#lmao crim is going to snap my spine like a mortal kombat finisher move

[pastelgrungewrecker]

Full House Hand || Sg Ish

I hope you find Some peace of mind In this lifetime.

It had been two weeks since Perceptor had broken the glass wall in Stormy’s spirit. It had been six days since Stormy had curled into himself and dropped to his knees with the kind of air-tearing scream you only hear from air raid sirens at the end of the world.

Nana did her best, soothing his hurts with every remedy she could but when the blackrot began she couldn’t help but feel the fear of God lay a hand upon her soul.

Percy explained the happenings with a cygarette between too-sharp teeth; barely restraining a special kind of rage as his own body reflected the panic and anger he felt burning deep down.

‘It’s the network he’s built. Stardust is... infected, as well. But she is far, far closer to symbiosis given her exposure was in the womb. However...’

The smoke is silver like the streak forming in his hair.

‘She is being hurt. And because they are connected- he is living through it too.’

Aurora took her steps unsteadily out of Ironhide’s old truck- the vehicle outfitted with scrap steel plating like a makeshift tank and she carefully balanced the medical supplies she had been able to liberate with the help of Ironhide’s pistol.

Her eyes softened, “We’ve only studied a little of the mycomutagen, thanks to Percy and Perceptor’s donations. But I still don’t know very much- I was brought on during the enzyme discovery.”

“Enzyme discovery?”, asked Brainstorm hoarsely, rubbing sleep out of his eyes carefully so as not to smear oil from modifying every vehicle they could find for war, “What enzyme discovery?”

“It’s a by product of the mycomutagen.”, she explained gently, “We think it’s to protect the brain of the infected organism from other possible parasitic attacks, and perhaps even to shore it up against damage from MTBI or TBI.”

“So what does that mean?”

She sighed, “Xaaron he... For some reason when it was discovered he demanded I be brought on; it turns out this enzyme compound has many uses but one specific application is what he had me throw my entire being into.”

“..And that was?”

“Mnemo reversal treatment.”

The silence was palpable, heavy in the air and broken only by a weak groan from the room Stormy was being kept in. The air seemed to crack like uranium glass- scattering its neon shards as Brainstorm clattered haphazardly to drop in front of the minicomm system and frantically began punching in commands. The screen chimed to life, and a face none of them recognized showed itself.

“Hello, you’ve reached the estate of the Honorable Crown Xaaron, how may I assist you.”, were the robotic words of the AI assistant, “He is currently unavailable, please do not hesitate to state any needs you may have and I will be sure they are delivered upon his return.”

“Xaaron Location, current.”

“I am sorry. That is Classified.”

“Xaaron agenda, previous twenty four hours.”

“I am sorry, that is classified.”

“This is Brainstorm, this is his fucking SON where is my FATHER-”

“Hello Brainstorm, you have a video message to be delivered upon your first contact of this commline. Would you like to view it now?”

“Yes, play messaage-”

The screen flickered, the feed clear and calm and dim and Xaaron sat with his hands folded together like he always did. His eyes were downturned- the tattoos on his jaw that matched his son still crisp even in low light.

“I am not a saint, my son.”, the recording whispers, “And I have told you so, so many lies. And here, at the end of the world; I have many things to confess.”

Aurora felt her spine seem to freeze- both Perceptors seemed to appear to stand at either side of Brainstorm as the recorded message continued.

“Your mother...”

A softly choked noise.

“I have been... I am a vile bastard, you were right. I had been paying to keep her at the facility you and your twin had visited- keeping her sedated. Calm. Because the sound of her crying broke the last pieces of a heart I had. But... But then these doubles... And the mycological marvel many of them carried arrived.”

Xaaron did not smile.

“The physical I told you and your double you needed was not necessary, nor was it run of the mill. I had them draw blood from you both- we had discovered a specific compound three days previous and there was. There was a chance. A chance I owed it to my family to take. To your mother.”

The man in the recording hiccuped softly, lips trembling and his bright gold eyes squeezing shut as tears leaked from them.

“To. To you. I owed it to you- To bring her back to us all. Especially now at the end of a world that never loved you, that never held you close. A world where you never knew my shore, my ocean- Never knew her sky, her mountains. Once this recording has finished- You will be sent data by the AI assistant I have installed and modified. Tracking. Information.”

Xaaron swallowed the break in his voice, “And with that- you and your twin will. You will be able to trace each other; with the proximity comm scanners. Perceptor still carries his from the Wreckers, he hides it in a boot locker. Anyone matching the DNA markers or specific mycomarkers will be able to be traced.”

Xaaron stared with his tears free and his face tired, “Find my granddaughter. Save your family. And I will see you if I am able to save ours. Please, my little warrior- my wild sun; Through all my mistakes I have made, you were never one of them.”

He swallowed hard, and leaned back as though checking something off screen to show his lack of uniform, before he breathed deep once.

“Never forget, Brainstorm- I love you, and I love the ones who love you. If I do not make it back- If WE do not make it back, know that we have always loved you... And we are sorry we couldn’t or wouldn’t be there before.”

He smiles weakly at the camera, leaning forward enough to mimic touching his forehead to Brainstorm’s and he exhaled quietly. And Brainstorm, unbidden- followed suit as his heart broke.

The recording ended.

“Hello, this is the assistant to Crown Xaaron.”, chimed the AI voice again, “I am initiating a datadrop to the traced address of this call. Once this data download has completed, I will then be initiating a full scale facility shutdown after uploading all conserved facility data to drop serve Theta.”

“WHAT, WHY-”

“This facility was breached four hours, nineteen minutes, and eighty seven seconds ago. For the protection of all, this must be done.”

The flicker of a flashdrop, the connection buffered no doubt from the facility’s own satellites and technology. 

“Data download complete. Upload and sitekill initiated. Thank you for being with Kimia until the end, Science Quadrant A Supervisor Brainstorm.”

The AI’s digital face smiled before a hideous technological screech bellowed out through the speakers and the line went dead- the screen flashing [CALL TERMINATED] at the same tempo as a funeral bells chime.

“No, no no no no no-”, stammered Brainstorm as his fingers moved furiously over the plastiglass trying to reactivate the connection, “No, no please come one this can’t- not like this we already lost Stardust and we lost Pulsar I can’t I CAN’T LOSE YOU TOO DAD THERES’S-THERE’S STILL SO MUCH TO CATHC UP ON AND-”

“Brainstorm.”, whispered Percy, “Darling, please it’s. It’ll be alright. It’s going to alright, he’s a strong man, he was a fighter once too-”

“No no no no no no please no please no no no I can’t I can’t not anymore I’m gonna lose- lose everything all over and then me and double are gonna be alone and we can’t- I don’t I can’t say goodbye and mean it not if it means forever and ever no-”

Perceptor had spirited away, coming back with the handheld and connecting it to the minicomm with no words and his scars underlit by the tiny screen.

“Per- Percy how can you just be CALM how dare you NOT EVEN FUCKING REACT HE’S-”

And then the sniper’s hands were cupping Brainstorm’s face, stroking thumbs over the inkwork lines as his voice sounded in softness.

“Ssssssh, honeybee. Calm your thunder, hurricane.”, he soothed, “I will bring him home, do you understand me? Focus on my hands, now- The tracker is uploading and will integrate upon completion- and then I and my double will go out there and we will bring them home, to you, and no one and nothing will be lost.”

“But HOW-”

“He shares your DNA- or, more accurately... you share his. If you can be tracked, so can he.”

Brainstorm paused.

“Now- go to your double. Tell him what we know. Tell him what I have said. Give him and Aid my love, and my double’s. I’ll be back by teatime.”

“Y-You fucking... prep school boy.”, said Brainstorm through the tears he hadn’t realized had fallen and clogged  his throat and soul, “It’s n-nearly dinner. Dork.”

“Same difference. I’ll be back in a tick, love.”

The handheld pinged loudly, chirruping as it began its trace and Perceptor looked to his double with a nod.

Aurora watched her boy- her boys, gather each rifle case as they passed by to the door before she stopped them. She reached out; her arms thin and tired and her eyes crinkled at the edges and pulled them both into a hug made of steel and cotton linen as she kissed each of their temples.

“You both better come back home to me, do you understand me?”, she whispered, “If anyone touches a hair on your, or their, heads I swear I’ll go off my rocker for the last time, dammit.”

“We know Mumma.”, chuckled Percy, “But to come home we must away first. We’ll see you soon.”

Nana crept up behind Aurora, putting a hand on her friend’s shoulder as they watched the pair go down the front steps and jog to the near-graveyard of vehicles being modified by Ironhide.

The rumble of an engine was loud- even as it drifted away.

Lock watched from the old peach tree in the yard. Both the Ratchet’s watched from the reinforced barn as the younger family members bustled back and forth from weapons stockpile to gear and back again.

Perceptor floored it as soon as they left the edge of the property- his double crossing his legs primly and worrying his lips with fangs before Perceptor looked to him.

“...So. What aren’t you telling us.”

“Their mother won’t be part of the network- it’s not a true infection, just microdosing a protective excretion so-”

“You’re dodging.”

“Stormy is showing signs of torture.”, murmured the vampiric double, “A specific kind of torture- no, not really torture thought it feels like it.”

“Continue.”

“Have I ever told you why my mother wasn’t exactly present?”

“I assumed it was much like your Ratchet- an attack by your zealot false god.”

“She tried to kill me to win a weapons contract bid.”

The air grew still as Perceptor’s eye flicked to glance at his double before focusing back on the road.

“I was still in regular contact with her- through everything.”, continued Percy, “And she was the first one I told about. About the infection. and she said she just wanted to check me over. Make sure I was alright.”

“...She lied, didn’t she.”

It wasn’t a question, it was a statement.

“She did. One minute I’m having a cup of coffee with my mother as she fixes my hair, the next minute I’m strapped up in some hellish machine. It took two weeks- two weeks to get the strength to do what I needed to, and in that time she’d already been selling scraps and bundles of her research to the highest bidder- and there is only one man who would have been able to get every last scrap of it after she was gone.”

“Your Optimus?”

“Prowl.”

The name sat in the air, turning it toxic and rancid like a miasma and the only sound was the handheld’s chime. The sun was setting- the darkness tucking around them as the fields gave way to thickets and finally full woods full of death and life and secrets unknowable and whispered only by the owls and rock doves.

Suddenly, the tracker went berserk. The location pinged a thousand different directions and sudden gunfire began to sound- the flashes disorienting and forcing Perceptor to swerve hard enough to topple the modified truck he steered. They slid- the bottom of the vehicle slamming an old tree trunk and bending at the joint between cab and bed.

Both snipers had braced- keeping their good eye shut and staying silent until the gunfire stopped.

“Turrets.”

“Oh absolutely, precious. You want them, or should I take them?”

“I think you’d do well on the ground double-”, gritted Perceptor as he forced the seatbelt latch to release with a hard yank, “How long has it been since you’ve had brunch with the devil?”

“Oh ages, darling.”, giggled Percy, swallowing hard before he stretched his jaw to show fangs like a spider’s, “Abso-fucking-lutely AGES...”

“I’ll be your cover, let’s book it.”

Perceptor slithered out on his belly, reaching back in to grab his rifle case and giving his double a nod before he crawled into the ditch they had skidded to a stop next to. And with a mad cackle and pistols in hand, Percy rocketed out of the wreckage and unleashed his assault.

It was a squad of fifteen- he could smell their infestation, smell its inferiority, how it had starved so desperately and barely held them up on their feet.

Fangs bared and jawbone clicking as his false mandible spread just a little he fell upon them with gunfire and voracious hunger- they scattered near immediately and screamed their anguish when they were shot down from the shadows but never fatally.

How merciful it would be, for the hidden gunner to allow them to die with dignity and limbs still attached.

Perceptor looked away whenever his double fell upon a new victim, instead focusing his reticule on knees and the middle of spines- chuckling to himself at the ones that wore thicker belts like that could save their skin from a disabling shot between the vertebrae. The remaining victims, all four of them, surrounded what they had been protecting- a downed transport shuttle, looked civilian by make and model but showed the signs of attempts to break into it. It looked as though the engine had been shoot own and it had gone down hard enough to bury the nose a few feet into the ground.

They raised their weapons- Percy stood tall and wild with eyes like a baphomet statue and pistols aimed as Perceptor slunk free of his hiding spot like Eden’s serpent crawling free from his guise to reveal the devil himself.

“Stand down. This is your only chance to survive.”, he said, his voice like ice.

“For a gentle use of the word SURVIVE, darlings.”, laughed Percy, his head tilting as he licked a thick smear of gore from his own chin.

They both saw as the remaining one braced as though about to fire, and they struck.

It was over in moments. Perceptor scoffed in disappointment.

“This is the best your false god has, then?”

“Numbers have been down for quite some time, double-dear. Happens when your leader kills all dissenters but counts yawning as dissention.”

The crack of a wrist being snapped hard enough for skin to tear, and Perceptor grimaced- knowing his double was no doubt draining the body while it was still warm.

“Hurry up, would you- We need to bust into this shuttle.”

“Yesh, yesh-  Wumoment.”

“You really are the foulest little house spider sometimes.”

“Oh, like there’s nothing you swallow sloppily in this world, right.”

“SHUT IT.”, snapped Perceptor, trying not to snicker at the lewd humor before he stepped over the dead to inspect the door before it thudded.

It groaned before haphazardly sliding open and a soft hand held the edge tightly. Crips eyes, eyes like Brainstorm’s when furious but the wrong color, stared back out.

“...Madame, I am here to save Xaaron and one other. I am Perceptor.”, he said gently, kneeling down.

“Ah, his sniper in law.”, she said, her vice carrying the husk of grand speeches and heavy woe, “He’s taken a hit to the head when he was trying to lock down the shuttle against those. Things. They pulled up in some kind of weird tank I think, pretty sure they shot us down.”

Percy raised his eyebrows, threading his fingers together, “Fabulous sweetheart- could you do me a teensy favor and perhaps tell me where they no doubt illegally parked? They managed to wreck our ride as well.”

Her hand released the door edge, and pointed to an overgrowth of kudzu-like leafy vines a bit farther from the side of the road. Both snipers nodded at each other before Perceptor heard a grunt and a low groan from inside the shuttle.

“Sir!”

==========================================================

Brainstorm sat next to Stormy- who’s face was pale as the rising dawn outside the window- and sighed.

“...Dad left Kimia before it got. Got raided. By the other side.”, he said quietly, “...He lied about the physical, got our blood and-”

“I know.”, rasped the industrialist, leaning gently back, “I know how physicals work, and he had a terrible firewall protecting his internal memorandums.”

“Thanks for keeping me in the loop, dude.”

“The ends justified the means.”, was the woozy reply, “We’d... We’d have mom.”

“Yeah, well. Turns out- the funky fresh backpacker in your flesh pajamas? It can be traced.”

Stormy’s head whipped around to look at Brainstorm faster than a lightning strike, “What?!”

“Yeah. Yeah- he developed a DNA trace through it. We’ll be able to find Stardust, and where those pieces of shit are hiding. Hit them with a surprise assault I’d imagine.”, said Brainstorm softly, running his shaking hands through his white hair, “A-And that’s good, great even but-”

“...But what, copycat?”

“...Xaaron went out, alone, to get Mom.”, he whispered, “He left a message, he told me everything- and he said he loved us, and he said he’d try and bring her home but if. If he didn’t. For us t-to know th-that. That-”

Brainstorm froze at the warmth. He blinked eyes already overflowing with tears again as arms encased in elbow length reinforced gloves went around his shoulders in a tight hug.

“He’ll be back.”, said Stormy, trying desperately to be sure and knowing he was failing, “He has to be, remember? He. He promised he’d be there at Christmas for Stardust th-this year.”

Wet warmth on Brainstorm’s shoulder and he bit his lip to silence the sobs that wanted to sound and returned the embrace. They cried in silence, as the sun rose behind a screen of overcast and they rocked back and forth- twins curled in utero, comforting themselves with old heartbeats they still can’t recognize.

The rumble cut through the morning like a knife- they both looked out and saw the heavy machine trundling like an oncoming thunderhead up the dirt road and they looked at each other in sudden panic. In rage.

They tore out, followed by most of the family as they all feared the worst as it drew ever closer and closer before suddenly its massive engine cut off in a loud stall.

“Damn thing is held together with fucking DUCT TAPE AND PRAYERS GODDAMIT-”

“Honestly, doublemine- your language is ATROCIOUS-”

“It’s HONEST you incessant TWAT.”

“Relax, professor Bitch.”

“Young men.”

“Apologies.”

“Sorry about that, Mister Judge.”

The conversation echoing from behind tinted windows faded. The massive vehicle’s back end unfolded itself open- and a collection of slow steps sounded and gentle hushed words as those footsteps hit the autumn grass in a steady rhythm. 

Xaaron squinted at the daylight, a butterfly bandage over a bright wound over his eye while the other was ringed in a bruise as Perceptor and his double led him and the weight he carried into the chilled air.

He blinked, sore from injury and guilt before he turned enough to see Brainstorm and Stormy- his smile was tired and proud and he straightened a back that both the snipers knew ached from the shuttle crash before they fell back, letting Xaaron take his final steps alone.

“Hello, my sons.”, he said- the rumble of his voice heavy as the weight he finally could unhook from the hinges of his heart, “I am. Home. I am home, and... And so is she.”

She raises her head just enough; worn out from the ordeal she had just survived, she waves weakly and smiles crooked in the way Brainstorm always had before she laughs softly and gestures with her thin hands.

“My boys- My boys, come here. Come here and give me a hug- I’ve just had the worst time of things.”

Xaaron lets her gently alight on still socked feet, her robe wrapped near perfectly around her thanks to Percy’s ministrations during the ride over and she opens her arms wide.

Brainstorm and Stormy try to stand straight, and dignified-

“Once you get some time with your mum,”, said Percy as he skirted around the rescued woman, “Then we’ll get started on bringing her granddaughter home.”

“Granddaughter?”, she gasps, glancing over her shoulder at Xaaron.

“Yes, her name is Stardust.”

Brainstorm and Stormy are still trembling, blinking owlishly in the morning light before Nana calls out.

“Oi now! Bring that lady on inside dammit- y’all gonna free- WAIT A DAMN MINUTE, I KNOW YOU!”

The woman looks up, “Ah. Madame Doctor Valerian. Delightful.”

“Senator Caecias, truly I’m charmed. Ain’t you banned from these parts.”

“Well, with the world ending, my sons being here and me not having much CHOICE-”

“Yeah, yeah. Boys, bring your mama on in, I’ll see if Aurora has anythin’ she can wear. Both’f them are tiny as hell anyway...”

It was hearing Nana call Caesias their mother that broke them. Both of them surged forward and flung themselves onto her willowy frame with broken sobs shattering free from birdbone ribcages and she laughed though her tears had begun when she felt their arms wrap around her.

She held their heads to her chest, shushing their cries even as all three sank down to kneel in dewy grass.

Inside the assault vehicle that had been liberated- the handheld flared to life briefly and chimed out.

Somewhere, away from the reunion- Stardust had closed her golden eyes as a CR chamber’s door clicked shut; and the tracker so far away from her chimed as she opened them once again; and they were underlit in vicious and voracious crimson.