I had to double check because I was certain I put Please on the list, but then it doesn’t really matter. I got an idea anyway.
AU: None of the current ones
A nightmare. This was a nightmare.
The sound of the worn plastic ice bucket slamming to the floor echoed in Oscar’s ears, and his eyes were wide with terror. A bruise was already forming on his forehead from slamming into a wall that hadn’t been there seconds before.
He was trapped. A human had spotted him while he ran desperately for cover in the motel room. They’d grabbed the ice bucket without a second thought, and in a few steps that covered distances Oscar would have to sprint for several seconds, stomped over to him.
The ground was still shaking. No, he realized, that’s just my knees.
Tears welled up in his eyes and raced down his cheeks. Oscar stood in carpet fibers that reached past his ankles, with almost no light leaking under the rim of the bucket. A circle of dim light ringed him in, an outline for how utterly trapped he was.
He hadn’t made it. After years of getting by on his own, keeping out of sight and collecting what he needed to survive, he hadn’t made it. It only took one failure to ruin everything, and the one failure had finally arrived.
Now, he was at the mercy of a human.
Light burst in from the opposite side of the container as it suddenly tilted upwards. Oscar whirled around, his cloth bag swinging with him and slamming into his side, heavy with the spoils he’d taken from the room. A breath caught in his throat and his shoulders hitched up with a new wave of adrenaline crashing through him like stormy waves on a rocky shore.
A hand with fingers bigger than his body slipped under the opening, blocking his escape route and inching towards him. Oscar could only watch, knees still shaking, as it came closer.
The first fingertip brushed against his chest and Oscar froze. Not an instant later, the hand lurched forward and that finger pressed into one side while a giant thumb closed in on the other, pinching around him and forcing the breath from his tiny, frail lungs. Oscar grimaced with pain.
More light washed over him now that he was secure in a pinch grip. The bucket was set aside and Oscar, stuck hopelessly in the casual strength of a single hand, shot into the air at the human’s whim. Air whipped at his messy brown hair and he closed his eyes, curling into himself as much as he could.
When he came to a stop, Oscar had his hands over his face. The human hummed thoughtfully, a deep, loud voice rumbling through his entire being. It was too much, too fast, too scary. Oscar sobbed and more tears came.
“Quit that,” the human ordered gruffly. Before Oscar could parse the words enough to understand that the order was for him, another pinch grip found him. Fingertips bigger than his head pinched roughly around one of his arms and tugged it away from his face.
He yelped in pain, and his other hand automatically braced against the pinch grip to try to free his arm. It was already bruising, he could tell. The human was too strong.
The human hummed again while Oscar sobbed, and then let go at last. Oscar held his hurt arm close to his chest, resisting the urge to cover his face again. Doing it once had gotten him hurt. He didn’t want to risk even worse consequences.
He dangled in the air like that for several seconds while the human looked him over, a cold and appraising look in those eyes. One fingertip nudged at one of his legs, propping it up to stare in disapproval at the cloth wraps he used for shoes. Then, it lifted up and mussed his mousey brown hair. Oscar squeaked in pain as it strained his neck.
“You’ll take some cleaning up,” the human noted, lifting Oscar higher. Oscar squealed with vertigo, finding himself now looking down at a huge human face, one that frowned at him like he was an interesting stone found on the ground.
Suddenly, a smirk appeared on the human’s lips. Oscar trembled at the sight of it and more tears coated his cheeks. He had never been seen by a human before, and now he understood why the idea scared him so much.
He was nothing to this man. He was just an object to pick up and observe, a toy. Nothing more.
Please …
A startled cry choked in his throat when the hand pinched around him dropped suddenly. Freefall wormed into his gut for a heartstopping second, and Oscar clung to the fingers around him despite the pain they caused in his ribs. His eyes shut tight for the brief moment.
Then it was over. The hand stopped moving, and then the grip around him relented.
Oscar landed in a heap on something hard and cold. The air escaped his lungs and he rolled over as motion assaulted him again. He looked upwards at a circular view of the ceiling, partially blocked by a human face peering in at him. The smell of cheap plastic surrounded him and he hiccuped.
He was in the ice bucket. Smooth sides that would resist any attempt to scramble up, the edge was over his head. With the human looking right at him, he wouldn’t have a chance to use his climbing thread to escape.
Not that it mattered. Once the human was finished walking, the bucket was dropped harshly onto what Oscar had to assume was the table. He jolted and then scrambled back, pressing against the wall of the container.
He didn’t know what the man had planned for him. It took him a second or two to find his voice.
“Please,” he managed to squeak out. Fear and despair coiled together in his tone, a hopeful appeal to the giant’s better nature.
All he got was another smirk. “Oh, you’ll be one of Mina’s favorites, I guarantee it,” he said, the cryptic words soaring over Oscar’s head.
Then, another circle loomed into view, and Oscar recognized the lid of the ice bucket just before it slammed into place overhead, echoing loudly in his ears and shutting him into total darkness.
Brothers Apart 