hellos everyone I am alive!!!! As most of everyone who reads my stuff knows, I was going Through It in 2021 ; but after a year of intensive therapy I’m doing so much better and I’m ready to start making content again❤️if you’re still here and interested, it’s violently appreciated❤️
The next chapter of Thunderstruck is almost done!! PWF next chapter is started as well. I also feel like my mind is so much clearer and I’ve improved so much in general so doing a total rewriting of LT would do the story more justice. Here’s a little snippet of some first chapter dialogue under the cut:
Charles’ voice echoes down the hallway, where he’s talking to a team of psychiatrists on the phone. Nathan strains to listen, only able to hear, “—clearly suffered severe abuse—“ and, “—completely disoriented and confused.” None of which sounds promising, but all of which sounds accurate, and it leaves a heavy, burning dread in the pits of his stomach.
One time, when he was a kid, he had this alligator that he would kind of hang out with at the lake. It’s the most Florida Thing Ever, he knows, but he would go sit down by the docks, and the thing would show up and just chill on the bank with him until he’d leave. When it got shot by whatever poacher asshole, it was still alive, still on the docks, but his mom wouldn’t let him near it; she didn’t want him to see his friend die. And Nathan is kind of scared, that Charles is his mom, and Toki’s just as fucked as his alligator.
“Can you hear anything, Picklesch?”
“Uh uh. Naht a sound.” A long drag of smoke billows around where Pickles’ head is pressed against the tightly secured door where Toki is being treated, and Nathan is thankful for it, because he can’t stand to see the concern on his face. “I’m still workin’ ahn the lock thet Charles put ahn to keep us from breakin’ in.”
“Why’sch he trying to keep usch out, huh? What’sch he hiding?” Murderface snaps from where he sits on the ground nearby, idly picking at some dirt on his bloodied knees with his knife. It’s really fucking weird that today was the same day they rescued Toki. Nathan needs to take a shower too; minus all the gore, he smells like rotten skin meat and Magnus’ general store cologne still.
“We have bigger issues than Charles, Murderface,” Nathan mutters almost gravely, quietly, “I think—um. I think Magnus really fucked Toki up. Like, bad.”
Pickles swallows audibly, tugs at the dreads framing his face as he kind of curls in at where his knees are bent in a crouch. “I know it’s bad, I mean. We could all see thet—thet it was bad. But how bad d’ya think it really is?”
Nathan is almost thankful that Charles paces right into their line of fire in that moment - because while he saw the way Toki’s face was sunken in alarmingly deep, the way every rib jutted out from underneath his shirt when he was upside down, the bruises on his neck, he’s not sure how much more he can truly bear to hear right now.
“Hey! Charlesch!” Murderface grabs a nearby remote, hurling it in the general viscinity of where their manager is walking. “Let usch into Toki’sch room, asschole! You make usch go out there and get him, and now we’re not allowed to hang out with him? It’sch fucked up, man!”
“Excuse me, doctor,” Charles mutters into the phone. He turns to the three of them, “Boys, please. I don’t have any answers myself right now—“
“But whey can’t we see ‘im? We have a right to fuckin’ know whet’s goin’ ahn in our own damn house, Charles!”
“I promise you, that I’m doing everything I can to figure this out, but—“
“What is there to even figure out? He’s either okay or he’s not, and we need to fucking know.”
“Do you guysch ever notische that Charlesch continuouschly—intentionally—keeps schuper important information from usch?”
“Y’know whet, Murderface, I do consistently pick up on thet. Whet the fuck is up, Charles?”
“Yeah, what the fuck IS up, Charles?”
“Alright, ah. Do me a favor, and listen to me, because I don’t have time to, ehm, repeat this again today.” Charles scrubs a hand at his eyes underneath his glasses, and Nathan notices how disheveled he looks; some of his hair ungelled, and his tie is loose from being tugged at. He looks scared, and Nathan hates that it makes him scared, too.
“Toki is severely injured, emotionally and physically. He’s not speaking, blinking, ah, he’s suffering from malnourishment, dehydration, insulin shock, sepsis—these are just a few life-threatening things on a long list of things going wrong right now.“
Nathan just kind of blinks, because he doesn’t know how to physically express the type of dreadful emotion that washes over him. Hearing Pickles’ voice is a comfort, even as it sounds terrified, “So—? Whet the fuck are we s’posed’ta do? Is he gahnna’ be okey?”
“I’ve been consulting the world’s top doctors. I have a team that I’m flying in on the Dethjet in the morning. I’m doing everything I can to treat him, and I don’t want to, ah, scare anyone, but even with everything Im doing - the worst case scenarios here could potentially be…the most likely.”
“No.” Nathan growls, shoulders squaring as his fists clench, and he may look like he’s going to beat someone - but he’s really just about to throw a tantrum. And Charles knows it, frowning at him, but Nathan just snaps, “We’re not fucking doing this. He’s supposed to be okay now, it’s. It’s fucking—“
“It’s fucking naht fair.”
“Yesch! And It’sch not fucking fair that we’re not even allowed to schee him! Espeschially if you’re right, and he’sch got toxic schock—“
“Insulin shock—“
“—we schould be, if anything, enforsched—to go in there now more than ever!”
“I know you want to see Toki. But the, ehm, best way you guys can help him is to stick together as a group, alright?”
“When’sch the lascht time we’ve been together ‘asch a band’ at all?” Murderface pauses, looking at them worriedly, “If—?”
“No.” Nathan and Pickles’ voices overlap each other, creating that weirdly satisfying harmony with their differences in pitches, as they both jab their fingers at their friend.
“I’m juscht saying—!”
“No!”
“But—!”
“No!”
“Jeschusch chrischt, fine! But be fucking realischtic! There’sch a reaschon that Charlesch won’t let usch schee Toki. He’sch fucked up, guysch, and we knew that wasch fucking likely, he wasch with fucking—“
“Don’t fuckin’ sey his name, I swear t’gahd!”
“Schee?! You’re both in denial! You’re hiding from reality, and I’m the only level-headed one, asch alwaysch!”
“D’ya think it’s our fault?”
“Oh god, you know it isch! Nathan, schould we kill ourschelvesch?”
“Boys. Stop.” Charles pinches his temples, sighing loudly through his nose. He doesn’t look like he has the energy to deal with their nonsense today, and that just spikes Nathan’s unease even further. “But I am—ah. I think you all should consider going to see Skwisgaar. Do we know how he’s doing?”
“He’sch being almoscht asch difficult asch you.”
“Yeah, he’s, um. As expected,” Nathan mutters, and Pickles backs him up with, “So, y’know. A fuckin’ miserable train wreck.”
“He wasch calling the wheelchair guy to try and figure out how to hack your fingerprint door. And then he schtarted calling the fucking clown to try and get a reaction out of Toki—“
“And we couldn’t fuckin’ have Rahckso here—“
“Yeah. Because we hate him.”
“—So, those horse tranquilizers I shaht ‘im with are gonna have ‘im out for a good five hours.”
If a regular person were being discussed here, Nathan would probably think that sedating them with a blowdart during a panic would be a bit extreme. But after seeing the way Skwisgaar has acted throughout Toki being gone, a horse tranquilizer is like. Practicing moderation. And that’s something Pickles isn’t usually good at, so, he refuses to not to be supportive.
*
