UnevenCube2554

cw: vore, borderline panic attacks with basically all parties involved, starvation mention

Ok so it’s been established that Sapnap has instincts to store people. The events of this comic happen shortly after the fiancés make their permanent home in the store, just after Sapnap is hired by Dream and still isn’t quite used to or comfortable at his human size.

Sapnap has only stored someone once: Bad, and it went so poorly that he cut contact with everyone in his life but Karl and Quackity and got so afraid of eating that he starved himself so bad he almost died. So what’s the logical thing to do? Clearly ignore that it ever happened. Also ignore the random multiple instances of amnesia from moving through the forest from the colony to the store where you went to bed with such severe stomach pain that you could barely see, blacked out, and woke up far from base with rodent fur or fish scales stuck in your teeth. There’s nothing to worry about there, obviously.

So yeah Sapnap is stupid and hasn’t put anything together: during the year that it takes the trio to find and decide to settle in the store, he’s been subconsciously going after vaguely borrower-sized prey in the forest that satisfy his instincts less, but he was still too traumatized from the incident with his father for even his instinctive self to try swallowing Quackity or Karl and risk losing them, too.

And the stress of pretending to be human pushes his instincts off a little as he’s adjusting to his job and new fake identity as a human, so by the next time they hit, it’s worse than ever. And now there’s nothing else to store. The fiancés are asleep in the break room, where Sapnap had been too exhausted to shift small after he clocked out of work the previous day. He picks up one of them, not caring which. He’s not conscious at all as he swallows him down, something his instincts have been begging for, have needed since he swallowed Bad. The body he swallows down is lanky, doesn’t move much in his sleep, but snores quietly. Karl, then. Sapnap doesn’t wake up. His newly stored prey doesn’t either. Quackity, still asleep on a table, is unaware that this is even happening.

Sapnap wakes up first in the morning and doesn’t register anything wrong. He gets ready for work and takes a moment to realize that Karl isn’t where he fell asleep, which isn’t new for him; he may have gotten up early to borrow. He’s done it before. Sapnap carefully moves Q’s sleeping form to a vent so no other employees find him and starts his shift.

Then Karl wakes up. He doesn’t know where he is: Sapnap hears him calling out, moving around, trying to feel for a way out. He’s confused, he’s scared. Sapnap is, too. He didn’t even know, how could he have done this, why would he do this?? He locks himself in a broom closet, trying not to sob, hyperventilating into his hands as silently as possible. Sapnap can hear tears well up in Karl’s voice as his pleas for Quackity and Sapnap himself get louder, can feel Karl’s hands shake as he pounds them against the inside of his body, and…and Sapnap can’t say anything. If he speaks out, if he assures Karl that he’s ok, Karl will know. He’ll know that he’s in a monster, he’ll figure out where he is, who he’s inside of. And Sapnap can’t handle losing him like this, not after losing his dad the same way.

Another thing to note for this that I haven’t touched on before is Karl’s backstory. I’ve mentioned he’s the only indoor borrower, but that he met Sap and Q when he moved outside. This is because his indoor colony was found and killed by humans when he was young, and he ran from the house into the woods where Bad’s colony found him and took care of him (he just went to a different person’s house each night, whoever had enough spare food to cook him a meal and space to let him sleep).

But they didn’t find him immediately: he wandered around the woods scared, confused, and alone for a while. He was half dead and starving when someone brought him to the colony he would eventually consider home.

So anyway, I bring that to your attention to point out that Karl is doing Not Good At All right now. He’s terrified of being alone again, and his biggest fear has come true. All he can hope is that his fiancés rescue him like the colony rescued him all those years ago, because he has no idea what else he can do.

Sapnap goes about his work day, trying (failing) to ignore Karl. His fiancé (captive) quiets down after about 2 hours, giving up on trying to get any help or free himself (don’t think about it, don’t think-) and Sapnap works. But Quackity has been long awaked by this point, and has figured out that Karl is missing. He searched by himself for hours and found nothing. So he does the next best thing: goes to Sapnap. He follows him around the store, begging that he do something to find out where Karl went. More hours go by, so many more hours. But Sapnap won’t look at him, won’t even hear him out: when he hears Q’s voice, he turns in the opposite direction and walks off. He won’t say a word. Sapnap is bigger and therefore faster than him, so it takes Q a while to find him and catch up each time he leaves. But the same happens each time. More hours go by, precious time that they’re losing when it comes to finding their third. Quackity is panicked: Karl could be hurt, kidnapped, dead, and Sapnap is ignoring him??

Sapnap meanwhile decides his best course of action is to wait until Karl falls asleep, then let him out. Hopefully he can tell when Karl falls asleep, then figure out how to get him out, then try to explain why he’s soaked, then try and think of an excuse for ignoring Quackity all day, then explain to his co-workers why he won’t respond when they try to make conversation or ask why his face is so red or why his eyes are tear stained and bloodshot-

Needless to say, this has all taken a toll on Sapnap. Dream forces him to take the break he’s been neglecting all day (Quackity knows how to get to the break room, and if he’s corned there by him, he might break. He’s never been a good liar, especially not to Quackity, who he loves like he loves no one else and who’s been able to read him like a book since they were children. He’s already lying to Karl, and he already feels like it’s killing him, carving a hole in his heart. He can’t face Quackity. He can’t afford to break), because he looks like shit and feels like shit and frankly has never been this stressed in his life. Sitting on the beanbag in the break room he’s been forced into by his boss for a second couldn’t hurt. It’s been a really, really long day. It’ll only be for a second, and he really needs to just…not think for a minute. Just for a minute…

1 hour later, Quackity finds Sapnap asleep in the break room. He’s furious, he’s upset, he’s confused. He scales the beanbag and yells, pleading for Sapnap to wake up, to help him find Karl. He moves to the front of Sapnap, banging on his chest shouting for him to hear him and wake up!