1885a ficlet iii. — doctor doc and his unexplored paternal instincts
notes ; TWO 1885a ficlets in a week i spoil you guys !!!! probably one of the last ones before i try and work 1885a into a full fic.... anyway this one's okay i think. 682 words ! no beta we die like strickland.. if you see any errors uhhh dont tell me please . you know where it is
december ? maybe. probably december.
—
doc was in the midst of giving marty an earful about running off or something like that. marty was barely listening, just repeating ‘yeah, doc’ and ‘sorry, doc’ over and over. he wasn’t doing it to be an ass, he was just in a world of pain right now.
this time around, the doc doesn’t exactly know what the hell happened. all he remembers is the boy disappearing from his side while they were checking out a farmhouse they assumed to be abandoned, before reappearing with a pretty gnarly cut on his arm. safe to say, house wasn’t actually abandoned. just a bit rundown. whoops.
“stop moving around,” the older man’s voice was stern, “moving around’s not gonna do anything for it.” he pressed his fingers down on the skin around the cut.
“does it still hurt?”
“yeah, ‘cuz you’re squishing the shit out of it.”
“well, i have to, squeezing a cut is actually pretty important. for one, it helps clean the cut out,” doc explained, relieving the pressure on the cut, “keeps it hygienic, lessens infection risk. give me your bandana.”
marty pulled his bandana off in one rough tug, passing it over to the other. “you know, doc, i think hygiene is gonna be really hard to maintain around here,” he huffed.
emmett didn’t reply, just worked on tying the bandana around marty’s bicep. “how does that feel?” he spoke up once he was done.
“it’s a little tight.”
“but does it feel like it’s cutting off circulation at all?”
the boy shook his head.
“good,” doc’s lips curved into a small smile, feeling proud of himself. he wasn’t happy that his friend got an injury bad enough requiring his neglected medical skills but he was happy that he got to use said skills, “all done.”
marty gave a thin-lipped smile back, “thanks, doc,” he looked down at his feet, kicking his feet back and forth in his chair.
“now marty, i don’t wanna have to repeat myself again but please, be–”
“be more careful, yeah, yeah, don’t worry doc, i heard you the first eighty times you said that.”
doc sighed, nodding along with what he was saying. “it’s just, i need you to drill those words into your head,” he pointed at marty’s forehead, tapping his finger against his skin, “you’ve got to really get it in there.” he dragged out each word like he was teaching something to an infant, an act that irritated marty just a little bit.
“yeah— okay, okay. i’ll keep it in mind, promise," marty swatted the other’s hand away, “i’m seventeen, not seven, don’t treat me like that.”
it’s not really his fault that he keeps getting into situations. along with the constant dissociation, fear of loud bangs and insomnia, marty has become extremely clumsy. it may have something to do with the fact he’s in a state of constant fear but who knows?
the older man didn’t apologise for the way he acted, staying silent for a few moments before getting up and brushing it all to the side. “right, we should get going.” he slapped his knees upon standing up in true dad fashion.
“what’s the rush?” marty followed suite, picking his discarded serape up off the floor.
“i’m not fully confident that this place is abandoned, that’s all.”
“..why not? shit’s falling apart all over the place.”
“you could say the same for that farmhouse. look at what happened in there.”
oh, doc. he could completely annoy marty one minute and be completely overprotective the next. he’s making a really realistic fatherly figure, marty thought. “if this wasn’t abandoned i think we’d be found out by now.”
“still, we mustn't assume. the owners could be out for all we know.” emmett was busy gathering his items in quick succession, really ready to make a run out of here incase it’s non-existent owners return.
the boy didn’t have much stuff to gather aside from his serape. just that handy axe and a rusting revolver he stole with maybe three more bullets left in it. “whatever you say, doc.”
can’t believe we were robbed of the dom mommy emma of normandy / nerdy young viking canute dynamic we could have had. like. to be clear. im not saying that’s precise history. i just think it would have been a fun treat for me.
This is a small and cute/angsty story I wrote in my grief of Valentine’s Day, so single’s united that day by doing anything else. I was in class and writing at the time. Now, post-Pride is a bit of a shocker for posting this. It’s about body dysphoria, but not in the Trans or Neutrois kind of way, but the Evil-Medic-Slapped-My-Head-On-A-New-Body-But-That-Body-Was-My-Friends-Old-Body kinda thing.
Yeah, it stories about Spyper. The Freak from TF2/FF2. :’)
So, I think I’ll just get into it!
story in tribute to @girzapata6 / @freak-n-ready my freaky pal who always just allows me to get away with things! Weird things sometimes!
The day was cold where he was. Spyper looked around as he sat on top of his flying camper van and watched the cool weather force the fighting men below to either bundle up a bit more or sweat some heat into their person. He was alone, and his van was covered by a tree that had grown to the highest it could go and its large branches were wide and thick enough to house a number of leafs to hide his van as he watched from over top of the foliage at the fight. He had his van parked so no noises drew the fighting men to his position and reported him to the Administrator or worse, a Capture Team.
He watched a Heavy come out from spawn and get backstabbed by a cocky Spy spawn camping the poor giant. The Heavy threw his hands up in the signature backstabbed pose and fell over dead in front of spawn as the Spy got away. Spyper felt his mouth twitch in disgust as he remembered a far off time, when he was able to wield a knife as well as that Spy had and been able to backstab as efficiently and as scummy as he had just done. It wasn't a fond memory, as he remembered paying for it during the humiliation round but he at least gained a bit of humility. This Spy does not have it, and probably has not been taught the rough way seeing as the Heavy had a team of Pyro´s who didn't seem too good at their job and only one Sniper on the team had Jarate. And that Sniper… was running back to spawn, strangely.
Spyper watched as the Sniper abandoned the high ground with his partner and retreated all the way to spawn, Jarate in hand. He threw it at the ground about ten meters from the spawn door as Heavy came out and managed to catch the Spy trying to get away from the blast radius. It failed as the Spy was covered in it and Heavy revved up his Natasha and fired. The Spy barely got away, but at least Heavy was able to leave the spawn, and whoever came out next didn't have to suffer that fate too.
The Sniper did not seem pleased as the Spy got away alive, but Heavy was laughing and setting his gun down to slap his knee in a jovial manner. Sniper gave him an awkward glance before the Heavy said something to cause a smile to form in its place. The Sniper began to laugh as Heavy pulled out mittens and made a boxing motion in the air and they probably teased about the Spy's soon demise. They didn't stay in such a place for long as the Sniper used a resupply cabinet to refill his Jarate and Heavy picked up his gun and called out for his Medic partner as he went off. The Spy didn't show up the entire time it took Heavy to find Medic and get back to shooting.
Spyper chuckled. While it wasn't perfect, it was at least a deterrent from picking on your counter class. He looked at his hands and… his hands weren't his…
The Sniper's hands looked back at him and he felt the phantom shadow of his old hands. Skinnier, thinner then this and good at picking locks and holding things still at a distance. He could remember how his fingers would pinch his cigarette familiarly, now he felt like a giant when he could get his hand on an old cigarette type he liked. His knuckles were thicker and he couldn't see the bone of his fingers anymore. His old hands were naturally cold when he wasn't doing anything with them, but these hands were always warm now…
Wait, these hands? They were his hands… or, were they? He rubbed his thumb over his index finger and felt the small ridges on the distal phalanx, where the fingerprint was. He rubbed them together slowly, not his fingerprint… Or was it.
He suddenly felt wrong. Something was wrong here. He hadn't felt this way in years, he hadn't felt so bad in years. He looked at his hands and followed to his arms. He would never show this much skin as a Spy… he was a Spy, wasn't he? He was Spyper after all…
He let his arms wrap around himself in a self-hug. Something wasn't right. It didn't feel right. Why today?
He pulled something from his pocket as he dropped one arm to let himself go, his heart beating with emotions he'd rather not deal with. He pulled out a card, a card you see in a convenient store rack with tourist stickers above it. It had the traditional Happy Valentines Day on the front in bright red with pink and purple hearts leading all the way across the front and back. He opened it and his heart lightened naturally at seeing a photo of Intelligent Heavy smiling and giving a thumbs up to him. On the page that was opposite of it, was his friends message…
Spyper have a good Valentines Day, and as soon as your trip is done, I hope you meet us in Dustbowl before Halloween. This year will be great but I will not spoil surprise.
Your friend forever,
Intelligent Heavy
He smiled at the thought of the big lug waiting patiently around Dustbowl for him to return from exploring. But the image was saddened by the fact he still had a ways to go, and his heart and brain agreed they could not return to his friends anytime soon. He had a purpose traveling, and he wasn't okay with going back now.
The wind picked up and blew his paper and hat. His hat stayed on his head but the photo taped to the card shook in the breeze. Strange, Intelligent Heavy always made sure the photo was taped down so the photo and card were both preserved and Spyper didn't just take the photo by itself… He liked Spyper keeping the sentimental cards to show the occasion. And Spyper indulged him. Sometimes. Spyper didn’t really like the cards, they were mostly clutter.
But why was this one different? He flipped the card over and actually let out a vocal, “Huh?” Before remembering the handwriting.
It was his old handwriting, neat and practised it had been, strange and alien with weird pulls against the muscle memory of the L's and the T's. But it was his own handwriting. Sny? Sny had written to him in this letter? He read it cautiously.
You and I aren't a lot alike as we originally thought, and we've already had this discussion before. You learned before I did about how this new existence of ours isn't so bad, but isn't perfect as I made you understand. I hope you don't plan to wallow in pity forever, cause we all gotta love ourselves eventually.
Sny
P.S. What the hell is your writing style, I oughta smack you bloody Spook for your fancy penmanship.
He almost let out a snide and laugh when the match below began to simmer, and he didn't want to be caught. He let the image fold over and looked at his dear friend on the front. The big smile was genuine as it always was. And Sny's words rang in his head as his heart welled up to see them. But not now.
He kicked his legs in joy. His legs. He let his thumb rub over the cover of the card and smiled. His thumb. He guessed, even if Sny was a cynical jerk sometimes when talking about what happened to them, he knew his literal other-half cared for him a little more then he showed. And that was great. He and Sny hadn't been close before… Before…
Never mind all that. His murderous thoughts for the Medic who did this to him can wait.
Right now, he just wanted to enjoy himself. And being himself.
