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scarletfish · 11 months ago

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Andreil Time Travel AU

happy nye I just had the most devastating andreil AU idea while playing Life is Strange-

(cw: canon-typical references to violence, (temporary) suicide mention, this started as a bullet point list that quickly spiraled out of control into 4000k, oops)

***

So Nathaniel grows up a Raven, right? The Perfect Court's #3 striker, the Butcher's son, set to inherit a legacy.

He's also born with the ability to travel backwards for very brief periods in time.

It starts when he joins the Ravens. The first time Nathaniel travels back (ten seconds, during practice) it terrifies him so badly he runs into the goal post and knocks himself out.

He thinks he's hallucinating for a while, cracked under the stress. He never tells anyone. Even once he comes to terms with the fact that it's real, he refuses to try and learn to control it for years. It happens sporadically, out of control, at the worst times times of high emotion.

When he wins his first game as an official Raven. When Riko loses his temper. When he screws up and ends up under his father's knife.

(That night is what finally gets him to face this "ability" he's been ignoring and avoiding. He can't travel far, 10-15 seconds at most, and he has to concentrate or he'll get stuck in a loop. He's gotten stuck in some... pretty bad loops.)

He locks them away somewhere as cold and dark as his father's basement.

But ‘rewinding,’ as he calls it in his head, isn't all bad. He's hesitant to use it, scared that someone will find out, scared he's actually, truly just insane – but not too scared to squeeze in extra practice time when he can, to replay the exact twist of Kevin's wrist that spirals the ball into the corner of the goal perfectly, or, once, to replay the rare sound of Jean's laugh – loud, a bit shocked, unrestrained.

Nathaniel spends weeks trying to remember what he said and how to replicate it.

From what he can tell, the only downsides are increased exhaustion, headaches, and the occasional nosebleed if he pushes too hard. Nothing that would draw attention in the Nest. He thinks about it less and less.

Honestly, by the time Nathaniel is approaching his junior year, it's become a natural extension of him, like his Exy racquet. He's close to getting everything he's ever wanted: freedom, autonomy, a contract to play on a pro team when he graduates. Kevin and Jean are going to graduate, and in a year he's going to follow one or both of them across the country, get as far away from this fucking place as he can, and play Exy until it runs him into the ground. He's happy.

Of course that's when tragedy strikes.

Jean doesn't come back to their shared room the night of graduation. In fact, when the Raven’s private medical team arrives on the scene, they confirm Nathaniel’s greatest fear – Jean isn’t coming back at all.

Shattered over the loss of his closest friend and partner, delirious with grief, Nathaniel impulsively throws himself as far backward in time as he can reach. He only means to rewind a few hours, to find Jean and stop him from doing the unthinkable – he doesn't know how but he'll grab him and hold him all night if he has to, he can't lose him, he can't believe he missed this, he thought they were going to build a life together outside of this hellhole and how dare Jean leave him here alone –

Instead, Nathaniel wakes up somewhere... new.

For one thing, he's traveled further than three hours. It was past midnight in the Nest, but the sun is just barely cresting the horizon now. He knows because he can see it through the window. The fifth story window.

And that's the other thing that becomes clear as Nathaniel scans his new surroundings. If he's traveled to the past, it isn't his past. He's never seen this building before in his life.

Overall, he spends a bewildering thirty minutes in this strange orange-accented building, heart racing, unable to channel the adrenaline of trying to save Jean into the random place and time he's wandered into.

The first person he runs into is a tall man with a buzzed head who claps him on the shoulder and calls him 'Neil.' He looks betrayed when Nathaniel introduces the overly-familiar guy's gut to his elbow. He’s wearing an obnoxious orange hoodie. Boyd, Palmetto State Foxes. Nathaniel sneers.

There’s no time for this. He’s never traveled to a different location before, only different times. He doesn’t even know where Palmetto is, only has the vaguest idea of Exy’s greatest NCAA embarrassment. The longer he spends here, the less chance he has of saving Jean. Jean is not at Palmetto.

Somehow though, inexplicably, Kevin is. And here’s where Nathaniel realizes something is really wrong, because Kevin is wearing orange and white and lunging to fist his hands in Nathaniel’s hood and shake him and he’s speaking–

“What the fuck are you wearing–”

But all Nathaniel can focus on is the violent white scarring twisting up Kevin’s left hand.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Kevin is not a Fox, Kevin is not broken. Jean is broken. Jean is missing, and he doesn’t know these people, and he needs to find Jean before it’s too late.

He must say some of this out loud because Kevin shakes him hard and asks harshly, fear edging his words, “Too late for what, Neil? What the fuck have you done now?”

Boyd leans around the corner of the hallway with a defensive arm curled around his stomach to ask, “He’s looking for Jean?”

At the same time Nathaniel snarls, “Don’t fucking call me that.”

Kevin’s eyes dart to the Fox in the hallway and back to Nathaniel before narrowing. Nathaniel roughly tries to shrug his fingers off, but Kevin digs in, leaning closer. Then he does something insane.

He sniffs Nathaniel’s face. Nathaniel twists away, and the hand Kevin raised to – slap him? Grab him again? Just barely brushes his forehead. Kevin exhales sharply through his nose.

“Are you drunk? Sick? What’s wrong with you?”

Another door pops open about ten feet down the hallway. “Neil’s sick?”

As everyone’s heads turn, Nathaniel lunges in the direction of the nearest stairwell. Except, Kevin is a bastard and has shifted himself directly in Nathaniel’s way, like he was expecting this. He throws an arm out to further block Nathaniel’s escape.

Fine, if he wants it that way.

Nathaniel pulls out his knife. Chaos erupts.

Boyd shouts in surprise and starts calling for someone to get ‘Andrew.’

The messy-haired boy hanging out of his dorm room throws his hands up, hooking a foot around his door and pulling it shut with a firm “Nope, that’s none of my business.”

Kevin is shaking with anger, and he points at Nathaniel’s chest. “Is this some sort of fucked up prank?”

Nathaniel doesn’t understand the question, so he gestures with his knife. “Move. I won’t ask again.”

“After everything they did to you, what are – I don’t…” Maybe anger wasn’t the right emotion. Kevin looks more likely to throw up than throw a punch.

Coward.

Nathaniel is ready to open the door and shove him down the stairs when the door at the far end of the hall slams open, bouncing off the wall with a bang. It sounds like a gunshot. Yet another Fox has arrived. Kevin breaks off his unintelligible muttering (something that sounded like “what’s going on”) mid-sentence as Neil straightens to assess the new threat.

“Thank god,” Boyd breathes at the sight of the short blonde standing, for all the drama of his entrance, nonchalantly in the doorway. Inexplicably, Nathaniel’s stomach aches.

Stocky, broad shoulders, black jeans and tee, and a pair of black armbands. One of the Minyard twins, he recalls. The backliner is nothing special, but the goalie, what was his name –

“Andrew,” Kevin snaps, a greeting and a command (though it isn’t clear what he’s asking for).

Andrew Minyard, sophomore, save percentage of 0.892 in spite of (and no thanks to) his team, 5 shutouts last season, with some of the quickest reflexes Nathaniel has seen on a college team outside of the Ravens–

The stats looping through Nathaniel’s mind on instinct are abruptly cut off when Kevin shoves– actually shoves Nathaniel from behind, right between the shoulder blades, propelling him further away from the safety of the stairwell.

Nathaniel goes to actually stab him this time, but Kevin ducks in a practiced maneuver and slides out of range. He levels a pointed look at Andrew and flicks a hand at a furious Nathaniel. “Take care of that.”

Nathaniel throws his knife and dives for the now unguarded stairwell door.

Kevin screeches, his striker reflexes barely saving him from getting skewered in the neck. The handle shudders and jams under Nathaniel’s grip. Locked. He kicks it for good measure, stubbing his toes with a curse, and then turns back to face the consequences of his actions.

Kevin clutches his (unharmed) neck with a wounded expression, which is objectively hilarious, but, con, Nathaniel is now disarmed. He expects immediate retaliation from one of the Foxes, but Boyd has discretely slipped away somewhere, while Minyard is still planted in the doorway, eyes pinned to Nathaniel's chest with an unreadable expression.

“Do I have something on my shirt or what?” Nathaniel asks heatedly. They both ignore him.

“So you didn't have anything to do with this then,” Kevin interjects, gesturing up and down Nathaniel's body.

Minyard drags his eyes away with visible effort and cocks his head.

“He came back from his run dressed like this,” Kevin answers the nonverbal question, “freaking out over Jean and ranting about how it's ‘too late,’ which is fucking ominous, and then he pulled a knife on me –”

Apparently having heard enough, Minyard shoves roughly past Kevin and moves toward a wary Nathaniel. As he passes Nathaniel’s knife where it’s stuck in the wall, he retrieves it.

He moves slowly, and Nathaniel tracks every smooth, deliberate movement. Nathaniel doesn’t take his eyes off the knife, so he’s taken by surprise when Minyard reaches for him with his other hand.

Nathaniel bares his teeth. “If you touch me, I will skewer you.” Minyard’s eyes widen slightly and he freezes with his fingers inches from Nathaniel’s neck.

It’s a bold claim for someone who is apparently (and actually) unarmed – Minyard’s eyes trail down Nathaniel’s body for a second time, probably trying to unearth any hidden weapons – but he drops his hand and, maintaining eye contact (a threat?), tucks the retrieved knife into his left armband.

“Neil. Do you know where you are.” His voice is irritatingly familiar – low, and a bit gravelly. Nathaniel realizes with a start that this is the first time he’s heard the goalie speak.

“Surrounded by idiots?” Nathaniel spits. (He has no idea where he is.)

Minyard hums and nods at the small Raven insignia on Nathaniel’s chest. “What is it they say about birds of a feather?”

“I’m not here to play word games.” Nathaniel crosses his arms.

“No, apparently you’re here for Jean.” Minyard speaks slowly, like he’s speaking to a child or a wild animal. “Moreau is with Abby. You know this.”

Nathaniel did not know this. “He’s… Abby?”

“Renee got him out of that hellhole. He’s… safe.” Safe. Nathaniel slumps back against the locked door at his back. If this man is telling the truth, then he did it. Jean is alive. He isn’t sure how or when, but the relief is enough to make his legs weak.

Renee… Nathaniel wracks his memory. Most likely Renee Walker, the Foxes’ other goalie. He’s torn between his need for information and his pride, between his instinctive distrust and the uncomfortable feeling that he would trust the man in front of him with his life. He has to be sure though.

“How did she get him out?” He asks accusingly.

“They’ve been talking for months,” Andrew says slowly. Not condescending, but in a way that makes it clear Nathaniel should have known this already. “She went in and got him when Kengo died.”

Nathaniel’s world tilts on its axis for the second time in the past 24 hours. When Kengo died? Kengo is dead? And then his thoughts aren’t the only things spinning – there’s a metallic taste in his mouth, the door behind him clicks open, and Nathaniel stumbles back, shoving his way around the new arrival and away from Minyard’s reaching hand, nearly falling down the stairs in his haste to get away, get away, get away, before he’s–

******

Nathaniel wakes up in surroundings that are both more and less familiar.

And here's the thing. Nathaniel realized very quickly that he could take objects with him when he travels. His clothes, his racquet, whatever he's touching travels with him.

But for the first time, he wishes desperately that he experimented more, that he told someone about this. Kevin would have whipped up a game plan full of exhausting and boring scientific drills within seconds. Maybe he’d have more answers than questions for once.

Still, nothing Nathaniel’s done could have prepared him to come to in his ten-year old body.

It takes him a moment to realize. The cool, dark tones of the Nest loosen something in his chest, and he’s relieved to be home, even if he’s somehow ended up closer to the court than his room (apparently he’s going to have to get used to traveling through space AND time).

Then he reaches to scratch his elbow absentmindedly and realizes how badly he’s fucked up.

His limbs look alien – too thin, too gangly, none of the painstakingly built muscle or calluses from years of Exy and all its related triumphs and punishments.

His eyes catch on his palm. The skin is smooth, even though he remembers sitting on the floor of he and Jean’s shared room, prying open a can of stolen peaches with a knife. They were so hungry that they didn’t notice right away when Nathaniel sliced his hand on the jagged metal lid.

To see physical evidence of his partner erased like this is…. jarring.

He’s not going to figure anything out from the storage closet, so he pushes his way out of the small room and into a familiar nightmare.

Noises from the nearby court echo down the hallway, shoes squeaking, children shouting out plays and passes, travel bags littering the hall.

He remembers this. He couldn’t forget this day if he tried. A knot of dread pulls tight in his gut, squeezing until he’s trembling. No matter how many times he tells himself he’s had worse days, much worse days, that this day was the beginning of the rest of his life and the day he learned he might be able to earn his freedom, no matter what he tells himself – his hands still shake.

Is this real, or a dream? A memory? Is he dead?

The sounds of Exy are like a siren call drawing him through the locker room. Nathaniel walks like he’s going to meet his executioner. His vision tunnels. He slips unnoticed past the teenagers at their lockers, following the familiar path to Evermore’s court.

Sticking his head out around the doorframe feels like sticking his neck on a guillotine. Kids are paired off for warm-up drills, rotating through tests of agility, strength, and precision.

At center court are two young boys, scrawny and sweaty, not particularly unique in the crowd of scrawny and sweaty children save for their black uniforms. But the other kids orbit them like planets around a sun, sneaking glances and showing off for the princes of Exy.

Kevin Day and Riko Moriyama. And if they’re on court… Neil squints until he can make out three figures through the plexiglass, seated a few rows back near the center. It’s the only time he’s seen Ichirou out of his luxury box seats, leaning forward to listen as Tetsuji whispers something in his ear.

Though he knows it’s coming, Nathaniel’s limbs lock up and his throat closes as he recognizes the third man sitting with them. It’s the only time he’s ever seen his father in the stands.

That, if nothing else, cements his location in time. This is the day Nathaniel first met Kevin and Riko. This was his first bloody trip to Castle Evermore, the day he found that there was something worth living for. The day his mother tried to run and cost herself her life and Nathaniel his freedom.

Frying pan, fire.

Jean isn’t even here yet. He’s still in France. He has no idea what’s in store for him.

Nathaniel ducks back into the locker room before anyone sees him and curls up in the tight space between the last locker and the wall that he hasn’t fit in since he hit his growth spurt at fourteen.

Obviously his last jump was a fluke. In what messed up world would Kevin end up playing with the Foxes? Something had to have gone majorly wrong. But then, Jean was alive… Nathaniel clutches his head, tugging at his hair. How is he supposed to save Jean if he isn’t even here yet?

He’s distracted by something warm slipping down his face and over his lips. He swipes absently at his nose and his fingers come away red. Blood. There’s a tugging at his center, pulsing in time with a dull ache in his head. This trip has been strange, but Nathaniel knows what that means. He doesn’t have much time left. Either this is going to kill him, or he’s going to get pulled back to the present.

“Nate, what the – oh my god, is that blood?”

Nathaniel scrubs at his nose with the hem of his black shirt before glancing up at the distraught boy in front of him. A messy “2” is scrawled on his cheekbone in Sharpie, stark against a face which is even paler than usual. Kevin never could handle blood.

“I’m fine, it’s just–”

“Damn Wesninski, picking fights already?” And wherever Kevin went, Riko was never far behind. Or maybe it was the other way around. Nathaniel’s head swims. He rises, giving his face one last swipe.

“You’re just smearing it around,” Kevin mutters.

Riko slings an arm around Nathaniel’s shoulder and tugs. “Whatever, it looks badass. Let’s go scare those West Coast kids!”

Kevin clears his throat tentatively. “I think Nate’s father is looking for y–”

“Oh, right! Your father sent us to get you, he’s with Onii-sama now in one of his meeting rooms. I can show you where to go, he doesn’t like people wandering around his offices.” Riko huffs. “You should probably clean that off your face too, then.”

“Right,” Nathaniel croaks, cold to his core. He nods at the sinks. “I’ll just – I’ll meet you in the hall, give me a minute.”

“Hurry up,” Riko calls over his shoulder, bounding out without looking back. Kevin pauses, eyes searching, but then he leaves as well.

As soon as they round the corner, Nathaniel lunges for the corner locker that he stashed his duffel bag in. It’s got a broken lock, so no one uses it, but he knows how to jimmy it open from the right angle. He rifles around for his notebook.

It isn’t a foolproof plan, or even a necessarily good one, but it’s all he’s got. He can’t help smearing blood across the cover and the first few pages as he flips to an empty space and writes in large block letters, “RENEE WALKER, RECRUIT, GOALIE.” He doesn’t know where she is or how to find her, doesn’t even know if his actions now have an impact on his future, but he has to try.

She saved Jean in that other world where everything was upside down. Maybe she can do what Nathaniel couldn’t and save him this time, too.

Folding the book, he shoves it to the bottom of his bag beneath his clothes, wedges the locker door shut, and hurriedly wets a wad of paper towels to clean his face off.

Then he goes to face his father. He doesn’t travel back to the present for another 56 minutes.

*****

Nathaniel very nearly gets away with it.

It’s strange, living with these new overlapping memories – like the opposite of losing a tooth and poking around at the gap with your tongue. Renee’s appearance fills a gap Nathaniel didn’t know existed, but she neatly folds into their lives as if she was always there (which, Nathaniel guesses, in this new reality, she was).

He remembers writing her name in his notebook in a desperate bid to change reality, and he also remembers finding her name the next day, scrawled among water marks and blood stains.

He was transported directly back to the present about an hour after Riko took him to meet his father and Ichirou – he didn’t relive his entire childhood – but the new memories are slowly rising to the surface while his old memories sink and fade.

When the Ravens started looking for a new goalie Kevin's freshman year, Nathaniel put Renee’s name forward. Riko was hardly impressed with her high school performance, but Kevin owes Nathaniel a favor. Nathaniel ensures Jean goes along to extend the recruitment offer.

Nathaniel doesn’t like Renee – initially because of the way Riko treated them, the assumptions he made about why Nathaniel pushed so heavily to recruit her. Then he gets to know her, and he likes her even less. She tucks her cool and calculated persona behind a calm, Christian facade, and Nathaniel trusts her about as far as he can throw her. (She’s taller than he is, but light, so maybe five feet?)

No, he doesn’t like Renee. But he needs her. Because when he comes to graduation night with blood spattered across the lower half of his face and a sharp stabbing at the back of his head, Jean is the one kneeling beside him, and nothing else matters.

It would be a lie to say he never thinks of the strange jump between his past and his present – the awkward sideways step into a nonsensical world where Kevin wasn’t a Raven and the worst Exy team in the NCAA called him ‘Neil’ with a horrible fondness.

Anyway. He very nearly gets away with it.

Except a couple weeks later, Nathaniel opens his locker and a boy with auburn hair and fury in his blue eyes tumbles out, using his momentum to slam them back into the opposite row of lockers, knife pointed at Nathaniel’s throat.

“Give him back,” he growls.

For all intents and purposes, Nathaniel is looking at himself.

“What.” It’s like looking in a mirror if your reflection was trying to kill you. This is what he gets for messing around with time. He should’ve known Jean’s life wasn’t free. Nothing in their lives is fucking free, or fair, but he’ll be damned if this freak shows up out of nowhere wearing his face and tries to undo one of the only good things he’s ever done.

“You know what I’m talking about,” Other Nathaniel snarls, “I remember you. Whatever you did, undo it. Give Andrew back,” he snarls, “And Renee too, while you’re fucking at it.”

*****

might go back and extend/polish and drop it on ao3 if people are interested?

shoutout to my sister who suggested Raven!Renee when I was brainstorming what kind of change Nathaniel could make that might save Jean’s life while fucking up Andrew’s. I have not known a moment of peace since but I’m torn between dropping tiny unconnected snippets here and committing to a full multi-chapter fic

#this is so chaotic someone should have stopped me from playing LIS directly after both oxenfree games #the foxhole court #aftg #foxhole court au #jean moreau #neil josten #nathaniel wesninski #tw suicide reference #time loop brain rot #this was meant to be a brief summary :')#kevin day #sav writes #aftg fic #raven!neil

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