post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Rb'ing this here on purpose because my Torchy would say this xD

I made that one Rancher biologically accurate fanchild thing into an actual skin.

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

2.5

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Skizz and Impulse immediately jumped into mother hen mode as soon as she rode in with the burning, unconcious stranger on her back, of course. Skizz being Skizz took charge, ordering Impulse - the strongest of them - to lift him off Gem's chestnut back and lay him down on the sofa, but the pygmy dragon swooped underneath, stopping them, hissing and spitting.

"He says his hair is actual fire," Impulse translated, pulling the creature back towards him, leaning his head away.

Skizz thought quick, his bright blue eyes taking in the room and its options. "Gemmy Bemmy, get a blanket and put it on the ground."

The tiles would crack, but they wouldn't burn. Gem hurried to do as she was told, crouching down onto her forelegs to lay out the softest blanket they had.

Impulse lowered the creature down onto it as Skizz gave Gem her next order: "Go make an icepack."

She practically cantered to the kitchen, hurrying to fill a plastic bag they kept for just this purpose with ice. She'd seen both her dads do this so many times when their old wounds flared up that she could do it in her sleep.

When she brought it back, she could hear Impulse ask the faerie who'd fetched her, "Do you know what he is?" Impulse's thick brown hair, usually quite neat, was sticking out in a way that suggested he'd wiped sweat from his forehead.

"He said he's a Tango!" the small male said. He was zipping around, fretting something awful.

The dragon, curled up on the mystery creature's chest, growled something.

"Tango's his name," Impulse repeated in English for those in the room who couldn't understand every language in the world. "He's half pygmy dragon, half human, apparently." The dragon added something else, and Impulse translated uncertainly, "He calls himself a... Tek?"

Skizz paused, the ice pack half in his grip, half in Gem's. "A human and a pygmy dragon? How does that work?"

"Skizz!" Gem scolded.

"Right, right, sorry!" He grabbed the ice pack and pressed it against Tango's burning forehead. It hissed.

Skizz frowned at the steam rising from the bag. "Dippledop, will you check Gem's back? It might be burned."

"I'm fine!" Gem protested, taking a step back, but Impulse came over anyway.

"We just need to check," he told her, and Gem rolled her eyes.

He ran a hand over her glossy back, checking for any scarring her coat might hide. She huffed, but held still. It would be so annoying if she had burned herself, after all.

After a few moments, Impulse gave the all clear. She was fine.

Skizz let out a sigh of relief. "Oh good." Finally, he turned to the faerie. "What's your name?"

"Zed. Zedaph. The dragon is Torchy."

Skizz nodded. "I'm Skizz. My buddy over there is Impulse, and the beautiful centaur is Gem."

"Is he gonna be okay?" Gem asked, flicking her tail nervously.

"I don't know a thing about dragons." Impulse glanced at Skizz, who shook his head.

"I don't know that he's human enough for my knowledge of them to help."

As a half-human himself, Gem had hoped Skizz would know what to do, maybe at least figure out what human remedies would work on Tango. He'd always been good at knowing what she needed, after all.

Gem sighed. "So we're flying blind."

"Not entirely." Zedaph flew up to Impulse, hovering in front of his face. Gem decided she liked his voice. It was slow, with a laugh braided into every word, even as he was clearly panicking. "You can understand Torchy, right?"

"Right."

Torchy said something in whatever dragon language he spoke.

"Oh great! Torchy said he doesn't know enough about Tango to help. Even he doesn't know how much of Tango is human and how much is dragon."

"Oh good!"

Skizz and Impulse had a way of turning sarcastic and hysterical when things went wrong. Things were definitely going wrong now.

Gem sighed. She had to be the voice of reason. "So, we work with what we know, and make up what we don't."

She wished Pearl was here. Pearl would know what to do. At the very least, she'd be able to lift the spirits in the room. Usually that was Skizz's job, but he was just as stressed as the rest of them. She knew Impulse wished Grian were here for the same reason.

Honestly, all four of the siblings would have been welcome. Jimmy was guaranteed to do something silly that would get Skizz to grin and join in, and Lizzie was so good at keeping a level head that Gem was sure nothing would shake her.

But then she thought better of it. Joel wouldn't stay behind if Lizzie and Jimmy were here, and if Grian came, Scar would be close behind, and with Scar would come Bdubs. And if Bdubs joined the party, Etho would be sure to hear of it and he could never stay away from such a large gathering, and Cleo wouldn't allow Etho to be here with both of her boys without supervision, and then Cleo and Pearl would be at loggerheads the entire time, not to mention the weird tension between Impulse and Bdubs, and it would just be chaos. Besides, if Pearl came, Scott would probably accompany her, and Gem wasn't sure she'd be able to resist the urge to kick him while she was stressed.

Maybe it was better to just keep it to the five of them - six if they included the very unconscious creature lying on the floor at her feet.

"What happened to him?" Skizz asked, pulling Gem from her thoughts.

"He was sick - sneezing and coughing and stuff - so I got him some medicine I stole from the humans for sneezing and coughing, and then like half an hour later, BOOM, he started burning up and collapsing!" And still, even with his voice laced with panic, Zedaph seemed to be on the verge of laughter. Gem wondered if that was just how he sounded or if he, like her dads, was hysterical.

"Gemmy, go open a window," Skizz ordered softly, and Gem hurried to obey, grateful for something to do.

She didn't just open a window, she opened every window, throwing the wooden blinds wide to let in the fresh air. Then she opened the door as well. It was wide and tall, adjusted repeatedly as she grew to be able to fit her in, so plenty of air was able to flow in.

Then she eyed Tango, especially that fiery hair.

Slowly, uncertainly, she said, "We need him to cool down, right?"

"Right," Skizz said. He was still kneeling beside Tango, still holding the long-melted icepack to his forehead like it might do something.

Impulse looked up at her. He was still standing, but he was so much shorter than Gem that unless she was sitting or lying down, he had to look up at her anyway. "Do you have something in mind?"

"If we put him out..."

"Put him-" Skizz looked up at Impulse. He was about a million years old, and at least ten times older than Impulse, but sometimes it was like he knew half as much as Impulse about anything. "Could that work?"

"I have no idea." Impulse shrugged and glanced at Zedaph.

"Don't look at me!" Zedaph threw up his tiny arms. "I've barely known him longer than you!"

They all turned to Torchy and Impulse asked, "Could it?"

Torchy lifted his head, looked between all of them, then at Tango. He let out a small puff of smoke, and Gem thought it looked like a sigh. He huffed.

"I guess it's worth a try," Impulse murmured.

Carefully, Skizz opened the top of the bag and slowly poured it over Tango's head, keeping one hand upright on his forehead to prevent any of it flowing over his face.

The hiss of steam filled the room, and Gem flinched back, raising her arms to protect her face. The fire on Tango's head died, and almost immediately, he started to scream. It was the tortured, agonised sound of someone in indescribable pain.

The panic in the room went up about sixteen notches as Tango started to thrash, back arching, limbs flailing wildly. A desperate attempt at speech, pleas maybe, managed to make it through the screams, but there were no decipherable words among the babbling.

Impulse had frozen up, Skizz was shaking so bad Gem worried he'd shift right there in their living room, Zedaph was way too tiny to do anything, and Torchy was flying in circles and panicking. She was on her own here.

She dropped to the ground beside Tango, folding up her legs beneath her body, and reached out to try and secure him, worried he'd hurt himself. Before she could reach him, however, his flailing hand connected with her face. She reared back, staggering gracelessly to her feet and just barely managed to keep the horse instinct to kick him in the face at bay.

That was when Torchy decided to actually be helpful, swooping down to land on the floor above Tango's head. He started puffing fire at his wet scalp, boiling away the water little by little. Tango stilled slightly, letting out a moan of relief among the quieting screams.

It was too slow: Torchy was only little, his fire not that warm, and Gem knew pygmy dragons didn't have that much fire in them anyway. It wasn't long before the steady stream became a series of thin, splotchy bursts. But Torchy refused to give up. He kept breathing fire over Tango's head as the hybrid slowly calmed, his screams fading away to nothing. Only once all the water was gone and Tango's own flames starting flicking back to life, feeble at first but growing quickly in strength and number, that he finally stopped twitching and stilled.

Finally, Torchy collapsed, all out of fire and out of energy. He curled up among Tango's flames, and Tango raised a weak, trembling hand to up to him, laying it on the dragon back. He didn't move again from that position.

Shaken, Gem looked around at the rest of the room.

Now that the screaming had stopped, Imp and Skizz were coming back from whatever haze of memories they'd been lost in. She didn't know much about their past, about how they'd come to be together, but she knew it was bad, because she often found them wide awake and holding each other in the middle of the night, and sometimes when they were in pain they started crying and panicking. Now, they were just staring, wide eyed, at Tango on the floor, at Gem and the red mark blossoming on her cheek.

Zedaph had taken up Torchy's place in flying stressed circles around the room, buzzing and twittering in the language which was most garden faeries' only means of communication.

Shakily, she said to the rest of the room, "Okay, so not that. Any other ideas?"

A brief moment of silence, then Skizz started giggling hysterically as Impulse ran to Gem's side, jumping up to grab her arms so he could pull her down and inspect her face.

"OhmygoshGemareyouokay?!" he gasped.

"I'm fine, Impulse," she assured him, shaking him off and straightening.

Skizz managed to get ahold of himself, stepping forward to eye up Tango. "Is it just me, or does this guy look better? No, I think it's- no, yes! Yeah, he definitely looks better!"

Gem inched warily closer, not eager for another accidental slap, and saw that, indeed, Tango did have a little more colour in his face, his skin looking closer to gold than the washed out yellow-beige-ish colour it had before.

She took her first real good look at Tango. He was short, almost as short as Impulse, but unlike Impulse, he was built like a stick bug, all thin limbs and knobbly joins and narrow shoulders. Under the tight yellow shirt he wore, Gem could see scales covering the lower part of his neck and clearly continuing beneath the shirt. He slept with his mouth open slightly and his jaw clenched, revealing sharp teeth, and his hands ended in sharp claws rather than nails. She could certainly see the dragon descent in him, even if she couldn't quite figure out how it had come about.

She decided not to dwell on it.

"What do we do now?" she asked instead.

Impulse, still trying to fuss over her, glanced down at Tango. "I guess now we wait. Try to keep him cool... without getting him wet, probably."

A rush of guilt his Gem. It had been her idea to try that, after all. She swallowed. "Will he... do you think he's...?"

"He'll be fine, Gemmy," Skizz assured her gently. "You couldn't have known."

She pursed her lips. She wasn't as prone to guilt spirals as Grian, for example, but she felt bad. He'd sounded seriously hurt.

"He's already doing better," Impulse pointed out. "Looks like that was the shock his body needed to fight whatever it is that's making him sick. I'd say you did him a favour!" Then he grimaced. "Even if it was an... uncomfortable one."

Gem barked out a laugh, then clapped her hands over her mouth to contain the sound. "Uncomfortable?"

"Less than fortunate," Impulse confirmed.

"You sound like Grian," she pointed out, and Skizz chuckled.

"More like Mumbo."

"Whatever." Impulse rolled his eyes. "My point still stands. You shouldn't lose sleep over this. You were just trying to help."

"I guess." She smiled down at her dads, who grinned back up at her. "Thanks."

"I'll watch him," Skizz offered. "You guys go get some sleep."

Impulse glanced up at Zedaph, who was hovering uncertainly above them now that the worst stress was over. "Do you... need a bed?" he offered, clearly unsure how or even if garden faeries slept.

"You know what, I'll just crash down here, if that's alright," Zedaph answered, lowering himself onto the armrest of the sofa. "But thanks for the offer."

"Of course. Let Skizz know if you need anything."

"Will do. Thank you, fellas."

Impulse trudged up the stairs to the bedroom he shared with Skizz while Gem crossed to the door to her room - she struggled with stairs sometimes, especially when she was tired.

She couldn't shake the feeling, as she sank down against her cushioned recliner, that something had just changed in her world.

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(Massive shoutout to Mel @mellioops for giving me suggestions for Gem's horse half! The recliner comes from this post from @/theartingace)

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Skizz

Name: Skizz Tay

Species: Human-born mermaid

Appearance:  Eyes- Bright blue

Family:  Best friend- Impulse Daughter (adopted)- Gem

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Impulse

Name: [redacted]

Nickname: Impulse, Dippledop

Species: Dwarf

Appearance:  Hair- brown and thick, but kept short

Abilities: polyglot

Family:  Best friend- Skizz Daughter (adopted)- Gem

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Gem

Name: Gemini Tay

Nickname: Gem, Gemmy Bemmy

Species: Centaur (Haflinger)

Appearance:  Hair- on her body: chestnut

Family:  Father (adopted)- Impulse Father (adopted)- Skizz

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Zedaph

Name: Zedaph

Nickname: Zed

Species: Garden Faerie

Appearance:  Eyes- Pink Hair- Pink Height- 3.5" Other markings- Iridescent wings

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Sneak peek into the distant future. Period cramps projection beam at Jimmy Solidarity (only because I was so mean to Tango last time lol)

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

For those of you who were interested in the discord, here's the invite link: https://discord.gg/uSGwvmbUep

For those of you who said you wanted to join later, I've added it to the pinned post for ease of access!

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

3

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(Prefacing this with a bit of a content warning: it gets a bit dark. This is a bit of an insight into Tango's life at the lab, and the sorts of experiments they did when he was younger, but Cub and Doc are big softies and try to take care of him through it all. Proceed at your own discretion.)

In the dream, he was a kid again, back in the lab, scientists of all descriptions surrounding him. His limbs were strapped down, just in case, and there were about six syringes filled with various anesthetics, just in case, but this was going to be quick and easy and painless, nothing would go wrong, they promised.

Cub was finishing setting up what felt like dozens of machines hooked up to Tango, monitoring his vitals, his brain activity, any shift in his eyes, every twitch in his body. Anything that had even the slightest chance of changing, Cub wanted to track it.

Cub looked different in the dream. Much, much younger, and much, much more human. In fact, the only suggestion that he wasn't fully human was the row of sharp teeth behind his lips, and Tango could only spot them occasionally, and even then only because he knew they were there.

Even though this had nothing to do with him, Doc was standing against a wall, watching the proceedings with cool curiosity. Tango had asked him if he didn't have anywhere else to be, hating the amount of eyes already fixed on him, and Doc had merely shrugged and declared they'd "survive without me".

Doc looked different too, though less notably. His prosthetics were clunkier, with less fancy bells and whistles, and he didn't yet need a hat to hide his horns, only his fluffy hair.

"We'll start small," Cub said, finally finishing up and moving to stand beside Tango's head. He held a pipette in his hand, filled with water. "Just a few drops. Then we'll go from there."

Tango braced himself. He wanted to close his eyes, but that would make nullify an entire system that Cub so carefully set up. Instead, he curled his hands into fists and clenched his jaw. He couldn't hide his racing heart, not with the constant beep-beep-beep betraying his nerves, so he didn't bother trying.

"Three. Two. One." Cub squeezed the pipette, letting a single drop fall from the end onto Tango's head.

His flames boiled the drop before it even touched him, sending it flying upwards in a tiny cloud of steam.

Pens scribbled on paper all around.

Cub had realised very early that Tango didn't have nearly as much water in him as a human, and had been building up to testing him with it ever since. Now, Tango was barely sixteen, a teenager, a kid even by human standards. By dragon standards, he was still practically a hatchling (although, with a human mother, he hadn't actually hatched out of anything, so he was unsure about the terminology there). He was trying his best to calm his fear, but so young, it was nearly impossible. All he could do was brace himself and wait.

"Increasing volume," Cub said, putting down the pipette and pulling out a measuring cylinder instead. "Ten milliliters. Three. Two. One."

Again, much of the water evaporated in time, but a few drops landed on Tango's head. Sizzling filled the room as Tango sucked in a breath. It didn't hurt... much. It was like a bug bite. In just a second, the pain was over, the last of the water boiling away and the flames that had been put out rushing back to life.

More writing.

"Does it hurt?" Cub asked.

"No." It didn't, not anymore. It had, for a second, but it was fine now.

"Ready to move on?"

Tango nodded. "Yes."

He could handle the small pain. It wasn't much, nowhere near the worst pain he'd already experienced in his short lifetime. He could handle it.

"Increasing volume." Cub retrieved another measuring cylinder. "Twenty-five milliliters. Three. Two. One."

The water was poured. Most of it landed on his head this time. He gasped. This pain was a little more than before, closer to a wasp sting. It took a lot longer for the water to go away so his flames could return, leaving his scalp exposed for longer and making the pain last longer. Before long, though, the pain faded and he was fine again.

"Tango?" It took him a second to register Cub was speaking. He looked up at the scientist.

"I'm okay," Tango insisted. "Keep going."

"Do you need a second?"

"No. I'm fine."

"Alright." Cub sounded doubtful, and Tango heard Doc's scoff from the other side of the room, but they pushed on as requested. "Increasing volume. Fifty milliliters. Three. Two. One."

Like before, the pain was exponentially worse. Tango just barely managed to turn his yelp into a groan. He knew how important this research was, not only to Cub, but to Tango himself, as well. He needed to know how much water was too much. This certainly was not too much. He could handle it.

Of course, none of these thoughts were coherent in the moment, presenting themselves more as concepts than tangible thoughts. The pain was far too bad for Tango to produce anything even halfway intelligible.

When the dimness in Tango's vision finally faded, he met Cub's gaze and nodded. He was fine.

"Increasing volume. One hundred milliliters." Cub sounded rushed now, like he wanted to get it over with. Though he'd never admit it, Tango was grateful. "Three. Two. One."

Tango did shout that time, a combination of nonsense syllables that felt less pathetic than an actual scream but still gave him an outlet for the pain. It was awful. This was what he imagined burning felt like, though it was in fact exactly the opposite. When Tango's flames were put out, he felt the same thing other people would feel if they were lit on fire. His vision blacked out entirely, all his senses but the ability to feel abandoning him, leaving him consumed by the pain with nothing to distract him. He panted, waiting for the pain to pass, waiting for the world to return.

It felt like hours ran past him before he could see Cub's round, concerned face hovering over him. It immediately flooded with relief.

"Thought we lost you there for a second, man," Cub told him.

Tango tried to speak, but his voice caught in his throat. He swallowed and tried again. "I- I'm fine."

"That's enough," Doc said.

Tango turned his head as much as he could manage to find the male no longer standing against the wall looking barely interested. Now, he was just beyond the wall of machines and scientist, both hands curled into fists, bionic eye flashing slightly, like it did when one of his contraptions blew up.

"No," Tango grit out. "No, I'm fine."

"Tango-"

"I'm fine."

Doc and Cub shared a look. It wasn't a look Tango was familiar with, but he would very quickly come to recognise it as the "Tango's being a stubborn idiot" look.

"One more," Cub conceded uncertainly.

"Finish it." Tango wasn't planning to say it. He didn't want it - void, he really didn't want it - but it was important data, and he'd be damned if he had to go through all this again to get it later.

Cub signaled to one of the interns holding a syringe of anesthetic, but Tango pulled his arm away.

"No! No, that defeats the purpose! You need organic data. That'll mess it up."

"Tango, there is no way we're doing this with you in this state," Cub protested.

"I'm fine."

"No, you're not." That was Doc. "You are not fine, Tango. Cub is right."

Tango scowled between the two of them. "If we're going to do this, we may as well do it properly."

That was when he noticed what Cub was holding. It looked like a small glass bucket, filled with water. He braced himself and, before either Cub or Doc could protest again, leant forwards as far as he could with his limbs strapped to the chair he was sitting in with as much force and speed as he could muster. He didn't reach Cub and he bucket, didn't even come close, but he managed to startle Cub so much that the bucket was dropped anyway.

The pain was worse than anything else he'd ever experienced. It completely took everything over, taking away even his self control. He screamed properly this time, but he couldn't hear it. He thrashed in the bonds, but he couldn't feel it. The machines around him were going haywire, but he couldn't see them. It was everything, everywhere, and it wasn't stopping, it wasn't stopping, he just wanted it to stop, someone MAKE IT STOP!

It was agony, pure agony, that flooded his veins and tore his nerves to shreds, so bad that he felt like it was killing him. Some part of him, far larger than he would ever, ever admit, wished it would hurry up and kill him faster, just so the pain would stop, stop, stop, stop!

And then he woke up.

But the pain went on. He screamed and thrashed, and his limbs weren't being held down by thick metal rings, and there weren't innumerable wires poking out of him. There were people around him, and not a scientist among them.

And still the pain persisted, never stopping, never resting, never giving him a moment to breathe. The part of him that could still think thought he might have been begging, but he wasn't sure.

Still, the pain refused to calm. He vaguely registered the back of his hand hitting something - someone - but it was secondary, tertiary even, to the pain, the pain, the awful overarching pain.

And the pain just kept on slicing through his bod-

It dimmed.

Heat was brushing his scalp. He couldn't hold back a moan of relief, leaning back into it, as, little by little, the warmth chased away the pain. It wasn't until it passed from "unbearable" to "not quite tolerable" that he was able to recognise what was causing it: Torchy, puffing every bit of fire in his tiny body at Tango's head.

Far too many minutes later, the pain was gone entirely. Slowly, as part of his head dried off, the fire returned to life in those spots, eliminating the pain entirely, until finally his whole head was ablaze again. Tango sighed, his entire body sagging into the floor he was lying on.

He raised a shaking hand over his head, found Torchy curled up among the flames, completely spent, and lay his hand onto the dragon's scales.

A voice said, "Okay, so not that. Any other ideas?"

Unconsciousness once again claimed his exhausted body.

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[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Just an interest check: if I were to make a discord for the AU, both to talk about the AU itself (plans, process, ideas, art, etc) and to just connect and chat with new people, how many of y'all would be interested?

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

2

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Tango started sneezing about twenty minutes after leaving the lab. By the time they reached the city's outskirts, six hours later, he was a sniffling mess, eyes burning and nose running, throat tight. Every part of his skin not covered in scales was covered in rashes. On top of that, his legs felt like jelly, there was a sharp pain tearing his sides open, every step hurt his feet and his lungs felt like they were on fire.

"Maybe we should stop for a bit," Torchy suggested, concerned. The little dragon was flying around Tango's head since his touch irritated Tango's skin even more.

"We should... get somewhere less... open... first." Tango was gasping, every breath a struggle.

But he refused to stop. It was just allergies and a lack of exercise, it would all calm down once his body got used to being outside the lab's sterile walls. The best thing to do was to keep pushing, keep, walking, force his body to adapt. He would survive allergies, he would survive being unfit. He wasn't sure he would survive what wandered around out here, beyond the city limits, where laws barely applied and civilisation ended.

Sometimes, when the scientists in the lab worked late, they'd come into Tango's room at night and he'd light a little fire in the middle and they'd sit around telling scary stories. He was told it was a human tradition older than time. Far too often, those stories included werewolves who refused to abide by the palace's laws, vampires who were so consumed by their bloodlust they'd lost all their humanity, human-born sirens who had forsaken community in favour of luring travellers away from their paths.

Cub had once sworn up and down that a garden faerie had tried to gouge out his eyes, killing every plant in a ten-foot radius in the process, and to this day he still didn't know how he'd escaped intact.

Doc had then scoffed and claimed it was all hearsay, but the tale had stuck with Tango. He was rather fond of his eyes, and preferred not to risk losing them.

"I can keep going," he said to Torchy. "I can... I'll be fine."

They had barely walked another hour before Tango was forced to stop by his feet - which were dragging on the floor - hooking on a rock, sending him plummetting with a yelp.

"Tango!" Torchy gasped, swooping down to join him on the ground.

"I'm- I'm fine," Tango assured him, running a hand across Torchy's scales. "I'm fine."

Tango allowed himself twenty seconds of rest - he counted each one - before pushing himself back to his feet.

"Just a little further," he told himself.

He could see a small copse of trees in the distance. If he could just make it that far, he'd be fine. It was close. Just a little further.

When, after a few seconds, it became clear his feet weren't moving any time soon, he sighed and sank into a crouch, absently itching his arm.

"I'm fine," he whispered, staring at the trees, like repeating it will make it true.

He shook his head, shaking that thought out of it. He was fine. This was just a normal bodily reaction, and it would pass. It wasn't like he was dying or anything. He was fine. He just needed a few more seconds to rest. Then he'd be able to command his legs to move again, and he could keep going.

He was fine.

That was when he heard the voice: "Hello! What do we have here?"

Tango leapt to his feet, twisting around and staggering back and falling onto his butt as he yelled, "Hagagah!"

Hovering in front of him was a garden faerie with pink hair and eyes, and a dress made out of a brown leaf that seemed to be clinging to life by the fingertips - leaftips? The creature was a little more than three inches tall, his hair short and messy.

"What're you doing all the way out here?" he asked, flying a little closer to Tango's face.

Tango squeaked. "Please don't steal my eyes!"

"Steal your eyes?" the faerie chuckled. "Why would I do that?"

"I don't know!"

The creature laughed again. "I'm Zedaph. What are you?" He spoke the question slowly, drawing out each word.

"Don't you mean who?" Tango couldn't help but ask.

"Nope!" Zedaph flew a few laps around Tango, faster than he could follow. "I've never seen anything like you before!"

"I'm Tango."

"RIght. Aaand, what's a Tango?"

"Well, me, obviously!"

"Right! Of course, why didn't I think of that?" He was laughing again.

Zedaph's voice was strange, quiet and high-pitched and buzzy, and he spoke English like his mouth wasn't meant to ever have any of these sounds in it. And yet, every single sound came out clear and amost easy. Sure, he spoke slowly, drawing out most of his words, but he never faltered and stuttered, only paused and hesitated now and then.

"And this is-" Tango paused to sneeze. "-Torchy."

Torchy landed on Tango's head, peering at Zedaph through the flames. Zedaph grinnged at the little dragon.

"Very nice to meet ya, Torchy!"

"Of course it is," Torchy muttered, getting comfortable on his perch.

Zedaph's grin faded and his tiny features twisted into a frown as he looked at Tango.

"Hey, you don't look too good," he noted.

"I'm fine," Tango insisted again. Then immediately was wracked by a sneezing and coughing fit, barely managing to find time in between to breathe. When he emerged, his throat hurt more than ever, his eyes itched like they were full of powder and his chest burned. He leaned over his knees, which were pressed against his chest, and panted for breath.

"Yes, I can see that." Even when he was concerned, his voice seemed to carry a laugh, like he couldn't help but find a joke in every detail. "Hey, I think I know something that could help!"

And, before Tango could say a word, the little faerie flew off.

"Well, that was... weird," Tango said to Torchy, who merely grumbled. He'd been thrown off Tango's head during the coughing fit, and was instead curling up on the rock that had sent Tango crashing to the ground minutes ago. Tango poked him. "Don't get too - ACHOO - comfortable. We need to get moving again. Just cause this faerie didn't steal our eyes, doesn't mean the next one won't."

"He's fetching something!" Torchy protested, like he was settling down for any reason that wasn't bedtime. "We should wait for him!"

"He's probably fetching a swarm to pick us apart piece by piece. We can't just hang around here." He glanced up at the trees. They just had to make it to there.

"Just a little further," Tango pleaded.

"Give me ten minutes," Torchy insisted. Seconds later, he was fast asleep.

"Oh you-" Tango reached out to grab the dragon by his tail to shake him awake, but was interrupted by Zedaph's voice.

"Here we are!"

Tango looked up to see the faerie flying over, his wings struggling to lift both his own body weight, and the small glass vial he was clinging to.

The vial was a good inch taller than Zedaph, and filled with a dark purple liquid. Tango didn't know where he'd gotten it, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

"What's this?" he asked instead, holding out a hand to let Zedaph drop the vial and land, giving his poor wings a rest.

"Medicine!" Zedaph looked proud of himself. "It should fix you right up!"

Tango frowned, looking at the liquid sceptically. "You want me to... drink it."

"No, I want you to pour it on your toes. Yes, I want you to drink it!"

Tango sighed, lifting the vial with his other hand so that Zedaph could stay where he was. He sniffed the medicine. It smelled... bad. Fake. Human.

He sighed. What did he have to lose, at this point? After only a second's hesitation, he downed the whole thing in one gulp, trying to get it out of his mouth as quickly as possible. Zedaph flew off his hand as his entire body jerked involuntarily at the taste of the stuff.

It tasted, somehow, even worse than it smelled. Like every piece of artificial food he'd been given over the centuries rolled into one disgusting mixture. Tango shuddered and hurried to pull a flask of water from his bag to wash away the taste, first rinsing his mouth and spitting out the water, than swallowing to clear his throat, as well.

"It's not that bad!" Zedaph protested in that strange, laughing voice of his.

"It definitely is that bad." Tango coughed. He didn't feel remotely different, better or otherwise. If anything, the swallowing had made his sore throat worse. "And it didn't even work!"

"Well, give it time!"

Tango huffed and started trying to get up again, but Zedaph flew right into his face.

"No, no, stay down until it kicks in!"

"I need to keep moving."

"We can keep moving in about twenty minutes. You might fall again if you get up now."

"I'll be fine."

"Tango."

Tango sighed. Closed his eyes. Took a deep breath that was sliced to pieces by another coughing fit. Wiped his runny nose. And leaned back onto his elbows.

Zedaph stayed with him, chatting away about something Tango paid no mind to. He was too busy trying to breath without coughing his guts up to listen to a word that was said.

Until finally, slowly, the pain lessened. His throat opened up entirely, all pain vanishing, and his nose dried up and stopped running. When he breathed, it was without the constant scratching he'd been dealing with all day, and he didn't even nearly cough.

Tango let out a jubilant, incredulous laugh. It had worked! It had really worked!

"That sounds promising." Zedaph flew back up to his face. "Feeling better?"

"Loads. How did you do that?"

"Secrets of the trade, my friend."

When Tango stood up, the only shakiness came from the exhaustion of walking for a full day. When he crouched down to wake Torchy, he didn't nearly collapse at all. Somehow, in twenty minutes, Zedaph had fixed him completely.

The faerie accompanied them when they started moving again, Torchy flapping along sleepily beside Tango's head.

The excitement was short-lived, however, because halfway to the trees, without any change in the weather, Tango was suddenly freezing. With shivering hands, he grabbed the coat that was still draped over the bag and pulled it on. Both Torchy and Zedaph watched him, confused.

Torchy settled on Tango's head, leaning forward so his face was upside down in Tango's vision. "Tango?"

Dragon's weren't built to be cold, and Tango was no exception. He could feel himself weakening by the second.

Zedaph went to land on Tango's hand, but quickly shot back up into the air.

"Holy moly! You're boiling!"

"N- no?" Tango frowned. "I'm freezing! Hence the coat, genius!"

He just had to make it to the trees. He could collapse there, when he wasn't so in the open. Just a little further.

"Maybe you should sit down," Zedaph suggested.

Tango shook his head, then stumbled, losing his balance. The whole world had tipped, leaning wildly to the right for a second.

"Maybe you should listen," Torchy told him, his claws clinging into Tango's scalp to stay on. He was still upside down.

"Just a little further," Tango muttered, his words slurring together. "Juss a lil-"

A figure appeared at the treeline, all the wrong shapes and sizes, built all wrong. It seemed to watch them, though it was impossible to tell properly from so far.

Zedaph spotted the figure at the same time as Tango, announced, "I'll go get help!" then zipped off at top speed towards the figure.

Tango took one step after him, then another, then went careening wildly forwards, just barely catching himself before he splatted. Torchy shrieked as he was flung off Tango's head, flinging out his wings to stay in the air.

Just a little further.

The next step had him falling to his knees. The world was still dancing circles around him, and now its corners were fading away to blackness.

He struggled to get back to his feet, but the best he could do was one foot before falling to the side as the world gave another sickening jolt. He stomach turned, and he leaned over and emptied its meagre contents onto the ground.

He was vaguely aware of someone calling his name, then two someones, as his vision faded completely to black.

The last thing he heard was a feminine voice gasping, "I'm sorey I took so long!"

Then everything stopped.

[previous] [next] [first]

[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]

1

[next]

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 firey 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 seperate 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.

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 anaesthetics 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 concensus 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 doorframe.

"More tests?" Tango frowned. He'd already sat through a whole host of tests this 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 indispensible.

It was Cub who had first combined the DNA of a pymgy 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 tantalising 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 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 hide the goati-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 labcoat in public."

Tango looked down at the labcoat 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 labcoat 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 black 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 components, and as much of Torchy's horde - a small collection of gears and springs - 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. 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 legs look far wider 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 this 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."

"Two days?! I can't walk two days!" Torchy protested, in his dragon language.

"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!"

Tango was the only person in the lab who could understand Torchy. Dragons, like so many other races, were born knowing the language, and Tango had inherited that ability. Torchy could both speak English as well, but he refused to. He'd been caught by the king of the time shortly after coming out from hiding, and had since taken every offence at the mere suggestion that he speak their language.

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 faeries 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.

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

"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 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 ready. This world was about to see what a Tek could do with freedom and a pocket full of seadust.

[next]

[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 that, 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 (these will be edited and added to as more information is revealed through story/asks).

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.

And now, for your enjoyment, the discord is up and running! Come say hi! :)

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Cub

Name: Cub Fan

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 Other markings- Small, tattered, feathery wings; sharp teeth

Abilities: Traces of death magic

Occupation: Head geneticist in the palace labs

Background: 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

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

Occupation: Head engineer at the palace labs

[post-apocalyptic-fantasy-au]

Torchy

Name: Torchy

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

Abilities: Fire breathing