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heartofsnark · 3 years ago

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Can You Feel The Sun? (Chapter Ten): Aint It A Gentle Sound, The Rolling In The Graves

Notes: Cyberpunk had consumed my brain, it is official, so have more fic. This and the next chapter are both uhhh heavy, the next chapter moreso in my opinion. So, please heed the warnings carefully.

Word Count: 10323

Chapter Warnings: Violence, gore, blood, suicidal thoughts/mentions, suicide baiting, physical assault/attacks, choking, depressive thoughts.

If you haven’t yet, you can read the previous chapter here!~

She heard him.

Doesn’t hear the breaths that rattle and shake her chest. Didn’t hear her own cries, her own curses. Couldn’t hear the thumping of trash as she climbed from the pit.

But she heard him.

“What?” It's but a whisper on her lips, staring at the man with blurry halved vision, and she can’t hear it.

Bile rushes up her throat, stomach churning as it tries to empty its contents. V rolls over to her hands and knees, retching into the mud and filth. Puke and blood heavy on her tongue, more blood than anything else. She spits the last of it out, pushing already blood matter hair from her face on instinct.

Then she moves her hand back further, to her ear, nothing in it, but she feels for a hearing aid. There has to be a logical explanation, why she heard him but not her own gagging. Why she heard him but not the wind whipping through the trash, why does she hear him.

No hearing aid, not even a broken remnant of it lodged in her ear, the other side the same. And her touching, she feels something else… The hole in her skull, part of her head open to the world. She feels the edge of bone, gore clinging to her digits and she doesn’t know what she touches beyond it, prodding at her flesh with filthy fingers. When she pulls her fingers away, she looks at the tissue, the fragment of bone, all sticking to her hand. How the hell is she alive?

And the man, she knows him, the memories and cyberspace. He should be dead too, Arasaka killed him…

“John...ny?”

She tests his name on her tongue, can feel the reverberation of it in her chest, but not hear it. V waits for a response, waits to hear him, to know she can again. But nothing. Maybe it was a fluke, maybe, an auditory hallucination. She twists to face him again.

“What the- what the fuck?”

He’s gone, was he ever there? Bullet to the brain, maybe he’s all a hallucination. Maybe the memories and cyberspace just long form hallucinations? That happens, right, why some people claim to see heaven? The brain hallucinates when deprived of oxygen...or maybe when a bullet goes through it, touching parts that shouldn’t be touched?

That’s it. That’s all it is. Hallucinations of a damaged brain. She needs a doctor, needs Vik. She gathers her strength, attempting to push herself back up on her feet, legs giving out as she hits her knees into the mud, digging her fingers into it.

Just stand up, just stand up and walk damn it. She screams at herself, then she sees something, a flash of movement in her blurry vision. At first just a shadowy figure standing amidst the trash. Focusing harder so she can make out who it is.

Dex starts to wander into the landfill, boots crushing through mud, towards her. Adrenaline spikes, anger in her center as she glares at his fuzzy figure. The man who killed her blew her brains out and threw her away like trash. She still has Yorinobu’s gun tucked into her belt.

V grabs the gun and suddenly she gets on her feet real fucking easy.

Maybe it’s adrenaline. Maybe it’s spite. But it makes her steadier and she knows if it’s the last thing she fucking does, she’s taking Dex down with her. She makes it halfway through the passageway through the trash and takes aim.

Dex’s eyes go wide, looking over her, she has no idea what she looks like. But she’s sure it’s horrifying, a walking corpse.

“H...fuck!?” her contact struggles to read his lips, but she tries to fill in the blanks, practically laughing.

“What’s wrong Dex, you come to see if you can get it right this time? Think you can manage to not fuck it up this time?”

“How...fuck...alive?”

“Bad news, apparently one of us has shit aim, Good news is it ain’t me.”

And she pulls the trigger, directly through the center of Dex’s head. Brains and blood spraying as he hits the ground, dead at her feet. And she expects to feel better, for her, for Jackie, for Bug. The man who set this shit show up is gone, the man who blew her brains out, would have Jackie’s too if he had the chance, is gone. But she just feels empty, body still a mangled mess and standing in a landfill.

Then she sees a flash of black fabric, a person. Before she can raise the gun or do anything, there’s a hand of flesh and chrome grabbing her wrist. Arm twisted and she’s yanked over, losing her balance, crying out as the gun falls from her fingers. The hand over where her blade would come out, when she tries to let it out it won’t budge under the grasp. She’s pulled back and towards them, back knocking to her chest as she struggles to fight a grip strong enough to crack bone if she let it. Their other hand is on her throat in a moment, tight and crushing as she’s pulled flush to their chest.

V gasps as the hand tightens, already damaged vision blurring further as she gasps for air. Calloused fingers and chrome digging into her windpipe, tears stinging her eyes. She scratches and claws with her bad hand, but can seem to get a grip on him. Held tight to their chest, she cranes her neck, fighting the hold on it and looking up with darkening vision to see him. The bodyguard from Konpeki, brown silver ringed eyes and long graying hair pulled back off his face. Metal etched face like stone as he strangles the merc.

What bit of strength and consciousness she regained is sapped quickly under his heavy hand, body starting to go limp as she starts to pass out. Then she’s thrown to the ground, on her hands and knees as she tries to break the fall; gasping desperately for air. She feels even weaker now, adrenaline fading, pain hitting her again. Why is an Arasaka fucker here? Who the hell sent him? Did Dex drag him here?

She twists to sit down, leaning against a rusted fridge as she touches her bruised throat. The guard stalks closer, shiny shoes walking through muck before he crouches down in front of her. Her contact subtitles start in Japanese before trying to translate what bits they catch from his lips.

“Arasaka-sama….found….father’s killer,” his eyes staring her down, “...her….no...doubt. Yes. Expect… hour.”

He’s going to drag her in, throw her to the non-existent mercy of Arasaka. Flashes of those memories, Johnny’s death, if it’s even real and not just a story from her damaged brain. But she remembers his death, the pain of what they did, every neuron on fire. Is that what they’ll do to her?

“Go fuck yourself!”

She gathers all the spit and blood in her mouth, she hopes traces of puke too out of spite. And she spits on him, right in his face, all she can muster. Spittle coats his bearded face and she feels a moment of sick satisfaction, no matter how small.

“Quiet!”

He backhands her, a sharp slap that forces her head to move. Then he wipes her spit off on his sleeve. Her vision blurs, consciousness threatening to slip away as she feels his hands lifting her up. The world going dark for a moment as she’s carried away by the bodyguard.

When the world returns for a brief moment, she’s in a passenger side seat, laying against the leather. The driver side door opens and she watches as he sits behind the wheel, for a moment his eyes linger on her. His nose wrinkles in disgust as they start to drive out of the landfill.

“...smell...shit.”

She wants to cuss him out, but she can no longer summon the energy. Blood loss catching up with her. If she’s lucky, she’ll die before she ever sees the inside of an Arasaka interrogation room. They can play with her corpse to their heart’s content, as long as they don’t get anything from her. Her eyelids are heavy, the world going dark again.

It’s a sharp pain that brings her back, a choking gasp for air as her entire body convulses, pulling at raw nerves and muscles. The UI in her contact blinks system malfunction, blurring distorting, glitching already damaged vision. Every part of her seizing, she has to remind herself to breathe, tell her heart to beat.

Chrome etched fingers push an airhypo into her hand, the guard is twisted up behind the wheel, holding at his stomach. He’s hurt, but how? Why is he giving her first aid? It could be a trick, but she takes that risk, knowing she’ll die without something anyway. She wraps bloodied twitching fingers around the airhypo and punches it directly into her chest, a needle of medication plunged into her system. A brief booster of relief. Her lungs able to breathe, pain numbing for a moment, muscles relaxing.

The wind is whipping as he drives. An orange sky around them, car driving down a a highway, the sun just starting to come up. Beautiful for a moment.

tHE she goes to toss the hypo container out of the convertible, throwing it right into the face of a man driving a motorcycle up along side of them. His eyes an intense red, optic glow. Dressed in Arasaka uniform, his eyes on her. Friends of the bodyguard? The motorcycle accelerates, moves in front of them, then the man pulls a gun. Another motorcyclist races past the drivers side. Glass shatters as bullets blast the windshield. A third one weaving into the fray. The long haired guard punches the gas, ramming into the back of one of the bikes. It sparks and flames, sending it’s rider flying before the motorcycle rolls off the windshield over their head.

The hell is going on? Why is he fighting his own men? Why are they fighting him? A black and red gun is pushed into her hand, the intention clear without words. Half blind, half dead, but hopped up on a booster; she takes aim.

Its not her best work, firing at the cyclists. She focuses on the one lingering towards her side, closer to them. She aims for tires first, bullets sparking and pinging off the bike, but not quite make the impact she needs. V tries hard, tries to focus harder on his head, trying to land a headshot as the pair continue to shoot at the car. The movement of which does nothing to help.

His motorcycle starts to flame up, streaks of red flickering as he rides. When it stalls in the middle of the highway, the long haired guard hits the gas harder, catching the front of it and destroys it, sending him across the road.

They get neck and neck to the other rider, cold red eyes glaring at them before drifting off to another lane, picking up speed before he guns it back towards them, slamming the bike into the side of the vehicle. Knocking the car off course, they slam into oncoming traffic, head on into someone else's car. But the long haired man doesn’t slow down, swerving pack into their lane, too quick, as he ends up half on the curb. The side of the car scratches an NCART stop as the guard turns them around; driving in reverse to face the motorcyclist. He drives head on towards them and V starts shooting again, trying to get clear aim.

One lucky shot hits where she needs, bike combusting and rider flying. As breathing gets harder for her, her muscles start to tighter, pain in her...everything starting to come back. The boost of adrenaline from the hypo is fading. And another motorcycle comes speeding at them, riding through the dust and smoke of the former. How many are there?

The bodyguard starts to turn the car back around, a vehicle merging clips against them, sending the civilian car right into the path of the motorcycle. He hits the hood of it, motorcycle sparking and man sent flying, but he leans into the launch of it, mantis blades extending from his arms as he lands on the back of their car.

And the flames weren’t just from his bike, he’s more metal than flesh. Charred remains of skin giving way of the metal bones beneath. He sweeps his blades back and forth, the rock of the car and the heat of fire on his skin making his aim messy, just missing their heads. He flips to the front, clinging to the grill of the car as the bodyguard drives.

Mantis blades sink into the hood as the man starts trying to climb his way up and to them, a flaming metal skeleton with half melted skin. She desperately tries to shoot him off as he pulls himself forward, a turn pushing him back, but the grip of his blades through the metal stays. He just nearly reaches, swiping a blade out but a swerve of the car makes him miss. A blade hooks into the dashboard in front of her and he punches out the other, stabbing between them.

“Traitor!”

Her contact reads the words on the man’s lips, clear as day. The long haired guard, Saburo's own bodyguard; a traitor?

The car smashes into the bottom of a billboard, cracking and buckling. Her head slams against the dashboard, darkness swimming through her vision, consciousness fading, she’s not sure how much more she can handle. She blinks, but maybe it was more than a blink, the long hair guard gone.

Then her door opens, hands hook beneath her arms and she’s dragged out of the car, across the road. Taking in the crash. Pinned between the car and a pole, the flaming metal exoskeleton of a man convulses, mouth opened in what looks like a scream, maybe he still has nerve endings. His body is crushed, his bladed arms swinging out.

Hands leave her body, the guard crouching in front of her, his movements slow. He’s injured too, clutching at a bullet wound. She tries to focus on his lips.

“Do not pass...again.”

“No promises…” She croaks out.

“...eyes...open…”

Her eyes drift to whats left of the other man, still struggling, still pinned. She levels the gun with his head as best she can, pulling the trigger and putting him out of any pain he may be in. Or may she’s simply saving her own ass by killing a witness. She’s not entirely sure. The bodyguard takes the gun from her hand, looking at her like he’s caught a child misbehaving. She lets out a soft laugh.

Bleeding out on the highway, skull caved in, a mangled corpse. And she laughs. Maybe her and Jackie aren’t that different, maybe he’d be proud of her…maybe.

“We both...medical attention. Do...know...ripperdoc… trust?”

“Vik Vector.“

“Must...quickly,”

“He can help, he’s the best.”

“Have...get...somehow. Call...anyone.”

“He’s behind Misty’s Esoterica in Watson, you’ll get there faster without me… I’m...not...gonna…”

“Make the call.”

He speaks slow and clear enough, the contact translating perfectly. He’s got no reason to want to save her, she doesn’t know what his game is. But, she sends a call through her holo, to Delamain. She doesn’t know why that’s the first thing to come to mind, maybe the cab will tell them to fuck off, the ride paid for by Dex after all. But the taxi service is the first thing that comes to mind. The avatar comes up in her contact.

“Greetings, my scanner indicates you are outside the service area.” The contact reads him clearly, maybe the holo feeding subtitles better.

“Pick me up, please… I have to get to Vik’s clinic, behind Misty’s Esoterica,” she tells him, her eyelids starting to grow heavy again.

“Of course,” he agrees with no hesitance, “a vehicle en route. It should arrive in less than twenty minutes.”

And her eyes close, blinking and eyes going dark again. It feels like only a moment.

But when she opens her eyes again, she’s in a Delamain, stretched across the backseat with her head in the guard’s lap. He’s leaning over her, able to see through blurry vision, the heavy gray around his temples and the blood splattered across him. His hands are pushing through her hair.

“Please proceed to insert the jack below the ear, though not too deep. There should be auxiliary neurosockets between her lymph nodes, beneath the SCM muscle.”

The subtitles filter across her contact, Delamain by the choice of words, but she’s not reading his lips. Unable to look directly at his AI avatar, she's not sure how, but doesn't have the energy to question it. The guard holds a jack between his fingers, brows furrowing for a moment.

“...hit vein...mistake...die.”

“As she will if you do nothing.”

“I think I have the socket…”

“Now proceed to connect.”

The world goes dark again, V barely able to stay conscious for more than a moment. This is it, she’s really dying. So much for laughing in the face of it and making Jackie proud.

And when she opens them again she’s being pulled from the back of the car, the guard’s hands hold her. His grip is slipping, barely able to lift even her small frame, he’s hurt badly. Familiar hands interrupt, stronger in this moment, a ripperdoc glove on one hand. Vik pulls her from the cab easily lifting and holding her. He starts to walk away with her, the Arasaka bodyguard starting to follow, but his steps are staggering.

“Can’t..”

Then he’s falling, hitting the ground of Vik’s garage, his back leaning against the Delamain cab as he clutches at his bleeding arm, his face starting to go gray. V can feel the reverb in Vik’s chest, cracked open skull leaning against it as he calls out.

And it feels like a blink. Just a moment, a bit of darkness, but the world has shifted again. A bright bright white light glows over head, she’s on Vik’s operating table, the ripper doc standing over her.

“It’s neurogenic shock, she’s dying,” Delamain’s subtitles come across her contact.

Tears burn at her eyes. This is it, she’s really dying, after all this trouble. She’ll bleed out in Vik’s chair. Vik’s lips move, but the contact reads nothing, only a blip. He twists and turns her face where he needs her.

“There is risk of-”

Vik cuts the taxi cab AI off, but she doesn’t know what he says, light too bright to see anything else. Only able to catch the movement of it. And she’s been expecting this, each moment since Dex shot her feeling like her last. But this has to be it the end, heart slowing again, eyelids heavy again. Her skull has been cracked open, brain exposed to trash and air for the past several hours. She’s been bleeding out for god knows how long. She was never going to make it out of this, was never meant to.

A billion thoughts dance in her head, of Jackie, of all that’s happened. She reaches out and grabs Vik’s shirt, bloody fingers twisting into the blue of his shirt. Her grasp is weak, but Vik stops when he feels the feeble little pull on his clothes, looking down on her. And he looks so scared, green eyes wide as he stares down at her.

“I’m sorry…”

Its all she can think to say, she’s sorry. She’s sorry about Jackie. She’s sorry she didn’t listen to Vik. She’s sorry she took the job. She’s sorry she couldn’t save him. She’s just sorry.. And she hopes Misty hears it, hopes it gets back to Mama Welles. Hopes they know she’s sorry, hopes they know she tried…

And it all goes dark again, that void that welcomes her time and time again. She doesn’t expect to come out of it, truly she doesn’t. Stuck in the dark for who knows how long.

For a moment the world comes back, mind fuzzy, she can see Misty checking something. Wants to reach out and touch her, say something. But her body won’t move, her mouth dryer than the desert. That Arasaka guard is in Vik’s other chair, Vik working on him. And she blinks again.

Vik is at his work bench, watching a boxing match. Her clothes are changed, her skin cleaner than it was before, her vision glitching but no longer halved. Does she still have contacts in? The question is foggy in her brain, barely formed before she’s falling into darkness again.

The guard and Vik are standing before where she lays. How much time has passed? The long haired bodyguard looks healthier now, healed up, dressed in white. Not a trace of blood on him, no more gray in his face.

“How is she?” Subtitles form across her vision, clearer than usual, able to pick it up at a further distance.

“Slower on the mend than you, but lookin' better every day.”

Day… has it been days? Her eyes are drifting shut again, unable to keep them open for long. But the void doesn’t greet her this time, instead fuzzy dreams...memories. Being on a stage, being at a nomad camp. Sometimes she’s her. Other times….

Her eyes open again. And this time the Arasaka guard is closer, hands fussing with something. Touching her shoulder, her skin. He pulls away after a moment, then taps her shoulder, a heavy pap against her flesh. Then she’s gone again.

Dreams and memories drift into each other.

Drinking in some shitty bar with Misty and Jackie, capping the night off with booze as they talk let loose after a week of shitty jobs and annoying customers, She throws back her favorite bourbon and cherry coke, but it turns to tequila in her mouth. Shot glass hitting the table, Misty and Jackie replaced with Kerry and Rogue, snickering as she grabs another shot.

Vik repairing a knife wound in her gut, teasing her nose for trouble, but when he goes to turn he becomes Milt, a man she knows, though she doesn’t know why. He’s replacing her liver for the third time that month, tells her she needs to cool it on the booze.

Entangled in the sheets with Sabrina, a short lived flame. But when they twist to roll over, its not Sabrina looking up at her. A blonde with freckles across her nose and soft green eyes instead of the dark haired woman V thought she could love.

She’s on stage, screaming lyrics into a mic and the noise doesn’t bug her, she screams her rage, her message. But fingers meet guitar strings and the world shifts, electric axe becoming acoustic. A dirty club becomes a tent and instead of playing to a crowd she’s in her mother’s lap, mom humming Rhiannon as she teaches the young nomad to play.

Busting through the doors to Arasaka tower, nuke on her back, but the doors open to Yorinobu’s suite, Jackie shushing her to stay quiet. As if she’s ever struggled to be quiet.

She’s got a blade in the side of Konpeki Plaza, grabbing Jackie, but the moment her hand wraps around his wrist she’s the one dangling, holding onto Rogue as she dangles above Arasaka Tower.

Sometimes who’s in what memory switches, changes. Sometimes it’s her setting off the nuke in Arasaka, painted nails clicking against the bomb. Sometimes it’s tattooed and silver hands softly correcting Jackie’s sign language.

It all blurs and blurs and blurs until she’s not sure who did what. Who’s the deaf merc and who’s the rocker who nuked a tower? And her head aches to keep track, to know who she is, the pain building and building which each twist of it, each change in those dreams that muddy the waters of who she is and who he is. Until the pain is overwhelming.

“Argh ahh, fuck!” She gasps and screams out, waking up in agony. She grabs and clutches at her head, trying to soothe it.

Hands come and touch her face, looking up at Vik, eyes kind as he slides a spare pair of hearing aids on her. Able to hear her own panicked breathing as Vik soothes his hands across her jaw.

“V? You in there?” he asks her, his wording strange, who else would she be?

“Vik..” she speaks and signs, hands trembling and voice rough, her vision still glitching and distorting. Her torso is wrapped in bandages, a pair of pajama pants on her for modesty. There’s more bandages wrapped around her head, down her forearm. There’s no markings of the mantis blades on her right arm.

“How you feeling?”

“Everything hurts...visions...do I have contacts in?”

“Yeah… lots to discuss, kid,” he says, swallowing hard and crossing his arms, “had to install optics on you…”

“What?” Her eyes are gone, replaced with tech, just that easily. The eyes she sees through no longer the ones genetics or her father gave her, but corp created metal.

“Bullet damaged the optic nerve, I had no choice, I-”

“I know,” she says, arm and hand too sore to sign, Vik would never install them if it wasn’t necessary, she trusts that.

“On a brighter note, switched you to the projectile launcher.”

“Huh?” She checks her left arm, indentations of chrome, similar but slightly different from the mantis blades.

“The blades work best together, I would have just repaired the right and spruced up the left, but… when the blade ripped out, the muscle was damaged beneath it. It can’t support anymore cyberware, to install a new blade in it, I’d have to remove the full arm. Figured, be better to give you the tech you wanted more, anway.”

“I owe you, a lot, seriously. May...take longer to pay you back than I thought.”

“That’s, uh, that’s not the most important thing right now. V, what do you remember?”

“Dex… shot me and then I started seeing things…” She explains, sitting up a little straighter and pulling her knees closer, body aching at the movement.

“These...hallucinations, describe ‘em to me.”

“There’s a lot, it’s like, I’m someone else, but still me. Seeing someone else’s life. I’m on stage in some grimey little club, bright lights. I start playing, screaming into the mic, letting out my hatred...screaming out a message. Got something to say, desperate for anyone to listen. Then I finish the set and… head my ass to Arasaka Tower, nuke the whole damn place… I don’t know if it was a dream or. I know it sound’s ridiculous.”

“Not ridiculous at all, kid,” Vik tells her, nodding along and sitting down, fiddling with his glasses, a nervous tic she’s rarely seen.

“Night City looked different, older and I hated it. Then… they killed me, Arasaka scorched me with something, every nerve frying. It felt real, so- so fucking real, I knew it wasn’t me but it felt like it. Never had a dream like that…”

“You weren't dreaming, V. Those were memories. There's a personality construct on that shard, Dreams you had were from his past.”

She blinks, processing the words for a moment. That makes sense, when she thinks about it. Commercials for the relic advertised it as a storage for a person’s engram, something akin to an imaginary friend. It didn’t cross her mind in the moment, but logically Jackie and her should have seen someone with the chip slotted in… Right? But either way, she had a chip with someone’s intel, she got fucked up and maybe the chip activated, triggered, and showed her whoever was on it. Johnny… who gives a fuck.

“Okay, so, it was just the chip… Where you put it?” It may be too hopeful, but if the chip is in good enough shape, Vik is savvy enough, he may have had a container that would work. If so, she may be able to get in contact with Evelyn. Close the deal, for Jackie.

“V… I…”

“Did it get destroyed?” She reaches up to her chip slot, without thinking, touching her fingers against it.

“Don’t touch it,” Vik yells out, calloused fingers wrapping around her wrist just as she feels the edge of something in her chipslot. He didn’t pull it, which is odd enough, but why is he so worried of her doing it?

“Why? Something wrong, if the chip is fucking with me, I can just pull it out, right? No harm, no foul.”

“It’s not that simple, V.”

“What do you mean, it’s not that simple? Its just a shard, a chip like anything else.”

“Not quite, you two're connected in a way I can't make head or tail of.”

“Connect- what do you mean, me and who?”

“Johnny Silverhand. A terrorist - real talk o' the town back in my day,” he lets out a heavy sigh, leaning forward , “ Anyway, that's not what's important right now….”

And there’s something in the way his body language changes, the shift in expression. She’s seen him worried to death, seen him nag her time and time again. Tell her in a thousand different ways she had to stop knocking on death’s door or it’d start knocking back. But he barely meets his eyes now, face drained of color, like he’s the one who took a bullet. If she didn’t know any better, she’d think he was about to cry.

“So, new eyes, new chrome, and reliving a terrorist’s life; none of that's important. So, what exactly is?”

“You, uh, don't got a lot of time left, kid,” he tells her, voice cracking in a way she’s never heard.

“Wha-what do you mean?” She’s hurting sure, that’s to be expected, but she doesn’t feel like she’s on death’s door, not anymore. She should be out of the woods now.

“ The biochip… It's basically a bomb, fuse lit already. You don't have much time left, much… life. A few, maybe six months tops. Silverhand's construct is overwriting your consciousness - gradually taking over your body until one day you'll just be… gone”

He can only meet her eyes for a few words at a time, blinking and looking away each time his eyes start to look watery. V’s breath catches in her throat, Vik’s words pinging around her skull. She believes him, no reason not to, he’d never lie about something like this. Hell, she doubts he’d ever lie at all. Death has teased her relentlessly all her life, but never so much as it has in this past...day, weeks? Since Dex shot her, moment after moment of thinking she’d met her end. Each time convinced it was the end, that she’d bleed out in a motel, thrown away in landfill, die in Vik’s chair.

But this… this isn’t what she imagined. A bullet, a knife wound, a quick hack, someone’s chrome; all things she could see taking her. Bleeding out in an alley, in a car, shot point blank dying before she hits the ground. Those are merc deaths, the kind of death that’s been awaiting her. Culled at the hands of her family, a quick clean captive bolt shot to the skull.

Becoming someone else, mind twisted and warped, a terrorist taking her place. Her brain and being carved away to let someone else take root. Is it even a death? Or just ceasing to be? Rewritten, reworked, turned into someone new. A terrorist, a rockerboy; taking her place, wearing her like a cheap suit.

Vik rubs at his forehead, refusing for another moment to make eye contact, giving her a moment. Letting this settle in or maybe he’s just trying to collect himself, after another beat of silence he meets her eyes again.

“V. It's important you get all this,” he tells her, but, Vik can help her. He’s the best, pulled miracles out of nowhere, for fucks sake, he pieced her head back together. The fact she’s here right now means…

“That’s okay, you’ll fix me up. Right, Vik?”

And his face falls, a quiver in his jaw, “If I could, I would, V, believe me. But this is… Way beyond what I know how to do.”

“You're the best of the best, Vik,” her voice is higher than she wants, shakier than she’d like, as he puts his head in his hands again, “Why can't you help me?”

“Want the long story or the short?” He sits up straighter, takes in a deep breath, trying to pull himself together.

“I want- I need to know everything, Vik, what’s happening to me?”

“OK. There was, is, a construct, a psyche on the chip. That of Johnny Silverhand. You jacked it in your chipslot. Nothing happened, right? Until you died.”

“Shot point blank by Dex Deshawn...how…”

“Low caliber - you lucked out. Not least thanks to another poor decision by Mr. DeShawn. The nannites off the chip started fixing the damage. Biochip revived and... short-circ'd you. Started uploading data into your head. As far as it was concerned, your brain was an empty vessel that needed to be filled by the engram it was carrying.”

“But-but, I’m here, this is me. I’m me, I-”

And he nearly breaks, she can see it in him, A grown man, old enough to be her dad, looking down like a kicked dog. Like he’s about to break down in tears and when did she start crying? Her eyes stinging, tears running hot down her cheeks, she doesn’t know when the dam bursted, when her voice started sounding so pathetic. But...this is her, she’s here, she doesn’t want to become someone else…

“The shard doesn't read, it writes. Headache of yours? It's the biochip rewiring your neural pathways, building new neural structures, doing away with the old. From the biochip's perspective, your brain cells are a tumor that needs to be scooped out, while your body's an empty shell to hold the construct. You’re….just a cancer, an intruder.”

An intruder, a cancer in her own fucking body. It’s almost poetic, if it wasn’t so infuriating. Her body trying to destroy itself for years and now this chip is joining the fight, like her body was never meant to be her’s. But it is, this is her. Years under someone else's thumb; she fought for the right to herself, her body, her life. And now some wannabe rockstar is out to ruin that?

“So, that’s it? Johnny What’s His Fuck is out to kill me? Booting me out of my own damn body and taking my place?”

She tries to turn it into anger, blaming him, because who else does she blame? Anger is easier, safer, she can work with anger better than the anguish in her chest, the tears soaking her face.

“It's not willful on his part. It's automatic, inevitable. And neither of you can stop it.”

The finality makes her choke. Nothing to do. Nothing to stop it. This is happening. All she can do is wait to rot inside her own body, wait for the moment where Johnny claims it as his own. She’ll be gone, wiped, the world forgetting she was ever part of it. Just a weak little merc killed by her own body, never truly meant to be here in the first place.

“Ca-can’t we just take it out? Turn it off-I, something?!”

“Either way's out of the question. You'd die, immediately.”

“What do you mean?” “Chip saved you… it’s killing you, but, it’s also the only thing keeping you alive. Without it keeping your brain going… life support and a death sentence, all in one. “

“Vik, you’ve always come through for me, there’s nothing you can’t do. If-if you can’t help...what-what the hell do I do? Please… I,” Vik stands up, looks at her like she’s already gone, arms crossed over his chest, “Vik?”

“I wish I knew, kid.” And he turns his back to her, walking away.

“Vik?”

“Misty!” He calls the woman’s name half in a yell and half in a sob, breaking down.

For a moment she’s left alone, wiping tears from her eyes. The look on Vik’s face trapped in her mind, looking at her like she’s already dead and this is her funeral. Looking at her like a wounded dog. Like her mother and sister did when she lost her hearing. Pity, despair, mourning what’s been taken. And she cries into her hands, because this time it’s not her hearing. It's her everything. Years of trying to feel like she had an ounce of fucking control, just for it to be taken. Years of searching for a place in this world, for the world to tell her one never existed. Her own brain reworking itself to be anyone else, even a terrorist.

There’s a creak of wheels against the floor, a wheelchair being pushed into her peripheral vision. Misty’s pushing it towards her, V doesn’t lift her head to make eye contact, just watching the chair wheels spin.

“You're askin' too much from an old-timer like Vik,” Misty speaks softly, touching V’s hand and the merc finally meets her gaze, “C'mon, V, let's get you home.”

Misty helps V into the wheelchair, the merc’s legs shakier than she expected, and she curses under her breath. She hates it, needing the help, needing Misty’s hands to steady her. Feeling weak. But Misty helps her happily, wheeling her out the garage of Vik’s clinic to a car. Misty tucking her into the passenger seat and helping buckle her seat belt when the merc’s hands are too clumsy.

V watches the world go by as Misty drives, looking at the city that passes by. A world, a city, she wanted a place in. That she wanted to respect her, to know her. A world she wanted to matter in, to prove she was strong, to feel like she meant something. And now she’ll just vanish from it, with no one caring. A world that will never miss her, because it never knew her to begin with.

And a part of her wants to climb across the console and into Misty’s lap, to throw her arm around the older woman and sink there. To hug someone who to some extent, if only because of Jackie, cares about her, who maybe, just maybe she matters to. But for a billion reasons, ranging from the fact Misty’s driving to the fact she can’t imagine why Misty would ever want to hug her. While kind, V can’t imagine anyone wanting to curl up with the person who got their boyfriend killed. V promised to keep him safe and couldn’t.

“You wanna talk, V, about what happened?”

V doesn’t respond right away, unsure of what to say, there’s so much swimming in her head. So many words that just die on her tongue. Does she talk about Jackie, does she apologize? Does she act selfishly, talk about what’s happening to her? It’s all a mess. Then they’re pulling into the parking garage of V’s building. Misty gets the folded up wheelchair out of the back of her car, holding a bag with V’s belongings in it, bringing them to the passenger side. The older blonde opens V’s door and helps her into the chair, wheeling her to the elevator.

The doors to the elevator close, ads playing across the screens, V fiddles with the fabric of the sweatpants that Vik put her in. She tries to speak, words don’t come out. She tries to sign, her fingers clench but don’t move beyond it. The elevator shaking as it takes them up to V’s floor.

“Its-it’s all so hard to make sense of…” she finally says, just being honest, as the doors open and Misty wheels her down those dirty halls.

“I know it is, sweetie, you’ve been through so much.”

“We were just stealing the chip and then everything… went to shit…. And, and, then he died and I thought I was gonna die too with him in my sleep...if that’s what it was, like I was dreaming but...not.”

“Sleep's a… Small hint of death, the inevitable,” Misty tells her as they reach V’s door, the older woman scooping up a box by the door as the merc unlocks it.

Memories of her door fucking up flicker around her head, Robert Linder… No… that’s not possible. They hadn’t even touched Konpeki yet, but she swears she knows that name. That it’s him, his birth name. Robbie, Robert, before finally settling on Johnny. Her throat feels tight, chest constricting, how is that possible. Then Misty is pushing her through the doors.

“I-I can't actually tell if I'm awake now, right now. Nothing feels real, I mean, I could be dead already, right?”

“Not something to think about right now, V,” Misty tells her, stopping the chair by her bed, before coming to stand in front of her, “Here, got some meds for you.”

There’s two pill bottles in Misty’s hands, blue and orange. She crouches down in front of V, meeting the merc’s eyes without looking down at her. Misty rattles the blue pill bottle.

“Omega blockers - taken regularly, they'll keep things from progressing too quickly. Also, they should keep that guest of yours calm, quiet.”

Quiet. Because she’s going to see him, going to hear him, already has. The memory of hearing his voice, seeing him above her in the landfill. She’s not alone in her own head and putting him in a chemical straight jacket is all she can do. She takes the blue bottle from Misty, shaking the pills around inside, her only hope of squeezing out even six more months of life… before she becomes someone else.

“Pseudoendotrizine's from me,” Misty shakes the orange bottle, “Effect'll be opposite. It'll speed things up, free the demon, so to speak.”

V takes the second bottle from Misty, shaking them around, as the older woman stands. Suicide pills… Misty is giving her a way to kill herself, only instead of getting to go to sleep and never wake up, it will speed him up. Rewrite and rework her. Death without the dignity of a true end, one day she just won’t be her. She’d rather bleed out, rather have been left to rot in that landfill. At least then she would have died as herself. Least she wouldn’t have to watch and feel as she becomes someone else, as she loses everything that makes her, her. And Misty wants to speed it up… wants to watch her die quicker…

“Giving me a pill to kill myself… so I can die faster…” V’s broken little voice comes out and she see’s Misty’s eyes go big for a moment, soft and looking at V like a dying animal. Just a sad little thing to be pitied.

“Listen, you're likely to be fine for a while. But some time down the road. It could turn into pure agony. I'm givin' you options, honey.”

“I have painkillers...I-”

“Your psyche's gonna die, V. You'll feel… your old self slipping away. At some point, you won't recognize yourself. It'll be terrifying. It'll be painful. But it doesn't have to be.”

V nearly cries, but forces it back, thinking of the road ahead of her. The finality in Misty’s voice echoing Vik’s. So, why is she here, six months of suffering? If she’s lucky. She should have been left to die, least then it’d be a quicker one. A real one, instead of just becoming a stranger in her own body, instead of being rewritten, replaced.

“Might as well just blow my brains out, be easier.”

Misty shakes her head, “Well, that way you'd kill two souls. Is that what you want?”

And maybe she does. Maybe she doesn’t. V isn't quite sure of the answer, herself. She just doesn’t want to hurt like this, doesn’t want to be here in this moment. Doesn’t want this. A clean death is easier, instead Vik pieced her back together just so she could suffer. She thinks of laying down in the landfill, before she saw him, and wishes it back. To lay down in the muck, a bleeding mess, and never get back up.

“I think...I need to lie down,” she says, her bed never looking so tempting. V pulls herself from the wheel chair and sits down on her bed, legs over the edge as she just feels herself sink into her mattress for a moment. After a moment, she feels Misty sitting down next to her.

“Here,” Misty holds something in her hands, soft green eyes looking at V, “got one more thing for ya. Vik pulled this outta your skull.’

Misty gently pulls on V’s wrist, touch gentle as she makes the merc roll her hand over and presses a necklace into her palm. A circular pendant on a chain, wires suspending a bullet in the center of it. The merc rubs her fingers over the metal, the bullet that killed her.

“Wha-?”

“A lucky charm?”

“Haven’t you heard, I got a terminal case of bad luck.”

“Don't be silly. As long as you're alive, there's hope. And don't let anyone tell you otherwise.”

Misty says that and a part of V believes she believes it. But she said not moments okay, with that same confidence that V is going to die. And the merc can’t help but wonder if Misty even knows which one she believes more. How could V possibly stop this? Vik doesn’t even know what he’s looking at, how the hell could she? Her brain is destroying itself, turning itself into someone new. How do you stop that?

“Really think I can survive this?” V asks, just wanting to know how Misty really feels, if there’s any hope in this situation.

“'Course you can. I mean, you did already die and come back once, didn't ya?”

“Technically...I guess.”

“Promise you'll try to get some sleep?” Misty pats her thigh and starts to get up.

“Misty, wait, um I, about Jackie...” She tangles her fingers in Misty’s sweater, voice catching, she can’t let her go without saying something about him. Misty sits back down.

“Yeah?”

“I’m, I’m...I’m so fuckin’ sorry, I…”

“V… “

“I can’t believe he’s gone… It doesn’t feel real…” Tears burn at V’s eyes, falling down her cheeks with a blink.

“Jackie… was special. Really spiritually rich. He touched so many people with his love. Don't worry, he'll be around. I don’t think… we ever truly lose the people who meant something to us, a part of them always stays with us, ya know?”

“Maybe… he… talked about yout lots, you know that? He loved you to pieces.”

A soft smile starts to pull at Misty’s black painted lips, before it falls again, fingers messing with her hair as she weighs what V’s said.

“We got into a fight right before he went off to do this job.”

“He wasn’t mad at you. I hope you know that, loved you more than anything.”

“I know. I just… wish our last moments together could have been… different.”

“Sure you'll be okay?”

Misty is too good for all of this, truly, she deserved so much better. And V just wishes she could have brought Jackie home to her. Misty chews her lip and after a moment she nods, looking up to V.

“Life is so beautifully powerful, so much more powerful than death, so yeah, I’ll be fine. Not today and probably not tomorrow, but I’ll get there. And so will you.”

“Maybe…”

“But right now,” Misty squeezes V’s shoulder, “you need rest. So sleep, please sleep.”

With that desperate plea, Misty stands up, pushing the wheelchair out through V’s apartment. She only stops once, casting a final somber look at V, as if checking to see if the merc has moved at all. Then she leaves. And V is left alone with her thoughts, with her worries, with her guilt, and fear.

Body and mind heavy with the weight of it all, she takes out the loaner hearing aids that Vik gave her and pushes herself back into bed. She lays down, feeling the soft of the mattress sink underneath her. V takes another look at the bullet pendant, holding it over her head as she stares at the thing that killed her. Pried from her head and now in her hand, it seems surreal. Everything feels that way lately.

She lays her head down on her pillow, holding the pendant close as she lets herself just relax for a moment. To just let this all go if only for a few hours, to let her mind and body rest, to figure out what she’s going to do when the morning comes. Her eyelids grow heavy, slipping into sleep.

There’s an odd, almost electric sound that starts to gently stir her from sleep, like a tv glitching. Followed by a soft thunk, thunk, of something hitting something else. Her heavy eyelid slowly pull open. A man against the wall between her bed and window. Overgrown dark hair, aviators hiding brown eyes, dressed in a bullet proof vest and leather pants. He thumps his head back against the wall, a pent up energy drawing every muscle in his body tight, like a tiger about to pounce.

“Gotta get out of here, understand? And I kill anyone who gets in my way.”

And he’s on top of her, in a flicker, a flash, he’s suddenly crouching over her body, staring down at her. Close enough to smell cigarette smoke and a hint of sweat, close enough to see the dirt that clings to his skin, scratches in his flesh. His silver hand presses against the mattress beside her head,

“You included.”

She flinches and kicks out at his warning, the gravel of his voice promising to end her if he has to. And he’s gone, just as easily as he arrived. A dream? Her heart hammers in her chest, breaths shallow as she tries to calm down.

Her mind is still foggy as she starts to sit up in her bed, then she hears the glitching sound again, the thumping noise of a head hitting the wall. V swallows a lump in her throat, blinking at the man who’s back against the wall, thumping his head.

“Need a smoke,” he demands, seemingly annoyed he has to say it, “where’d you stash yours?”

A stranger in her apartment, in her mind, trying to bum cigarettes. Her hearing aids still tucked away, yet she hears him clear as day. It’s all surreal. She can’t bring herself to answer immediately, still half out of it, her vision seeming to glitch as she moves. A cyan fuzz to the world as she slowly sits up on the edge of the bed and brings herself to stand up, looking at him. He’s not real, she has to remind herself, even though he looks and smells like it. Just a figment in her head, threatening her life and demanding nicotine.

“D-don’t smoke.” Is all she can think to say, as stupid as it is, thankful for a moment she can’t hear herself say it, can’t truly take in her own idiocy. As if that’s the most concerning part of this whole mess.

“Then go out and get some! Just need one last one!” He screams at her, making her flinch, head hurting already.

“Jesus christ, man, calm the fuck down.”

“The fuck kinda joytoy are you s'posed to be?” He sneers at her, looks down his nose at her. Heat and anger rush through her, face warm, asshole. Snide, fucking prick. Not worth it, though, just some asshole rattling around her skull.

“No, I- I’m not dealing with this.”

She shakes her head and turns to go to her closet; grab some clothes, pop the pills, take a shower, and figure out what to do from there. Then he’s in front of her, before she’s even made it past her desk, hands slamming into her chest as he pushes her back. She cries out as she hits the ground, pain shooting through her already injured body. He stands over her, right hand pulled back, ready to strike and his left in front of him.

“Who you work for? Start talkin'!”

He points a chrome finger at her and her left finger points back him, moving without her consent, world glitching with cyan fuzz around her. She tries to clench it, to pull it back, to control her own body. But nothing and behind his eyes, she sees him looking. Testing it, he unclenches his hand and her own mirrors the motion. He twists his hand around and hers does the same in turn, in perfect sync, like she’s just a puppet. She tries to pull her hand down, but nothing.

His right arm moves and her own follows the motion, no matter how much tries to pull it back, as muscles aching from her rebellion. Her body listens to him, not her. This can’t be happening, he can’t control her, he can’t make her do things. Vik said six months, it's barely been hours and she already can’t move her own body.

“Fuck…” The man above her curses, turning his palms to his face, her hands doing the same.

For a moment, she considers begging him to release whatever control he has on her, if he even knows how to do it but stops herself before the broken plea can be heard, nothing but a soft noise dying on her lips. Disgusted she would ever have to beg to have control over her own body, cursing herself as his right hand pushes back into his hair. Her hand does the same, pushing through her hair to rub over her chip-slot.

“Fucking chip,” her fingers pry at the biochip without her permision and she’s reminded of Vik’s warning, “Rip the thing out myself!

Let him, let the dumb bastard kill them both; she decides just before he tries to rip the chip out. Fingers prying at the damage tech left in her skull, And she screams, like a shock to her brain, a bolt through every nerve as her vision glitches. Her body tenses, seizes, and somewhere she hears him yell too. World going dark for just a moment.

Then red dances across her vision, world and sense slowly returning, she’s somehow twisted to face her window. Not sure how she ended up there, if she had a seizure, if he dragged her. But it looks like he gave up on prying the chip out, because shes’ alive, she thinks. There’s that blue fuzz and static floating around her vision again as she starts trying to get up.

Before she can get both feet under her, there’s a hand wrenching into her hair, twisting the strands around his fingers and yanking. She cries out as she’s pulled up to her feet by her hair, freshly stitched together scalp being pulled on. V presses her hands to the window sill and glass, trying to get her bearings as she’s pulled back back by the hair. Her reflection stares back at her, her pitiful face wincing in pain, Johnny behind her pulling her around like a ragdoll.

“I’ll take control!”

It’s a snarled yell into her ear, his breath on her neck as he slams her head against the window, the a heavy sound of flesh cracking against glass.

“I’ll find a way!”

He reels her head back and does it again, glass starting to splinter and break apart under the force. Then he pulls her back, twists her around to face him, moving fast. Hands quick and harsh, tearing at her skin as he wraps both around her throat. Flesh and metal cutting off her air as he slams her against the window, head bouncing against it as she claws at his hands. Finally in control of her limbs, but unable to do anything as he cuts off her air, leaning close enough for her to smell the smoke on his breath.

“You hear me?!”

He screams in her face, brown eyes glaring over his aviators, harsh and burning into her skin. She can feel the hatred, the anger, all coming off of him in waves. It swims in her head and chest, pressing against her own fear as he strangles her, a snarled look on his face. He wants to kill her, to see her go limp and die under his hands right then and there. She knows that, can feel and read him, knows it as well as she knows her own name.

Just as darkness pinpricks her vision, she feels the air return, rushing into her… just a moment before he lets go, letting her slide down the window onto the ground. She’s in no place to question it, sucking in deep grateful breathes, lungs burning for it as she watches him pace.

Haphazardly, she pulls herself to her body, sitting on the edge of it; putting more distance between herself and the window he seems so fond of. She digs through her pockets, finding the omega blockers Misty had given her. V needs him gone like yesterday, to vanish like a bad fucking dream.

“Not like that!” He yells and smacks the pill bottle from her hand, metal fingers stinging her skin and sending the medication across the room.

“Fuc-ah!” V yelps as his right hand wraps tightly into her hair, again, yanking at the roots as he forces her to look directly at him, unable to see his eyes through his aviators.

“Stick some iron in your mouth and pull the trigger!”

He lets her hair go to reel back his hand, it cracks across her cheek in a heavy smack that sends the merc reeling to the ground. Sharp pain pinkening her cheek as she braces her hands against the floor, everything hurts. Her scalp torn at, her cheek struck, and her throat bruised. She feels it all, a brutal assault as real as anything she’s ever felt.

“I can feel it,” he talks as he walks across the room, glitching with her vision, “our minds… touching…”

Across the room, she sees it, beneath his pacing feet is the bottle of pills knocked down. Every muscle seizing, legs refusing to work as her body seems determined to shut down on her. But if she can just get to the pill she can shut him out.

“I'm like mold on fruit… creepin' into you… Nothing I can do about it,” he rambles to himself, voice tight and angry as she drags herself across the floor, trying to reach the blockers.

“You hear me!?” He yells, crouching to one knee just over them, taunting her before he flickers across the room again, “I'd puke if I fuckin' could!”

She focuses on the pills, he’s irrelevant, not even real. Even if he feels like it, even if every strike and yank has left her hurting, he’s not real. V is nearly there, stomach rubbed raw at the drag of her body over the floor. She just needs him gone, far far away, put into whatever corner of his mind she can lock him away in.

“It's just a copy of the engram - I'm out there somewhere, gotta be…” He keeps talking, keeps rambling, won’t shut the fuck up.

“Just leave me the fuck alone! Get the fuck out, just go!”

“Lead to the head is the only thing that’ll fix it,” he points his fingers like a gun at her head, before dropping to a knee in front of her sneering, “hear me bitch!? A bullet to the fuckin’ brain!”

She grabs a pill from the floor, cramming it in her mouth and swallowing it try, rolling over onto her back as she begs for it to work. And he flickers into view, standing over her, looking down at her like she’s less than filth. Before he glitches out in a mess of static, cyan fuzz erasing him.

And there’s a moment of relief, left in silence, safe from his hands. Safe from a touch too real for a brain supposedly only in her mind. Him being gone brings a moment, a glimmer of hope, the merc able to breath. To know for however long the pill lasts, she won’t be struck, or taunted. Won’t be plagued with his voice, the rough boom of it still ringing in ears that shouldn’t have heard it.

This whole thing, the chip, her inevitable death… Vik said Johnny couldn’t help that, had no choice. And she knows from his memories he was put in the chip against his will.

But this was a choice. The hair yanking, the choking, the screaming, the threats, all of that was his choice. And he made it clear, if it was up to him she’d just die faster. If it was up to him, he’d get the satisfaction of killing her with his hands rather than the chip. A stranger in her body, in her mind, able to control her and he wants her dead, he wants to hurt her.

She cries, because what else can she do? Tears rushing out anew, it seems to be all she can do lately. V has no idea how to handle this, no idea how to stop it, how to keep him from getting control back. She doesn’t even know how long the pills will last, no clear dosage or instructions, just ‘regularly’. It feels pathetic, crying and weeping with no idea of how to fix it. But she allows herself that much, laying on the floor surrounded by pills, a new intruder in her body; she cries and curls into herself, hugging herself like a child.

#cybepunk 2077 #cp2077 #johnny silverhand #silverv #female v #original female character #original female v #goro takemura #vik vector #misty olszewski #fem v #aidan becker #aidan v becker

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venusandromedadjarin · 4 years ago

Text

Cuyan

Ch. 11, A Glint of Beskar

18+, TW: rape, non/con sex discussed, trauma, 2.4k words

The familiar sound of the hatch opening wakes you up later that night and you groggily reach for the baby, only to find him asleep and squished between you and the back of the couch. He coos softly, disturbed by your sudden movement, and you do your best to get up without jostling him more before heading outside. One of the pit lights is on and it gives you a clear view of the bounty that Mando is currently manhandling onto the ship. It’s a young woman, and she doesn’t seem to care that Mando is easily twice her size as she turns around, struggling against him trying to kick at him. Her knee makes contact with his groin and he does his best to not show weakness, but you see him tense before shoving her the rest of the way into the ship. The gas hisses, and you figure it’s safe enough to walk towards the ship, your heart pounding with excitement. He’d been gone less than a day and you already had an ache in your chest from missing him, and worrying about him hunting.

He meets you at the bottom of the ramp, his helmet tilting towards you. You can’t see his face light up at the sight of you in the t-shirt, his t-shirt, that you’d been sleeping in, your arms crossed over your breasts. His gloved hand reaches out to you, and as soon as you take it he pulls you into his chest, his strong arms holding you up against the cold Beskar.

Even though your relationship had started to change, the one thing that remained was comfortable silence, and as you led him back inside, you both wordlessly thanked the Maker for that.

Naturally, Mando isn’t there when you wake up and neither is the child. You take the brief break to freshen up in the sonic shower, doing your best to clean off without water. Unlike the shower in the Crest, it’s not a place you want to stay long and you quickly get out and get dressed. Peli actually has a mirror in her bathroom, and you fuss with your hair for a moment before deciding on a braid. As you make your way through the quaint apartment, you spot a cup of caf on the kitchen counter, a note underneath: In the hangar with Peli, don’t come into the ship. -M At first, you’re a bit taken aback, but then you calm your racing thoughts, realizing where they were heading was not likely. The caf isn’t the best, but the warmth spreads through you and eases your anxiety about the information you plan on sharing with Mando. After talking to Peli, you know that she’s right. He does deserve to know. But what strikes you the most is what she said about him and how he acts around you. Smiling into the cup, you take another sip before padding out into the heat of the day. The suns are already high in the sky and it’s blindingly bright.

A pit droid is trembling on the ground and the child tries to terrorize it, even though he’s half the size of the machine when it’s standing up. His eyes grow larger, something you still are surprised by, when he sees you and begins to waddle toward you as you look around for Mando and Peli. Her shrill voice is coming from inside the hull, and you hear him sighing as one of them bangs on something inside. Scooping the kid up, you approach the door but hesitate, remembering the note.

Almost like he can sense your presence, Mando steps into view, effectively blocking your path before you can peer inside, “Good morning.” If you didn’t know better, you’d guess he was smirking. “I like this.” He reaches a gloved hand towards your hair, his fingers running down the length of the braid before giving it the smallest tug, sending a whole new warmth through your core.

Blushing, you step back, achingly aware of the child in your arms watching the interaction, “What are you doing with Peli?” It comes out more shrill than you’d have liked, and he notices the implication right away, tilting his helmet towards you, his hands on his hips.

“Nothing. I’m taking you on a detour,” he pauses, looking down slightly… almost sheepishly. “I-if you want to go. She said she’ll watch the kid.”

You can’t help the grin that spreads across your features before whispering, “Just the two of us?” He nods, his hand coming up to tilt your chin up to him as he steps closer, his thumb dragging over your lower lip and making both of you breathe slightly heavier.

“Just the two of us,” the modulator cracks out his whisper.

The moment is quickly broken by the sudden fussing in your arms as Peli comes down the ramp, the little womp rat struggling to get to her. “Hey kiddo!” She takes him from your arms, smiling warmly before nodding her head towards a jump speeder suited with bags, “You two better get going.” Mando reaches out to rub the kid’s ear between two gloved fingers before taking your hand. As he mounts the bike, a giddy excitement pools in your belly and you settle behind him, pulling on the leather jacket and scarf that was laying on top of the bags and wrapping your arms around his waist. He doesn’t waste a moment before lurching out of the docking bay and racing towards the dunes, the two suns high above your heads.

Mos Eisley speeds by, the tan buildings all but blending into the sand colored landscape. You lean your cheek against Mando’s shoulder, his cloak giving a small buffer between your skin and the Beskar. You feel him sigh contentedly and you smile, watching as the sand swirls underneath the speeder.

After what feels like hours, and judging by the suns probably was, you make out structures in the distance. The closer you get, you start to see the shapes: giant, bulbous rocks that almost look like… mushrooms. You gasp and he chuckles in front of you. “Is that,” you yell over the wind whipping around you, “the Mushroom Mesa?” His helmet nods against the wind, but his modulated voice doesn’t answer you. As he enters the structures looming up on all sides, you let go of his waist and sit up, throwing your arms up, whooping out of joy. In front of you, you hear the most beautiful sound burst the modulator: his laughter. Even with the modulation you can hear how lovely it is, and at that moment you think it’s the best sound you had ever heard but aching for the day you could hear it unobstructed. He races between the rocks for a few more minutes before finding a spot to camp, one that’s easy to guard but also easy to leave.

He dismounts from the speeder, taking your hand and squeezing it, “Do you know how to speak Tusken?” You nod, your brow creasing curiously, waiting for him to elaborate. He lets go of your hand, moving to unhook the bags behind you before gesturing widely with a sweep of his arm, “I’m going to set up camp, and you’re going to go ride through here. If anyone stops you, it will be Sand People and I trust you can handle that.” He reaches down to grab a blaster, tucking it into your waistband, “Just in case. Be careful.”

The smile you give him before speeding away is dazzling.

It had been years since you felt the wind through your hair like this, and it brought tears to your eyes.

The rocks are gorgeous hues of reds and tans, the shapes carved out from millions of years of erosion. You catch glimpses of movement a few times, but nothing stops you as you race through the structures, dodging rocks and leaning with the movements. You don’t know how long it’s been by the time you begin to make your way back to the camp, but the suns are lower and sinking fast.

A medium sized fire is burning and there’s a small lean to next to it, blankets spread out under the cover. Mando is waiting for you when you arrive, his hands clasped behind his back and in the dim, soft light, you can’t help but gawk at him. Even with pounds of Beskar on, you’re struck by how handsome he is, though you’ve never seen your face. Smiling sadly as you dismount, you wonder if you ever will.

“How was it?” His question holds the smallest amount of amusement as he leads you to the blankets, sitting down with you and pulling you into him, tossing the blaster in your belt to the side. “You must be starving.”

Taking the food he hands you, and watching in awe as he lifts his helmet enough to eat without hesitation, the realization of how much he trusts you strikes you suddenly. “It was gorgeous Mando. Thank you.” You lay your hand on the Beskar on his thigh, wishing you could feel his warmth. The rest of the meal passes in pleasant silence, his helmet coming down soon after and before you both settle back to look up at the stars. “Can you identify them? With the helmet?”

His body shakes with a silent chuckle, “No, but my father taught me a lot of the constellations when I was a boy.” He points some of them out, drawing the shapes with his fingertip as you watch from his side, stricken by the sky. His fingers gesture towards the moon, pointing at each one, “That’s Ghomrassen, Guermessa and the last one is Chenini. Do you see the cloud over us?” He waits for your confirmation before whispering, “Ibac cuyir te ka’ra.”

“The whole galaxy?” Mando’a lacks a word for galaxy, but you recognize the context in which he uses stars and look at him, only to find him already looking at you.

“Part of it, yes.” You gaze at each other for a few moments before reaching up to cup the side of his helmet, making no movement to remove it and he flinches until realizing it’s not your attention.

“I need to tell you something,” you push the words out before you can think twice. “About before.”

“Before..?” You’ve never heard him seem so confused and it shocks you before elaborating.

“Ner oyay.” My life.

He only nods as you remove your hand, turning to look into the flames. Taking a deep breath, you begin.

“When I was very young, you know that my home on Nevarro was ambushed during the Clone Wars. The attack wiped out everyone, except me for all I can remember. I remember being put into a cellar with the little boy I used to play with, but he was taken from me and I continued to hide, afraid of the explosions I could hear; the screams were deafening. I waited for hours, too afraid to move from behind the boxes in the dark.

“When Teckla finally found me, I was too terrified to speak to her. She carried me through the rubble and she did her best to shield me from seeing-“ you break off abruptly, sucking in a quick breath and trying to calm your nerves. When you start again, you make extra effort to slow down. “She did her best, but I still saw everything. My parents never even made it away from the cellar.

“I didn’t talk to her for over a year. She tried so hard to fix things for me, take me in and love me but I wouldn’t let her for so long. Even her last words and her last actions were trying to protect me-“ a sob escapes from your throat, and you shakily wipe tears away from your face, not even realizing you had been crying. You can’t bear to look at him, but you feel his gaze on you as his arm tightens around your waist. “A group of Quarrens attacked our hut in the middle of the night, lighting our house and our neighbors’ on fire. Teckla forced me out of it before I even knew what was going on, but by the time I got to the speeder, it was too late and they killed her right in front of me before shooting at the engine. When I crashed, I vaguely knew what was coming. I had heard the stories.

“As the guy slammed me up against the building, there were screams around me, but I wasn’t strong enough to pull away to help. I wasn’t strong enough to fight. So he took me, multiple times as I watched helplessly as people died and women were raped. At some point, I think I lost consciousness, either from the pain or just out of sheer panic. I woke up in a hut surrounded by other women, all of us were bloodied and out of it. No one knew where we were.

“I honestly don’t know how long I was there. I just remember the pain,” you take another shaky breath, the tears still rolling down your cheeks but he doesn’t move. “Eventually I was moved to the encampment but I didn’t realize at first that I wasn’t going to be abused anymore. All I saw were these men trading me for money. It was probably the best thing to happen to me at that point though, but I was so weak that I couldn’t fight at first. For weeks, I dealt with verbal abuse as I tried to get better, at least well enough to be in the arena. Part of me knew it would get worse if I didn’t figure out how to get in there.”

You laugh a humorless laugh, “Red is actually the one who helped.”

He spoke so softly you barely heard him, “Red?”

“The bounty you went back for. She’s the only one that stayed the same over the years. Even though she was horrible, she was the only one who I knew through it. She saved me in some ways.” Gazing into the flames, you huff, “Dank Farrick. How messed up is that?”

Making no move to leave your side, he stares at you quietly. You wish you could see his eyes. “Say something,” you whisper, suddenly afraid of his silence and what it might mean. You curse yourself, terrified of the repercussions of giving him this information.

His next words bring new tears to your eyes, “Cyare, gar cuyir cuyan.”

Beloved, you are a survivor.

#the mandolorian x reader #the mandolarian #reader x din Djarin #din djarin reader insert #din djarin

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pastelninjaimagines · 5 years ago

Note

head canons on modern au akatsuki (except tobi and zetsu) going on a roadtrip + camping and the chaos that ensures?

So I know you said no Tobi…but I can’t bring myself to leave out best boi Obito, so I hope including Obito (not the Tobi personality) is cool - mod tina

The Roadtrip

Nagato has no clue how Deidara, Kisame and Hidan were able to convince him to approve the camping trip, but his pounding headache that began not even 10 minutes into the road trip with them all piled into the van tells him that he was out of his mind

Kisame and Kakuzu were tasked with packing up the car, with Sasori occasionally butting in to rearrange their work. They had to pile in all the camping gear, some of it getting tied to the roof of the car. Anyone’s bags that weren’t brought out by 8:30 am sharp weren’t allowed to be in the car bc it’s hard enough to fit everyone in plus “a bunch of junk,” as Sasori put it.

Kakuzu drives. No ifs ands or buts. If he doesn’t drive then no one is going anywhere, he’ll ensure it. He’s the ultra grumpy old man, and as far as he’s concerned, the only responsible driver (sure, Sasori and Itachi could potentially be responsible enough to drive - but Itachi’s nearsighted and not the greatest long distance driver, and Sasori has major road rage, he will either drive them into a ditch or run someone else off the road). They leave right at nine, not a minute later. So, “if your ass isn’t in a seat, your ass gets left.” Kakuzu states too that he isn’t pulling off the road every thirty minutes for someone to take a piss, so they better be prepared to either hold it or whatever, bc he isn’t stopping until he deems it necessary to stop (aka to fill up on gas - or to pull up to McDonalds drive through and order 1 cup of black coffee)

Konan designates herself as navigator, bc again, she’s responsible - more so than the other “candidates” and won’t get sidetracked. Kaukzu also respects her enough to actually follow the directions she gives him. She’s a calm presence in the passenger seat. She won’t set off Kakuzu’s hairline anger, and she’s in a good position to cool everyone off if the back of the car gets too rowdy. Occasionally she’ll turn around and try to have a quiet conversation with Nagato, or she’s lowering the volume on the stereo that Deidara continuously tries to crank up. If there’s a quiet moment, she likes to sit back and close her eyes or gaze out at the scenery, appreciating the landscape as it whirls by

Sasori sits behind Kakuzu and every once in a while tries to play backseat driver by making very offhanded comments consisting of: “Shouldn’t you have turned there?” “Could’ve gotten there by now if I drove.” “Do you even know where you’re going?” “Can you drive? You’re not even going the speed limit.” If he’s not nagging, he’s listening to his own music, airods in. He’s not listening to the trash Deidara is playing from the stereo longer than absolutely necessary, it’s enough that they have to sit next to each other in the cramped car - bc of course they do. Deidara’s constantly chattering or fiddling with the radio, the self-proclaimed dj for the trip. He’s turning around to have loud, boisterous conversations with Hidan or he and Obito are playing card games. Obito seems to have brought an endless supply of card games, so either he or Deidara are playing or he and Nagato are. Obito and Nagato have deemed themselves as “keepers of the snacks” and occasionally give whatever preferred snack is requested, sometimes they deny whoever’s asking (aka Deidara or Hidan) if that said member is making too much noise

Kakuzu requested that Hidan was as far away from him as possible, so he’s sitting in the back row, now Kisame and Itachi’s problem. Hidan just babbles constantly about nonsense. So if Deidara doesn’t turn around to keep him occupied, he’s talking Kisame’s ear off. Itachi ignores him, and everyone else (or at least tries to) by reading a book. And when it simply gets too noisy for him to concentrate, he pulls out his thermos with hot tea he made that morning to sip on and stares out the window, hoping the monotony of the scenery lulls him to sleep at one point.

Do they get a flat? Of course they do. And do Kakuzu and Sasori get into a loud argument about who’s fault is it that they god a flat? Duh. They argue while Kisame very calmly changes the flat tire and gets the car all ready to go again. Once they get on the road again, everyone’s a bit calmer and quieter, and its smooth sailing from there until they arrive at their destination

Camping

Putting up their camp sight is chaotic order in the best of ways. It all gets done, but there’s a lot of shouting and confusion in the process thanks to either some of them being lazy, too loud, or both. Would anyone be surprised to know that Kisame does most of the work with putting things together. If anyone needs help putting up their tent, he does it for them kindly and with a smile. He starts the fire pit, gathering a ring of stones and tasks others to find good firewood, etc. They set themselves up with all of their tents in a circle. The first day of them at the camp sight is really just organizing and trying not to kill each other. Most are actually excited, being all together out in the wilderness, away from the modern technology and others’ intrusions. It’s peaceful for most of them, and by the time the daylight is starting to fade, they’ve all gathered around the campfire that’s blazing big and bright. Nagato and Konan offered to prepare their first meal, some canned foods, heated up on their cast fire pots. As darkness descends over the camp and all that’s left for light is their fire, they begin to trade spooky stories. They all go around telling whatever scary stories they have, and then vote on who’s was the best/scariest. They vote Sasori’s mainly for his delivery which was very unsettling and creepy

The next morning they make a quick breakfast and go out to do whatever activities strike their interest. Kisame and Itachi go out hiking, and go up high into the mountains until they find a lake where Kisame can do some fishing. Itachi likes to sit against a tree trunk overlooking a cliff and read, taking in the beautiful scenery that stretches out below. Deidara, Hidan and Obito decided that they would go canoeing. They went down to the big, winding river and set off, racing each other around bends to see who could go the fastest. it was all going well until they hit the rapids unassumingly, and they all got swept away until it was over, Hidan actually got tipped overboard and had to get himself out of the canoe while underwater. They had to go a few miles downstream to retrieve the abandoned canoe and make their way back, all laughing about the unexpected detour. Sasori goes off by himself on a hike, discovering a cave and explores the deep, damp darkness of it for a while, but goes back to camp with some sticks he’s collected and starts widdling the sticks into figures of woodland animals. Kakuzu stays at the camp sight, no one knows really what he does all day, but he says he has to stay to “safe guard my belongings.” Konan and Nagato go off hiking too along the river, until Nagato gets too tired from the sun and has to rest, so they find a nice spot just to relax before heading back to camp.

Kisame and Itachi are the last to return to camp as the afternoon grows very late, but they return with some fish that Kisame offers to grill up for that night’s meal. They opt out of telling ghost stories around the campfire to instead enjoy the board games that Obito brought. They play until everyone gets tired and goes to bed or decides that while they’re too tired to play, they can always go star gazing, and look up at all the brilliant little lights in the sky, so much more clear out in the wilderness than in civilization.

The next day, everyone does again whatever activities that they didn’t get a chance to partake in, but Sasori mentions to Itachi and Kakuzu that he found a cave that could easily be set up to scare a certain gullible blond and an overly religious albino. That night, Itachi convinces Kisame to be the friendly face to lead Deidara and Hidan to the cave. hyping it up that they should see the underwater lake that it leads to, however he doesn’t go in with them. Sasori orchestrated that the flashlight Deidara was using would malfunction, by replacing one of the batteries with a corroded one. Konan dressed up as a ghost girl to float around with “blood” on her face, while Itachi and Kakuzu generated eerie sounds coming form deeper within the cave. The pair ran out screaming on the sight of Konan’s “dead body” lying bloody on the cave floor, and Sasori snapped a picture of their shocked faces when they emerged in from the mouth of the cave. Deidara and Hidan were not amused in the slightest once they realized they’d been tricked.

When they decide that they’ve had enough of camping and that it’s time to head back into society, they pack up, making sure to clean up all of their trash and try to make their clearing look as untouched as they had found it, piling all of their belongings back into the van with themselves as well. Kakuzu warns that anyone not in the van when he gets the engine started is left behind, and he’s not turning around to pick up their sorry ass.

#akatsuki #akatsuki naruto #deidara #sasori #nagato uzumaki #pain nagato #konan naruto #itachi uchiha #kisame hoshigaki #obito uchiha #kakuzu #hidan #akatsuki hc #naruto #naruto shippuden

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wftc141 · 4 years ago

Text

Voltron: Global Military Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism Unit-Chapter 13: The Crusade

TWO MONTHS LATER

26/04/2018

1723 Hours

Colombia

The clouds cast over the partially empty dirt road, surrounded by the greenery of the countryside. The winds brushed off the fields and the trees outside a village a few kilometers nearby. Perfect place to be isolated from the crowds and perfect to slip by unnoticed. A second Voltron team, dubbed ‘Tigers’ have been deployed in Colombia to intercept a group of terrorists reported to have gotten hold of an unknown cargo, possibly a chemical weapon, from Europe. Coran and his analysts, Gold and Colbert, have been overseeing the mission through a drone watching the team down below amongst the clouds.

The team has been split on different sides of the road, blending in with the greenery among the hillside. Team leader Lieutenant Damon Halliday, former SAS, had been keeping watch on the road waiting for the convoy to arrive. He had his rifle ready, mounted on the grassy hill with two of his other teammates, Montgomery and Yeon. The last two of the five Tigers, Garceau and Okusanya, guarded the other side with Garceau being an experienced sniper for the team.

“Got visual on the convoy.” Montgomery said.

Halliday took out his binoculars to check and noticed a faint sight of several vehicles from a distance with a truck towing a cargo container as well.

“I see it. Two vehicles and one truck.” Halliday acknowledged.

“Should we call it in?” Montgomery asked.

Halliday nodded and reached for his comms to report. “White Tiger to Zero, we have eyes on the convoy. Ready to strike, over.”

“Copy, White Tiger. You are clear to engage, over.” Coran responded.

“Copy, Zero. Out.”

Halliday then looked back at the convoy which was now closing in on their position and readied his rifle.

“All Tigers engage!”

The team opened fire on the convoy, hitting the vehicle tires and taking out the drivers. The convoy stopped as the terrorists got out to fire back. Montgomery and Yeon took out some of the terrorists on one side of the convoy while Garceau’s marksmanship picked off the remaining as well as Okusanya’s swift mowdown with his LMG. Shortly, the gunfire ceased and all of the terrorists were on the ground motionless.

“Clear!” Halliday said.

“Clear!” Garceau replied.

“White Tiger to Zero, hostiles are neutralized and the convoy is clear, over.”

“Copy,” Coran said. “Investigate the cargo. We need to identify its contents before deciding on our next move, over.”

Halliday then got his team to approach the convoy stranded in the middle of nowhere, weapons raised in case of anything happening. The team checked the bodies to make sure they’re dead before checking the truck.

“Montgomery, Okusanya, check the truck.” Halliday ordered.

“Roger.”

The two approached the truck with heightened caution. Montgomery opened the door and dragged the body out to check inside the cockpit. Okusanya approached the rear door and felt for any way to open it. The rest of the team kept their distance while guarding the convoy. Halliday heard the doors open and turned towards the truck where Montgomery and Okusanya were as they stepped into the truck.

“Boss?” Montgomery called shortly. “We got ourselves something worse than just chemicals.”

“What is it?” Halliday asked.

“Uh,” Okusanya replied. “A bunch of mercury and sulfur, lots of toxic shit mixed into the barrels!”

“White Tiger to Zero, we got ourselves some sort of toxic substances, possibly a chemical bomb. Awaiting orders, over.”

A brief pause after Halliday relayed the report.

“Copy, White Tiger,” Coran replied. “Retrieve a sample and exfil, over.” “Roger. Out.”

Halliday was about to get an order ready before he was suddenly rocked back by a sudden explosion. Shielding himself from the blast, Halliday stumbled away from the truck as the deafening ring echoed in his head. Once he looked back, Halliday noticed the truck engulfed in flames and slowly coated in black ash. He then realized something. “Montgomery, Okusanya! Come in, over!” Halliday shouted through his comms.

There was nothing from the other end. Halliday had no reason to deny that both Montgomery and Okusanya are dead, consumed by the explosion while they were inside the truck. His breathing continued to pace as he looked around, finding both Garceau and Yeon still intact. Halliday quickly rushed over to the two.

“You okay?” He said.

“We’re okay, sir!” Yeon replied.

“I’m good,” Garceau let out a cough. “Putain d’enfer. What happened to Montgomery and Okusanya?”

“They’re dead. They were inside the truck.” Halliday said.

“Merde! What now?”

“White Tiger to Zero, Red Tiger and Grey Tiger are KIA and the cargo is destroyed! Repeat, Red and Grey Tiger are KIA and the cargo is destroyed! We need an evac, over!”

“Negative, White Tiger,” Coran said. “Can’t send in an evac now but we’re noticing toxic substances from the truck heading your way. Get the hell away from it now, over.” Coran said.

Halliday looked over to the truck and noticed a mix of yellow and green clouds emerging from the burning truck.

“Bollocks!” He cursed before standing up. “Tigers! Get clear from the truck, now!”

The team wasted no time to get away from the convoy, forced to leave both Montgomery and Okusanya behind, though there was no way to recover what was left of them. Once they got to a safer distance, Halliday was about to reach for his comms.

“Hey, bossman,” Garceau said, grabbing Halliday’s attention. “I think we got company.”

Halliday looked at where Garceau was staring at and noticed a group of cars driving towards their position.

“The hell?” Halliday muttered as the vehicles closed in.

Suddenly, gunshots began to zip towards them. The team ducked down and tried to use the vehicles as cover. Halliday braced as gunshots hit the vehicles behind him.

“White Tiger to Zero, we’re under heavy fire from unknown hostiles! We need that bloody evac right now!”

He peeked through the corner and noticed several gunmen coming out of their cars.

He couldn’t count the exact amount but there were a lot of gunmen with military-grade body armor over their clothes. Halliday managed to shoot some of them down but more took their places. He noticed his comms didn’t reach out to base and the response was nothing but static. He could hear anything from them. His team were struggling against the gunmen. Halliday noticed the gas slowly emerging further towards them. There was no other choice but to run into the forest.

“All Tigers retreat!” He shouted as he made a break for the forest.

The team ran towards the forest. Halliday looked behind his shoulder and noticed Yeon tripping over and falling onto the ground. Some of the gunmen reached Yeon and fired their rifles at him. Halliday looked away, knowing Yeon sealed his fate. Now it was just him and Garceau. The two stopped by some trees and took cover behind them.

“Where the fuck’s Yeon?!” Garceau shouted.

“Bastards got him!” Halliday replied.

He heard Garceau curse in French before hearing shouts from afar. Halliday noticed more gunmen chasing after them and opened fire. He managed to take out a few before running empty. As Halliday switched to his pistol, he looked at Garceau about to open fire with his rifle, only to get shot in the shoulder and fall over into a pit behind him.

“Garceau!” Halliday shouted.

Out of newfound determination, Halliday got out of cover and fired across the forest to draw out as many gunmen as he could. He couldn’t see them through the canopies and the bushes shrouded among the trees. Suddenly, a bullet hit his leg and his arm. Halliday let out a shout before falling over onto the dirt, landing on some tree roots. He couldn’t feel his right hand as he struggled to reach for his gun while holding the wound to keep it from bleeding further.

Footsteps rustled and closed in. The rest of the gunmen arrived, approaching him with their weapons aimed at him. Some approached the pit Garceau fell into. Halliday noticed one of them bore a ski mask with sunglasses under his helmet, as well as more kitted out gear than the others. Halliday could assume this was the team leader.

“¿Qué hacemos con a él, señor?” One of the gunmen asked the leader.

The leader glared at Halliday before turning to his men. “Llévalo a él con nosotros.”

“Sí, señor. ¡Agarrarlo! ¡Vamos!”

The gunmen approached Halliday and grabbed his arms, lifting him up to drag him away.

“Get your bloody hands off me, you bastards!” He cursed as he struggled to wrestle free.

Halliday continued to struggle and kick away fruitlessly while the gunmen held on without breaking a sweat. Suddenly, he heard Garceau shout from the pit before shots were fired. Halliday then noticed one of the gunmen rip off a tracking device from his vest before glancing at him. His comms are already screwed and his team is dead. Halliday has no idea who these people are but they are definitely involved with the terrorists. His impulse rocketed and he continued to rock aggressively as he shouted curses at his attackers. Suddenly, everything went black, not before he noticed a gunman thrust a rifle butt at him.

Coran, Gold and Colbert stared in silence, jaws open. They watched the whole ordeal unwind from their surveillance room in the hideout until they lost sight of Tiger and their leader Halliday. All of this started to go sideways when the truck exploded suddenly and then an unexpected group of hostiles arrived.

“Bloody hell. What just happened?” Gold asked.

“A lot just happened, son,” Coran said. “We just lost contact with Tiger.”

“And the comms couldn’t reach out to them for some reason. It was working fine a while ago! Something must’ve jammed the signal.”

“We’ll get to the bottom of this. We need to get Lion recalled.”

“Are you sure, sir?” Colbert asked. “They just took care of the Galra issue a few months back and they’re still off-duty.”

“I’m positive, Colbert. This isn’t just some simple issue. We just lost an important team from NATO and a man I call my friend to a group of unknowns. They’ll understand soon enough. Recall them.”

Colbert knew it wasn’t her position to debate. She simply nodded and turned towards her computer.

“Yes, sir. We’ll send out the recall.”

________________________________________

27/04/2018

0647 Hours

Macon, USA

A white Ford Escape slowly drove by the side a few blocks away from a suburban house situated outside of Macon. The sun was still rising and the people inside were up and running. Once the SUV stopped, the doors opened and two people got out, both a man and a woman. Both of them wore jackets under their shirts and jeans with gloves. They walked up to the house down the path near the forest, adjusting their sleeves as they focused on the house.

Once they reached the front door, Hunter 1 simply glanced at the camera from the left corner. These weren’t their average American neighbors. They were agents working under extremists, hiding in the US with plans in motion. The camera itself was way too advanced for a normal neighbor.

“Who is it?” A voice asked from the other side, with a good American accent.

“Девять-четыре-восемь-балалайка.” Hunter 2 replied.

The two waited for the response. They already acquired their password earlier on which could fool the agents that they are on their side. As soon as the door unlocked, the two pulled out their suppressed MP7s with Hunter 1 opening fire on the door. Entering the house, Hunter 1 walked over the body and stormed into the surveillance room to his left where he took out the agents trying to reach for their guns. None of them prepared for a surprise like this.

As Hunter 2 continued her sweep on the ground floor, Hunter 1 moved upstairs and heard footsteps from above and in a room and the sound of a window opening. He knew they were trying to make a run for it. But they weren’t the only ones.

“Hunter 3, you got rabbits coming out of the house from the back.” He said.

Hunter 1 reached the upper floor to check the rooms which most of them were empty. He then heard some faint muffled shots from outside.

“Hunter 1, this is Hunter 3. Rabbits are down.” Hunter 3 replied from the comms.

After searching the entire house, Hunter 2 began gathering the intel from the servers in one of the rooms while Hunter 1 found a fuel canister and started pouring gasoline all across the house, over the bodies and everything else to cover their tracks before ending the trail by the front door. Once Hunter 2 left the house with the intel in tow, Hunter 1 lit a match and tossed it onto the trail. Flames lit up and spread towards the trail like wildfire and by the time it reached the end, the house was burning, smoke levitating to the sky. Shortly, the two met up with Hunter 3, an African-American male, carrying his sniper rifle and bag with the ghillie suit used for the operation.

“All good?” Hunter 3 asked.

“Hell yeah, brother.” Hunter 1 answered.

“Russia’s gonna owe us for this one.” Hunter 2 said.

“They should,” Hunter 1 briskly concealed his weapon as he approached the SUV. “We just took out their corrupt FSB team since they don’t want to kill their own.”

“They would let us do this anyway since they’re in our country.” Hunter 3 said.

“We would’ve done the same thing if we had corrupt agents.”

“Would we?” Hunter 2 asked.

“Maybe.”

Once the team got into their SUV, they drove off and away from the burning house, leaving the rest to the police.

“Hunter 1, hostiles are neutralized and we have secured the intel, over.” Hunter 1 reported through his comms.

“Confirmed,” His supervisor replied. “Be advised, you are now given a new assignment. There will be a plane set for Colombia where you will work with Voltron. We have a situation that is urgent.”

Hunter 1 suddenly froze after hearing the name. He wanted to say no but that would be against his supervisor’s wishes. Hunter 1 scowled and eventually nodded.

“Copy, Hunter 1 out.” He grudgingly said.

Once he got off the comms, he slammed the steering wheel of the car, puzzling his teammates who looked at him confused.

“Fuck!” Hunter 1 swore.

“Matt?” Hunter 2 asked.

Hunter 1 panted as he glared out at the windscreen facing the freeway. Both Hunter 2 and 3 exchanged glances, waiting for his response.

“The last thing I wanted was to see them again.” Matt growled.

________________________________________

27/04/2018

0745 Hours

Hawaii

Shiro let out a yelp as he jolted upright from a nightmare. As cold sweat ran down his body, his breathing rate was accelerated with his heart racing from the sudden experience from the nightmare. Shiro looked around frantically, finding himself in the bed he was in last night. It was just a dream. Just a dream. Although he noticed apart from the many nightmares he had for his entire life, this one saw him die.

“You alright?”

Shiro turned to his side and noticed his bedside was empty and saw Allura approaching him fully dressed. She must’ve heard him shout from his nightmare. Shiro gave himself a breather to calm himself down.

“Yeah,” he replied. “Just a bad dream, that’s all.”

“What was it this time?” Allura asked.

Shiro then saw a vision of someone familiar standing by his side. He swore he remembered that vision but he just couldn’t make it out.

“Shiro?”

The face was clearer and he realized he was the man from his nightmare.

“It was Adam…”

Allura’s mouth gaped wide as she stared in disbelief, knowing she herself knew Adam before. Shiro couldn’t believe his eyes either. He had never seen Adam in his dreams ever since Lahore.

“How did it-”

“Same as always,” Shiro quickly answered. “I wasn’t able to save him from that explosion.”

Adam was Shiro’s first. They both developed a bond that turned into love during Shiro’s time with the SEAL Team Six. Adam was a CIA agent who was killed in Camp Chapman in 2009. Shiro recalled trying to save him before the explosion consumed him right before his eyes. He had blamed himself ever since then and carried that guilt for his entire life.

“It wasn’t your fault, Shiro.” Allura said.

Shiro doesn’t reply. Suddenly, he heard his phone buzz from his nightstand and he reached over to see the message. As soon as he saw the message, Shiro immediately got out of bed and got dressed with Allura waiting for him. Voltron was calling them back in and surprisingly, it was earlier than usual.

________________________________________

27/04/2018

1146 Hours

Somewhere in Texas, USA

“700 meters moving down the rock side,” Lance reported using his spotter scope. “Got eyes on him?”

“Yeah, Got that son of a bitch.” Keith replied, focusing his sniper scope on the field as he laid on the hill frontside.

The scope caught sight of a mountain lion sneaking it’s way to a herd of sheeps in the farm’s field. Calculating the distance and controlling his breathing, Keith pulled the trigger. The bullet looked to be heading straight for the mountain lion but it hit the ground below it, scaring it away. The two watch the mountain lion scurry away down the hill.

“Fuck! It’s gone.” Keith cursed, slamming his hand on the mat.

“Well, the good thing is…you scared it away.” Lance assured.

“The bad thing is he’ll come back. Fucking mountain lions.”

“I mean, can you blame ‘em? Circle of life.”

“My cattle aren’t food.”

“Technically, sheeps are food.”

“I don’t eat sheep.”

Lance slowly glanced at Keith, surprised by his suddenness.

“Really?” He asked.

“Really.” Keith answered.

“What are you, an animal lover?”

“I am, actually.”

“But you were eating burgers.”

“That doesn’t count.”

“Fuck you mean it doesn’t count? You’re eating a dead cow, cabrón.”

“It was a mystery burger.”

Lance realized what he was talking about and scrunched up his nose.

“You mean that nasty, tasteless, bootlegged one that vegans eat?” Lance guessed.

Keith nodded. “Yup. You should try it.”

“Do I look like a fucking cow to you?”

“Oh, so you’re saying vegans are cow eaters, huh?”

“I’m just saying I’ll take meat over plants any day now.”

“Your parents never gave you broccoli since you were a kid?”

“Dude, they had me eating meat so I could grow big and strong. Me and my siblings. Hell, my brother and sister fed the same meat to my niece and nephew.”

“Uh huh. My dad did way worse than that. I had to hunt.”

“I thought you’re an animal lover?”

“I was hunting predators who were trying to eat my cattle.”

“Huh. Good point.’

The two went into silence, staring down at the field where the cows were, still chewing on the grass.

“You know, I was wondering,” Lance asked. “How are you paying for all this?”

Keith scratched his face. “After my dad passed away from cancer, guys from his old Force Recon unit managed to take all of the bills and taxes so I can take care of the farm. They never told me how but I’m basically living free…for now.”

Just then, they heard sounds of rotors spinning faintly. The sounds began to get closer until the two saw a Blackhawk from a distance approaching their area. The helicopter lowered itself beside the field, causing the sheeps to scatter away, bleating as they galloped.

“Hey, Keith.”

“Yeah.”

“A fucking Blackhawk just landed on your field...right next to your sheeps.”

“Yup.”

Leaving their equipment behind, Keith and Lance approached the Blackhawk and once they got close, they noticed Pidge get off the helicopter and approach the two, surprising them both.

“Pidge?” Keith called.

“You two! Lets go!” Pidge demanded.

“What’s going on?” Lance asked.

“We got a mission, obviously! Get in!”

Keith and Lance exchanged glances and nodded before getting inside the Blackhawk. As the two entered, Keith got out his phone and dialed the number as the helicopter ascended from the ground.

“Hey Alice, I need you to watch over the farm…”

________________________________________

27/04/2018

0800 Hours

Sydney, Australia

Hunk was just finishing up on the omelettes he was making. He was about finished with the side of the nearly complete piece of omelette. The scent of salt and eggs surrounded the entire apartment as the air passed through the open balcony door. Hunk had already prepared the fillings and the first omelette was just about done with the last one. As he finished up prepping the omelettes, he turned around and noticed Shay wasn’t up.

After his mission in Brazil, he ended up spending some time with Shay at Sydney during his time off-duty. Flash-forward, the two went into a relationship and Hunk moved into Shay’s apartment in Pyrmont since he can’t really go back to Fort Benning. During his time with Shay, he got to learn a lot about her, both her work and her life outside. Hunk had noticed Shay had been sleeping in a lot more than usual, though he didn’t blame her.

Covering the breakfast to preserve the heat, Hunk headed into their bedroom where he noticed Shay still in bed, covers sprawled all across with one of her bare legs exposed. Her untied hair spread out over the pillow like seaweed. She looked as if she was spooning a pillow. Hunk could hear her light snores as he approached her, even when he was the first to wake up way before her. He even did a morning jog at six and she was still fast asleep. Hunk sat on the bedside and he couldn’t help but take a gander at her beauty even at its unkempt nature. He moved a lock of her hair covering her eye aside before slightly tucking it behind her ear.

The curtains were still closed so maybe that could wake her up. Hunk stood up and went up to the curtains and opened it up, letting the sun into the room. The light brightened the bedroom and Hunk got a clean view of the bay overlooking the city. Then, he heard a moan from behind and turned around, noticing Shay was slowly waking up. Hunk reached her side and checked up on her as her eyes slightly opened.

“Morning, Hunk…” She lazily said.

“Morning, Shay,” Hunk replied, grinning. “Slept well?”

Shay turned over onto her back as she tried to close her eyes. “Mmm. Five more minutes, please.”

Hunk chuckled. “I already got breakfast ready. Bacon onion omelettes. It’s gonna get cold soon.”

He noticed a smile creep across her face while her eyes were still closed.

“Okay, you win,” she muttered before sitting herself up. “I’m up. I’m up.”

As Shay stretched her arms, Hunk got off the bed and headed back into the kitchen to get breakfast ready. Shortly, as Hunk placed the plates of omelettes and glasses of orange juice on the table, he looked up to see Shay walking towards him wearing her sweatshirt and shorts from bed. Her hair was still left untied.

“Smells nice.” Shay said as she leaned over to kiss Hunk.

“It’s your favourite.” Hunk replied.

The two sat down and began to eat their breakfast. Shay took a bite of the omelette, sliding the fork into her mouth.

“So good as always.” She said as she ate.

Hunk chuckled. “Glad you still like it. I added something to make it tastier.”

“What’d you add?”

“Parsley.”

“Can’t really taste it but it’s still yummy. You should be my personal chef.”

Hunk chuckled as he watched her eat up. He knew Shay wasn’t the greatest cook surprisingly but he didn’t mind. As long as she likes it, he’s happy. The two continued to eat, talking about work and Shay’s sleeping habit. Then, she got into a different subject.

“You know,” she said. “You never told me why you wanted to be a soldier when you could’ve been a chef.”

“You never asked.” Hunk answered.

“I’m asking now.”

“Well, since you asked nicely, I always wanted to be a cook because my father was a cook back in the Navy. He was really good at it and I wanted to be like him.”

“But why the army?”

“The attacks on my home gave me the motivation.”

Hunk then took another bite of the omelette before going for the glass of juice.

“You know, you never told me about your family or why you wanted to be a war correspondent for Vice.” Hunk said.

“You never asked.” Shay replied.

“I’m asking now.”

“Since you asked politely,” she paused for a moment. “I was never a huge fan of the military or the war. I only became a war correspondent so I can understand why people go to war...and see the cost of it.”

Hunk then noticed she'd stopped eating. Her expression darkened.

“I saw so many people in the Middle East die in front of my eyes,” Shay continued. “Men, women, children. I even lost close friends of mine. Everytime I sleep, I keep seeing flashes of everything that I’ve seen. I want everyone to see why war is hell and what the cost of it is.”

Hunk had stopped eating too but he was already finished by then. He never thought Shay would end up in a situation like this. Thinking about it makes Hunk feel ashamed for being a soldier, considering how many people he killed. Was he actually the type for Shay?

“I’m sorry you had to go through all this.” Hunk muttered, looking down to his hands on the table.

Shay looked at Hunk in confusion before realizing why.

“Hunk...I didn’t mean-”

Suddenly, Hunk’s phone started buzzing from his pocket. He pulled it out and after noticing the notification, he sighed.

“Great.” Hunk muttered in disappointment as he stood up.

“Work?” Shay guessed, standing up as well.

Hunk looked at Shay, feeling bad to just leave like this. He really wanted to spend more time with her.

“I’m sorry-”

“No, no, it’s alright,” Shay said. “Get out there.”

Hunk was still upset that he had to leave Shay but he knew that there was no other option. Hunk then began to gather his gear from the bedroom and then made his way to the door. He was about to unlock the door.

“Hey.” Shay called.

Hunk stopped and turned around, noticing Shay approaching him. She then leaned forward, kissing him for a while before pulling away.

“Be safe.” Shay whispered.

Hunk smiled and nodded. ��Will do.”

Just like that, Hunk walked out of the door and headed off to the elevator. Both Shay and Hunk prayed for the safety of each other and themselves.

________________________________________

28/04/2018

1132 Hours

Colombia

The Lions of Voltron, all dressed in their uniforms, have arrived at the US air base in Colombia. They were directed to a briefing room for a meeting where they will soon meet someone. The only members who were missing were Coran and his analysts. Some time has passed and nothing much has happened, leaving the team in the dark.

“Well, this is weird.” Lance said.

“In what way?” Keith asked.

“Isn’t it obvious? We just landed in Colombia and none of us knows what the hell’s going on.”

“Lance’s got a point,” Pidge said. “Not only that, where’s Lieutenant Smythe and his computer team?”

“I know you guys are concerned,” Shiro butted in. “Me and Major Brooks have no idea what’s going on either. But we were obviously called here for a reason. Why else would NATO go to all the trouble bringing us here?”

“Why not bring NATO’s best counter terrorism unit?”

The team turned around to the sound and noticed Coran standing by the door, accompanied by another person. He looked to be a Native American man in his 50s with long brown hair, a beard and a vertical scar on his right eye.

“Well I’ll be damned.” Allura said, standing up and approaching the man alongside Shiro with a smile. “So glad to see you again.”

Allura and the Native American man both hugged.

“You too, Brooks,” The man said as he and Allura broke the hug. He then went up to Shiro for a hug. “Same goes for you, Shiro.”

“Yeah. Good to see you too, old friend.”

Allura and Shiro then turned around to their team, who were unfamiliar with the man.

“Team,” Shiro said. “This is Bryce Kolivan, Station Chief of the CIA.”

“And I’m guessing he’s the spook who handed us the mission to go after the Galra in Brazil.” Lance said.

“Sure was. Had faith that Voltron would get the job done.” Kolivan answered.

“So what’s going on here that you want us to handle?” Allura asked.

Kolivan’s grin faded and he let out a deep, grim sigh.

“Lieutenant Smythe was helping us intercept a terrorist group smuggling in some sort of unknown cargo, possibly a weapon, into Colombia from Europe.”

“Tiger was sent to interrupt the convoy,” Coran added. “They succeeded in eliminating the terrorists but unfortunately…they were ambushed. Four of the team members were killed while their leader Damon Halliday was captured. Colombian Special Forces have already recovered the bodies of Tiger at the scene, although they had to quarantine the truck containing lethal chemicals.”

The news hit particularly Shiro, Coran and Allura, although the others felt neutral since they never heard about another Voltron team other than them. Damon Halliday to Coran was a close friend and a capable soldier with lots to tell. The news that Halliday got taken was hard to get over.

“Who took him?” Shiro asked.

“From what we’ve gathered, we believe Halliday was captured by the Colombian cartel Los Cruzados,” Kolivan answered. “The cartel consists of local triggermen who either used to serve in the army or law enforcement. They’re very ruthless and deadly and have been described as potentially the Medellín Cartel’s successor as they’re already considered to be narcoterrorists. They have murdered numerous government and military officials to the point where the government themselves are afraid to fight back.”

“Do we have a location on where they took Halliday?” Allura asked.

Kolivan shook his head. “No need for that. I already have a Ground Branch team boots on the ground searching for him. Your intel team found Halliday’s last known location. Hopefully he’s still alive by then.”

________________________________________

1300 Hours

Colombia

Matt Holt cut through some vines as he and his team ventured through the Colombian jungle. Their supervisor had already pinpointed the location of their objective at a shack somewhere in the jungle. From the skies, they had two analysts of Voltron watching the team through a stealth drone. Jem and Stacy watched from the feed as the Hunter team moved through the jungle, closing in on the destination.

“Hunter 1 to Zero, we have reached the target building but no signs of any hostiles. Are you positive that this is the building, over?”

“Yes, Hunter 1. Positive.”

“It better be, out.”

Just as he got off the comms, Jem sighed as he stared at the screen annoyed before turning to Stacy.

“This is like - the fifth time this Hunter 1 guy kept bugging us on whether the location is right or not. Didn’t his CIA mates make it clear to him?” Jem said.

“He didn’t seem too happy to be working with us.” Stacy replied.

“Yeah. You saw the way he glared at us for most of the time when we first met, right? I mean, what is his problem anyway?”

“Hell if I know, Jem.”

The team stayed at their position for a while, not moving from their spot.

“Matt, are we good to go?” Hunter 3 asked.

Sighing, Matt signaled his team to move. The two watched as Matt and his team approached the building as seen by their heat signatures. The team stacked up by the entrance with Hunter 2 tossing a flashbang through the door gap into the room. After the loud bang, the team stormed in with weapons raised as they prepared to open fire. However, no shots were fired and Jem noticed the building was empty. The team then began to sweep the area for hostiles.

“Clear!” Hunter 2 said.

“Clear on my end!” Hunter 3 followed up.

Jem and Stacy waited for Matt who was still checking the rooms without a word.

“Hunter 1 to Zero, we’re seeing nothing here, over.” Matt hissed.

“Intel said there would be hostiles there, over.”

“Well, the intel you got was fucking wrong. Just look how Voltron turned out.”

Jem noticed Matt sounded like he has resentment towards Voltron for whatever reason.

“Hey Matt! You better come look at this!” Hunter 2 called.

Matt and Hunter 3 went up to Hunter 2 who was in one of the rooms. Once they got there, the two noticed blood stains on plastic wrapping alongside chopped fingers on a bloodied table, presumably Halliday’s.

“Seems like they were here,” Hunter 3 said. “Somehow they knew we were coming.”

Matt didn’t say anything but he simply sighed before turning to his team.

“Lets get the fuck out of here.”

#voltron #voltron: legendary defender #voltron legendary defender #voltron global military intelligence and counter terrorism unit #voltron: global military intelligence and counter terrorism unit #modern covert counter-terrorist au #covert counter-terrorist au #modern covert counter-terrorism au #covert counter-terrorism au #fanfic #fanfics #my fanfic #my fanfics #wftc141's fanfic #wftc141's fanfics #wftc141's fanfictions #wftc141's fanfiction #my fanfictions #my fanfiction

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department-shoe-stud · 4 years ago

Text

A Series of Successful Pranks

Annie and Jay aren’t actually that bad at pranks.

They’re just godawful at getting away with said pranks.

1. The Pink Dust Bomb in Gambol and Japes (c. August, 1979)

“Okay, you know the plan, Pip?” Anna Louise looks up at her brother and nods, giving a wicked grin.

“Ready to go.” Jacob nods and walks up to the store owner, rattling off inane questions, while Annie ducks behind an aisle of Gambol and Japes’. She sets the jinxed box down and presses the timer. She quickly walks up to Jay and nods. He nods back, says goodbye to the owner, and the two quickly leave.

“Three,” Annie says, door closing behind them.

“Two,” Jay replies, turning back to look at the shop.

“One,” They say in unison, and fall into uncontrollable laughter as the inside of the windows of the store get covered entirely in pink dust. Customers come rushing out, coughing out pink dust and wiping it off their clothes, only for it to immediately suction itself back onto them.

“Jacob Leon and Anna Louise!” The siblings’ roaring laughter is cut short at the sound of their mother’s voice, and they turn to see her standing there, arms at her hips, fury in her eyes.

Jay looks down at his little sister. “Race you to freedom?”

Annie looks back up at him, then kicks his shin as hard as she can. “Every man for herself!” She turns and sprints off down the streets of Diagon Alley as her brother grunts in pain, and their mother scolds him.

Annie makes it around the corner of Gringotts before the pull of Accio takes her over and she falls on her back, being zoomed back to the feet of her mother and brother, looking furious and betrayed accordingly.

“...Hi Mum. Would you believe me if I told you Jay made me do it?”

Aoife O’Reilly was many things. A fool was not one of them. She didn’t believe Anna Louise for a moment.

2. The Jinxing of the Phillip Jones Brass Ensemble (c. May, 1980)

“Nobody saw us come in, right?” Anna Louise shakes her head as Jacob glances back at door, not trusting her lookout skills.

“Jay, I’m a hundred and forty-five centimetres tall. If someone say me sneak in, they deserve a better security job than a concert hall,” Annie says, crinkling her nose at the mere fact that this is the site of their next prank.

Jay crinkles his nose back at her and rolls his eyes. “This is gonna be wicked, I promise.” He peeks his head over the theater's seats and, upon seeing they’re empty, sprints down to the pit, Annie protesting as her short seven year old legs struggle to follow. Jay hops over the barrier, just barely sticking the landing, and grins up at Annie as she finally catches up, pouting down at him, winded. “Well, c’mon, Pip.” He turns back to the large brass orchestra all nicely set up before him as Annie grumbles and slowly climbs down the stairs.

“This is stupid,” She mutters, and Jay snorts, rolling his eyes as he takes out a wand.

“Is not.”

“Is too.” She eyes the wand, squinting and tilting her head. “Isn’t the school gonna know that you did magic outside?”

“They track the magic using your wands, which is why I took a spare from Charms. You’ll like Charms, Flitwick is grand.”

Annie nods, then squints. “Wait, are you sure?”

Jay nods, grinning. “Positive.”

Jacob was eighty-six percent sure. It fluctuated on a minute-by-minute basis.

“Now, watch this...” He grins, winks at Annie, and mutters a homemade jinx. A fine layer of what appeared to be blue glitter settles over each instrument. Annie looks up at Jay, underwhelmed, until Jay smirks, flicks his wand, and the entire orchestra begins loudly blasting ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’. Annie slaps her hands over her ears, racing after Jay as they flee through the fire exit, setting off an additional alarm as Muggle guards begin to flood in.

~~~

“Good news!” Jay announces, strolling into the parlor with a toothy grin. “Since no Muggles were present. the Ministry let me off with a warning.”

Annie lets out a whoop as Mum O’Reilly raises an eyebrow at her husband, walking in after their son.

“Bad news?” She asks, and Papa O’Reilly turns to his son with a scowl.

“Jacob’s under house arrest for the rest of the summer.”

Annie boos. “Why would the Ministry do that?”

“They aren’t. We are.” Papa O’Reilly jerks his head up the stairs, and Jay stomps up them to his room.

“Papa?” He turns to his daughter, who look him dead in the eyes, and blows raspberries at him. He shakes his head, ruffles her hair, and walks into the kitchen, opening the window to let the family owl Scuddlebeak in.

3. The Great Magical Castlebar Stampede of 1981 (c. January, 1981)

“Being the amazing older brother that I am,” Jacob announces as he and Anna Louise march down Main Street with mysteriously rattling packages in hand, “I have decided to give you an amazing birthday present before I am inevitably dragged back to Hogwarts.” He sighs, pouting at his sister. She giggles, and shifts her box as it starts its escape attempt.

“I dunno, Jay. Making me carry my own present’s kinda lame.”

“No no, it’ll be wicked Pip, I promise.” She hums, scrunching her nose, and following after him as he turns into an alley. She gasps, and he shushes her as she stares, wide-eyed, at the array of magical beasts gathered in the small side street.

“How...?” Annie asks, breathless. Jay laughs, setting his package down and grabbing the box from her hands as well.

“I know a few people who owe me a few favors.” She blinks at him, and slowly grins.

“Did you get me a bunch of magical creatures for my birthday?” He laughs.

“No, we don’t have the space.” Annie’s grin immediately drops into a frown, and Jay claps his hands. “But! We’re gonna have fun anyway.” Annie cocks her head.

“How? Petting zoo?” He looks back down at her wide, hopeful eyes and laughs again, slightly less ecstatic.

He hadn’t expected her to be so about magical creatures. When had that happened?

“Ever heard of the Running of the Bulls?” She blinks, and turns back to the animals.

“Wait, really?” Annie gasps, looking between him and the Abraxans. He nods, and she slowly starts to grin as well, much to Jay’s relief.

“Really. C’mon Pip, it’ll be a gas.” She eagerly helps him with the ropes around the larger creatures, then excitedly helping him open the boxes filled with Puffskeins.

“Ready?” Jay asks, and Annie grins wickedly, nodding manically. Jay grins back, and blows a whistle. The noise startles the animals, and they take off running down Main Street. Annie and Jay sprint out into the street to watch as people dodge out of the way of the animals. Most look alarmed, while others, the ones Annie recognizes as the other wizards and witches, look downright shocked.

“I should have figured.” Jay and Annie both freeze at the familiar voice, and turn to see their lovely neighbor Mrs. Finnigan and her infant son Seamus. Seamus is staring, transfixed at the animals as his mother stares at the O’Reilly children with disappointment.

“It was a birthday present?” Jay defends.

“Happy Birthday, Anna,” The witch says. “Sorry you have to be grounded on it.”

4. The Flying Sled (c. July, 1981)

“Are you sure this is gonna work?” Anna Louise asks Jacob, and he nods.

“One hundred percent positive.” Annie hums and looks down the slope. “I’ve been practicing. No one at school has suspected a thing.” Annie hums again.

“If you’re sure…” Annie says, sitting on the wooden sled and bracing herself. “Ready when you are, Jay.”

“Pip, this is going to be amazing.” He gets to the back of the sled and starts pushing. When he gets to the edge, practically sprinting, he jumps on and takes out his wand. As they barrel down the slope, he grabs his sister’s shoulder, and she looks back at him. He grins, and they reach the end of the slope, leading into the ramp. As they barrel off, Jay shouts, “Wingardium Leviosa!”

The sled shoots off the ramp, and the spell carries them. Annie lets out a whoop. “Jay, this is amazing!”

Jay laughs. “I know-” He starts, but his gloating is quickly cut off as the spell breaks, and the pair go hurtling down to the ground from nearly twelve meters in the air. The siblings scream, and hit the ground. Hard.

“Well… It could have been worse,” Jay says, and Annie glares at him as the healer casts Episky on her arm.

“How? How could it have been worse?” She asks, glaring daggers at him.

“We could have been farther from the house and Mum and Dad wouldn’t have heard us,” Jacob says, giving a shaky grin that is soon cut off by a loud ‘Ahem’.

“You’re welcome for that, by the way,” Their father says, staring at his kids with clear disappointment. “Honestly, Anna, I expected you to be smarter than this.” “It was Jay’s idea!” She shouts in her defense, and winces when the healer patches up the scratches on her cheeks.

“And when was the last time Jacob pitched an idea that didn’t go horribly wrong?” Their father says, and Jay shoots a glare at him.

“Joseph,” Their mother says, walking into the room and looking at her husband. “That’s enough. They’re already hurt, don’t humiliate them too.”

Annie looks down at her feet, shame all over her face, and Jay glares at their father, who stares back.

“Well, the cuts will heal, but there will be some nasty scars, unfortunately,” The healer says, and their parents thank him for his time. They walk out with him, discussing payment, and Jay scoffs.

“Honestly, can Dad get off his high horse for two damn seconds? Like he’s never done anything stupid,” He huffs.

“Can you go one summer without breaking me?” Annie retorts, and he looks back to see her pouting, taking the wind out of his sails a little.

“Sorry, Pip. I really did think I had it.” Annie shrugs, then looks up at him, eyes glinting mischievously.

“Practice more, and we’ll do it again next year, okay?” Jay grins at his little sister and winks.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

That next school year, Jacob went missing. Annie sat inside the whole summer, not looking forward to Hogwarts at all, and refusing to look at her scar. She wore long sleeves the whole summer just to avoid it.

Bonus (Because I don’t like leaving Annie on a sad note):

“You still owe me a levitating sleigh ride, you know,” Anna Louise says, smiling over at her brother as he lounges on his porch chair.

“Can’t a guy get a little peace and quiet? Merlin’s beard, I’m trying to tan here.”

“You’re going to burn,” Annie says, stealing his sunglasses off his eyes. Jacob squints at her.

“You said you didn’t want to do it until I practiced more,” He says after a while. “Being stuck in a painting stops you from doing that.”

“Well, I wasn’t stuck in a portrait for years,” She responds, small smile on her face.

“Good for you. I don’t recommend it,” Jay mutters.

“I had plenty of time to practice my spells, too,” She adds, and smiles at the warm summer breeze billowing her hair out around her.

“...Is the ramp still up?” Jay asks, and Annie turns to him, grinning.

“Like I’d have the heart to take it down.” ~

They attempt the sled ride again, Annie casting the spell this time, and she loves holding it over his head that she managed to do it and he didn’t.

Jay likes to retort with the fact that she still crashed them into a bush and that was the only reason they weren’t more injured.

Annie claims she was aiming for the bush.

#More Anna Louise content!#My girl is back on her bullsh*t #and im Here to provide yall with the details #the O'Reilly siblings have two brain cells and it's been in the custody #of their mum since 1979 #hphm #anna louise o’reilly

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machineofreality · 5 years ago

Text

Episode 2: Grave

[If the embed doesn’t work, here’s a link: https://anchor.fm/worldcycle/episodes/Episode-2---Grave-ec0cdn]

Full Text:

Welcome to episode two of the World Cycle, a serial audiobook podcast.

You can find the full text of the episode at world cycle dot tumblr dot com[, right here].

The story goes:

Grave smiled as she slammed her foot down on the gas. Her van roared and charged down the empty road at the barricade held by Aegis Security troops. They fired their cute, little guns at Grave’s armoured steed and the bullets bounced right off. A man with very similar artificial eyes to Grave levelled his grenade launcher at the van and Grave mentally crossed her fingers.

This was her first time out since she and Rigger has souped up the van and she had no proof that Rigger had been right and that she wasn’t about to die. The forty-millimetre grenade struck the windscreen of the van and Gave was blinded and there was a resonant thump. But the windscreen wasn’t even scratched.

Aegis Security scrambled to get out of her way, but not all of them made it and Grave’s steed thundered over their soft bodies and through the roadblock. The AR signs blazed into life around her, High-Threat Response was on its way and she needed to be going.

The winding streets of Carrum Downs had once been the perfect place to lose Aegis, but with the looming presence of the forward operating base, Grave had to go much further and she had to go much faster. More rounds and more grenades drummed off the van as Grave raced through the Aegis and Federal Security Force troops, those blazing AR signs following her the whole way.

She skidded through another roadblock and onto Hall, headed for Cranbourne, the highway, and eventually Dandenong. The AR was following her, but Hall was straight and no car she would find out here was going to stop the van.

First came the thundering of the armoured car, charging up the road behind Gave and her steed. She could see the man poking out the top with his heavy machinegun and foolhardy arrogance.

Grave leaned back in her seat, hit the button for her shell and plugged the cord from her dash into the side of her head. The world exploded into shards of light and the back doors of the van opened to disgorge Grave’s children.

Scout went up and up and up and saw only the one armoured car, and a VTOL screaming to meet them on the road. Copter set the sniper’s sights on the man with the machine gun, and his torso came apart under its bullet. The Rollers split around the armoured car, firing their adorable rifles uselessly into the armour plates and a magnetic mine adhered to the front axle, and sent the armoured car blasting off the road.

The VTOL’s machine guns fired and Grave felt the bullets passing through the van like needles in her skin as Kamikaze streaked through the air to embed itself into the VTOL’s window. There was an explosion in the air and the VTOL crashed into the high-rises that flanked the road.

As Grave’s bullet-riddled van pulled up to The Lab, she sent confirmation to Rigger than the armour could not hold up to Aegis’s heavy machine guns. Her children were back in the van and the doors were closed, but she lamented the little shafts of light that made it into the back through the bullet-holes.

Even at ten in the morning, neo-techno blared from the Lab. Calum stood outside, his artificial arms gleaming in the sunlight, almost as ostentatious as the machine-gun in his hands. He waved Grave inside the small, brick structure with his typical disinterest.

Inside was quiet and cosy, Tess was at the bar with his friend, Jasmine. Tess waved at Grave as she took a seat at one of the booths and turned on the white-noise generator. She rested her forehead on the cool tabletop and figured that someone would wake her when the exiles arrived.

Ivy delicately placed a black coffee on the table beside Grave’s head and slid into the booth. Unlike Grave, Ivy’s eyes were not obviously artificial and so she appeared constantly distracted as some arcane stream of information played in her vision at all times.

Together they waited in silence.

Brick sat down, shaking the table with her metallic weight, and smiled her sharp, metal teeth at Grave. Last to arrive was, of course, Gazer, who pushed Grave along the booth so that he could see the door from his seat.

Now that everyone had arrived, Grave explained her need. They’d had word through Sam that Aegis Defence Systems, parent of Aegis Security, had sold the Federal Security Force some new missile system. It was supposed to be more durable, and unhackable – an assertion at which Ivy scoffed – and it needed to be dealt with as soon as possible.

Gazer wanted to know if they were working with the Enforcement Bureau, and Grave admitted that they were. She explained, for the umpteenth time, that they needed to work with the Enforcement Bureau to end this war.

Gazer left.

All the information Grave had was that the missiles were going to the forward operating base in Carrum Downs. They were arriving tonight. No, there had been no way for Grave to get through the blockade sooner without being killed.

Gazer sat back down and didn’t look directly at anyone. He did not warm as they discussed a plan. He did not warm as they moved to Grave’s van. He warmed when Grave gave him the sniper rifle Buzzer had sent with her for the purpose of this bribe.

Simon, with blood on his hands and on his bag of tools, confirmed that the missiles were coming from the airport and would arrive in Carrum Downs via the Eastlink. Grave paid Simon for his trouble and left before Simon could offer to let her see the Aegis officer who had furnished him the information.

They waited off the Eastlink in Wantirna and Scout and Gazer kept an eye out for the Aegis Defence Systems convoy. They had a plan in place, and it would crumble the moment it was executed but Grave reasoned that it was better than nothing.

Even flying free, high above, staring down at the road through Scout’s powerful cameras, the wait was maddening. It was just past midnight when Scout spotted the convoy. Two huge trucks, conspicuously solid in construction, with the Aegis shield painted in bright red and blue.

Grave told Scout to keep an eye out and relayed the images to the rest of the exiles. She returned to her body and started the van, pulling onto the Eastlink a couple hundred metres in front of the trucks. From her comfortable apartment in Mount Waverly, Ivy started the flickering AR signs around the van to signal a malfunction.

The trucks changed lanes to avoid the van, moving into the right-most lane. Brick, on her very disposable motorcycle, charged across from the other side of the road and hurled herself onto the cab of the forward truck. The cab dented under Brick’s metallic weight.

Gazer and his sniper rifle started firing from some distant rooftop and the truck’s windshield cratered with the bullets. The truck swerved as if trying to avoid the clinging Brick and scraped against the barrier before righting itself.

Spike drifted from the back of the van to wrap itself into the front of the truck and Grave’s world shattered as she was suddenly a truck with an astoundingly heavy woman clinging to the front. From her new position, Grave opened the driver-side door and Brick climbed in and used her hands to dispose of the driver. The guard in the back of the truck, even with his rifle, fared no better.

Brick reported that the truck was empty. Grave the Truck opened the back doors and Brick sprung onto the front of the rear truck. An AR vine crawled over the cab of that truck and all the doors sprung open.

Still Brick punched her way through the windscreen and hurled the driver from the cab. The guard in the back of the truck went out the open back doors with a stoic kind of shriek. But this truck, too, was empty.

The Aegis Security and Federal Security Force joint base in Carrum Downs had once been a six-storey apartment building, surrounded by other, similar apartment buildings. Now it was a six-story monolith of pitted, reinforced pastcrete. The buildings around had been demolished, presumably along with the residents.

It was just past two AM in the morning when two Aegis Defence Systems trucks slammed, full-speed, into the side of the base. Neither truck made much of a mark on the base, but alarms sounded and soldiers were roused from their beds.

Snipers swarmed onto the roof and found themselves with new holes from Gazer’s distant rifle. Soldiers mustered about the trucks, keeping their distance, but not keeping enough distance. The trucks detonated, cutting nearly a dozen soldiers to pieces and leaving two new pits on the reinforced, pastcrete building.

Grave’s van slammed through the garage door on the ground floor, just barely making it through the heavy metal. Brick and the Rollers charged out as Ivy, still comfortable in her Mount Waverly apartment, disabled the alarms, then the locks, then the lights.

Gunfire lit first the garage and offices on the ground floor as the recruits and poor soldiers fired wildly into the darkness. Soon, they were all gone. Brick and the Rollers went down the stairs, lighting up the training ground as cover popped up to defend those fighting people who were keeping their skills sharp in the middle of the night.

It was wonderous news that none of the soldiers trained with rockets or grenades, else they might have stood a chance. As it was, Brick and the Rollers made it down another floor with relative ease. Here was the underground garage and storeroom, where they had expected to find the missiles, but there was no sign of them.

On the bottom level of the basement was the server, to which Ivy couldn’t gain access remotely. While the Rollers stood guard at the stairs and lifts, Brick went down another floor to gain access to the server. She pulled the spider from their pod and stomped their head in, first.

Soldiers poured into the storeroom and the Rollers engaged, rifle to rifle. And then came the tank, thundering down into the underground garage. The rollers were fast, were nimble and accurate, and the tank had shells to waste. As the first Roller was disintegrated into flaming pain, Ivy informed everyone of the where the launch site was, and then she started screaming.

Grave pulled the van out of the garage on the ground floor as the second Roller was struck down below, connection already severed. Grave called to Brick, but the server was shielded and she couldn’t get through.

Then came a message from Brick: Get very far away.

Grave thundered into Carrum Downs, that AR display following her through the streets. And then a mighty boom and the base erupted into fire and stone. The AR display was gone, along with Brick and the base.

The missile battery had been parked within easy range of the Digger’s mortars, a huge, metal shelter was set up to keep the bombardment off it. Once there had been a building on the site, but the war had reduced it to rubble as Aegis Security had blasted the place to deal with the gangs supposedly sympathetic to the Digger’s cause.

Scout circled high above and through its many eyes, Grave saw a half-dozen drones like it, and a half-dozen drones like Copter. Beneath the metal shelter Scout could see three people working at the battery’s controls, and nearly fifteen people with guns, keeping an eye out. Among them were people with grenade launchers and one man with a rocket launcher.

The van couldn’t hold up to a rocket launcher and Gazer couldn’t hold up to the drones keeping an eye out for someone like him. Their comrades’ mortars wouldn’t get through the shelter on the battery, so they had to act. The one entrance to the space was blocked by a heavily armoured truck, a portable fortress from which to watch the missiles launch.

They needed to move quickly, needed to deal with the drones and move that truck. If Brick or Ivy had been there, the truck or the drones would have been no problem. But the drones were too small and moved too fast for Gazer to deal with them quickly, or for Copter to deal with them competently.

If Grave could get a mine under the truck, that might clear the way, but with the scout drones out in force, it would be impossible to do it without being spotted. And then the engineers scurried from under the shelter and ran for the truck and it was too late for planning.

Grave hurled the van toward the truck and struck with a resounding clang and a lurch, pinning two of the engineers to the outside of the truck. Gazer started firing, slowly hitting the copter drones. The light on the truck’s door turned red and the last engineer could not get it open.

Copter lifted out of the back of the van, shot the last engineer and was hit by a rocket fired at the van. Nine mines, the last of Grave’s stock, climbed under the truck and Grave reversed as quickly as the van could go. The explosions rocked the truck, sifting it just slightly and Grave charged the too-small opening, hoping that the van could push through.

A grenade struck the front of the van as Grave hit the gap, leaving not a scratch on the van nor shifting the truck an extra millimetre. The truck screamed against the ground, brakes and axles destroyed, as a rocket streaked toward the van. Scout dove from high above to intercept the rocket.

The truck screeched out of the way and Grave accelerated at the missile battery as it whined and emitted smoke. Grave dove from the van as the missile tube opened and another rocket struck the windshield, gutting the van. But the van had enough momentum and Grave knew what she was doing.

When the van hit it, the missile battery pivoted, the missile hit the inside of the shelter and with a deafening crash, the battery was gone.

If you like my work, you can find my writing at worldcycle.tumblr.com. If you really want to, you can follow me on twitter @theworldcycle, you can find my interactive fiction at worldcycle.itch.io. This podcast is made possible by Anchor, you can go to anchor.fm/worldcycle and it should be on most podcast apps. If you want to support my work, you can do so on ko-fi, at ko-fi.com/worldcycle. Thank you for listening to [and/or reading along with] the second episode of the World Cycle Podcast. Episode three will come out on Friday, April 10th.

Good bye.

#writing #podcast #my writing #world cycle podcast #episode 2 #cyberpunk #writeblr #fresh new episode #I actually like this story #though admittedly that doesn't mean it's good #The Diggers

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miairviin · 5 years ago

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Nie Vergessen

Yesterday was a cold day. It was cold in every sense of the word. When we woke up and began making our way to the Brandenburg Gate to meet up with our tour guides, a steady chilled rain began to fall. It persisted as we wound our way through the streets of Berlin. Photo ops were now inhibited by numb fingers slipping on screens as we scrambled across sidewalk in search of temporary shelter. So, the day literally began in the cold.

The plan for the day was to tour Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, the blueprint for all other concentration camps to follow. Originally, Sachsenhausen was designed for political prisoners and initially, they were not designed for the insidious Final Solution. Rather, they were designed to get the communists off of the streets. When the Nazis came to power, the Communists were the rival political party and Hitler did not want any competition for the throne. But the communist threat died down, as once they were imprisoned in places like Sachsenhausen they broke and renounced their beliefs. However, Heinrich Himmler insisted that concentration camps just like Sachsenhausen should become a part of the German landscape. Bad people went to prison, he argued, but people who were simply inferior and tainting German blood should go to a concentration camp. And from there, horrors like Buchenwald, Auschwitz, Dachau, and countless other killing factories were gradually built. Sachsenhausen became a model for these other camps, and Himmel even ran the other camps from a T-shaped building in Sachsenhausen.

I had been prepared by others who had visited a concentration camp that it was going to be a heavy day. I had read books like Night and The Diary of Anne Frank and seen movies like Schindler’s List and The Pianist. I knew it was going to be a tough day. But as soon as we were led inside the gates, everything shifted. The wind began to whisper, people began to grow silent, and there was an indescribable chill, not just from the temperature, that stayed on my skin under my jacket. We began by learning about the Schutzstaffel, or as they are more commonly known, the SS and what exactly it took to become a guard at a place like Sachsenhausen. The path to being an SS officer? Terrifyingly simple. It was a position of brute strength, not necessarily smarts. Guards were encouraged to be cruel. The more cruel, the better. They began as 16-20 year old boys who were trained with the ideology that when one makes a mistake, they must be humiliated and punished so it does not happen again. By the end of their training, they were hardened, but they were still boys. However, boys who were ready to teach their newfound philosophy to the prisoners they were now tasked with guarding.

Life in the camp was dismal. Through vivid stories and with the help of a few museums on the grounds, our tour guide was able to stitch together many different accounts from different prisoners to construct what a day would be like in Sachsenhausen. The entire tour, I never truly warmed up. That chill lingered the entire time I was walking through the camp grounds. There were certain instances of cruelty that were so shocking, so horrifying, all I could do was look at my shoes. What could possess a person to act out so violently and in cold blood? To torture someone by pouring cold water all over their body, which is already dressed in a single layer of clothing, in the dead of winter? The guards would even give prisoners the wrong shoe size intentionally. They were starving, stripped of their identity, stripped of their home and their possessions, turned into a number, and for sport, the guards would give them the wrong size shoe? I could not believe it. I have always known evil exists, but this was in a class all its own.

The anguish and discomfort I had been feeling the entire time reached a crescendo towards the end as we made our way to the equally aptly and horrifying named portion of the camp, “Station Z.” Prisoners entered through Tower A, where there was a gate with the signature Nazi slogan written in iron bars: “Arbeit macht frei” which translates to work makes you free. Upon arrival, the guards pointed to the chimney and told them that through their labors, they would meet their demise, and through that demise, they could be free. It was eerie to hear those words coming out of the mouth of a tour guide but to be a prisoner in the 1940s and hear that? I cannot even pretend to imagine.

Station Z was at the very back of the camp through a small gap in the wall that had been added when Sachsenhausen was converted into a memorial and museum. We walked in and to your immediate left was a short building that stood in a circular pit, a dirt ramp led down past the building and into a small circle at the edge. I stopped in my tracks. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what happened there. The narrow walkway that ended in an ominous alcove. It was for a firing squad. For executions. Station Z also had a gas chamber which was nothing short of exhausting to look at. I did not know where to even begin my grieving as I surveyed the area where so many people met their ends. In addition to the gas chamber, there was also another equally horrifying way in which the Nazis carried out murder. It involved a series of rooms meant to resemble a medical check up prisoners had grown accustomed to and as comfortable as they could be with. Once they reached the final room, the prisoner was toId to stand up against the wall to measure their height. When they did so, a small hole opened up in the wall and a German soldier on the other side pulled the trigger. It was an assembly line murder which could be carried out over and over and over again. It was so much. It was all so much. I decided all I could do was take a moment of silence, again, just watching my shoes. Our last stop in Station Z was at the site where about 30,000 Soviet POWs were massacred. It was a mass grave which was marked by seven photographs of men taken by the Germans. According to our guide, those particular men were selected to be photographed by the Nazis because they might look odd, or scary to the German people. We observed a moment of silence here as well.

Since International Holocaust Remembrance Day was only a few weeks back, the entire camp was littered with beautiful flowers. Especially white roses because of the White Rose Resistance headed by two siblings who went to the University of Munich, Sophie and Hans Scholl. They were executed for handing out anti-war leaflets at their university. They were executed for standing up for what was right. Before we left, our tour guide left us with one plea: be empathetic humans. It’s easy to sit back and say that would never be me, I would never have been apart of this but the truth is we don’t know because we weren’t there. Would we be like the Scholls? Would we be the impressionable German youth? We cannot say. What we can do, however, is learn. We can learn about this atrocious era of human history. We can go beyond the movies and the books and go to places like Sachsenhausen. We can be empathetic people. But no matter what, we must absolutely remember. Never forget. Nie Vergessen.

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thebibliomancer · 5 years ago

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50 More Days of Comics! 37/50: Dark Horse Presents #137 (1998)

An anthology! I love an anthology! Ask anyone!

Apparently Dark Horse Presents was the first comic published by Dark Horse. Which is fair enough. And it ran from 1986 to 2000 when it was cancelled. And then volume 2 of Dark Horse Presents ran from 2007-2010 and was published on MySpace!

Wild.

Anyway, this comic has the Predator fighting Nazis so it must be exceptional.

So the first of the three stories is Predator: Demon’s Gold.

The story is narrated by an Ecuadorian remembering back to when he was a child. The Nazis came and burned his village and killed everyone in it except for him. Him, they needed.

Narrator: “They wanted the same thing white men have always wanted from my land: silver and gold. They wanted what was hidden high in the Llanganati Mountains, the secret my village had kept so long.”

And they tell him they’ll let him live if he leads them to it.

Something I learned while googling the Llanaganati Mountains to try to find out where on Earth this was set is that the Treasure of the Llanganatis is a pre-existing legend and not something this comic made up.

Per the legend, it was the gold and silver and platinum and assorted other treasures hidden in the mountains by the Incan general Rumiñahui. He had been gathering it as a ransom for King Atahualpa but when conquistador Pizarro just went and had Atahualpa killed anyway, Rumiñahui hid the treasure and never revealed where it was.

Except in this story where he told somebody who passed it down to a nameless village and a nameless narrator.

Knowing that actually adds to the story weirdly enough.

When frightened boy Narrator leads the Nazis to the “sweat of the Sun, tears of the Moon” treasure, they plan to kill him anyway.

And like in the legend, if you renege on a promise to let someone live in exchange for two rooms full of treasure, you don’t get the treasure.

Because as the boy prays to the Inca gods, his prayers are answered in a way.

I don’t know why he was there but a Predator was there and he starts murdering the Nazis in his gruesome Predator way.

Narrator: “These men who had butchered my village, they were ripe corn before the harvest blade.”

He kills the Nazi leader last, pulling his spine out by his head, like some kind of Mortal Kombat.

The boy assumes the Predator, who he thinks is a demon because sure, will kill him last “would demand one more sacrifice in return for protecting the sweat and tears” but with a swipe of his wrist blades, he cuts Narrator’s bonds and walks out of the cave.

Narrator: “But it spared me. And vanished back to whatever pit had given it birth. That was long ago: I’m an old man now. My own death draws near. You ask me where the treasure is? That secret I take with me.”

There’s so much intriguing potential here. Who was he telling the story to? Was this like a Titanic the Movie setup? Why was the Predator guarding Incan treasure? But alas, as far as I know, they remain mysteries.

STORY 2! My Vagabond Days.

Set April 4th, 1968 and centered around a boy named Martin who is generally unenthusiastic about school. But his teacher talks about Apollo 6 and tells the students to write three paragraphs on “What Would I Like to Accomplish.”

Martin and his friend Jerome already know they want to be astronauts!

And later at dinner, Martin tells his parents about his assignment, his mom noting he sounds excited considering he doesn’t usually do his homework without a spanking.

Martin: “I am! ‘Cause I know exactly what I want to be!”

Dad: “Oh yeah? And what’s that?”

Martin: “I’m gonna be ‘n astronaut!”

Dad: “Ha! Oh you are, are you? Is that what you think?”

Dad: “Astronauts get good grades, and they don’t get caught stealing an’ lying all the time. So where does that leave you, spaceboy?”

And Martin runs to his room to cry. Mom berates dad because this is the first time she’s ever seen him excited about his homework but dad says Martin will be lucky to get a job at all the way he’s going.

Later, Jerome calls Martin out to climb to the roof of their building and use binoculars to look at the moon.

They obviously don’t see astronauts on the Moon with binoculars.

Jerome: “So, what do you think you’ll accomplish in your lifetime, Martin?”

Jerome: “Martin?”

Martin: “... nothin’.”

Jerome: “No, I’m serious.”

Martin: “Yeah... Me too...”

Kids internalize stuff, parents!

This was kind of a bummer after seeing the Predator fight Nazis. Kind of jerking my emotions around, Dark Horse Presents.

Last story: The Ark Part Four

The last part of a multiple part story? You fooled me, Dark Horse Presents! Uncool!

Anyway, near as I can gather, there was an alien spacecraft that got shot down and unleashed a bunch of alien monsters who seem animalistic and not gleep glorp take me to your meepmorps.

Also they’re fairly resistant to bullets.

There are several convicts from the nearby prison and some prison guards or cops? who are with them and worried that the prisoners will attempt to escape in the confusion and then there’s a main guy maybe called Guidry.

He has the idea that since the town of Pruitt has been evacuated, they can vent the natural gas pipes underground, saturate the town, and then drop a match. Boom, no more alien monsters.

On his way into the sewers, Guidry cautions everyone not to take up smoking.

Jonas: “No problem. I’ve got a rule about cigarettes. Only after sex... Or when somebody punches up Leann Rimes on the tavern’s juke box.”

Guidry, later: “I’d like to buy her a carton of Marlboros, and I don’t mean for some country-pop listening party...”

Once the gas has been vented, the group runs into another problem. Somebody has to set it off. And there’s a monster now between them and the manhole.

Then somebody steps up to take the sacrifice.

Narrator: “I don’t know what prompted Dylan to do what he did. Was it out of some suddenly-discovered sense of obligation? I doubt it. Serial arsonists rarely undergo that sort of epiphany. But I can’t help remembering the look on his face. He wasn’t thinking of the pain, or the finality of death. He was looking for the cleansing embrace of the flames. I only hope it was all he had ever dreamed.”

And then the town blows up.

And all the monsters blow up. Except for the biggest and meanest of them. And now its pissed.

The four survivors flee the surviving monster and wind up back at the prison.

Guidry: “Guns, grenades, hell, Warden Moeller probably keeps whips and leather in the basement -- That doesn’t work, we can throw cafeteria food at the thing till it pukes to death--”

Hah.

The warden won’t let them in, even though one of the survivors is Sheriff Hiatt from Pruitt. So Jonas just kicks a prison bus open and drives it through the fence.

Jonas tells Warden Moeller to stfu and the prison guards open fire on the monster, to no avail.

Guidry has one last plan though and tells Jonas he’ll need her help.

So he aggros the monster to chase him through the prison -- and holy crap, this thing is tearing through prison bars like they’re twizzlers -- and all the way to the electric chair room.

He dodges behind the chair to trick the monster into skewering it with its claws and then Jonas turns on the power.

The monster is finally dead. And Guidry voluntarily turns himself in to serve out the remainder of his prison sentence because Pruitt (the town that’s currently on fire and flattened) is his entire life and home and between another six months in jail vs never seeing it again? Easy decision.

Plus, he’s also sweet on Jonas and she seems to be into him too. “I’m a firm believer in rehabilitation.” So, yeah, that’s disciplinary action waiting to happen.

#50 more days of comics!#Dark Horse Presents #the Predator #internalized feelings of worthlessness the story #and giving an alien the electric chair #what a grab bag of whimsy

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dragongirl642 · 5 years ago

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Breakdown x reader x Wheeljack - intro

Author note:

This is kind of gender neutral as whenever see this → (looked down at me/looked up at me) the first option is female and the second option is male.

Otherwise they're just the first name, last name, eye colour, etc...tags.

This has been really cringey for me to write and I apologise for any unnecessary cringe or weirdness.

You are Silas's lost (daughter/son) because...why not ┐0_0┌

You have a sort of premonition/future sense power and other augmentations due to Silas being an a-hole father-to-be.

Have fun reading. ;)

First person pov:

I trudged up the steps to Jasper Nevada's only high school. Hoisting the strap on my guitar up higher on my shoulder. "New town, new school, new day, new life, new me." I chanted under my breath, eyes taking in every aspect of the school building. A Japanese girl with pink streaks in her hair was sat drawing on the stone guard barrier. A small boy in glasses and an orange jumper moved to join her after he was pushed to the floor by a tall ginger boy; 'Rude! Poor kid's much too young, what did he do...skip every grade?' The popular girls were gathered at the top of the steps with a group of boys; attention on the ginger boy. I raised a hand to adjust my cap and promptly stopped before I could walk into said boy who was laughing raucously with a couple of his mates. Unfortunately for him, he was blocking the door.

"Excuse me." I tried to start off with a friendly approach. My attempt at a positive mood instantly soured when he turned round and looked me up and down like I was some meat on display. He leaned close, too close. "Well what do we have here, a pirate?" I scoffed in disgust, "you're blocking the door." I didn't react to the pirate comment, most people freak when they see my eye patch. 'I have a reason for wearing it!' I was scarred across my eye and even though I can still see through it, people get freaked out by the blood red eye underneath. 'Burst blood vessels if you're wondering.'

He looked to be thinking for a moment when he said, "(I'll move for a kiss/I'll think about it)."

I was just about to give him a walloping when a voice cut in. "Leave (her/him) alone Vince!" We both turned to look at a dark haired teenage boy, who looked decidedly regretful on the fact that he had attracted what was obviously a bully's attention.

"Does Jackie boy have a voice now?" Vince's taunting voice fuelled the fire in my belly and I grabbed his shoulder, spinning him to face me. "You still haven't moved bud." I growled menacingly. Vince just laughed, his mates following suit; "and what are you going to do about it (girly/mate)?"

I smiled and threw my cap directly in the air before, placing a well-aimed kick to his shin. He hopped back and I unshouldered my guitar, holding it by the body I jabbed him with it, winding the male. Moving my hands to the neck of the guitar, I flicked it, catching his left hand in the strap and yanked, he promptly flew past me and landed sprawled at the top of the stairs. I caught my cap in one hand and placed it back on my head. Internally, snakes writhed in the pit of my stomach, 'I promised myself it would be different here.'

His mates cautiously sidled round me when I glared at them and ran to help Vince up. I looked at him, "You better not have broken my guitar and for the record, I don't like bullies."

I then addressed the boy who had tried to stand up for me, "mind showing me where the office is?" He nodded and gestured, "uh...this way." I followed him inside, not without noticing the pink haired girl having what looked like a fit of excitement behind me, and we walked down the school corridors. I looked over to see him staring at me. Attempting to break the silence I spoke.

"Name's (y/n)...what's yours."

"I'm Jack...Jack Darby."

"Well Jack, at least you made the effort to stand up for me, I respect that."

We shook hands at that and I faced forward again.

He kept staring at me, "So how did you get..." he gestured vaguely on his face. I huffed, "it's a long story." Eventually we reached the office and Jack left to go to his form room as the bell rang. I enrolled, picked up my map and class schedule and headed for my form room.

"6C, 6C, 6C..." I muttered under my breath as I looked for said room. I only had to check my map a total of twice before I finally found the room. Through the window in the door I could see the homeroom teacher sat at the front reading. From my small window I could see that g*t Vince sat with his gaggle of mates. 'Great...I've got to share form with that idiot.' Taking a breath to steady myself, I lifted a hand and knocked.

The teacher spotted me and motioned for me to enter; I did so.

"And who are you." They looked at me like I was going to attack her.

I met their questioning eyes. "I'm a new student, I enrolled today."

They nodded, expression becoming friendlier; "Well why don't you tell us your name and a bit about yourself."

I faced forward and gave my introduction. "My names is (y/n) (l/n), I'm 16 years old. I play guitar and piano. I'm a black belt in Tai kwon do, judo and I've trained in various other martial arts." Vince scoffed at that. "I like comic books and eating pizza. DON'T ask me about the eye patch because you won't get an answer." I looked at the teacher, "And that about covers me."

She nodded, "Why don't we find you somewhere to sit...there's a spare seat by Vince" I inwardly wince, "or by Jack." I look over to see Jack smiling encouragingly and gesturing to the seat by him.

I smiled and walked to my new seat, deftly dodging Vince's stuck out foot.

'Come on that's an old trick, he really expected me to fall for that?'

I sat and Jack smiled, "so we have the same form huh...can I see your classes." I wordlessly hand it to him and watch as he grins. "We have all our sciences and history together! I can show you where your next class is."

I nod, "Thanks Jack."

------------------------Time skip to lunch-----------------------

I sat at a vacant table, placing my guitar on the chair beside me. No sooner had I placed a bite of my pizza in my mouth a vibrant pink and black blur raced besides me and shot into the chair opposite me. I stared at the girl I'd seen earlier, she was staring at me intensely.

I looked at her and swallowed my food, "Can I help you?"

She grinned, "You...were...awesome!" She then proceeded to launch into an excited retelling of my earlier morning's exploits. I just ate my food very slowly while watching this girl. 'Is she on a sugar high?'

I felt relieved when Jack walked over and told her to calm down; not that it helped. The small boy in glasses had joined us too.

I looked at Jack, "Friends of yours?"

He nodded, "(Y/n)...this is Miko" I nodded at here and she grinned at me, "and this is Raf." The small boy adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "It's Rafael but most just call me Raf." I smiled encouragingly at him, "well it's nice to meet you."

Miko suddenly burst into questions, "How well can you play? What's your favourite music? Can you teach me a couple of those moves you used on Vince? What's your favourite colour? Ever been to a Slash monkey concert? Did you move here because you fell for the brochure too?" I held up a hand and she promptly fell silent, looking at me expectantly. 'Oh might as well.'

I grinned, took a large breath and said, as fast as I could, "I can play up to grade 8, I like all music, with your parent's permission I could maybe teach you a couple of moves, my favourite colour is (f/c), yes and this town has a brochure?" I took a gulp of air and looked mischievously over at the girl. "How was that for impressions?" The two boys at our table began chuckling in the background. Miko just flipped her hair and laughed, "You didn't get my voice right" she sang. I huffed and tried the squeakiest voice I could muster, "Is this right?"

Jack fell off his chair and Raf had started visibly shaking. Miko started laughing harder and I joined in.

'Maybe this town will be better than...hey at least I've made some friends already.'

---------------------------Time skip to end of school-----------------------

I walked down the school steps into the sunlight. Miko bouncing alongside Jack on my left and Raf on my right.

"Bye (y/n)!" "See ya." "Bye."

I waved as I watched them get into their respective vehicles. Jack clambered onto a blue motorcycle with pink accents, Raf got in the passenger side of a yellow and black Urbana 500 and Miko hopped into the passenger seat of a green 4x4. As for myself I walked a little further down the street before opening the door of my internally modified red Dodge challenger. Horn accents on the front gleaming in the afternoon sun. I'd fallen in love with the design a couple months ago when I passed a similar car when I'd come to look at flats in Jasper; when I was staying in a motel just outside Carson City. Some other students threw me shocked or jealous looks at my car. Just as I shut my door, Jack rolled up to my window; motorcycle growling loudly before quieting down.

I rolled down the tinted window to see what he wanted. He looked at me with a slightly panicked expression and gave a small kick to the side of his motorcycle, before squeaking out a quick, "nice car" and zooming off.

I furrowed my brows, "Weird". Both Miko and Raf's cars passed me really slowly before driving off as well.

I made sure my guitar was safely secure on the floor of the passenger side before stepping on the gas. I drove away from school, I decided to go for a drive to get to know my new neighbourhood.

Jasper is pleasant but boring. "Does anything happen here?" I muttered exasperatedly, before perking up. 'Though I loathe him, I heard Vince mention a race...and its location.' Smirking, I pulled a 180 and headed out of town.

Gas, Shift, Turn...I allowed my body to go into autopilot until I passed the 'Thank you for visiting Jasper, Nevada' sign. Then I perked up, trying to remember the map of the surrounding area I had memorised. 'There should be left somewhere past those rocks'. I thought, scouring the horizon for my turn off.

Out of the corner of my eye, a green flash caught my attention and I looked in my rear view mirror to see just empty road.

"Strange" I mumbled.

--------------------------Time skip to race-------------------

I'd finally found the place. There was a line of cars already forming. I could see some of the girls from school tittering on the side-lines. I pulled into place and a girl walked up to me and tapped on my window. I rolled my window down a centimetre and waited.

She looked nervous. "Um...I'm here to tell you the rules." I cut her off. "I already know the rules of these things, this isn't my first race...what's the prize?" She stopped stunned for a moment before saying, "100 dollars cash." I nodded, even though she couldn't see me and was about to roll up my window when who should turn up but the ginger haired tw@t himself.

Vince knocked on my window. "Hey new guy, you better watch yourself out there." I rolled my window down an inch so he could just about see my face. He looked at me, "Oh it's you...you better watch yourself." With that dark threat he turned to leave. "Let's hope you have better luck than this morning." I called after him. He shot me the dirtiest look before getting in his car.

I rolled up my window and faced forward, another flash catching the corner of my eye. I turned my head to see a red Aston Martin beside me, its side mirrors quickly moving so they were facing back and not towards me as they had been just a moment ago.

"Hmmmm...also strange" I mumbled.

A girl walked out and stood with a flag above her head, I tapped the gas and my engine purred. Intently watching the flag, the second it went down I gunned the engine and shot forward. I soon pulled ahead with only Vince and the red car posing any competition. I saw Vince swing my way and threw on the brakes. He shot past me and instead went into the red car.

"You scratched my paintjob" screeched an indignant voice from the vehicle. With the distraction I zoomed forward once more leaving Vince to the guy's mercy. I slowed when a scraping sound came from behind me. I looked in the rear view to see the red car's driver trying to ram Vince of the road. "You scratch my paint, I scratch yours!" Eyes wide I pulled my second 180 of the day and shot forward, heading for the red car.

We played a small game of chicken before he obviously decided it wasn't worth it and swerved off. He shot me an insult; the word Autobot featuring heavily. 'What the hell is that?' I shot through the empty space, turned and followed after Vince; who was now in the lead. We entered a long stretch and I could see the lights off the finish line ahead. To my side I saw the red car pass me. Not wanting to lose I saw the only option I had left.

"Here's one for victory" I whispered and pushed the turbo button on my dash. Flames spewed from the exhaust pipe as I was thrown back into my seat. My car leaping forward and passing the red car and Vince with no problem.

The finish line was closer than ever and I removed my finger from the button and threw my weight onto the brake. Skidding across the finish line, my car finally shuddered to a halt. 'Thank all that is good for the double suspension.'

A different girl from earlier ran up to me with a small bag, I rolled down the window slightly and accepted my prize. Rolling it back up, I counted my money whilst watching Vince and the other driver cross the line. To my surprise I spotted Jack in the crowd. He was looking at my car with something akin to shock. I debated going to talk to him when I saw Vince exit his car. Not wanting to talk to the boy, I drove off.

It wasn't till I was pretty far from the track that I noticed the Aston Martin was following me. I turned a corner round a large rocky outcrop and turned off my engine. Hand inching over to my guitar case. In my mirrors I saw a green flash round the corner, before both the red car and a larger blue 4x4 drove round the corner. A deep humming began in my spine.

"What the..."

They both skidded to a stop off either side of me. A disbelieving voice sounded from the blue one, "You're meant to be dead Autobot."

'What's an Autobot? Never mind...that voice! WAIT did they say Dead?!'

Before I could dispute this claim the red car spoke, "We'll make sure it's permanent this time."

'They obviously think I'm someone else...time to go!' Before they could come after me, I once more gunned the engine and drove of at high speed. Both cars following.

I headed for the road, making it onto the highway. I risked a glance in the mirror to see them gaining on me. Jasper's lights in the distance, I prayed I would make it. I reached for the turbo button once more.

My breath hitched, as with a jolt I was rammed by the blue one; flipping my car. I held on for dear life.

When it came to a stop I groaned. A pounding in my head alerting me to the fact that I might very well have hit it, very hard, on the dash. 'Hope that's not fatal.'

Hanging upside down I could feel the blood rushing to my head. The red beginning to drip into my vision not helping my new view of life. I looked around and could see the two cars circling mine. I curled up and hit my seatbelt.

#Thunk#

'Ow that hurt!' I readjusted myself so I as the right way up and reached over to unclip and grab my guitar case. Sounds of metal scraping metal sounded just outside my windows and I turned. Pulling the handle, the door opened an inch then stopped. Bracing myself I kicked with all my strength and the door swung open fully.

"Well that was easier than I thought...wait what's this?" That same voice from the red car spoke as I crawled out the door; but from above me. Confused, I looked up. 'Big mistake.'

Two searing red rings look down on me from a sea of black, set in the pale face of a giant red robot. "So it wasn't an Autobot that gave me these" he gestured to some scratches on his frame, "but a human."

"Easier to break than an Autobot." The voice from the blue car spoke up; emanating from the mouth of a hulking blue bruiser of a robot. Two glowing yellow, 'eyes?', looking at me intently. "What happened to its optic?" It began studying me intently.

I pulled my case from the car while thinking of how to buy time. "First off, you totalled my car," I took a shaky breath, "I'm pretty sure that makes us even."

I tried my best to look innocent as I held my guitar case, hand going to the second hidden catch on the side. They shared a look before the red one laughed. "Fleshy...that isn't how this works." The red one's right hand transformed into a circular saw and my eyes widened.

The blue one held out a hand, "Wait...maybe we could keep it." The red one looked at him incredulous.

"Um...its cute...I mean uh...as a pet?" The blue one tried to recover from his outburst, slight confusion on its face. I felt the intense urge to 'awww' at it.

The red one smiled deviously. "Well I've always wanted a human test-subject."

'Good feeling gone.'

#whoosh#

A swirling green vortex opened up beside us and the two vehicles I had seen Miko and Raf get into, came zooming through. I watched in astonishment as they transformed. Metal shifting and gears turning, they became humanoid robots like the first two.

Coming to my senses, I ran behind my upturned car; dragging my guitar case with me. I watched as my saviours leapt to my rescue. The bulky green one tackled the blue robot with the hammer, while the yellow robot attacked the red one. I ducked down, laying my guitar case down I flicked the second catch, opening the back compartment of the case.

Surveying the selection inside, I quickly thought of how to help my robot rescuers. I reached in and grabbed a grenade. Finger sliding through the loop, ready to pull when needed.

I looked over the edge and saw my chance. The red robot had knocked the yellow one back. He was screeching something about his paintjob but I interrupted him. Pulling the pin I yelled, "Hey Red!". He turned to see the grenade flying through the air towards him. He ducked to avoid it but unfortunately for him, it went off just behind him, flinging him forward. The blue robot, knocked the green one away and ran to his companion. He got up and the two said something to each other before transforming and zooming off.

I fished my 35mm calibre pistol out of my case, flicked the safety off and warily eyed the two robots left.

The yellow one took a step forward and I tensed. "We're not gonna hurt you." The green one said as the yellow one beeped soothingly. It sounded familiar and I recognised several different patterns in the beeps. It beeped some more and the green one spoke, "I'm Bulkhead and this is..."

"Bumblebee." I finished his sentence before he could speak. They both looked at me, evidently surprised.

I visibly relaxed at this show off friendliness. "I was a code breaker, I spot patterns in images and sounds. Give me an hour and I'll be speaking fluent beep." I explained jokingly.

Bumblebee beeped enthusiastically, "someone else...understa...yay...hip...ay."

I grinned at the childish display, flicked the safety back on my pistol and stowed it away in my case. I circled my car observing the damage as the two alien robots talked. 'Ooh that's a nasty dent. I'm gonna have ta hammer that out...at least the boot wasn't damaged.' My internal monologue was only interrupted by Bulkhead.

"So we need to take you back to our base for your own safety."

My gaze flicked up, "No can do buster. I need to fix this," I gestured to my car, "unless...I can bring it to this base of yours?"

They shared a look. "But...totalled" Bumblebee beeped, I only caught a few words but enough to get the gist of it. I wagged my finger at him, picking up my guitar case in my other hand. "It's a lot tougher than it looks...only looks bad cuz it's upside down. It'll still drive." Bulkhead spoke this time. "Well...uh...ok. You promise to follow us?" I nodded, "Of course, could you flip it for me though." Bulkhead complied and before I knew it I was driving my dented ride along a dusty, quiet road, heading to an intersection. Bumblebee was in front of me and Bulkhead was behind. When we reached the intersection, instead of turning, Bumblebee continued straight towards a rocky wall; speeding up. I hesitated, but then sped up too. Just as I thought he was going to crash, a giant, hidden door opened in the rock face. We drove into a lit tunnel and rounded the corner into an open space. An orange and white robot stood at a huge, green, glowing monitor, he turned and frowned as I drove in. A blue and pink skinny robot stood by a balcony and looked at my car with shock and sorrow, 'definitely female and definitely Jack's motorcycle'. I parked up besides some human sized stairs and stepped out my car.

"(Y/n)!"

I turned to see Miko come running down the stairs, followed closely by Jack and Raf. Jack looked me over. "Are you okay? I saw Knockout follow you and called the Autobots." I stepped back, hand clenching around my guitar case's handle. "Whoa calm down I'm fine. The red guy was called Knockout huh...what a name! What about the blue guy? And what's an Autobot?" The words came spewing out of my mouth as my brain finally succumbed to the weirdness of my situation.

"Maybe I can clear up any confusion." A deep resonant voice stated and I turned to see a blue and red robot, bigger than all the others, looking down on me. I looked up at him feeling both comforted and petrified off the aura he was giving off.

'This is someone I should respect.' I nodded my head. "Of course, it would be welcome."

He kneeled and looked me in the eye. "I am Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots!" With that he began to explain to me their history, how their planet was destroyed and how they now fight the Decepticons on Earth, who are led by Megatron. I learnt that the blue guy's name was Breakdown. He then began to introduce everyone.

"You have already met our three human charges, of whose ranks you have now joined." I grinned.

"This is Arcee" the female robot glared at me and I raised an eyebrow at her, smile falling slightly.

"Our medic Ratchet." He hmphed "Just what we need...another human." I grinned and cocked a hip, "I'm sure you'll grow to love me doc." He spluttered at that.

Optimus' mouth twitched and he blinked. "You have also already met Bulkhead and Bumblebee." Bumblebee perked up, "...understands me!" I grinned even wider, "I sure do."

Expressions of happiness to shock to resignation showed on all their faces, Raf suddenly stepped forward and gave me a hug. I stiffened momentarily before warily returning the hug. "It means a lot to him" he whispered before moving back.

I then looked at Optimus, "Allow me to introduce myself, I am (y/n) (l/n), it's an honour to meet you all."

Bulkhead and Bumblebee then began gesticulating wildly and explaining in great detail how when they were fighting Knockout and Breakdown, I threw a frickin' grenade strong enough to knock Knockout down.

Miko heard the word grenade and instantly perked up, "You have grenades!" I took an alarmed step back. The black and pink haired ball of energy looking to become a nuisance at any moment.

Turns out my worries weren't unfounded, as she practically leapt on me; legs curling around my waist and arms latching round my neck in a mockery of a chokehold. "Show me!"

I knew 15 different ways to get out of this, 7 of them being lethal to Miko and the rest would put her in a hospital; so instead I squeaked out a "help" while looking at Jack. The teen pulled the hyperactive girl off me and I got up. Unfortunately in the fall my guitar case had fallen to the side. Raf, both intelligent and curious, quickly found the hidden catch and opened the back compartment. My hand shot out, "Don't touch that!"

In his surprise he jolted backwards, knocking over the case so that it was open to the world.

The kids and the Autobots all stared at the contents of my case. Grenades, throwing daggers, duelling knives, my pistol and a silencer/sniper extension barrel for the pistol, were all neatly laid out and strapped in. I quickly stepped forward and moved to close it when Optimus spoke. "Wait."

I froze.

Arcee stepped in, "What would a teenager be doing with weapons?" the suspicion in her voice, clear for all to hear.

I mentally debated in my head. 'They're alien robots, who would they tell?' The urge to spill out my heart growing. 'It would be so good to finally trust someone...even if they are alien."'

I sighed, "Fine I'll tell you." I closed my case and moved to the boot of my car, "But you haven't seen it all." I opened the boot and lifted the entire bottom out, exposing another compartment containing a suitcase. I removed it, placed it on the floor and opened it to show its contents; it was full of weaponry. A sniper rifle, a pump action shotgun, two more pistols, another assortment of knives, two combat tactical swords, brass knuckles, a tactical war hammer and ammunition were all laid out and strapped down. On one side, a folded cloth package contained my Kevlar suit, some very faded dark stains showing exactly what it had been used for; a hi-tech black helmet with a tinted visor strapped beside it.

"By the allspark!" Ratchet's exclamation causing me to lower my head in shame; my brain going into overdrive.

I took a shuddering breath to calm myself. 'Showed them this...why not give 'em my life story too.'

"I was born into a...a bad crowd, you had to learn early on...heh, let's just say it wasn't for the squeamish. You were trained, given a purpose...I knew more than anyone else...before I even started school. Then one day..." My breath hitched and I felt choked up, I swallowed before continuing. "One day...there was a heist, it went south pretty quickly...I triggered the security override but there were guards...we didn't know...my mother was shot. She was the only reason some of them...didn't touch me." I lifted my head to see the implications of my words sinking in on all their faces. "So I ran...I took my share of all the profits and my weapons...and I ran. I have these, because I'm scared they'll find me. But when they do...I won't go back," my voice dropped, "...not without a fight."

Arcee knelt down, "So you have no-one else you can turn to?" The suspicion was still there, but fading.

"You didn't mention your creator...um male parental unit." I looked at the medic, confusion evident on my face. "Do you mean my father?" He gave an impatient nod.

A sad but angry look found its way upon my face. "I know my father by name only...and this picture." I reached into the case and took out the helmet; I flipped it and from the inside unstuck a photo. I held it up to the Autobots, who all reacted in surprise...and fear. "I see the resemblance," Ratchet muttered.

"My father's name was Leland Bishop...you've obviously met him, huh...my mother asked me to never try to find him...she said he was a monster...worse than the ones we dealt with every day. She told me she ran...after she saw him looking over her pregnancy scans and blueprints for...experiments...and found evidence."

Optimus looked at me worriedly, "Evidence of what exactly?"

I looked into his bright blue optics. "Evidence...that he'd been tampering with her medication...giving her injections in her sleep. She thought it was why...why...I was so good." I looked town, tears of frustration and self-loathing building in my eyes; I closed them. "Why I was so good at killing."

My eyes flew back open when I felt pressure on my sides. Jack, Miko and Raf were all hugging me. Jack looked sorrowfully at me, "We don't blame you for anything (y/n)." Bumblebee took the time to speak up, "where...you staying?" I looked at him, "I rented a room at a motel last night..." I trailed off.

I'd admitted my weakness and was ready to accept the consequences.

Optimus then spoke as well, "If you have nowhere else to go...you will be welcome here."

That was it...the floodgates opened. I began crying; my vision blurred and my chest became uncomfortably tight. My knees collapsed and I fell to the floor. Only held up by the comforting embraces of the 3 human children. I gulped the air as I tried to fight back the tears streaming down my face. For so long I'd been running. 'I haven't cried since...' I started weeping even harder.

One arm wound its way around Raf's small body, almost of their own accord; I just needed to cuddle something small. My other pulled Miko in close, the usually hyperactive girl not protesting at the restricting embrace. Thumps signalled Optimus moving to stand beside Ratchet and I wearily opened my eyes to see Bumblebee, Bulkhead and Arcee all hovering anxiously nearby.

I tried to pull myself together. Long forgotten screams echoing in my head. I shook my head and slowly disentangled myself from the others. Wiping my eyes to try and clear my vision. Finally, I felt like I could breathe again; but the screams wouldn't stop. I held my head, 'shut up, Shut Up, SHUT UP!'

I was descending into my own memories, I'd worked so hard to suppress them.

A voice calling "Prime!" and the sound of lift doors sent my mind into a panic. My eyes shot open and I rolled forward, ripping a pistol out of the case, flicking off the safety and firing a warning shot at the intruder.

"Woah...friendly!" Came a startled male voice. My vision cleared completely, to reveal a man duck behind the door. I blinked and lowered the muzzle of the pistol. He peeked round the corner, staring intently at me. I stared back, before flicking the safety off and emptying its ammunition chamber. He walked out onto the balcony and looked at Optimus whilst pointing at me.

"Prime, who is this?"

He was practically yelling and while the stoic Prime's expression remained neutral. I saw and heard both Ratchet and Arcee give exasperated sighs. Bumblebee beeped quietly into Bulkhead's audio receptor and he started chuckling quietly.

Optimus took a step towards the balcony. "Agent Fowler, this is (y/n) (l/n). We have offered them refuge here from their past and the Decepticon threat."

Whilst Optimus had been talking he had descended the stairs so he was stood at the foot of both flights, a meter in front of me and the other kids.

"Little young to be handling a gun. I'm Special Agent William Fowler but why would you need to run from your pa..." he then trailed off, eyes wide at the sight of the open cases of weaponry behind me.

While he stared, I racked my brains. 'That name...it's familiar.'

Optimus answered Fowler's question, "(She/He) is the (daughter/son) of Leland Bishop...Silas."

Realisation bloomed in my brain. "Fowler...you're the agent who helped us!...You kept our existence on that shipment a secret." Fowler's jaw dropped, before he nodded, dumbstruck. "She was pregnant? Hold up...Your mother told you about me?"

I smiled, for once a genuine smile, "Without you...she might not have gotten away." My smile fell, "not that it matters now."

Fowler placed a hand on my shoulder, "Her name was (mum's name) right?" I nodded. "Well it looks like she raised a mighty fine kid...though, what's with the eye-patch?"

Unwanted, a chuckle almost escaped me. I raised a hand to my eye-patch, 'this man saved my mum...he deserves to see what became of me.'

I closed both my eyes and removed my patch. Fowler gasped along with the others. I could just picture what they were seeing. The skin, flaky and dark. An unhealthy blue in patches, the rest a splotchy red. One jagged line of pale scarred skin running down from just under my eyebrow, over the eyelid to curl round below my eye. I opened my good eye, to gauge their reaction to this next reveal. I slowly teased open my 'damaged' eye. Wincing slightly as I adjusted to the light.

If I'd been in a better mood I would have laughed at seeing the blood practically drain from their faces. I could picture it perfectly. The iris had gone completely black, parts of it had also been removed in the operation, making it look like I had one huge pupil, swimming in a sea of red. There was no white in my eye anymore, just a blood red dome. Both my normal eye and my other one focused on Fowler. He took an involuntary step back.

An itchy pain was beginning to bother me, the glare of the lights blinding me; so I put the eye patch back on. Cool relief flooded the side of my face as my eye was once again plunged into darkness.

"It was a...job, gone wrong." After answering Fowler's unspoken question, I turned and deposited the gun back in the suitcase. I closed both that and the guitar case. Replacing the suitcase in the boot and closing the compartment. I closed and placed my guitar case in the boot before shutting it completely. My hands hadn't even left the metal when Jack spoke.

"If (she/he) is going to stay here...where will they sleep? What about school?"

I looked at him. "Honestly school skipped my mind."

I fought the urge to put Fowler in a headlock, when he suddenly laid a hand on my shoulder; "I can handle this."

-----------------------Time skip--------------------------

I opened my eyes to shreds of faint light streaming in through the curtains of the trailer Fowler had got for me. I stretched and yawned before rolling out of bed. 'Well really, it's more of a small bunk.' Trudging over to the small kitchen area, I made a bowl of (favourite cereal) and slowly wandered to the trailer door. Snatching a baseball cap off a nearby hook; I placed it on my head before kicking the door open. I hopped out to sit on the porch step. Bright sunlight and a warm breeze greeted me. Not caring if anyone saw me in my bright (favourite colour) pyjamas. 'I love weekends.'

I watched the small sliver of horizon I could see through the gap in between the large boulders that lined the edge of the base. Hiding my trailer from prying eyes but giving me a perfect view of any approaching vehicles. As the sun rose I watched the sky change from a deep purple, to a blush pink, to a light blue. Breathing deep, I savoured this new freedom.

I allowed my mind to wander. From darkness to light. From smog and the criminal under-city to a life of peace. Well...relative peace. I reflected on my conversation with Arcee a few nights before.

After Fowler had left to get the trailer I had asked the motorcycle bot why she looked like she simultaneously wanted to cry and tear me apart. Turns out that epic car I'd passed earlier was her dead friend. 'Yeesh'. She seemed grateful that I thought he was epic and cool and had said he would've liked the description. We seemed on slightly better terms now, but I can tell she doesn't trust me quite as much as she could.

After finishing my cereal, I stood and jumped back into the trailer. Dumping my bowl and spoon into the sink. I collected an outfit for the day and walked back outside. I turned away from the horizon and approached the rock face. The steel door's camouflage did nothing to hide it from my now practised eyes.

I keyed in the code in the hidden slide-back keypad and walked inside. Passing through the thick concrete tunnel, I opened another door to finally enter the base. The huge hallways were lit. "Ratchet's up" I muttered. 'When is he never up?'

Rolling my eyes, I crossed the hall and walked through another human sized door into a bathroom complex. I took a shower, dried my hair, got dressed and brushed my teeth. Nightclothes under one arm, I walked all the way back out to the trailer.

'One thing good about living here...I'll always stay fit.' I smiled sardonically at the thought. Putting my folded clothes on my bunk. I turned and regarded the bowl in the sink. "Ugh". With a huff, I washed and dried the remains of my breakfast.

"Not disturbing you am I?"

I jumped at the voice that suddenly issued behind me. Turning rapidly and throwing the spoon in my hand. It embedded itself in the trailer wall, inches from Jack's head. He had ducked, hands raised to protect his face, eyes wide at my now engorged pupils.

"Ahhh...STOP it's me."

I let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding.

"Don't sneak up on me...you could've lost your head."

He slowly straightened with a sheepish look on his face. "Sorry about that."

I nodded and sent him a smile. Before walking over and pulling the spoon from the wall. With a nonchalant flip I tossed it over my shoulder; grinning inwardly as I heard it land in the wash rack. "You better."

He nodded and backed out the trailer door. After sending a cursory glance around the trailer, I shrugged, picked up my guitar case from its place leaning by the door, unhooked my key and followed him out. He was standing by the door into the base. I kicked the trailer door closed and jogged over. We punched in the code and went inside. Strolling down the corridor I glanced over at the dark haired male at my side.

"So...why're you here so early...it's Saturday!"

He looked at me, then quickly looked forward again after he almost tripped over his own feet. I held back a laugh.

"Um," oh the poor boy was blushing, "Arcee picked me up early cuz I booked off work and I'm spending the whole day here. Raf and Miko will turn up soon too."

We finally reached the main room of the base. Bulkhead and Bumblebee driving in right on time.

Miko bounded over and practically shrieked in my ear, "Let's have a jam session!"

I winced slightly but otherwise nodded in compliance. Bouncing enthusiastically, she practically skipped up the stairs to get her guitar and speaker from by the sofa.

An incessant beeping coming from the monitors broke through my Miko-aftershock. I turned round to see a cybertronian symbol flashing next to the communications window. I frowned.

"Aren't you gonna answer that Ratchet?"

The cybertronian merely grunted before mumbling, "He can wait." This caught Bulkhead's attention, who looked at the screen. His optics widened and he practically screamed, "It's Jackie!" before bounding over to the screen.

"Up up...you'll probably damage it." The medic waved away Bulkhead, who was now practically vibrating with excitement, before opening the channel with a huff. "Yes Wheeljack?" Ratchet tried and failed to conceal the resignation in his voice. The reply was instantaneous.

"Hey sunshine...didn't think you'd answer so quickly."

That sarcastic voice played havoc on my brain. I quickly turned back to Miko, seeking distraction, I froze in horror at the sight before me. She was vibrating, bouncing on the spot and grinning madly; her eyes were also fixated on the screen. She suddenly ran to Bulkhead, I turned tracking her progress. He picked her up and they both started excitedly chatting with the voice on the channel. Briefly glancing away to get my bearings, I walked backwards to stand beside the couch. Raf sat on it, laptop open on his lap and typing away furiously. 'Were those ear-defenders?'

I tapped his shoulder and he removed the protection gear, looking up at me expectantly. I leaned closer. "Who's Wheeljack? And do I need to tranquilise Miko?"

Raf smiled. "Wheeljack is a wrecker who likes to visit from time to time, the wreckers were an elite Autobot faction who specialised in 'wrecking' Decepticons and I don't think you need to tranquilise Miko."

Jack smiled as he sat down on the other side of Raf; picking up a controller of the floor as he did so. "He's right. You don't need to just tranquilise her...you need to chain her to the couch and tranquilise her." I smirked at the dark haired teen; leaning nonchalantly on the arm of the couch, I placed my guitar case on the floor beside it.

I threw Arcee a cautious smile when she approached to watch as Jack started up a video game. The voices excitedly chattering with the screen behind me, echoed in the concrete bunker. "See you in 5!" being one such loud proclamation from Miko. I glanced back over my shoulder to see the girl and her guardian chatting amicably as the transmission cut off; with a tired looking Ratchet beside them. I stood and walked over to the railing, waving an arm for his attention. He huffed, but stomped over anyway; leaving the pair by the monitor.

"What do you want?" He looked at me expectantly. I stared back.

"When was the last time you slept?" He groaned and brought a servo down his face.

"Look...I don't need you to tell me when to recharge I can look after myself." I continued to stare intently.

"Stop that!"

Still staring, brows furrowing slightly for added measure.

"I said stop!"

We stayed locked in deadlock before I spoke, in the most persuasive voice I could muster.

"You haven't had enough sleep and you obviously dread seeing this...Wheeljack," his optics narrowed, "So why don't you go catch up on recharge and I, along with Arcee and Optimus will keep an eye open."

He seemed to consider it for a moment before protesting, "My wor..." I raised a hand to cut him off, "Can be completed later...quality not quantity."

Ratchet rolled his optics and flapped his hand at me. "Fine I'll go recharge...but when he gets here, don't let him out of your site." He then walked down the corridor towards his berthroom.

I watched him go before turning and walking back to stand by the couch. I flicked a glance over at Arcee.

"You caught that, right?" She nods, "Already informed Optimus." I smiled, she sent me a tentative smile back. "Not many people can get Ratchet to take a break." I nodded humbly at the compliment.

I looked at the couch again, 'might as well sit down.' My muscles coiled in preparation to move but in that split second their direction was changed.

"Good ne..." The voice from right behind me was cut off, as I flipped the spry girl over my hip onto the couch. Raf and Jack having only just jumped off in time to avoid collision.

I stepped back, releasing my hold on the girl. "You lot have got to stop sneaking up on me."

Miko merely rolled off the sofa and bounced excitedly, "You have GOT to teach me how to do that!"

Seems nothing can deplete this girl's energy. I froze when the voice from the screen issued from behind me. "I'd like to see what you got too." I turned around and eyed the newcomer. Scars here and there testament to the many battles I could tell he'd been in, 'were those katanas.'

"Name's Wheeljack." He looked at me expectantly.

"I'm (l/n)...I mean (y/n), (l/n)'s my surname." He smirked at me. 'F*£k why did I mix them up?'

Bulkhead wrapped an arm round Wheeljack's shoulder. "Jackie here is the best, we fought together as part of the wreckers..." I quickly thought off a way to cover up my previous blunder.

"Could you tell me about some of your battles? I'm sure you have some awesome stories to tell." Bulkhead latched onto the new subject with glee and I allowed Miko to grab my hand and push me to sit down in preparation for story time. Wheeljack glanced fondly over at Bulkhead before turning back to us.

"Ok I'll tell ya'a story if you tell me one in return."

-------------------------Time skip-------------------------------

I'd spent most of the day listening to war stories from Wheeljack and Bulkhead with Miko before going to bed when she went home and he left in A SPACESHIP. 'I so wanted to take it apart.'

I'd told one story of my own. 'Only because Miko wouldn't stop it with the puppy eyes and pestering till I did.' It was a recount of one of the most successful jobs I'd been involved in.

I'd been "loaned" over to a mafia group. We broke into a rival Don's home and I disabled the security system. We successfully stole over $200 million. I'd gotten quite a large cut out of it too. Of course that had gone into keeping my mum and me off the street and in our "protectors" good books. I mentioned, in brief, the resistance we met; but skipped over the part where I killed a rival guard completely. I'd tried to gloss over that.

{Flashback:

I cast a concerned look at Miko, to see whether she picked up on the fact that I was a murderer.

Thankfully, she seemed to remain oblivious to the fact and excitedly chattered about how much money we'd scored and how I, "met a real mafia boss...like in the movies?"

I nod good naturedly, red staining my mind. "Yeah...just like in the movies." She bursts into questions and asks me whether I've got any more.

Shaking my head I reply, "Not one's I'd like to tell...maybe Bulkhead has some more."

She thinks for a moment, before asking Bulkhead whether he has any space battle stories. He happily said he does and starts recounting one such tale. Periodically asking for Wheeljack's input, who gives it.

All through the rest of the story, I notice Wheeljack keeps giving me these thoughtful looks.

I stared at him, waiting for him to look again. When he looked at me again he caught my eye contact...and held it. We entered a mini-staring competition; unnoticed by Bulkhead or Miko. I felt my cheeks begin to heat slightly, but not enough to reveal my blush fully. Wheeljack noticed anyway and smirked. We continued our contest until Bulkhead nudges Wheeljack for his input. He sways and we break eye contact.

Feeling strange, I refuse to meet it again...and so does he.

'Were his cheeks turning blue slightly or was that just me?'

Flashback end}

(Author note: The potential is there. Now I'm going to branch this off early. Your next adventure determines who you fall for. :)

Breakdown ending Wheeljack Ending

#transformers #fanfiction #xreader #Breakdown #Wheeljack #transformers prime #tfp

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