Chapter Text
For the very long, dreary (and should be congratulatory) days after Shauna Shipman gave birth, the child remained without a name. Mostly, he stayed cradled into his mother’s bare (and fruitless) chest- his wrinkly face eerily calm. Despite having cried purposefully so purposefully the first day and next, he was now not like a real baby, but stillborn.
The Yellowjackets’ initial reaction was quiet annoyance. Nobody could, obviously, tell Shauna her baby was irritating in contrast to placid Canadian wilderness, but it certainly muttered under Mari’s breath before being shushed by Akilah. But now, they all prepared for the familiar effect of death. Shauna, especially: sleep could not come, her appetite was more raving than ever, and she hadn’t the ability to do much more than pace and rest in-bed with her fingers on her baby’s tiny chest.
Shauna knew what they did and she seemed to be the only ones that came to terms with it. Everyone else made up fucking stories of "the wilderness" and "honour" but that was all complete bullshit and conscience-saving lies. Shauna's eyes scoured her teammates. Why weren't they looking for Crystal? Crystal was surely dead by now. Anyone with reasonability would try and find it... but if there was already a plan in motion, why would they need to? They had to want her baby; Compared to eating Jackie, everything else must feel minor in comparison, like preying on an infant.
Delirious-minded and corrupted, Shauna's thoughts worked only on biological instinct. Besides the lovely pangs she felt in her chest when she saw her baby's face, her emotions were completely void. Even the ways she thought about Jackie, her greatest frenemy, felt monotonous.
A cognitively guilty part of Shauna felt bad for thinking this, but another reasonable part wished she had eaten more when she had a chance: the ear, obviously, had no fat and not much flesh. When Shauna had bitten into it she had to curdle her tongue to suck the miniscule meat off of the bones (which she promptly then hid in the snow). Shauna hated herself so fucking much now- why hadn't she closed her eyes, plugged her ears and just taken more? Jackie wasn't alive! She was logical enough to realise she was hallucinating, and it was sick and insane, but at the time she still felt it homicide to rip more off. Now herself - and her son as result - were starving to death. Shauna felt pure rage at everything that’s taken place- the plane crash; doomcoming; letting Jackie sleep in the wilderness; and lastly, the makeshift abortion not going as planned.
Okay, that last part Shauna felt awful over. It would certainly be easier, but now she had borne the wilderness a son and there was no rewinding nine months ago. All the odds wanted him in an early grave. He isn't latching, he is not even trying; he is still; he is barely alive right now. I will take good care of you.
Jackie had an entire list of baby names in her journals, but mostly for girls- stereotypical suburban chick ones Shauna mocked her for. Jennifer, Molly, Callie, Christiane.
Maybe Shauna could name her baby something Catholic, for hope: St. Sebastian, for example, was a guard captain who was punished for bringing prisoners resources. This punishment was arrows shot at him (intense) but they simply brought no harm. If her son also survived this snowstorm, Shauna thinks he would be just as resilient.
Jackie would tell her "God no!" at the aspect of naming a baby something as fancy as Sebastion, but it's not like it's permanent- if they go home, she has all the time before that to decide what to put on that birth certificate paper. If they simply never go home, she could switch out names until her son is tall and eighty and bothered by it. Shauna giggled stupidly as imagining her baby living prosperously in the wilderness, outgrowing all the girls' clothes and surviving his mother. That was probably the first time she has smiled in months.
Shauna Shipman lays in her bed, caressing the baby tucked under her arm, and thinks until the day bleeds into night and the fireplace is lit. Misty toddles over, ready to play doctor. Misty has been giving Shauna twice-a-day examinations since birth since there is - more or less - an open wound between her legs.
Getting on her knees Misty, shuffles between Shauna's legs, places a blanket over her lap, but before inspection, asks "Are you producing any milk yet?" Shauna, if in a better mood, might jest at how professional Misty fucking Quigley is trying to be. But she looks beyond her child's blanket-shadowed form at hip into MIsty's eyes and is simply disillusioned. "No." She, for lesser words, snaps. "When will Mari be done cooking it?"
"Soon," Misty states and (for no other less crude way to say) pulls down Shauna's clothes like a gynecologist.
They, of course, are talking about her placenta.
Shauna isn't actually disgusted at the blatant consuming of her own body. It's the most legal form of cannibalism they've partaken in yet. Still, some of the others are on the fence- like Robin, who for example, who vomited up her own stomach acid at the first sizzle of it in the saucepan. But if Shauna could eat anything at all to feed her baby, she would definitely take the opportunity. Screw Robin, the wailing bitch. Screw Lottie, even more, who fucking suggested it!
Shauna is frankly too tired to even make mean eyes at Van, who is crinkling up her eyebrows at the scene. This is in worry more than disgust, but Shauna misinterprets everything as an attack on her at this stage. Lottie lurks behind her, one hand on the chair Van's sitting on, and looks onward. There is nothing in Lottie's eyes, but this is one of the few moments she hasn't been non-stop "praying to the Wilderness". Shauna is sure she hears Nat smack at something and whisper at someone, probably Mari, to watch herself.Coach Ben has a ways away behind her. Shauna doesn't mind his presence, it's a little comforting: He isn't promising she or the infant won't die. He is so incredibly still, like a river, like a mouse. His moral ball-and-chain held him back in the discussion of placentophagy. Consuming a teenage girl's organ that was removed from her genitals out in the wilderness has to be some sort of criminal offense as an adult male.
All the while, Misty is poking and prodding Shauna uncomfortably, and every time she hisses, Misty's head arises from under the blanket to ask "Why the noise?" in irritating but usual fashion. Shauna is in pain, and eerily sure that her vagina is now completely collapsed from Misty's weird murmuring. As routine, wounds have reopened and there's now a fresh sea of blood. One of Misty's treatments was to apply an array-of-herbs-soaked-cloth to the area, which does relieve the stab of pain, but doesn't urge the bleeding to cease at all.
Misty removes the blanket and pulls up Shauna's clothes for her, then pats her knee awkwardly. "You're still wounded, but definitely not as bad as compared to a few days ago. Give it some more time and don't do any strenuous activity or anything like that. Just eat dinner and see if the baby starts to eat. That's the main thing." she monologues. Shauna is pissed off at the avoidant advice. She leans forward fully to speak face-to-face. "But how am I supposed to feed my baby?! I’m not making anything yet. What am I supposed to do about that?" It's natural, now, for everything she says to sound angry, but this time it really was. Nobody's said anything helpful about her baby, but empty consolations. They all want her baby to die, they're hungry and ruthless- Shauna cannot let this happen lying down, but what else can she do? Does she have to end the snowstorm and go hunt herself? She's restless nowadays.
Misty looks a little afraid and stutters. "W-well, it's mostly because you're hungry.. if you eat tonight, and three times tomorrow, it has to start working."
"And what if it doesn't?" Shauna ignores the fact that they don’t have enough food for a steady three meals a day, in hope.
"It will! It will! Babies work like parasites, you know. No, it's a good thing!They take all the nutrients. It's good, though! It means it's your body's first priority!" Now she's standing up, afraid and smiling awkwardly."Don't worry" Misty says unpurposefully patronisingly.
Shauna strokes her son’s face in consolation and he looks up at her in recognition. The one stroke of happiness flushes back to Shauna’s face and she smiles. There is desperation under her love. Bitterly, Shauna admits Misty is right: there is nothing else she can do. Shauna raises her bundle of baby higher and kisses its lips before difficulty maneuvering her clothing layers over her baby so her bare body is pressed against him and his swaddle. This is a great deal of comfort to present Shauna. This way he is assuredly warm, and can't die like this. There's one less way he can be stillborn. She looks down herself to console her worry, and he is sleepily blinking. Around ten more minutes of stroking his toasty cheek, he fades into a slumber with no fight. His little body must be extremely tired.
The background atmospheric sound of placenta cooking comes to a still and while Shauna cannot see it happen, she knows Mari plated it on the table from the slap of wood. Gross.
Shauna leans back on her pillow, eager for her meal. After a few more moments of murmuring, she hears people discussing, whispering something and then Tai appears at her side.
"Hi," she says gently with a hand on Shauna's shoulder. "Here you are." Shauna reopens her eyes but doesn't make an attempt to sit up. Her placenta is in a wooden bowl. Her portion is small, but gut tells Shauna it’s the biggest piece, out of teammates mercy. In Tai's other hand, there's a cup of tea. Shauna's throat is dry so she takes the cup wordlessly and talks a large gulp (awkwardly, given her position). "Okay." Shauna doesn’t think to thank Tai. Everyone else passes by fast. Shauna and her son are mostly alone in this world. The good part about dying is, though, that everyone wants to do things for you. "Can I change his diaper for you?"
Shauna realised fast, by Akilah’s two-cence is diapers need to be changed far too often to be reasonable. For diaper rash, and shit like that. Shauna almost hourly fumbled with her wilderness-edition cloth diaper and knew by now the signs of it needing change. “No, it’s fine.”
"Okay... Do you want a bath yet? I could atleast wipe you down." Tai suggests a little bit of a smile at the implication that Shauna smells like shit. She definitely does. But still, "No."
She wants Tai should go away now, so she can lay with her child.
"Lottie would really like to see you if you'd let her this time, she's been praying for the baby." Ugh, the tree cult- but at least Lottie is attempting to help... even if she's really psychotic at the moment. Thinking back to last year Lottie, who used to ask Shauna for tips on running faster or used to ask Shauna to take pictures of her, Shauna felt no friendly recognition. She doesn't feel friendly recognition for Tai, either, now she thinks about it. "Not at the moment." Which means never. Is Tai going to offer to fucking feed it to her next?
After slightly less prominent words, Tai finally leaves and Shauna picks up the meat with both hands. It warms her and she strategises the best way to eat it. On a last thought, she closes her eyes to say grace and then flavour bursts in her mouth. It tastes wet and more earthy than nature itself. Shauna's mouth immediately waters: all that she's consumed so far has been bone broth, eagerly awaiting for the day Misty gave her the doctorate okay to eat solid foods without irritating her stomach pain.
She resists a smile, as to not look strange, and places it back on the plate and licks her fingers. Hunger is like a fire alight in her stomach but she makes sure to chew her food until it's puree, sip tea and eat slowly. Hopefully, it brings more comfort and more function to her body.
Stroke the baby's head. Pick it up, takes miniscule nibble, place it down. Repeat the routine until all that remains on the plate is grease. Shauna sighs knowing no hunger at all has been appeased, but she excitedly checks herself for signs of being able to feed. Expectedly, there is nothing produced. Shauna is so worried as of late that there is nothing in her able to get even more emotional.
Suddenly, Shauna is asleep.