#Also i never knew what a cloaca was until this ship

[emperorsfoot]

This chapter is short and a mess. It doesn’t flow right. I’m pretty sure there are like, million logical errors, and the transitions between the flashback and present don’t feel organic. 

But I updated! 

And that’s what’s really important, right?

...

A holo-screen, no larger than a standard issue datapad was projected from the armrest of Red Hord’s throne. It should have displayed readouts of the rift. Projecting energy readings from the special anomaly, radiation levels, temperatures, gravitational forces if it had any. Instead, the display was taken up entirely by the face of Hordwing.

“Maintain communications as you pass through.” He was saying.

Red Hord only rested his chin on his fist and allowed his fellow cabinet Lord to voice his concerns as if they were advice from a senior colleague. They couldn’t show it, not in front of brothers of lower rank, but Hordwing was worried about him. Hordwing didn’t want him to go to a shadow dimension they knew next to nothing about that had already trapped one of their brothers since his disappearance.

But, their Emperor, no, their Brother, had ordered Red Hord to go, so he must go.

That did not mean that Hordwing had to be happy about it.

“And be sure to send a signal through the rift every six hours so that the rest of the fleet can monitor your progress.”

“Out of curiosity, if the rift snapped shut behind me and I was trapped in there with Hordak, what could you do?” Red asked him. Equal parts annoyed by the other man’s hovering, and genuinely wanting to know what Wing thought he could do.

Hordwing only frowned at him.

Red Hord smirked back. He liked pointing out to the older man when he was being absurd. It made for a fun dynamic to their relationship.

“Just keep the com open for me.” He growled. Then, in a softer tone, so that only Red Hord could hear, he repeated. “For me, Red.”

With a sigh, Red Hord did leave the com channel open. He leaned back in his throne. “Helm, take us through the rift. We might all go to join the Host, let’s not arrive there an embarrassment.”

“When we go to the Host we’ll go together, Red.” Wing reminded him. “You’re not allowed to die without me.”

“You’re not allowed to choose when I die, Wing.” Red hissed back, keeping his voice down so that none of his own crew could hear him. “Only our Brother may choose when we die.”

Every single screen on the bridge –discounting the one Lord Hordwing was on- displayed the rift. From all different angles. Allowing for wide shots of its complete length and width, with measurements on its size, to close up images where one could see the small details of the fabric of space torn and tattered like actual fabric. Threads and strands of reality irradiated and glowing, drifting on the fluctuations of power that held the rift open.

As the Leather Vest drew closer, the readouts changed to data on their ship. Course heading, hull integrity, radiation shielding. Several alerts climbed into the yellow as they drew nearer. When the nose of the ship passed through, everything went to read. Temperature rising, hull plates heating, radiation shielding weakening. A few of Red’s bridge crew looked back at their Lord, silently asking for permission to turn back.

But, Prime ordered them into the breach. So, into the breach they would go. Come high water or the All High Host.

“Continue on heading.” He commanded.

“What is it?” Demanded Hordwing over the com. He could hear the alerts over the channel, but was not at an angle where he could see anything on the bridge. “What’s wrong.”

“Nothing I imagine isn’t perfectly normal for passing between dimensions.” Red Hord growled. It was kinda nice that Hordwing wanted to maintain radio contact and make sure Red was okay. But did he really have to be so annoying about it? Red Hord wasn’t a hatchling fresh out of the tank! He was a Lord, promoted by Horde Prime himself same as Hordwing. He didn’t need one of his older brothers looking out for him.

The ship gave a shudder as it passed all the way through the rift.

Hordwing’s image on the com screen went fuzzy for a moment. His voice breaking up. “You alri- -Red? –Respond- -what- -appened, Red Hor-?”

The bridge crew scrambled to assess any possible damages. Hull integrity, atmosphere leakage, nitrogen levels. Anything that could indicate fatal damage to the ship. Everything came back just within acceptable limits. A little high. Definitely undress stress and definitely close to the border between ‘Acceptable’ and ‘Danger’. But still just the right side of acceptable. Whatever Prime did with his magic sword to open the rift and ground it so that it stayed open, he also grounded it to make it safe for his forces to pass through.

Red tried adjusting the frequency of his com to try and get a clearer channel out to Hordwing. “All systems normal.” He informed the other man tersely. “I shall message the Emperor with an update within the next six hours.”

“And me, too, Red.” Wing added, voice a low whisper again. “You’ll message me too, right?”

“As the situation allows.” He nodded to the other Lord. Then switched off the com. Then to his helmsman, “We’re through. Put us in a stationary orbit over the planet, then do a scan for 66694-42-003’s signal.”

Damn Zero-Zero-Three. The idiot couldn’t just fuck-off happily to the middle of nowhere. No. He just had to rip open a pimple in time and space to wave at Horde Prime. ‘Hello, Brother! I live! Come find me!’ Damn idiot.

And Hordwing’s –for lack of a better descriptor- clingy behavior was due in part to Zero-Zero-Three.

Red Hord and Hordwing always had an interesting dynamic from the first moment Red was named and promoted to the cabinet. They were very close in age, only one batch apart, but from different crèches. Wing rose through the ranks of the First Division and Red through the Second, so they never actually met face to face until his promotion. They worked together well, easily. Red Hord did not have so easy a time whenever he had to work collaboratively with Hordren or even Hode –and Hode was, in part, the reason he was promoted in the first place!

Then Hode turned traitor.

Wing and Red were there aboard the Velvet Glove when Hode and his Gar partner tried to steal the Sword. Wing was one of the ones that held him down when Prime chopped off his head. Wing was one of the few that got to hear the last thing Hode said to Prime before he died. A statement that shook Wing to his core.

Wing didn’t get the opportunity to process, however, because almost immediately, Hode was replaced by Zero-Zero-Three, whom was named Hordak.

Hordak was also close in age to Red Hord –three batches apart- they did not develop the same kind of easy working relationship that Red enjoyed with Wing. But they did work well together. They might have worked better together if Hordak knew more about Hode. Red so desperately wanted to tell him more about Hode. To confide what he knew to another brother.

Red couldn’t talk to Hordwing, he used to be a wing pilot before he was promoted and pilots had no filter. They talked too much and didn’t know what not to say. Red Hord could not talk to Hordwing. Hordak had been Hode’s favorite. He would have liked to talk to Hordak, but Hode never clued the younger clone into what he was doing. Hode intentionally kept Hordak ignorant. In hindsight, that ignorance was probably what, not only saved Hordak from being executed along with the rest of Hode’s Force Captains, but also allowed him to be promoted to the cabinet.

But then Hordak fainted in a strategy meeting and was immediately stripped of his rank and banished to the front lines.

Red remembered Wing suddenly grabbing his hand and squeezing harder than was necessary when they watched Prime wrap his hand around Hordak’s neck and lift their little brother gasping and wheezing from the floor.

Wing held down one brother while Prime cut his head off, then watched a second brother be lifted in a choke-hold before being cast out. Maybe Wing was the brother he should really tell about Hode. But Wing was also an idiot. A different kind of idiot from Hordak, but still an idiot was an idiot.

After Hordak’s –Zero-Zero-Three’s- banishment, that was when Wing started with the whole, ‘when we go to join the All High Host, we go together’ bullshit. He watched Prime banish one cabinet Lord, a brother of equal rank to his own, for having issues that were the fault of the cloning facility and not the brother’s himself. And he watched Prime kill another brother, also a cabinet Lord, but one with seniority, who has served Prime for years!

Somehow, he got it into his head that either he or Red Hord were going to be next. That the first time either one of them failed, Prime was going to kill them on the spot. Wing did not want to be apart from Red, he had grown very attached to his brother. So, if they were to go to the Host, he wanted them to go together. At the same time.

Red almost rolled his eyes at the thought. Wing didn’t get it. If a brother was executed by Horde Prime, they did not go to join the Host. Traitors and weaklings were unfit to fill the ranks of the Host. Traitors and weaklings did not get an afterlife.

After Hode was unceremoniously executed, Red abandoned him. Abandoned his ideas and his Plan. Moved on. Took everything he knew –really knew- about the older brother and locked in a box. Away, deep in the back of his mind where he didn’t have to think about it. His loyalty returning to where it belonged, to where it always should have been. To Prime. His Brother. Brother to all.

It was stupid anyway. Hode turned out to be an idiot. Only an idiot could think to supplant the Emperor of the Known Universe. That was what happened when you let an alien fuck you in the cloaca. It fucked up your brain too. If Hode hadn’t crawled into bed with that Gar from Eternia none of this would have happened. Zero-Zero-Three never would have ascended to the cabinet, and by extension never been banished, and Red Hord wouldn’t be commanding his ship through a terrifying rift in the very fabric of space to a shadow dimension to collect the idiot for Prime.

Sometimes, Red did wonder how things would be different if Hode had succeeded. What kind of Horde Prime would Lord Hode have been?

…

Four-Zero-Eight looked at the droplets of dark purple blood. Hearing the drip louder than it actually was. Hearing a pounding in his ears. His arms shook with just the effort of holding himself up and his vision swam. For half a moment, his mind failed to register what his Lord was saying.

“You stupid, worthless, incompetent, failure!” Lord Horrin was snarling, saliva spraying from his mouth as he spoke. He was so angry.

He kicked Four-Zero-Eight in the side and the younger clone went tumbling across the hanger floor. What were they doing in the hangar again? Was this even the hangar of the Wool Cardigan? Oh. Right. They were abourd the Vinyl Hood. Lord Hode had to save Horrin’s strike force from a mission gone bad.

“The rebels took Nordor because of you!” Looking around the hanger, Lord Horrin lifted a crowbar that had been left out next to a batwing in mid-repair.

Vision swimming, Four-Zero-Eight barely register his Lord raising the crowbar over his head. He closed his eyes, preemptively wincing at the pain he knew was coming.

But the blow didn’t come.

“That’s enough!”

Four-Zero-Eight opened his eyes, vision still blurred. It took his brain longer than he felt it should have to understand what he was seeing. At first, he thought he must have been saved by a shadow. A figure of darkness grabbing Horrin’s wrist, holding back the blow. But that was insane. Shadows didn’t move like figures. Staring at them, breathing hard, Four-Zero-Eight blinked his nictitating eyelids until his vision cleared enough for the scene to make sense.

It wasn’t a shadow. It was a cape. Long, and black, and hooded. The hood drawn low over the head so that the face was all in shadow. The only thing visible, the crimson glow of his eyes. Lord Hode. Lord of the Third Division, and commander of the Vinyl Hood, the ship they were currently on. Lord Hode stayed Horrin’s hand.

“This is not how you educate a Force Captain that has failed you.” Hode said, voice issuing from the shadows of the hood, sounding as deep and dark as the shadows themselves. Hode had the same voice they all had, Horde Prime’s voice, but –somehow- Hode knew how to manipulate his tone and pitch so make himself sound so different when he wanted to. Hode looked down at Four-Zero-Eight, noting just how severe his injuries were. “This is not how you execute one for failure either.”

Horrin pulled his arm out of the other Lord’s hold. “You do not get to dictate to me how I deal with my own Force Captains, you Old Ghoul!”

“But I do get to dictate what goes on, on my own ship.” Hode replied calmly. “And I dictate that brothers are not to be bludgeoned with crude tools on my hangar floor.” It looked like Horrin was about to respond, but Hode cut him off before he could. “If your Force Captain failed to take the rebel stronghold of Nordor, perhaps it is because you –his superior- did not adequately prepare him for the mission.”

“How dare you-!” Horrin turned to fully face the other Lord.

“How dare you!” Hode snapped back, raising his voice only to match Horrin’s. “You fail in the mission our Brother chose to honor you with. You needed me to save you. Then you come into my ship and get blood all over my hangar blaming a subordinate for your own failure as a commander!” Hode snapped his fingers. “Lord Horrin is tired from his ordeal, Zero-Zero-Three, show him to an officer’s stateroom so he may rest.”

“Yes, my Lord.”

Four-Zero-Eight blinked blurry eyes as a still pillar wearing a dress and a Force Captain’s badge stepped forward to politely escort Lord Horrin out of the hangar.

Hode bent down in front of him, the only thing in focus.

Taloned fingers gently brushed hair out of his face, examining his wounds. “He really did a number on you, little brother.”

Four-Zero-Eight had to spit blood out of his mouth before he could speak. “I am grateful to my Lord Horrin for taking the time to teach me this lesson.”

The words sounded robotic and insincere, even to his own ears. But working in the Second Division under Lord Horrin had thought him what to say and when to say it. Even when he was half delirious. He knew how to get by. He knew how to survive. It was how he was able to rise to become a Force Captain in the first place. Not because he was the best, most skilled, or most competent. It was because he knew how to play their game.

Those glowing red eyes blinked at him from under the darkness of the hood. His response impressing Lord Hode somehow. “My, my, Four-Zero-Eight, you just might be wasted under a Lord like him.”

…

“Lord Red Hord,” a bridge officer pulled him from his reminiscing, “orbit is stable and we have located a signal consistent with 66694-42-003’s. Your orders, sir?”

Red stood from his throne. “Our Emperor wasn’t his little brother returned to him. Let’s go pick him up.”

#entrapdak #ocs #original horde clone #lord hode #hode #red hord #lord red hord #horde prime #evil horde #horde empire #hordak #hordwing #fanfiction #ao3 #RenkonNairu #a song of steel and light