of a mighty storm making the world shake, now sounded to Fin like nothing more than a dull, mournful echo, fading unheard in the vast emptiness of the kitchen.
Fin seized the tiny, precious window of opportunity while Davey’s back was turned, busy at the refrigerator, pulling the heavy door open with a wet, suctioning sound. He pressed his body so flat against the cool, smooth porcelain of the mug that he could feel the minute imperfections in the glaze, his senses taut as a wire on the verge of snapping. The familiar metallic clinking of glass bottles inside the fridge and the giant’s deep, almost painful sigh provided a welcome blanket of noise; they drowned out the barely audible, faint scuffing of Fin’s tiny boots on the hard surface of the countertop.
With an instinctive agility perfected over fifteen lonely years in the house’s world-in-between, Fin pushed off. He darted like a fleeting shadow from the deceptive cover of the mug into the deep, saving darkness cast by the bulky stainless-steel breadbox. His heart hammered against his ribs so violently it felt as if a small forge hammer were trying to force its way out.
Even as he pressed himself into the shadows, he felt the dull tremors of Davey’s steps traveling through the skeleton of the house—a familiar yet now alien vibration. With trembling fingers, the giant had grabbed a bottle of beer, removed the cap with a dry hiss, and was now limping with heavy, uneven strides toward the kitchen table. He continued to mutter incessantly, a dark stream of unintelligible insults directed at this McLeary and his faulty, life-threatening wiring.
Fin remained motionless, his eyes fixed on the saving gap in the wall, which lay just an arm’s length away in the shadow of the coffee machine.
"Just a tiny bit further," Fin whispered to himself almost soundlessly, wiping the sweat from his palms onto his trousers.
He reached the narrow, saving crack in the wall, precisely where the wallpaper had peeled back slightly over the years due to dampness, offering a secret portal into his world. With one last, fleeting glance over his shoulder, he saw Davey standing in the doorway, half in the light of the hallway, half in the shadows of the kitchen. In the dim, dusty light, the giant looked like a monumental statue made of ancient, weathered stone, deeply etched by the merciless hardships of the sea and the salty spray. He stood there perfectly motionless, a stranded titan in his own home, never suspecting that just a few feet away, a pair of tiny eyes was watching him with a mixture of turbulent compassion and deep-seated, instinctive fear.
With a fluid motion, Fin slipped into the protective darkness behind the wall paneling. As soon as the familiar, comforting aroma of dry old wood, the metallic tang of the pipes, and the soft scent of decades-old dust enveloped him like a heavy cloak, he sank against a massive crossbeam, his knees trembling. He closed his eyes and listened to the ebbing rush of his own blood in his ears. He was safe. The solid barrier of brick and timber once again lay between him and the world of the giants.
But the house, he felt it in every fiber of his tiny body, now felt fundamentally different than it had only an hour ago. The era of the "Great Silence," that time of undisturbed freedom and lonely peace, was irrevocably over. The rightful, though heavily scarred, master of the house had returned, but he brought no peace with him. He was burdened with a dark, smoldering rage toward the mysterious Cadal, eaten away by a deep frustration over this McLeary, and shrouded in a leaden, existential exhaustion so palpable it made even a hardened Borrower like Fin shudder to his core.
Fin wandered slowly through the walls toward his improvised living space. There, with an almost solemn gingerliness, he laid his new needle-hook, the gleaming testament to his labor—beside him on the soft cushion of a glass wool mat. He knew, with the instinctive certainty of a creature that had spent its entire life in the shadows, that the coming days and nights would be defined by an unpredictable danger. A giant like Davey, whose nerves were frayed and whose body was marked by exhaustion, did not react according to familiar patterns; he was like a wounded animal whose movements were erratic and whose senses, reeling between wakefulness and delirium, were unreliable.
Yet, as Fin sat there in the absolute, velvety blackness, his back pressed against the vibrating wood, listening to the distant, tormented creak of Davey’s old wing chair in the living room, he felt no desire to pack his bundle or flee deeper into the cold, uninhabited reaches of the foundation. The sense of freedom he had savored so much during the five months of solitude faded against the strange, heavy relief that now washed over him.
The giant was home at last. He was the beating heart of this house, and with his return, the time of absolute, hollow loneliness was over for Fin as well. He would watch Davey, just as he had for the past fifteen years, no longer merely as a thief of supplies, but as a small, invisible guardian spirit in the dusty gaps between worlds. Fin would endure there in the dark and watch over the giant, waiting with every fiber of his being for the looming, bitter thunder in Davey’s voice to finally give way once more to that deep, gentle, and warm hum he otherwise reserved only for those precious moments with his young granddaughters.
Once the wild, erratic pounding of his heart had finally settled into a steady rhythm, Fin could not stay long in the protective but lonely darkness of his realm. Curiosity had always been a force of nature among his little people, a driving power that was often stronger than reason or the raw instinct for self-preservation. Seeing Davey Rennick so changed after this seemingly endless absence had triggered something profound deep within Fin; it was a mixture of worry and an almost childlike fascination that he simply could not ignore.
He set off, utilizing those secret paths he had learned by heart over the course of a decade and a half, until he could have walked them blind. With the silent grace of a predator, he moved through the narrow, dusty shaft directly behind the sink, where the moisture from the pipes made the air heavy and metallic. He balanced with outstretched arms across a massive, rough crossbeam that supported the skeleton of the house, following the gentle, almost hypnotic hum of the copper electrical lines.
That humming, vibrating through the walls, reminded him inevitably of Davey’s angry tirades about that man McLeary; to Fin, the electricity beneath his feet felt like the distant crackle of an approaching storm. He felt his way further, traversing the hollow spaces between the floors until the surroundings began to change. Fin knew without a shadow of a doubt exactly where in the house he was when the familiar, heavy scent of old, brittle leather and the sharp, comforting aroma of Davey’s strong pipe tobacco grew stronger and more dominant with every breath.
He reached his favorite "window" to the living room: a tiny, smooth-worn knot-hole in the wood paneling that opened out at the exact spot where the massive, dark oak cabinet almost touched the wall with its heavy cornice. With the litheness of a weasel, Fin slipped through the narrow opening and landed completely soundlessly on the vast surface of the cabinet, which was covered in a layer of dust an inch thick.
Up here, in the airy heights near the ceiling, he felt like an undisputed king of the skies, far removed from the dangers of the floor. It was a place Davey had not graced with a feather duster or even a passing glance in years. Between a heavy, tarnished silver pocket watch, whose ticking had fallen silent decades ago, and a stack of dusty textbooks on maritime electrical engineering, Fin had built himself a cozy little hideout over the years. He had lined it with soft wool lint, fine silk threads from old ties, and carefully draped scraps of fabric.
From this strategically perfect vantage point, he could overlook the entire living room, studying every detail of the worn furniture and every movement of the giant without Davey ever noticing him, even if he were to stare directly up at the ceiling in a moment of distraction. To the eyes of a giant, Fin was nothing more than one shadow among many up here, an insignificant speck of dust in the clutter of time.
With his heart pounding and his breath held, Fin crawled on all fours to the sharp edge of the cabinet, lay flat on his stomach, and looked down into the depths of the room.
Davey sat deep in the cushions of his large, worn-out wing chair, which seemed to groan softly under the weight of his massive frame. He hadn't even bothered to pull the heavy wool blanket, which usually hung neatly over the backrest, across his legs, even though the Glasgow winter chill was already creeping through the cracks in the window frames. In the background, the television was on at a minimal volume; cool, flickering lights in clinical blue and pale gray tones danced across Davey’s exhausted face. In this artificial glow, the deep worry lines, driven into his forehead as if with a chisel, stood out even more sharply and relentlessly than Fin remembered. Some late-night news flickered across the screen, but the sound was turned down so low that the announcers' voices reached Fin above only as a distant, meaningless murmur.
Davey was already fast asleep, overwhelmed by a leaden fatigue that had allowed for no preparation. His salt-and-pepper head had slumped heavily to one side, his mouth slightly agape. A soft snoring, rising from his chest at regular, almost agonizing intervals, filled the room. It was a sound that had often frozen Fin with fear during his first years in this house, reminding him of a predator's growl; now, however, it seemed strangely familiar and almost comforting, it was the unmistakable sign of life from his giant.
From his high post, Fin watched him with an intensity that was almost painful. He saw the barely perceptible, uncontrolled tremor in Davey’s right hand, which hung limp and powerless over the leather armrest, his fingertips only inches from the carpet. On the small, round side table directly beside him stood the bottle of beer, its glass gleaming dully in the shifting lights of the TV, right next to a crumpled photo of his two granddaughters, its corners already beginning to tear.
"You really look terrible, old giant," Fin thought to himself, slowly lowering himself onto his small heels and wrapping his arms around his knees. His gaze remained fixed on the massive figure in the armchair. "What did they do to you out there, on that cold metal thing in the middle of the sea?"
The words Davey had spat out in the kitchen earlier still echoed in Fin's mind. He thought of McLeary, that incompetent electrician, and the simmering, almost desperate rage that had resonated in Davey’s gravelly voice. It was a strange, almost paradoxical realization that struck Fin that night: although Davey was a giant, a titan of flesh and bone who could reduce Fin's entire existence and his painstakingly built world within the walls to rubble with a single, careless step, in this moment, he seemed terrifyingly vulnerable.
The pale light of the television gave his skin a sickly sheen, and the irregular rising and falling of his chest looked labored. To Fin, he no longer seemed like the invincible master of the room, but like someone who had carried far too heavy a burden for far too long, a weight of responsibility, fear, and hard labor, and who now, having finally crossed the threshold of his home, was collapsing almost silently under its immense weight.
Fin suddenly felt an almost irresistible, instinctive urge to leave the safe heights of the cabinet and climb down its rough back panel. It wasn’t a desire for loot, a hunger for crumbs, or the craving for a lost button that drove him. He simply wanted to be closer, to bridge the distance between their disparate worlds for just a moment. An absurd, dangerous thought flashed through his mind: could he perhaps soothe the incessant, slight tremor in the giant’s large, calloused hand by stroking it ever so carefully with his tiny fingers? A minuscule comfort from the shadows for the stranded titan?
But no sooner had the thought formed than he shook his head vigorously at his own life-threatening recklessness. It would be pure madness ,a breach of the iron law of his people that had ensured their survival for generations. One wrong awakening of the giant, one reflexive movement of that massive hand, and Fin would be nothing more than a stain on the carpet.
Instead, he forced himself into stillness and remained perched above in the deep, protective shadow of the old books that smelled of yellowed paper. From his high vantage point, he guarded the giant’s restless, heavy sleep, just as the giant had unconsciously guarded the house, and thus Fin’s entire existence, all these years. In the flickering darkness of the living room, torn apart by bluish flashes from the TV, they both looked like lost souls, outsiders in a world out there that had become far too loud, far too fast, and far too big for either of them.
Fin nudged a little closer to the stack and gently rested his tired head against the cool, linen cover of a book on electrical engineering. He would stay here, a small, loyal sentry in the darkness, and not budge until the first pale light of morning turned the heavy curtains gray, or the giant started awake from his dark, troubled dreams.
Fin held his breath so abruptly that his lungs began to ache as Davey suddenly jolted in his chair, as if struck by an electric shock. A deep, guttural rumble, originating somewhere deep within his broad chest, escaped the giant's throat while he forced his heavy eyelids open and blinked dazed into the flickering light of the television.
From his hiding place, Fin watched as Davey struggled to find his bearings; he rubbed his eyelids so hard with the heels of his hands that the skin seemed to creak, groaned softly under the weight of his own limbs, and finally rose with a laborious, almost agonizing effort. Fin instantly pressed himself flat into the gray dust directly behind the cold, silver casing of the old pocket watch, making himself as motionless as a stone until Davey had left the room with heavy, shuffling strides.
A little later the giant returned, and with him, an intense, almost intoxicating scent flooded the living room. It was the heavy, savory aroma of a meat dish with dark gravy, Davey must have warmed up one of the large tin cans in the kitchen that had been waiting in the cupboard for months. Fin, whose last cube of cheese was long forgotten, watched with a painfully growling stomach as Davey sat on the edge of his chair and mechanically forced down a few forkfuls.
But the giant’s appetite seemed to stand no real chance against the all-consuming exhaustion in his bones. His gaze remained clouded, and the fork moved slower and slower as his head slumped forward once again. After barely ten minutes, during which he had toyed with his food more than he had actually eaten, Davey gave up the fight against fatigue and pushed the plate aside with a dull, clinking sound on the side table.
"Tomorrow..." Davey murmured, his voice sounding as raw and hollow as if he were speaking into a deep, empty well. He addressed the word to the bare wall opposite him, as though an invisible listener were waiting there. "Tomorrow, I’ll finally clean this place up. Tomorrow... I’ll put everything right." It sounded more like a desperate promise to himself than a statement of intent.
With an effort that was almost painful to watch, he rose groaning from the deep cushions of the wing chair. He braced his hands against his knees to find the momentum to stand, then straightened his massive back, which was marked by age and hard labor. As he did, his joints and vertebrae cracked as loudly and dryly as snapping underbrush in an autumn forest. A deep, rattling sigh escaped his lungs as he set off toward the bedroom with heavy, shuffling strides that made the floorboards tremble beneath the carpet.
Fin remained atop the cabinet in absolute stillness, his head slightly tilted, his ears pricked like a lynx’s. He followed the giant’s acoustic trail through the hallway, hearing the dull thud against the doorframe and finally the characteristic, long-drawn-out metallic squeak of the old bedframe upstairs. It was a sound Fin had learned to interpret over the years: first came the short, bright squeak of the springs as Davey sat on the edge of the bed, followed by a deep, aching groan of the metal, which told him that Davey had finally lay down full length and surrendered to sleep.
Now or never. The thought hammered at Fin’s temples like a war drum.
With determined, almost feverish fingers, he reached for his old hook, his new one hung at his other side, its metal gleaming like a promising blade in the pale remains of the streetlights. His heart was pounding in his throat, a wild, erratic throbbing that seemed to fill his entire chest. He wound the end of the fine but tear-resistant cord around his wrist and, with a fluid, practiced motion, secured the hook to the sharp edge of the cabinet. A soft click told him that the barb had dug deep into the soft pine molding. Fin tested the hold with a short, sharp tug, took one last deep breath of the dusty air of his home, and then let himself glide slowly and completely soundlessly down into the yawning abyss. His tiny boots touched the soft, deep pile of the carpet so gently that not even a house spider would have noticed his arrival.
Once he reached the bottom, he remained crouched for an agonizing second, his senses strained to the breaking point. He cast one last nervous glance toward the yawning black maw of the dark hallway. Nothing moved. A leaden, almost unnatural silence had returned to the room.
Then Fin sprinted. What would have been a single, mindless step for a human was a grueling marathon for Fin, a dash across a vast, gray plain of treacherous fabric fibers and mountains of wool that muffled his footsteps but also slowed him down. He ran until his lungs burned, his target locked in his sights: the massive, turned leg of the heavy living room table, which loomed before him like a titanic tower. With the blind expertise and precision gained from fifteen years of danger, he swung his hook upward once more. The metal bit into the top of the heavy oak surface with a dull thud. Fin braced his feet against the wood of the table leg, seeking purchase in the fine cracks of the glaze, and hauled himself relentlessly upward with the concentrated, raw muscle power of his arms and shoulders.
As Fin finally peered over the heavy edge of the tabletop and his head emerged above the rim of the massive oak, his eyes widened until they were nearly the size of saucers. The sparse light still cast into the room from outside danced upon the surface of a culinary revelation.
"Holy mother of pearl..." he whispered, so softly that the sound was immediately lost in the vastness of the room. He caught his breath, and for a moment, he even forgot the peril he was in.
The table before him resembled a battlefield of delicacies, a land of plenty that the giant, in his overwhelming fatigue, had left almost untouched. Davey had barely finished half the portion before sleep had claimed him. There loomed a massive mountain range of creamy mashed potatoes, its peaks still steaming slightly and exuding a buttery scent. Beside it stretched a wide, glistening plain of dark, thick gravy with small chunks of meat, pooling like little lakes in the recesses of the plate.
And then Fin spotted his personal jackpot, the crown jewel of this raid: a large, thick slice of soft white bread, leaning against the edge of the plate like a stranded galleon. One corner was slightly dipped into the gravy, which only made it more valuable in Fin's eyes. He stared at this abundance and swallowed hard. There was more nourishment gathered on this single ceramic plate than he could have collected in an entire week of grueling, risky expeditions behind the walls and beneath the floorboards. It was a feast that could have lasted a month, if only he could get it safely back to his hideout.
The smell was sheerly overwhelming; it hung heavy in the air, a dense cloud of roasted aromas, fat, and spices that practically clouded Fin’s senses. He was now closer to such prey than he had ever dared to imagine in his wildest dreams, certainly not at a time when the giant was physically present in the house. With knees trembling from the tension, Fin stepped cautiously onto the cool, smooth wooden surface of the table, which spread out before him like a vast, dark marketplace, its borders blurring in the gloom of the room. He stared at the furrows Davey’s fork had left in the mashed potatoes, deep, jagged trenches in a strange, white mountain landscape, the evidence of a hasty and joyless meal.
Fin unhooked his tool from the edge of the tabletop and tucked it securely into his belt ,he would retrieve the other old hook from the cabinet tomorrow, before covering the final few steps to the edge of the massive porcelain plate. The greed now biting in his stomach like a wild animal made him forget all caution for one dangerous moment. He reached for the white bread, its texture feeling unimaginably soft and yielding beneath his fingers; with both hands, he tore a substantial piece from the fluffy crumb and swallowed it almost without chewing. A warm shiver ran through his body; it tasted of pure butter, of the sharpness of salt, and of that real, unadulterated life of the giants that was so often denied to him.
"Thank you, Davey," he thought with a thievish, almost euphoric grin, as he frantically began to pluck away as much of the bread as possible. He stuffed the soft chunks into his small pockets, sewn from sturdy fabric, until they were bulging and nearly bursting at the seams, firmly determined to secure a safe supply for the uncertain days ahead. In that moment, he felt like a small, invincible thief in paradise, intoxicated by his own daring and the abundance of the moment. Fin ate some of the mashed potatoes and the brown gravy with great relish. In his triumph, he did not have the slightest inkling that this was merely the prelude, the quiet beginning of a night that would fundamentally change everything he thought he knew about his world and the giant.
Someone on AO3 recently accused me of using AI to write my story, which deeply hurt me because I pour my whole heart and soul into every single chapter. I actually ended up deleting the comments because they made me so sad. But my amazing friends reminded me not to let people like that ruin what I love. One of them told me: "Write even more just to spite them."
So here I am, spreading my work to new places!
A03 Link
Chapter 2, 3, 4
Summary: You don’t need to know the game Still Wakes the Deep to follow this story, because I’m definitely not following the canon. I’m doing my own thing here.
(I'm just a huge Rennick - and g/t fan.)
Expect lots of G/T fluff, slow burn, and a deep dive into the relationship between a Human and a Borrower.
And this story is all about one such Borrower.
He lives secretly within the walls of Rennick’s house.
But what if the two of them meet and somehow become friends?
Or even more interesting, a Borrower on an oil rig!
I’d really appreciate your feedback; let’s see if you like it :)
Chapter 1
Over the last fifteen years, this labyrinth of echoes and shadows had become his true home. He knew every rotting floorboard that groaned under the slightest weight, and every cool draft that revealed a window left open on the floor above. He moved through this space with a confidence that defied the limits of intuition; he knew this world-in-between better than the back of his own hand, better than the face he only rarely saw in the reflective surfaces of discarded cutlery.
On this night, Fin balanced with the skill of a sleepwalker atop a thick copper pipe. It was a vital artery, pulsing the warmth of the central heating through the ancient masonry. Outside, the relentless Glasgow winter reigned, a damp, freezing breath lashing against the exterior walls, turning the rain into needles of ice. But here, deep within the protective belly of the house, the metal beneath his bare soles acted as a welcome heater, sending a pleasant tingle up into his calves.
In his right hand, he clutched his most precious possession. The cool metal pressed against his palm, a reminder of his own self-sufficiency. It was a new hook, a masterpiece of improvised smithing that he had fashioned only the night before from a long sewing needle. It was more than just a tool; it was his key to the world, his anchor in the darkness, and the only piece of constancy in a life played out among the shadows.
He was particularly proud of this tool, a small marvel of improvisation that, in his eyes, was more valuable than any gold coin from the human world. With the precision of a watchmaker, he had held the sewing needle in the dancing, azure flame of the gas stove. It had been a perilous undertaking, a balancing act between success and catastrophe; the heat was so intense he had nearly singed his eyebrows, while sweat stung his eyes. He had waited, holding his breath, until the metal glowed cherry-red and became as soft as wax.
Then, with all the concentrated strength of his small arms and an old, self-made pair of pliers, he had bent the needle around a rusty nail, millimeter by millimeter, until a perfect, wickedly gleaming barb had formed. To perfect the grip, he had wrapped it countless times in fine, heavy-duty thread, a deep black yarn he had fished out from under an overflowing sewing basket during a risky expedition. The hook now lay as heavy and secure in his hand as if it were an extension of his own body.
"A good hook is the difference between a full stomach and a fatal plunge into the abyss," his father used to say, whose voice in Fin’s memory often sounded like the distant rumble of thunder.
Fin paused for a moment, eyes closed, letting the gentle vibration of the heating pipes travel through the soles of his feet while his thoughts drifted back to his family. Fifteen long, lonely years had passed since he had left the familiar nest beneath the creaking floorboards of the old post office. Back then, he had been young, driven by a restless spirit and an irrepressible thirst for adventure that kept him awake at night. He had grown tired of the confinement, the constant smell of old mail, and his parents' incessant, fearful warnings about the "heavy steps" of the humans.
He had craved freedom, a kingdom of his own, a territory he didn't have to share with five noisy siblings, where every tiny breadcrumb was hard-won and immediately divided.
In his search through the city, past yawning chasms and loud streets, he had finally found this house. From his very first journey through the hollow walls, Fin had known instinctively: This is it. Even then, the owner had no longer been a young man; he was a man of habit whose life moved in fixed patterns. His steps were heavy, making the beams tremble rhythmically, and his movements were slow and as predictable as the tides of the Clyde.
"A slow giant is a safe giant," Fin had thought back then with a triumphant smile, as he set up his first sleeping quarters behind the baseboard in the living room.
Today marked a special, almost eerie milestone in Fin’s reckoning of time: it was the one-hundred-and-fiftieth day of the Great Silence.
With the grace of a creature made of shadows, Fin sprang from the warm copper pipe, sailed through the dusty air for a fleeting moment, and landed silently on a narrow ledge directly behind the massive baseboard of the kitchen. Without pausing, without the usual instinctive glance from the darkness to check his surroundings, he stepped out into the open, unprotected light. He did so with a casual arrogance he had only acquired in recent weeks.
For exactly five months, the heavy, dark brown oak front door had not slammed shut with that characteristic rumble that made the entire house tremble. For five months, there had been no rhythmic thundering of heavy boots on the floorboards, no cheerful, shrill whistle of the tea kettle announcing the afternoon, and no deep, dry cough drifting from the upstairs bedroom at night like distant thunder.
To Fin, this state of affairs was nothing less than the absolute jackpot, an unexpected blessing in his hidden existence. He wasted no thought on where the giant might have gone. In Fin’s worldview, there were no long journeys or faraway places; perhaps the human had moved away to be with his own distant kind, or perhaps his flame of life had simply flickered out silently, like a candle in a draft. The concept of an oil rig, somewhere out there on the roaring North Sea, was as unimaginable to Fin as life on the moon. To him, nothing of significance existed outside these four familiar walls, save for the pale, gray light of Glasgow that seeped through the tall windows, illuminating dancing specks of dust.
He strolled across the vast, scarred surface of the kitchen table as if it were his private promenade, his own hard-won property. With a contented sigh, he threw himself into a soft, warm puddle of pale sunlight that fell precisely onto a forgotten, yellowed newspaper the human had left on the table.
"Five months," Fin thought to himself, letting his fingers glide almost tenderly over the rough, printed paper, where the letters looked like tiny, dead beetles. "He’s never been away this long. Never."
Normally, the rhythm of this house had been as steady and relentless as the tides of the sea: for a few months, the giant would be present, a noisy but predictable god lumbering through the rooms, leaving behind delicious crumbs of shortbread and cheese, and filling the entire house with the heavy, comforting scent of strong pipe tobacco and damp wool. Then, as suddenly as he had arrived, he would vanish again for what felt like half an eternity, pulling the door shut behind him and leaving Fin in charge of the entire, silent kingdom.
Fin sat atop the cool, porcelain-white rim of the large sugar bowl with an almost regal nonchalance. He was savoring this new, boundless freedom to the fullest, yet as he sat enthroned there, a quiet, almost painful loneliness crept into his heart, a feeling he had rarely known before. When the giant was home, the house was filled with a constant, electric friction. It was an existence on the edge of a precipice, a perpetual danger that sharpened Fin's senses and made his blood race. Every raid on the pantry was a strategic masterpiece; every moment spent pressing his ear to the walls to locate the human was a high-stakes game of life and death.
Without the giant, without the deep huffing and the creaking floorboards, the house had frozen into a silent, soulless shell. The silence was no longer just the absence of noise; it had become heavy and oppressive.
"Why isn't he here?" Fin whispered into the wide emptiness, letting his gaze wander into the adjacent living room, where the large, orphaned wing chair stood in the gloom like a sleeping beast. "Perhaps he finally found someone who likes him. Someone of his own giant kind. Or perhaps he is hunting those terrifying monsters from the ancient Borrower legends, creatures with claws of iron and eyes of fire."
Fin shook off the melancholy, stood up, and stretched his limbs until his joints popped. He had a busy schedule ahead of him today, a workload worthy of a sole ruler. In the dark storage room, a loose, ruby-red thread at the edge of an old Oriental rug was waiting to be harvested. It was premium material, robust yet soft, perfect for patching the holey hammock in his hideout deep within the masonry. He no longer had to worry about being discovered; the fear of "being seen," the primal dread of his people, had almost entirely faded. He could whistle, he could sing at the top of his lungs, he could even dance a boisterous victory parade right in the middle of the hallway without anyone disturbing him.
He felt like the undisputed king of a deserted but magnificent world.
"Just don't come back too soon," he murmured against the dusty air of the kitchen as he hooked his new tool onto his belt. "Take your time. But... do come back eventually. The crumbs are getting dry and dusty, and the cheese in the trap under the sink turned to stone long ago."
In his arrogance, Fin had no inkling that at that very moment, somewhere out there on a massive, swaying platform of rusted steel amidst the raging, pitch-black North Sea, a man named Davey Rennick was battling the salty wind. Rennick stared into the spray, thinking with an aching longing of his distant home, and of how indescribably beautiful it would be to finally enjoy the cozy silence of his own kitchen once again.
It was a silence that Fin was relishing so deeply in that moment, soaking it in so thoroughly, that he had completely forgotten the lurking dangers of the world beyond the walls.
Fin sat on the razor-sharp, dusty edge of the massive mantelpiece in the living room, dangling his legs with a nonchalance that would have made any of his ancestors pale with terror. From up here, the room looked like a deep, shadowy valley, a private box seat high above the abandoned kingdom he now called his own. The height, which in the past would have triggered vertigo and the constant dread of open space, now granted him an intoxicating sense of power. He was no longer a secret guest; he was the rightful heir to this silence.
His gaze wandered slowly over the orphaned objects on the mantel and finally came to rest on a heavy silver photo frame, which stood slightly crooked between a crusted pipe and a box of old matches. The glass was covered with a fine veil of dust, but behind it, a younger, grim-looking Davey Rennick could be seen. He wore a bright orange jumpsuit that almost glowed in the harsh light of the camera, standing with crossed arms in front of a colossal, monstrous steel structure that rose like an iron skeleton from the raging, churning sea. Fin did not understand the significance of this image, to him, the steel girders looked like the legs of a gigantic, dead spider sinking into a gray void.
Fin snorted softly, a short, dry sound in the unnatural quiet of the room. He studied the giant’s unmoving face, searching for similarities to the man he had studied for the last decade and a half, like a rare scholar poring over an ancient manuscript. He had watched the giant hundreds, perhaps even thousands of times, usually from the protective, familiar darkness behind the narrow slats of the metal ventilation grille recessed deep into the wall.
He vividly remembered the countless long winter evenings when the human sat alone at the massive kitchen table, the pale light of the ceiling lamp carving deep furrows into his face. Fin had often crouched just centimeters away behind the wooden paneling, his ear pressed against the cool timber or watching through a tiny, worn-out knot-hole. He knew the giant's rituals down to the smallest detail, as if they were a part of his own life story. He knew exactly how the man would run his massive, calloused hands over his face when exhaustion took hold, and how his skin would rub against his coarse stubble with an almost audible rasp. Sometimes, the giant spoke softly to himself, a deep, throaty hum in that heavy Scottish dialect that made the thin partition walls vibrate like a speaker membrane, sending a pleasantly eerie shiver down Fin’s spine.
Once, about three years ago on a particularly dark January night, it had almost been the end. Lulled by routine, Fin had grown recklessly careless. The human had been drinking a glass of heavy, amber-colored whiskey, staring absentmindedly into the void with glazed eyes, his gaze lost somewhere in the distance. Fin was certain the giant was already drifting into a light doze and had ventured out of his bolt-hole. He crept across the vast, treacherous ocean of the carpet to filch a shiny copper button that had rolled into the deep canyon beneath the sofa earlier that afternoon.
But the silence was deceptive. Suddenly, without any warning, the giant stood up. The old sofa groaned and cried out at the sudden loss of weight, and a massive foot, encased in a thick, fuzzy blue wool sock, came down with a dull thud right next to Fin. The sheer pressure wave of the movement nearly knocked Fin off his feet, leaving him reeling like an autumn leaf. With a desperate leap, he dived into the deep shadows of the coffee table, his heart hammering so loudly and erratically in his chest that he was dead certain the giant must hear the drumming in the silent room.
The human had bent down heavily to reach for that very button, and suddenly his hand was a mere arm's length away from Fin’s makeshift hiding spot. Fin held his breath until his lungs burned like fire and his head spun, his eyes squeezed so tightly shut that colorful spots danced behind his lids. He waited for the cry of discovery, for the descending hand, for the end. But the giant only breathed deeply and raspily, closed his trembling fingers around the button, and walked with shuffling steps to the window to stare out into the Glasgow darkness.
"Too old and too tired to see," Fin had thought minutes later, still shaking as he dragged himself back to the safety of the wall. It had been nothing more than pure, outrageous luck.
But the human had not always been merely the gentle, weary fossil he appeared to be during the quiet hours. Burned into Fin’s memory was one particularly stormy, pitch-black evening shortly before the man’s departure five months ago, a night when the house was filled not with the usual silence, but with the giant’s unbridled, raw fury.
The giant had stood in the hallway, a massive shadow in the dim light of a single bulb. The black coiled cord of the telephone was stretched to its breaking point like a bowstring, while he gripped the receiver with such violence that his knuckles protruded like white pebbles beneath his thin skin. Fin had crouched high above in the shadows of the staircase structure, fingers dug deep into the rotting wood, listening with bated breath.
"I told you, you bloody idiot!" he had bellowed. The force of his voice was physically palpable; it rolled through the narrow hallway like an avalanche, and Fin had to cover his ears, his face contorted in pain to avoid being deafened by the sheer sound pressure. "It’s a hack job, pure madness! If that line snaps, if the pressure gives way, we’re all going under out there, and for good!"
Then a name fell, one that the giant didn't just speak, but spat into the air like a poisonous curse: Cadal.
"Cadal, you godforsaken, blind fool!" the man had screamed, and in a burst of pure rage, he slammed his clenched fist against the wallpapered wall. The blow was so violent that a framed landscape painting ten feet away wobbled precariously, and Fin nearly lost his balance on his narrow observation post. "Your boundless greed will put us all in our graves! Find some other fool to clean up your mess; I’m done with you!"
Back then, in the confines of his hiding place, Fin hadn’t had the slightest inkling who or what this "Cadal" might be. In his imagination, he conjured up another monster, perhaps an even more massive, more malevolent giant threatening his own from afar. The pure, unadulterated hatred resonating in the giant's voice had shaken Fin to the core. He watched with a mixture of fascination and naked horror as the human's entire frame shook and his hands trembled uncontrollably when he finally slammed the heavy receiver back onto the cradle with a deafening crash.
Now, five months later, in the oppressive stillness of the abandoned house, the distant echo of that toxic phone call still resonated in Fin’s mind. The words remained like scratch marks on the inside of his memory.
"Who is this Cadal?" Fin murmured, his voice barely a whisper in the dusty silence of the living room, as he surveyed the void the giant had left behind. "And did he finally get you in the end?"
He lowered his gaze to the new hook in his hand. The metal gleamed with a dull luster in the fading daylight, a symbol of his own mastery. Fin was proud of his independence, of the iron-clad fact that he had survived alone in the darkness between the walls. He was self-reliant, a shadow king. Yet, the longer the "Great Silence" lay over everything like a heavy carpet, the more often he caught himself in a thought that felt almost like treason: he missed the giant. He missed the warm, yellow light seeping under the door into the hallway, the rhythmic scratch of matches against the box, and even the distant, rumbling thunder of the curses that had filled the house with life. Without him, Fin was nothing more than a ghost in a museum.
Fin stood up with a start, brushing the gray dust from his small trousers, crafted from an old lens-cleaning cloth, with short, energetic movements. He couldn't afford to go soft. He had plans. He decided to undertake the great trek to the giant’s bedroom upstairs today, an expedition into the inner sanctum. There, in the deep, mysterious crevices of the nightstand drawers, the most interesting treasures often lay hidden: shiny little coins that held the weight of shields for Fin, or forgotten, unopened sweets.
"If you don't come back soon..." Fin said quietly as he set off, slowly vanishing into the heavy, velvety shadows of the curtains. He left the sentence unfinished, unable to speak the ending, the fear that the giant might no longer exist at all.
He gave a short, bright laugh, a desperate attempt to chase away the rising melancholy, but the sound was thin and lonely, immediately lost in the vastness of the empty room. In his small, sheltered world, Fin had no idea that thousands of miles away, Rennick was currently battling the raging sea and lashing rain on the swaying oil rig Beira D. He did not know that the name Cadal was no phantom out there, but a massive oil corporation, and that fate would soon bring them together in a way that would put all the legends and warnings of the ancient Borrower stories to shame.
Three days had passed.
Fin pulled his knees tightly against his slender body, wrapped his arms around them, and pressed his back against the rough, pleasantly warm surface of the chimney flue that ran deep within the hidden interior of the wall. Here, in the velvety darkness between the old, sooty bricks, time was a strangely malleable, almost fluid concept; hours could pass like minutes, while seconds of fear stretched into an eternity. In the silence of this liminal world, his thoughts wandered more and more frequently back to that fateful night fifteen years ago, when he had tied up his tiny bundle of rags and turned his back on the familiar confines of his youth.
In his mind’s eye, he saw his mother’s face as clearly as if she were standing right beside him. It was illuminated by the flickering, honey-yellow glow of a nearly spent, stolen tea light, which cast long shadows against the walls of their dwelling. "Fin," she had said back then, her voice as soft and brittle as the rustle of dry autumn leaves on cobblestones. "Do not go into the houses of the lonely giants, my boy. Beware of their silence. They either become overly vigilant because they have no one to distract them, or they grow careless and melancholic, and melancholy attracts misfortune like light draws moths."
He hadn't listened to her warnings, driven by a burning hunger for space and significance. He didn't want to lead a meager life in the old post office, where day in and day out one fed on the bitter, dry crumbs from the pockets of postal clerks and the sticky remains of discarded rubber bands. He had craved a real house, a place with history and substance.
Sometimes, in moments like these, his heart would pound as he wondered if his siblings were still living there beneath the floorboards. He wondered if they had grown as tall and strong as he had, or if one of the gaunt, yellow-eyed post office cats that prowled through the sorting hall like shadows at night had claimed them long ago. A sharp, cold pang of regret shot through him at the thought, a sudden longing for the familiar scent of ink and paper. But with the hardened resolve of a survivalist, he pushed the feeling away, locking it in a dark corner of his mind.
He had chosen this house back then. He had chosen the grumpy giant with the heavy step.
Although the human was often away for months at a time, leaving the house to sink into a dim, Sleeping Beauty-like slumber, there were those rare, radiant moments when the building practically exploded with life. This always happened when his son, as Fin assumed, visited with his own family, filling the dusty air with noise and warmth.
Fin remembered the young man vividly; he had grown nearly as tall as the giant himself but possessed a much softer, more open face. At his side was a woman whose presence spread a cloud of lilac scent that lingered in the cracks of the wallpaper for hours after they had left. But the true stars in Fin’s secret theater, observed from the shadows, were the two young daughters.
To Fin, they were "mini-giants." They were a whirlwind of noise and impetuousness, a wonderful catastrophe that left treasures in its wake: bright, colorful plastic beads that sparkled like gemstones in the light, elastic hair ties in every color of the rainbow, and, the absolute highlight of his scavenging raids, sticky, half-chewed gummy candies lost in the depths of the sofa cushions.
Fin felt the corners of his mouth twitch upward at the memory of last Christmas. He had spent hours perfectly motionless behind the resinous-scented base of the Christmas tree, watching through the dense needles as the human laboriously knelt down on the thick carpet. His massive knee joints had cracked as loudly and dryly as breaking ice on a frozen lake.
"Grandpa, Grandpa! Look what I made!" the older girl had cried in her bright, bell-like voice. She had rushed toward him, thrusting a scribbled drawing, bursting with color, right under his nose.
Fin had witnessed the human take the crumpled piece of paper with such caution, as if it were made of the most precious, wafer-thin glass in the world. The same massive hands that had slammed so violently against the hallway wall in blind rage while he cursed that mysterious Cadal were now gentle and trembling with pure, unadulterated affection. With a deep, honest laugh, he had hoisted both girls up at once, one on each powerful arm, as if they weighed nothing at all. He had pulled them close, burying his stubbly face in the napes of their small necks, humming with happiness like an old, contented bear, a deep, satisfied rumble echoing in his chest.
"You’re my anchor," the giant had once whispered to them in the deep, golden silence of a late afternoon, as the two girls had fallen asleep on the sofa, curled up together after a long day of play. Fin had been sitting only a few feet away in the dark shadow of a cabinet. "It’s only for you that I head out onto that water, my little ones. Just so I can buy you the best gifts, even if your father gives me that look for it."
In that fleeting moment, Fin had understood something that never appeared in the dark horror stories of the Borrowers, those tales of man-eating monsters and soulless titans: giants possessed hearts that, despite their raw power, were just as vulnerable and fragile as those of the little people. He realized now that his giant didn’t venture out onto that swaying, metallic beast in the middle of the lashing sea for the sake of adventure. He toiled out there in the cold, surrounded by constant danger and the looming malice of that terrible Cadal, just so these two little girls could laugh in a safe, warm home.
It was this witnessed love that had moved Fin to grant the giant his silent trust, long before he would have ever found the courage to exchange a single word with him. A giant who was so infinitely gentle with his granddaughters, who could dampen his voice to a tender whisper so as not to wake them, could not be an entirely evil being.
Fin rubbed his burning eyes with the back of his hand. The omnipresent silence in the house felt even heavier now, more oppressive after this memory, almost like a physical weight upon his shoulders. His gaze wandered to a dusty corner in the hallway, where a small, lost glitter stone from the girls' last birthday party still sparkled in the dim light, a tiny relic of a happier time.
"You just have to come back," Fin whispered into the velvety darkness of the wall cavity, his voice trembling slightly. "Not just for the fresh crumbs. Not just for me, so I can feel alive again. Your granddaughters are out there waiting for you. And if you don't come… who is supposed to protect them from the harsh world?"
With a determined jerk, he squared his shoulders. He stood up, checked the secure fit of his new needle-hook on his belt, and began the arduous but familiar descent through the skeleton of the house down into the kitchen. Today, he would inspect the pantry with particular care. When the giant returned, and Fin clung with every fiber of his being to the belief that he would, he should not return to a hungry, neglected home. In his own invisible way, Fin would ensure that at least a sense of order was maintained and the world was ready for when the heavy oak door finally clicked shut again. He would see to it that at least the crumbs were in their place.
I actually got this drawing done relatively quickly 🤔 Banky took me literally no time to render too 😳 I think the hardest part really was situating the background
Hey! If you’re doing requests for writing, may I ask for one of Rennick x female reader. Reader is tiny and Rennick’s giant. Rennick does fear play on the reader because the reader is actually a nice person on the right even to ppl like him and Addair. So he wants to have fun with her dear. Turns out she’s a fighter, even lifting his mouth open to try and get out. She doesn’t know about the safety of the stomach. So soft vore like. Sorry it’s long it’s just so good to see another vore lover in this fandom!
The howling of the storm outside the oil rig’s windows was nothing compared to the roaring pounding in your chest. The colossal waves of the North Sea whipped mercilessly against the platform's steel stilts, causing the entire complex to subtly shudder at irregular intervals. Yet this force of nature paled completely against the threat looming directly in front of you.
You stood on David Rennick’s monumental desk, crafted from dark mahogany. With your height of barely ten centimeters, everything in this room felt absolutely gigantic. The coffee mug to your left had the dimensions of a bottomless well, the heavy silver fountain pen looked like an ancient siege weapon, and the man throning behind this desk resembled an unmerciful titan from another world.
In truth, you were known on the platform as the "good soul." You always had a kind word for the hard-working men and women in their oil-stained overalls. Even toward the most tyrannical superiors like Rennick or the unpredictable Addair, you always remained polite, respectful, and warm-hearted. You firmly believed that every human possessed a good core deep down inside—one just had to uncover it with patience and empathy.
Yet it was precisely this unshakeable good nature that had awakened Rennick’s sadistic streak. For a man who defined power only through fear and oppression, your mere existence was a provocation. He wanted to see this innocent, kind facade shatter under extreme pressure. He wanted to witness the moment your optimism turned into pure despair. In short: he wanted to have his cruel fun with you.
"Ye're always so bloody friendly, lassie, so ye are. Think ye can just smile your way through ma station, eh?" Rennick’s deep, rough voice boomed through the luxurious office, the bass in his voice vibrating the wood beneath your feet. He leaned back in his heavy leather armchair, elbows on the armrests, fingers interlaced. His gaze locked onto you like a predator cornering a defenseless mouse. "Even tae me, so ye do. Ye smile, ye greet, ye gie a helping hand. Ye think if ye're just nice enough, naething's gonnae happen tae ye on ma rig, eh? That the hale wide world is a bloody petting zoo? A fatal mistake."
You were just about to open your mouth to reply in your usual gentle voice, to somehow diplomatically defuse the situation, but it was too late.
Before you could bring out a single word, his giant hand shot forward with terrifying speed. To your small eyes, it was like a crashing wall of flesh and bone. His thick, calloused fingers closed mercilessly and tightly around your narrow waist. The pressure was immediate, stealing your breath for a moment.
You let out a startled, choked sound as he effortlessly lifted you off the desktop. Your legs dangled helplessly in the air as he brought you up to his eye level in a single, fluid motion.
The wind howled outside in a shrill pitch as Rennick held you just a few centimeters away from his face. You could feel the heat of his breath on your skin and see the icy, mocking glint in his dark eyes.
"Let's see how friendly ye bide when fear's clawin' at yer neck, eh? Nae soft smilin' is savin' ye now."he growled with a cruel, wide grin that bared his teeth. His fingers squeezed just a tiny fraction tighter—just enough to show you how absolutely and completely you were at the mercy of his whim.
Rennick slowly opened his mouth. The scenario now unfolding before your eyes was like a nightmare come true. The wet, hot cavern opening up in front of you was absolutely terrifying, looking like the gateway to another, darker world. His flawless rows of white teeth gleamed menacingly in the dim, sterile light of the office, like the blades of a waiting guillotine. Centimeter by centimeter, he guided you closer to the yawning abyss. He savored every single second, relishing the naked, unvarnished terror in your eyes, waiting for the exact moment your psychological resilience would finally collapse. He expected you to cry, plead, and whimper for mercy—just like the rough guys on the platform did when he brought them to their knees.
But Rennick had underestimated one crucial thing: you might be nice, warm-hearted, and always polite, but you were no cowardly, defenseless prey. Within your chest beat the heart of an unyielding fighter. Anyone who believed that kindness was a sign of weakness didn't understand you in the slightest. You were already tiny, yet you had still asserted yourself in a brutal, male-dominated profession on this isolated oil rig. Furthermore, your best friend on the platform was none other than Finlay—and anyone who was friends with such a tough, strong-willed woman quickly learned how to stand their ground. If old Rennick thought he could just break you like that, the Installation Manager was going to have to try a hell of a lot harder.
When he finally shoved you headfirst between his fleshy lips, and the suffocating, wet heat of his breath enveloped you like a heavy blanket, your survival instinct kicked into absolute overdrive. Adrenaline flooded your veins. Instead of freezing in shock or breaking into a panic, you fought back with everything your small body had to offer. You balled your tiny fists and, with pure, concentrated willpower, struck hard against his sensitive lower lip.
"Oho… we’ve got a proper wild yin here, by the looks of it. A feisty wee thing, aren't ye?" Rennick mumbled dully. His voice sounded strangely vibrating and deep through his half-closed mouth. He was visibly surprised by your sudden, fierce resistance, but instead of intimidating him, it only amused him all the more. For him, it was like a captured bird thrashing in his hand.
With an arrogant snort, he pushed you completely into his oral cavity and firmly closed his lips behind you.
Abruptly, an absolute, suffocating darkness enveloped you. The heavy, pungent scent of bitter coffee and strong tobacco hung in the air like a dense cloud, nearly choking you. Beneath you, the floor shifted—his massive, wet tongue rose, trying to relentlessly force you backward toward his deep, dark throat. You couldn't possibly know what he intended, and you knew nothing of the absolute safety of his stomach. For you, there were no nuances in this moment: this was a brutal, deadly struggle for naked survival.
But you strictly refused to admit defeat. You had no intention of going down without a fight in this darkness. With all your might, you dug your legs firmly into the soft, yielding tissue of his tongue to anchor your stance. With a furious, determined cry, you thrust your arms upward. You pressed your small hands flat against his hard upper palate. With the sheer, unbelievable strength unlocked by the pure adrenaline in your veins, you braced yourself simultaneously against the palate above you and the tongue beneath you. You made yourself as big and rigid as humanly possible.
Outside, in the brightness of the office, Rennick’s eyes suddenly widened in pure astonishment. “...Mmmph?! What the bloody...?!” he rumbled internally, the immense vibration shaking the dark space around you like a minor earthquake. The mocking expression on his face froze. You were so unimaginably tiny, and yet, with your titanic will to survive, you actually managed to challenge his jaw muscles! The pressure you exerted from the inside was so focused that you forced his heavy teeth a small distance apart. A tiny, gleaming slit of light suddenly pierced the wet, dark mouth and cut through the darkness as you iron-willed your way to breach the barrier and forge your path back to freedom.
Rennick let out a deep, rough, and thoroughly amused rumble. The sound waves rolled through his entire oral cavity like a mini-earthquake, making every single fiber of your small body vibrate violently. For a brief moment, your sheer willpower and the unexpected strength you put on display genuinely seemed to impress him. Yet this fascination quickly gave way to his usual arrogance. At the end of the day, he was still David Rennick, the undisputed, tyrannical ruler of this gigantic oil rig, and he had finally had quite enough of this little rebellion.
He decided to bring a sudden end to the demonstration of your resistance. His massive jaw muscles flexed like thick steel cables. Against this raw, biological force of nature, your dainty arms didn't stand a ghost of a chance; they were effortlessly and mercilessly crushed down. His heavy rows of teeth closed again with a dull, final click, and the saving slit of light that had just given you hope vanished in a fraction of a second. You were trapped once more in absolute, pitch-black darkness.
Before you even had the time to reposition yourself in the thick flow of saliva or plan another escape attempt, Rennick shifted his tactics. His colossal, muscular tongue rose massively. It robbed you of any remaining freedom of movement, pinning you flat as a flounder upward and pressing you ruthlessly against his hard, ridged palate. You were completely immobilized, pinned between flesh and bone.
Outside in the office, Rennick slowly and relishingly tilted his head back. He took a deep breath and swallowed once—heavily, deliberately, and with a terrifying finality.
“...Mmmph... gulp...”
The sound echoed in your ears like a dull beat of a kettle drum as the swallowing reflex kicked in. You were swept over the base of his tongue and propelled straight into the yawning throat. Instantly, the wet, muscular walls of his esophagus gripped you. The tight, fleshy tunnel enclosed your tiny body like a living vice. Every breath was stolen from you as the peristaltic waves—an unstoppable, rhythmic cadence of muscle contractions—squeezed you deeper and deeper down into the living darkness.
There was absolutely nothing you could do. There was no foothold, no edge you could have clung to. The suction and pressure of this biological machinery were simply too powerful for your ten-centimeter frame. You slid downward relentlessly, centimeter by centimeter, while the outside world of the oil rig and the howling of the storm fell completely silent. Instead, the soundscape inside your new, fleshy prison was dominated by something else: the loud, deep, and absolutely dominant pounding of his heart, thudding directly alongside the esophagus. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Each beat vibrated through the walls, a stark reminder of whose power you were at the mercy of.
The tunnel seemed endless, but the pressure pushed you ruthlessly further down until you reached the bottom of the esophagus. With one last, heavy, and wet plop, you passed through the tight sphincter of the gastric entrance.
The confinement abruptly gave way to an eerie vastness. You fell a short distance through the darkness and finally landed unsafely on the soft, wet, and rhythmically pulsating floor of his stomach.
Gasping, lunging for air, and utterly exhausted, you remained lying in the absolute, impenetrable darkness. Your heart was racing wildly, and the adrenaline that had just driven you to peak performance now gave way to a leaden fatigue. Cautiously and with trembling hands, you felt around to explore your new surroundings. It was tight, incredibly warm, and the organic walls around you felt soft, velvety, and damp, while pulsing in a sluggish, comforting rhythm. You instinctively held your breath, squeezed your eyes shut, and braced yourself inwardly for the unbearable, burning pain of stomach acid—but it never came. Instead, a pure, almost protective warmth enveloped you. It didn't hurt. Your body signaled no danger to you, but rather a strange, biological security.
Suddenly, Rennick’s voice boomed from far above through the thick muscle tissue. It sounded muffled, yet still deep, powerful, and filled the entire cavity as if the space itself were speaking to you.
"Ye’re a proper teuch wee thing, I’ll gie ye that. Got a bit of iron in yer backbone, eh?" his voice echoed in the darkness, and every syllable caused the walls of your fleshy prison to gently vibrate. At the same moment, you felt a change from the outside. The stomach wall shifted as the gigantic Installation Manager placed one of his heavy, massive hands onto his abdomen. He stroked slowly, almost thoughtfully, over the curve of his belly—right where you were located—and then pressed gently but firmly against it. The soft pressure from the outside rocked you a little back and forth. "Tae fecht agin' me… naebody on this hale rig has ever had the stones tae dae that afore you. They usually fold like paper."
You curled deeper into the pulsing confinement and pulled your knees to your chest. Your clothes were completely soaked from the plunge, but the paralyzing panic of the last few minutes now finally gave way to a deep, unstoppable exhaustion. You were trapped, there was no doubt about that. You were deep inside the interior of a man who ruled the entire oil rig with an iron fist. And yet, as paradoxical as it sounded, you were absolutely safe in this moment from the raging storm outside and from every other danger.
"Ye’re stayin' deep inside here the night, lassie. Locked away in big Davey’s belly, and that's an end to it." the voice from above announced mercilessly, yet allowing a completely new, noticeable undertone of genuine respect to ring through. He no longer considered you just a defenseless toy. "Gie it a rest now. Ye'll be needin' yer strength the morrow when I let ye back out. But just you mind this, lassie: no matter how hard ye try tae fecht, I always hold the winning hand. Ye're clean in ma power now, and don't ye forget it."
You didn't answer. Instead, you pressed your small hands gently and almost gratefully against the warm, rhythmically vibrating stomach wall. You had lost this unequal battle, but you had fought it with your head held high, proving to the giant that the spirit of an unyielding warrior lived within your small body.
The dull, steady thump-thump, thump-thump of his mighty heart droned reassuringly from above, acting like a lullaby in the absolute isolation. While the storm outside the oil rig’s windows whipped against the steel in vain, you closed your eyes in the safe, warm darkness of his interior and fell asleep, exhausted but unbroken.
I happened to come across my old Medusa Rennick artwork again in my gallery and just had to write this :3
Medusa Rennick & Reader
(ー_ー゛)(ー_ー゛)(ー_ー゛)(ー_ー゛)
The monotonous, almost meditative scratching of Rennick’s ballpoint pen on the rough paper and the distant, dull rumble of the North Sea outside the thick walls are the only sounds breaking the silence of the room. The wind whips the sea spray against the windowpanes, but inside here, a very unique, almost tangible calmness prevails.
For the past few days, something has noticeably changed between you. A pleasant, quiet familiarity has taken the place of the initial skepticism. The cool distance that initially stood like an invisible wall between you has secretly melted away—like the coastal ice in the first breath of spring. Even the endless, grueling administrative stress suddenly doesn't feel so crushing anymore. It is astonishing how much lighter the burden of responsibility weighs when you no longer carry it alone on your shoulders, but share it in silence.
Tonight, this atmosphere is particularly intense. The hectic rush of the day has subsided, and the heavy scent of cooled coffee and the salt of the sea air lingers in the room. Rennick sits slouched but highly focused at the massive wooden desk, illuminated only by the dim glow of a single desk lamp. He is brooding over the quarterly reports for Cadal—a bureaucratic nightmare of endless columns of numbers and fine-print paragraphs that would make even Medusa close her eyes from a headache. His forehead is deeply furrowed, and every now and then, he knits his eyebrows together as he corrects a line.
You finished your own tasks for today a while ago. The files are sorted, the reports checked off. Normally, now would have been the perfect moment to call it a day, grab your jacket, and leave the room. But instead of leaving, you let yourself be held by the glow of the lamp and the peaceful intimacy of the moment.
With almost silent steps, you walked across the wooden floorboards until you quietly stepped behind his chair.
With the utmost caution and in a fluid, almost slow-motion movement, you reach out your hand so as not to startle him in his deep concentration. The little snakes, which usually perk up suspiciously at any unexpected movement and let out a warning hiss, now know your scent inside out. For them, it is inextricably linked with safety and calm.
When your fingertips finally touch the cool, silky scales of the foremost little snake, there is no defensive reaction. On the contrary: the tiny creature does not pull back, but trustingly presses its head flat against the soft flesh of your thumb, as if it were actively seeking the touch.
"Hey there, beautiful," you whisper in a voice so quiet it almost drowns in the distant rumble of the surf.
With your index finger, you stroke her neck in a feather-light, rhythmic motion. "Did you all have to scold him so much again today? He works far too much, doesn't he?"
Your familiar words seem to trigger a chain reaction. Lured by the soft whispering and the cozy warmth of your hand, two more snakes awaken from the dense cluster. They wind their way out curiously and without any hesitation, smoothly sliding their narrow bodies forward and beginning to slowly coil around your palm and your fingers.
It is a fascinating, completely surreal feeling—the delicate, slightly ticklish brush of their forked tongues gently flicking against your skin to sense you. As you continue to whisper soothing, almost silent words to the little reptiles, you gently scratch them with your fingertips. For a moment, time seems to stand completely still in the small room, sheltered from the stormy weather, carried only by this silent, profound display of trust.
Mid-word, Rennick suddenly stops. The tip of his ballpoint pen hovers motionlessly on the paper, right over the unfinished letter of a Cadal statistic. The absolute silence that fills the room afterward is almost tangible. His shoulders, which just moments ago were completely tense and stiff under the weight of his bureaucratic duties, visibly sink a bit lower, as if a part of the immense pressure has dropped away from him all at once. A deep, rough, and almost inaudible rumble escapes his throat—a sound that carries less anger and much more of a deep, long-awaited relief.
He lets out a quiet sigh and shakes his head slightly. This minimal movement throws the living nest on his head into a stir; the little snakes react instantly by coiling even tighter, almost protectively, around your warm fingers, savoring your proximity. With a slow, nearly ritualistic gesture, he raises his hand and uses his index finger to push his tinted glasses a fraction higher up the bridge of his nose.
He takes strict care not to turn around. The danger of accidentally looking directly at you in a thoughtless moment, and thereby unleashing the ancient, perilous heritage of his existence, is far too clear to him. Yet even without direct eye contact, his striking profile stands out sharply in the dim, warm light of the desk lamp. A tiny, barely perceptible twitch around the corners of his mouth reveals that your presence is anything but an intrusion to him.
"You're far too good to them," he rumbles at last. His deep voice, which is so often characterized by bureaucratic distance and cool authority, possesses absolutely no harshness at this moment. Instead, it sounds soft, almost a little raspy with exhaustion—and resonates with a subtle, nearly touching embarrassment. "You’re absolutely spoiling 'em rotten. If this keeps up, they’ll be dancing on ma nose before long and won't listen to a bloody word I say."
At his words, you can’t help but smile, and a warm feeling spreads through your chest. A checking glance at his head has long since revealed the truth he tries so charmingly to hide behind his grumpy facade: the snakes, which usually hiss wildly and aggressively at each other during bad moods, hectic rushes, or acute stress, are completely deeply relaxed at this moment. The usually restless, dense cluster has lost all aggression. Some of the small reptiles have nestled flat and protection-seeking against his warm scalp, while the others are visibly enjoying your gentle caresses. From the tangle, a quiet, rhythmic, and absolutely contented rattling now sounds—an unmistakable sign that they feel completely safe.
"I think they just like me better than you, boss," you tease him in a quiet, mischievous whisper.
While you speak, you bravely move your hand a bit further to a slightly larger, shimmering dark snake that has curled up just behind his left ear. Carefully, you run the pad of your thumb over its smooth head. "You only ever scold them anyway when they don't do what you want."
"I do not scold. I merely maintain the necessary discipline on this godforsaken island. And that applies without exception to all facets of ma life—including ma hair," he replies dryly, as usual.
Yet no matter how hard he tries to maintain the role of the unapproachable superior, the tiny, barely noticeable twitch in the right corner of his mouth betrays him mercilessly.
Then, something happens that makes you catch your breath for a heartbeat. With a slow, almost resigned movement, Rennick gives up a piece of his eternal need for control. He leans back a small but significant bit further, so that the backrest of his chair presses gently against your stomach. It is a silent, incredibly trusting gesture. In this moment, he completely leaves the care and soothing of his extraordinary, living pride to you.
For a precious instant, the strict bureaucrat seems to completely forget the infinite pressure of Cadal, the crushing quarterly reports, and the constant, nerve-wracking demands of the upper management. In the cozy silence of the room, there is nothing left that matters. There exists only the soft, almost silent hissing of the snakes, the comfortable warmth of the office, the roaring of the North Sea outside the window, and your hands—which might be completely turning the head of not just his little companions, but perhaps the unapproachable boss himself.
Remember the chat where we made Addair a Smaug dragon? I’m getting the itch to draw that again. I need too.
He seems like the type to demand so much like treasure and such but also demands stuff like Belly rubs. He hates to be disturbed when trying to sleep and may demand to be pet. Caz would have a handful, especially if Rennick gets turned into a giant dragon too.
Does anyone else get butterflies when they see giant/tiny art they really like or think is cute? I don't mean like butterflies when you see your crush I mean you're so happy and love the art that you get an adrenaline rush (butterflies is adrenaline)
The Scenario: The world outside is loud, stressful, and the tiny is having a severe anxiety attack or is completely overwhelmed by sensory overload. The giant notices this immediately, gently lifts the tiny up, and offers them the safest sanctuary there is. Inside, it is dark, comfortably warm, and the outside world is completely muted. The only thing the tiny can hear is the deep, soothing, rhythmic heartbeat of the giant and the gentle rumble of their breathing. It acts like a blanket of white noise. From the outside, the giant softly strokes his own chest, letting the tiny know: "I've got you. You're safe."
Sleepwalking and Midnight Snacks
The Scenario: Both are sleeping together in the bed, but the tiny is a restless sleeper or wakes up in the middle of the night with nightmares. In a half-asleep state, almost instinctively, the tiny nudges the giant's lips. The giant, likewise still half-asleep, simply opens his mouth and gently takes his little friend inside. The next morning, the giant wakes up with a cozy, full feeling in his stomach, and the tiny stretches with a yawn inside, having had the best night of his life. A perfect, cozy Sunday morning awakening.
The "First Class" Pocket for Traveling
The Scenario: The giant has to navigate through a super crowded city, a loud concert, or a stressful airport. Instead of transporting the tiny in a cramped pants pocket or a backpack where they could get crushed, the tiny prefers to travel "First Class" in the stomach. The tiny loves the gentle rocking motion with every step the giant takes (like being in a hammock). Every now and then, the giant taps his stomach from the outside to ask if everything is okay, and the tiny nudges back from the inside to say "Yes!"
Post-Vore Cuddle Coma (The Afterglow)
The Scenario: The tiny decides that it is time to come back out. When the tiny is gently brought back up, they are often so deeply relaxed and "pre-warmed" that they aren't even fully awake. They are completely sleepy, just like a little kitten. The giant carefully wipes them clean, wraps them in a huge, soft hoodie, and both spend the rest of the day cuddling on the sofa. The tiny burrows into the giant's chest to keep listening to the heartbeat they were just hearing from the inside.
omg. i can't believe it - we finally have an AO3 tag!! 'Giant/Tiny Relationships'!! this is not a drill, people! i went and tagged all my (relevant) fics with it
