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purgatory-is-life · 3 months ago

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Mechtober prompt 24/day 24-Hijacking

another one i mightve. gone a little insane with lol

@mechtober-2024

And The Walls Begin to Tear (Rending This False and Hollow Reality) - Reality666Rift999 - The Mechanisms (Band) [Archive of Our Own]

tw; cursing, disassociation, losing time, blood, sleep walking, marius gets kneecapped briefly, implied sex and a few sexual innuendos, like maybe one idk what u want from me im but a hapless ace, nightmares, probably more, let me know what i should add!!

---

Lyfrassir could not be more confused. Which was saying something, as they lived on a sentient starship with immortal pirates after watching their entire world get consumed by an outer god.

And yet, here they were, confused out of their mind.

They had been on their way to hang out with Brian in the cockpit, content to just work on their most recent knitting project while he flew and talked about anything and nothing, and yet…

They were in the artillery storage room. Somehow.

Admittedly, Lyf hadn’t been feeling the best, they’d had a persistent and annoying headache, and had been a bit dizzy, but that didn’t explain how they somehow got to a storage unit while on their way to the bridge. Aurora was very careful to keep the storage rooms away from high-traffic areas, a few too many instances of food getting destroyed half-way through a long haul trip, and Marius and Jonny eventually resorting to cannibalism for one reason or another made it abundantly clear it was too dangerous to keep the storage areas where everyone went regularly.

Lyfrassir had no idea how they got here.

Lyf looked around at the room, and went to speak, but Aurora beat them to it.

“Lyfrassir?”

Lyf jumped, looking around frantically for where the voice was coming from, spotting a speaker hiding in the corner. “A- Aurora…?”

“Yes. Are you alright, Lyfrassir?” The voice was almost robotic, and slightly glitchy, drawing out the vowels a bit longer than they should’ve been drawn out. Lyf had never heard Aurora’s voice, according to the others she hardly used it before they arrived, and she’d given up entirely on it shortly before they arrived at Yggdrasil. She preferred to communicate with her screens when she had to.

“I- yes, I’m fine– why am I down here? Did you bring me down here for something?”

“No, I didn’t…” Cold air blew into Lyfrassir’s face. “You stopped walking towards the bridge, and then my camera footage got incredibly corrupted in several rooms. When they cleared, you were here, staring at nothing. I have been trying to get your attention for twenty minutes.”

“…What the fuck,” Lyfrassir looked around again, tail swishing as their heartrate picked up. “What the fuck.”

“Are you alright, Lyfrassir?” Aurora repeated.

“I– I don’t remember coming here? I don’t…” Lyf wrung their hands anxiously, startling at the fact that they weren’t holding their knitting supplies anymore.

Aurora blew cold air at Lyfrassir again, creaking and groaning in concern.

They took a deep breath.

“Okay… Okay, this is… weird… But… This can be a problem for Future Lyf. How- how do I get out…?”

Aurora creaked, fans whirring with unsaid concern, but she lit up a light above the door, and Lyf left. They still had to keep Brian company, after all.

—--

The colors were overwhelming, swirling and squealing at the very thought of being perceived.

“Edda?”

They were singing, and that singing sounded so familiar, so warm.

“C’mon, this ain’t funny, Edda.”

Like their mothers and their father, it was comforting. Like their brother and their sibling, It was so warm.

It was calling.

They were calling.

“Edda! What the fuck is wrong with you?”

They wanted to reach towards it, but did they have hands? No, they weren’t real. They were never real, after all.

What were they, again?

“C’mon, the joke’s over, Edda!”

An extension of its will. That’s what they are. Just another piece of It.

“The fuck is going on right now, Lyfrassir?”

They are a Key, they are a Gate. Just a pawn in It’s great game.

The colors were so warm, so beautiful.

“Lyf?”

The Void was calling.

“Lyf!”

The Void was so warm.

“Lyf, please…! I-…”

Their family was there. The colors were so pretty, moving and swirling with minds of their own. They wanted to reach towards them, join the colors around them–

“Lyfrassir!”

Jonny snapped his fingers under Lyfrassir’s nose, snapping them out of their haze. They blinked blankly at him for a moment, before glaring.

“What, d’Ville?”

“What the fuck yourself, Edda. You were jus’ starin’ off into space and weren’t listening.”

“What? You were just telling me about your concert plans, I was listening.”

Jonny growled, rolling his eyes. “Now I know you ain’t paying attention, we moved on from concerts like, ten fucking minutes ago.”

Lyfrassir stared at him, eyebrows furrowed. “…What? But– hm…” Lyf turned away, picking at the skin on their lips. Jonny rolled his eyes.

“You’re lucky we don’t know shit about your immortality, otherwise you’d have a bullet in the head right ‘bout now.”

“I’m surprised you’ve been able to resist this long,” Lyf pointed out.

“Fuck off. I ain’t dealing with whatever Raph comes up with if you die-die.”

Lyfrassir flipped Jonny off at that. “Whatever. Just continue. Where were you?”

“Fine. So…”

—--

Ever since escaping Yggdrasil and the Bifrost, Lyfrassir had been experiencing nightmares. Screaming, the sounds of boiling flesh and shrill growls, and overwhelming rainbow aura’s that burned to look at. Squamous Things from deep within the Void, things covered in eyes and tendrils constantly releasing an ear-piercing shriek from their many mouths. Every night, scenes from the Black Box and reminders of the Bifrost played behind their eyes. And those nightmares only seemed to increase in intensity and frequency after they died for the first time.

They were not pleasant. And sometimes Lyf woke up from those nightmares sore and more tired than they were when they went to sleep, sometimes they had unknown bruises and scrapes (the injuries were at least usually easy to hide, never on their hands or face or tail. It was… almost odd, really, how the bruises were never visible when they were in their normal clothes…), and on very rare occasions, they woke up in a completely different part of the ship.

Usually, when they woke up in other parts of the ship, it was to loud, blaring alarms as Aurora creaked and shrieked at them. Aurora had expressed that it was hard for her to keep an eye on them, her video feed corrupting and glitching every once in a while, only getting worse whenever they lost time or woke up somewhere else. So sometimes, she woke up with Lyfrassir out of place, they were just staring or standing somewhere, rainbow-tinted hair floating aimlessly around the former-inspector, and Aurora had no idea when or how they arrived at the rooms they appeared in. And the most effective way Aurora had found to snap them out of their strange state, was to blare alarms. She had tried to flash the lights with the alarms a few times, but that often just served to make them further disassociate.

So usually, if they woke up in a strange, different part of the ship, it was to loud, blaring alarms.

This time, though, they woke up to soft, yet chaotic and discordant violin music. It was… surprisingly nice, working to drown out the call of the Void leftover from their dreams.

They blinked, attempting to clear the colors and chaos from their vision. As the colors edged away, only remaining on the periphery, Lyf watched as Baron Marius von Raum came into view, playing that discordant melody. His eyes were closed, eyebrows furrowed, as he focused on the song.

Lyfrassir felt a piercing pain behind their eyes, causing them to flinch. “Shit, fuck,” they mumbled, closing one set of their eyes and rubbing them. They tried to inhale, something stung as something warm started dripping from their nose. “Fuck!” They said, a bit louder, using their free hand to catch the thick, dark blue, slightly iridescent, blood. The noise caught Marius’s attention, and he opened his eyes. He smiled, not his usual manic grin, something different… Something a lot softer. He put his violin down, no longer playing that strange song.

“Ah, you’re back. I’m glad that worked… I wasn’t sure it would, actually. That–… Normally doesn’t bring me back.”

“What the fuck are talking about, von Raum?” Lyf asked, pinching their nose in an attempt to stop the blood.

“You were Lost, from what I could tell. I get Lost a lot too, though I bet it’s different for you…” Marius hummed. “Wow, you’re ah, you’re bleeding a lot.”

“Mm.” Lyf sat down, leaning against one of the Aurora’s many rooms. They looked around, trying to figure out where they were, but the colors at the edges of their sight seemed intent on making sure they had no idea where they were. “Where… What room are we in?”

“Hm? Oh, ah,” Marius looked around, “looks like our meat storage room. Or one of them, at least.”

The blood finally stopped flowing from their nose, and they let go of their nose, wiping their blood stained hand on their sleep-pants. “Hm.”

“Are you alright, Lyf? Do you– I can keep playing, if you think you might get Lost again.”

“Von Raum, what does that even mean? You keep saying that– I was ‘Lost’. What the fuck do you mean by that?” They snapped. Perhaps, they could have asked nicer, but they were tired and had a migraine forming quickly, they couldn’t think past the fog very well. Marius didn’t seem to mind too much, shrugging.

“I… I really can’t think of how to describe it. Funny, for a storyteller, right? I just… I get Lost a lot. In my Music. I thought, for a while, that the others understood, but I’m starting to think they don’t. They get a weird look about them whenever I bring it up. Hm…” Marius sat down opposite Lyf, fidgeting with his violin bow. “I– I live because of Music, I’m Marius because of that Music. Because it needed a Voice, a Player in the real world. It’s something like the Bifrost, I think. I don’t know. I’ve lived with that Music for my entire life, even before I was Marius. I can deal with it, because I’ve figured out how to deal with it– when to let it take over, when to ignore it, when to try to play over it. It takes me sometimes when I’m not paying attention, though. It’s a weird thing, Sound isn’t consistent, you know. But it is loud, and sometimes it’s hard not to get overwhelmed by it. Not to get Lost in it. That’s what I mean, you were Lost in your own thing. Probably the Bifrost, considering… I dunno what it’s like for you, but it’s never pleasant for me, and I figured you’d rather have something to guide you back out sooner rather than just leaving you to wander ‘round Aurora aimlessly till you found your own way out.”

Lyfrassir opened up their second set of eyes again, watching Marius carefully. Marius was picking at his flesh hand with his metal one. His violin had disappeared. “That’s…” Lyf wasn’t sure what they were going to say. They could probably say a lot of things, there were several thoughts running through their head in response. “That explains a lot. …Thank you, Marius,” they settled on.

“Of course! Like I said, though, I uh, I wasn’t sure it would work… Though it did for Zeze, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised…” Marius’s eyes glazed over, and he stared off into space for a few minutes. The silence was filled only by the occasional creaks and groans coming from the sleeping Aurora.

“What? Who’s…” They let their voice trail off, not wanting to put their foot in their mouth like they had so many times before with the Mechanisms. “Marius?”

The other jumped, tail flicking before he settled again. “Hm? Yes, Lyf?”

“Are you– alright? What was it you just said?”

“Hm? I just finished explaining getting Lost, didn’t I?”

“I… Sure, I suppose so…”

“Alright. Anyway, you going to be alright, Lyf?”

“I… I probably will be, yes.”

“Alright!” Marius stood up. “Then I’m going to head to my room. If you find yourself Lost again, or on your way to it, I’m just a knock away! Another time, Inspector!” and then Marius disappeared further into the sleeping starship.

—--

Lyfrassir was half asleep, warm and comfortable on top of Brian (he kept his lights on, dimmed but still on, when he slept, which was slightly odd to Lyf), content to just stay there forever…

…Only to have their one chance at comfortable sleep interrupted by a haunting, echoing violin song.

Lyf jumped at the noise, as Brian groaned. “What’s that noise?” Lyf asked.

“Sounds like Marius…” Brian said, still half-asleep sounding. “He does this sometimes. ‘M surprised it hasn’t happened sooner. Or, more recently, I guess…” the drumbot snuggled further into the bed. Lyf rubbed their eyes and sat up.

“Is he– why is he playing so late?” Lyfrassir yawned. “And why not in one of the music rooms?”

“‘S probably asleep…” Brian opened one eye, looking up at them. “Jus’ ignore him, he’s fine.”

“Did anyone ever tell you you get incredibly clingy after?”

“Jonny’s the clingiest…” Brian yawned. “But also the hardest to break down… If you don’t like violence as a love language…”

“Hm.” Lyfrassir was about to leave it at that, if Aurora didn’t groan loudly, and several doors slammed open.

“Shut the fuck up Marius!” Gunpowder’s voice yelled from the hall, which only served to make Marius’s mournful song get louder.

Brian heaved a heavy sigh, opening his eyes. “Okay, we should probably see what’s going on. Keep things from escalating too much.”

“As the only responsible two.”

“Ivy’s plenty responsible. Usually.”

“Eh. When she wants to be.”

“But she’s probably not going to wake up.”

“Tim if you don’t get that dumbass to shut the fuck up I swear to Space God–!”

“Okay, we really should go see…” Lyf stood up and Brian rolled out of his bed lazily. The two left the room, exiting into the hallway to observe what was happening. Jonny and Tim were both awake and holding their weapons, seemingly only being held back from killing Marius by Ashes, who was standing in front of them.

“He’s only just gonna get worse if you kill him,” the half-asleep quartermaster grumbled.

Lyfrassir turned and looked towards the not-a-doctor. He was playing loudly, a tune that sounded messy and all-over-the-place, but also… incredibly sad. A deep, unending sense of grief and mourning filled them as they listened to the tune. His eyes were distant and glazy, expression nearly blank, and he was walking very slowly down the hall. The further he got, the louder the music seemed to grow.

“Is– is Marius okay?” Lyfrassir asked. They watched in concern as he continued to play, not reacting to the noise around him.

“Yeah, he gets like this sometimes,” Ashes said. Raphaella exited her room, rubbing her eyes, while The Toy Soldier appeared from wherever it stayed. Aurora groaned loudly. “He’s not usually this loud, though,” Ashes growled. “Maybe wakes a few of us, pretty much never wakes ‘rora up, though.”

“Gets like…?”

“Plays in his sleep,” Brian explained further. “And wanders around. It is rare that Marius sleep walks, admittedly, but he plays in his sleep a lot.”

“…In his sleep?” Lyfrassir raised an eyebrow, turning towards Marius. Something about his demeanor seemed… familiar.

“It Really Is A Shame! You All Need Rest, Because You Are Mostly Biological Beings! Marius Is Not Being Very Considerate, Right Now.” The Toy Soldier pretended to sigh, crossing its arms.

“Yep,” Ashes said, sighing. The music got louder again. “This is an, unfortunately, common situation. And killing him doesn’t work, just makes him play louder and longer.”

Jonny managed to duck away from Ashes, pulling out a knife from seemingly nowhere. “I cannot fucking sleep with his damn racket!” Ashes reached out to grab him by the scruff, but Jonny managed to escape, and scurried over to where Marius was still lazily walking through the hall. “I’m gonna fucking kneecap this mother fucker and move him somewhere where he can’t fucking keep us awake.”

As Jonny went about taking Marius’s kneecaps, Lyf watched as Marius didn’t even notice, only playing that haunting tune. (The Colors hated the noise, and an anger not their own began roiling in their gut, which they promptly shut down and ignored.)

“He’s not asleep,” they said, realization dawning.

“What?” Brian was the only one who responded to them, the others still just irritated at Marius for disrupting their sleep.

“He’s not asleep,” Lyfrassir insisted.

“Yes, you said that, but what does that mean?”

“I… I don’t really know how to describe it? I think he’s explained it to me before but it’s… It’s strange and doesn’t make much sense if you don’t experience it. But he is not asleep.”

“Hm.”

“I’m–”

“If you know how to get him to be quiet and actually get some rest, feel free to try, Lyf,” Brian yawned, before placing a kiss on their cheek. “I’ll be here if you still want to cuddle later.”

“Mhm,” Lyf grinned and kissed him on the cheek. “I’ll find you when I get cold.”

Brian stuck his tongue out at them, before returning to his room. Lyf walked over to Jonny and Marius, the violin-playing not-a-baron now sitting limply against the wall, still playing that saddening song. Jonny had successfully acquired a new set of Marius-kneecaps, and was grumbling about his interrupted sleep.

“I can take him back to his room,” Lyf said, “you can go back to having a threesome with Ashes and Gunpowder.”

“Fuck off, Lyf,” Jonny grumbled. Still, he stood and started stomping back to his room. “Just so long as I don’t have to deal with him.”

Lyf sighed, as the other Mechanisms returned to their rooms or the rooms they had been sleeping in. “Marius?” The violinist didn’t respond. Lyfrassir sighed, and scooped him up in a princess hold. They walked back towards Marius’s room. “You’re– Lost, right? That’s what this is, it got too… Loud?” Marius still didn’t respond, but his playing got marginally quieter. Lyf kept talking, on the way to his room. “I– I don’t know how you pulled me out of it, and I know you said it never worked to play music for you. It just pulls you further in, right? I don’t know if talking will help, then, but I really don’t know what else to do. I don’t really understand this.”

Aurora opened Marius’s door, giving a hum, a question mark appearing on a screen.

“It’s fine, Aurora. He’s fine. I– I think, anyway. I’m new to this.”

Aurora creaked again in response.

“You can go back to sleep, we’ll be fine.”

Aurora groaned, but her noises started to quiet and lessen. Lyfrassir sat on Marius’s bed, starting to run a hand through his hair. It was knotted and matted, and Lyf wasn’t sure when the last time he’d brushed it out was. They wrapped their tail around Marius’s waist, clicking their tongue. “I don’t know what it’s like for you, besides what you said. I didn’t even realize what it meant, at first. The colors of the Bifrost, they’re all I see. I hear the call of the Void, it sings with my family's voices, begging me to come join them. Sometimes I don’t even know who or what I am. It’s like a dream. I think I mostly get– Lost when I’m asleep. Because I think it’s my nightmares that trigger it. It’s– it’s strange. I don’t like it. It’s weird to get Lost.”

Lyfrassir blinked as their hair started moving with wind that wasn’t real, the pearlescent stains started glowing. Marius’s song slowed down, head turning a miniscule amount towards the glowing colors. That gave them an idea. They pulled away, reaching behind and undoing the braids that had survived their night with Brian. The colors seemed to glow brighter, catching Marius’s attention, his grief-fueled tune slowly turning into something different, something a bit nicer. Lyf returned to running a hand through his hair.

“Is it the colors? Are colors the opposite of your Music?”

“Hm…” Marius purred quietly, but otherwise didn’t react outwardly much more.

“I think I can grow to like the stains. If it helps. Norns, I really hope you don’t remember that. I’m tired, okay? My filter isn’t working correctly.”

Marius just purred, the music turning to something that resembles a more coherent song, something that sounded a lot like ‘Loki’. Lyfrassir hummed in response, a purr coming from their own throat, seeking to comfort the not-a-doctor. Their purrs sounded completely different, due to how different their vocal chords were structured in comparison to each other and the purrs seeming differing intentions, but Lyf liked to think the purring was somewhat effective to help draw Marius out of his labyrinthine songs. Marius continued to play quietly, staring in utter fascination at the way Lyfrassir’s hair was moving and glowing, colors shifting.

Eventually, the light returned to his eyes and he stopped playing. Marius slumped against Lyf, and his violin disappeared. He stared up at them, confused.

“Ly-yf?” his voice sounded rough, hoarse and gravely. “Wha– what ‘re you doing ‘ere?”

“You were– Lost, I think,” Lyf explained, tightening their tail’s grip on Marius’s waist. “And you were waking everyone up.”

“Oh…” Marius’s eyes fluttered closed. “‘M sorry… ‘S hard to ignore, sometimes… It just takes what it wants…”

“Mm.” Lyfrassir continued running their hand through his hair, and his tail wrapped around them. “I think I get it.”

“Mm… Lyf?”

“Hm?”

“My knees hurt…”

“Yeah, Jonny stole them.”

“Oh… They do that a lot… ‘specially when I wake ‘em up…”

“They seem to relish any excuse to cause violence and harm.”

“‘S cause we’re the Mechanisms,” Marius mumbled, “‘nd violence is how we communicate. ‘S not healthy. As the doctor.”

“You’re not a doctor.”

“Of medicine, at least…”

“Are you going to be okay, Marius?” Lyf asked.

“I’ll be fine,” the not-a-baron replied. “Don’t worry ‘bout me. I think ‘m finally too exhausted to get Lost again.”

“I’m sure Brian wouldn’t mind if I bring you along to cuddle. He seems more open to cuddling just whenever than a lot of you.”

“Yeah, ‘cause it’s Bri, and he’s a touch starved dumbass…”

“You have no room to talk on that front.”

“Mm… Shut up…”

“Do you, though? Want to join me and Brian?”

“That… does sound nice…” Marius yawned. “You’re warm… Bri’s warm… makes a good scratching post, too… Yeah… That sounds nice.”

“Alright.” Lyf picked up the half-asleep violinist, and began heading back to Brian’s room. They bit their lip and swallowed thickly, before saying, “You know, if you ever start getting Lost like that again, I’m just a knock away.”

Marius smiled at that. “Thanks, Lyf…” he fell asleep before they even got to Brian’s room, but woke up comfortably squished between Brian and Lyf some time later. He smiled and snuggled in a bit closer to them, sighing. He could sleep for a little while longer.

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