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Business of Broken Ethics Chapter 5

Deviation Actions

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Nighthoof had been standing outside the cell as if waiting for Starker to wake up from his nap and see him. His hands had been resting on his hips with an almost paternal sternness in his demeanor and expression, “Starker did you fight with the other inmates at breakfast today?”

He merely had shrugged tiredly in reply, “Wasn’t trying to, officer.”

“So you admit you’re the one that gave Jim Harrinose those two big slashes on his face?”

Starker had rolled his eyes, “Self-defense, officer. He was about to drive that big rotten horn into my lungs.” Inside he snickered at the revelation of the Big Guy’s real name. Jim Hairy-Nose.

Nighthoof tapped his foot thoughtfully, drumming his fingers against his side, “Well…I’m surprised actually that no guards were present during the situation before it already appeared to have ended.” He muttered.

Starker blinked, “Wait, you believe me?”

Nighthoof sighed softly and ran a hand through his mane, “Yeah, honestly. It seemed like you were finally trying to behave these past two days and I happen to know that despite the dire warnings I gave about not laying a finger on you, some of these inmates get rowdy with newcomers. Happened before.”

Starker grimaced at him, “You don’t need to be tellin’ people to leave me be, I can do that myself.”

“Clearly.” The horse retorted, “But anyways, I’m not here to chew you out or anything. I wanted to be clear on what happened.” He muttered a jaunty farewell and had left.



He wasn’t sure why the earlier conversation had replayed in his head, or why he was even awake. It was well dark outside, dim moonlight filtering into the cell in silvery filaments. It was probably late. It felt late.

Probably a consequence of letting himself unbalance his sleep schedule. He’d started getting habitually worse with it, letting himself fall asleep out of absolute boredom and then waking up in the middle of the night. Of course the bells that went off during the day to signal the two meals per day and the bell that allowed prisoners their exercise and bathing period in between helped him stay awake, and regulate the time.

Not that he really participated in much of these out-of-the-cell periods anyway. Even though it disgruntled the other prisoners and had him placed in a ‘special treatment’ kind of light, Nighthoof arranged for Starker to be isolated from the other inmates during these times, and seemed strangely and especially keen on having him shower alone for reasons he didn’t quite understand, and had a feeling he didn’t really want to know.

To be honest over the course of—now three—days Nighthoof seemed to have had a miraculous shift in his attitude toward him. He had seemed so condescending and absolutely snappish but he was finally cooling down or something. Starker wondered if he was just trying to be professional and civil or he really was on his side. Did he even care so much if he was or wasn’t anyway?

And Esther. Was she sleeping okay at night? Did she have a clean and warm bed in a nice cozy room somewhere, and was heading to bed after having her favorite for dinner? Starker wasn’t much of the type to think about spiritual or emotional things but nevertheless he found himself wishing he could project his positive thoughts on her reality somehow.

Something clattered outside his cell, the noise being so sudden and jarring from the silence that he bolted up into a sitting position. It sounded like someone had thrown something like a pebble at the steel bars in front of him. As far as he knew, however, no one was occupying the empty cells adjacent or across the hallway from him. In fact, he was almost certain he had been put in his own sector, with the fact that he was technically a child being the big reason.

The silence stretched on for awhile, and finally Starker eased back down, convinced that it might have been his imagination.

No sooner had he planted his head on his pillow he heard a strange rumbling sound from beyond the bars. He lifted his head wearily and honestly had been expecting to see just about anything except what appeared outside of his cell.

In the dim light of the moonlit cell, there was that pissy leopard cop, Rosemary. Since she had shown up the previous night just to taunt him, he almost half-expected she was going to do it again for whatever vague enigmatic reasons she had.

He wasn’t expecting her to show up in a glittering evening gown though.

He blinked, rubbing the back of his paw across his eyes. It was just horribly bemusing and almost too much to process in his weary mind.

The leopard woman was in fact, wearing a rather expensive-looking and modern-style strapless black gown that hugged her form and ended near the middle of her thighs, the fabric was sparkling like it had many tiny silver stars trapped in it. He noticed the bright silver bangles hanging off her wrists as well; they started jangling as she moved her arms. Her eyes glowed brightly in the gloom and Starker realized that rumbling sound was coming from her.

She was purring.

He tilted his head, remembering hearing something about how she took the night shifts on some nights at the prison, though he wasn’t sure if this was one of them. He wondered if she was on her way out to some dinner date with some unlucky bastard.

But clearly she appeared to be right where she wanted. Rosemary lowered to her knees in a rather elegant and feline-like keeling position and stretched her arms slowly, keeping her half-lidded and batting eyes on Starker the whole time. Her tail kept slowly winding around her lower torso and legs, “Hi there…” she mewled softly into his cell, with just the slightest bit of a hesitation.

Starker was thoroughly confused. He scratched the back of his head absently and managed to find his voice, “Er…on your way somewhere…?” he murmured awkwardly.

Rosemary grinned sweetly and straightened her back, still kneeling on the floor, running her paws through her bangs and thrusting her chest out a bit, “Yes…and I’m here…” her voice was low and thick, with a melodious sound embedded in it that Starker had never heard in it before. It was so weird and very contrasting to her usual venomously hissing voice.

“Why…?” he dared to ask, and suddenly Rosemary rose up and grabbed up at one of the horizontal steel bars that bisected the vertical ones, sprawling her rather shapely form against the metal. She opened her mouth, licked slowly over her lips, and answered in a husky voice,

“I wanted to see you, you big strong dog.” She flattened her ears a bit, tilting her head and showing her tongue occasionally, “Like what you see? I’ve heard it through the grapevine that you teenage boy types prefer mature women.”


Honestly he wished she was taunting him again. He had no idea why she suddenly wanted to come sprawling her body on his cell bars and talking about grapevines telling her something about kids like him liking bitchy old hags like her. He was honestly creeped out, more uncomfortable and unsettled than the time last night where she had some to torment him about things she had no right to be saying. He coughed slightly into his fist, “What am I supposed to be seeing…?”

Rosemary paused from her slight swaying motions and frowned for a moment, a bit confused, but quickly blinked it away as she slowly rose to her feet, the end of her tail hooking the edge of her dress suggestively, “I mean…you’ve had such a stressful time here at the prison and we certainly got off on the wrong foot…perhaps I can…make it up to you…?” She stared him up and down, like she were examining a choice cut, and Starker had the urge to pull the blanket up over him so she’d stop looking at him.

“Uh…no thanks…” he muttered, adverting his eyes from her.

“Come on now, I’ve got the keys to your freedom right here kid…” She flicked her fingers and revealed a lone silver key in her palm, “I can make you…very happy you know…” She smirked.

Starker sighed, “I doubt that’s the actual key to this cell.” He growled, beginning to grow annoyed with Rosemary’s weird performance.

A quick movement of her arm, a sharp click, and suddenly she pushed the cell open, waving her arm in a welcoming manner.

Starker stared at her suspiciously, “What are you getting at?”

Rosemary appeared to have a bit of strain on her features now, but insisted her mannerisms, “I mean, I could take you into a world of pleasure…you and me. Alone.”

The dog teen narrowed his eyes at her, despite she wouldn’t be able to see them past the bangs he always wore in his face, “Ahh…what?” He shook his head. Was she talking about...romance? With her? He was already disinterested in the very idea, but the current situation made him feel the slightest bit of repulsion, specifically because it was her.

Rosemary blinked at his confusion, her smile looking more forced, “I mean, us. In the basement. Going at it. For you.”

Starker shook his head hopelessly, “Going at what??” he growled. It seemed like she wanted to speak in the vaguest terms all of a sudden.

The leopard gritted her teeth, darting her eyes to her left for a split second. She almost looked completely lost, “The dance with no pants.” She almost hissed, her eyelid twitching, “Us. Naked. In the basement.”

Starker made a very disturbed expression and leaned back from her direction, “That’s a really fucking weird thing to say.” He shook his head, “Damn it, go away lady. Goodnight.”

“Damn it all, just come out here, it’s important.” Rosemary hissed through the bars, “I can’t talk about this so loudly, just come here.”

Starker breathed loudly through his teeth in utter exasperation and flung himself off the bed, making his way toward her and out of the cell, clearly very annoyed, “What is so bloody import—“

CLANG!

Pain exploded on the back of his head. The dog fell like a brick, twitching as his blurring vision fixed on the female cop standing over him. Rosemary smirked as she stepped over him, flicking her tail about triumphantly. His vision wobbled and went dark just as he felt a clawed paw sink into his scruff.

---

“Honestly the whole thing was so degrading…”

“Honestly I thought it was hilarious. Never knew a kid his age who was so horribly dense about women. Really. From my standpoint it was pretty hot.”

Laughter.

“Oh shut up, would you? I think he’s waking up.”


A thin whine came from his throat, and he clamped his mouth shut on it. The familiar feeling of skull-splitting pain returned to his senses, reminiscent of the day he woke up to his new jail cell.

He cracked open his eyes but quickly shut them as daggers of light shining directly down on him from the ceiling pierced his skull. He tried again, slowly, and this time a figure appeared over him.

Rosemary’s image sharpened, still donning that evening gown, only this time all traces of her weird seductive act was completely void from her face. A curve of a toothy grin sliced her features and her narrowed eyes fixed on his form, “Ah…there he is.” She purred, turning away from him to face a table that was sitting next to the metal slab Starker realized he was laying on.

And not just that. A reflexive tug at his limbs and he realized his arms and legs were clamped down to the table. The awful itch at the sensation of being completely restrained scratched at the inside of his chest, making him thrash wildly on the table, “What the HELL?!” he snarled, forcing every bit of his anguish and fury into the scream.

Rosemary turned around, smiling smugly, brandishing a piece of chalk and a long, knife-like device in one hand.

Starker barked as loudly and harshly as his lungs would able him, words not even useful to portray the intense anger and hate he felt at the realization that Rosemary, had in fact, trapped him here.

Wherever it was.

Rosemary’s smile faded and her free paw raised. There was a flash of silver on her fingertips and suddenly Starker’s head whipped to the side, three parallel red lines adorning his cheek, “Shut the hell up, mutt.” She hissed with her old familiar venom again, “This basement is far enough underground that the freaks up in their cells wouldn’t hear, but you’re so damn annoying.”

“Easy now…” another voice, an unfamiliar male voice, piped up, “Don’t harm our specimen, Rosie dear.”

Rosemary narrowed her eyes at someone to Starker’s left, and with a quick inspection he turned and saw a stout figure, a youngish goat with a long white coat and large glasses perched on the bridge of his nose whom Starker had never seen before. More people stepped into his sights, staring at his form stretched out on the metal table. A ram, a crane, both uniformed police yet unfamiliar as well, and the scrawny salamander who had been one of the ones to arrest him.

Starker continued to tug at his restraints, “What the hell is going on?!” he snarled, pushing himself up as high as he could manage, hoping one of these creeps would stray close enough to lock his jaws mercilessly into.

Rosemary flicked her small knife around, “Oh, that was quite an interesting fight the other day, wouldn’t you say? Never saw anyone subdue someone as big and overbearing as the Big Guy.” She mewled.

Starker glowered at her, feeling like his eyes were lighting up bright red with how much rage he had toward her, “What’s yer problem with me, bitch?!” he barked, “Why’re ya doin’ this? What is yer issue?!”

Rosemary narrowed her eyes, sticking a pinky finger in her right ear nonchalantly and twisting it as if Starker had irritated it with his voice, “Honestly, shut up. As I was saying, your retaliation was pretty…interesting to say the least. Those things on your back. Where are they? Have you been hiding them under your vest the whole time?”

Starker looked down to realize he wasn’t wearing his vest at all, and spotted it slung on a stool nearby.

“Obviously not, apparently. They must be retractable then.” On the word ‘retractable,’ Rosemary slid her claws back out from both paws, rolling them and angling them in the light, almost thoughtfully, “Now how to get you to pull them out for us…?”

Starker spat at her, hitting her dress and was punished with another clawed slap across the face, “Fucking rude.” She hissed, wiping the dog’s saliva off with a rag from the table, “Alright listen, we don’t have all night. I saw your display in the cafeteria today and I’m honestly quite fascinated with those lovely…plant things you have. It’s quite the biological anomaly, indeed.”

Starker glared at her, unmoving.

“Honestly…I’m sure other people would be simply fascinated as well as I am. Just think, ‘The Mutant Dog Child, Stronger Than a Rhino’. ‘Plants Growing Out of His Spine.’ Ah, truthfully I’m not so good with headliners. We’ll leave that to the reporters.” She murmured, and began looking his torso up and down.

Starker felt horribly exposed under those amber eyes, and squirmed visibly, “What are you saying…?” he growled in a softer voice.

Rosemary smiled, “Why, after I saw those plant mouths of yours, I got to thinking. What else is weird about this kid? Now that I really think about it, a boy of fifteen years shouldn’t be capable of completely shattering and annihilating a person, crushing their bones to dust and shredding every last salvageable bit of their organs and the like…I don’t even think Big Guy is capable of this kind of destruction. So I was wondering. What is it about him? What makes Mister Starker Harynn tick?”

Starker scowled at her, but she went on before he could say anything, “Your story is talk of the town. Hell, it probably is talk of the next town over too, maybe even further. They want to know how you managed to do it, a kid murdering in vengeance for his pathetic little fawn friend. And so I thought…I’ll find out how…or we we’ll find out…and sell our little discoveries to the media. Imagine the profit we rake in. Exposing the teen murderer as a mutant freak of nature!”

“Fuck you.” Starker snarled, “Ye can’t sell nothin’. Ye got no evidence.”

“Not yet.” Rosemary meowed rather excitedly, passing the knife to the goat who stood opposite to her, “Not yet kid. We gotta cut ya open and see what else we can find since you won’t be pulling out those pinchers for us.”

Starker blinked at her in disbelief, “You really think—“

He flinched as Rosemary suddenly swiped the chalk vertically down his torso, leaving a dusty black trail down his belly. He looked up in time for her to press her paw against his forehead, pushing his head down against the table. A separate set of hands clicked something over him, and suddenly he couldn’t raise his head. He was completely locked down.

Starker saw the goat in the white uniform crack his knuckles loudly and study the blade in his hand, “Dr. Minty, if you please.” He spoke in a light, almost singsong like voice, “Hah, I could go with a cut of that discovery profit, officer Rosemary. I’ve been busting my ass for the twenty years I’ve lived, and they still wouldn’t let me into a profitable profession at an actual hospital. I’m here squandering my time on lowlife criminals who can’t keep their hands to themselves. Bunch of ferals, the lot of ‘em.” His words sounded rather menacing in his fixed, cheery tone, and he adjusted his glasses to examine the line Rosemary had drawn on his body.

Starker tensed, “W-wait…seriously…” he stammered, feeling the dread pulse up his spine and explode in his chest, “Th-this is crazy, ye can’t seriously be…”

Minty lowered the fine blade toward the top of the line, at his chest, and he flinched visibly, “WAIT!” the dog shrieked.

It was hard, being pinned down to the table, but he managed to push all four pincers from where they had been retracted. The gathered adults stepped back and murmured sounds of awe and shock at the sight. He tried to look calm and not completely freaked out by how serious these characters were in apparently operating on him. He moved the appendages about, twined them, opened and closed their jaws, showing them how tangible and controllable they were, “S-see? There. J-just…that’s what ye want right?”

“Ha!” Rosemary screeched, and clamped her claws around one of his pincers. He jerked it back reflexively, but not before the leopard cop managed to dexterously cuff the appendage to a latch on the underside of the table. The loop had been locked small enough so the pincer head wouldn’t squeeze out.

Starker growled tugging vainly at the cuffed pincer. He knew he was very strong compared to people of this world but…he wasn’t exactly able to bend metal just yet, frustratingly enough. “What was that for?!” he snarled, to which Rosemary smirked,

“Ah, just gonna keep that one hanging out. I don’t care if you put the other three away or not.” She said, smiling.

Starker did not attempt to retract them. No use hiding them anyway.

“If you don’t want us to cut you open, let us bind those pincers shut.” Rosemary murmured, pulling out a coil of wire and a roll of bandages.

Starker growled, “F-fine. Do it.”

Within a minute, all four pincers were muzzled. For extra measure, they had also bound the stems to his locked-down arms.

“Don’t need you bludgeoning us while we’re trying to concentrate.” Rosemary purred.


Starker blinked, “Ye said ye wouldn’t do it if Ah let ye…!” he cried, voice brimming with emotion, which got him a harsh laugh from the feline’s mouth,

“You’re such a stupid dog.”

“W-wait…! Wa—“


His muzzle was bound shut within another minute, with a bit more effort.

“Ughhn, can I start now, ma’am?” Minty whined, “This is taking so long to tie him down and I want to see his mutant innards…”

“Hah, alright, alright. We got him nice and still and quiet for you, Doctor. Go on ahead.” Rosemary mewled cheerfully, turning to look at the three other cops in the room, “Remember my fellows, speak not a word of this, and you’ll be getting quite a big slice of the cake.”

The three looked a bit unnerved and unsure about being present, and Starker heard one question if this was legal. Rosemary simply waved at him, “All the more reason to keep your mouths shut.”

Starker couldn’t move his head very well, but turning down his eyeballs, he could see the goat lightly tracing the blade down the line Rosemary drew, giving him a horribly tickling sensation.

“Aah, scalpels are so sharp…” Minty muttered, “This one especially will cut you nice and clean. I’m afraid we’re not like those fancy hospitals with the pain-numbing liquids and stuff, it’s expensive and I don’t feel like wasting any. It’s gonna hurt like hell, and usually to combat that here, we give the patients lots of whiskey…” the goat paused to give a small chuckle, “Too bad you’re underage.”

The scalpel hung precariously over the beginning of the line on Starker’s chest, and sunk in. Starker immediately squeezed his eyes shut, gritting his teeth as an unbearable pain began sparking to life in his torso. Minty steadily sawed the scalpel down the line, producing a rag in his other hand to wipe off the blood that was welling along the line he was making.

Starker bit down on at least five screams that rose in his throat. A few strangled exhales and whines escaped, but he did not want to give them the satisfaction of hearing him screeching in pain. Fuck these fucking creeps!

“You see gentlemen, when opening up a patient’s torso, the incision has to be like a door so the flesh will peel back easier.” He heard Minty murmuring.

Someone replied in a rather sickened voice that they didn’t care for the biology lesson.

“Uff…” Starker murmured, feeling the goat slice horizonally across the top and bottom of the long line. The horrifyingly raw feeling of white hot pain was coursing in panicked streams through his body, hitting his head and making him feel woozy. He tightened his jaws as hard as he could, made the tightest fists he could, anything he could do to take his attention away from the intensity of the raging fire on his torso.

“Don’t kill him now, I don’t wanna explain that to Deputy Nighthoof.”

“I’m being careful! Shush!”


The goat doctor gave a small coo of interest as he peeled back one section of the skin, and then the other. A loud whine ripped from Starker’s throat as he did. His eyes were continually watering.

“Shut up, mutt. You are powerless.”

“Oooh my…what in the WORLD?”




“Hhnn…” the dog whimpered, flinching hard as something small and sharp began pricking at the contents of his body. Who the hell was poking a needle in there?!

“Oooh…I see two lungs, one heart…there’s some blood vessels…oh what very hard rib bones these are. Tap tap tap, like a xylophone.”

“Urghh…Doctor please…”

“Aahh…? No liver? No stomach? Where’s the intestines? Where is the STUFF?”

“Oh my god…he doesn’t have a digestive system!”

“What is that big black sphere where…I think the stomach should be though?”


Starker could feel the tears streaking down his cheeks. Someone was poking a thin needle into him repeatedly, still.

Minty held up a blood-filled syringe, “Ooh. It looks like normal blood. I was afraid it would burn me or something if I touched it. I want more samples.”

“Minty, just what IS that black sphere thing though?”

“Eh?”


It was called a Void, Starker knew he had one that he was told replaced the entire ‘digestive system’ as these people called it. It was a prominent thing to have for a higher-tier Nightmare, as it vaporized anything that fell into it. Everything is converted to energy, every last particle going to serve energy in his muscles and reinforce his bone strength. It also kept it energized for extended periods of time. Days, weeks, as the Nightmare’s body was capable of recycling the biological energy for very long periods of time. It was one of their most iconic, ‘immortality’ features.

That damn doctor suddenly jabbed his syringe against its surface.

The sensation could only be described as the intensity of a stick of dynamite exploding in his core. Starker’s blood went an acidic icy cold and he jerked violently, a muffled screech of agony ripping from his throat. He was dimly aware of the onlookers jumping back a few inches from the reaction.

He wanted to tell the fucking goat to keep that needle AWAY from that. He didn’t even know it would HURT like that. No one has ever actually touched a Nightmare’s Void before. But now he knew it was better left that way.

“Ah, calm down! I didn’t even pierce it…I can’t pierce it, in fact. It’s like the surface of a rock.”

There were some clicks and whirring sounds in the background. Someone commented on getting those ‘photos’ developed.

“Well whatever that thing is in his belly, I wanna guess it substitutes his whole digestion process, hence the placement and the absence of well…everything else. Quite amazing…I’d love a sample if only I could just pierce the darn surface…”

Starker opened his eyes wide, chest heaving, wishing he was able to protest and tell the damn goat to not even try. All he could manage was a pleading, pathetic whine.

He saw Rosemary pulsing in and out of focus in his vision. She noticed his pleading expression, and stared back at him evenly.

Her mouth curved into a wicked, horrible smile.

“Don’t give up, Minty. Try poking it again, there might be a soft spot.” She purred in a horribly low, sickeningly venomous voice. She didn’t even turn away, she kept staring into Starker’s pain-stricken face.

Starker began visibly trembling, shaking his head wildly in protest as best he good. Minty poked the needle against the Void’s surface again, and Starker’s body lurched off the table again, shrieking whines and muffled screams tearing through the basement. Even the three cops sworn to silence were looking very disturbed. One of them continued to take pictures, however.

“Minty, try the scalpel.” Rosemary’s hideous hiss curled into his ringing ears, her eyes locking with his.

HELLBENT FUCKING WITCH.

The goat had the fine blade in hand and poked at the surface, provoking another pain spasm. He bit his lip and tried a sawing motion against it.

Starker whined high-pitched and breathlessly, colors slicing across his eyes and every corner and fiber of him shrieking in agony. He gagged, though nothing came up. The pain was crushing, unrelenting, dizzying. He felt unable to breathe, and if the otherworldly canine had been biologically capable of it, he would be vomiting from the agony. He could hear resounding alarms and loud crashes in his head, his own whining and shrieking joining the chorus.

WHY ARE YOU FUCKING DOING THIS TO ME

“Okay okay…stop that, it’s not doing anything…”
muttered a faraway voice, “you’re gonna kill him…”

“I have my doubts…just look how WELL he’s doing so far!”

“Well?!”


“Yep. Patients by now would usually pass out or die from the pain. Look at ‘em, still looking at us with his pretty red eyes.”


“Uhnn…” Starker sighed painfully, thanking anything there was to thank that Minty was done poking at the Void. The room was careening around him.

“Hey, I want to try something…”

“What is it, Minty?”

“Ohoho…I have a theory. Be right back.”


The room went rather quiet. Starker went limp on the table, chest heaving unevenly.

Someone shouted at him not to think about dying. Rosemary told him to shut his damn mouth.

Pain was still pulsing through his body, but it had felt dull compared to the utter torturous sensitivity of his Void organ. Oh no, Rosemary had noticed that all right. He seethed at the way she had egged on that crazy lunatic doctor to keep antagonizing it.

All too soon, his chipper voice resumed in the din,

“I want to inject the kid with these.”

“What…?! WHAT?! Minty, these are the poison samples we keep to identify the substance in a poisoning victim. I thought we weren’t trying to kill the kid?”

“Oh shut it, I want to see what the good doctor’s idea is.”


Fucking Rosemary.

“Ooh, well I have a theory about how well he’s holding up compared to most patients who have operations. I mean, not even when I was sawing at his stomach marble thing did he pass out or just drop dead from the pain. That and coupled with the fact he’s a mutant and possesses the strength to destroy a person completely…I think he’s a superspecies of a sort!”

“Oh, so what does the poison have to do with anything…?”

“I want to inject him with just one for now. I want to see how his tough mutant body handles it. If I’m lucky, I could get a sample of some mutant kid vomit.”

“Disgusting…”


Starker sighed a whining sigh miserably. He’d never been poisoned, but he had an idea of what could happen. A Nightmare had a rather quirky immune system, in that it’ll attack anything foreign that gets inside the body. However, this world was so much different from the Nightmare zone. He remembered once a long time ago how he had been told by Esther he had what she called a ‘flu bug’ but he hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary aside from a sneezing problem. Meanwhile another time, Esther passed him a seasonal cold that planted him in bed for nearly a week. It sometimes handled things well and sometimes handled things…very poorly. The energy in a Nightmare is all used up for battling these foreign bugs, the recovery itself is often sometimes the roughest part of the ailment, in this world, especially for the ones that end up getting quite severe before they’re targeted as foreign substances.


The same applied to medicines of this world, strangely.

At the very least, the Nightmare’s immune system would keep him alive, nevermind the agonizing details.

To be directly injected with a foreign poison…Starker already knew it was going to be a horrible, painful experience. He whined sorrowfully.

“Hmm…”

“Arsenic? It’s a popular poison.”


Shut the hell up Rosemary.

“Oh! No, no, no! Much too cliché!”

“Cyanide?”

“No no…hmm…ohh, here’s a good one. Yes, I’ll use this one first.”

“…Methanol?”


Starker hardly had any energy left to fight when he felt a prickling sensation in his wrist, undoubtedly a syringe. The tiny prick felt incredibly small, even insignificant, to his battered nerves and overloaded senses. It was hard to believe it was significant, but Starker knew that what they were giving him right now, he would suffer for later.

Starker whistled out another whine and rolled his gaze to his wrist, noticing just the end of the needle being pulled out of his skin. Everything still felt too much, too stimulating, almost enough for his mind to drop out a few times. Don’t focus on the pain; he would manage to think coherently. Concentrate on something else.

With increasingly blurry vision, Starker couldn’t help but stare at the goat as he meticulously stitched the dog back up. He explained something about the thread, how it would dissolve on its own, but Starker couldn’t pick out the details. The stitching stung, and left his skin burning as though he was still bleeding. But it went by quick, faster than he expected.

It’s over, he thought, almost feeling euphoric. They’re done. His body begins to come down from the panic, and his eyes fluttered, struggling to stay awake in his stupor.

“Hey...Hey. Hello?” The echo of a voice from miles away distracted Starker, and he blinked open his eyes once more, before they sank back down.

“Wake up!”

Starker felt a sharp sting on his cheek and the voice goes shrill, ringing in his ears. The teen’s breath hitched as the world begins to focus back into view again. The first thing his eyes spotted was Rosemary once more. Too worn out to physically growl at her, he bared what he could of his teeth instead.

“Are you listening? You can understand me?” She continued to question him aggressively. What more could she want from him?

Starker noticed how the pressure on his head had lifted already, and he allowed a small, minute nod.

Rosemary purred in satisfaction, and she gently pressed her claws against the cuts on his cheek. “I need to you to keep this in mind,” she rumbles. “If you breathe a word of this to anyone, if you even think about it in front of other people, there’ll be consequences.” Her voice dipped down to a quiet hiss, malicious and incredibly creepy.

Before Starker can question her actions, she continued. “Not to you, of course. But I do have power, and if you were to fuck something up, well, it would sure be awful if something fucked your deer kid up.” Her claws dug into his face more, and combined with the threat and the faint sting, he felt his eyes sting as unbidden tears gather up.

“She’s only a kid,” he mumbled, hardly able to form words. “You wouldn’t..”

“I would,” she immediately answered. “I don’t give two shits if that little girl is fifteen, ten, seven or three. If you utter a word of what happened here, she gets hurt.” Rosemary swiped away her claws the final time, leaving the last few cuts on his cheek, right under his eye.

The next events blurred by sluggishly and yet all too quickly. Rosemary’s voice dimly sounded in his ears that it was approximately three-forty in the morning, and even though Nighthoof and the day shifts wouldn’t arrive until five, she wanted to throw the mutt back in his cell and get a chance to clean up the makeshift operation room in the basement.

They released the clamps holding down his limbs, a foggy reassurance from Minty that he was harmless now in his state, and someone bound up his midsection in bandages. There were a few more clicking and whirring sounds from one of the officer’s camera, most likely getting a few final pictures of his still-exposed pinchers while he wasn’t strapped down. He listlessly let the people there patch his cut up and felt himself moved onto another surface, something softer that sagged under his weight. Someone threw his vest on top of his chest, and he dimly felt the surface be lifted up and carried.

He had just begun to drift off before there was the clattering of steel bars, and the surface overturned and dumped him unceremoniously onto his ratty mattress, jarring the wound and forcing a loud high-pitched yelp of pain out of him.

He rolled off his wound just in time to see two of the cops closing his cell and running off with the stretcher they’d brought him in on.

Rosemary paced into his view, standing triumphantly at the bars of his cell, “Yeah, that medical evidence alone should at least buy us each our own seaside manor, wouldn’t you say?” Starker forced out a breathless, strangled sounding curse toward her, which she chuckled at, “You must think I’m some kind of monster, kid. Well here’s the deal: I’m not, I just know all the good opportunities to exploit for some kind of chance at success, y’know? You probably think you’ve been victimized just because you’re legally a child. Well you know what I think?”

She paused, as if she were waiting for Starker to throw some kind of witty retort of her. A tense silence filled the space,

“You got yourself in prison, kid. You did it, you admitted to it. And you got your ass caught, so you’re just the same as any of these other low-living shitheads. Worthless drags on society. That’s all you’ll ever be, and I’d jump at any fucking chance to profit off of you pricks, pain involved or not. And I am gonna be rolling in it when I’m through with you.” The leopard paused again, this time she leaned forward and flashed her strikingly white canines at him, voice dropping to a deadly low tone, “And I don’t take kindly to snitches, at all. Remember what I said, mutt. You don’t want to take this chance and fucking cross me, you are powerless and so’s your precious little girl.”

She straightened her back, smoothing a bit of head fur and threw one last cruel scoff at him before turning on a heel down the hall.

Starker curled up, clutching his vest feebly with one paw while the other hugged his body. He weakly retracted his pinchers.

His midsection was still pulsing pain across his body relentlessly, coupled with a new headache creeping its way into his skull. The canine whimpered pathetically into his pillow before stuffing one corner into his mouth and clamping his teeth down on it as hard as he could. Yes, bite down on something, focus on this. He wanted to pretend that instead of a pillow in his mouth, it was Rosemary’s throat, but he was too frazzled to bring her image to mind. Eventually sleep came to him, but it was a ruthless sleep that plunged him once again into the memories of what had happened that night.
welp

break the ace dog

the amount of things i was tempted to add to that seduction bit.

was so many
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IT HAS COME AND IT IS TERRIBLE