#new orb rescue mission au dropped

[linddzz]

In Which Hob, a Shitty Wizard, Meets a Supposed Demon

Last week or so I made too many posts about what if Hob, still immortal, trying out occultism but kinda crap at it (which is some bullshit considering that Death is his drinking buddy), first meets Dream as the devil in the basement of The Magus Burgess. I called it "the shit-wizard Hob AU"

I still don't know if I'll finish it. But I couldn't stop it from starting.

No editing no betas we post on Tumblr like idiots.

EDIT: very mild editing still no betas we still stupid

********

In August of 1923, Hob Gadling - currently Rob Gedlen- is introduced to a demon.

It is, he has to admit, rather impressive. Or at least, the bonds keeping it tamed are. The prison space is everything a magus cellar should be. All arched, ancient stone and dim lighting that only barely illuminates the painted ceiling. Shadows so deep that even the electric bulbs only give the dark textures of colour. Green algae, the saturated grays and browns of rock, the faded blue and gold of the artificial night sky.

The oily glint of black iron chains. The sweeping ooze of the light over the curved iron scaffolding the chains held up, and the dizzying reflection off of the glass orb held within the iron like a gem clasped in dragon claws suspended over a small, mirror flat moat and an intricate golden circle.

Very impressive. Forboding even. The sort of thing a magus should have in his cellar.

The man inside of it looks for all the world like an ordinary naked man. Right number of limbs, hair and skin natural colors, everything in place where it should be. That's if one ignored the fact that he was sitting calm and clean in a fully airtight sphere of glass. Ordinary, if you were a dimwit and took human shape as a sign of humanity.

“This,” Burgess says with a wicked, bitter sort of pride, “is the Order’s secret of success.”

Hob whistles, because he thinks he should show some sort of appreciation. He's been working for Burgess for a few years now after all, and knows when to look suitably impressed. It is impressive, so he doesn't need to play it up too much when he follows Burgess past the wrought iron gate.

The man in the glass looks less like a mystical secret and more like he needs a coat. He's even sitting with his knees tucked to his chest, delicate ankles crossed in front of him, arms loosely draped forward and black haired head bowed down as if in deep thought.

With his nakedness, the curled position would look painfully vulnerable, were it not for the overwhelming sense that he's waiting.

“He's a demon of dreams. Or close enough to a demon.” Burgess explains. His cane tapping on the stone is the only other sound in that strange space. “I was attempting to summon Death itself, and failed at my task. But I did not come away empty handed.”

Yeah, that's probably for the best. If Hob had sauntered down here and seen Her displayed in a glass cage like a bauble, he would have done something stupid and violent. Best case scenario; She would just laugh at him for overreacting. Worst case; She'd do it with that sad little twist to Her mouth.

The entity Burgess did nab seems miniscule compared to the apparatus around him, to the manor towering over their heads. Yet even Hob and his absolute shit senses for magic can feel how everything is circling the center point of the man. They're all little marbles, orbiting the sphere and the mass within it.

“An incubus?” Hob asks, walking around the perimeter of the moat. His tone is mild, curious, intrigued. It's a talent of his to not exactly lie, but to use some of his feelings to mask others.

It’s a horrible thing, to take the freedom of another for your own benefit.

Her voice echoes in his head. That moment is never far from his head. The sad sweetness of her voice turned sour. The hard disappointment in her dark eyes. He will never forget the horrid, sickening twist of guilt of that meeting, and he feels it when he looks at the demon in the magus’ cellar.

The lights reflect oddly in the sphere, making it seem as if the man himself were the source of illumination. His skin is the sort of gleaming white that poets would froth over. Hob isn't a poet, but even he can tell that “white” hardly does it justice. The alabaster statues a floor above are going to appear dull and crude now when compared to the snow-under-moonlight of the man down here. The shadows of him are blue, violet, deepest velvet black.

Maybe not snow under moonlight, Hob thinks, reminded of the multi-hued winter twilight.

Now that he's closer, Hob can make out the sharply sculpted features of him. His curled body is a lean, hungry twist of muscle that reminds one less of actual flesh than of a tangled metal chord. His cheekbones are sharp and high, his eyes cast down with a sweep of raven wing lashes. The only hints of life are the faint flushes of seashell pink at his ears, his fingers, the still and plush lips.

“If you like.” Burgess says, which means the man isn't an incubus and Burgess thinks he's fucking clever again. The magus is watching Hob now, who is examining the circle, the iron chains, anything that will keep him from thinking too much about the thin form trapped within it.

“I attempted first to gain favors from it.” Burgess continues when Hob says nothing. “But it is stubbornly silent. No matter.”

Burgess has stepped past the moat, past the circle, to stand with his nose nearly touching the round glass wall. Hob stays outside of the barriers, but he is close enough that he can see the hate that always sits beneath his boss’ manners.

“No matter.” Burgess repeats, sneering at his captive. “Found a use for you anyway, didn't I? Just its presence brings power to this place. It amplifies the magic here, makes the spells wrought near it more solid.”

“Not much hope for me then, if I'm already by some magic booster.” Hob grins, and his boss chuckles almost fondly. It had been a whim that had Hob joining the Order. He’d never tried being a magician before, though he had gone to a few seances when they were at their peak. Occultism wasn't too fashionable anymore, so Hob thought it was best to try it out now before it got truly passe.

He's glad he's only been at it for a few years, because he's crap at it. All the costumes and chanting and intricate rituals seem silly, even when he's seen the true results of it. It was just a bunch of nonsense cobbled together from bad translations and old frauds that everyone knew were frauds back in the day! But if you followed the stupid made up rubbish perfectly, sometimes it would result in some actual magic.

That's one of the stupid things about magic. If all you can think about while doing a spell is that you must look like an utter berk, it won't work.

“We all have our talents, Mr. Gedlen.” Burgess says mildly, indulgently. “It's why I have brought you here, actually. You may not have the Gift,” he always referred to magic like that, you could hear the self important capitalized letters in it, “but you’re measured. Resilient. Notably unshakable.

Hob supposed that was true enough. Being in a house with a bunch of wizardy twats who were too busy going mad while practicing the perfect runes took a level head. Someone needed to have enough of a practical mindset to smother out all the fires that tended to happen, even if those fires had colors that gave you a headache.

“I've tried other magicians, promising acolytes, ruffian's from the street.” Burgess continues, sighing with remembered disappointment and gazing hard at the unmoving demon. “They would lose their nerve, complain of nightmares, or they would be too dimwitted to know the sorts of things to report on.”

Hob moves again, still keeping to the edges of the moat, until he is looking at Burgess’ back and into the lowered face of the demon. “You want me to be a guard?” He asks, voice mild because he isn't sure how he feels about that.

“An observer.” Burgess corrects. “You're sharp, though I've noticed that you try not to show it. You don't have a talent for magic, but you're quick to catch onto the supernatural.”

Hob should hope so, all things considered.

“I want you to take one of the guard shifts, yes. But I want to see what you observe compared to the thicker minds my son has hired. I want you to tell me when it moves, how it moved, if the light seemed different, if you felt tired despite the forced march pills you will be required to take. Any sign that it might be trying to wear away at the binds that hold it.

Do not be fooled by it's stillness or fair looks.” Burgess taps his cane on the sphere, making it ring like a perfect crystal. “This is a demon. If it ever breaks free, it will destroy all of us without a thought.”

The demon lifts its head then, and Hob wonders if his heart finally stops. The movement is slow, strange and dragged, a statue that can only mimic how a living thing would move. The raven wing lashes fly up. The demons eyes are shadowed. Far more deeply shadowed than they should be for the amount of light shining off his skin.

Within those shadows, the place where his eyes must be draw all the light in, refine it, refract it back in the distant twinkling of two dim, hateful, cold stars.

“Yeah. I don't doubt that.” Hob says quietly, and the demons eyes blaze in its beautiful, dead face.

[flowersandskeletons526]

“The Harshest Future We Could Have Imagined” - Lumity Future AU Fanfic Part 4

Luz catches up on training.

Part 1    Part 2    Part 3

---

Luz yelped and dodged three massive stone spires that sprung from the ground.

“Spikes?!” 

Eda cackled, doubling over and almost dropping her  paper and pencil. Scrambling to her feet, Luz huffed and glared at her teacher. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Amity sit on a stump and hide a laugh behind her hand. 

“You know, when I imagined your training, I thought it was going to be more smelling moss and eating snow,” Luz panted. 

“Oh please, I did enough of that trying to teach the new troublemaker over there.” She pointed to Amity, who rolled her eyes. “She’s the one who found that glyph.”

Luz frowned. Amity shrugged. 

“Eda had me licking rocks in a cave and I angered a rock demon. It broke a stalagmite and I found the glyph inside. It was growing like tree rings.” 

“And now Eda can attack me with spikes.”

“Hey, you wanted to show Willow that you know how to fight. You don’t have the same range of magic as Belos’ soldiers and you’re not ready for a staff yet, so you need to learn as many glyphs as you can and use them to fight inherent magic. You have to train outmatched because you’re going to be outmatched on the battlefield.” 

“Give me a staff! Then I won’t be outmatched and I won’t have to worry about running out of paper or getting skewered!”

“You’re not ready, Luz. If you’d been here…” Eda’s voice trailed off. Luz bit her lip and glared at her feet, avoiding looking at Amity. The reminder sent a pang through her heart. Eda sighed. “Maybe it would be different. You’d complete your education and have your staff, but right now, you have to catch up. This war changed things. It changed everything.” 

A hush fell over the yard. Luz nodded slowly and sighed.

“I know,” she murmured. “So let’s learn some new glyphs. How do I do the spikes?”

“What, you think you’re going to skip learning from the island? Geez, kid, how much did you forget? No, you’re going to learn the same way you used to. From little Miss Perfect, this time.”

Amity choked, face going red. “What?”

“I’m too old to be traipsing all over the Boiling Isles finding new glyphs with you. This is how it’s going to be: I’ll teach you to fight, Lily will teach you history and the inner workings of the Emperor’s coven, and Amity will train you in magic the same way I trained her.”

“Amity doesn’t use glyphs.”

“But we do.” She tapped beneath her one gray eye. “She learned glyphs with us after you left. That was one condition of learning from the strongest witch on the Boiling Isles.”

Luz looked to Amity. Amity shrugged one shoulder.

Eda clapped her hands together. “Speaking of which, that training starts today. Now. Amity, it’s up to you where you want to take her, but you’re going to be doing this every day that you have the time. Willow already agreed to start handling more of the rebellion.”

“You asked Willow for permission to let me train Luz?” Amity asked. 

“No, I told her to be aware that she would be taking on more leadership responsibilities. I don’t ask permission from anyone. You know that.” Eda crossed her arms. “Luz, she does want you to fight with them. She just wants you to be ready first.”

“We all do,” Amity chimed in. She stood next to Luz, staff in one hand and the other resting on Luz’s shoulder. “You’ll get there.” 

“You will. Now, you two get going. I am going to go take a nap.” 

Amity passed Luz her staff as Eda disappeared into the house. “I’ve never shown you Raja, have I?”

“Not yet.” 

“Take her.”

Luz took the staff and inspected the palisman sitting on top. It wasn’t simply a snarling tiger; two goat horns sprang from its head, and a pair of feathery wings was folded against its back. Luz rubbed a thumb over the tiger’s paw and turned to Amity.

“A winged tiger?” 

“She found me when I was looking for a tree. I started carving her, thinking I was going to do a falcon, and then my mind went blank and she turned up.” She smirked and patted the wooden animal’s head. “I already had the codename Tiger, so it was only fitting.”

“Where did you get that name, anyway? I understand Willow and Gus being Thorn and Clone, but how did you get Tiger before you found your palisman?”

Amity chuckled wistfully, flashing her fangs. “I was wearing face paint for camouflage on a stealth mission that sort of looked like stripes. One soldier was about to find me so I tackled him and let him go but scared him half to death. He started running around saying the rebellion had a tiger demon after that. It’s on my wanted posters. I’m the ‘Tiger Demon.’”

Luz guffawed, studying the palisman once again. “That’s awesome.” 

“Emira thought it was funny.” Amity’s smile disappeared. “Edric would have, I think. Before.” 

Luz touched Amity’s hand. “Hey, you don’t have to think about that right now.”

“I’m always thinking about it, Luz.”

“Well, now’s your chance to not think.” She swung around the staff and stopped inches from Amity’s face, oblivious to how the shorter girl blushed. “Take me to the cave where you found the spikes!”

Amity giggled and hopped on the staff, holding out a hand. “Come on.” 

Luz grinned from ear to ear. She sat behind Amity and wrapped her arms around her waist. The wooden wings on the palisman extended, just like Owlbert, and they launched into the air. Luz let out a loud, whooping laugh as they rose to the clouds, clinging to her old friend as the staff carried them over the Isles. 

She rested her chin on Amity’s shoulder. “I forgot how much I missed this!” 

“Not everything on the Isles is bad now,” Amity laughed. She covered Luz’s hands on her stomach with one of her own. “All the magic is still here, figurative and literal.” 

Luz leaned back. She took in the rising bones of the ancient fallen giant, the wispy yellow clouds and purple sky, the oddly colored trees. Between the great fossilized islands below her and the beautiful witch wrapped in her arms, a double edged blade of elation and longing struck her heart. She held Amity tighter. 

Amity stiffened and tried to ignore Luz’s head resting between her shoulder blades. 

“I missed this place, Amity,” she sighed. “The human world is my home, but… I think I always belonged here. With you.”

Amity gripped her staff tighter. “With me,” she mumbled under her breath.

“What?”

“I-I said probably!” 

Luz lifted her head. “You think so?”

Amity sighed. “Yeah, I do. Even though life’s gone to shit, I… I mean, we, we really, well… needed you. Here. W-We needed you here.”

Luz smiled and gave Amity a quick squeeze. “I wish I was. Do you really think Willow will let me fight once I get back into magic?”

“She will. Willow’s just worried right now. Worried about you, worried about the rebellion. I’m a commander but she’s the real leader. She’s always been.” 

“Because she tried to assassinate Belos?” 

“She almost succeeded. I’m just glad she got out of there before he hurt her worse than the scar on her face. But, we did learn one thing from it.” 

“What?”

“He bleeds.” 

Luz shuddered, then startled. “Oh! I forgot!” She reached under her shirt and retrieved a small triangular pendant, strung on a fraying cord. She handed the souvenir to Amity. “I’ve kept this since we rescued Eda. I want to give it to Willow now. Show her I’m ready and I’ve been ready.”

“What is it?”

“A piece of Belos’ mask. I hit him in the face with an ice spike.”

Amity chuckled. “Of course, you did.”

“Do you think Willow will reconsider when I show her this?”

“It depends, Luz. That was a long time ago and you are out of practice. It’s a new world.”

“I know. That’s all you guys keep telling me.”

Amity sighed but didn’t press further. Luz huffed, closing her eyes and leaning on Amity until they began their descent. 

They landed outside the mouth of a large cave. Thin stone spines hung from the ceiling and sprouted from the floor, gashed with deep claw marks. Luz shuddered at the thought of what could have made those. Amity nodded into the cave and sparked a jet of pink fire in her palm, leading the way into the depths. Luz followed, listening to their echoing footsteps and the click of Amity’s staff against the stone floor. 

They weaved between the rocks by the light of Amity’s fireball. After about a half hour of walking, Amity glanced over at Luz. A tiny smile graced her lips.

“Y’know,” she said, “when Eda first brought me down here and started training me with her methods, I thought she was insane. Well, more so than normal. Compared to Lilith’s teaching, it was a little, well…”

“Unorthodox?” Luz suggested. 

“That’s it. I didn’t think I would ever learn about magic by licking rocks and eating snow.”

“Yeah, learning from Eda was always a little odd. It teaches you a lot, though.”

“It taught you how to steal my wand and anger a Slitherbeast.”

Luz laughed in surprise. “You remember that?”

“Of course, I remember that. That’s when we made the Azura book club. I’d never forget that.”

Luz smiled fondly, thinking of Amity’s blushing face and the twins teasing her… 

Her heart sank. The twins. Edric. 

Titan, Edric. 

“Luz, are you listening?”

“Hm? Oh, sorry. Spaced out. What did you say?”

“I asked if you were ready to get the glyph.”

“Yeah! Okay, what do you want me to do? Fire magic? Karate kick the stalagmite in half to get it?”

She struck a pose as Amity tilted her head. “I have no idea what a karate is. No, Eda told me to train you exactly how she trained me. Which means that we are going to be using that to get the glyph.”

Amity drew another spell circle and sent a large light orb into the air. A ways down the tunnel, the light reflected off shiny brown scales. Luz sucked in a sharp breath, and Amity put a finger to her lips. A six legged creature faintly resembling a large dog lay sleeping between the spikes. Armored scales puffed and flattened as it breathed, and one large eye was situated in the center of its long face. Haphazard fangs poked out of its mouth. It kicked one leg in its sleep, which Luz found reminiscent of King and by extension very cute. 

Nudging her with her elbow, Amity smiled at Luz and slowly drew another circle as she spoke. “When I did this,” she whispered, “I accidentally stepped on it. I’m not doing that again, so we’re going to improvise.”

“Improvise how?”

She completed the circle. A firework blasted from her hand, whistling down the tunnel, and exploded on a far wall. Luz covered her ears as the explosion echoed. The rock demon jolted awake. Its single eye fixed on them.

“Uh, Amity? What now?”

The creature roared. 

“Run!” 

They took off back towards the mouth of the tunnel with the monster crashing after them. Luz screamed as Amity laughed, the creature snarling and snapping at their heels. Barely managing to outpace the rock demon, they hurdled over spikes and ducked low hanging ceilings by the light of Amity’s fire spell. Luz stared at her old friend in terrified shock.

“This is how you learned the spell?!” she squawked. 

“More or less!” Amity replied.

“How did you not die!” 

“I almost did a few times! Training with Eda, remember?”

“What do we do now?”

“Try to get it to hit a spike!”

Luz glanced behind her at the demon. It glowered at her savagely. She pushed Amity’s shoulder.

“Go left!”

Whistling to the demon, Luz grabbed its attention as Amity split off. She weaved between spikes and watched the demon do the same. A towering stone loomed ahead of her.

“Luz, look out!”

She leapt to the top of the spine at the very last second. 

The demon jumped too late. 

It slammed head first into the rock with a thundering crack. Luz jumped aside as half of it came crashing to the floor, shattering into pieces. Amity grabbed her by the arm and yanked her back while the rock demon staggered to its feet. It shook its head, whimpering, and slunk back into the midnight depths of the cave. Luz let out a tired, relieved laugh as Amity dropped her arm. The witch stepped over to the broken spike and gestured to the now flat surface revealed. 

“Come get your glyph,” she said, smiling. 

Luz grinned and stepped up beside her. Amity was right; the glyph sat inside the stone like a ring in a tree. Fumbling for her paper, Luz hastily copied it down and slapped her new glyph on the ground. Amity yanked her back as the paper glowed. 

A thin, sharp spike shot up and smashed into the ceiling. Luz burst out cheering while Amity crossed her arms and smiled. 

“Spikes! I can do spikes now!” She jumped into Amity’s arms. Amity stiffened in shock, face going red. Luz pulled back, still holding Amity as she grinned down at her, Amity’s hands resting against her chest. “Thank you so much!” 

“As long as you keep them away from me,” Amity chuckled. 

Luz smiled sheepishly, remembering their early rivalry days. “Hey, you tried to squish me with an abomination.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me.”

They smiled, reminiscing, holding each other in gentle silence. Luz dragged a hand down Amity’s arm as they gazed into each other’s eyes. Her fingers bounced over a long, raised scar running down her bicep. She frowned and looked down at the strip of pale tissue. Amity looked away.

“What’s this from?”

“An old fight. It was just a flesh wound, it wasn’t anything serious.”

“It looks serious.”

“It wasn’t, really. I’m okay now, anyway, so it doesn’t matter.”

Luz bowed her head with a sigh. She pulled Amity closer and rested her chin on her shoulder. Amity disentangled her arms, wrapping them around Luz’s neck as tears pricked her eyes. Luz rubbed Amity’s back as she closed her eyes. 

“You have no idea how much I missed you,” the human mumbled. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help you guys. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep my promise to you.”

“What promise?”

“I’m your fearless champion, remember?”

“Luz, that was for Grom.”

“I meant it for more than Grom.”

Amity held her tighter. “You had to go back. You know you did.” 

“There’s nothing for me in the human world besides my mom. I should’ve stayed here.” 

“Well, you’re back now. That’s all I care about.”

Luz sighed and buried her face against Amity’s neck. Amity, hardly able to think with Luz’s warm breath on her skin, carded her shaking fingers through the human’s hair. She couldn’t remember how many times she had imagined this, imagined Luz in her arms, holding her tight amidst the disaster their world had become. She shuddered and let herself relax into Luz’s embrace. 

“I can hardly believe you’re here,” she admitted without thinking. “I missed you for fucking years, Luz. I didn’t know if you were ever coming back, or if you were safe in the human world, I didn’t know anything.”

“I’m sorry. I should’ve been here with you, Amity.” 

“Don’t apologize.”

A huge roar split the quiet. The two jumped apart in time to see the rock demon barreling at them again. 

“Ah okay heartwarming discussions can wait until later!”

----

The next few weeks continued like that. Luz would follow Amity all over the Isles, retracing the years of training she missed from Eda. With each new glyph she added to her repertoire, she added new memories to make up for all the years she missed, most of them to do with a certain golden eyed witch. 

Amity, laughing beneath a forcefield that Luz summoned in the boiling rain.

Amity, covered in abomination goo after another failed attempt to find a glyph in it. 

Amity sitting in the sunlight. 

Amity grinning at her. 

It was amazing until Amity was called away to lead the rebellion. She would disappear for a day or two, sometimes longer, only to come back without an explanation and a myriad of new scars. She didn’t talk to Luz after; she didn’t talk to anyone, save a quick hushed briefing with Eda and Lilith before disappearing into her room. 

Luz left her alone when she got like that, after a few warning looks from Eda and a fumbling, patchy, halfhearted explanation from Lilith. But in the end, Luz got the message herself. Amity’s haunted, shadowed eyes were explanation enough. 

The outbursts were worse. Out of nowhere, any little inconvenience would have Amity shouting and cursing at the top of her lungs, eyes alight with pain and rage. Only Eda and King could calm her down when she got like that. Luz watched sadly as Amity curled up on her sleeping bag, hiding her face in trembling hands, with King draped over her back with sad eyes. 

Sighing and shutting the door quietly, Luz left them alone and went to sit between Eda and Lilith on the couch. Eda nudged her with her elbow and passed her a mug. Luz took a swig and almost spat it out. 

“Oh gross, what is that?” she coughed. 

“Apple blood.”

“How do you drink that?”

“It’s an acquired taste.”

“Everything you consume is an acquired taste,” Lilith chimed in, sipping a cup of tea. 

“Hey, remember when you cursed me?”

“Oh for the love of the Titan!” 

Luz managed a tired giggle as the sisters squabbled over her head. Her grin disappeared as soon as it arrived, and she slumped into the cushions. Eda noticed and laid a hand on her shoulder.

“Kid, what’s wrong?”

“Does this always happen now?” Luz asked. 

Eda sighed and leaned back, sipping her apple blood. Lilith cleared her throat. 

“Amity has seen too much for someone your age,” she began. “They all have. It has taken a toll on them, and, for Amity, at least, this is how it manifests. Just let her work through and she’ll be fine.”

“How long has she been doing this?”

“Since her first few battles. The big ones, anyway,” Eda answered. “They’ve all got their own way of coping. This is Amity’s.” 

Luz sighed and looked over her shoulder in the direction of their shared room. “I don’t get it. She seems so happy when we’re training and then out of nowhere, this.” 

“Huh, wonder,” Eda snorted. Lilith shot her a look, and the younger Clawthorne turned aside. Luz frowned at her feet. 

Lilith tapped Luz’s shoulder. “Why don’t you go talk to her?”

“Weren’t you two just saying to leave her alone?”

“We said that this is how she copes. She’s never been all that open to us, but she might say more to you.” 

“I’m going to talk to her.” 

“Luz,” Eda called, “don’t push.” 

“Okay.” 

She knocked lightly on the door to their room and stepped inside. Amity was curled into a ball on her bed with King laying on her. King jumped up to meet her, hopping into her arms and climbing onto her shoulder.

“She hasn’t said anything since she got home,” he whispered. “It keeps getting worse.”

Luz gently pushed him off. “Hey, Amity,” she said gently. 

“What?” Amity mumbled into her hands. 

“Do you want to talk?” 

“About what?”

“Anything.” Luz sat down on her own bed beside Amity. The witch uncovered her eyes, and Luz offered a smile. Amity sat up.

“Did Eda and Lilith send you up here?”

“Not necessarily. I wanted to check up on you.”

“I’m fine, Luz.”

“Really? You don’t seem fine.” 

“I am.” 

Luz sighed. “Okay.”

Amity pulled her knees to her chest and sighed. Luz sat back, idly drumming her fingers on her legs. Amity hid her face. 

“Three people,” she mumbled.

“What?”

“There were three casualties today. Not dead, but too hurt to fight. One has a broken leg, another was cut to shreds, and the third…” Amity shook her head as her voice trailed off. “There was so much blood, Luz. There’s always so much blood. I can’t stand to be in that fucking healer’s building just because it stinks so fucking badly. I can’t stop smelling blood…” 

Luz touched Amity’s arm. When she didn’t pull away, she wrapped her arms around her and flopped down onto the bed. Amity stiffened, ready to thrash her way out of Luz’s grip, but the gentle hand that found hers calmed her within a moment. She screwed her eyes shut and tried not to cry as Luz pressed her face against the back of her neck. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. She pressed her front against Amity’s back. “I wish I was there to help.”

Amity shook her head. “I never want you to see shit like this.”

“I’m sorry you have to.” She pressed closer. “Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“Good. Promise me you’ll be safe if I can’t be out there with you.”

“I don’t need you to protect me, Luz.” 

Amity’s scroll buzzed. She sat up out of Luz’s arms to look at the message and frowned. 

“What is it?” Luz asked. 

She stood. “Willow wants to see us.”

“Us?”

“Yes, both of us. Let’s go.”

[thanksjro]

Eugenesis, Part Six Scene Six: Jolup Sinks Rewind’s Ship

You sure as shit have, sugarplum.

It’s time to get the down-low on everyone’s favorite severely-depressed detective.

So, hey, remember waaaaay back in Part One, when Nightbeat used his deadname to sign a report accidentally? It’s okay if you don’t, because I sure did.

God, that was ages ago, wasn’t it? Anyway, that string of numbers is his biocode, which I guess sort of functions as his social security number. So, if any of y’all wanna go ahead and steal his identity, I’m not gonna say anything.

Now, that’s a mighty low number for a Transformer. Strikingly low, even. Turns out that Nightbeat wasn’t biomorphically created, but rather cold constructed. Cold construction as a term didn’t exist within the canon when this was written- trust me, I checked. Sure, robots were built, as opposed to bursting from another’s torso like an over-microwaved hotdog, but they usually turned out like the Dinobots… that is to say, not exactly smart.

Cold construction was an experiment, trying to build Transformers outside of the messy lines of “genetics" and “family lineage”, and as it turns out, the first batch didn’t come out as expected. Or, at least, Nightbeat didn’t.

Hey there, friends. Just a head’s up, before I try to tackle this: I am, as far as I’m aware, neurotypical. With that in mind, let’s take a look at what may be an honest attempt at inclusion for a neurodivergent take on a character in a story published in 2001.  

Now, some of these snippets look kind of harsh at face value, but let’s take a closer look. Everything harsh isn’t really Nightbeat putting himself down, but rather him quoting what others have said. Notice the use of quotation marks. Think back to Part One, how he was treated by his peers- they treat him like everyone else, they respect him, they trust his input. Hell, Rodimus himself wanted Nightbeat on the mission to go get Optimus from the past. Nobody who’s been in the story has tried to belittle Nightbeat for being wired differently. That’s fucking phenomenal treatment of a character like him in the early 2000’s.

I’m probably out of my depth here, but it seemed worthwhile to mention.

Anyway, back to the plot.

Right, that.

Nightbeat gets pulled out of his inner monologue when Red Alert asks if he’s okay, since he’s been staring off into space for the last little while. They’re still waiting for Optimus to show up, and everyone’s starting to get antsy. It’s hot as hell over by this collapsing wormhole, which isn’t helping them settle either.

Something finally comes up over the horizon, but you and I both know that it wouldn’t be Eugenesis if things just got on smoothly, now would it? Quantax starts firing on the team of Transformers, while he gets nervous about the wormhole still being there. He decides that if it is, he’ll jump back to this exact point in time to show himself that it is. This is a stupid plan, for a lot of reasons. 

Good idea, Quantax.

While he’s trying to come up with something better, someone lands a lucky shot and takes his ship down. Trailbreaker goes to see who it is, I guess because he isn’t aware of what happened the last time a Transformer went to go see Quantax.  

Oh no, he’s been turned into The Transformers The Movie Prowl!

Before anyone can try and save Trailbreaker’s stupid ass, the Quintessential Flying Fucks show up. Nightbeat’s not having it- he orders his team to take them down.

The Quintessential Flying Fucks are here for the wormhole as well, but they’ll be taking out the Autobots beforehand. While everyone else handles the Fucks, Nightbeat chases after Quantax, who just bolted for the temple.

Nightbeat catches up and tackles him to the ground, only to get himself pummeled for his efforts. As the blows rain down, Nightbeat tries to reason with Quantax that the wormhole is dangerous and shouldn’t be tampered with. Not sure why he thinks this would ever work, but alright.

Quantax, pal, do I have some friggin’ news for you.

Quantax pulls out of Nightbeat’s hold to hide in the shadows, only to jump out and slash him once he gets close enough.  

I hope nothing bad happens to Muzzle here. I feel like Nightbeat really would snap if that orb got broken.

Trying to buy some time, Nightbeat tells Quantax about the futility of trying to change the past, the future, simply because it’s all already laid out, and has been from the beginning. Quantax doesn’t take the jab well, jumping out at Nightbeat again and stabbing him in the stomach, spilling his guts. Nightbeat uses the slump of his body to topple the both of them into the hole in the floor.

Outside the temple, Centurion’s wondering just how the fuck he’s still alive. Jolup’s got him by the throat, his legs have gone AWOL, and he honestly just wants to go home at this point. Jolup’s about to drop the poor guy in a conveniently-placed pool of lava, when Optimus finally shows up.

He, Thundercracker, and Astrotrain- who I’d legitimately forgotten was in this novel- are all pointing their weapons at Jolup, and demand he put the cinnamon roll down and back away slowly. It’s a sweet gesture. Too bad Centurion’s already dead, though.

With a grand, villainous flourish, he drops Centurion into the lava, where he promptly explodes, then flies off for the temple. Astrotrain pursues, as Optimus orders Thundercracker to find Nightbeat and get back to the eighties.

Sevax is in the middle of a scrape with Hound, about to be shot to death. Looks like it’s all over for this son of a gun.

Or not. Man, there goes Rewind’s weird coworker ship. Too bad, he’d already written a huge chunk of his slowburn Ultra Magnus/Hound coffeeshop AU slashfic.

Jolup tells Sevax to slap a bandaid on it and get ready to go while he goes and grabs Ryknia.

Back inside the temple, Nightbeat is clinging to Quantax like his life depends on it- because it does. They’re both hanging off the edge of a hole that’s filled with molten lava. Quantax pulls himself up with his very strong arms, just in time to stand up and immediately be shot back into the pit. Nightbeat dares to dream a dream almost too beautiful- that Optimus is here to save him, like the romance novel protagonist he is!

No such luck. It’s just the Quintessential Flying Fucks. But how did they shoot Quantax? Didn’t he make that impossible? Good thing they dragged Trailbreaker along for the ride, and also good thing he’d managed to keep hold of his gun. Loopholes are fun.

The Fucks run for the wormhole, and all Nightbeat can think to do at this point is stand in front of it and hope for the best. Or maybe the least worst, in this case.

But… but the lore!

Nightbeat gets them with the device as they go through the portal, thus wiping everything from their brains and assumedly dooming them to a short, brutal loop for the rest of time. Thus the plight of the Quintessential Flying Fucks draws to a flaccid and confusing close. I had a feeling this might happen. I was hoping it wouldn’t, though.

Thundercracker soars through the wormhole next, and Nightbeat manages to hit him with the mindpurge just as he crosses the barrier. He’s not even sure if it’s working anymore at this point.

Then Optimus gets there, and it’s time to take him back. They hold hands, click their heels three times, say “there’s no place like home”, and step into 1984. Optimus stares at the collection of almost-dead robots on the Ark, not really feeling the scene, as Nightbeat blathers on. He offers to let Optimus keep his memories of 2013, so he can try and prevent his own death. Optimus… well…

And then he gives Nightbeat a gun and tells him to shoot him until he’s basically dead. Which he does, once the guy’s had the entirety of the last few days scrubbed out of his head. There’s an actual reason for this, though I won’t lie, I kinda freaked out a little when I first got to this part. In order for Aunty to reformat Optimus into his fresh new Earth bod, he needs to be injured enough for the scans to pick up. While this is happening, we also get an explanation for why the 1984 Decepticons got reformatted too- the mindpurge dropped and rolled under the counter while Nightbeat was busy murdering his celebrity crush, and wiped the entire history of the war out of the ship’s database. Now it didn’t see Autobots and Decepticons, but rather just a whole slew of injured robots. So if we want to end prejudice, what we need to do is mindwipe our cars and then shoot our dads in the chest. Gotcha.

And then Mount St. Hilary erupts. Time to go.

Back in 2013, Astrotrain’s been reduced to being transportation, as he always is, and the team’s watching the wormhole cook the atmosphere around it from a good fifty miles away. Fun fact, the curvature of the earth makes it so that we can’t see more than eight miles in any given direction from sea-level. Even though they’re holed up in a building right now and arguably above sea-level, I can’t help but wonder just how friggin’ big Cybertron must be for them to be able to see this right now.

Genocide’s over! Time to break out the booze.

Nightbeat’s taking his sweet time, but it isn’t for a lack of trying. He’s been dodging the repair beams, trying not to kick dead people in the head as he scrambles for the portal. He gets there eventually, the wormhole now running so hot he literally bursts into flames and his eyes melt out of his head as he passes through.  

There’s my macabre little man! Back to normal at last. All’s well that ends well!

The wormhole explodes as it shuts down behind him.

Hours after, things finally cool down enough for a rescue team to go try and find survivors.

Motherfuckin’-

NO.

NO, NIGHTBEAT, YOU’RE NOT ALLOWED.

That’s the end of Part Six.