#barnaby bb

[i-ate-your-dog-srry]

Yayayay bbb!!!! I think I'm getting a hang of himz!!! :3 edit: whyyy is the quality so low- also thank u kit and sesame for da tuts TuT

[whumpinggrounds]

Valuables

CW: BBU general warning, fire, difficulty breathing, smoke inhalation, male whumpee, pet whump, female whumper kinda

“Oh god. Oh, my god. The house – the house – our house!” Mistress Caroline is wailing, wailing like Barnaby has never heard her wail. “Vernon, Vernon, can’t they hurry? Won’t they hurry? I don’t understand where they are-”

Buoying up his distraught wife with an arm under her armpits, Master Vernon stares at the towering pile of smoke with an expression that’s attempting stoicism. “Come on now, Caroline. Deep breaths, darling.” He jostles her, and she shrieks again. Barnaby could’ve told him that wouldn’t work. “The fire department will be here in moments, it’ll…it’ll all be all right.”

“It won’t be all right!” Mistress Caroline’s hands come up to clutch at her throat. “Our home – our beautiful home – our beautiful things, all of our things-”

“They’re just things, dear, we can replace-”

“Oh, you.” There’s real venom in Mistress Caroline’s voice as she rounds on her husband. She’s raising her hand to beat on his chest, the way she does when she’s truly furious, but before she can, her gaze catches on something behind her husband.

Her gaze catches on her loyal servant, Barnaby.

Never has Barnaby longed more fiercely for Pierce, the older Box Boy, a grave and gray-haired expert who outgrew the title boy more than thirty years ago. Pierce would understand the desperate light in Mistress Caroline’s eyes. Pierce would know how to soothe her, settle her, make her see reason.

Barnaby just steps forward, head bowed. “Ma’am?”

“Barnaby, I need you to go into the house for my jewelry box, understand? You know the one, the painted china with the mirrored lid-”

“Caroline.” Now it’s Master Vernon’s turn to be sharp with irritation. “The boy is brand new. He is worth much more than whatever’s in that jewelry box-”

Now Mistress Caroline does slap him. One quick blow across the mouth, more to shock him than to harm. “Have a heart!” There’s true misery in her voice. “Some of those pieces belonged to my grandmother – my great-grandmother! I have to…I have to at least try…”

Faced by his wife dissolving into tears, Master Vernon softens, even with his cheek pink from where she slapped him. “Oh, honey, the fire isn’t even near our bedroom,” he tries, but Mistress Caroline won’t be soothed now. She’s nearly hysterical. Once again, her eyes fix on Barnaby.

“Go,” she urges, flapping a hand at him. “I said go!”

For one endless moment, Barnaby waits for Master Vernon to intervene, but his master doesn’t look at him. His arms are encircling his weeping wife. He’s picking his battles, and he isn’t picking Barnaby.

Taking a deep breath of air already tinged by smoke, the Box Boy turns toward the house.

Opening the door, he’s met with a wall of smoke, black and thick and choking. Even as he coughs, Barnaby plunges into the house, obedient until the end. From the rear of the house, the kitchen spits off heat and light and hideous smoke, smoke that burns his eyes and sears his throat. Taking even a few steps froward is agony. Bent almost double, Barnaby creeps forward, one hand fumbling ahead of him, the other rubbing uselessly at his eyes.

His reaching hand finds the banister. The thought of going up, of entering into the suffocating blanket of ash, makes Barnaby’s legs weak. Around him, the wood of the house screams under the assault of flames and heat, and Barnaby whines with it.

He doesn’t want to.

He doesn’t want to.

He must.

One foot, and then the other, Barnaby climbs the stairs. By the end, he’s almost crawling, rasping in air as best he can, staying as close to the floor as possible.

Just a few more steps. A few more steps to the bedroom, and then within it, Mistress Caroline’s bureau. The jewelry box is on it. Barnaby can picture it, cool white china and painted flowers. Once he has it in his hands. Then he can leave this hell.

Are his eyes full of grit, or is the hallway carpet blurring beneath his fingers? Barnaby can’t tell. His eyes are in agony, his throat, his lungs. He coughs but no sound comes out, he tries to breathe but there’s no air. The radiant heat on his skin and the blisters it raises don’t register. Barnaby is cooking from the inside out.

Still, nonsensically, he drags himself forward. Over the heavy hall carpet, over the threshold of the room that Master Vernon and Mistress Caroline share. There’s a window open, and smoke billows out into the sky, pours out into the sky, utterly overwhelms any glimpse he might catch of the sky.

There’s fresher air near the floor. Barnaby drinks it in greedily, hacking as he does. On hands and knees, vision fading, he creeps toward the bureau.

When the firefighters find him, he’s unconscious at the base of the dresser, curled in the fetal position. They reach down to move him, and the jewelry box spills from his insensible hands.

[whumpinggrounds]

Best Attempts

CW: BBU general warning, male whumpee, pet whump, multiple pets, female whumper,

“Barnaby? Barnaby, where are you?”

There’s a tinge of irritation in Mistress Caroline’s voice, and Barnaby winces. He’s taking too long setting up the dining room, and he knows it, but there’s nothing he can do to fix it. He’s moving much slower today, his body aching when he tries to turn too quickly. His breathing is quick, raspy. His entire body feels too warm, skin on too tight.

Mistress Caroline rounds the corner, and Barnaby snaps as straight as he can. His posture isn’t perfect, but Mistress Grace doesn’t notice. Behind her, though, Pierce’s gray eyes narrow. The older servant evaluates Barnaby’s rigid body with a critical gaze, and Barnaby knows he’ll be hearing about this later. He returns his eyes to Mistress Grace’s face a moment too late, and he hears the disappointment in Pierce’s exhale.

“Barnaby, we have a very, very busy day today. I do not understand why such a simple task is taking you so long!”

Bowing his head, Barnaby takes the criticism. “I’m so sorry, Mistress,” he tells her, voice appropriately grave.

Tapping one high-heeled foot, Mistress Caroline lets out a sigh that ruffles Barnaby’s hair, even from a few feet away. “Don’t just apologize, Barnaby. Do better.”

“I will do better,” Barnaby promises her, and he knows his voice sounds a little too eager. Not professional enough for Pierce’s tastes. He tries to moderate it with his next words. “Mistress Caroline, I will do better.”

“Hmph. Start now. When you’re finished, we’ll want lunch. Something simple, I think. Dinner tonight will be fancy enough for me, I don’t need anything big.”

Barnaby nods, head still feeling much too heavy on his neck. “Of course, ma’am. A salad?”

The way Mistress Caroline’s voice lifts means she’s smiling, and Barnaby’s done well. “A salad would be perfect. Get to it, Barnaby. I’ll eat in an hour, in the sitting room. I have calls to make.”

With that, she clicks out of the room. Lingering for just a moment, Pierce hangs in the doorway. Then he takes a few steps forward, takes Barnaby’s head in his hands. With clinical detachment, he presses cool fingers to the space below Barnaby’s chin, then his forehead.

“A fever, Barnaby?”

As soon as he hears the words, Barnaby recognizes the truth of them. It slots into space so neatly that Barnaby feels stupid for not knowing earlier. “Y-yes, Pierce, I’m sorry-”

“Not your fault, son.” Pierce’s disapproval has subsided into something softer. Still gruff, but more forgiving now, and some of the tension bleeds from Barnaby’s shoulders. “Normally, I’d talk to Mistress and give you time off. With the dinner party…” Pierce shakes his head. “Not possible. Do your best. I’ll see if we have anything to reduce the fever.”

“Pierce?”

Mistress Caroline’s voice drifts down the hallway, and both men stiffen. With one apologetic look, Pierce is gone, and Barnaby is alone.

Barnaby does his best. He really does. WRU may have taught him how to work, but Pierce showed him how to take pride in it. So, Barnaby makes Pierce proud. He cleans the room, sets the table with painstaking care. The process lasts two, almost three times as long as it usually does, because Barnaby has to check and recheck his work. His hands are shaky and sweaty, and his vision keeps going hazy, out of focus.

But he sets the table. When that’s done, he turns to the kitchen, ignoring the way his body aches for rest. It’s salad. It’s putting a few things in a bowl. It’s just putting a few things in a bowl, that’s all –

There’s a high, unhappy voice calling Barnaby’s name, but it sounds very, very far away. “Barnaby! Barnaby, where are you?”

Then, much closer, a gruff, older voice. Known, but the emotion in it is unfamiliar. If Barnaby didn’t know better, he’d say that Pierce sounds sad. It’s his last, wondering thought before he passes out cold in the older servant’s arms.

“Oh, Barnaby.”