title...

oneshots/short series taglist: @whumpsday @jumpywhumpywriter

So Whumpee waited. They waited through their stomach eating itself. They waited for days, weeks, months. They were tired. They would've done anything for a drop of blood. They would've licked it up off the dusty floor if given the chance. They would've done anything.

And one day, they woke up to the scent of blood.

They were immediately fully alert, sleep long forgotten, their starved body going into overdrive at the sensation. Blood. There was blood around. Somebody said something, but it didn't reach Whumpee's ears, there was blood, there was actual blood, and they had to find the source right away.

They pounced on their cut-up prey, licking up the blood and then sinking their teeth into their flesh. They didn't care who it was. They just cared that they were finally getting a drink. So they drank. And drank and drank and drank.

Then they moved on to another body, ignoring the scared screeches and what must've been begging. They weren't a person anymore. They were a famished beast, and they acted accordingly. They didn't stop until their stomach was full, and even then, they kept drinking more.

Then, they stepped back, blood still dripping from their lips. They stepped back and took a look at the bodies. The tied up bodies of their friends. Full of lacerations, and now, bite marks. Their pale bodies. Their lifeless bodies.

They felt like they might throw up all the blood they'd just drunk.

"What… What have you… What have I… What is this…?" they stammered.

"Did you enjoy your meal?" Whumper asked from the corner of the room. Whumpee couldn't take their eyes off their friends.

"This wasn't me—"

"Oh, but it was."

It was. Whumpee collapsed onto the ground, onto their knees. Their friends. Their best friends. They were so ravenous, they didn't even hear their last words. They were so gluttonous, they couldn't stop before all of them were dead.

"You did this to me," Whumpee insisted, they had to, because the alternative was so much worse. That it was them. That they were the one at fault.

"You can say whatever you like," Whumper said idly. "But it's you who's covered in their blood."

Whumpee wiped their mouth. They were crying now. "Why?" was all they could choke out.

"Because for me to train you properly, you needed to get rid of all previous attachments," they explained. "And what better way to do that than this?"

Whumper was right. Whumpee felt utterly alone in the world now, and utterly broken. They hated Whumper, and yet, they felt like they were too spent and stupid and useless to do anything but obey them.

"So I hope you enjoyed your first meal with me. There will be many more. You will kill others for me, people you don't love. It'll be much easier, I won't need to starve you for so long. Won't that be good?"

Whumpee couldn't nod or affirm. They just knelt there, tears streaming down their face. They had no one anymore.

You can't answer. The tears just come and come, one after the other, snot and blood dripping down your face. You sit — collapse, more like — on the ground, hiding your ugly face behind your hands. You can't talk to her about the facility. You don't know for sure, but you're pretty confident it'd be a death sentence.

The woman approaches further. Slowly, like she's approaching a feral stray cat. "Here," she says, and you look up. She's holding out a tissue.

You shouldn't accept it. You shouldn't accept anything from outsiders. You don't move, but she doesn't get tired of holding it out for you, in case you change your mind.

A minute passes. She sighs and crouches to be at eye-level with you. She reaches out and you squeeze your eyes shut, expecting to be hurt further, but instead, she gently dabs your tears away with the tissue.

"I'm not going to hurt you," she says, as if reading your mind. "Please, take it."

~

Caretaker had never officially said it out loud, but did they need to? It was obvious from the way they gently scratched Whumpee under the wing, in their gentle touches, their soothing words. So Whumpee was happy.

"Here," Caretaker said with a smile, placing the seeds in front of them on the table.

"Thank you," Whumpee chirped, and they blushed a little at just how high-pitched their voice sounded. Caretaker could still embarrass them with such simple acts of kindness. As their mate, they really should've gotten used to it by now. "Will you eat with me?"

"Ah, no. I'm kinda in a rush. I just put together your food and now I'm off to work."

"Oh." Don't sound disappointed. Don't sound disappointed. Don't sound disappointed. "I see! Well, I hope you have a wonderful day. But our date tonight still stands, right?"

Caretaker furrowed their brows and let out an awkward little laugh. "Our date?"

"Yeah, in that take-out restaurant you keep mentioning. You told me you'd take me out?"

"I did, yeah, but it's not… It's not a date."

Whumpee blinked. But when mates went out on outings like that, they called that dates, didn't they? Maybe Caretaker was just uncomfortable with Whumpee being so direct. It'd make sense, given Caretaker was too shy to even call them their mate so far. "Oh. Right. Not a date. Just an outing."

"As friends," Caretaker added, kind of emphasising their point. Whumpee froze entirely.

"I don't understand," they said quietly, rejection blooming in their heart like a bush full of of thorns. "But we're mates, aren't we?"

"Whumpee— What? No. I don't— I'm not interested in you like that," they said gently. "I'm not interested in anyone like that. I'm ace."

"What's that mean?"

"Asexual, like, not interested in anyone sexually. And aromantic, not interested in anyone romantically. But especially not you."

Oh. Especially not them. "What do you mean…?"

"You're traumatised and vulnerable. I would never take advantage of that." Well, that made the previous statement a little better, but it still stung.

"It's not 'taking advantage' to court someone and then enter a relationship!" they insisted. They loved Caretaker. It not being reciprocated was shattering the tiny world they'd managed to rebuild.

"When have I ever courted you?" Caretaker asked, baffled.

"You do things only mates would do! Like petting me under the wing! And I let you, because I felt safe with you, and I wanted it too, and, and—"

"Oh." Caretaker rubbed the back of their neck awkwardly. "I think… I think there's a misunderstanding here. I never thought of that as courting."

"But—"

"I don't know a lot about your culture, admittedly… I didn't know, okay? I didn't know that was like a romantic thing for you. Look, I really have to rush, we'll have this conversation after work, okay?"

"But—"

"Be good! I'll be back in a few hours!"

Whumpee watched them rush out of the apartment, and they were left there, all alone. They had been left alone plenty of times in the apartment, but this was the first time they really felt alone.

"Okay…" they mumbled to themself, pushing their plate of seeds away. They weren't hungry anymore.

You don't resist as your assigned handler beats you with a ferocity so far unmatched. She wails on you, punches you, kicks you when you finally fall to the ground. You don't shield your face, and she lands a kick directly to your nose. It hurts. It doesn't hurt nearly as much as not being good enough.

All your life, you've been in this facility. You weren't even allowed to leave the premises, with limited outside time. All your life, you've been in and out of operating rooms, your handler wanting to enhance your performance with body-modifications. Your metal arm with a blade embedded in it that you can pop out on command probably wouldn't be enough to defend you from your handler's wrath.

And so you just lie there and take it. And take it. And take it.

You might die.

Dying would be preferable to not being good enough.

Your handler is talking, but your ears are ringing so loud you can't make out the words. She grabs you by the collar of your uniform and pulls you up so you're kneeling, but it's hard to keep your balance. Blood is dripping from your nose onto the floor below. Your eyes are nearly swollen shut.

"...failing to meet expectations..."

"...useless, absolutely useless..."

"...waste of money and resources..."

You take the verbal abuse just as well as the physical one. You don't protest, you don't try to plead your case. You just take it. And take it. And take it.

Eventually, she grabs you by the shirt again and drags you to your feet. You stumble after her as she makes her way through the winding corridors of the facility you've called home your entire life. Some other weapons look. Some turn away. No one steps in.

Eventually, the two of you arrive at the front door. You haven't been out of the building in decades, not counting the inner yard. All your life, your handler primed you to think of the outside world as alien and scary, a world you'd only ever need to infiltrate and take out targets in. You didn't belong in the outside world.

And yet, she opens the door and shoves you outside. The door closes behind you with a loud bang. You collapse on the doorstep.

Surely, this is just a punishment. Part of it. You'll be let back in once you learned your lesson. Right?

You spend the day lying on the facility's doorstep, trying to keep tears at bay. A good weapon is emotionless, strong, resilient. Surely, this is a test. And you are not going to fail.

At sunset, the door finally opens again. It's not your handler; it's a man, no kinder than her. He barks at you for having stayed by the door, orders you to go.

But go where? You have nowhere to go.

"Please," you try, but he shuts you down immediately.

"You're not part of this organisation anymore. Get away from the door and never come back. You don't want to end up dead for drawing attention to the facility, do you?"

Maybe you do. Death would be better than being abandoned. But the part of you that's still loyal, the part that has been thoroughly trained to follow orders from handlers, makes you get up on shaky legs and walk away.

Walk away from your handler. Walk away from your comrades. Walk away from your life.

You find an empty bench in a park and lie down. It's dark out by now, the bench only illuminated by a street light right above it. You have no idea how you must look. A bruised, battered body with a metallic arm in clothing that doesn't match the outside weather.

You don't care. It doesn't matter how you look. You close your eyes, trying to imagine you're still in your bunk bed, sleeping above #065. #065 snored. You found it annoying at first, but it soon became a comfort. It meant you were right where you belonged. The park, on the other hand, is quiet. A stark reminder that you aren't welcome anymore.

The tears start up against your will. You sob, hiccuping and sputtering, and you must look so pathetic, but your handler isn't there anymore to beat sense into you. It's just you, alone, and you haven't been alone in... ever.

The sounds of your disgusting wailing must've drowned out the sound of footsteps approaching the bench, and so you're caught entirely off guard when a gentle voice asks, "Hey, is everything alright?"

You immediately sit up, on high alert, your brain screaming DANGER. But the woman holds up both hands, and you see there's no weapon on her. You relax just a fraction.

"I heard you crying," she explains. "And you look..." She trails off. She doesn't know how to address your swollen face.

"Go away," you say immediately. You're not supposed to draw attention, that was one of the rules you lived by up until now.

But you aren't bound by those rules anymore. You have been kicked out. So what's the protocol in dealing with strangers now? Are you supposed just make up your own rules?

The woman slowly lowers her hands. In a way, she reminds you of your handler. The same high ponytail, the same brown eyes. Except she's looking at you with pity instead of rage. Your handler has always been angry with you for something.

You stare at each other for a minute or so, neither of you moving or saying a word. She looks like she's looking for the right ones to make you feel at ease — you, on the other hand, have no intention of speaking to her any longer.

You stand up from the bench. You start walking away.

"Wait!" she calls after you. "Please! Are you from the facility?"

You stop. The locals aren't supposed to know what goes on inside the facility. Does she somehow know anyway?

"I can see your arm," she says, probably meaning your prosthetic. Many of the weapons got enhancements at the facility, it's nothing special. Just a metal arm. With a built-in blade. "I've seen others with similar prosthetics come and go from the facility. I... Truth is, I've been trying to look into it. The facility. There's some shady stuff going on in there, I'm pretty sure. Maybe you can help?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," you say.

"I've never seen anyone from there be out after nightfall. Especially not... in your condition."

The stupid tears keep falling down your face. You're so pathetic. That's why you've been kicked out. You angrily wipe the tears away and turn back around to face the woman.

~

"Yeah," she lied again.

"You don't look… How do I put this…"

"I'm fine," she cut in. The nightmares were one thing. The thing keeping her from sleeping the most was the fact that Whumper…

She didn't even want to go there. She just wasn't comfortable sleeping.

But she also couldn't not sleep.

Caretaker leaned in a little. "You know, if you're having trouble sleeping, I have a secret recipe passed down through generations from my great-great-grandma… If you wanted—"

"No," she said, maybe sharper than intended. Caretaker flinched back from her tone like they'd been punched. "Thanks," she added, to soften the blow.

"Look, I'm just worried. Not getting sleep is a surefire way to get sick. One of my friends who struggles with insomnia once went completely psychotic from lack of sleep. The way they recall that time and tell the story… It sounds very scary. I don't want that to happen to you."

Whumpee blinked a few times, trying to keep her eyelids from shutting and never opening again. She stood up from the table. "I'm gonna go for a walk."

"Whumpee…"

"I'll be back by dinner."

"I have an idea," Caretaker said, and Whumpee already knew it would be stupid and wouldn't solve anything. Because Caretaker didn't know. Nobody knew. Nobody but Whumpee and Whumper. It was their little trauma bond. "What if I opened the couch and we slept together?"

Whumpee blinked. "What?"

"The couch can be converted into a double bed. What if we had like a… sleepover, almost?"

They couldn't possibly think that if locking her door and checking it three times and locking her window and closing the blinds wasn't enough to make her feel safe enough to fall unconscious, she would sleep with a quasi stranger? Were they insane?

"What do you say?" they asked with a smile. Whumpee huffed. And yet, something in her prompted her to answer quite differently than she'd originally wanted to.

"Okay. We can try that."

Why did she say that?

Caretaker immediately perked up. "Okay! Go on your walk and I'll have everything ready by the time you come back."

"Okay," Whumpee said tentatively.

So that was what happened. She went on a walk, almost fainting on the side of the road, and by the time she got back, the couch was indeed a double bed, with two sets of blankets and pillows on it. Caretaker was already in pyjamas, reading a book, but when Whumpee entered, they put it down.

"Ready to snooze?" they asked.

"I'm gonna go take a shower." Cold. Preferably. So she'd stay alert.

"Okay."

The shower did almost nothing to her exhausted body. She was pushing 60 hours of being awake, or was it 72? She didn't know anymore. She was tired. She dragged herself to the couch in her pyjamas and climbed under the covers. She wouldn't sleep. She'd just close her eyes for a little bit, until Caretaker went to sleep. And then she'd get up and run in place or something, anything to keep the slumber at bay.

"I'll protect you, okay?" Caretaker said, and Whumpee tensed.

"What?"

"You clearly don't feel safe. But I'm here. I'll protect you while you sleep. If it makes it any better, I can keep watch. Just read while you sleep."

So it was that obvious?

"I'm fine," she said, and oh no, oh dear, the couch was cosy, the covers were warm, and she was slipping away. She was half-asleep already. And why did Caretaker's protection make her feel… at ease?

"Yeah. Just go to sleep. I'll be here, awake and alert, so you don't have to be."

She struggled against it. She struggled to stay awake. But at some point, her body just couldn't handle it anymore.