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Collar / touch aversion / “leave me alone.”
“Othello?”
That snapped him out of his own misery, but he was only able to flinch in his position.
He felt a hand on his arm and tried to move away as harshly as he could. The warm touch felt like a thousand stabbing needles. “ Don’t touch me! ”
“Calm down.” her sugary sweet voice soothed, undeterred as she trailed her hand up his arm, making him whine with anxiety. “I’m here to save you.”
“Save me?” he repeated.
“Yes.” she moved her hand away and he felt warmth above his forehead for a moment.
Plop .
His breathing caught for a moment with the sensation, before he realized nothing followed the sound. He felt it falling on him, but nothing past that. No slow, painful trail down the side of his head, or the gross feeling of the trail when it dried and crusted.
“See?” she hummed. “You’re safe now.”
“Safe…” he took a shaky breath.
“Yes.” She set the hand that had taken the torturous water for him, setting it on his forehead and wiping away some of the crusty trails. “Don’t worry, It’ll be better for you, you’ll see.”
Her hand moved, removing the blindfold from over his eyes slowly, and he squinted as the dingy light attacked his retinas. While he tried to adjust his vision, she moved to free the rest of his body, and he found his eyes wandering up to the pipe above him, and the wet crack in it.
He saw the water gather, and form, and suspend itself above him.
And when it dropped, he pulled his head to the side, and it didn’t hit him.
He felt his anxiety spike just at the close call and pulled his hands to his plastron to cease their shaking while she worked on releasing his legs.
She was helping him.
She stood up, offering him her hand, and he looked up at her, confused and still shaking. “Why?”
She tilted her head. “Why what? Why am I helping you?”
He nodded.
She smiled, tilting her head in an almost gentle way. “Because you’re my brother.”
Brother… right, he was a brother, he guessed to her, but didn’t he also have brothers? Brothers and a sister. She was the sister (right?)
His head hurt and he wasn’t really thinking right. He wasn’t sure about anything, but she’d helped him, she saved him, so he trusted her.
He reached out and took her hand, and she helped him stand up.
The motion sent his head spinning and his stomach churning as he fell against the wall and expelled what was left from his stomach.
She patted his shell, which wasn’t pleasant, but he allowed it, since he didn’t feel up to swatting her away. When he was done, she helped him up and led him out of the room. “We’ll get you some food and water, then a good nap, how’s that sound?”
Othello nodded. “Good… h-how long was I…?”
“A few days.” she said, taking him into a room with a table and a connecting kitchen. “Sit down.”
He did as told, sitting in one of the chairs at the table with a huff. She slid him a glass of water, then turned to go into the kitchen.
Othello found himself staring at the water, almost glaring at it. It seemed so simple, supplemental to life and all that, but also like a threat. There was always more water, more drops.
He wrapped his arms around his stomach, looking away from the glass and staring at the wall. It seemed to twist and ripple in an unnerving way, and his eyes trailed up to the ceiling above him.
At the pipes.
He swallowed hard, looking down at his legs and closing his eyes, trying to calm his breathing.
Plop .
The feeling on the top of his head made him gasp, shaking his head for a moment furiously despite the ache to get it off and reaching up to rub at it, only to find it dry.
He looked up, there were no pipes. He looked at the wall, and it lay still.
He looked back at the glass of water, waiting for it to move or jump out at him or something but it just sat there.
She came back over, setting a plate with a sandwich in front of him and looking at the water, then up at Othello.
After a moment of quiet contemplation, she walked away again, and returned with a straw that she plopped into the glass. “Does that help?”
It did, actually. It seemed less daunting with the assurance that it wouldn’t spill any drops on him, so he took a hold of it, and drank some. It refreshed his dry throat swiftly, and he downed half of it before moving to the sandwich.
Once he was done eating and drinking two glasses of water, he began to watch her anxiously, feeling like something was wrong, something was missing .
“My brothers?” he asked.
She raised her brows at him, staring for a moment, before motioning for the door. “Jason and Jeremy? They went to run some errands.”
Jason and Jeremy… that sounded familiar enough, and he trusted her, so he let it be.
“Why don’t you take a nap, and they’ll probably be back when you’re up again.” she suggested.
Othello nodded. “Okay.”
“Come on.” she took his hand again, and he had to keep himself from pulling away. It still felt wrong. It was too warm, and her hands were too small and calloused, not smooth like he felt like would feel right.
They didn’t fit right in his own.
She led him into a bedroom, and let him lay down, leaving a fresh glass of water on his nightstand with a straw, and giving him a “goodnight” before turning off the light and leaving the door cracked open.
He slept off and on, his body tormenting him with phantoms anytime he fell too deep, and startling him awake in a panic until he finally gave up and trudged out of the room.
His head hurt a little less after the nap (if it classified as one rather than several) and he found his way to the living room, where she was talking to two boys.
“Kendra, don’t you th-” one of them paused, looking over at him and blinking. “Hey Othello.”
He waved, shuffling back and forth on his feet as an awkward silence fell on the group.
Kendra stood up, clapping her hands once and startling Othello. “Alright, glad you’re awake. How are you feeling?” she wandered over, circling him. “Ready to take over the world?”
The smaller of the boys put a hand up. “Don’t you mean ‘take on the world?’”
“Shut it, Jase.” she pointed at him. “Othello knows what I meant. Right?” she tilted her head to look sideways at him, her lavender hair falling over her shoulder.
He nodded. “R-right.”
Jeremy stood up, coming over radiating his own, if not significantly less, anxiety. “Are you sure you’re feeling alright? You can rest more if you want.”
He didn’t want to, not when the dreaded pipes were waiting for him, so he nodded. “I’m fine.” he fidgeted with his hands, looking down at them. “I’d really like to do something with my hands…”
Kendra smiled. “See? I told you.”
Jeremy nodded. “Alright, would you like to help me with something then? It could be simple or whatever.”
Othello shrugged. “Whatever is fine.”
Jeremy gave him a warm smile, and for some reason, he clicked more into place in Othello’s brain as the older brother he felt he was missing. “Okay, let’s go see what we can find.”
“Right.” Othello followed him, and they worked for a bit, building a small toy robot that eased Othello’s anxiety significantly. “Can we paint it purple?”
“Of course!” Jeremy said, pulling out some paints, all in different shades of purples, blacks, silvers, and some white. “Take your pick.”
Before Othello could grab the most eye catching one, there was a knock at the door, and they looked up to see Kendra standing there.
She gave another smile like before, walking over and getting down on her knees. “Hey, you know what happened to you, right?”
He swallowed, fearing answering wrong. “I- not really?”
“You were captured.” she explained. “And we couldn’t find you, not for a while. I’m sorry.”
He nodded, that made sense, and seemed to be filed away like it was correct information. He remembered being captured, but the actual memory was rather fuzzy.
“I made you something, but you don’t have to take it if you don’t want it.” She pulled out a circular device. “It’s a tracker, and if it’s removed, it’ll immediately alert us, so that this never happens again.”
His anxiety spiked again as he took a hold of it, running it through his fingers. The metal was sleek and colored a dark purple, pleasing to his eyes and brain. “F-for safety?”
She nodded. “For safety.” she watched him contemplate it hard, then sighed. “I worked so hard on it, but if you don’t want it, I guess I’ll just let it go to waste after helping you out.”
Othello felt a pang of guilt, “n-no, I’ll use it, thank you.”
She hummed, satisfied, and helped him fasten it around his neck. It felt uncomfortable at first, but after a few moments, it seemed to shift and settle comfortably, not as constricting as he’d expected it to be.
It was for safety.
Because he trusted Kendra, and his brothers.
He was safe, away from the pipes.