stargrey (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
stargrey) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomweekly2025-09-22 07:42 pm
stargrey) wrote in fandomweekly2025-09-22 07:42 pm
Entry tags:
[#274] The Rotting (Mexican Gothic)
Theme Prompt: #274 – Near-Death Experience
Title: The Rotting
Fandom: Mexican Gothic
Rating/Warnings: PG-13 / Vomiting, fungal body horror, violent illness
Bonus: Yes
Word Count: 692
Summary: Noemí struggles to recover from the assimilation with the gloom.
They had all stood witness in Great Uncle Howard’s room as the fungus rooted deep into the grey matter of her brain—the hyphae, microscopic filaments, threading into every fold of the unspoiled organ to claim it, to extend into her mind and draw her thoughts, memories, consciousness into the mycelium, and she fell to madness.
She had sat there at the foot of Howard’s bed, clawing desperately at her forearms until they bled, and Francis had knelt beside her and whispered some word of comfort in Spanish, hoping she could understand, but she had only stared at him uncomprehendingly and muttered, “Open your eyes,” before vomiting blood and bile onto the floor.
Her body fought desperately to reject the gloom, even as her mind was consumed, and she twisted and thrashed as he and Virgil brought her to her own chambers and set her upon the bed. She sweated feverishly and drooled and gave frequently to violent convulsions, and Virgil, uninterested, did not linger in the room, so it was Francis alone who drew a chair up to her bedside. She was to be Howard’s wife, but Howard wasn’t well enough to stand vigil, and he was to be Howard, so he was expected to monitor her in his great uncle’s stead to see how much of her would be left in the end.
“She was compatible,” they all said, and really what this meant was she was healthy and willful. If the body and the mind were too weak, the mycelium would eat too much in the assimilation process, leave too little behind, and that weakness would become a rot, sometimes fatal. “She was compatible,” they all said, and he had seen how spirited and dauntless she was, whereas her unfortunate cousin had been somewhat shy, so he had thought perhaps she would be okay; perhaps she was strong enough that it did not matter that he was helpless, or too cowardly, to shield her from this outcome.
What a selfish lie that had been! But it was too late to prevent her suffering, and now he could only guide her through it.
When she clutched the blankets in her agony and confusion and babbled unintelligibly, tormented by hallucinations and unable to recognize him, he took one hand and soothed her; when she moaned and gripped her stomach, he ushered her to the toilet and held her hair from her face while she vomited, but the evening hours dragged on without relief until she grew too weak to move her head or limbs, and he realized with a pierce of guilt in his feeble heart that she may not live at all.
The oil lamp burned steadily in the dark, moldy room. From some combination of pain and exhaustion, she lay still, perhaps asleep. He sat with his head bent over clasped hands, as if in prayer, though only one god watched over this house and would not answer.
She fluttered fitfully back into consciousness, and he raised his head.
“Who are you?”
“Francis,” he answered as he did each time, and her brow furrowed in confusion. It was always a wrong answer.
She grimaced. “It hurts,” she groaned, and his heart broke. Too little too late.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, but something else captured her attention—an empty space in the corner of the room—and she let out a strangled gasp and muttered something about ghosts and dust.
Unsure of how cognizant she was but certain she was dehydrated, he stood to fetch her some water, and she cried out.
“Don’t leave me,” she begged. “There is something wrong with the people here. And the walls. They’re all rotting. Please, stay with me.”
So he stayed. He stayed at her bedside and held her trembling hand until she fell back into uneasy sleep and never wished more that she was further away, that she could be on a train back to her home in Mexico City instead of here, trapped forever within the rotting walls of High Place with all its rotting people. But he was helpless, or too cowardly, so he stayed and she stayed with him.
Title: The Rotting
Fandom: Mexican Gothic
Rating/Warnings: PG-13 / Vomiting, fungal body horror, violent illness
Bonus: Yes
Word Count: 692
Summary: Noemí struggles to recover from the assimilation with the gloom.
They had all stood witness in Great Uncle Howard’s room as the fungus rooted deep into the grey matter of her brain—the hyphae, microscopic filaments, threading into every fold of the unspoiled organ to claim it, to extend into her mind and draw her thoughts, memories, consciousness into the mycelium, and she fell to madness.
She had sat there at the foot of Howard’s bed, clawing desperately at her forearms until they bled, and Francis had knelt beside her and whispered some word of comfort in Spanish, hoping she could understand, but she had only stared at him uncomprehendingly and muttered, “Open your eyes,” before vomiting blood and bile onto the floor.
Her body fought desperately to reject the gloom, even as her mind was consumed, and she twisted and thrashed as he and Virgil brought her to her own chambers and set her upon the bed. She sweated feverishly and drooled and gave frequently to violent convulsions, and Virgil, uninterested, did not linger in the room, so it was Francis alone who drew a chair up to her bedside. She was to be Howard’s wife, but Howard wasn’t well enough to stand vigil, and he was to be Howard, so he was expected to monitor her in his great uncle’s stead to see how much of her would be left in the end.
“She was compatible,” they all said, and really what this meant was she was healthy and willful. If the body and the mind were too weak, the mycelium would eat too much in the assimilation process, leave too little behind, and that weakness would become a rot, sometimes fatal. “She was compatible,” they all said, and he had seen how spirited and dauntless she was, whereas her unfortunate cousin had been somewhat shy, so he had thought perhaps she would be okay; perhaps she was strong enough that it did not matter that he was helpless, or too cowardly, to shield her from this outcome.
What a selfish lie that had been! But it was too late to prevent her suffering, and now he could only guide her through it.
When she clutched the blankets in her agony and confusion and babbled unintelligibly, tormented by hallucinations and unable to recognize him, he took one hand and soothed her; when she moaned and gripped her stomach, he ushered her to the toilet and held her hair from her face while she vomited, but the evening hours dragged on without relief until she grew too weak to move her head or limbs, and he realized with a pierce of guilt in his feeble heart that she may not live at all.
The oil lamp burned steadily in the dark, moldy room. From some combination of pain and exhaustion, she lay still, perhaps asleep. He sat with his head bent over clasped hands, as if in prayer, though only one god watched over this house and would not answer.
She fluttered fitfully back into consciousness, and he raised his head.
“Who are you?”
“Francis,” he answered as he did each time, and her brow furrowed in confusion. It was always a wrong answer.
She grimaced. “It hurts,” she groaned, and his heart broke. Too little too late.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, but something else captured her attention—an empty space in the corner of the room—and she let out a strangled gasp and muttered something about ghosts and dust.
Unsure of how cognizant she was but certain she was dehydrated, he stood to fetch her some water, and she cried out.
“Don’t leave me,” she begged. “There is something wrong with the people here. And the walls. They’re all rotting. Please, stay with me.”
So he stayed. He stayed at her bedside and held her trembling hand until she fell back into uneasy sleep and never wished more that she was further away, that she could be on a train back to her home in Mexico City instead of here, trapped forever within the rotting walls of High Place with all its rotting people. But he was helpless, or too cowardly, so he stayed and she stayed with him.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject