Over the past few months, i've been a little tired, but progress is going well. The story is being outlined, but the characters and concepts are being finalized. Puppet, or hopefully now better known as: The Red String
Will likely be coming to tumblr (and maybe ao3) sometime sooon! I would really appreciate it if you would spread the word or show this to Moots who you think would be interested in it! I would love interaction and making friends if anyone would like to say hello or to know more. (This is my first time making a web series, go easy on me ;3)
Genres: Modern Hurt/Comfort
Themes: Love, Perserverance, Freedom, Family, Personal Worth, Jesus
POV: Third (Limited)
Plot Structure: Hero's Journey
Status: OUT! IT'S OUT NOW! RAHHHHHH GO READ IT PLEASE! IT'S JUST STARTING!!!
Knives and targets, blood and tears. A Shadow, a chameleon in the crowds of the nobles, a hundred identities, a hundred faces. But he knows only one name as his own, Puppet. That’s what she calls him. The woman who owns his every thought. Lady Eilene Hallon. Her wish is his movement, her life is his breath. Not a person, but a possession. 026. The Northwing Facility’s newest weapon. And as long as 026 can remember, that’s all he’s ever been. A life lived in a ditch, the constant taste of blood and lingering agony of Eilene's rage. Pulling himself back to his feet, alone.
Raised since childhood for the scope of a gun, 026 should know better than to feel remorse for his prey. After all, that's all they are. Prey. But the blood on the walls and the screams for mercy haunt him, his only semblance of freedom found in high nights and Dreary mornings. Everything slowly goes from bad, to worse as 026 begins to lose his grip on everything that kept him sane. Until he fails. His target leaves alive. And Eilene is furious.
Tortured for half the evening and left to die, 026 accepted that he would, ready to meet the darkness with one last sigh, anything would be better than this. Until he wakes up, temporarily blind with a couple dozen broken bones in a place he doesn't recognize and people he doesn't trust.
Eve, the farmer's daughter who fished him out of the alleyway and hauled him home. Cole, the easily-excitable little boy with a lot of questions and an empty space in his life for a protector. Iris, the matriarch and the watcher who waits for 026 to prove himself to her. Lucian, the friendly church book-keeper and retired Therapist. And the Watchful eyes of a God 026 never believed in, whispering that his life has a purpose, and it's not his time to die just yet.
Characters
#026 - Puppet - Male - 26 yrs old - Mixed Ethnicity/Biracial - ISTP
A Young man raised for as long as he can remember to believe he was a weapon, taught to supress himself for his job, but bits of his spite and grief still poke through. Defiant and angry with a wild streak. This causes him to often lose control of his emotions and abuse any substance he can get his hands on to cope with his situation.
Dislikes: Being called out, Sudden loud noises, Specifically red dice, Grease, Mud & Dirt, Complete silence
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Lady Eilene Hallon - Whumper - Female - 41 yrs old - Greek - ESTJ
A charismatic Noblewoman with a penitent for blood and violence, she has high-expectations and little patience for mistakes. Her favorite toy is of course, #026, who conveniently gets rid of all of her problems for her
Likes: Things being quick and easy, Rich flavors, red wine, The colors Red and Blue, Night, Stars, Silence
Dislikes: Slow processes, Failure, The color orange, Fish, Birds, Most flowers, Loud noises, Swearing
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Evelyn (Eve) Sparrow - Caretaker - Female - 24 years old - Caucasian - ESFP
A Sweet young woman who recently moved back into town from college to help her aging mother on the farm and care for her siblings. She's generally a very happy girl with a heart of gold who tries her best but sometimes misjudges the situation.
*would you read whump where one of the characters have the same cultural, ethnic, gender, sexual identity, or even physical appearance and behavior as you?
Readers of whump, do you read stories where you can identify with the whumpee/whumper/caretaker?*
Yes
No
It doesn't matter to me
It depends on which character
Voting ended onMar 18, 2024
I realized that I may have made a mistake by including assumed answers in the last poll. I can hear my mini self criticising me; oh what a terror! what woe in my previous poll, terrible technique in gathering data! amateur scientists take note
Nevertheless, I enjoyed reading the responses, so if you have an itch to explain your answer complex or simple go ahead and type what's on your mind!
god. there’s just something about the hurt/no comfort trope that just really speaks to me. i love seeing my comfort characters go through shit and never get recompense for it all; seeing them broken down and battered and on the brink of completely letting go--whether that’s through death or mental instability or whatever it is...but they’re just one string away. it’s even juicier when it’s canon compliant, or at least in the canonverse, because then you can’t ever see canon the same way again.
i love letting myself cry with these fics, feeling the angst tear through me as the characters face all the major archive warnings (albeit underage doesn’t usually apply) and more, that dead dove shit, that horrifying numbness that proceeds it, when you sit at the bottom of the fic and just stare at the screen...and then you type out a gushing comment because WOW that just sent you straight through Feels Hell.
First post and I really don't know how tumblr works. All I can say is that I'm into sanders sides, spop, the owl house, jr.eg and grej, and I'm always reading lmao. I also like whump
Whumpee yelped in pain as she sprawled on the floor, the canvas sack torn away from her head. She scrambled across the floor, gagged and bound, eyes wide and darting around for any escape. She tried to scream, or beg to be let go, but her words only came out in a muffled sob.
She flopped across the stone floor, trying her hardest to distance herself from the three boys standing near the fireplace.
"Oh come on, Aeva." The tallest boy with frowzy fox bronze hair crossed his arms. "She's harmless."
"Harmless?" The one in the middle, with a golden cuff around his neck scoffed, taking the ornamental sword from the mantle of the fireplace and slicing Whumpee's bonds, allowing her a terrified shriek as she fumbled and scrambled to run from him.
"AEVA!"
"Look at those teeth. She's a Destroyer, Mal."
The Red-haired boy scowled, visibly upset as Whumpee raked her claws against the wallpaper, trying to dig through it in a desperate attempt to escape. "Aeva. Put the sword down, and call the guards! She could break something!"
"Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you said she was harmless." Aeva smirked smugly, aiming the sword toward Whumpee's neck.
"I... Stop it. This is just cruel."
"Oh, stop being such a buzzkill!" The Third boy grinned sadistically, lunging at Whumpee and causing her to fall back and land hard on the carpet. shrieking and screeching in fear, unable to understand their language.
Both Aeva and the other laughed, the last huffing in annoyance. "I'm calling the guards."
But as Mal started for the door, Aeva grabbed his arm, pulling him uncomfortably close, hot breath a warning on Mal's cheek. "No, you're not. You're in my house, and you do as I say."
Mal wrenched his hand out of Aeva's grip. "Fine."
"You know what? Kaz, I don't think Mal really understands what following orders is, do you? Mal, why don't you go... retrieve her for me?" He motioned the sword toward Whumpee, who made a break for it, attempting to scramble her way beneath the couch. "Or I'll tell your mother you were the one who set her free."
Mal turned to look at her, eyes wide and afraid. If his mother found out about this, she'd die, and he'd be locked in the cell again. But he'd heard the stories of what even the weakest of Destroyers had done to armies. He took a breath, stalking over to the couch, and pulling a scarf from the back of it. Probably one of Aeva's Mother's. How bad could she be? She's only a child.
He backed up quickly to avoid being attacked, and began circling the couch, Kaz and Aeva having moved to a safe distance, snickering between the two of them. Mal took a shaky breath and charged the couch, shoving it just enough to startle Whumpee. But as his knee connected with the arm, her head darted out from beneath it, teeth sinking into his calf.
Mal screamed, attempting to dislodge her and failing. But through the pain, a moment of clarity overtook him, and he froze, slowly lowering himself to one knee, shaky breaths coming through gritted teeth. Whumpee sunk her teeth deeper into his flesh at his movement, eyes wide with terror, but hesitated as he stopped moving.
Very slowly and cautiously, silently cursing through the pain, he offered her the scarf. She sniffed it cautiously, before releasing his leg and snatching it from his hand, darting back toward the couch.
But as she went, he tackled her to the ground, pinning her hands behind her back, gasping. "There... Tie her up, and... don't tell my mother."
Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed it, and if you did, I would love getting any kind of comments!
It's Not too hard to guess, but Caretaker and Whumper are in this backstory
Mal collapsed against a wall, lightheaded and dizzy. Something warm trickled from his nose, dripping over his upper lip, and he shakily reached up to brush it away, his vision only focusing to see his hand come away covered in blood. Chaos reigned around him, people running, screaming, bullets flying, fires crackling, and rubble, making the earth shake beneath him. Pain throbbed through his whole body, bruised and battered, unable to focus on anything. The sky was black, two moons peeked through the clouds, one crescent, the other full, lighting the massacre in silver. There were no stars.
He only remembered misplacing his bad leg in his mad dash for the entrance and cracking his head against the ground. How had that hole gotten there? Why had he fallen? Right... he couldn't run. Why couldn't he run?
Just then, somebody darted past him, and shouts echoed behind him. His eyes drew to the running man just as a bullet cracked into the back of his skull, splitting his face. Pink matter and blood sprayed in front of him, fragments of bone, skin, and hair splattering across the stone as he dropped like a rock. Instantly, the young noble went into fight or flight. Though he couldn't think straight and the world seemed to spin faster every second, he dragged himself into a crawl and tried to scramble away from the voices and the wild, neverending gunshots.
He scuttled through the ruins of one of the Saltoris homes like a rat, burning and falling, Soldiers swarming over its grounds like hungry cats. He hauled his protesting body over the shattered rocks on his hands and knees, slicing his palms on the shattered glass, faint pain pulsing in his bad leg. When it became too much to bear, he army-crawled his way toward the entrance, arms turning only shades darker than his fiery hair now stained brown with dirt and dried blood. Searing flames crackled just over the hole he'd scurried into, heating his hiding place like a tiny oven.
The ground grew sticky with blood the more Mal drew close to the courtyards. People shouted, gunshots crackled. He was pretty sure he even heard a grenade somewhere. Worries and grief for his family swarmed for attention in his mind, but his need for survival won out as he crawled into the place where the tea room had once been. His knuckles bled, and he could hardly tell body parts from rocks anymore. His hands stuck to the wet carpet, ash and blood stung his nose, and the dizziness became too much to bear.
Mal found himself retching into a corner, clothes ripped and covered in various filth and hair. Shouts echoed around him, and the air thickened, people crowded, the fires grew higher, gunshots more rapid. He played dead amongst the corpses. They'd been laughing over tea one moment. With only one gunshot, his mother's blood turned the tea red. He'd hidden in a closet until they drew too close, and he had to move. Footsteps thundered around him, and his head throbbed. Blood streamed from his wounds, his leg ached, he couldn't think straight, and he wanted to cry.
But as the voices grew louder and more bodies piled on top of him and the others, Mal's ears rang louder, and he only heard snippets of the orders. "Make sure the house is cleared out! No Saltoris left alive! Iscalus' orders. From Lord Aeveda himself!"
The voices grew fainter, and Mal couldn't tell if they'd left or he was just losing his grip on reality. All he knew was that name. Aeveda. Aeva. That fucking bastard.
And he drifted away from reality, unconscious amongst the bodies of his brothers, uncles, and cousins. Surrounded by the smell of rotting flesh, empty bullet casings, and the maggots that awaited his surrender.
If you liked it, please leave a comment, I love reading them!(and perhaps a reblog to support my series?) Thank you!
