Whumpee biting and screaming while getting dragged away, and Whumper injecting them with a sedative. Whumpee's team helpless, watching Whumpee go limp in Whumper's arms
Someone who's swarmed by nightmares so vivid and disturbing - they become terrified to sleep.
Their caretaker-housemates watch this battle —for months, from the nightmares to chronic insomnia. They're helpless in watching their friend deteriorate into a insomnia-fueled wreck.
They find microdosing Valium day & night helps. Buuuut... they become somewhat narcoleptic. Falling asleep mid-sentence – then coming to... with no awareness they just checked out.
Their caretakers know it's bad, but it's also the best, most peaceful state they've seen their friend in months — It's the lesser of two evils.
When an old friend comes to visit, they witness this person check out while playing cards at the table... Head drops, drooling for a moment before they snap out of it, tune back into the room and continue playing cards like nothing happened.
To housemates/caretakers, it's become "normal.
Visiting friend — is horrified.
"How could you let this become normal!? This is not okay!!"
An argument breaks out. Whumpee half-knows they are talking about them, but are still too dim minded by the sedatives.
In which Jak has been dealing with both how normal doctors work and being held accountable for choosing violence when other options were available. He isn't enjoying it. Brother Tam (monk oc inspired by Mister Rogers) is doing his best here
TW for discussions of mental health and mentioned use of sedatives in the context of preventing a patient from harming themselves or others. It's an angsty chapter,but necessary for Jak to start letting himself heal 😭
By the time Dr. Goad approved moving Jak, he'd been in Ward Two for four weeks.
For a month.
A month of hourly checks and pain medication and people touching him, his bandages. A month without privacy, or more than the barest shreds of autonomy.
The smell of antiseptic made him sick, but he couldn't get away from it.
It didn't hurt to get up and move anymore, but he wasn't allowed to leave.
And now there were security guards outside his room.
It was their own fault, they shouldn't have tried checking vitals without waking him up first. Jak wasn't sorry for attacking Berto. He wasn't sorry for attacking any of them.
He'd do it again if it meant getting out, avoiding the slop that was supposed to fix his poor nutrition, allegedly.
He'd heard some of the staff talking about moving him to "Phoenix Block" if he continued to be violent. The high-security wing of the "children's hospital", supposedly, where the hourly checks were closer to every twenty minutes, and all the doors required passkeys to open.
Jak knew prison when he heard it.
He was getting out of here. He didn't want to have to kill anyone, but if that's what it took to get away, he'd do it.
When Dr. Goad woke him up on the thirty-second day in Spargus and told him to get dressed, told him he was being transferred to "Convalesence Ward" in a separate facility entirely, he thought maybe it was a reprieve. That he wouldn't need to kill anyone after all.
He'd made the minimum weight requirement to be allowed to leave the immediate supervision of the pediatricians, he was told, but that it was in his best interests not to deliberately antagonize the head of C-Ward, Dr. Leon.
"If you attack him, he will defend himself and you will not like it," Goad warned as she handed him a small canvas bag with a copy of his treatment plan in it. "You're also going to start speaking to one of our counselors-"
"Good luck with that," Jak hissed.
As usual, Goad wasn't fazed.
"The Foundling Bureau has determined that you must complete minimum twelve anger management sessions if you want them to even consider moving you to the youth barracks with your peers."
"And I'm supposed to care what some Bureau wants because-?"
"Because you're a Foundling, kid. That means you're a ward of the state until you're twenty-one. The state handles cost of living, education, medical bills etc. But they also get to make the call on when you're ready to be integrated into the rest of the city."
Goad nudged his shoulder.
"Let's go. Stick with your treatment plan, don't try to kill anyone, and maybe you'll be earning your gate pass before Rainfall."
The first week in C-Ward was a nightmare.
No walls, just curtains between two rows of beds. No lock on the door. Jak could see armed men walking that hall every hour. The one with the glass eye definitely didn't like him.
Probably because Jak headbutted him and broke his nose. Served him right for getting so close.
Dr. Leon was not a "pediatrician." He got all the stubborn adult patients, and he coddled no one, especially not "upstarts with too much punch in their system." A battle of wills always ended in Leon's favor. Always. Violence resulting in deliberate injury was not tolerated. Doing something that could cause harm to himself or staff meant sedation, since he'd been promised that no restraints were to be used except as an absolute last resort.
Jak had learned after two involuntary sedations not to try to kill him. He had eyes on the back of his head, always seemed to know when Jak was about to strike.
He also had an unholy level of patience for outlasting defiant patients. And he wouldn't leave unless Jak drank the disgusting protein mix. If he wanted what little privacy the curtains provided, he had to take the formulated mixture.
Jak hated it. And he was pretty sure he hated Leon, too.
They didn't make him stay in bed if he couldn't sleep at least. And they'd told him at the outset that they wouldn't sedate him at night unless he requested it — and he never would. At least Jak could say that about this tower. They just made him go with someone if he wandered, allegedly so he wouldn't get lost.
Usually it was the man with the faded red blotch on his forehead. Brother Tam. The '"mandatory counselor". He'd showed up the day Jak threw the protein bottle at Leon's nurse.
Leon wouldn't let Jak leave the room until he'd cleaned up the mess.
Jak wished he'd thrown the bottle at Leon.
But Brother Tam didn't snap or scold. He sat down on the floor and gently asked Jak to hand him a towel. He just...talked, about things that had nothing to do with the situation.
Jak wouldn't have even considered touching the rag, just to spite Leon. But he didn't like the idea of a little old man cleaning his mess. That wasn't how the world worked.
Tam didn't gloat, or even say a word about his acquiescence. He asked instead if Jak wanted to go exploring with him to find the laundry chute.
Jak didn't know what to make of Brother Tam. He spoke to Jak like he was a young child, and that was infuriating. But he'd started bringing bribes for not getting into fights, and he had all these weird ideas about self-worth that made Jak feel a little bad about getting angry with him.
It was one of the nights when sleep wasn't coming to him. Leon had left the ward already, and Jak didn't care enough to even feel relieved.
Tam found him sitting in the hallway outside the ward dormitory, looping a bit of string around and around his fingers. Too tightly, but he needed that sense of compression. He needed grounding at the moment.
"Good evening, friend."
The elderly man smiled down at him.
"You look like you have a lot of thoughts tonight. I find that when I have too many thoughts to sleep, it helps to take a walk. Do you want to take a walk with me?"
Jak shrugged. He didn't really "want" to do anything. But he didn't...didn't not want to do anything, either. He couldn't explain the sensation. Tam reached into the tote bag he always carried and brought out that stupid cardboard circle with the seven colors on it. Emotion spinner, he called it. Each color represented a different feeling. Happiness, sadness, anger, fear, excited -- that one never got used -- confused, and one vaguely the color of oatmeal that Brother Tam referred to as "the blah."
"How are you feeling tonight, friend?" Tam asked.
Jak waited a few minutes before cooperating. He always did. So far, Tam was a lot more patient than some of the hospital nurses. Definitely gave him his space more than Leon.
Jak needed a couple more instances before he could say with any confidence that this wasn't an act.
After a moment, Jak pointed to the oatmeal colored triangle.
He didn't really feel anything right now. Just sort of numb to everything.
Tam nodded as if this made perfect sense.
"There's nothing wrong with feeling that way," he assured Jak, "Sometimes when we've been hurt very badly for a long time, it's hard for our brains to make the right amounts of chemicals that make us feel happy or excited about things. They've been more focused on survival. But that's okay!"
He reached out to offer Jak a hand up. As always, Jak brushed him off to haul himself to his feet. He needed to know he could still do it himself.
"After the last couple days I think we've explored all the way to the ground floor on this side of the citadel," Tam said as if he hadn't noticed, "Shall we try going up a few floors tonight?"
Jak shrugged. He didn't have an opinion one way or another.
Tam kept up a steady stream of talk in a low, soothing voice as they walked. Nothing of importance, just comments about architecture, counting the number of stairs they walked as if he were a child, the same thing as always.
The difference came when they'd reached the huge open chasm that supposedly led to the very top of the tower. There was a sound coming from one of the floors above them, something Jak would not have expected in a million years.
Music.
Not the tinny, garbled voices on the radio in the saloon, or like when Tess hummed, or even his own whistling in happier times. This was an instrument. Not a recording, it was real. Jak could hear the deep notes of strings being plucked and stilled in a familiar melody. If he remembered it, Jak supposed the song must have been very old indeed.
*A Stillness in the Rain". That's what the song was called. And Jak-
Jak remembered.
He remembered Uncle teaching him to play the first four notes on his lumpy clay ocarina -- it was all it was capable of.
Brother Tam seemed to realize Jak wasn't with him and turned to find him frozen on the steps, head tilted back and listening. The old monk cocked his ears in the same direction until he too picked up the sound. A warmth spread across his face as he returned to stand with Jak.
"It's the king," he said softly. "It has been...years, since the last time he played."
"Harp?" Jak asked -- signed, lest he miss a single note.
"A lyre, I think," Tam answered. "I'm glad to hear it again. Music is a balm to a troubled soul."
"He forgot a measure," Jak said in observation. He wasn't really talking to Tam so much as just signing his stream of consciousness.
"That's alright. That part's hard."
"Oh?" The monk turned to more fully face him, a sparkle in his brown eyes.
"I didn't know you knew this song, friend."
"Uncle taught me."
Uncle wasn't much of a musician, but he thought it important to pass on the traditional folk songs of the Hill Country, where he'd grown up.
Was there any Hill Country left now, after the Metalhead Wars?
The metalheads...
Jak had never stopped to think about it -- rather, he'd deliberately avoided thinking about it -- but Sandover was the epicenter of the original invasion. None of the villagers could fight, they'd just used Jak for that! They were old!
They were dead.
All of them. Every single person he'd ever known growing up. Every inhabitant of the coastal villages was long, long dead.
I didn't say goodbye.
Somehow, that was the thought he kept circling around to, again and again.
I didn't get to tell Uncle goodbye.
I never got the chance-
He died without ever knowing what happened to me.
Sandover was gone.
Home was gone.
His childhood was gone.
"For the greater good."
All Jak had to show for that "greater good" was a handful of ruined huts and a melody. Did anyone even know the words anymore?
Jak's chest burned. His throat felt clogged. Tight. He had to move. Escape. If he didn't get out, he was going to-
The first hiccuping breath was soft enough to escape notice at first.
Not the second.
Nor the third.
He couldn't breathe through his nose, his face was hot- it was like having a fever.
Fitting, he felt sick.
Tam was talking to him, calling his name- it didn't matter. Jak couldn't focus on that at the moment and he wouldn't have cared if he could.
Haven had taken more from Jak than just his innocence and his freedom.
They took his home. They took Daxter when they threw Jak away.
Jak had nothing.
He didn't even have the clothes on his back anymore. Precursors only knew what had happened to those.
A heaving sob shook his entire body -- he was going to throw up, he knew he was going to throw up -- he couldn't see.
At some point he must have backed against the wall, because he remembered sliding down to sit on the stairs, just so he wouldn't topple off into the chasm.
Palms pressed against his eyes, teeth gritted uselessly against the next tremor to rock him.
Jak cried as he had not cried since he was a very small child. It was near silent then, too. Silence was safety.
But he couldn't manage complete silence this time. Hot tears burned against his palms, mucus clogged his nose and ran down his upper lip. It was ugly, and painful.
Like becoming his darker form.
An inane thought passed through his mind, a half-formed comparison of dark eco to grief that he never completed.
"Jak, are you hurting, friend?" asked Brother Tam. He sat down on the step just above Jak and placed his wrinkled hand on Jak’s shoulder.
"I'm very sorry that you're hurting right now. But it's good that you can cry. That sounds strange, doesn't it? But it's true."
"Uncle's dead."
His hands shook, slurring some of his words.
"Everyone's dead. I never got to say goodbye."
Tam made a noise of understanding. "You lost your family?"
"Not lost." Jak raised his eyes, but could barely make out the monk's shape.
What a stupid oversimplification. Lost, like they'd vanished at sea. No, Jak knew exactly what had happened to them. Samos took him through that bloody Rift Gate and left them to die.
Rationally, he knew they would have died too if they'd stayed. But knowing that Samos knew all along who was waiting on the other side did not incline him to be charitable.
"Haven destroys everything good. Why-"
Why do they hate me so much?
Why was nothing I did ever good enough for any of them? I tried so hard!
Hands went back to his face, hiding eyes stained scarlet. His kaftan sleeves were soaked, a mess of tears and snot. He gripped a handful of his own hair, desperate to ground himself.
"What's wrong? What happened?"
An authoritative voice rang out above them.
"...oh, excuse us, sire. I don't suppose you have any water with you?" asked Tam placidly.
Heavy boots thudded down the stone stairs, echoing off the chasm walls over Jak's quiet, hiccuping sobs.
"What's wrong with him?" Damas demanded, "Is he hurt?"
Brother Tam folded his hands and shook his head.
"I don't think this is a wound recently given, sire. I think Jak may be acknowledging wounds he received a long time ago."
Jak curled into himself, as if he could hide from the men. He couldn't think beyond the oily black sorrow. He had to expel it. Vomit it out before it could choke him.
Tam stood and turned a very serious gaze to the king. He gestured upwards towards the floor Damas had come down from.
"Young Jak heard the song you were playing. He told me his uncle once taught him that melody, too."
The monk winced sympathetically.
"His uncle was killed, I think. And his community, by the sound of it."
Some of the tension eased in Damas’s shoulders, leaving them to bow under an empathetic weight.
"Did he lose all of his family? Has he no parents?"
Tam raised a hand. "I wouldn't ask just now, my lord. Some things a man's just got to process on his own time. This young man's been fighting for an awfully long time. Go ahead and let him cry himself out. It'll be good for him."
"Good for him? He sounds like he's going to throw up!" Damas protested.
"That's why I asked for water."
With a mildly chagrined expression, Damas unhooked a flask from his belt and held it out.
"Not much, I'm afraid."
Tam knelt and tapped Jak's shoulder.
"Jak? Do you think you can drink some water?"
Jak pulled away and shook his head. Just leave him! Just- Just let him be!
Damas took a step down and nodded meaningfully to the boy.
"This isn't the appropriate place to deal with this. Bring him up to my chambers."
The tide had ebbed for the moment when Tam pulled Jak to his feet and led him upstairs. His head ached, and his eyes throbbed, and that catch in his chest told him this was not over. Five years he'd gone without shedding a single tear and now he couldn't make them stop. He hated it. He hated himself. He must have looked so pathetic!
The room they took him to was dimly lit, and Jak didn't bother looking beyond the flagstone floor and a few patterned rugs. A stronger hand than Tam's took hold of his arm and pulled him across the room to a battered settee that had likely been green at some point. Damas barely had to push to get him to collapse onto the couch. Jak stared blankly at the floor with hollow red eyes. The violence of the tears had inflamed the blood vessels in his sclera badly.
Damas walked away, leaving Jak in a kind of limbo between the waves of repressed pain and grief striking him. Tam took his place, easing down beside him.
"Lord Damas hoped you might feel a little bit safer in here," he explained.
"I know this is hard, and I think this will probably be hard for you for a good while. But you're not alone, you've got Dr. Leon in C-Ward, and you've got me, and the king-"
"Don't put Leon in that list, he's terrible," Damas interrupted.
"Only if you avoid scheduled health examinations, sire."
"He's terrible," Damas said again.
Jak jumped when something cold and wet was draped over his hand.
"Wash your face," Damas said gruffly. He nodded to the cloth. "And hold that against your eyes until it isn't cold anymore."
Hesitantly, Jak did as he was told. His skin chafed against it, but it was a kind of relief. Faintly, he could hear the sounds of a whispered disagreement between Damas and Tam. That was almost enough to make him curious, but not quite. Tam, oddly, did not win the disagreement. There was a note of disapproval in his gentle voice when he announced that he would just be in the other room.
Jak focused all his attention on stifling the tears, ruthlessly forcing them back into their box. He was showing weakness. He was showing that he could be broken. It had to stop.
"Did they take everyone?"
The sudden question startled him, but he managed not to visibly jolt. When he raised his head slightly, he found Damas sitting across from him, elbows resting on his knees. Upon making eye contact, the king asked another question.
"You didn't get the chance for closure, did you?"
How could he know that? How could some warlord king know anything about grief?
When Damas spoke again, he sounded as though he were talking to himself more than Jak.
"It happens so fast. One moment you have a- a home. It's not perfect. Some of it is harsh and cold. But it's the only thing you've ever known. And then one day you blink and home is gone. One day you blink and there are people you trusted abandoning you in hell."
Jak's head shot the rest of the way up.
"Why do you know that?!"
Damas gave him a grim smile. Not so much sympathy as understanding.
"Many Wastelanders' stories begin the same way, my friend. Mine does."
Then he leaned forward, clearly struggling to find the right words.
"You're not...not alone."
He made a sound that might've been a bitter laugh.
"No one in Spargus is. We're the forgotten ones, we kind of have to stick together. No one else is going to watch our backs."
Test subject: Leonardo Hamato.
Caretaker/assigned personnel: Bishop Stones.
Date of capture: May 29th, 2040.
Gender: AMAB/Male.
State: cooperative/docile under sedation
Danger Level: low; 3.5/10.
Personality Level: preferable; 5/10.
Notes:
- The mutant “Leonardo” seems to consider himself as the leader of the group they have been found with the date of capture. The scars on its plastron and lower shell seem fairly old, and cannot be blamed to the IRP team, as they followed protocols. Although their efforts, they have seem to have used excessive force against the subject, causing some mild bruising and swelling on their lower arms and behind the neck, seeming to be from choking and a death-like grip. The mutant remains cooperative, though it doesn’t seem to stop its emotions and anxiety attacks from happening. Sedation is heavily advised when handling the subject, isolation, along with separation from its “brothers”, is recommended as well when performing procedures on “Leonardo” and the rest of the subjects it came in with.
Recommendations:
- Sedation for 6 hours and 30 minutes, 1-2 hours per day without sedation for warmups and assigned meals if no procedures are needed to be performed.
- Supervised visits with its “brothers”, 2 hours per free day with no procedures.
- meals must be kept light; processed foods are prohibited, as it seems that “Leonardo”’s stomach, along with its clutch mates, cannot handle it.
- dissections and cognitive experiments are where they stand out the most, therefore, it is better to keep its body intact a week prior to the procedures.
i wanted to write a fan fiction based on my OC Annie in st laniers hospital AU. This is based on the doodles.⬇️ TW for SIB(self injurious behaviors), very small implied trauma, restraint, seclusion, and sedation
Annie sat in the common area, the too-bright lights buzzing and burning their eyes. It didn’t make it any better that it distorted their vision more than their astigmatism and horrible myopia already did.
They clutched their monkey stuffed animal, it’s fabric only emulating slightly what it felt like in real life, they wanted the real one, the one they had for 14 years.
They had tried to verbalize it the best they could to Ragatha what it had looked like, but they couldn’t speak so well without their AAC device, which they had in the…real world.
So it ended up looking only somewhat like the toy, which further dysregulated Annie, it wasn’t real. It was all code and pixels.
They had little books in the common room, and the ones they had weren’t ones they we’re interested in. They did really like drawing, one of the other ones, Gangle? She had a notebook all the time, but they couldn’t verbalized they wanted one too, especially in this state of being in this..damn headset world.
Annie clutched the plush tighter to their chest, their breath quickening, of course they didn’t need to breathe, anyways, but they only did It because they felt more juman when they did it.
Not like some…rag doll. They did have quite and few Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls in real life, ironic that their avatar was one. Also, that’s one of the reasons they were drawn to Ragatha so much.
There was no one but another….person? Who was in the common area with them, a mix match of different toy parts, like an abstract painting.
Zooble, that was their name.
“You okay?” A voice broke through their head, it was monotone, but slightly more genuine than they heard spoke to other people here. It may have been because they were…what age?
Were they 17? They thought so. But they remember on their medical papers that…doctor, Abel? He said they had the mind of a 11 year old. Sure..in the real world, they had uh? Intellectual disability? A few other conditions too, actually quite a few more.
But, they didn’t believe in that mental age bs, they were a teenager.
Anyways-
A horrible, screeching alarm sound echoed through the room. The fire alarm. It hurt.
As if their body had a mind of its own, they quickly began to beat at their skin, no, cloth? Fabric? Stuffing?
It hurt, bad, but they couldn’t stop. It pounded through their head, their body wouldn’t stop melting down. In the real world meltdowns happened because of this, but it didn’t help that they didn’t have bones, so it wasn’t enough.
Zooble came towards them, trying to calm them down, to no avail.
“D### kitchen NPC’s..Burnt the food again!” They whispered under their breath, and attempted to place their claw and…semi hand thing over Annie’s ears. Which they didn’t have, so it didn’t help.
“DON’T TOUCH ME!” They screamed, pushing them back roughly. They began to pull at their yarn hair, extremely roughly, they felt a Riiipppp.
Chunks of yarn and thread was in Annie’s hands, they threw it down, punching Zooble in the shoulder accidentally. They sweared, loudly, they felt bad that it hurt, they didn’t mean to hurt them.
“Please don’t do that! Caine?” The mismatched toy person called out, hoping for him to turn off the alarm. Even if he did, it was too late, they were too far into their meltdown.
As if even their mouth wasn’t theirs, they sunk their teeth into one of their arms, they heard the stitches pop.
Instead of blood, all that came out was fluff, but a bite imprint was left in their fabric.
Annie felt their arms grabbed and gently pulled away, they screamed, it was shrill. Everything hurt, everything was terrifying.
“STOP TOUCHING ME. LET GO!” They cried, struggling and wrestling with all their strength.
But the adult didn’t budge, they didn’t really have any knowledge on how to deal with meltdowns, or how to properly restrain someone in a way that wasn’t completely traumatizing.
As if it couldn’t get worse, a familiar voice ran out in a less enthusiastic tone.
“Come on honey, let’s go to your room.”
Caine, Annie didn’t hate him, but didn’t like him either, not only did they feel he patronized them, he was also a male. This scared them, in ways that was unimaginable, they had talked to Kinger about their trauma, but he didn’t really know how to respond.
Two hands wrapped around their sides, causing another scream come from them. They wrestled and kicked and punched and smacked, but before they knew it they were placed in their room, the door locked.
“LET ME OUT!” Annie screamed, pounding on the door, salty tears sunk into their fabric, creating a wet mess that further overstimulated them.
They had nothing, nothing to hold, they had forgotten their monkey, even if it wasn’t real, they still wanted it. They wanted Ragatha. Anyone to hold them and tell them it’s ok.
Annie punched at their head, body shaking and twitching from the adrenaline, it didn’t make it better that they heard the door unlock and creak open.
“Everything is going to be okay, my little bumblebee.” Caine reassured, stepping closer towards the shaking rag doll.
Through their blurry teared-filled eyes, they could see the familiar syringe, every time they got a shot or blood drawn Ragatha was with them. But she wasn’t this time.
“PLEASE.” They shouted, scooting away towards the corner of the room. Caine stepped closer, in his other arm a familiar sight, their monkey.
He came closer, gently sitting down and taking them into his lap, an arm wrapped around their arms, rolling up one of their sleeves, and his own legs crossed over theirs.
“GET OFF ME!” Annie cried, trying to squirm away.
Caine held up the monkey toy, “I have your monkey here, you want him?”
They did, but the right words didn’t come out.
“DON’T-“
Caine cut them off, squeezing them tighter against him, not budging even a little bit, like how Zooble didn’t.
“I need you to take a big breath.” He whispered, holding their right arm still.
Annie sobbed, too exhausted to move, or even scream anymore. “I said stop!”
Caine shushed them soothingly, but it didn’t help.
“You’re going to take a nap, okay sweetpea?”
Their breath hitched, a wheeze escaping their throat. They couldn’t move, couldn’t scream, couldn’t do anything.
But those pleas led to nowhere, as they felt the needle puncture their shoulder. They squeaked as the sedative was injected into their body, quickly acting, quicker than in real life.
Annies’ eyes heavied, body becoming numb and still, like they were in quicksand. Everything melted away, and they felt themselves placed in their bed, covers tucked tightly around them.
“It’s ok, you’re ok, you’ll just take a small nap.” Caine whispered, before turning the lights off and leaving the room.
1. Absolutely stellar writing oh my god oh my god oh my god. This is so freaking vivid and I mean I don’t mean to overshare but ime this is so so accurate to what a meltdown with sib is like, you captured it perfectly. I love this and I’ve read it twice over and
2. :( I NEED ANNIE TO HAVE SOME JOY RN THEY DON’T DESERVE ALL THIS SUFFERING. Honestly this is making me a little mad at Nurse Caine even though you 100% wrote him accurately…AUGH I JUST WANT THEM TO BE HAPPY :(((
