#so here's how quirrel started off fluent in sign lanquage | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

buglife · 3 years

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Shh I got inspired by those doodles I did of Monomon and sick bby Quirrel so I wrote a ficlet.

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It had been a few months since Monomon found a tiny pip rolling around the trash in the City of Tears. She thought at first that it was some sort of ball that some child had lost. Then it sneezed, which scared the hell out of her. She had looked closer and she was surprised to see a nearly transparent pip crawling around the garbage. The poor thing was dented up and was attempting to eat a discarded cloak. When he saw her, he hissed and curled up into a ball, thinking that if he couldn’t see her, than she couldn’t see him. She had picked him up, this little shivering ball of tenacity, and took him with her.

One thing lead to another and she had found herself as an adoptive mother to a baby isopod. The doctor she took him too told her that he shouldn’t even be out of the pouch, let alone being all by himself. Either he was abandoned or something unfortunate happened to his mother, and having the guard investigate gave her no answers. She decided that it was probably going to be a mystery forever, and decided to focus her energy on raising her newly acquired son.

She had named him Quirrel, after an old philosopher who often wrote about the beauty of the world. She somehow knew he’d be able to see the world for the beautiful thing as it is and not be focused on the doom and gloom of it all. She was a scientist, so of course she could find beauty in even the smallest micro-organism and all the way to the desolate wastes. Something told her he’d see it too.

Her high hopes proved to be true, as he turned out to be a rather clever little pip. He was still far too young for speech, or even to be roaming about by himself, so she decided to conduct a little experiment. Sign language wasn’t uncommon in Hallownest, but most non-hindered bugs tended to learn it after they have mastered speech and not before. What if she taught Quirrel, a little pip, some sign language now?

Her experiment bore fruit, and he learned some signs quickly. It was only a few words now that were simple to sign. He was still a baby and lacked the fine motor control for the more complex signs, but he could at least tell her when he was hungry or if he wanted something. She imagined that this experiment could do a lot of good in the end.

What concerned her however, was the lack of actual noise he made.

Quirrel was an incredibly quiet baby at he beginning. He simply refused to make much noise at all, and when he did, he flinched as though expecting to be punished for it. It had taken weeks of positive reinforcement before he started making the noises a little pip was expected to be making. It was very endearing to see him babbling and having her students babble back at him. His tiny eyes would light up and he’d wiggle in excitement before continuing the ‘conversation’. Even with all the encouragements from both her and her students, he still preferred to be quiet, napping through most of the day whilst in her pip pocket. That was normal for an isopod this young, but it was still concerning that he felt that he had to stay quiet.

That changed early one morning when he started to audibly fuss. Usually he’d just try to escape when bored, writhing about and trying to climb out of the pocket. But today, at the most ungodly early hour, he was making noises, squeaking and hissing in what seemed to be discomfort. Monomon had at first though he was hungry, but he outright refused his usual leaf paste. She tried tiktik bits, sliced fruit, and even a cookie, but he refused it all and grew increasingly more frustrated with each rejected food item.

She had tried asking him to tell her what was wrong through sign language, but he was either unwilling or unable to bother with it.

Finally he had enough, and began to wail, loudly. She had never heard him make a noise that loud before and it startled her enough to spill the juice she was trying to tempt him with all over herself. He only stopped loud enough to take a breath before belting out another heaving cry, little eyes overflowing with tears as he made his discomfort known.

“Shhhh….shhhh...it’s okay, my little one.” She attempted to try and comfort him, but he just wailed louder.

Concerned, she picked him up and tucked him under her chin, trying to soothe the sobbing pillbug, when she noticed what could be causing all this pain. His forehead was burning hot, and he was faintly shivering as he bawled into her veil. It wasn’t hard to figure out that her pip was ill and she plucked him out from her embrace to take a better look at him.

There were bags under his eyes and his face was tinged blue with heat. He had his mandibles open wide enough when crying that she can see some swelling in the back of his throat. She gently palpitated his belly and could feel the organs within twist and with every movement he cried harder. So, he was nauseous, which made sense on why he would refuse a cookie. Fever, chills, sore throat, most likely he picked something up from one of the students. She mentally kicked herself, she should have made her students wash up before picking him up as they liked to do. She should have not allowed them to give him little smooches and hugs. She should have not brought him with her at all when among the masses of students and archivists that swarmed about her. But she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him all alone, not after what he’d been through.

The fact of the matter is that no amount of hindsight was going to change the fact that Quirrel caught something and was currently not having a very good time about it. His wails were starting to sound raspy and wet, no doubt that his sinuses were starting to be affected too. The sheer amount of screaming wasn’t helping matters and her thoughts raced on what she should do.

“Modern Manca Medicine, Chapter Seven, pages nine through ten,” She recited out loud as she recalled one of the many books she absorbed after taking Quirrel in, “Common treatment options for sickly manca and juvenile pillbugs include swaddling and standard fever reduction tactics for most invertebrates. Hrm... Grubs and You: A New Mother’s Guide, Chapter Nine, page twelve. When a child refuses to eat, honey is a suitable way to provide needed nutrition and slip in medication without upsetting the stomach. Hrm... that would work, wouldn’t it?”

Quirrel continued his crying, rapidly losing his voice, and she brushed a kiss on the top of his head to comfort him. His antenna twitched and his sobbing died down just a teensy bit, but it was enough for her to notice. He must have smelled her and realized she was going to help him, his eyes were too full of tears to be much use to him at the moment. She grabbed a spare blanket and wrapped him up tightly to deal with the shivers. He instantly stopped wriggling so hard and she managed to slip him back into the pip pocket without much incident.

Next, a cool cloth was needed. She needed to bring down his fever so he could rest. That wasn’t too hard to find. She ended up tying the wet cloth on his head like you would a kerchief, pinning down his antenna so they can cool down as well. She was quite happy to find that after she did that, he had stopped his wailing. He was still making noises of discomfort, squeaking and hiccupping, but he wasn’t outright screaming anymore. Her auditory organs was most happy with that turn of events for sure.

“Herbal Remedies for the Modern Bug, Chapter two, pages one through twenty.” She floated quickly to her herb cabinet, selecting dried bundles here and there. Lemon balm for fever, mint and ginger for his stomach, marshmallow root for his throat, maybe licorice root too? Lavender and Chamomile to help him sleep so he can focus on getting better, yes, that should do it. She mentally ran through the list, using a free set of tentacles to rock Quirrel gently. For now he seemed content to stay in his pocket, squeaking here and there as he braved through his illness. Poor little pip...she resolved to give him extra cookies once he felt well enough to eat them.

She put a kettle to boil and threw her selected herbs inside to seep and condense. She would have used her alchemical equipment to do this faster, but she didn’t feel like taking him downstairs where there would be students and workers showing up. When Quirrel started fussing again, she replaced his now warm cloth with a freshly cooled one, and he quieted down again.

Finally, the kettle had boiled enough and she strained the liquid into a bowl. Next, she took out a jar of honey and began the delicate procedure of making medicine that won’t be instantly spat out by a fussy grub. She calculated that a 2:1 ratio should work the best as he would be less likely to spit up something that tasted relatively good. Eventually, she mixed up a small cup full of her makeshift medicine and retrieved a clean eyedropper. Calculating body weight, she drew up half a measure, and with that finished she went to attempt to give it to Quirrel.

He, of course, put up a fuss, and began screaming again. She understood why, he wasn’t feeling well and his belly was hurting. The last thing he would want right now was something to go down into said hurting belly and she was not surprised when he tried to bite her a few times. Unfortunately for him, Isopods are not known for being able to do much more than nibble. Using that to her advantage, she let him latch on to the end of one of her tentacles, letting him get nice and occupied, and then shoved the end of the eyedropper into the corner of his mouth. The medicine was squirted down his throat before he could do anything to stop it and for that he bit her harder. He even hissed a little and it would be adorable if he wasn’t feeling so poorly.

He let go to scream again, but then stopped and stuck out his tongue. He was obviously tasting the honey now, and he loved honey. Monomon sighed in relief, at least next time she gave him a dose she wouldn’t get bit for her troubles. He opened his mouth a couple times and blinked, looking up at her face. He lifted up his hands and wiggled them.

“Abah?” He sniffled, trying to clear his throat and sinus.

“Hrm, what do you want, my little scholar?” She was pleased to not longer see him screaming. “Use your hand words.”

He made two fists and bumped them together. <”more,”> he signed.

“Of course, you can have more honey. I think you deserve it, after putting up with all that.”

He seemed happy with the idea, and she was able to give him another teaspoon of honey before he signed ‘done’ at her. His little belly could only take so much now and she took the time to wipe his face clean. He fussed at the cleaning, but yawned once she finished. Clearly the medicine was starting to work, his breathing was better and feeling his gut showed that it was settling down. She gave him a nuzzle and a kiss and tucked him back into his pip pocket. He was asleep nearly instantly and she gently strapped the pocket to herself once more.

Once he was secure she floated downstairs and was once again, swept up into the chaos of the Archives. Someone had accidentally released the charged lumaflies and they were setting books on fire.

Thankfully, Quirrel slept through the whole thing.

#hollow knight #fanfiction #my writing #monomon the teacher #quirrel #sickfic #baby quirrel #tiny scholar au #terra lumina #monomom #my niece learned some sign language when she was a toddler and it really helped with communication #she could sign if she wasn't feeling good or if she was tired #so here's how quirrel started off fluent in sign lanquage #hurt/comfort #i think you can call this hurt comfort?

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