(Unfinished) Paying a Social Call
AN; due to the abhorrent actions of some of the members of the pressure dev team, I have decided to discontinue this piece. I no longer feel comfortable creating content for pressure, if the situation somehow changes, it is unlikely I will return. If there is enough want for the fic to be continued, I will do so. Since I DO want to write reader insert content, my content will likely be migrated to writing for something else.
Wordcount; 3.5k
Request: I canât find the request, but I do remember seeing someone who got the searchlight spear stuck in them LOL. Something about a searchlight encounter.
Type: Injury, hurt/comfort, angst. Injury healing my beloved.
Warnings: graphic depictions of injury, reader gets impaled, no pronouns but âyouâ used for⌠you.
You, in your ever-so wonderful predicament, find yourself haphazardly gripping onto the interior of one of the cargo containers teetering on the edge of the many blown-out pits. Your hand tingles, fingers twitching painfully as the prickly sensation of electricity dances through your tendons; youâd finally managed to locate the final generator of the many youâd been tasked to fix, but youâre stuck in a stalemate with the⌠resident searchlight looming overhead. You canât call yourself an electrician, or a mechanic(nor a repairman, for that matter); your lack of knowledge had gotten you shocked by the frayed wires more than once.
The cargo container shudders as you shuffle awkwardly towards one of the ajar set of doors. The searchlight, in which youâd given a hateful nickname to, circles overhead. It wails momentarily, buzzingâerârumbling? Groaning? As it sweeps near you. The water from the, albeit impressive, anti-gravity of the lunar dock drips into a puddle somewhere out of view. The amount of water staining the floor makes the dock uncomfortably humid.
Your hand twitches painfully; you momentarily lose your grip, sliding back down to where you started. You grumble as you pull yourself back up, this time with your non-injured hand, eyeing the last generator you need to open the industrial door. If it had a voice youâd think it was mocking you.
You look up, attempting to locate the searchlight again. It had just swept over you again â making a diagonal to the opposite side of arena. An opening. You take it.
Scrambling to your feet, awkwardly bumping into the ajar door, and landing haphazardly onto the concrete floor, you make an, admittedly, poor dash to the sparking generator. You glance up as you crouch to one knee in front of it, eyeing the searchlight that was starting to make its returning arc in your direction. You physically startle at this, wrenching the door of the generator open as you do so: youâre already falling behind. Great!
Itâs really REALLY hard to identify and fix what the hell has been wrong with these god-forsaken generators beyond the salient water damage from the too-humid lunar dock. You physically stutter for a second, before identifying the issue: one of the two primary gears is dislodged and embedded into the wiring lining the generatorâs interior. On instinct, you go to pull the gear. A loud crack echoes through the air, and you jolt back. Ah yeah. Right. You glance at the arcing sparks of electricity dancing off of the generator; the searchlight is turning to return towards you. You hiss as the muscles in your hand lock, tendons painfully seizing. Right â no time for that. You look up again. Itâs coming, something worse than panic seizes your heart.
You pull part of your shirt out from your belt, wrapping your hand in the fabric wrench the gear out of the wire. The gearâs axle is bent-you glance up again, getting closerâ doing the best you could, you ram the gear into the axle, avoiding the other primary gear and trying to fit it âwell enoughâ between the other gearâs teeth. Itâs definitely not perfect, and this generator is certainly going to be much more broken than beforeâ the gear jerks backwards, grinding against the twisted joint, and the generator sputters to life.
You slam the door shut, and pull the lever on the side of the generator harder than you intended to. Smoke billows out of the back of the casing, you ignore it. Surely itâll work for now, yeah? Yeah.
âŚthereâs a tense pause before the red, flickering light blinks green. Immediately, a larger, brighter green light cuts through the dimly-lit lunar dock, accompanied by an ominous, low blaring alarm. However short the alarm was, itâs certainly enough make panic crawl up your spine. The searchlight is drawing near â too near. Itâs too close to try and scramble for cover, and sprinting for the, now opening, containment door is a risk youâre being forced to take.
You donât think for even a second that cover was an option when refuge was fifty feet from you.
You waver when you attempt to stand, stumbling idiotically when you use your bad hand to push yourself up, before catching your balance and booking it for the stairs. You ignore the pain that was now crawling its way up the nerves in your arm again.
An orange light passes dangerously close to you as you continue your sprint; trying to slam to a stop on the stairs ends with your boot wedging itself into the lip of next stair. You stumble fecklessly, stopping inches from the second light passing in front of you. You definitely donât miss the wailing coming from the searchlight that is now hovering above you.
You weave through another one of the searchlightâs beams. The door is so close.
Itâs so close. One of the beams locks onto you. A wail. You keep running. A hook whizzes past you, imbedding itself into the concrete directly to your right. Youâre right there.
Another hook, closer this time. More accurate.
You make it past the door. The light is still on you. You turn aroundâ!
It happens fast. Imbedded right below your ribs. The large, serrated hook pulls against your stomach. Your feet, planted into the ground, slide forward against the rough concrete as the searchlight tries to yank you out of the saferoom. Your mind screams for you to get rid of it; a Hail Mary to avoid another violent death. So you do.
Itâs a split second before both of your hands grip the hilt of the hook, youâre getting dragged harder now, before you wrench the hook out of your abdomen.
You donât feel much when you do so. You stumble back momentarily as the force you put into ripping the hook out of yourself throws you backwards. The containment door shuts with a clang. The hook is shut in the door â it jerks once. Twice. Before the door bends around it to force itself shut.
You watch it clatter to the ground. How the hook was so friable, you wonder, goes unanswered. You donât hear it. You DO hear a loud heartbeat. Itâs yours? Yeah. It is yours. Huh.
Youâre just standing there. Breathing. Hyperventilating? You know something is wrong. You should be panicking. Screaming. Crying. But you donât.
Youâre shaking really bad. Your vision is skewing, hearing fading. Something is wrong. It hasnât hit you, not yet.
You step forwâ wait, no. No you donât. You meet the floor. You really wish you were unconscious right now. Or dead. Dying sounds great right now. Youâll just come back, yeah? You can feel the cool, dusty concrete against your face. Your diving gear weighs uncomfortably on your back. Your chest feels tight.
You canât make much out any more. You know youâre in pain. You know that youâre on the ground, on your stomach. You want to sleep, but something in your mind prevents you from succumbing to the darkness. You feel halfway to death, though. You can definitely still feel the annoying prickle of pain as it dances up your hand and arm, a grim reminder of your incompetence.
You donât succumb to the darkness but something different filters through your mind; fuzziness follows the dreary pull, filling your ears and replacing the buzz with something quieter.
âŚ
You fail to make out the sound of one of the two doors sliding open in front of you. Faint, inaudible mumbling. Somethingâerâ someone shuffles over to you.
You feel something pull at the satchel tied around your waist. Another pull. Youâre shaken awake? Aware? by the tugging. A frustrated huff. Hands meet your shoulders, and youâre flipped over onto your back. You groan in protest as youâre sidled, diving tanks digging into your back. Pain pings in your head in response to the turn.
Whatever it was jerks back, likely startled by the âvery-much-livingâ corpse lying in a pool of their own blood, moving. And groaning. You weakly attempt to wave off the thief, blearily opening your eyes and muttering something incoherent as you try to bat away the hands trying to rob you of your own pilfered goods. Your head bumps against the floor as your, poor in hindsight, attempt to defend yourself fails.
Your eyes donât give you much help to identifying your thief, either. You cough out another âmmmmmmge..t aâway frmâeâŚâ as you try to blink away the, weirdly thick, tears that are clouding your vision.
In response, you hear an exasperated chuckle. Or a disappointed one. You wouldnât have been shocked if it was both.
Hands meet your shoulders again. This time, less aggressive. Softer. A little bit more careful. Youâre gingerly lifted so the diving tanks are no longer digging painfully into your spine. Your head lulls as your torso moves from the ground â you groan in protest again as your head bonks against your diving tanks. The bullet shell pricks against your throat.
You feel too far into your head and a million miles away at the same time. The perpetrator speaks again, something like: âwh..happeâŚ..idioâŚâŚ..âistening?â
You donât respond. Well, you try to, but you just end up letting out an âauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuâŚ.ghâŚuhâŚ.â before dropping your head again. Thick tears still cloud your vision, and your clogged sinuses arenât doing anything good for your hearing. You really try and give into the darkness that had been dancing around your sightline, appearing in your peripherals and sneakily darting to the opposite side of your peripherals when you glance over.
You blink hard. Twice. You donât open them on the second, trying to sleep, rest your eyes, before youâre shaken violently. Right, thereâs still hands on your shoulders and someoneâs face in YOUR face.
Wait a second.
Thereâs been something. Someone. In front of you, trying to steal your stuff, for the better half of like⌠two minutes. What? You feel your heartbeat leap and thatâs where the darkness decides to humor you.
Instead of jumping to your feet, you pass out.
..Probably. You know that youâre missing a lot of information on what the hell was happening. Or happened. Youâre vaguely aware of an, incredibly exasperated, grumble of your name and the dizziness that accompanied being shaken violently by your shoulders again. And the weird pressure headache. Especially the pressure headache.
Youâre not unconscious for long; but because youâre trying to both keep yourself alive and awake from your heart wanting to explode and being impaled, memories come in short, scattered waves.
Youâd been picked up with surprising care, straining as intense, ripping pain clawed its way through your abdomen; your diving gear shifting as your benefactor attempted to avoid the bullet shell on your neck and your wound, now coated with caustic, drying blood, stung as they did so.
You donât recall much after that; maybe being jabbed in the forehead with a claw, or shaken again, but your stupor had only led you into lethargy.
âŚ
âŚ.
âare⌠âkay?â
..
..
You come to; finally managing to blink the thick, uncomfortable tears enough away so you could actually see.
You feel awful. Pain rends its way around the underside of your ribs as you writhe.
Youâre lying on your back, diving tanks removed (much to your relief). You startle for a moment, hand flying to touch the collar of your uniformâ bullet shell is still there, pricking at your neck. You donât know whether to be relieved that it was still there, or to let the dread sink in that you still have about a fourth of a gun and all its firepower steadily aimed at your jugular.
You let your hand sink to the ground again. Youâre up, above the ground, away from a startling bright light and the faint rumble of a decrepit fan; resting on some kind of ledge. Youâd been kindly placed on and amid several kinds of pillows and cushions, which were probably taken from the many abandoned couches and office chairs scattered around the blacksite.
Additionally, through the hole in your jumpsuit from the oh-so-kind-searchlight-hook-impalement, you can feel a patch of gauze and tape where the entrance wound lies; the tape pulls stiffly at your skin.
Thereâs another prick of pain centered near the patched wound, a ways below your ribs and to the side. It feels more like youâd gotten a tetanus shot rather than impaled; it has a dull, echoing throb. Shifting, you notice that thereâs no gauze on your back â nor can you feel an exit wound. It still hurts like hell, though.
Your head throbs. The tension headache youâve had since the stabbing thrums like a heart and rattles against your skull. Your attempt to wave the headache responds unfruitfully; only intensifying as you shift uncomfortably. A shot in the dark, and you missed. Horribly.
Familiarity strikes you. You know where you are.
Glancing to your right: the source of the light, recognizable fins and disheveled hair, was your mysterious benefactor. Hello, Sebastian.
You watch him for a moment. Heâs facing away from you, so you can only see his backside; though his fins do flick toward the occasional bumps and crashes that echo around the blacksite. He brushes a strand of hair away from his face.
A pang of sizzling hurt shoots through your chest, climbing up your throat. You try to suavely(or as suave as exhaling with the bottom of your chest is) exhale to clear your throat, only to immediately choke on your attempt. His fins immediately flit to you; his head following after. He stares pointedly at you, waiting for you to stop coughing.
You cough hard again and let out a strangled grunt as you are, rather violently, reminded of the very much real likely-fatal wound youâd received. You still, tense, but still nonetheless. Right. Heâs been looking at this charade the entire time; you follow his lead and also look his way. He looks oddly attentive.
âHere I thought you managing to get skewered by that searchlight âwhile being in a completely different room than it âwould be the last embarrassing thing you did, huh?â He points out.
âWhatââ you croak. âWhy?â Why what? Whyâd he save you? Why is he making fun of you? Whatâs happening? What did he do? why?? Thereâs a surge of things you want to say, to question, but the words catch.
ââŚso uncouth. I, with my last shred of empathy for you and your gaggle of idiots, chose to help you instead of leaving you to die in a pool of your own blood.â Sebastian snarks sarcastically, hands clasping together. He rises a little, to be more intimidating or so you could both see each other better, goes unanswered. âFirst,â he points, âyou should be thankful.â
Thereâs another tense pause as you register his words. He makes a âthank me nowâ gesture with his hands. Orâ two of the three. His third hand holds a folder and is resting on his⌠hip. You blink. He doesnât.
âIâ? Thank you?â You echo, voice cracking at the âi.â You wince, pulling yourself up with your forearms into a sit, straining the âthank youâ as pain creaks its way through your torso again. Sebastian bites back a mordant âdonât hurt yourself now,â and gives you a deadpan instead.
âYou know, people who get saved from meeting their maker tend to be more grateful than,â he waves a claw at your pitiful form, âthis.â Ah. He wants you to grovel. You donât want to do that.
âI donâtââ you start.
âSecond,â Sebastian cuts in, a canny, stressed smile accompanying his shift, âletâs not move, yeah? Ruin all my hard âsaving your lifeâ work?â
You consider his words for a moment. Probably a moment too long because his face falls flat again. You just nod. Defeated? Not really. There wasnât much of an argument, just him⌠lecturing you.
âGood.â Another, even more sly, smile glides over his face. One of his earfins flick. âNow, be a good little convict and stay put.â
Sebastian gives you another once-over. You bristle at the comment and give him a suspicious once-over. The feeling of âwhat the hellâ settles deep within your soul.
Another surge of questions, thoughts, exclamations run circles through your mind. The pain still comes in agonizing waves. You VERY much remember the whole âripping a gigantic, serrated hook that had hit you so hard that it imbedded itself through your abdomen and into the floor behind you,â but the wound no longer matches. You can most definitely feel the entrance wound, as it continuously sends rounds of pain through your lungs and stomach, but thinking about your marred intestines makes you even more nauseous than you already are.
Sebastian had mumbled something about you being a dim-witted moron as he turned back to the Manila folder he was holding. Youâre still sitting up and have half a mind to attempt to lay back down; âsitting stillâ is practically impossible now as weird, winding pain peaks briefly in small sections where you think you remember feeling the serrated hook tear through, before it sizzles out and numbs just as quickly. You keep shifting and rolling your shoulders to try and reduce the pain, but it proves to be an effort in futility.
Itâs too little and too muchâ the hurt, the questions, the noise and the lack thereof. The headache. Especially the headache. And the whole impalement thing. The questions of how and why heâd done anything more than leave you to waste away to your death dance around your mind. Thereâd been an annoying, quiet droning hum in your ears thatâd accompanied your earlier awakening. It grew louder as the room got quieter. It was loud now.
The silence that followed your awkward attempt to stave the pain ends abruptly. Youâre too busy poking at the patch of gauze on your abdomen to notice that Sebastian had turned, again, to eye you. How long heâd been side-eyeing your efforts is unclear.
He huffs, snaps the folder shut, and startles you. Your startle consisted of you pulling your hand away from the gauze (and further causing pain) to look at him.
âYou going to ask me something or are you going to keep poking at the hole in your abdomen?â He questions, quirking a brow at your current disposition. He looks like heâs about to reach out to grab you before stopping halfway and re-clasping his hands.
âI donât understand.â You wheeze, voice still hoarse.
âNot a question. Try again.â Sebastian chides.
âTheâ you. Saving me.â And then suspiciously, ââŚwhy?â
âMmm⌠give a little get a little, yeah? Maybe like giving to charity.â He snickers, accentuating the end of his sentence with a twitch of one of his fins. EhhhâŚ
Now itâs your turn to deadpan. âCharity?â You look down nudge the patch again. Ow. Pain ricochets through your stomach, further inducing the nausea youâd been trying to push through. It pulls at your skin. Still hurts. ââŚsure doesnât feel like it.â You grumble, sotto voce.
Looking up, you nearly leap out of your skin. Sebastian had, somehow within the time you were looking down and messing with the patch, and silently, had risen up and was now very, very close to you, upper hands gripping the metal bars lining the edge of the platform youâre on. Heâs squinting at you skeptically, and you do the same; though yours is much more terrified.
A beat passes. Sebastian speaks before you do: âyouâŚ. actually awake this time?â
âŚand thatâs all I had. Thanks for reading. Assume reader gets healed, Sebastian tells you to kys or something, and you wander off and die in a hole idk
I do not plan on continuing this piece. I am stepping away from pressure, and deleting all of the content related to pressure that is not my own; my fics may or may not remain up.
also the title is an rdr2 reference













