post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Do we get to see your main story and cast or only the blocky people?

At the moment, only the blocky people. If the main cast have a bigger role later on (bigger than just Becca giving Tango the pouch, I mean), I might post character descriptions just to give a bit more of an idea of what's happening with them, but at the moment I'm planning to keep it with just the blocky people.

I will say, the main story happened before the AU: it's the events that led up to the King being killed and Becca becoming Queen. I might allude to it later on, maybe have the characters talk about their experiences of it, but I don't think I'll have it be hugely part of the AU.

Plans may change though, and I'm a huge believer in "never is a long time", so we will see what the future holds.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Tango's room was... not a cell, exactly. It was comfortable, and he had all the books and trinkets and furniture he wanted. He'd painted the walls himself, in fiery sunrise colours to match him, and the carpet was soft enough that his toes sank into it when he walked around. He even had his own separate bathroom with no cameras in. But the only window was a mirror on his side of the wall, and the door locked from the outside, and cameras near the ceiling monitored his every move, and he was only allowed to leave when one of the many scientists interested in him decided he could, and even then, he never left the lab.

Still, it was all he knew, and he'd learnt as a kid to make do with a little.

Besides, it's not like the scientists were bad to him, not anymore. After 105 years, he'd become a sort of mascot to the palace labs, and it was taboo among the scientists to mistreat him. The tests, while annoying, never hurt, and for the ones that did they provided him with powerful anesthetics that made him loopy and completely numb.

The tests themselves varied. They took cells from all over his body for the geneticists and microbiologists. They took samples from his scalp for the chemists trying to figure out how the fire on his head works. They tested how his body reacted to various types of radiation for the radiologists. The list went on and on, even after 105 years, of things they didn't know about him and wanted to find out.

He'd outlived four kings already, and more scientists than he could count, and they were no closer to discovering how much longer he was suspected to live. He still felt as lively as ever, so the general consensus was that he still had quite a while.

He was sitting at his desk, fiddling with the mess of wires and parts between his hands, when the door opened.

Tango looked up, confused, and saw Cub standing in the door frame.

"More tests?" Tango frowned. He'd already sat through a whole host of tests that morning; he thought he'd be free for the rest of the day.

"No quite," Cub told him.

He was a man on the shorter, rounder side, but you wouldn't notice, not with everything else going on with him. Cub was the lead geneticist in the lab, and often conducted many of his experiments on himself. As such, he had a pair of tattered wings too small to be anything more than decoration, borrowed from the genes of a feathered dragon; a full set of sharp teeth not dissimilar from Tango's own, with which Tango had seen Cub snap a bone in half, borrowed from a mermaid; and pitch black hair and eyes, as well as traces of death magic, from a dark elf. He was the only person Tango knew who was older than him, though no one knew which race Cub had gotten the longevity from. While he was by no means human anymore, he got away with walking freely around the palace without hiding any part of himself by being a perfect mix of friendly, unsettling and indispensable.

It was Cub who had first combined the DNA of a pygmy dragon with that of a human, resulting in an infant with a mix of human and dragon traits, ie, Tango himself.

Cub studied Tango for a second with those almost soulless eyes, before announcing, "The king is dead. The new queen has ordered that all Vis being held against their will in the palace be released."

Tango blinked, reeling. "What?" The king was dead? He'd only been crowned a few years ago - that had to be some kind of record for shortest rule of the era. And the new queen...

Tango had met her once. Rebecca Argnum. She'd come to the lab the day before she disappeared two and a half months ago, and she'd sworn that she'd help him see the world some day. Tango hadn't put much thought into it - her brother was still young, after all, so by the time he died, he would have children of his own, and Rebecca wouldn't be next in line anymore - but still, it had been an tantalizing prospect ever since. Now that it was suddenly a possibility - not just that, but a reality - he didn't know what to do.

Finally, he managed to get a question out of his brain and into his mouth. "What about Torchy?"

"Last I checked, he's still a Vis, too. He's as free as you are."

"But can he come with me?"

"If he wants to."

"Where is he?"

Cub eyed him up a moment longer, before smiling smugly, pointed teeth on display. "I sent Doc to fetch him. He's on his way."

Relief pulled Tango's shoulders downwards. Torchy, the pygmy dragon that half of his DNA came from, was usually in his room with him, but he'd been taken out earlier that morning for reasons no one would explain to Tango, and hadn't yet returned.

With the first of Tango's questions answered, the rest started spilling out. "Where do I go?"

"Wherever you want."

"Where am I allowed to go?"

"Wherever they'll have you."

"What happened to the king?"

"A group of rebels killed him."

Good.

Before the next question could make itself known, Doc M stepped up behind Cub, a tiny, writhing mass of red-gold scales twisted around his cybernetic arm.

"Torchy!" Tango grinned.

The dragon lifted his head, spotted Tango, and pushed off of Doc's arm, with a happy growl of, "Tongo!" Torchy struggled more with speech than most pygmy dragons, and often his words came out garbled. Most of the time, no one besides Tango had any idea what he was saying.

Torchy reached him and settled on his shoulders, twining happily around his neck.

"Don't use me as your errand boy again," Doc snapped to Cub, though Tango knew he wasn't actually mad.

Doc seemed intimidating to those that didn't know him, because he was abnormally tall, had a resting scowl and held a grudge like a champion, but those who actually knew him knew he was really a big softie. He was the chief engineer in the lab, often working side-by-side with the geneticists, and was almost as strange to look at as Cub. An undercover mountain nymph, he took great care to conceal his the goat-ish parts of him: he wore his dark hair long and hid both it and the goat's horns the hair didn't quite conceal under a cap. His skin was more grey than pink, and he had a goat-like beard growing from his chin. Much of the right side of his body had been replaced by bionics, leaving him with a glowing red eye, an arm rather more "muscular" than the other, and a limp due to his right leg being human-shaped and his left being goat-shaped. No one knew what had happened for him to require the additions, and whenever someone asked, he always refused to explain. Doc was the oldest person in the lab, apart from Cub, and took orders from no one except Cub and the king himself.

Although, it was probably the queen herself now, Tango reasoned.

Everything Tango knew about engineering and electronics, he had learnt from Doc. Everything Tango knew about genetics and biology in general, he had learnt from Cub. In return, Tango didn't put up a fight when they wanted to do any sort of test, even the uncomfortable ones. The three had formed an unlikely crew of mutual benefits and mix-and-match bodies.

Doc held out his flesh arm, a messenger bag swinging from it. "I got you food and some real clothes - you can't wear Cub's old lab coat in public."

Tango looked down at the lab coat he wore. It was scorched from where he'd lost his temper a few times, stained from where he'd spilled seadust on it, and torn from both his and Torchy's claws. Cub had gifted it to him years ago, after the previous lab coat got incinerated due to events entirely unrelated to Tango's flames, he swears it.

"Thanks," he said, accepting the bag from Doc. He flicked it open and peered inside. All he could really identify from the pile of folded clothes was a dark grey vest, though he definitely saw both yellow and red fabric beneath.

"Go get changed, then you can throw some of your things in the bag and we'll walk you out," Cub told him, gesturing at the bathroom door.

"Got it."

*

Half an hour later, Tango was standing at the palace's side gate with Torchy coiled around his arm, Cub on his left and Doc on his right.

He'd filled the messenger bag with books, seadust and seadust-related components, and as much of both his and Torchy's hordes - a small collection of gears and springs for Torchy, and a handful of pieces of wood he carved himself for Tango - as possible.

Tango loved the outfit Doc had picked out for him - though part of it was, of course, due the fact that he had never had real clothes before: in the summer, the lab coat sufficed, and in the winter he burrowed under the blankets and slept most of the time.

But he had real clothes now. The long-sleeved yellow shirt was tight enough to keep wind out and heat in, and the grey vest he wore over it was buttoned all the way down to keep it from flapping around. A pair of thick, baggy trousers made his thin legs look far bigger than they really were, fuzzy grey boots kept his feet warm, and fluffy bands around his wrists kept his hands from freezing off. Without the carefully warmed conditions of his room in the lab keeping him just the right temperature, added measures were a must to ensure he didn't freeze; as such, a long, thick, black coat lined on the inside with blue fur was hung neatly over the bag, ready for when it was needed.

Tango only hoped it was enough.

"Keep walking east," Cub was telling him. "You'll reach the Subsol Woods in about two days, if you make good speed."

"To du?! Toy cu wok to du!" Torchy protested.

"You won't be doing any walking," Tango reminded the little dragon, holding up his arm to look him in the eye. "You'll probably barely even do any flying, for void's sake!"

Doc chuckled, but then sobered up quick. "Just make sure you ration your food and don't eat it all at once. In the woods, you'll find both a faerie and an elf camp, though you'll probably come across the elves first. Tell them Meyer sent you, they'll take care of you."

Right. Tango kept forgetting that "Doc" wasn't the engineer's real name.

"Got it," Tango nodded.

"Good luck," Cub said.

Tango took a deep breath, and took his first step out of the castle gate.

"WAIT!" a voice called before he could take a second.

They all turned to see a young woman - barely more than a girl, really - running towards them. The queen.

"Thank goodness, I was worried I'd missed you," Queen Rebecca panted when she reached them.

She'd been crying; Tango saw the red rings around her pale brown eyes right away. If it weren't for that, though, it would have been impossible to tell. Her red-gold hair still lay in perfect waves, her back was still pencil straight, her head still held high. A queen through and through.

"Your majesty," Cub and Doc said together, bowing.

Wordlessly, Tango copied the motion.

The young queen waved her hand at him. "Ah, no need for that. Once you're outside those gates, you're officially free - you're barely even under my rule anymore."

"Oh," Tango said, because what else was he supposed to say?

"I wanted to give you this before you go." The queen held out a small drawstring pouch.

"What is it?" Tango asked curiously, taking it and weighing it in his hand. It was heavier than he expected, considering how little it seemed to hold.

"Something that'll help you later - trust me, it's saved my life more than once."

Tango started to open the pouch, but the queen hurriedly said, "No, no! Wait until you're alone."

Tango frowned. "Why?"

"It's..." She hesitated. "It's the sort of thing best opened in private."

"Right." Tango nodded, like that made any sense at all.

As he was tucking the pouch into the messenger bag, she went on, "I also wanted to wish you luck. I told you I'd get you out, and I did."

"Thank you," Tango said, and meant it with his whole heart.

Finally, finally he was getting to see the world.

He turned back to the city beyond the gate. He'd have to navigate that before he even reached the plains that stood between here and the Subsol Woods, but he'd memorised many, many maps of the country in his time, including one of the city as it currently stands. He didn't think he'd have much, if any difficulty with it.

After another deep breath, he took his second step out into the world.

And just like that, he was walking, a free male, his best friend on his arm and a mystery pouch in his bag, and Doc's call to "be careful!" in his ears.

He had no idea where he was going or who he would meet, but he was prepared. He was more than prepared - he was ready.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

PAFAU masterpost

Welcome to my post-apocalyptic fantasy au! Basically, I took the blocky people and stuck them in my own pre-existing world.

The premise of the world is the, a thousand years in the future, wars and disease have left the human population at a fraction of what it was, leading to many mythical races and species feeling safe and comfortable enough to emerge back into the world. What results is an eclectic mix of humans and magical races struggling to bring the earth back from the brink of total destruction while trying to survive each other.

The au will focus mainly on Tango, but will include snippets from other characters povs as well.

World building posts can be found here.

Character descriptions can be found here.

Race descriptions can (eventually) be found here.

Story posts can be found here.

Feel free to send me asks about my world and processes etc, or even send suggestions if you have any, though I can't guarantee I'll implement them.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Cub

Name: Cub Fan

Nickname: Rub-a-dub Cub Reason for nickname: He's forever washing his lab coat - to no avail

Age: 149

Species: Your guess is as good as mine

Residence: Homios

Appearance:  Eyes- Black (glow silvery-blue in the dark) Hair- Black Height- 5'6" Build- Round Complexion- Other markings- Small, tattered, feathery wings; sharp teeth Outfit- Lab coat covered in mysterious stains, over black shirt and jeans

Abilities: Traces of death magic, plant manipulation (combine to allow him to grow a poisonous, parasitic fungus - Skulk)

Family:  None

Occupation: Head geneticist in the palace labs

Background: First joined the lab team in his early twenties as a normal human, and took his time climbing the ranks, but climb he did, thanks to his genius and creative ideas. When he didn't receive permission to perform his experiments, he'd perform them on himself, leading to him becoming an absurd mix of races. No one knows where he got his longevity from, nor how long it'll last, but he's so far shown no signs of slowing down, and everyone else is too afraid to suggest it. It was Cub who came up with the idea of Tango.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Doc

Name: Meyer Vonk

Nickname: Doc Reason for nickname: Guess

Age: 122

Species: Mountain nymph (only a select few know)

Residence: Homios

Appearance:  Eyes- One black, one cybernetic + red Hair- Dark brown, longish; long beard Height- 6'5" Build- Half goatish, half human-shaped cybernetics Complexion- Greenish-grey Other markings- Goat horns that he hides under a cap Outfit- white lab coat over loose black trousers, paired with a white shirt if you're lucky

Abilities: low-level mind control by music

Family:  Husband- Ren Daughter- Hillary

Occupation: Head engineer at the palace labs

Background: Joined the labs in his mid30s, by his 40th he was very close to being top dog. He's kept the role since. Met Ren when he came to the palace lab for an interview, married him two years later - he's a go big or go home kind of person. They adopted Hillary, an abandoned half-celestial elf, three years after getting married.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Torchy

Name: Torchy

Nickname: Beacon Reason for nickname: when he gets angry/agitated, his mouth sets on fire, but BRIGHT fire, not just normal

Age: 500

Species: Pygmy dragon

Residence: Tango's shoulders

Appearance:  Eyes- Red Hair (scales)- Red along his sides, belly, and the back edge of his wings, fades to yellow down his back and the front edge of his wings Height- 1' on hind legs Build- dragon shaped Complexion- Pale pink under scales Other markings- scars at the base of his wings where the DNA was taken for Tango Outfit- n/A

Abilities: Fire breathing

Family:  None

Occupation: free

Background: was well into his 300s when the Vis came out of hiding, but got caught by the human King at the time very quickly. At first, the experiments were to see about stopping his fire or transferring his fire resistance to a human. When Cub had the idea of fusing his DNA with a human's, these came to a halt as all energy was put into this new project. Since Tango was born, there were very few experiments on Torchy - they had his entire genome mapped out and could just do tests on that instead - so when he wasn't sleeping, he was usually playing with/hanging out with/annoying Tango.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Tango

Name: Tango

Nickname: Tongo Reason for nickname: Torchy doesn't speak well so it's his garbled version of Tango

Age: 105

Species: Half-pygmy dragon, half-human (combination-race called Tek (so he is Tango of the Tek variety))

Residence: nomad

Appearance:  Eyes- Red Hair- Fiyah (flares when he's feeling strong emotions) Height- 5' Build- Deceptively skinny (he is STRONG) Complexion- Gold Other markings- Scales on his shoulders, upper chest/back and lower neck; sharp teeth; claws/talons instead of nails Outfit- Tight yellow shirt with grey vest over it, both covered by a large black coat in the winter (he's very sensitive to the cold), wrist warmers always, red trousers, grey boots

Abilities: Fire resistance

Family:  Mother- A random one of the original geneticists Father- Torchy

Occupation: Free 

Background: Tango is the result of a team of bored geneticists having access to both human and pygmy dragon DNA, and the resources to mash them together. He was treated well, for a science experiment, because scientists are massive nerds and huge softies and extraordinarily fascinated by fire.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Origin

The first two World Wars were both named the War to End All Wars. And for a while, that’s what everyone thought. But, of course, that is not human nature. After all, power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Leaders got greedy and attacked, and other countries retaliated, as they will.

The second Great War was followed by a third, which was followed very quickly by yet another. Then another. Then another.

Desperation and ambition will drive a person to do crazy things - world leaders stopped being careful, stopped caring about anything other than their own survival. As technology advanced, the situation only worsened. Mutually assured destruction became the norm, fear grew in every hole and crevasse. Diseases, both natural and not, spread like wildfires, wiping out populations faster than ever before.

Then, finally, a nuclear apocalypse. Humanity went from hundreds of countries to only a handful of cities and colonies across the world. 

And finally, 1100 years after the end of the second Great War, there were no more humans left to keep the mysterious Vis (pronounced Vee) away, they emerged from the hiding places they had kept for millenia. Dwarves from the mountains. Centaurs and faeries and elves from the forests. Mermaids and sirens and nymphs from the seas. Races and magics that had previously only existed in stories. 

At first, the two groups were wary of each other, sticking to themselves, never mingling. But then it became clear that the Vis were much more adept at coaxing life back to the post-nuclear landscape, and the humans had mastered navigating and surviving it. The only way for everyone to survive would be if humans and Vis worked together. 

And it was great! There was peace! Harmony! In an attempt to re-populate the world, they interbred, resulting in halves and demis, with only part of the powers and characteristics of their Vis parents. 

What happened next varies depending on who’s telling it. The Vis say the humans got greedy and started trying to use them. The humans say the Vis turned on them and went against their agreements. 

Regardless, everyone agrees that the two groups broke apart, that the Vis used their thousands of years’ worth of experience to get away from the humans and left them to their own devices. 

Then came the real challenge: surviving without each other’s support. It was fine to start with. But it wasn’t long before it became evident it was impossible. Coexistence was the only option. So the Vis merged back in, disguised and hidden, and the humans allowed it, feigning ignorance. 

Those that were able to hide in plain sight stole food and resources and smuggled it out to those who weren’t. They got jobs and homes and lives, settling more than they had in history. But the opposition remained.

Before long, the humans forgot a time when the Vis hadn’t lived with them. And they forgot how bad it was. Laws were passed to restrict the Vis’ freedoms and rights, but the Vis stayed, because they lived longer, and many had generational memories, so they remembered what a bad idea it would be to pull away from the humans again. 

Kings got greedier. Rulers overstepped their power. In short, things had gone to shit, and for years, no one was brave enough to do anything about it. 

Then, almost two hundred years after the return of the Vis, the rebels started. No one quite knew what had finally triggered the increase in violence from both sides, only that, for a lot of people, it was only just safe enough to leave their houses during the day. Definitely not at night. 

But finally, finally, someone was standing up to the human rulers. Hope started stirring among the Vis that things could get better, even as the opposition kept increasing. 

Just before the fighting started in earnest, Princess Becca, sister to the young king of our battered and broken country and the only human defender the Vis had, disappeared, her best friends along with her. Some claimed they left of their own accord, others that they were kidnapped by the Vis. All anyone knew for sure was that, only a few months later, the king was killed by a large group of Vis rebels and the princess returned just in time to take the throne.

Finally, with a queen willing to fight for Vis and human equality, the world looked like it might one day return to a safe haven for all.