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Cold, the cold of a steel fills beneath Torbek's back.
Torbek's arms and legs were chained to the steel table tightly with a leather belt as well his tiny waist and neck.
His breathe ragged through his muzzle, he turn his head left and right along with his eyes darting around to sense his surroundings. Unfortunately Torbek couldn't gathered much of information because all he get is that the room is dark, really dark as if the room is in a black void. The only thing that are imminent light is right above him, shines so brightly that it could blind you for one second, yet despite it's brightness it doesn’t illuminated the surroundings in the slightest.
A creak of a door sounds open, an echo thumps of footsteps coming down from Torbek's legs direction. Torbek quickly looks down towards the direction of the sound, no one is there, no a door, no person in sight and yet the sound of the footsteps keeps getting closer and closer.
Eventually the light starts to lighted the figure, from Torbek's perspective he could see they're wearing a white lab coat with a full gas mask with goggles on their face, makes it hard to identify who they are. The masked person just stares intently as Torbek is scared out of his wits, still trying find a way out in a frantic. It’s way too dark, he couldn't think of anything to get out of here, pulling his arms out of the leather didn’t do much at all no matter how many times he tried.
Torbek eyeing the figure again with terrified manner, he opened his mouth as he tries to protest, but nothing came out.
He tries again,
and again,
nothing.
The figure just watched and let out of huff at his sad and pathetic attempt, then looked down and slowly reaching to grab something, rising up with a syringe on their white glove hands but it’s not any normal syringe that Torbek at least would know. The syringe was big, almost as big as the same height as the mysterious figure. Torbek’s eyes at first look at the liquid inside the syringe, it is glowing magenta color almost mesmerizing with the way it flows.
Then slowly his eyes lead towards the tip of the needle, because of the size Torbek could see the hole on the sharp tip. At first Torbek was confused and still disoriented from him being all panicky, but his eyes widen as a realization has been sinking in...
The figure is adjust their hand-grip of the syringe to bring down the needle and aim it at to Torbek’s arm, slowly about to puncture in...
Oh,
Oh no.
Oh no no no no no no no-
Not wanting any of that liquid inside of him, Torbek with a adrenaline pumping through his veins once again struggling out of his chain, trying to at least pull his body away from the needle but it does not matter, the chain still doesn’t budge and even the table doesn’t move a inch. Torbek kept struggling until he ended up startles by the figure has finally spoken quite monotonously, slightly shaking their head, “Now, now, Torbek, if you wouldn’t want to get hurt. I suggest you to... stop moving.”.
Torbek stops, in out of his control. He felt a force of magic crossing through his body, he tries to move his arms, legs, body, head, nothing. All he could do is moving his eyes and stares at the needle is about to close in.
Torbek is now closing his eyes and began to sobbing, he cannot do anything. Absolutely powerless, scared, and alone. He wished that his friends would come to him and save him, anyone, but he knew...
In no way his friends would cared enough to rescue him, that will never happen.
Yet, in his heart, he kept begging for it,
begged and begged...
and begged.
...
Torbek...
Torbek opened his eyes, thinking that the figure calls his name but, something is different with their voice and... it’s echoing? He felt someone is touching his shoulder but the figure hands doesn’t leave their grasp away from the syringe.
Torbek.
Torbek eyes widen as he realized that voice isn’t coming out of their mouth, it was coming out of... somewhere around the room. It does not coming at one place, but it’s everywhere.
Torbek!
His eyes again tries to look around but then, he feels that his body is shaking out by a third person and now he realized that his vision is now getting darker,
More darker and darker,
and darker,
and...
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“Torbek!!”
“AAAAAAAARGH!!”
“AAAWH!!” Gricko screamed in shock as Torbek shrieks suddenly upon waking up, in cold sweats Torbek immediately rising up to sitting position and clutching his blanket tightly to his chest as he begin to hyperventilating, the canister full of witchlight on his back are starts to bubbled and his eyes flickers glowing magenta like a broken lightbulb. His body shape are getting taller and thinner while he is still hunch over, few a noises of disgusting popping and snapping can be heard inside of his arms and legs that starts to elongated.
Gricko immediately move his position from his side to directly in front of him so he could block Torbek’s vision to only focusing on him. “Woah-woah there big fella.” He let of a soft and gentle voice as he raise his hand up to his chest level, crouching slightly to make himself look smaller. Gricko’s hands are shaking and possibly about to shit himself, but he tries to keep his composure to make himself calm and collected, he showed his weak sympathetic smiles to Torbek. “There-there, Torbek. Keep looking at me and try to follow my lead, okay?”
His hand are now facing up towards the ceiling and raise it up to his chin, he breathe in as his body stand up straight, wanting to demonstrated it in his movement “Come on now, breathe in...”. With his tiny portion of consciousness and self-awareness left, Torbek tries to focus only at Gricko and follow his instruction, he takes a deep breath in.
“Okay good, now...” Gricko let out his breath out of his mouth as his hands now facing down and move it downward back to his chest level “Breathe out...”. Torbek let out his breath away, the magenta light on his eyes are now only gently pulsating than before and his body slowly stops transforming midway. Gricko smiles brightly now knowing that his technique is working, “O-Okay good job, Torbek! Just keep following me now. Breathe in... and out... in... and out...” and he repeats along with Torbek.
Until his last ‘breathe out’ his eyes became back to his normal plum color irises, his canister starts to fill up again, his body is still in this strange formation but he is seems to be his normal self. Both of his hands are shaking as he is hugging himself, rubbing and squishing his arms. His eyes are both closed off, clearly exhausted.
“There you go, Torbek... Are you feeling alright?”.
“...Mmmrpp... T-Torbek will be okay, Gricko no need to be worried.” His eyes opens to make eye contact with the little man, trying to show a weak smile at him.
His alertness in his body starts to dissipates, still cautious but he is calming down little bit, “Okay that’s good... Do you need anything at all? You want some bananyas, Torbek?”.
A slight pauses from Torbek, and he give a tiny nod “...Mmmmrg yes, Torbek would like some...”.
“Okay then hold on, lemme summon me spirit friend...” Gricko says as he look down on his belt and grab his ocarina out and starts play a tune of Donkey Kong Country by Nintendo® from Super Nintendo Entertainment Systemᵀᴹ, a bunch of flowing bananas starts appearing one by one in front of both of them. Torbek closing his eyes, his head swaying following the soft lullaby tune from the ocarina. Gricko has finish his play and position his hands to catch now falling fruit, “Here have some of bananyas, Torbek..” Gricko grinning warily showing the bananas cautiously walking close to Torbek.
Torbek looks down at the bananas and shakingly let out to open his palms so Gricko could drop all of them off, “Mmmmmrp.. Thank you, Gricko...” Torbek says calmly before he quickly devour all of the bananas out with the peel on like a hungry beast.
Gricko put his hands on his hips as he let out of a big sigh of relief, “Phew, you scared me for a second there, Torbek. I thought I was ‘bout to die first.” he let out a chuckles trying to downplay the situation, Torbek groans out of remorse and once again clutching his blanket, bringing it to his chest “Hhhhrgg Torbek is sorry, Torbek doesn’t know why it keeps happening.”.
Gricko shakes his head, “It’s okay, Torbek. You did just had a bad dream after all. I probably shouldn’t wake you up like that but, I’m worried ‘bout you, buddy!”. He is stretching his body before he sits down crossing his legs with his hands gripping the knees, exhausted from all that adrenaline.
Torbek looking down for a moment, his body is slowly getting back to normal as once again that revolting noises of popping bones inside of his body finally stops. He let out groany sigh finally feeling like himself again, then looks around his surrounding and just see the sleeping tent made out of pillows and a big blanket supports with a wooden pole. It is dark and very eerie, it makes Torbek very uncomfortable but it’s not something that is out of ordinary to him. Until he heard it, in the back of his head he could hear the door again from far away, it keeps banging, banging, and banging.
So not knowing what to do, he randomly blurt out as he fixed his head to facing Gricko, “Ummm.. did Gricko woken up from his sleep because of Torbek?”.
“Oh no-no no actually, I was woken up by Hootsie.” He point to somewhere with his thumb, “She’s keeps hootin’ at me wanting to eat more rats snacks. You know, teenager’s stuff.”. Torbek curiously turning his head towards the pointed direction to see Hootsie quietly eating a ripped out rat’s head, half of her face is covered in blood.
“Awwww you’re soo cute, Hootsie- Oh! Speaking of those rats!” He says as he snapping his fingers to get Torbek’s attention.
Torbek jolts, “W-What!?”.
“Umh.. just in case if Twig asking you this...” He looking around nervously and then he slowly lean forward to whispers, “Well, I don’t have anymore rat snacks so I was going on huntin’ for some.. Um, please don’t tell Twig that I feed her with one of those rats in the inn. I can’t find any of ‘em outside so I have to!”.
Torbek straighten his back and make a zipper motion on his lips, “Torbek’s lips is sealed.”.
Gricko’s shoulders slumps down as his tension leave his body, “Phew, there’s the weight of guilt away from me shoulders. I knew I can count on you, Torbek” he smiles at Torbek before he stands up and walks to Hootsie and crouching in front of her, pulling out a handkerchief from his pocket and starts to wipe away the blood from her face.
He is stopped for a moment as he thinks while looking at the ceiling “Oh yeah where was I? ....Oh!”, he is back to cleaning “And after feeding Hootsie, I saw you on the floor just thrashin’ around in your sleep clearly havin’ a nightmare so, had to wake you up y’know. Before anything bad happens.”
Torbek comes back to slouching over after hearing that statement, sadness cover up his entire face as he look away from Gricko. “...Torbek is sorry.”.
“Hm? For what, Torbek?” He stands up after finished cleaning, still focusing her and petting lovingly.
“...Torbek is sorry for being Gricko’s.. and everyone’s burden...”
Gricko stops petting and slowly turn his head to Torbek, troubled by Torbek’s words. “...What are you talking about, Torbek? That’s not true.”
“B-but it is true, mmm-everyone always have to keep their watch on Torbek. When Torbek were in battle or waking up from a nightmare it is always end with someone getting hurt. Torbek does indeed cause a lot of trouble for his friends and Torbek doesn’t really know what to do!”
...
“Torbek... sometimes wonders if Torbek should be here at all...”
Silence fills the room with the tiniest sniffles coming out from Torbek, clutching his knees and hid away his face in it. Gricko frowned his face, quiet for a moment as he looks down to his feet and then leaves a exhale through his nose before he turns to Hootsie to whispers to her ear and then point his finger at Torbek. Hootsie leaves him with a nod and approaches Torbek to his side, she begins to pawing on Torbek’s feet and hooting at him.
He lift his head up to look at Hootsie for a second and slowly reach his right hand out to pet her, while he still sobbing. Hootsie accepted the pet and gets in position to snuggle up besides him.
In the midst of this, Gricko walk to in front of Torbek as well, looking up at him with his face showing gentleness and empathy in his eyes “Torbek, I know you cannot control it, everyone is very well aware that you cannot control it. This isn’t your fault.”.
Torbek is not responding to Gricko’s affirmation and instead only looking at Hootsie snuggle around him, his face is still gloomy and sad but not longer crying. His eyes are puffy and red, and there is still a left trails of tears not been wipe out.
Gricko then looking down while tilting his head, slightly frowned and push his lips together. “Y’know, Torbek... Back in my day before I met you, Frosty, Kremy, and Gideon. I did some taming with some monstrous beast in my part time gig.”.
He then crossing his both arms together, “And, there is many time where I got hurt, in a lot of pain when they attack me, at one point almost died because of it. But, I ain’t mad at them for hurting me at all ‘cus,”.
He lifts his head to face Torbek “They were just very scared, they just only trying to defend themselves. And it really reminds me of you, Torbek!”.
Gricko walking a inch closer and tries his best to pet and scratch Torbek’s head despite with his height, “So what I’m ‘bout to say is don’t worry about it, okay? You’ve been through a lot, Torbek, and we want to help you. We are your friends and cared a lot about you, and we’re here always trying our best to help each other out, right?”.
Torbek lifts his head up to stares at Gricko’s gentle smile again, wrinkle from around his smiles and his eyes full of genuineness, care, and love for his friend. Almost dreamily, he leaning down to accommodate Gricko’s height, still accepting his petting “...Rrrmm... Alright...”.
“Hehe’ there you go.” Gricko chuckles while he is keeps petting him, even little bit more harshly and Torbek hummed in response . Half a minute later he finally stops to put his hand on his hips, question appears in his head and he asked while tilting his head “Are you be able to sleep alone, Torbek?”.
Torbek is now wiping up the wetness on his cheeks, “Mmmmmrp-Torbek isn’t sure... Torbek just doesn’t want the alone part, though...”
Gricko fingers rubbing his unshaven grainy chin, “Hrmm... Oh- how ‘bout a cuddle together here, then?” He lift his one eyebrow. Torbek tilting his head at this suggestion, his one ear perks up “...Really? Youu don’t mind to cuddle with Torbek?”.
“Yeah! I don’t mind, everyone’s already gotten’ used to your smell anyway.” Gricko shrugs casually, then his eyes looking sideways “Frosty was ‘ad regular nightmares too back in the day, and the way we always ‘ndle it is cuddle up together ‘till both of us fell asleep!”.
Gricko fixed his eyes to Torbek again, tilting his head and grinning curiously “So? How ‘bout it?”.
Torbek turns his head away to think. He never have a cuddle with someone once in his life before, besides with his flat girlfriend/wife. So the idea of real physical contact with someone are very, very intriguing to Torbek. So he turns to Gricko and nods, quite furiously than Torbek should and he stopped as he noticed it, “Yes-yes... Torbek wants to.” he answers.
Gricko give a smile of approval and then approaches to Hootsie, talking sweetly as he rubbing both of her cheeks, “Oowkay, Hootsie- Can you spread out for Papa? Roll to your side- Awwww look at youuu! Such a sweet girl..!” Gricko says affectionately as he been melted over Hootsie follow his instruction. Hootsie spreads out her belly as well do a little stretching with her feet like a cat, Gricko soon do a quick belly rub to Hootsie before flop his head on top of it. A sigh left out Gricko’s mouth as he get comfortable on the ragged carpet floor and Hootsie as his pillow, he spreads his left arm and beckoning Torbek to him.
“Come lay you head here, you can grab one o’ two pillows on the floor if ya want.”
“Mmmnn-no no, Torbek is good.” Torbek says as he is just sits there staring, slightly hesitant until Gricko pats the carpet, “It’s okay, Torbek. Come on..” Gricko sweetly luring Torbek in. Torbek’s ear twitch a bit, “Ummm... Okayy.” Torbek approaching to him and awkwardly laying his head on top of his tiny body, the spread arm are now wrapped around his head giving him scratching and pets on his head, within a few seconds Torbek groans softly upon the physical contact.
“Ohooo’ you liked that, big guy?” Gricko grins, lifting his one eyebrow.
Torbek murmured under his breath, “Mmmm yes... Torbek loves it.”.
“Hehe’ I will givin’ you more, then.” Gricko waving his eyebrows, then he closing his eyes as well while moving his hand position to scratch behind his ear and starts to sings sweet lullaby. Listening the his pleasant singing voice, Torbek breathing pace is now slow and calm, sink his head more low as his body feels more comfortable, he is getting sleepy but he felt one more thing missing here. Torbek looks up with half lidded eyes, “Can.. Torbek hug you, Gricko?”.
“Oh yeah, sure!” He answered nonchalantly.
With his approval, Torbek with uncanny speed lifts Gricko’s body slightly and place one arm beneath and above him, tightly embraced him almost possessively. Gricko almost speechless, looking at Torbek with widen eyes as he blinked couple of times. “Y-You should’ve warned me there, Torbek!” He let out a wary laugh, he wait for a response but there is none. Torbek’s head still on top of Gricko’s chest, now snoring very innocently.
“...Huh.” Gricko bewildered, a second staring his face before leading towards the ceiling, then he just shrugs it off, move around his body to feel comfortable around Torbek’s arms, with his one hand still on Torbek giving him a gentle petting.
Looking up to Hootsie as he says lovingly, “Goodnight, Hootsie...”
She lifts her head to give answered with a hoot and both of them sinks their heads low. Again back to sleep now along with his tall friend, accompanying him in his slumber for the night.