I am called Fenris. I am but a spectral being, simply travelling around the Limbo to find new content to study and entertain myself with.
Spectral beings don't have ages, but I am considered an adult in most places I've travelled in Limbo. And about pronouns? Any would be fine, I am not a being of genders, and despite the name, I am not a man, so usually I go by they/them.
English was not the first language I encountered in my travels, so I ask for patience if you find grammatical errors in my writing.
(This is a whump blog. You can always send asks, requests, or leave messages, if respectful. This introduction is just a little playing around with a persona, but it's not how I usually speak haha <3)
โ You can find me in Ao3 right here!
โ My Ko-fi is avaliable if you consider tipping me!
My own works will always have content warnings and a cut line, so if you're uncomfortable with emeto, gore, suicide, self-harm, nsfw, minor whumpee, eating disorder-y stories, or the most known triggers, know you will always be warned, and that part of the story will mostly likely be under the cut, so you will only see it once you click to read more.
I try not to reblog works with heavy contents when they don't have warnings, but I cannot promise they won't appear sometimes. I will l always put the content warnings in tags when necessary, though. And you always can kindly remind me to add a tag if I forget one :).
Images of those things will not be reblogged unless they're put under a cut with a content warning or I put in the tags what the image warnings are. And, again, you always can kindly remind me to add a tag if I forget one :).
Other contents, such as blood, violence, torture, physical or emotional abuse, whipping, etc, will always have warnings when they are in my posts or I deem them necessary in other's posts (usually I add tag when it is in images), but will not be always under cuts. This is a whump blog, after all, expect whump :)
If I ever forget an important tag, or you need a tag to be safe scrolling on my blog, you can always send a respecful ask (anon ask, if you're shy) asking for it <3
โ Additional warnings:
Everyone is welcome here as long as you're respectful towards me and others. That's pretty much the only DNI here.
I don't accept any racism, homophobia, transphobia, religious intolerance, any kind of prejudice/discrimination, or any degree of unnecessary disrespect whatsoever, towards me or anyone else. You won't see anything like that here, ever. I'm not the owner of reason and morality and will not enter or reblog discourses/fights about what is or isn't acceptable to read/write/see/enjoy, nor how or why or when or by who.
If you post a lot of negative things and I cannot trust your tagging system to keep those posts hidden from me, then I'm not going to reblog from your blog often, even if we are mutuals </3. You are free to talk about anything in your blog, but I am not here to watch people going for each other's throats, for any reason. So I'll see your posts if I am tagged in them, if they are rebbloged by my other mutuals or if I happen to come across your posts. This is to keep myself safe, and to minimize how much moral panic I get every day of my life. My mutuals can always talk to me in my discord, if you miss the interactions!
Content: dehumanization, "it" used as a dehumanizing pronoun, nsfwhump, detailed mentions of sexual assault (victim's testimony), victim blaming, unrealiable narrator, whumper POV (not the abuser), forced reveal, prisoners of war, institutionalized whump, open ending (of sorts), lack of empathy.
{ *Side-Chapter Summary } (Soon)
*Side-Chapter -> Not part of the main story, skippable.
(Curse of Withering's masterpost)
Mayfield could feel, from the moment they sat down to work, that something disgraceful would happen. Maybe it was the way even the sun resolved to hide between the clouds, or how their left knee had locked up in the middle of the hallway, or the way impatient knocks on their office's door sounded like; who they sounded like.
Or maybe every day in this forsaken place was disgraceful, and they shouldn't expect something better.
They supposed it had been long enough since the last time they were called to do a rape kit. Or a "medical check-up" for an "improper handling of unwilling gifteds's" investigation.
The way this wretched place kept coming up with names just to water down cruelty really vexes them.
"It got to the handler taking it out of the work way, then we got nothing," Smith says while guiding them to the interrogation room, footsteps unhelpfully fast. "Get it to stop crying and talk, or to stop wasting our fucking time."
Mayfield fleetly wondered if it had cried over retelling the sexual abuse or due to whatever verbal abuse it was going through while doing that.
"You find it truthful?"
"I will only care enough to find that out if we have an actual case to work with. Otherwise, I'm pinning this as another UG trying to get out of work."
Up until now, Mayfield hasn't found a single case of an UG lying about this to get out of work. Dismissed cases, yes. Closed cases of proven lies? No. It's way too much work, too stressful, and too risky for an UG to lie about something like this. "Hm."
When they step into the small, barren room, Mayfield's knee makes a loud, cracking sound again.
The gifted's head snaps up belatedly, eyes bloodshot, face swollen red with the aftermath of ugly crying. It was a sorry sight.
They slowly sit down on the opposite chair and picked up the folder with a subtle glance to its bruised wristsโ it didn't seem new enough to have been a recent struggle against the handcuffs locking it to the table.
"Good morning," they scan the first page, and "11584." Female, according to the file. Huh. Doesn't seem right.
It stays frozen for a few seconds, eyes slowly focusing. "G-Good morning, doctor?" It eyes their identification on the medical coat, but doesn't seem to catch the name. Mayfield doesn't see a request for glasses or any mention of eye problems in the file.
"You can call me Mx. Mayfield." There's quite a lot of written work for only three pages. Three hours, it says, between the gifted reporting to its work supervisor and now. Mayfield records in their mind all information so they can focus on the gifted's reactions when getting the testimony. "It says here you're a girl?"
11584 flinches and shakes its head, dark hair flowing with the moment. The action seems to bring it back in a snap, its voice high and briskly when it says, "I-I'm sorry-"
"It's okay. This is just for your medical information," they don't put any effort in gentling their voice, but the natural calmness of their tone seems to help, if only a little. "You have a vagina." They pause.
"Ye-.... Yes, mx," it chokes out.
With the way its thin shoulders huddle together, Mayfield is pretty sure of their hunch.
"Okay. And are you a girl?" They tilt their head slightly. It doesn't seem one, at least not to the extent an UG is able to control their own appearances and gender presentation.
It eyes them so cautiously Mayfield almost sighs. But eventually they whisper out, "please, no."
Alright, that's checks. "Are you a boy?"
A fearful nodding answer them.
Mayfield doesn't have to witness the interaction behind the one-way mirror to tell the investigators are rolling their eyes at the attempt of making the gifted less uncomfortable. They are all so dead set on the protocols that they, somehow strongly set in the illusion of not being monsters, still need Mayfield to help do the work they can't. It takes a good amount of tenancyโ or despairโ for an UG to report, and if they want to have a case, they need to have some lenity.
Well. Mayfield supposes that's the issue, in the end. These people don't want to have a case. If it depended on them, there wouldn't be a way for UGs to report sexual abuse at all.
For all their constant disagreements, Mayfield did have to thank Wilson's stubbornness for it being punishable. Mayfield themself thought it was impossible to convince the higher-ups to bother with rape when they allowed torture, murder and slavery. But Wilson does have a talent to make himself be heard no matter what.
If it depended solely on Mayfield, they know they would never have gone as far as he did. They never even bothered to do more than scold young doctors and guards before Wilson had raised a pandemonium about itโ before Wilson had brought that pandemonium into Mayfield's whole department and made it their personal and professional problem.
And now they were one of the sole medical workers responsible for rape kits. Oh, the irony.
"Alright. It says here you're 19 years old. Is that correct?"
"I- Ahm... yes, I think so." His fingers fidget with one another, and Mayfield takes notes on the bouncing leg, the nervous lip biting.
"Mhm. Why don't you tell me why are you here today?" They close the file and rest their hands on the table. It's not their work to note anything down here, and they got all they wanted from the pages.
"I- They..." 11584 swallows hard. "I heard- h-handlers aren't supposed to- to... h-have... touch-" his breathing picks up a bit, but Mayfield doesnโt interfere, "n-not supposed to have- uh... mh... have sex. Right? With us."
The tears aren't appearing yet, but the stress is so visually loud it bitters Mayfield's mouth that someone would think the boy was lying. One would have to either be profoundly stupid or purposefully ignorant in order to not see truth in the boy.
"That's right," Mayfield concedes, in that tone they use when a child finally got out a coherent sentence. Which, in this case, is very close to the truth, they suppose.
They can't ask if that's what happened today; a leading question like that can make the whole answer useless. There may be a protocol against sexual abuse by handlers, but the system is still set up for inertia, for letting their peers go in the name of less paperwork and minimum moral reassessment.
Really, fearing moral reassessment in this line of work is an infelicitous trait.
"Tell me what happened, 11584."
"M-My handler... I-... h-he-... I said to- said it to Mr. Smith. Do I have to say-... say it again?" His voice wasn't even fast or panicky, just... broken. Eyes going all over the place as if trying to organize thoughts before speaking, or to try and find a way out. Did they try to get out? Was that the reason for the handcuffs? Or was the escape searching trying to appease his internal conflict?
There was no escape either way. Mayfield wondered if he knew that already.
"... You do, 11584."
His eyes are glossy again, back hunching over his body. After a too long silence instals itself, Mayfield gets ups, slowly for their knee's benefit and to not scare the boyโ though, by the flinch, it didn't workโ and takes a cup from the water dispenser.
"Take a sip, then tell me." The boy flinches again when Mayfield puts the cup near his hands. They don't comment on it.
Hesitantly, he obeys and sips. More hesitantly, he obeys and tells.
"My handler... he took me out of the- of my work path and... uhm. We entered a- a closet, full of stuff." He pauses, takes some stressed, broken breaths. His face flickers with grimaces before scrunching for real. "It had a table," he says in the quietest, shakiest of voices, like it has a meaning. And Mayfield is sure it does.
Mayfield still doesn't interrupt. Doesn't offer direction that could be used to claim a forged story.
"He-... bend- bent-" as soon as the word express its meaning, the boy shakes and doesn't find the courage to speak up again.
When the silenceโ the sound of broken breathingโ rounds up to a minute, and it doesn't seem like anything else will come up, they allow themselves an irreproachable direction.
"Drink up. If you're done with that cup, I can get you another."
And so he does. And so they do. And so the silence comes back.
"11584," they sigh. "To take an UG out of a handler's custody, we need a reason. To fire a handler, an even bigger one. If something that isn't supposed to happen, happened, then it's better for you to tell us now, when we might find proofs more easily. But you got to give us something to work with, we need the full story." It's a bit of a stretch of what they can safely say to get a testimony, but even a questionable testimony is better than no testimony.
He closes his swollen eyes tighly, and Mayfield focuses on them while his hands drum quietly on the table. "I... I don't think-... I'm sorry, I don't want to- to do this. Please, can I go back to work?"
They sigh. The medical rooms are bad enough for this, an interrogation room? Everything is against the boy's easiness to speak. Since when did Mayfield apply to be an interrogator?
Since they argued in favour of the new protocols, they answer their own mind, because someone who would rape an UG could rape anyone in a more vulnerable position, and that's a safety hazard if they ever saw one.
"We can take you back to your handler," they notice the expected flinch, the barely-caught whimper that can't be faked, "and get you back to work. But then this gets drowned out. And if something wrong happens again, it might not have as much proof as this time." Is this too much of a stretch?
"... does he know? That I-... this- I'm here? Talking- That I told you this?" Somehow, the shaking gets worse. Worse to the point of medical concern. A quiet part of their mind examine the boy as if they could find an injury, something urgent to tend to. But they doubt the reason of the shaking is something they can solve in a check-up.
"... He knows you requested a meeting with a supervisor, he doesn't know why yet.
The "yet" is loud in the silence that follows.
With a tiny voice, 11584 breaks the silence, "will you tell him?"
"No." The chair creaks a little as they lean onto the table. "But if something did happen, I think he'll be able to tell, 11584."
Mayfield holds back a sigh at the shaky quietness. The expectation is a heavy weight, and something is about to give in.
It could backfire tremendously, but it was now or never. They put a wrinkled hand above 11584's cuffed ones and squeezed lightly. Their skin prickle with the unfamiliar comfort gesture. "Give us enough information to do something, boy."
As soon as the last word comes out of their mouth, something in 11584's expression breaks.
"He raped me."
There's a tense moment of silence before 11584's face crumbles once, twice. On the third time, the band-aid ripped out in a painful go. And then the crying begins for real. 11584's cuffs rattle with the force of his growing sobs, and his breathing is so choppy the boy seems increasingly pale with lack of air. The crying is so loud it almost gives them a headache.
They sigh. They stand up to fill the kid's water cup again. Now the job truly begins.
"Alright. Let it all out. We have time," they didn't, there's never enough time, but Mayfield would make do, as always. You don't take this type of testimony as fast as some of their colleagues think or want.
It takes some boring minutes until the sobbing quiets down to sniffling.
Mayfield takes the chance that the boy will answer now. "You said your handler took you to a closet. What did he do there?"
11584 rests his forehead on the table, and after a few seconds pushes himself away from it like it burned.
"... 11584."
"Against the table," he forces out.
"What was against the table?" It doesn't matter that they know, it matters that the camera catches him saying it without leading and that the person writing all this down registers his words.
"He bent me, and- and-" the boy pulls his hands like he wanted to hug himself with them, but stops at the sound of the handcuffs, settling for closing his eyes. "Pushed down my pants." Mayfield holds back a wince at the broken, wretched sound he makes.
He says something else, but Mayfield can only understand "fingers". They can deduce, but it is what it is, the boy needs to say it.
"Breathe, 11584. Drink your water if you need to."
It takes another set of minutes and a wrinkled cup for 11584 to speak again, face down and partially hidden.
"He pushed his fingers. In. With spit," what contorts with a tearful kind of disgust. "He used a condom. When."
Mayfield tries to not sound annoyed at his repetitive pauses, or at the need to endure the prolonging of this talk because apparently that isn't specific enough to the investigators. "When what?"
"Do I have to say more?" 11584's voice tightens again and his shoulders shake. Mayfield thinks they can see his face red. Is the half-hidden wetness tears or sweat? Tears, probably.
They hold back a 'I also wish you didn't have to.'
"We're almost done with the session, then you can get a break, okay?" A break before the exam, which is before another interrogation, probably. Mayfield doesn't really know all the steps done after they finish the exams.
"He used the condom forโ... for himโ self," the boys clears his throat, "before. Before he fucked me." The last sentence is so quiet Mayfield considers asking him to repeat.
After a soft drum of their fingers on the table, they decide against that. The microphone must have caught it.
"Was it anal or vaginal penetration?"
There's a repressed flinch that ends in the boy curled against his own arms. "... vaginal."
"Did he do anything else?"
Mayfield doesn't get a response from the shaking boy. Well, they suppose that's too vague.
"Where did he dispose of the condom, 11584?"
"I don't know." They can only see the curling and uncurling of his fingers. Mayfield refrains, with effort, from scolding him for the lack of manners.
"Are you sure? This may help you."
"I wasn't- I don't... remember. Much. After. It- I wasn't..."
They interrupt before the fast breathing becomes hyperventilation. "Okay, that's fine. Did he have another type of sexual interaction with you?"
The only answer is a shake of the head.
"Verbally, please."
"... No," he croaks. "N-No, mx."
"Did he leave any marks or bruises during this interaction?"
He nods against his arms. Mayfield waits, but there's nothing.
"11584," they say with a sigh, "raise your head and answer verbally, please."
It takes long enough that someone else would have punished him for it. Oh, well, anyone else would have punished many other things throughout the testimony, anyway. It is not Mayfield's job to teach manner to the prisonersโ "unwilling gifteds".
"He did. Mx," the voice sounds forced out, and with the frown, Mayfield can pick up irritation. But the cast down gaze and overall behaviour is respectful enough, so they let it slide.
"Did he use any kind of lubrication?"
11584 shakes his head again before answering as asked, "he said I was wet enough without anything." Mayfield can't tell if the resentment and tightness in his voice is aimed at them or at his handler, but it could be both.
Looking at the quivering chin and held back tears, they find the answer doesn't really matter. Whoever he is angry at, it is justified, they suppose.
"How long did this last? Do you know?"
"No, mx," he does an aborted move to rest his head down.
Yeah, they're tired of this, too. "Okay. Did you use the bathroom or got cleaned up after?"
He closes his eyes as if trying to remember? Or trying not to, they're not sure. "Ahm... not- no. Iโ... He- He took me to the bathroom, but, ahm, I didn't... I didn't use it."
"He took you straight to the bathroom?"
"Mhm." At the sharp eyebrow raise, they correct, "yes, mx."
"And from the bathroom, where did he took you?"
"Work. Mx."
"Did you change your clothes at all?"
"No, mx."
"Did he say anything to you during all of this?"
The hesitance breaks the sequence of perfectly smooth answers and questions, which is unfortunate, but it's more of an observation than a complaint. "Can we be done?" 11584 whimpers out, tears breaching his eyes silently again.
Mayfield allows for a small comfort and lets pass unnoticed the disrespect of ignoring their question. "Just a little more. That's the last question for now, then you can have a break."
11584 lays his head back down on his arms, but considering the answer, Mayfield is lenient to let it pass, too, "He called me a slut." There's a heavy pause and a shaky breath before he keeps on, "and other... stuff. Like that. Do I have to say it all?"
It was an extremely foul language and Mayfield wrinkles their nose to it. These handlers have such deplorable vocabularies. "... No. Was there anything else that he said to you?"
"Just... stuff like that," his voice breaks, and he sniffles before keeping on, "he said... uhm." The boy pauses again to shift and curl closer to himself. Mayfield doesn't scold it. "He said he was... uhmโ waiting. To do it. For a while."
Mayfield's nose wrinkles again. "As in waiting to do it to you, or to someone in general?"
"I don't know," it sounded like a whine, "he just said that."
"Alright. Anything else he said?"
"... I just remember that."
Which isn't much, but it's not like the handler's words would mean much unless he confessed to do the same to someone else.
"That's fine. Is there anything else you would like us to know?"
The boy hesitates before sitting upโ well, somewhat sitting upโ and stammering, "I... I didn't-... I didn't flirt. I didn't say- did... I didn't do anything. Like. Wrong. I wasn't- I didn't want to. I didn't ask- ask for it- for him. I didn't. And it wasn't- I wasn't doing anything wrong. The other- Mr. Smith asked if I did. I didn't."
... Of course he asked it. Mayfield holds back a sigh. What a despicable course of questions that is. What would it even accomplish? Why would the answers even matter? That isn't a proper punishment and even if the boy asked for it, the handler who did it was still an uncontrollable man. Really. Of all the people to have intercourse with, one chooses a prisoner who "asked for it"? It's not even a matter of morality, it's simply irresponsible and foul to have intimacy with someone vulnerable and beneath you in a power hierarchy, who can't safely deny it, for no other reason other than desire. Of all things. Desire. Like a brainless beast.
Mayfield could never understand how people allow themselves to be blinded with desire or hatred or emotions in general.
They sigh before saying, "I see." Standing up makes their knee crack loudly again, they really need to look into it one day. "You did well, we're done talking for now. Someone will be retrieving you soon for the physical examination. Take a break for now."
"Aโ Sorry, a what?" The boy looks at them for the first time in... hm, quite a long time. He seems paler.
Was it better to explain now or later? Mayfield ponders on it before deciding it's best to not scare the boy yet. "I'll explain it when we're there. For now, rest."
When all that answers them is a fearful frown, they turn and leave.
โโโ
During the whole actual check-up, Mayfield was purely clinical. Their hands didn't stray, but didn't offer comfort. Their words didn't degrade, but didn't soothe. The equipment was all clean and properly introduced and used, but they didn't bother warming it up. They did the bare minimum their vows asked for, and yet it was more than any of their colleagues would have done. They knew it was cruel, and they slept soundly at night anyway.
Mayfield saw the shaking when they told the boy to undress fully in order to take pictures of his marked body. Saw the crying when he had to pee in a cup in front of them. Saw the flinches when examining internally on a handcuffed boy. And they slept soundly at night anyway.
They saw the fear and brokenness when the boy was strapped down to a hospital bed in a small private room. They knew it would take days for them to be allowed out of there. They still told him to behave before they left him alone, because he was no longer their problem. And they slept soundly at night anyway.
โโโ
Kris lost the ability to sleep soundly about it, and about so many others, only a few months later, and they regretted not being kinder during all of it.
Not because of a sudden spark of empathy; Mayfield would always do what needs to be done and what gets the best results.
But because, indeed, parenthoodโ what a weird, superficial wordโ makes you look at the world and think, "what if it was my child?"
It is still purely egotistical and clinical, they suppose. Mayfield is a monster, and they're not half as bothered by it as they should.
Still, Kris stays awake at night. Wondering, questioning, as if they were still in med school and overanalysing everything about themselves and the world in an attempt to discover all the answers one could reach. It drove them to psychosis on their third year, and it felt like it would again.
Impersonal, as if they were a distant observant to their life. No emotions caught up to them, but the remorseless curiosity did. It always did.
What if it was my child?
Why didn't it matter when it was someone else's?
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(Curse of Withering) NSFW Special Chapter's taglist: @amandagn394 @zozgreenery @borderline-bunch @floral-comet-whump @mushiboble
Send and ask or comment on this linked post to he added to one of the taglists, or to switch taglists! :D
This chapter has a special taglist because the main seasons of Curse of Withering aren't supposed to have explicit nsfw, so I only tagged who asked to be tagged in this!
I will not use the CoW taglist for the nsfw chapter, but if you want to be tagged just let me know. It will go the the oficial chapters's masterlist like the other extra chapters.
Limbo Gods, Mayfield and Wilson's spiteful dynamic is older than Wilson's handling over Cyrus. These two fucks just have an almost decade old bickering.
The nsfwhump chapter is taking longer because my brain just spontaneously decided to add A HUGE plot on Mayfield's life and I had to fix some things of that chapter and fix the timeline of 10 things I never even made public yet.
sick character shivering in bed as they're overcome with a fever. delirious enough to start mumbling panicked words in a foreign language they dont usually speak. the only teammate who can understand them hears it, and replies softly in the same language. repeating gentle reassurance as they stroke their hair.
Whumpee who's spent a very long timeโmaybe even their entire lifeโin an environment where insults and obsenities were so typical that they don't see anything wrong with them. Until they unintentionally offend Caretaker and are very confused by their reaction.
Living weapon put off leash for the first time and they just do as told. They think they could run, but their feet won't move. Handler gives them an order and they go. And then they come back. For all their telling themselves that they'd bolt the second they could, their flawed, damaged flesh only knows obedience now.
โif you love this character then you must make her happy in your fics, right?โ wrong. the horror. suffering. internal hemorrhage. hospital. immediately
just watched a video of prey animals standing up to humans to defend their babies, and all i can think about is whumpee (scared, shaking, wants to run) standing up to whumper to protect a smaller, weaker whumpee
