Descent of Nightmare (Chapter Nine)
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saladloveChapter list: https://tanadin.dreamwidth.org/650.html
Map of Kaldriel: https://i.gyazo.com/332b0c0172dcc60acb46
Rough map of Hatu: https://i.gyazo.com/ea4f9f51b9dc7b9d8b86
Chapter Nine
Collision
Akrar, Kaldriel. November 8, 2277. Time instance 842N.
“Would you two either cut that out or go to your room? It’s making it hard to focus here,” Kyir complained as he tightened a screw on what he was working on.
Emma glared at him. “It’s not like we’re doing anything indecent.”
“Yet.” Kyir looked up at them. “You know how you are.”
“You act like you caught us multiple times,” Cataclysm protested. He wrapped his wings around Emma and glared at his friend.
“Once is bad enough! I didn’t need to see that!” Kyir groaned and covered his eyes with his hands. “I’m haunted even now.”
Emma blushed furiously and buried her face in Cataclysm's shoulder, ignoring Kyir’s laughter and Dare’s snickering.
They were interrupted by Jase’s voice calling down the stairs into the basement. “Kyir! Seven’s sent a request for your ass!”
Kyir immediately fired back, “You know I only take those from you!”
Emma groaned and Jase laughed. “He says ‘Butt. Mainframe. Now,’ and there’s no way I’m not coming along to make sure he doesn’t do anything I disapprove of to your ass.”
Kyir snorted and set down the screwdriver, stepping over to the passageway up. “It’s Seven, Jase. It’s unlikely he’ll do anything to it.”
“I’m protective, what can I say?”
Kyir rolled his eyes behind his shades. “You guys hold down the fort. Dunno when I’ll be back.” He picked up his toolbox and left the workshop, leaving Emma, Cataclysm, and Dare alone.
“Well, that was exciting. We learned about Kyir’s ass and how Seven secretly covets it.” Dare leaned back against the wall from where she was sitting on a table. “Not what I thought I’d learn waking up today, but hey, it’s an adventure.”
Emma jerked as her phone buzzed and she leaned back, away from Cataclysm, to check it. Her eyes widened as she read it and Cataclysm nudged her, frowning. “What is it?”
“It’s from Tanadin.” Emma sounded slightly numb. “She’s got M and she’s heading down here. She also said to help Shawn, Nathan, and Geek look for those kids they found in the mountains. M says they’re important and can’t be left to run wild.”
“M?” Dare sat up. “Wasn’t he that weird dude that ended up being an alien?”
“Yeah. That’s him.”
Cataclysm growled softly. “What’s he doing here?”
“I don’t know.” Emma slowly pocketed her phone. “I don’t like it, but I trust Tanadin. I guess we’re looking for some random kids.”
“That’ll go well,” Dare mumbled. “We’re great with kids.”
~~~
“You said you saw what?” Nathan demanded, raising an eyebrow. The biting winds pulled at his white hair and black clothes, bothering neither him nor Shawn but making the others shiver.
“Some kind of lizard, I think,” Clash mumbled. “I flew back here as soon as I saw it. I don’t know what it was. Maybe a demon?”
“Was it bipedal?” Geek asked, tilting her head. “What color was it?”
“Yes, and it was gray.” Clash looked a bit confused as Geek relaxed slightly. Cataclysm’s tight grip on Emma didn’t relax, but she didn’t seem to mind as Clash continued. “I don’t know what it was that I saw. I don’t know if it was even important. I’m sorry.”
“No, it was good to mention it. We should check it out.” Nathan snapped his fingers and started to float a few inches off the ground. “Someone grab Scott and let’s fly.”
Geek unceremoniously scooped up Scott, ignoring his protests, and took off, Clash not far behind. Cataclysm picked up Emma and followed while Nathan grabbed Shawn and Dare by the hand and shot after them. Shawn yelled at him and held on for dear life (well, kind of) and hoped that his shotgun wouldn’t fall off of his back, while Dare just yelped in protest and held on tightly. Magic must have held them in place, for there was no way that holding hands could keep them from falling down onto the rocks below.
Clash quickly took the lead and they followed him through the mountains, quickly coming down lower and lower towards Akrar itself. Clash turned and landed in a flatter area, shifting back to his human form while the others landed. He lowered his voice to a whisper and pointed towards a small cave entrance in the side of the mountain. “There. I saw it come out of there.”
A red light glowed in the darkness momentarily before a familiar cyborg stepped out into the light, eyes widening and shouting as he saw them.
“That’s the asshole!” Shawn barked, retrieving his shotgun, taking off his bracelet, and scaring the living daylights out of a cult of children. Several teenagers- all around sixteen or seventeen- raced out of the cave at the cyborg’s shout, weapons at the ready and voices yelling something in an unfamiliar language.
One of them- a tall boy with an obnoxious hat- yelped and pulled the trigger on his crossbow, firing a bolt directly at Shawn. He shouted in pain as it impacted his stomach, stumbling. He ripped it out and threw it on the ground, not needing to fear blood loss, and almost instinctively bared his teeth and shot right back at the one who had hit him.
Chaos erupted.
The other group scrambled out of the way of his shot- which, considering the fact that he had been shooting long-range with a shotgun, wasn’t hard- and charged, several of them taking to the air on demonic or metal wings. Their cyborgs- of which there appeared to be three- reflected light with an odd blue sheen, but Shawn didn’t take much notice of it as the one that looked like Seven raised his hand.
Shawn knew that posture and immediately dropped to the ground, but instead of a bullet whizzing over his head, a bolt of energy crackled through the air and sent tingles through his bones as it passed overhead. He got back to his feet and stared as the cyborg extended the blades on his arms and parried Cataclysm’s claws, baring his teeth and holding his ground.
A demon that looked remarkably like Cataclysm swooped past him, ice encasing her feathers and flying as she flapped. Emma rolled out of the way and Shawn watched as the demon landed and charged into melee, hesitating mid-step when Emma activated Nightbane.
Emma swung. Shawn looked away when he heard the demon scream, but looked back when it didn’t stop. Emma had only cut into her side, trying not to kill, and Shawn suddenly realized that they probably didn’t need to be fighting.
He didn’t linger on this thought long, however, as a girl with curly red hair and freckled skin leaped at him, scythe swinging in a deadly arc that he was forced to dodge around. A ghostly figure followed behind her, shouting and trying to stop her. Unlike the odd group they were fighting, she shouted in English, and Shawn almost immediately recognized her.
“Sheva?”
“Shawn! Stop this!” Sheva flew inbetween them, forcing both the girl and Shawn to pause. She looked between them and backed up, crossing her arms. Their eyes met and Sheva hissed, “We are only hurting ourselves as long as we keep fighting. Stop this! Stop this!”
“Sheva, what-”
“Now isn’t the time for questions! Stop them!” Shawn had never heard her speak before, and the bite in her voice was enough to convince him. He and the unfamiliar girl broke eye contact and started shouting, waving their arms and racing towards their friends to try to stop the fight.
To Shawn’s right, two phoenixes circled over Scott, one smaller and more aggressive than the other. To his left, Emma continued to fight against the demon. Figuring that Clash could handle stopping the fight, Shawn turned to Emma in time to see her get disarmed, Nightbane spinning away from her and hitting the ground beside him. She growled and punched the demon in the face, making her pause and blink a few times. Woozy from blood loss, the demon shook her head a few times and punched her back.
Shawn shoved himself between them, shouting for them to stop and making peace gestures with his hands. Both stopped and stared at him, but Emma shook it off first, disengaging to retrieve Nightbane from the ground. The demon stared at him uncomprehendingly before a goddamn monster knocked Shawn aside, snarling and standing between him and the demon.
It looked remarkably like the thing that had made the tracks.
Shawn opened his mouth to shout again, but was drowned out by Nathan’s bellow of “Dohsvarai! Enough!”
Everyone stopped, looking up to stare at him. The other group quickly backed up into a single mass, muttering and not taking their eyes off of Shawn and the others.
Except for one.
The girl from earlier strode right up to Shawn and poked him in the center of the chest, growling something in that same unfamiliar language. Shawn tilted his head. “What?”
She smacked herself in the forehead and spoke again, this time in English. “Okay, so explain to me what the hell you are, why you can see Sheva, and what’s going on here.”
“I’m dead,” Shawn said, blinking.
“I can see that.” She crossed her arms.
“Can I get a damn explanation?” Cataclysm snarled, striding up to them. The girl jumped and looked him up and down, glancing at the group behind her.
“As soon as I get one.”
“Okay, okay.” Nathan held out his arms. “Clearly there’s some kind of misunderstanding happening here. Group meeting. What the hell.”
The girl turned and waved her group forward even as Nathan motioned his friends closer. The two groups reluctantly stood near each other, mumbling in their respective languages. A few of them kept eyeing Shawn warily and he sighed, putting the bracelet back on and making them relax.
Nathan crossed his arms. “What’s going on here? Who are you?”
“And why do you have Sheva?” Shawn added.
The girl tightened her grip on her scythe. “The real question is why you know her.”
Sheva groaned. “Lucy Hite, meet Shawn Hite. Shawn, Lucy.”
Shawn’s eyebrows shot up and Lucy looked at him oddly, tilting her head. “What?”
“It appears,” Nathan said slowly, “that we’ve found a long-lost relative of yours, Shawn.”
“Can someone translate?” the Seven lookalike demanded. “I’m…” He hesitated. “Uhm. Twelve? Bar’thas?”
“Getting?” the girl beside him, who looked eerily similar to Tanadin but with calculating gray eyes, suggested.
“Kvet! I’m getting one word in three.”
“Bvey,” Lucy mumbled, and quickly went over what they’d discussed. Shawn watched the other group curiously, noting the presence of a robot and a lot of friend lookalikes. Suspicion rose in his mind but he kept it to himself, at least for now.
Geek suddenly tensed and stormed towards two demons in the group, switching to Demonic and demanding something of them. They responded immediately, the one with green magma patterns on his wings more aggressively than the other. The calmer one- who had to be his brother, they looked nearly identical- grabbed his arm and snarled at him before addressing Geek more directly.
Shawn’s phone buzzed and he took a moment to check it as Lucy tried to explain to her friends what was going on despite how little she knew herself. It was from Tanadin (although she was renamed to ‘one whole hot tamale’ in his phone), asking their location. He sent her the coordinates and shoved the phone back in his pocket in time to catch Lucy watching him.
“What...is that?”
“A phone.”
“A what.”
Shawn frowned. “How have you never seen a phone before?”
“We lived in a desert,” the Tanadin lookalike explained, speaking carefully and not looking too sure of her pronunciation. “We only got here a few dates ago.”
“Days,” Lucy corrected, and the cyborg took the correction with a slight nod.
Geek groaned and stepped back from her conversation with the two demons. “Nathan, I found them. These two are Jack and Exadae Dacion. They and the others lived in a desert for almost seventeen years, created by some guy named Zatar or something.”
“Well, that’s fantastic,” Cataclysm mumbled. He had a wing wrapped protectively around Emma and he kept glaring at the demon from earlier, who was having her wounds bandaged by the group’s robot. “What do we do now?”
“Get them back to Akrar, I suppose.” Dare didn’t seem too fond of the words she was speaking. “We can’t just leave a bunch of maniac desert children alone in the mountains.”
Lucy lowered her voice and quickly translated, earning some more mumbling. Eventually, they all looked at the Tanadin lookalike, who only nodded and spoke quickly to Lucy.
“We’ll follow you,” Lucy translated, “but we don’t trust you.”
“That’s fair enough.” Scott shrugged. “Now who was trying to rip my eyes out?” Clash growled quietly and hugged him tighter, eyes scanning the kids.
“That would be Solace.” The girl looked up at the mention of her name, raising an eyebrow. Lucy waved her off and she shrugged, going back to poking a girl with a white mask and mechanical bird wings repeatedly.
Scott walked right up to her and poked her in the shoulder. “What the hell.”
“Thark deh,” she snapped, baring her teeth at him.
“She said fuck off.” Lucy glanced at the Tanadin lookalike. “Twelve. Should we get going?”
“Kvet.” Twelve scanned them and, deciding that Nathan was the leader, addressed him. “Lead the way.”
Shawn sighed and pulled out his phone to text Tanadin that they’d meet them in Akrar.
He didn’t know what was going on, but he knew it probably wasn’t good.
~~~
“What the hell is that?” Scott demanded, pointing at the bizarre figure at Tanadin’s side.
They had chosen to meet Tanadin and M a little ways out of the city, far down the shore of the lake. It had been a long walk to get there, but it wasn’t anything that Lucy and the others couldn’t handle. She’d walked around in the desert for hours before, so the only difficult thing about this was how much everyone complained.
She hadn’t spoken to the unfamiliar group much, preferring to walk closer to Kallen and keep an eye on them. Still, she had picked up their names by now, and had learned that they were going to meet a kirinax and someone that the group didn’t particularly trust. Lucy was pretty sure she’d heard them say M, but that was ridiculous. There was no way he’d be on Kaldriel of all places, right?
As she looked up at where Scott was indicating, she realized exactly how wrong she was.
“M!” some of the desert group chorused, glad to finally see someone familiar. M looked a lot less happy to see them, but quickly dismissed them in favor of looking nervous about the reactions he’d get from the rest of the group. Tanadin, on the other hand, grinned and stepped forward, officially introducing everyone she knew to M and going on and on about how he wasn’t evil after all and was actually pretty interesting once he stopped being so damn mysterious. Most of the group seemed skeptical, but a few of them- Scott in particular- seemed to shrug it off and take it in stride.
Lucy didn’t pay a lot of attention to this, instead making sure that her scythe was within easy reach. She didn’t trust these people, but they hadn’t really given her much reason to distrust them either- sure, they’d attacked them, but Gyrad had shot at them first and hurt one of them. Twelve had given him quite the lecture on trigger discipline on the trek down to Akrar, one that Lucy had heard her give many times before.
Not that Shawn seemed to notice or care that he had a hole in him. Once he’d put the bracelet on, he’d gone back to looking like a normal guy. Lucy wasn’t sure how she felt about that, nor how she felt about the fact that they were apparently related. The only relatives they’d ever seen were twins, and while Lucy didn’t have a good concept of age, she was pretty sure that he wasn’t sixteen or created by Zatar.
Sheva wasn’t talking, either, despite the few questions that Lucy peppered her with. She seemed content to sit back and think, and for once Lucy wished she’d actually talk. Normally, it was impossible to get her to shut up half the time. Now, though…
“So, uh. M. Care to finally explain what all the fuss about these guys is?” Lucy looked up, thinking it was Twelve speaking, but no. It was Tanadin- who she assumed was Tanadin, anyway-, who looked remarkably similar to Twelve except for her blue-green eyes, slightly darker hair, and small scar on her jaw.
M clicked his claws on the ground and looked at them, yellow eyes unreadable with a mixture of thoughts and emotions. When he spoke, everyone seemed to understand him, whether or not they understood English. Lucy had a funny feeling that he had some kind of spell translating for him- he was speaking Dranonic, but those who could understand English heard it instead. It was disorienting, hearing Dranonic but registering English, and it took a little while for Lucy to get used to it.
“These,” M said slowly, “are the products of genetic experimentation. Before I came to Kaldriel for my mission, one of my superiors requested that I gather blood samples from anyone particularly interesting or useful. I did so and provided him with the blood and thought that to be the end of it. About a month and a half ago, now, he took me into the Timewarp and showed me...this.” He gestured with a clawed hand. “He combined blood samples into offspring and stuck them in Timewarp to make time go faster for them to avoid having to wait so many years to study them.” He growled softly in disgust. “These are your descendants. These are your...our...children. I was unfortunately included as well.”
Everyone was silent, then, and Lucy’s mind spun.
Children. So these are the sources of our DNA.
What does this mean? What happens from here?
What am I supposed to feel?
Lucy had a funny feeling that she should have a more stunned or overwhelming reaction to this news, but she only held confusion and acceptance. So many bizarre revelations had happened already, and this was by far not the largest. She glanced at Shawn, who looked as shocked as the others, and wondered quietly how she was supposed to interact with him.
“So we…” Tanadin hesitated, glancing at M.
“You are their parents, yes,” Kaldric confirmed, then repeated himself in Dranonic. “Unfortunately, one of them is dead and another is missing, so they are not all gathered here. This is, however, the vast majority of the group.”
“Well, that’s fantastic.” Nathan shrugged and sat down on the ground. “I’m glad you’re all suddenly parents. Congratulations. Now go teach your kids English and learn how to take care of sixteen-year-olds.”
“That was...unexpected,” Cataclysm admitted quietly.
“It’s weird,” Scott corrected, “but I kinda could have guessed. I mean, Solace over there looks exactly like Clash when she’s a phoenix. It’s really, really obvious.”
“My suspicions have been confirmed,” Shawn said softly. His eyes slid to meet Lucy’s, and she quietly struggled to remember what the word for a male parent was. She was sure there was one, but what it was eluded her in both English and Dranonic. “We’re your…”
“This is great and all,” Solace finally said, speaking normally and shattering the silence, “but can we get out of this cold? I’d transform but copycat over there might hit me with his wings again.” She motioned vaguely at Clash before crossing her arms. Lucy reluctantly translated for her, never taking her eyes off of Shawn.
“Let’s get inside,” Emma agreed quietly. “Then I think we need to figure out who’s whose.”
“Contact people,” Tanadin mumbled by way of agreement. “I know I’d want to be informed about this.”
“All members of the Black Market, Dare, Nine, Geluu, Atar, Goldtalon, Corvus, Cataclysm, and myself were sampled,” M told them, turning to follow Tanadin back to the city. “Atar and Corvus were sampled before the Black Market revolution. I traveled quite a bit until we, ah, ‘recruited’ Seven. Then was the moment that I knew I had found the group that would take down the Mainframe.”
The names meant nothing to Lucy, but it sent the other group- their parents- mumbling amongst themselves as they once again set off through the rocky terrain. Lucy glanced at Sheva as she started talking, trying to tell Lucy all about Akrar and something notable that had happened here but quickly losing her in the tangle of words and sentences. Lucy dismissed it, used to her rambling by now, and instead focused inwardly on her own thoughts.
No matter what happens next, things will never be the same.
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Date: 2016-11-12 12:38 am (UTC)Emma glared at him. “It’s not like we’re doing anything indecent.”
“Yet.” Kyir looked up at them. “You know how you are.”
“You act like you caught us multiple times,” Cataclysm protested. He wrapped his wings around Emma and glared at his friend.
“Once is bad enough! I didn’t need to see that!” Kyir groaned and covered his eyes with his hands. “I’m haunted even now.”
Emma blushed furiously and buried her face in Cataclysm's shoulder, ignoring Kyir’s laughter and Dare’s snickering.
Poor Emma and Cata XD
There is no worse embarrassment than being caught in the act, except being caught in the act by one of your parents, which happened to me, twice, my mother soon learned to knock and wait for an answer XD
They were interrupted by Jase’s voice calling down the stairs into the basement. “Kyir! Seven’s sent a request for your ass!”
Kyir immediately fired back, “You know I only take those from you!”
Emma groaned and Jase laughed. “He says ‘Butt. Mainframe. Now,’ and there’s no way I’m not coming along to make sure he doesn’t do anything I disapprove of to your ass.”
Kyir snorted and set down the screwdriver, stepping over to the passageway up. “It’s Seven, Jase. It’s unlikely he’ll do anything to it.”
“I’m protective, what can I say?”
>.>
<.<
*makes notes*
XP
“Well, that was exciting. We learned about Kyir’s ass and how Seven secretly covets it.” Dare leaned back against the wall from where she was sitting on a table. “Not what I thought I’d learn waking up today, but hey, it’s an adventure.”
*passes Sevenshock fanfic to Dare* XD
Emma slowly pocketed her phone. “I don’t like it, but I trust Tanadin. I guess we’re looking for some random kids.”
“That’ll go well,” Dare mumbled. “We’re great with kids.”
Oh and you're all just going to LOVE these kids, probably going to need to sit down when M explains where the kids came from though....
“That’s the asshole!” Shawn barked, retrieving his shotgun, taking off his bracelet, and scaring the living daylights out of a cult of children. Several teenagers- all around sixteen or seventeen- raced out of the cave at the cyborg’s shout, weapons at the ready and voices yelling something in an unfamiliar language.
One of them- a tall boy with an obnoxious hat- yelped and pulled the trigger on his crossbow, firing a bolt directly at Shawn. He shouted in pain as it impacted his stomach, stumbling. He ripped it out and threw it on the ground, not needing to fear blood loss, and almost instinctively bared his teeth and shot right back at the one who had hit him.
Chaos erupted.
Shawn you've just scared the shit out of these kids, please don't kill them.
WON'T SOMEONE PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN! XP
Emma swung. Shawn looked away when he heard the demon scream, but looked back when it didn’t stop. Emma had only cut into her side, trying not to kill, and Shawn suddenly realized that they probably didn’t need to be fighting.
Stop fighting please, you're fighting your children >.<
Shawn turned to Emma in time to see her get disarmed, Nightbane spinning away from her and hitting the ground beside him. She growled and punched the demon in the face, making her pause and blink a few times. Woozy from blood loss, the demon shook her head a few times and punched her back.
Did Emma just punch Anni in the face? She punched her daughter in the face! OMG >.<
Shawn watched the other group curiously, noting the presence of a robot and a lot of friend lookalikes. Suspicion rose in his mind but he kept it to himself, at least for now.
Looks like Shawn and Geek are going to be the first to figure this all out then....XD
“These,” M said slowly, “are the products of genetic experimentation. Before I came to Kaldriel for my mission, one of my superiors requested that I gather blood samples from anyone particularly interesting or useful. I did so and provided him with the blood and thought that to be the end of it. About a month and a half ago, now, he took me into the Timewarp and showed me...this.” He gestured with a clawed hand. “He combined blood samples into offspring and stuck them in Timewarp to make time go faster for them to avoid having to wait so many years to study them.” He growled softly in disgust. “These are your descendants. These are your...our...children. I was unfortunately included as well.”
M's finally dropped the truth bomb......time to see the reactions...
“So we…” Tanadin hesitated, glancing at M.
Tana's in shock
“You are their parents, yes,” Kaldric confirmed, then repeated himself in Dranonic. “Unfortunately, one of them is dead and another is missing, so they are not all gathered here. This is, however, the vast majority of the group.”
RIP Meria, mine and either Hawk's or Goldtalon's deceased Lab Kid who was the groups healer.
“That was...unexpected,” Cataclysm admitted quietly.
“It’s weird,” Scott corrected, “but I kinda could have guessed. I mean, Solace over there looks exactly like Clash when she’s a phoenix. It’s really, really obvious.”
“My suspicions have been confirmed,” Shawn said softly. His eyes slid to meet Lucy’s, and she quietly struggled to remember what the word for a male parent was. She was sure there was one, but what it was eluded her in both English and Dranonic. “We’re your…”
Cata's shocked. Scott and Shawn seem to be handling this news the best.
“Let’s get inside,” Emma agreed quietly. “Then I think we need to figure out who’s whose.”
“Contact people,” Tanadin mumbled by way of agreement. “I know I’d want to be informed about this.”
“All members of the Black Market, Dare, Nine, Geluu, Atar, Goldtalon, Corvus, Cataclysm, and myself were sampled,” M told them, turning to follow Tanadin back to the city. “Atar and Corvus were sampled before the Black Market revolution. I traveled quite a bit until we, ah, ‘recruited’ Seven. Then was the moment that I knew I had found the group that would take down the Mainframe.”
Tune in next time when the Lab Kids parents are unveiled and the results of the Guess the Parents are announced! XD
no subject
Date: 2016-11-12 01:26 am (UTC)-Observing Anon