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twdmusicboxmystery · 3 years

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10x22: Here’s Negan - Details

All right. Here are a LOT of details.

***As always, spoilers abound below for 10x22. Don’t read until you’ve watched!***

We start with Maggie and Hershel walking around Alexandria early in the morning. She calls him “a little rat” affectionately, which I’m side eying. Because of Carol’s rat last episode and because we already established parallels between Hershel and Beth from ep 17 in that he went missing and Maggie and Daryl searched for him.

Then they sing “you are my sunshine” together, which is the same song Carl sang Negan. Because the sun is a Beth symbol, we’ve always seen her in that song. I also wonder if it foreshadows Maggie losing Hershel in some way. I don’t mean him dying, but rather being kidnapped. A lot of us have thought about one or some of the kids being taken at some point, and their parents having to search for them.

Carol looks out a broken window (Broken Glass Theory) and sees the exchange. So, she leaves Alexandria and takes Negan with her.

Actually, the next thing we see is a dead rabbit she pulls from a snare. The rabbit is SUPER interesting. I answered an Ask HERE about the moon rabbit, and I really love this explanation of the symbol. It makes perfect sense for Beth because the moon rabbit sacrificed itself, which is exactly what Father Gabriel said cryptically in 5x16. “How you sacrificed one of your own….”

Plus the Moon rabbit is resurrected and combines the moon symbol and the rabbit symbol.

So what does it mean in this context?

Well, I still don’t want to go into too much detail, though I will soon. (I promise.) But if rabbit = Beth, I think this is yet another example of symbolism that points to Negan and Beth having a big arc together later. (And Carol will probably be thrown into the mix.)

That evening, Negan drinks by the fire. What he’s drinking is clearly moonshine. It’s from one of those big glass moonshine bottles. I don’t know where he got it. I looked a second time at the stuff they left for him, and it might be in there, but if so, it isn’t visible. It would certainly be interesting if Daryl left him moonshine, but I don’t see any super-obvious hint at that. If it’s already there in the cabin, well, that’s Leah’s cabin, so….

This is where he sees his old self from the trailer. Some of the dialogue jumps out at me as things Daryl might say about himself. Evil Negan says to his good self, “You are nothing without her.” That sort of thing.

The next day he goes back to the tree with the stained-glass windows where Rick cut his throat. One of the plate glass windows has a hole in it and the other one is lying on the ground.

My go-to explanation of course is that the one with the hole represents the bullet hole in Beth’s head. (We actually said this of the stained-glass window in Father Gabriel’s church that Sasha shoots a hole in in 5x16 as well.) And I always see someone falling down as a serious injury. So, when Beth belly-flopped in the elevator shaft with Noah, that was a foreshadow of her getting shot. So I’m kind of seeing the window lying flat on the ground in the same way.

Of course, Negan digs up Lucille, and then it goes into the flashbacks.

It starts of course with him being a prisoner of the biker gang. We do think this gang is a parallel of the Claimers from S4. Remember that I said, overall, Negan = Daryl, right? So, this guy (Craven) even kind of looks like Joe Claimer. They dress in a similar fashion, are rough-and-tumble kind of dudes. But also, Negan runs into them after he loses Lucille. He doesn’t realize she’s died at that point, but she has. Just like Daryl ran into the Claimers after being separated from Beth in Alone.

And we immediately see a blue cooler with IV bags inside. They’re Lucille’s chemo treatments. So blue cooler/Frosty Cola symbolism. Plus this can parallel to 6x06 when Daryl accidentally took off with Tina’s medicine when he met Dwight. Basically, these are both pointing to the same thing: a future arc involving Daryl and Beth. There are also 22s on the IV bags. So, 22 theory.

I will say that the format of this episode is a lot like 10x18 because so much of it is flashback. They even use the same font to show the time jumps. The main difference is that with Daryl, they started 5 years ago and then jumped forward, toward the present. Here, they actually move backward first and then forward again.

So it’s like a swinging pendulum. They go back 12 years to where he’s a prisoner of the bikers. Then it goes back 6 weeks to when he’s with Lucille in their home , and then it jumps back again to before the apocalypse when she first found out she had cancer, which was right about the time the turn happened. And then it moves forward to the two of them together in the house, and then back to him with the bikers.

Okay, so, “12 Years Ago” he’s telling his story to the bikers.

Then it actually says “Two or Three Days Ago” and it’s odd to me that they don’t specify which one it is. Negan says he found the mobile medical clinic 2 or 3 days ago, but there’s got to be a reason they don’t just go with one or the other. Anyway, this is when he found an RV with supplies. He tries to hold the doctor up and Laura (Savior) comes up behind him with a bat and hits him.

We also get a bit of a hallucination theme. When Negan looks at the RV and the dummy guards on the roof, his sight sort of warps in and out like he can’t tell for sure. When he wakes up, he’s also hooked to an IV. (Parallel to Beth at Grady.) The doctor says he was dehydrated, malnourished, and exhausted. So maybe, in addition to all the mental break stuff we’ve already said about Daryl in 10x18, we should add these to the list.

“Six Weeks Earlier” and it shows him and Lucille. The first thing we see is that she tells him he’ll have to kill the walker but he doesn’t want to. He just turns off the generator, hoping it will go.

So, she makes him read Pride and Prejudice to her. The Pride and Prejudice thing is really interesting. He only reads a line or two, but anyone familiar with the story will be able to pick out the scene. Basically, in the story, a man asks Lizzie to marry him and she rejects him. He doesn’t love her or anything. He’s just looking for a “suitable” wife, and she can’t stand him. After she rejects him, her best friend marries him instead. And this friend doesn’t care that it’s not a love match. She just wants to be settled in life.

So the scene Negan reads part of is where the friend, Charlotte, is coming to tell Lizzie that she’s marrying him instead. This is the part Negan reads:

"I see what you are feeling," replied Charlotte. "You must be surprised, very much surprised--so lately as Mr. Collins was wishing to marry you. But when you have had time to think it over…”

Here’s the thing. No way they’re putting dialogue from such a well-known book like this into the show without reason. And I know they said on TTD that it’s supposed to be an Easter Egg for Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Fair enough, but it’s not enough of an explanation for me. In the past, there have been things Nicotero has labelled as homages to various horror films, and I’m sure that’s true, but they’re also clearly Beth symbolism.

So, you could say that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies applies to Negan and Lucille. It’s a true love story, but zombies are thrown in. That works. But why this particular passage? It’s about NOT marrying for love, or the passing of a man’s offer of marriage from one woman to another. None of that applies to Negan and Lucille. It would have made more sense to have him read a different passage between Lizzie and Darcy, you know?

So, what does this mean? We’re not entirely sure, yet. For me, I tend to think it foreshadows a future arc (I’m sure you’re shocked) and I’ll get more into that in the next few days.

@wdway suggested perhaps we could apply it to the Leah situation. Daryl is in love with one woman, but hallucinating a relationship with another. I think that works, too. For now, let’s just keep it in mind, shall we? ;D

Dialogue parallels include Lucille saying, “we’ll have to kill it,” which parallels Beth saying the same thing about the walker at the moonshine shack.

And of course then we get that all important scene with the green wig, “serious” mention, IV stand and bag, and walker in the eye.

We see Negan going out to look for more gas for the generator, siphoning it out of cars.

We also see them having fun together. Obviously them playing darts is a callback to Still. The part where they play darts is actually just like half a second in the show, which just goes to show that they did the promo shot because they wanted us to see the symbols in the scene. I want to draw everyone’s attention to the fact that the British flag is printed on the darts. This is part of the template I’ll talk about in a day or two as well. For now, I just want you to notice it. It’s important.

When they do the candlelight dinner (*coughs alone*) they eat DOG food. Sirius reference. She suddenly says “happy anniversary” and pulls out a present for him. He says, “You know what day it is?” and she says, “no, I just wanted you to have this.” So I think the idea is that it’s not really their anniversary. She just said that as an excuse to give him a present. It reminded me a little of the “New Years Eve” theme we saw around the Claimers. Not exactly the same, but a similar vibe. It’s not REALLY New Year’s Eve. They’re just saying it as an excuse to do something else (in that case, kill Rick). Here, it’s not really their anniversary, but Lucille is saying that as an excuse to give him the jacket.

When Negan says she doesn’t owe him anything Lucille says, “I stuck with you because I could always see the man you are right now, even when you weren’t.” So again, kind of a Beth theme of seeing the best in him even when he doesn’t see it in himself. That’s a huge theme throughout this episode.

There’s more refrigerator/cooler symbolism when the fridge defrosts, ruining the last of Lucille’s treatments.

Then it jumps back to before the apocalypse. There were some symbols here as well. The main ones I noticed were specifically around Lucille. After her diagnosis, she gets in the car and hears the broadcast about the virus victims eating human flesh. Kind of a callback to hearing the Terminus broadcast in 4a.

Then she gets mad and says, just play some g**d*** music. (Music reference.) When the car pulls out, you have to check out this license plate!

XVD-1144. The 1-1 you should recognize from @frangipanilove’s 1-1 posts. The 44 references the comic book issue where Andrea was shot in the head, and survived. And of course there’s the X. So then @wdway had the ingenious idea to ask what roman numerals X and D stood for. X=5 and D=500. So we basically have “X, 550, 1-1, 44.” Yeah, series number 55 was Slabtown. Beth was on the 5th floor. And all the rooms around them in the hallway at Grady were in the 550s. If that’s not proof that Lucille is a Beth proxy, I don’t know what is.

Plus, notice the type of car: mustang. We’ve talked about this before, but horse symbolism, and the type of car is always important.

Another thing @wdway with her eagle eyes picked up. Lucille is scrolling back and forth between Negan and Janine’s numbers, right? Notice the date:

November 12. Recognize that:

Yeah, not kidding. It’s a reference to the headstone in Alone. 👀

Back in the future again, Lucille asks Negan to stay with her. You don’t realize this the first time watching it, but clearly she’s ready to die, and just wants him to be with her, but he’s bound and determined to save her, an goes anyway.

A couple of things to point out. Negan looking for meds parallels to Daryl looking for meds at the veterinary college in 4a. Also, on TTD they pointed out that Negan is constantly putting Lucille in a position to be alone. Before the apocalypse, he left her alone to fool around with another woman, who was her best friend. He made her go to the doctor alone. (Lucille alone at the hospital could = Beth at Grady.) We see him constantly leaving her here to get supplies. And he leaves for like 6 six weeks to track the mobile clinic.

I think that’s mostly an anti-parallel to Daryl. Daryl never left Beth intentionally. But I also think it could be a future theme, not in the sense that Daryl will leave her, but I’ve always thought he would feel super guilty because they left her behind and now she’s been “alone” for 8 years. And again, not physically alone as we know she’ll be part of other groups and such, but without him and her family.

Back with the medical people again, Laura gives Negan her bat, the one she first beaned him with, since he doesn’t have any other weapons.

All they said about Laura on TTD was that they wanted to use her—someone the audience would recognize—but also someone who had a relatively minor role. So they talked about how they could have brought Austin Amelio on and had Dwight give it to him, but because Dwight is a bigger character, and because his onscreen relationship with Negan was much bigger, it would have made it a Negan/Dwight moment and they wanted to keep this episode focused solely on Negan and Lucille. So they used Laura.

And sure, that’s fine. But they could have used any Savior they wanted. And why did they even WANT a familiar face? Why the return of the Savior with the blond hair, you know? I’m just saying. ;D

Of course Negan tells the biker gang where the medical RV is and then goes back to Lucille, but she’s already dead. This really was a very tragic episode.

We obviously have a suicide theme here, and the fact that Negan never actually shoots or stabs Lucille in the head, both of which parallel Beth.

On TTD, YNB even pointed out that she’s wearing the same clothes as she was the day he left, which means she committed suicide the day he left. Most of the 6 weeks he’s been out looking for medical supplies, she was already dead. Super tragic, no?

We also see keys, matches, the blue cooler again, and Negan wrapping the barbed wire around his bat.

So, a couple of preliminary thoughts here. The 6 weeks was bugging me because they said it 2 or 3 times, really emphasizing it. I’m kind of wanting to equate it to 6 seasons. Because if Beth doesn’t show until S11 (and clearly now she can’t, unless she shows in Fear or something, but I’m not holding my breath for that) then it will be 6 seasons since Beth left the show.

And again, it’s more anti-parallel than parallel. For 6 weeks, Negan thought Lucille was alive, but she was dead the entire time. For 6 seasons, Daryl thought Beth was dead, when really she’s been alive the whole time.

And, of course, Negan burns the house down, much like Beth and Daryl did in Still.

But here’s the other thing @wdway noticed. Check out the similarities here:

Similar colors and structures, and both seem to be on fire at some point. And I don’t think the cabin in 5x09 was pointing toward Negan and Lucille. Rather, I think the symbolism in both instances point toward something we haven’t seen, yet. But the parallels and repeated symbolism are there.

When Negan leaves, he gets on his bike with Lucille (the bat) and drives away from the burning house. And interestingly, we see him smack his mailbox with it and knock it off it’s post.

Couple of things here:

The name “Smith” is written on the mailbox, so apparently that was their last name. And they mentioned it on TTD. Smith is such an everyman sort of name. It might be one of the most common surnames on the planet, so there’s definitely some interesting symbolism there having to do with Negan.

But I’m side-eyeing the actual mailbox, as part of the Communication Theme. And, on a very basic level, I’m thinking that the mailbox was intact when Lucille was still alive. He destroyed it after he lost her. So maybe it represents something along those lines, or even represents the person they lost. So mailbox = Beth.

The scene that keeps flashing in my head is from 6x03 when Daryl is riding around on his bike, searching for Rick, and he’s passing all these mailboxes in the background.

Then in 10x21, we see him walking toward the military walker on the train tracks (*coughs CRM, *coughs Rick*) and he passes the blond, Beth walker, but doesn’t actually look at her or see her. Do you kind of see the similar theme there?

Negan brutally killing the biker gang can parallel Rick doing the same to Joe Claimer in 4x16.

Negan tells Craven a story about how he lost his job. He got in a bar fight. It was their favorite because it had a JUKE BOX. And they loved the juke box because it played their favorite song (You are So Beautiful to Me.) He even talks about “seeing red” and how he now realizes he can do anything he wants (read: kill anyone he wants) so we kind of see his evolution into S6 Negan here.

And honestly, they leave a lot of loose threads here. We never learn what happens to Franklin (he’s still alive at this point) and obviously Laura stays with Negan long term, but they really could do more flashbacks about how he started gathering people and found the Sanctuary.

So then we come back to the present where he’s just dug Lucille up under the stained glass window tree. In the first scene at the beginning, we see a walker making its way toward him. Yes, it’s a blond, female walker, and I’m pretty sure she’s wearing Daryl’s shirt from when he was at the Sanctuary. Here at the end, Negan has been lost in his own thoughts so long, the walker comes up behind him and he turns around and kills it with Lucille.

When he does, the bat splits down the middle. Yet another symbol of Lucille’s death.

He goes back to the cabin and sits in front of the fire and talks to Lucille (both the bat and his actual wife). He says, “I’m sorry I left you…I made myself not feel anything…I miss you.” See how we could apply that to Daryl?

He also says, “I’m going to do your fighting for you,” which I take to mean he’ll honor her memory better, now, rather than go back to the old, evil Negan he was. Which was really just years of him avoiding his feelings about her death. (Kind of like Daryl has with Beth, hence the Leah situation.)

Then he covers the bat in a white cloth (clearly meant to be a shroud) and puts the bat in the fireplace, burning it. On TTD, they do say this is meant to be the funeral she never got. 👀

Oh, and at the end of the “in memoriam” on TTD, it actually says, “Negan is burning down his past.”

So, at the very end, he actually goes back to Alexandria. Maggie, Carol, and Daryl are near the entrance and he asks where the “A” team is going. Carol warns Negan that if he lives at Alexandria, Maggie will kill him at some point. I actually really liked this ending. It was a good way to kick us into S11.

That’s the end of the episode. So, I’ll say this again and it will be a good segue into my next post about what I think Beth’s arc will be in S11, and how she’ll appear. I’ll post it either tomorrow or Thursday.

Without getting too much into the weeds, I think Negan and Beth will have some major, future interaction. And I really think the symbolism here backs it up, for various reasons. The symbolism itself wouldn’t prove anything, as we’ve seen this stuff repeated with lots of different characters and especially true love couples, which Negan and Lucille clearly were, despite his cheating.

But on TTD, Hilarie Burton talked about how strong Lucille was. She said she liked the character because so often when cancer victims or victims of other prolonged diseases are portrayed on film, they’re seen as angelic, ethereal beings. And while that’s fine if that’s truly who they are, you don’t lose your personality just because you become sick. So she liked it that Lucille was a little rough around the edges. She says that even before the apocalypse, Negan was just fussy enough that he would need a strong woman to rein him in, and he would also be attracted to exactly this kind of strong woman.

Strong woman = Beth.

So, I’ll just leave it there.

Anyone find any symbols I missed?

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiance #beth is almost here #bethyl

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miss-tc-nova · 4 years

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A SOLDIER’s Memories - Cloud Strife x Fem!Reader Pt 11

Bit cliche, but I love it.

Part 11: Acknowledgement

One Week Later…

I failed; and now here I lie in the darkness, banished to the furthest corner of my mind while Sephiroth uses me. I’m a terrible excuse for a hero, unable to vanquish my greatest foe for a third time. Now the planet will perish, taking what I love most with it. I don’t know what I hate more, the fact that I couldn’t win or the fact that I couldn’t get over Cloud. I tried everything to keep him at arm’s length, not to let him get to me, but even in the end all I want is to see him one last time.

The echo travels forever to reach me, but the tone is familiar. It sounds again, a little closer. “Stop!”

You shouldn’t have come here… My thoughts are so heavy and bogged.

“You are not his puppet!”

Just let me die. I’m so tired of fighting.

“You can’t give up now!” Flashes of Cloud’s face flicker in my mind. “Are you gonna let him win?!”

There’s nothing I can do about it. I tried. I failed.

“Are you gonna let some maniac with a god complex beat you again?!” I can see him, brandishing his sword, holding back mine. “Are gonna let him tear us apart again?!”

Those words spark something. Cloud?

I shove him back but he skids to a halt. My legs rush for him. He readies his sword, but a thrown khopesh ties it up and pulls it out of the way. The second is prepared to strike him down from above.

“BECAUSE YOU OWE ME! NO EXCEPTIONS!”

My arm swings forward; however, instead of cutting through the blonde, my hand flips the blade, sending it right through my stomach. His words gave me just enough of a shock to break through.

“_____!”

The pain is enough to bring my sanity back and also bring me down. Knees hitting the ground, I watch the tears drip into the dirt.

“Look at me. Look at me!” Cloud’s hands against my face bring my gaze up. The look of worry in his eyes grips at my heart. “I thought you were gone.”

“I’m sorry,” I cry.

His forehead rests against mine. “I know. I know it wasn’t you. But you’re gonna be okay. I’m gonna end this and we’re gonna get you some help.” Carefully, the man lowers me to my side. “Just don’t go dying on me okay,” he warns, pulling the belts from his waist.

“I don’t know if I can promise that.” My voice breaks.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he growls. I wince as he tightens the first belt just below my weapon. The second goes just above, placing pressure on the injury without removing the protruding object. “Just hang in there. You’re gonna be fine.” His voice softens, tightening the vice in my chest. “You have to be.”

“Cloud…”

“No! We made a bet and you lost! You owe me one favor and you’re not allowed to die! No exceptions! Say it!” The man is determined with a hint of fear in his voice. “Say it!”

I swallow the sob threatening to come up. “No exceptions.”

His gaze softens, full of the love I’ve been missing for so long. “I’ll be back soon.”

With that, Cloud stands and heads deeper into the Northern Cave. I break down crying. This is the end and I just lied to him. I want so badly to call him back, have him here in my last moments, but I can just watch him walk away from me for the last time.

Why did it have to be now of all times? Why do you remember at the very end?

Alone, in mourning, I slip away from the conscious world.

~~~~~

“Hey, you’re slacking.”

“Huh?” I’m blinded by the white world around me.

“You’re slacking. Come on. You can’t be here when you’re supposed to be taking care of that legacy of mine.”

A pair of boots stops in front of me. Following them up, I find a friend I haven’t seen in years and it breaks my heart.

“Zack.” I take a step forward, throwing my arms around his neck. Laughing, he returns the gesture. “I miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

I lean back to get a better look at his face. “Wait…are you��”

His weary smile is answer enough. “Yeah.”

That single word is enough to break my composure. “I’m sorry.”

Zack pulls me back in. “Hey, it’s not your fault. Besides, I’m not alone.”

“What?”

“I hope we don’t get any other visitors.” Her voice rings in my ears like an angel’s. Whirling around, I find the flower girl standing there with a serene smile on her face. I can’t help embracing her just as I had Zack.

“No no no! I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!” I blather on.

She giggles. “Why are you blaming yourself? Thanks to you, Cloud and the others could save the world.”

My mind jolts. “Cloud…He’s going to be so upset when he finds me.”

Zack folds his arms. “Well you did let him carry on with warped memories.”

“Not that…” I let my gaze fall to the flowers around us. “I told him I’d hold on but I just couldn’t.”

“But aren’t you still holding on?” My gaze snaps back to my friend. A grin lights up his face. “Wait, you thought just because you’re here that you’re dead?” He laughs like I’ve just told a punch line to some joke.

I hesitate, my gaze zipping between the two. “But the both of you are…So I must be…”

“Nope.” A hand ruffles my hair. “You’re just here for a visit. I told you you were slacking. That chocobo is worried sick down there waiting for you to wake up.”

When I hesitate in responding, Aerith leans closer with her signature, sunshine smile. “Just open your eyes.” I dwell on her answer. “Go on. He’s waiting for you.”

“Thank you,” I mumble watching the waving pair fade to darkness.

~~~~~

I wake up feeling sore but somehow better. The weight in my chest, that’s been there for so long, is gone. The fact I’m alive, that the world still exists, and my future is brighter, it all brings tears to my eyes.

This is a hospital room. I’ve got an IV and blood bag in my arm and a heart monitor disrupting my peaceful silence. I contemplate doing something, ultimately being too lazy to do so and instead rest a bit longer.

A light knock wakes me. The door opens before I can answer, revealing a blonde that brings tears to my eyes. He looks exhausted. His blank expression holds as he sets a bag on an empty chair and sits in the one beside my bed; he must’ve been doing this for a while. The emptiness instantly replaced by shock when he realizes I’m watching him. I’m so overwhelmed with relief that I can’t even say anything, fearing my voice will fail. Back on his feet, he’s leaning over me, arms threatening to choke me with his face buried in my hair. I managed to hold on, but when I hear the man sniffling, I fall apart.

“I don’t know how I ever could’ve forgotten you,” he murmurs, spurring my sobbing. Finally, he leans back to get a look at my face. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“You thought you were Zack and something about even looking at me freaked you out. I was afraid that if I reminded you, you might break.” Hands to my face, I try to slow the flow of tears. “Even if I reminded you there was no guarantee you’d accept it.”

“You should’ve told me.”

I mutter bitterly, “Why? So you’d have another reason to hate me?”

A chilly hand slips around my face, guiding my gaze to meet his, and he’s very serious. “Because you never should’ve had to deal with that on your own. Even if you had to beat it into me, I would’ve believed you eventually.” Sighing, his hand retreats, instead sliding through his golden hair. “It made more sense than the nonsense I was telling everyone.”

Cloud tells me about what happened and why he claimed to be Zack; of course Shinra would be behind the whole thing. At least it gives me some closure about what happened to him and Zack, but I have to wonder why I didn’t become a test subject too. I have to chalk it up to not being discovered by Hojo after the Mako carried me away.

“So what’s everybody doing now?”

“Going home.”

“What does that mean for you?”

He shrugs. “It means where ever you wanna go.”

My mind freezes and I’m kind of pissed that the heart monitor betrays the slight pace change of my heart. Even though his blue eyes travel to the machine that’s quickly becoming an enemy, I try to ignore it. “Why?”

His attention returns to me. “Because there are things we need to work out.” His hand takes mine and I curse that machine again. “Including what we’re going to do about us.”

That’s an iffy subject I’ve been arguing with myself over for a long time now. “I don’t know.” He frowns. “We’re a far stretch from the people we used to be.”

His thumb draws soothing circles against the back of my hand. “Even if we are different people, maybe we still fit together.”

I emit a puff of laughter. “Your tragedies to compliment mine?”

Cloud’s deep wondering lightens somewhat. “More like I’m pretty sure I’m still in love with you.” Fire surges up my spine, burning in my ears and bleeding across my face. I’m about to throw the heart monitor out the window. A soft chuckle escapes the blonde. Slightly aggressively, I reach into my gown, ripping the little patches off. “Hey hey! Be careful,” the blonde scolds through a grin. I stick my tongue out at him but he’s none deterred. “I forgot how cute you look when you blush.”

And I forgot just how easy it was for him to make me blush.

But maybe he was right; people grow and change, whether together or apart. He’s not the Cloud I fell in love with, but perhaps that doesn’t mean I can’t love who he is now. I was focused on what I lost and terrified of having it flaunted in front of me only to be torn away again; it probably would’ve haunted me for the rest of my life. But he remembers now, he can relate and understand; I don’t have to hide anything from him anymore. The conversations I thought we’d never have now seem far less frightening.

“So is that no?”

Feeling the lightest I’ve felt in a very long time, I let a pure, true smile take over. “Get me out of here and then we’ll talk about where we’re going next.”

#cloud strife #cloud x reader #cloud strife x reader #ffvii cloud #ff7 cloud #fem!reader

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kumeko · 4 years

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A/N: For the Eos Compendium zine! I’ve been dying to write Nyx/Luna since I’ve seen the movie, and took this as an excuse to just do it.

Summary: Nyx wasn’t sure if the past kings had something else in mind for him or if he was still clinging to life out of sheer stubbornness (sheer stupidity, Crowe would have called it). Either way, Luna was here and he was alive and this time, he wasn’t going to let her out of his sight.

…

“Nyx.”

A voice flowed over him like water, soothing the burns and lacerations that crossed his body. Every part of him felt like it was on fire, as though he was lying on a bed of coals. No, that wasn’t right—it was more like he was burning on the inside, a flame simmering just beneath his skin.

“Nyx, wake up.”

A heaven-sent balm, the voice continued to call his name. His eyes fluttered open, the bright light of the sun searing into his retinas before he squeezed them shut again. Fuck, he swore, but his throat was parched and the only sound that escaped his lips was a dusty cough. There was a tingle in his fingers and toes as he tried to wiggle them.

“You are alive.” A soft sigh of relief. Something warm and wet hit his skin. Cracking his eyes open an inch, Nyx slowly took in his surroundings. As his eyes adjusted, he could make out smouldering fires, jagged rubble. Hell, now that his body was awake, he could feel the cracked rocks beneath his back. The sharp points poked into his skin everywhere except for his head. A hand brushed his forehead, soft fingers hesitantly pressing into his skin. “Though I am not sure how.”

“Your Highness,” he managed, opening his eyes now fully to make out the bent figure of Lunafreya Nox Fleuret. His charge. She shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be here. Dozens of questions ran through his mind and Nyx closed his eyes once more. Taking a deep breath, he started with the basic steps. Was anything broken? Not his ribs, at the very least. Nothing felt cracked, just bruised.

And his skin, his skin felt like fire, like ash, like it would burn into nothing and flake apart at the slightest breeze. It was a strange feeling. An imprint of the ring was permanently scorched onto his finger and even though it wasn’t on, he could still feel the weight of it all. He breathed in. As he exhaled, Nyx opened his eyes and shakily started to rise.

Luna quickly grabbed his shoulders, helping him up. Closer now, he could make out the dirt on her skin, the tear streaks on her face. “Be careful, I do not think you have recovered yet.”

“As much…” His voice cracked. Nyx swallowed, his mouth still too dry. “As much as I can be, your highness.”

Not the response she was expecting, he was sure. Luna stared at him for long ten seconds, her eyes blinking owlishly, before she cracked a smile. “I suppose if you can talk like that, you are better than I expected.” Her slim fingers ran down his arm, leaving a trail of ice in their wake, before curling around his hand. Inspecting his fingers, she murmured, “Truly, it is strange. The ring has left barely a mark on you.”

“No, it definitely left something.” Nyx winced—his body still felt like it was on fire, ever smouldering. What had the kings said? He’d have their powers until the dawn had risen? He had taken it to mean the next day, but here he was. Maybe there was some other dawn they wanted him to live to. Or maybe he was alive purely by willpower, his body kept together by the shear strength of his stubbornness. Crowe would have called it idiocy.

She was probably right. He was too stupid to know when to die.

ii.

There were certain aspects of life that Luna had resigned herself to accept: her death, the fate of the world, the fact that her struggle would be a long and lonely one. The second she had summoned the trident, had connected with the gods, she had known all of these things to be true, whether she willed them or not.

The man following her like a loyal dog was not one of those things. Stopping in the middle of a muddy path, Luna turned around to face him. “You do not have to follow me.”

“What else am I gonna do?” Nyx’s lips quirked into a smirk and she didn’t know if his expression or his tone was more infuriating. A mix of both, most likely. “I’m a dead man walking.”

“Live your life, however much left of it there is,” Luna entreated, focusing on his scarred hand. Even now, she did not know how he bore the pain. His right arm was a mass of burns, thin flakes of skin chipping off here and there. The price of the ring was a steep one indeed, though not as high as she had feared. He had lived, at least. He should not be throwing his life away like this. “Meet your friend.”

At that, Nyx flinched. His eyes lowered and he shook his head. “Liberatus would understand. It’s dangerous out here and I don’t think your trident will cut it.”

“What I am doing is dangerous,” Luna corrected. “Whether you are here or not, my path is a difficult one.”

“I can make it slightly less difficult.” Looking more serious now, Nyx pulled out his Glaive knife. A knife that was now useless to everyone but him. He balanced it in his hand before slowing wrapping his fingers around the hilt. “I promised King Regis to keep you safe.” Gripping the knife tightly now, he tossed it behind her and burst into a million refracted lights as he warped to the wild beast behind her. “It’s the only reason I’m still standing.”

Luna spun around, watching as he killed monster after monster, his knife hurtling from one direction to another. It was a futile task. Even if they injured her, they wouldn’t kill her. Not yet. It wasn’t her fate to end here.

It was her fate to die across the sea, in a watery grave. You can’t save me, her lips refused to form.

Some part of her knew that he would try anyways.

iii.

The modest campfire flickered, just barely strong enough to survive the slight night breeze. Nyx quickly scanned the moonlit sky; with the bright full moon, anyone could spot them if they were looking hard enough. All it took was one magitech engine and while Nyx could take down a group, even he would have difficulties against that many.

“Is something wrong?” Luna asked quietly. On the other side of the fire, she hugged her knees to her chest, her eyes half-closed, and she looked more like a lost child than a fierce, stubborn princess.

“Nothing yet.” One last check and Nyx tore his eyes away from the sky. The embers flickered in and out of existence, the fire on the verge of dying, and he added another log to the pile. At least the smoke wasn’t too visible. “You should sleep.”

“As should you.” Luna eyed him now, looking slightly more awake. “I do not understand how you are still standing. When was the last time you slept?”

“…properly? Weeks ago.” Nyx shrugged, leaning back. “Maybe it’s the ring.”

“Perhaps so.” Luna pulled out the chain from under her dress, holding it up in the dim light. The fire flickered on the dull silver, casting reflections that looked like omens of the future. “Though I do not know of any such properties. Moreover, only the king should be able to draw out the ring’s power.”

“Prince Noctis,” Nyx mumbled, resisting the urge to spit out the name. Even now, he felt a surge of bitterness over all that was lost so the royal heir could survive. Over all who had died so a single boy and his entourage could make it to the next day. “When’s he getting the ring?”

The wrong question. As soon as he asked, Luna’s expression darkened and she let go of the chain. With a guarded look, she answered, “Not yet—there are still some tasks before he is ready. He must connect with his ancestors and gain powers of old. He must form convents with the gods.”

“And you won’t meet him till then?” Nyx clarified, though he already knew the answer to that before she nodded. This was a woman who had jumped out of a flying vehicle to help her king, a woman who kept pushing and pushing forward for a duty that wrapped around her thicker than any chain.

“Yes. There is much to be done.” Luna paused before softly adding, “And not much time to do it.”

iv.

“Your highness,” Nyx softly started, watching her from the corner of his eyes as she slowly picked her way down steep mountain path. It had been hard to find an opening where the empire had no eyes, a path that only the wild animals knew.

Before he could continue, Luna shook her head and cut him off. Firmly, she corrected him, “Luna.”

“That isn’t—”

“Insomnia is no more. Tennebrae was annexed.” Luna’s eyes lowered as though she was remembering some place, some time long ago, when neither of those were true. Her hand grabbed onto the nearby wall, keeping her steady as she found her footing forward. “All that I have left now is the trident and my name. There are not many who can still call me by it.” When he didn’t respond, she added, “Have we not travelled together long enough to drop such formalities?”

Despite her light tone, her eyes were just as determined as they had been when they’d raced through Insomnia. Rubbing the back of his neck, he nodded. “Fine. Luna.” In his head, Nyx could already hear Crowe and Liberatus laughing. Quickly, he amended. “Princess Luna.”

“Not quite what I was hoping for, but it is sufficient.” Luna smiled.

“Anyways, about your brother...” Nyx trailed off. There was no easy way to say this. Biting the bullet, he forged on, “He’s alive.”

“Ravus?” Luna almost stumbled over a rock, shock colouring her expression. Grabbing his arm, she stared up at him. “Are you certain?”

“Yeah.” If there was one thing that remained true even after all that they’d been through, it was that news travelled fast and gossip even faster. The small towns that they had carefully bypassed were full of stories about a one-armed general and the rag-tag team that Noctis had managed to scrounge up. “He lost his arm, but he’s still there.”

For once, Luna was like an open book. Joy and sorrow warred in her expression, her hand slipping off his to clasp her other one. “He is truly alive.” Her pace slowed, her foot scuffing the earth as she digested the information. “The old kings were very generous then, allowing both you and him to survive. Though, perhaps it would have been better if he had not. He will only obstruct us in the future.”

“You don’t have to say that, you know.” Nyx looked away when she turned to him, staring instead at the center of the large crater they were heading down. “You can be happy about it.”

“Can I truly?” Luna murmured, her hands squeezing tighter together. Her nails dug into her skin. “Even now, he is still with the empire, is he not?”

“I was hoping he’d died.” Nyx shrugged. “It’s fine if you’re happy about it—no one else will be.”

“Is that so?” Luna squeezed her hands one last time before finally dropping them to her sides. “I am happy, but also a little sad. I do not think he is my brother anymore.” She smiled ruefully. “I think my brother died long ago, I had just hoped otherwise.”

The Archaean roared. It took all of Nyx’s strength not to fall backwards at the sight of this god towering over them, at this angry being who looked ready to smite at a moment’s provocation. As it was, the heat was terrible enough without this added fear. Wiping his brow with his free hand, Nyx tightened his grip on his dagger.

In the middle of a stone ledge, Luna regally stood with her trident. He was never sure where this courage came from, where all that strength fit inside of that tiny, frail body. Even as the Archaean glared her down, Luna didn’t back away. Determined, she held up her trident once more and beseeched, “Remember the covenant. The chosen king shall arrive soon to claim it.”

A massive hand took a powerful swipe, his fingers just barely missing the young woman. Even then, she didn’t flinch, and Nyx raised his dagger. A god. He could take it on. Maybe. At least, it would give Luna enough time to flee. “Princess, I think it’s time to go.”

“Stay back.” She didn’t turn around as she ordered him, her gaze steady on the god’s.

“He’s—”

“This is my duty.” Those words again. Her duty. Her sacrifice. What visions of the future did the gods send her that she had completely forgotten self-preservation? “I will see it through.”

Nyx gritted his teeth. “Fine.” Crouching slightly, he kept his hand steady in case he needed to quickly drag her away. He could be stubborn too.

vi.

Luna pulled her jacket around her tighter. It was raining now, Ramuh sparking lightning and thunder across the sky, and they still had miles to go before they reached his location. In front of her, the meager fire Nyx had managed to make sputtered and died.

“Shit.” Nyx leaned forward, shielding the weak embers. Using the dry kindle he had saved, he tried to coax the fire back to life. It was too late; despite the small alcove they were hiding in, the rain was determined to get in everywhere. With a sigh, he sat back. “Sorry, princess. Looks like we’re in the cold again.”

Princess. She hadn’t liked the change in titles at first, but rolling off his lips, it sounded almost like a nickname. Curling up into a tighter ball, she sighed. “You tried your utmost. It is all I can ask for.”

“Still. Would have been nice to be warm for once.” Nyx leaned back against the wall. This close, she could make out the profile of his face, the rough scars that told stories she would never know. His usually neat braids were for once a little messy, unable to keep together in the constant rain. “I guess he got it?”

“Got what?” Luna asked, startled back into the conversation. “Who?”

“The Archaean. Noctis.” Concerned, he looked down at her. “You sick, princess?”

“No, I am fine.” Luna rubbed her cold arms. “Noctis did achieve the covenant, the Archaean was appeased. There is a reason all that heat vanished.”

“And then Ramuh had to sweep in and make everything wet,” Nyx commented blithely, a bitter expression on his face. “I guess it won’t go away till he gets here?”

“Not until the covenant is forged,” Luna confirmed regretfully.

“Then wouldn’t it be quicker if we just travelled with him?”

“Not entirely.” Luna buried her head in her arms, listening to the rain as it fell. The large droplets were comforting. “I had considered it. Unfortunately, the gods require ample preparation time and it would be too dangerous for both of us to travel together.”

Nyx said nothing. They sat in silence, listening as the thunder rumbled in the distance. Lightning flashed, crashing to the earth on a lone tree in the mountains. Luna could hear Nyx breath shallowly, his body tense and ready for a fight. He was always ready to jump into battle, to defend, to protect. She had almost forgotten what it was like to be with someone else and share a burden.

“Do you want to see him?” Nyx asked, his voice softer now. She didn’t look up to see his expression.

“Him?” She didn’t need the clarification, not really.

“The prince.”

“I do not know,” Luna answered truthfully to her knees. It was a little easier like this, when all she could see was darkness. She thought of the wedding dress she would never wear. “I have not seen him since we were children. I am not sure what difference it would make now.”

There was a small intake of air. Surprised, Nyx pressed on. “Then your engagement—”

“A ruse to ensure he left the city. To ensure I entered the city.” Luna closed her eyes, remembering the little boy who read stories with her. Who had left her notes in her exchange diary, the one small thing she had allowed herself to have. “At one time though, I think there could have been love.”

There was a long pause. She listened to the sound of him breathing. “And now?”

“Now there is no time for love, just duty.” Just a single duty. She had seen the images many times by now: Leviathan, a bloody dagger, a ring. A chance to save the world, to change its destiny in exchange for her own. “I am the Oracle, I must finish what I set out to do.”

“You know, it’s okay to do something for yourself. For once.” His voice was awkward, fumbling. His kindness more so. “If you want to see him…”

Did she? It was a question she both wanted and didn’t want answered. She feared what the result would bring. “Nyx? Thank you.”

vii.

A black dog darted out of the woods and Nyx resisted the urge to skewer the mutt. “It’s you again.”

“Who?” Luna broke into a smile at the sight of Umbra and kneeled down to pet him. “I take it he received the message?”

Umbra barked, his tail wagging proudly, and Nyx tried not to snort. A messenger to the gods? More like a magical dog.

Unwrapping the package on Umbra’s back revealed an envelope overly stuffed with pictures. The snapshots spilled out, revealing its contents, and Luna lit up as she started to flip through them. “So it was Prompto this time, I take it.”

Umbra yipped, laying down on his paws as he watched her.

Curious, Nyx picked one up. Two men were smiling at the camera, a woman in black standing just behind them. “They look like they’re on a road trip.”

“I am sure they did not want to send me sad photos.” Luna glanced at the one in his hand. “Oh my.” She raised a brow. “I did not know Gentiana could be seen like that.”

Gentiana. Nyx blinked. The other messenger to the gods. He’d seen Luna talk to her when she thought he wasn’t listening, her voice low and calm as she discussed their plans. Or rather, he’d seen Luna talk to the empty air, since apparently Gentiana was invisible to all. The only thing he noticed was the waves of sadness that saturated the air during each meeting.

“Maybe I should get a camera.” She was invisible to all but the lens, it seemed. He stared at her placid expression, her neatly clasped hands. She looked just as unhappy as he’d expected.

viii.

I’ll keep you safe, Nyx had sworn.

On a boat to Altissia, Luna stared into the waves, the Glaive’s words echoing in her head. Part of her wanted to believe him.

A part of her knew better.

viii.

There was a part of him that had expected this. Well, not all of this—it would take a prophet to anticipate the destruction of a city, the massive body of the leviathan, the endless troopers. And it had. And that prophet was now sitting in a pool of her blood, leaning on her trident as she struggled to stand.

It had taken him a second to warp to her side, his hands carefully cradling her to his chest. “I’ll find a doctor, it’ll be okay.” The words rushed out of him, an unfamiliar sense of panic rising within him. His fingers shook slightly as he held her. “You’ll be okay.”

“It’s fine,” Luna coughed, her voice already faint. A bloody hand rose up to cup his cheek, a soft smile on her face. “I knew this would happen.”

And so had he, no matter how much he had wanted to deny it. Her words had been laced with goodbye since the moment he’d met her. “A doctor,” he repeated, getting up. Maybe he could find an evacuation team. Or go to where all of the residents were taken to. His mind was a mess, thoughts tumbling out of him, and he froze indecisively.

“Nyx.” Weakly, she pushed his jaw toward her to grab his attention once more. “Noctis must be saved. The ring must be delivered. It is too late for me, but the world still has a chance. You know this as well as I do.”

And he did, and he did, but there was a difference between knowing and accepting. Red blossomed all over her white dress, her skin growing cooler with every second that passed.

“Nyx,” she murmured.

“I know,” he answered, leaning down till their foreheads touched. His hand reached for his dagger.

It ended as it started, with fire and water. The ring slipped onto Noctis’s finger and Nyx closed his eyes as the coals simmering underneath his skin erupted into flames once more. The kings had come to claim their pound of flesh. His body started to flake apart, like ash, like dust, like petals in the wind.

Nyx, a voice called out to him, a voice like a soothing balm on his frayed nerves.

Luna, he thought, and he reached into the void.

#ffxv #lunafreya nox fleuret #nyx ulric #lunyx #kingsglaive #ff15 #nyx x lunafreya

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happys-crazy-queen22 · 5 years

Text

Warped Tour Surprise

Gif Credit @bloodrunluv-blog

Requested By Anon I hope you enjoy it

Hope you all enjoy.

Happy Reading Dollies

@chriscrosscerulli @ryansitkowskiswifey @ilovetaquitosmmmm

"Warped tour here we come". You cheered as you started loading your bag into the tour bus.

"This year is going to be great". Chris kissed your lips.

"And why is that"?

"Because you're here and we can have tons of sex".

"That's the only reason"?

"No, I'm glad you're here with me. We get to spend time together and go to concerts like normal couples".

"That sounds truly romantic, Chris. I love you".

"I love you too". He kissed you again, picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder smacking your ass on the way to the door.

"Crazy goon, put me down". He threw you on the couch. You landed with a thud and your head landed in Ryan's lap.

"Hi there". You smiled looking up at him. Ryan was not impressed.

"Hi".

"Chris come get your girlfriend out of my lap and put her in yours".

"She's yours. I need a break she's been on my lap all night". Chris laughed as you gasped getting off Ryan.

"You liar. He's been in my lap the whole night".

"I really don't want to hear about your sex life. Please shut up".

"Oh Ryan, you love me".

"The jury is still out on that". Ryan chuckled as he went back to his phone.

"Babe, I'm going to lay down for a bit". You told Chris.

"You okay. Don't tell me you're getting sick we just started warped tour".

"No just tired. I didnt get much sleep last night". You winked at Chris as Ryan groaned.

"I'm still here hearing about your sex life".

"Good night". You kissed his lips and headed off to his bunk.

You must have slept for hours because when you woke up you were already there. The guys were walking around getting to know the band's that were playing.

Getting out of bed your head started to feel dizzy as you stood up. You quickly sat back down. Feeling nauseous and light headed you crawled back into bed and tried going back to sleep. You shrugged it off as the motion of the bus moving.

"Y/N"? Feeling a hand shake you a groan came from you.

"What"?

"You're missing all the fun". It was Chris.

"I'm not in the mood for fun. I don't feel good".

"What's wrong"?

"I think the bus ride made me dizzy and nauseous".

"Yeah that can happen if you haven't been on a long bus ride before. It will get better. You need anything"?

"No I'm good. Going to try and sleep some more".

"Okay. Rest well". Chris kissed your temple and rubbed your leg before leaving.

The night came Chris and the band were back inside they were up front talking and laughing. A very awful taste came into your mouth as you were sleeping. You tried swallowing it down but the more you swallowed the stronger the urge got to throw up.

"Oh fuck". You covered your mouth throwing yourself off the bed and leaped over the piles of bags and clothes in the floor and bolted to the bus bathroom.

Blech blech. The sounds of your lunch hit the toilet. Your eyes were watering and you throat burned.

"What is that"? Ricky asked, quieting everyone down.

"Everyone's here". Balz looked around.

"Y/N". Chris yelled sprinting to the bathroom. He knocked on the door.

"Y/N, you okay"?

"No". You gagged as a piece of food got stuck in your throat.

"I get you a sprite and some crackers". You heard him walk away.

"What's happened"? Ricky questioned.

"She's sick. I think she has motion sickness from the bus". Chris grabbed a can of sprite and a sleeve of crackers heading back to you.

"Hope she feels better".

Chris knocked again then came in. You sat on the floor with a rag on your face.

"Here you go". Chris popped the top on the can and handed it to you.

"Thanks". You cleared your throat. It was hurting and you sounded terrible. You haven't thrown up this much since the last time you got food poisoning at the seafood restaurant that Chris took you for your birthday six months ago.

"I'm sorry". He crouched beside you. Removing the wash cloth you eyed him.

"It's not your fault. I'm just not use to it like you are. I'll be better tomorrow".

"Do you need anything like motion sickness medicine"?

"No. Just leave me the bathroom, keep me in sprite and just love me".

"I can do that". He chuckled.

"Oh and guess what"?

"What"?

"Slipknot is playing one show here. They're the special guest".

"No f-ing way".

"So you need to get better. I want to take you to their concert".

"I'm already better. It's a date". You blew a kiss to him when he closed the door checking on you before he left.

Two days have past and you sickness hasn't stopped. Chris was getting worried but you just shrugged it off until you felt you threw up a lung. Your back hurt and you didn't feel like yourself.

"I'm taking you to the hospital". Chris grabbed your bag and started putting clothes in it.

"I'm not going to the hospital. I'm fine. This will pass".

"You haven't ate a proper meal in three days. You live on sprite and crackers. That's not healthy".

"Chris".

"Please go. For me"? He looked at you with those puppy dog eyes.

"Fine but under one condition".

"What"?

"You can't go". Chris shook his head.

"No, I'm going to be there. What if something is wrong"?

"Then I will call you".

"What if you dont have time? They will take you to surgery and I will never know".

"I'm going alone or not at all".

"Okay you dont want me to go the you're going with Ryan".

"Ryan"?

"Yes".

"Ask him, he's going to say no".

"Ryan will you take Y/N to the hospital"? Chris asked Ryan who was sitting in his bunk playing a game.

"Yeah".

"Ryan you're supposed to say no".

"You really need to go. I will wait out in the waiting room for you".

"Fine. Let's go". You groaned. Getting out of your nice warm bunk.

Ryan and you waited in the waiting room what seemed like forever but it was only twenties minutes. You had thrown up six times in that time. The nurse was afraid you would pass out.

"We are the only ones here what is taking so long"? Ryan bounced his leg.

"We might be the only ones you see but this hospital is probably filled with a lot of people. If you don't want to be here then you can go"?

"No, I told Chris I would take you and I am".

"I just hate hospitals".

"I know. Me too. Just relax and play on your phone".

"It dying". Ryan huffed.

"Here play on mine". You handed him your phone.

"Thanks".

"Miss Y/L/N"? A nurse called you.

"Here". You smiled at Ryan and followed the nurse. Ryan sat there quietly playing on your phone, texting Chris every few minutes with up dates.

"So miss Y/L/N, what brings you in here today"? Your doctor asked as she looked at your chart.

"I'm on tour with my boyfriend and we ride in a tour bus so the day we got to the site I got this feeling of nausea and I was dizzy. I thought it was just motion sickness but this has been going on for three days now, it's gotten worse and it doesn't seem to be letting up any time soon".

"Okay, lets take a look at you and see what we can do". You laid down on the exam table. She lifted up your shirt and started touching your stomach.

"I'm guessing you are sexually active"?

"Yes but we always use condoms".

"Are you on birth control"?

"No, I have really bad side effects in using birth control so I don't take any".

"Okay".

"I'm going to run a few test and see maybe something will show up".

"Fine".

The nurse came and drew blood and she hooked you to a IV you were dehydrated from all the throwing up.

"Everything has came back normal except one".

"Oh god".

"You're pregnant. Congratulations".

"What? How? I mean I know how but woah".

"I'd say you're about six months".

"Six months"?

"Yes".

"Can you get morning sickness after you find out"?

"Some have morning sickness through out the pregnancy and others only get it some on and off". "Why do ask"?

"Six months again I got food poisoning or could I have been pregnant at the time and it was just telling me and I didn't listen"?

"You may have been. Did you go to the doctor"?

"No. It was over in twenty-four hours".

"Then you may have been. It's highly likely".

"This is insane, really". Your mind was blown.

"Do you want to keep it"?

"Yes. Yes. I'm happy its just very unexpected thats all". "I came in here thinking I'm dying and I'm just pregnant".

"How did I not know"?

"The baby was probably playing hide and seek with you coming out at night and hiding during the day. Has you appetite increased"?

"Yeah but I was under stress so I thought stress eating".

"Well you're pregnant and not dying so you're boyfriend is going to get a shock of his life". She said with a chuckle.

"Yeah he is".

After the doctors you went to get something to eat. She had given you motion sickness pills to help you eat. Ryan was asking all sorts of questions on the way there.

"Are you okay"?

"Ryan yes. I'm just hungry". You said taking a bite out of your burger. "Mmmmmm, so good".

"Did she drug you"?

"No".

"Then why all of the sudden can you eat"?

"She gave me motion sickness meds and I'm pregnant".

"What"!!

"I'm pregnant and if you tell Chris before I do you'll never be able to play a guitar again".

"What"?!!! He was stunned. It wasn't even his kid and he was shocked.

"I'm pregnant". You took the last bite of your burger.

"I didn't know you two were trying"?

"We weren't. It just happened. Can you get me another burger"?

"Here you can have mine". Ryan handed you his burger.

"You think its a bad idea that I keep the baby"?

"No, I just can't believe that Chris is the first one to have a kid. I thought it would be Ricky or Vinny".

"Vinny? He's still a kid". You giggled.

"Exactly, they can learn to grow up together".

"Seriously though, I'm happy for you". He gave you a shy smile.

"Thanks Ryan".

"Now let's get you back before Chris has my head".

"Do you know the stage manager for slipknot"?

"Yeah"?

"Can you give them a call? I need to talk to them".

"Okay"? Ryan took out his phone and handed it to you. The drive back to warped tour you were planning something for Chris.

"Y/N". Chris wrapped his long arms around your waist.

"How did it go"?

"I was dehydrated and she just gave me meds for the nausea".

"That's all"?

"Yeah". You looked at Ryan who was hiding his face. He really couldnt keep a secret as big as this from Chris.

"Ryan"?

"Yeah, everything's good. But...". You gulped when Ryan said but.

"She has her appetite back so we may need more food". Thank God he didn't say anything.

"I figured she would. Im glad you're fine". "Are you ready to party tonight"?

"Yeah, I'm waiting for that date".

"They're about to go on. You want to head over there"?

"Yeah". You wrapped your arm around his waist his arm around your shoulder and walked to the Slipknot stage.

"Come on". You pulled Chris to the back with the Slipknot crew.

"We can't be back here". Chris sneaked in as you giggled.

"Y/N"? The manager waved you over.

"Wait, you know him"? Chris was in aww.

"Hey there".

"After the last song you can go on there".

"Thank you so much".

"No problem". He said with a smile.

"You're fucking kidding me? We're going on stage with Slipknot"? Chris was acting like a kid in a candy store.

"Yes".

"How"?

"I have connections". Chris kissed you hard and passionate.

It was the second to last song. You and Chris were rocking out to one of Chris's favorite songs. You're surprised Chris hasn't gotten whiplash but you'd worry about that later. He was is happy.

You could hear Corey tell the audience that the lead singer of Motionless in white is coming on stage with his girlfriend.

"That's your queue". The manager pointed to the front.

"Lets go". You grabbed Chris's sweaty hand and pulled him on stage. His face was frozen. He was nervous being there with a person he looked up to.

"Hi ya doing Chris"? Corey asked.

"Great". Chris mumbled into the mic.

"Wonderful, now this little lady has something to tell you". He handed you the mic.

"Chris, I'm having so much fun with you in this fairy tale and I think it's time we add a new chapter to it".

"I'm pregnant".

Chris starred at you with a blank expression. You understand that it was a shock but this was funny.

"You okay there pal"? Corey asked Chris who nodded and mumbled a few words.

"You sure, do we need a medic"?

"No".

"So, what do you think"?

"We're going to need a bigger tour bus". Chris ran his hand through his hair.

"Yeah but are you happy"?

"Yes. Fuck yes". He hugged you tightly swirling you around on stage.

"Give a round of applause for the new parents". Corey clapped. Chris quickly hugged him and squealed. You didn't know if he was happy about the baby or hugging Corey Taylor.

"I'm so fucking happy". Chris screamed, you giggled hugging him.

"I love you".

"I love you too". Chris kissed you sweetly with his hand on your belly.

Chris was truly happy until you told him that you were six months along then he fainted. He thought he had some time to get things ready but the baby would be here in no time. The guys still couldnt believe that Chris was the first to knock a girl up and become a dad when you told them.

#chris motionless #chris motionless x reader #chris motionless imagines #motionless in white #motionless in white imagine #chris motionless fanfiction #happys-crazy-queen22

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lopships · 5 years

Text

hypnic jerk - ch. 1

ive been wanting to write this since i rewatched Who Killed Markiplier/Warfstache, and now that DAMIEN is under my belt, i finally had the motivation to get it out there!

now if only i can find the motivation to write the rest ;w;

chapter: 1/4

pairing: bambi (me)/da(mien)rk/wilford

word count: 2,232

warnings: drowning, hypothermia, guns, corpse mention, death implied

You considered yourself a fairly normal person. You were partial to pastel colors, desserts with too many edible decorations, glittery acryllics, and combat boots. You worked, pet cats, sweated and bled just like everyone else. And when you slept, you normally dreamt.

As of late, those dreams were becoming increasingly… abnormal.

In your reoccuring dream, you woke up in the middle of a snowy forest. There was nothing but barren, dead trees as far as the eye could see, creaking in the shrill winter wind. The cold bit through your thin t-shirt and underwear like teeth through flesh, and immediately you’d double over and clutch at yourself for warmth.

The snow drove like tiny nails through the soles of your feet and you had no choice but to walk. Flakes of ice whistled through the wind, fingers through your hair as you trudged onward and onward, nothing but the darkening grey sky to provide the illusion of time passing.

By the time you heard his voice, you were near to collapse from exhaustion. From the trees came the loud shout of a man, echoing off of each trunk and bouncing through the forest back to you.

He sounded panicked, his shout peppered with pants of effort.

“Celine!”

You froze (nearly literally and metaphorically), your eyes instinctively scanning the trees for the source of this voice, fruitless. For a moment, there was only creaking from the branches, and you were left to your own theories. Then, again, this time with genuine fear edged in his desperate tone:

“Celine!! Can you hear me?”

You moved forward without real reason, and began to run deeper into the woods, trailing after the voice with desperate compulsion. The snow crunched with every footfall as you pounded through it, numb to the knees.

Bony fingers of trees slapped your face and you knocked them aside with a pumping arm as you looked around, desperately trying to find the voice to call out to the caller. But it was though the cold had frozen your vocal cords, too.

You ran, ahead and ahead, until your aching muscles strained in your legs and you could barely breathe. Sweat beaded and instantly froze on your brow, and you collapsed forward onto your knees at the bank of a wide, frozen lake.

The world had yawned and ice had wedged itself between its teeth, cracking in some places to make way for the black slush. The water went down and down, no sign of life under the thick mask.

For a moment, it looked like there was nothing under the ice.

Normally, in your dream, you reached forward as if to crawl onto the ice. The moment your hand touched it, it cracked beneath your weight, and you pitched forward into the black water to the sound of someone crying out your name, a voice that didn’t at all sound like the man from before.

The world yawned, and this time, you fell between its teeth.

But last night’s dream was different. The scenario had changed, and you’d woken up more puzzled and intrigued than ever. Everything was the same up until the moment you collapsed at the bank of the frozen lake.

Staring down into the dizzying nothingness, you pondered turning around rather than falling in, before a man burst from the treeline just opposite you. You looked up, seeing him on the embankment, scanning the width. He was scruffy, with a heavy, black, fur lined coat, and shaggy hair. His eyes fell upon you, and then moved on, as if you weren’t even there.

You blinked, rising to your weak feet and immediately collapsing back into the snow. You struggled to catch yourself, looking up only to find a large crack in the middle of the lake. The man gasped, and then pitched forward onto the ice.

“Celine! Celine, I’m coming, just hold on!” He shouted, his boots pounding as he closed the distance. You watched the cracks in the ice spread and spread under his footfalls, near gracefully like a spider forms its web, like a broken mirror.

He looked into the hole in the lake, reached between the teeth of the world and grasped something. You watched in abject horror as he pulled a corpse from the lake, frozen in your spot.

Then, the ground caved in beneath his feet, and he was plunged into the icy water. On instinct, you rocketed forward and cried out as if to help him, and you met the same fate.

The water stung all over as you collapsed into it, a thousand pricking needles all over your body that tensed every muscle without mercy. You drifted down and down, further and further, struggling to find purchase but to no avail.

The grey light from above the surface grew dimmer, darker, farther away. There were muffled voices, as if you were listening to a conversation from the bottom of a pool. Your heartbeat pounded in your ears, slower and slower.

You couldn’t hold your breath any longer.

The moment you sucked in air, an icy rush of cold hit your chest and you felt like dying. The arc of pain was enough to wake you, cresting into what you thought was consciousness, but only cresting… something else entirely.

You found yourself in a warm pool at a mansion you didn’t recognize, staring into the face of a man you didn’t know. He was broad shouldered and dark haired, wearing strange multi-lensed glasses, with a large moustache and yellow button up.

When you blinked, however, for an instant, he seemed much… brighter.

“Who are you?” You asked him, and he only grinned at you.

“Funny. I was about to ask you the same thing.” His arm extended for you to take, and you declined, sinking back into the pool. “Come, now. You’re going to catch your death if you stay there.”

You watched him for a long moment before linking your arm with his, letting him pull you from the water. You shivered as the cold hit you, the tips of your fingers and toes turning a deep blue. The man frowned as he observed the pale of your lips.

“Was the water so cold as to create these effects?” He was already removing his outermost layer for you, throwing it over your shoulders with a flourish and leading you towards the house. “I take it you didn’t come here on purpose, my dear?”

“I don’t know where I am… I thought I was asleep.” You shiver, hugging his jacket around your arms. The man chuckles and leads you a flight of stairs to the deck. You begin to understand how weak your legs are with each passing step.

“Yes, that is the case more often than not.” The man opens a door for you, gently leading you inside. The moment you cross the threshold, you end up in a large bedroom rather than an open den. You blink in shock the moment your stinging feet (coming out of numbness was worse than coming into it, you found) hit the shag carpeting.

You whirl around to find the man had changed appearance, now sporting a pink mustache, and satin shirt of a similar shade. You began to stammer, questioning this before he laid a finger over your lips and shushed you.

“Ah, ah, ah.” He simply shook his head and moved to the dresser, pulling it to and producing a large nightshirt and wool socks. You watched him, more confused than ever.

“But--”

“Shh.” He shushed you again, closing the drawer and approaching the bed. He laid the clothes and turned to the open bathroom door, stepping inside. You hopelessly followed, hovering in the doorway and gaping.

“How--”

“Shhhhh.” He shushed you more insistently, warming a towel with hot water in the tub. When he looked at you, you could have sworn you caught a glint of pink in his eyes. “Now, then.” He said as he rung out the towel, stepping forward and holding it out to you. “Use that on your extremities first. I’ll provide a warm drink to raise your core temperature.”

“I…” You turned away to face the rest of the room, only finding him suddenly sitting on the bed, holding out a steaming mug.

“I’m sorry that took so long, I couldn’t find my cocoa powder.” He simply smiles, as if reality weren’t warping around you. You felt dizzy, like you were dreaming within a dream. You ignored his offer, simply collapsing onto the bed and staring into space.

“What is going on…” You breathed.

“That is the question!” He bounces to your side, staring at your profile with a friendly smile. “Here, take this.” You automatically take the mug from him, the warmth burning your numb fingers. “Oh, and this.” You do the same with the pistol he hands you, not processing what it is.

“Who are you…” You look up at his face, eyebrows knitting together. The man stops mid-breath, looking at you for a moment and frowning.

“You don’t remember me?” He asks, and you shake your head stiffly. His frown only deepens, as well as the notch in his brow, confusion evident on his face. Then, it washes away in a wave of calm. “Of course you don’t… Silly me.” He chuckles, then tilts the mug back with the tip of his finger, pushing it closer to your lips. You automatically sip it. “I’m confusing the timeline again… We haven’t met yet, have we? Present, future… It’s all the same.”

“What are you talking about…?” Your confusion is edged with frustration. He sighs deeply, taking the towel in his hands and leaning down to wrap it around your feet. You’re grateful for the warmth, but you want these icy clothes off of you. As if on cue, he stands and turns away.

“Go ahead and change, I won’t watch you!” He folds his arms behind himself, turning instead to the framed photos on the cherrywood nightstand. “I am a lot of things, but I am not a peeping tom.”

You stand, your knees still a bit wobbly, and slowly pull your freezing shirt over your head. You feel warmer somehow without it than when you wore it, and are now eager to do the same with your panties. After, you slip the satin nightshirt he’d given you over your shoulders, noting how it drapes around your thighs, practically a dress. As you button it up, the man picks up a photo of himself and two other men who look… strikingly similar to him.

“Those were the good ol’ days…” He mumbles to himself, his eyes filled with stars as he scans the frame. You look at him over your shoulder, more curious than anything, before taking the socks to pull onto your cold feet.

“I’m decent.” You say as you sit back on the bed, burrowing your toes under the warm towel and burying your face in the mug. He turns back to you with a friendly smile, placing the photograph back down on the dressertop.

“Wonderful. I’m sure you feel much better now, don’t you?” He’s at your side in an instant, taking a sip of a hot drink himself, produced as if from thin air. “Oh!” He picks up the pistol from the bed, laughing and putting it back in a gun holster you didn’t realize was there. “Silly me, I’m sorry. I realized I never introduced myself. I’m called Warfstache, that is, Wilford.”

“I… see.” His peculiar name raises more questions than answers and you look up at him through your damp lashes. “And I’m Bambi. Thank you for the help, though you haven’t answered a single one of my questions.”

Wilford smiles, and it nearly reads as… sad. He sits aside the mug he held, turning on his heel. You watch him as he approaches the door to his bedroom, waving you after him.

“Where are you going?” You stand, sitting aside your own mug and watching as it disappears without your touch. The bed does the same, crumbling away into nothing, as if it never existed. The space it took up simply… isn’t there. You blink, somehow processing this as normality, and turn back to him.

Everything is blinking away, everything but Wilford, and the door. He opens it for you, holding it like that and looking back at you expectantly.

“I will be here again, soon.” He extends his arm for you to take. “And I may answer your questions then, but for now, it’s time for you to wake up.”

“I was asleep?” Your voice is strangely distant, but you link your arm with his, allowing him to pull you forward. You can’t explain what is beyond the door in simple words, but somehow you know that it is your bedroom.

“Suffice to say.” He chuckles. “I’ll see you soon. Stay warm.”

Wilford gives you a strong push, and you pitch forward through the door and straight into consciousness with a hypnic jerk. A gasp leaves your throat and you twitch, staring up at the brightened ceiling of your daylit room with weary grogginess.

You’re barely aware of your fan blowing, static in the background, and the crunch of your cat eating her breakfast. You roll over onto your side and find a familiar looking mug on your bedside table, wisps of steam curling from the rim.

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thecloserkin · 6 years

Text

fic rec (2/2): I Don’t Hear the Church Bells Chime Anymore Part by Noccalula (Part 1 is here)

They present themselves at the Hydra compound to volunteer as human guinea pigs. This is their last, best shot at taking down Tony Stark and his “imperialist death machine.”

Both of them were iron deficient, running light fevers, and dehydrated to the point that they were immediately given IV fluids. The first few weeks were nothing but antibiotics and lightning rounds of samples and examinations as the medical team worked to ensure that the twins were at least coming to a safe point to begin working on gaining weight and exercising; Pietro could not aptly put into words what it did for his heart to watch the sallowness in Wanda’s skin disappear, her eyes brighten again

almost makes you think their freedom a small price to pay for being restored to to peak health doesn’t it

but that autonomy had been the first thing they were informed that they would be signing over. Wanda had reached down to lay her hand across her brother’s, which lay across her thigh, and gave it a soft squeeze before she put pen to paper and quite literally signed her life away before handing him the instruments to do the same.

have any of you guys ever signed a cell phone carrier contract? or bought anything online from any merchant at all? or opened any kind of bank or credit card account? nobody actually reads the fine print — maybe you’ve seen the video of the voice actor who was hired to read Amazon Kindle’s TOS front to back and it took him 8 hours — but how much of that autonomy that Pietro and Wanda value so much was illusory? Even if they’ve never had a cell phone? …. Sure, we’re free to sign these one-sided impenetrable legalese contracts or walk away, but how do you function as a person in the modern world without signing them? You don’t have to worry about affording a lawyer to decipher them for you, since most of them include mandatory arbitration clauses to prevent you getting your day in court, or god forbid bringing a class action suit against the corporation. There’s no overt coercion going on but it’s not much of a negotiation when one party is holding all the cards. In the previous chapter Pietro and Wanda observed that they didn’t have a choice, really, and here the “choice” to sign their rights away is a farce of freedom. Capitalism is fucking depressing let’s move on to a lighter subject aka sexytimes:

So many of the things that Pietro was dying to do were still logistically tricky but it didn’t stop him from whispering them to her in the dead of night, his lips against her ear or the back of her neck just like old times as she heaved soft sighs, her back pressed against his chest. If they were covert enough, sex could pass for spooning or cuddling when the nurses passed by, shining muted lights into the room to ensure no one had gone awol. Somehow, the thrill of possibly being caught and the shame of just how forbidden the act was became part of the appeal for Wanda.

This is my jam: Sex that passes for spooning? Yesssss. The thrill of being caught? Hell yes. The taboo heightening the hotness? Sign me the fuck up. Can you imagine how wet she got when he whispered all the things he wanted to do to her? And the herculean struggle to stay quiet, to not tip off the nurses, damn I need a shower.

So Wanda gets her period after five years of being too undernourished to get it and the way it happens is the two of them wake up in a pool of blood which ofc freaks them the fuck out THEN when Pietro starts lifting weights without a shirt on there are all these scratches on his back from Wanda’s nails and the doctor who is no one’s fool decides Wanda needs to go on birth control asap. THEN the experimentation begins in earnest and the they insist on separating the twins afterward — these are Herr Strucker’s instructions. Nobody, no other subjects so far, has survived the second round of treatments.

”Now, most of Mengele’s experiments on twins were utterly worthless,” Von Strucker continued … “Because he was not interested in science - he was interested in torture … But we, doctors, are not interested in torture, no. And we noticed very quickly that there was one thing that Mengele missed, His research suggested that twins were more likely to survive lethal experimentations for longer if they were reunited after a separation.”

This is sO cReEpy — no we are doctors we are not torturers we are doing this for SCIENCE ok. It’s little wonder Strucker didn’t miss a beat when the true nature of the twins’ intimacy came to light: he saw it as something he could use. Their soul-deep bond would give him the leverage to fashion them into the perfect weapons. And spoiler alert, they survive! Pietro zips around super fast! Wanda can read minds now!

Though Pietro posed the more immediate physical threat, everyone was markedly more afraid of Wanda. This was something Pietro was almost visibly proud of.

There is a very specific kind of competency porn where one member of your OTP is just bursting with pride at the other member of your OTP doing something superbly well and this is a prime example of that, this is Pietro Maximoff telling these bitches to fuck off because look at my sister she is a telepathic reality-warping witch. (I just rewatched Firefly and the scene in “Ariel” where Simon breaks character in the middle of a hospital heist to save a random patient’s life and River just looks at him is also a prime example of this trope.)

“Superheroes.” The word felt disgustingly capitalist on Wanda’s tongue.

I am crying haha because this is so true. Isn’t the superhero story par excellence about a human with extra-special abilities accomplishing extraordinary things rather than, say, a bunch of regular schmucks building collective power through solidarity? One of the things I love about this fic is the fact that the people who work for Hydra, from Strucker down to Doctor Bellato and Istvan, are none of them evil people. They commit evil deeds, to be sure, but they are working within a system which greatly constrains their array of choices.

They could run forever – he could run forever, with Wanda in his arms. But he knew there was still a growling, raging thing in the pit of his heart that lived in Wanda’s as well, and that thing would not know satisfaction until it knew justice.

This is a very good, succinct account of what drives the twins. Justice is what propels them forward day by day but it is also, I think, what drives them to be together in the romantic sense, because I am not sure if, in a universe where Sokovia remained at peace, the Maximoffs would turn to each other. I think the shared trauma was a necessary precondition to the incest. Fight me but that’s my reading of their characterization in this particular fic, not applicable generally, and god knows I haven’t read any of the comics.

Wanda and Pietro had carried nothing from the old life but one another and fistfuls of nightmares, scars that would never fade and wounds that would never heal save but for through one another.

There is a whole chapter that is like, just the two of them holing up in a hotel and screwing each other’s brains out. A well-deserved interlude, kids. (Well-deserved for me the reader as well, I hasten to add I thought it was a real treat.) There’s a mural erected by some of their erstwhile comrades from the anarchist commune, titled “Long Live the Maximoffs” because they are now apparently the face of the (failed? stalled?) revolution. You know, every time I read the twins’ internal monologue repeating that old “we came into this world together and we’ll leave it together” aphorism it’s like twisting a knife in my heart. Of course it never occurs to them only one of them will die, and the other will have to learn to live without him.

The ultimate betrayal of Wanda’s heart was that the damned thing continued to beat without him.

And there it is. Not to take anything away from Vision but Pietro was the love of her life, thanks for coming to my ted talk. Thanks for joining me in combing through one of my favorite fics of all time and enumerating all the 987654321 reasons I loved it, and thanks to @noccalula-writes for the gift of this brilliant story.

#maxicest #pietro x wanda #fic rec

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voyagerafod · 7 years

Text

Star Trek Voyager: A Fire of Devotion: Part 4 of 4: Hotter Than Hell: Chapter Eleven

Seven of Nine hummed to herself while she did her routine diagnostics in the astrometrics lab. Everything was working fine of course, as it usually did, but she would not let pride in her work get in the way of her work. Just as she was wrapping, the noise associated with the detection of something new on long range scanners got her attention. As advanced as the sensors were, some things just didn’t show up at certain distances. Given the distance according to the data, this thing was far enough away that for it to have registered now meant it had to be huge, easily larger than a Borg cube, but putting out far less energy or she’d have seen it sooner. She could only get a rough silhouette of the object, which was at the center of a field of debris, possibly that of another ship, and residing inside a Mutara-class nebula.

She forwarded the data up to Lieutenant Kim’s console on the bridge. If Captain Janeway decided this was something worth exploring, she and the bridge crew could take it from there. Seven finished her work in the lab, and immediately made her way to her quarters, where she and her wife Samantha would make plans for the latter’s upcoming birthday.

Along the way though, she stopped.

Wait, she thought, her mind going back to the rough silhouette of the presumably derelict ship. Why do I feel like I’ve seen that somewhere before?

---

On the bridge, Harry gave the data Seven had sent him from astrometrics a once over before forwarding it to Janeway. He hoped Janeway would give the order to investigate, though he couldn’t quite place his finger on why. The details on the ship were minimal given the distance. Even Voyager’s Borg-enhanced sensors could only do so much. Even so, something about it seemed familiar, like he’d seen that silhouette in images before. Perhaps if it had been something he’d seen personally it would be stronger in his memory.

---

I’ve seen that design somewhere before, Janeway thought as she reviewed the data Harry Kim had forwarded to her. For some reason it makes me think of the Deltan homeworld, but their ships never looked that, did they?

“Mister Paris,” she said, “adjust course to take us closer to this nebula. Just close enough to get a better look at that ship.” “Yes, Captain,” Tom said. “Active or passive scan, Captain?” Harry said. “Passive,” Janeway said. “I hate to admit it, but I can’t put my finger on why that thing makes me nervous.” She saw Tom look down at his console, only to shudder. “You aren’t alone, Captain. I’m getting a bad sense of deja vu here.”

“Fascinating,” Commander Tuvok said. “I also must admit to some trepidation about getting so close to this derelict vessel, despite being certain I have never seen anything quite like it before.” “Didn’t Seven of Nine say she would get feelings like this while doing her research on the Borg degradation?” Lieutenant Ayala said.

“Yeah, I think she did,” Janeway said. “Ayala, take us to Yellow Alert. Tom, once we know exactly what that ship is, get us back on our original course, maximum warp.” “Captain,” Tom said, “might I suggest we just do that anyway?” “I’d be lying if I said I’m not considering it,” Janeway admitted. “But I’m also curious as to why this thing seems so damn familiar.” “Understood,” Tom said. It took barely an hour for Voyager to get close enough to get a more detailed scan of the derelict. It was definitely dead, no apparent signs of any sensor activity from it, passive or active. The viewscreen changed from a view of the stars outside the ship to a silhouette of the vessel as the long-range sensor’s real-time update began to fill in the details. Once the detail reached a certain point however, the bridge somehow managed to fall more silent than it had already been. Janeway thought she even heard the general background noises of the ship fade away, as impossible as that should’ve been while everything was still clearly working.

She stood up, and forced herself to walk closer, as if somehow seeing it closer would make it not true. She saw in her peripheral vision that Tom’s hand was shaking. But it was true. She had seen one of these ships before, though only from second-hand sensor data from a joint attack on the Deltan homeworld done alongside the Borg, years ago.

How could I have forgotten? she thought. How did we all manage to forget?

“That’s a Cyberman ship,” she said. “That’s not possible.”

“Do I get us the hell out of here now, ma’am?” Tom said. “No,” Janeway said, surprising even herself. “I want to make sure that thing is as dead as it looks. If it is, we can go about our business. If not, we need to warn Starfleet as soon as the next communication window is open.”

---

Seven of Nine nearly knocked over several crewmembers as she bolted towards the bridge. She had no doubt that everyone on the bridge, unless they’d happened to be nowhere near any information sources during the short-lived Borg/Cybermen alliance, would recognize that ship. If so, they were going to need her expertise. “Whoa, hey, Seven, where’s the fire?” she heard someone say. She turned, but walked backwards as she did so, so as to keep getting closer to the turbolift. She saw the visibly concerned face of Noah Lessing. “I remember everything now,” Seven said, breathing heavily from her run. “I know why the Borg are dying, but right now I need to make sure we get out of this nebula alive.”

---

“No lifesigns,” Harry said, “and a sizeable hull breach on the opposite side of the hull from us according to scans.” “I’m skeptical that the entire crew of this ship got blown out through that hole,” Janeway said. “I doubt the Cybermen could be smart enough to manipulate the Borg into an alliance and get away with betraying them, only to not have precautions in place to prevent something like that. Humanity figured out how to prevent that kind of disaster before we even sent manned vessels outside our solar system.”

“No sign of activity of any kind on the part of the ship,” Ayala said. “No sign that weapons are powering up, their warp drive, or whatever they use for FTL, is powered down. I think we’re looking at a dead ship.” No one said anything, but the tension on the bridge melted away so fast Harry could swear he actually felt it. His own body felt considerably less tense. “I suppose this means we can move on now,” Tom said.

“No,” Janeway said, smiling. “I think this means we can go home now.” “What?” Tom said. I agree, Harry thought. What is she talking about? And is she smiling like a school kid? “Think about it,” Janeway said. “What do you remember about the attack on Delta IV now that our memories are restored?” “Not much,” Tom said. “I was still in the academy. I remember being terrified the Borg were coming for Earth again.”

“The latest memory I have of that specific period,” Tuvok said, “was the Borg and Cyberman fleets both disappearing and hearing my commanding officer at the time say that the Enterprise-D had ignored orders and begun pursuing them.”

“Yes, but also,” Janeway said, standing up, “that the enemy fleet was headed for the Delta Quadrant.” “How did you know that?” Harry asked. “I was acting Captain of the Al-Bitani at the time,” Janeway said. “Owen Paris had just been promoted, and his replacement was waylaid because of the attacks. Before the combined Borg and Cyberman fleets left though, the Enterprise informed us about a key Cyberman weakness. Gold.” “Gold?” Tom said, sounding like he didn’t believe that could possibly be true. “We were under orders to go to any planets within less than a few day’s warp that had known gold deposits. We did, but by the time we’d gathered the material, it was over. Captain Picard sent a fleetwide report that the Cybermen had been defeated. The report included log data from the Enterprise. The Cybermen had advanced engines that had put them halfway from Federation space to Borg space in a matter of days.” “And if the engine of the Cyberman vessel is intact,” Tuvok said, “it is possible we could use it, much as we have done in the past with other experimental types of engines, to return to the Alpha Quadrant in exponentially less time than we are currently facing.” “With all due respect, Captain,” Tom said, smiling “You probably should’ve led with that last part.”

Harry couldn’t help but laugh at that, and surprisingly, Captain Janeway laughed too. Harry struggled to remember the last time he’d head her laugh. “Yeah, you’re probably right, Tom. Commander Tuvok, assemble an away team. Just to be safe of course, modify the phaser rifles. We actually do have some non-synthetic gold in the cargo bay. And to think, I only took it from the traders we met last week to be nice.” The turbolift door opened and Seven of Nine burst out, her breathing labored. “Cybermen,” she said, “the ship we… why does everyone look happy?” Harry, who was the closest to Seven, took a step to the side and patted her on the shoulder. “The ship’s a derelict,” he said. “But we think we can use it to get home.” “Oh,” Seven said. She looked around the bridge. “I suppose it would be too much to ask that we never discuss my rather abrupt entrance ever again? It was… mildly embarassing.”

“Yep,” Tom said.

---

Seven had wanted to go with the away team that was heading over to the Cyberman vessel, but Captain Janeway had assured her that there would be plenty of opportunities later and that Tuvok’s team’s only job was to assure that the ship was truly dead, and to restore the vessel’s life support if possible. “What we need to do in the meantime,” Janeway said, “is compare notes. I imagine that your Borg memories of the Cybermen will have more details than what we have.”

“I believe so, yes,” Seven said. “Though that knowledge may also be corrupted.”

“How so?” “I would need to have access to that ship’s memory banks if possible to confirm it, Captain, but I’m convinced that the Borg Degradation theory I’ve spoken of before is tied into the Collective’s alliance with and betrayal by the Cybermen.” Janeway did not seem surprised, which was a surprise in itself to Seven. “That makes a lot of sense,” Janeway said. “If the Cybermen intended to stab the Borg in the back, they’d want to make sure the Collective was in no condition to retaliate.” “What I’d like to know,” Harry Kim said, “is how come we had no memory of what the Cybermen had done in the Alpha Quadrant until we saw that ship.” “That wasn’t the Cybermen themselves,” Seven said. “It was the time traveler who allied himself with Captain Picard. His real name is unknown but he goes by The Doctor and is native to the universe the Cyberman originate from.” Janeway smiled. “I see I was right in assuming you had more knowledge than we did. Prepare a data packet. As soon as Tuvok gets back we’ll have a senior staff meeting. We need to know as much about this ship as possible if we’re going to safely use it for our purposes.” “I’ll get on that right away, Captain,” Seven said.

---

The Borg Queen had convinced herself she left the visible damage on the side of the Class-4 cube she currently occupied so that when she finally caught up Voyager, they would know that the Queen had personally been the one responsible for their destruction.

This was illogical. Revenge was a concern for organics. Symbolism was a concern for organics. But the Borg Queen’s state as the degradation accelerated had grown to the point where she no longer even noticed that the Collective had separated itself from her cube. It was common practice when a cube showed signs of an infection that could harm the Collective. It had happened once before, with a Borg that had been corrupted by humans who had named it Hugh. Hugh’s cube was severed from the Collective, denied perfection, it and the rest of its cube’s drones left adrift, their fate not known until new knowledge was obtained from Starfleet on the second failed attempt to assimilate Earth.

It was all too late for the Collective, but neither they nor the Queen knew that. What she was aware of now was that the decline of the Borg was happening. It was taking longer to adapt and to regenerate. Reaction times had slowed. The Borg Queen was certain that Captain Janeway knew it as well, and had taken advantage of it to escape this cube one human year prior. This alone, the Queen convinced herself, was why even though she’d been tracking Voyager ever since her Captain had planted the virus that had kept her from destroying Unimatrix Zero, they had not moved in to attack them. The cube had briefly lost track of Voyager some months ago, near a planet called Quarra according to the crew of the small freighter they had assimilated, but they had found the Starfleet vessel once again.

The Borg Queen’s physical form nearly collapsed as the rush of once-lost information returned to her all at once. On the viewscreen in her alcove, grainy due to distance and interference from the nebula, was a ship of a design that the Collective had paradoxically both forgotten and assumed would never see again.

“They did this,” she said aloud, the drones around her ignoring her verbal outburst. “It’s all so clear now. The Cybermen infected us. That is why we have been suffering these past several years. And now Captain Janeway has access to the source of this insult to our quest for perfection. We must approach this cautiously. We are but one cube, and a damaged one at that. There is no other vessel close enough.”

There were. The Borg Queen simply could no longer hear them. She did not know it, but the end of the Borg Collective as it had once been was coming.

---

“To avoid confusion,” The Doctor said from his seat in the briefing room, “I believe we should refer to the time-traveling alien who aided Captain Picard by his real name, seeing as I also am called ‘The Doctor,’” “I would,” Seven of Nine said, understanding where The Doctor was coming from even though she was able to keep the two men separate in her mind easily, “except that name is unknown to anyone apart from The Doctor — the time-traveler, himself.”

“You said his species name was Gallifreyan,” Captain Janeway said. “Let’s just call him that.” “Why would his real name be a secret, anyway?” Tom Paris said. “Also unknown,” Seven said. “One theory is that his species only believe in sharing their given names with loved ones, such as blood relatives, spouses, children, etc. Another theory the Cybermen had was that it’s a matter of simplicity. It was never confirmed, but some sources they, well, assimilated for want of a better phrase suggest that a Gallifreyan’s name gets a new syllable added to it after any major event, such a wedding, a death in the family, a regeneration…” “We’re getting sidetracked here,” Janeway said. “Back to the alliance with the Borg. How did it happen, why did the Cybermen betray the Borg, and how did this ship, out of all the ones the Cybermen sent to our reality, end up still being here.”

Seven of Nine summed it up as best she could, realizing that not every point was relevant, no matter how interesting she found it. “...thus after The Doc-, the Gallifreyan succeeded in defeating the Cybermen, their entire fleet was destroyed. The Borg were able to remotely activate every single ship’s self-destruct mechanism. Shortly afterwards, the Conduit attempted to assimilate the Gallifreyan’s ship, but was stopped by the ship itself, acting through Commander Data. Once the Cybermen were destroyed, our universe began to revert back to what we would consider normal, with our memories of events altered.” “None of which explains why this particular Cyberman ship is still here,” Janeway said. “Or what happened to all the Cybermen on the ship,” Joe Carey said, sitting where B’Elanna normally would. “All we found were parts, but there’s no way that every single one of them could’ve been blown through that hull breach.” “I have a theory on that,” Harry said, touching a few button on his PADD, bringing up detailed information on the sector of space they were in on the monitor. “Using astrometrics data, Seven and I determined that there had been a subspace sandbar in this nebula. It wasn't stationary, like the one we were caught in a few years ago, but based on its observed trajectory, the Cyberman vessel would’ve been caught in it.” “I believe once I’ve had a chance to look at the ship’s databanks I can answer these questions,” Seven said. “I would like permission to join the next away mission.” “I was going to send you anyway,” Janeway said. “Carey, prep Vorik and Gilmore on what you learned about their engines while you were over there with Tuvok. They’re in charge of seeing if we use their technology to upgrade our own engines.” “If we can’t?” Carey said. Janeway sighed, and Seven suspected she knew what was coming next. “Well, that ship is more than large enough to hold all of us, plus our belongings,” she said. “Hell, we could even fit our shuttles in there.” “Captain,” Seven said, pulling up a schematic of the Cyberman vessel, and placing it side-by-side with an image of Voyager. “I believe we may not need to attempt to integrate the technologies at all. As you can see here, Voyager is small enough to fit in between the two circular protrusions that make up the middle and rear-most sections of the ship.” “That could work,” Tom said. “We could use magnetic clamps to affix the ship’s landing struts to the Cyberman ship’s hull. And putting it right there,” he pointed at the monitor, “would protect Voyager if there were any sort of subspace or gravimetric shear to worry about.” “I think we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves here,” Janeway said, but Seven was convinced it was a viable plan. Certainly the fastest as well, as even if Cyberman technology could safely be integrated into Voyager’s, something she was skeptical about for security reasons, it would most likely take longer to perform the upgrades than it would to simply attach Voyager to the hull, send over a small team to man the Cybership’s controls, and-

Her train of thought was interrupted by the sounds of Tom Paris and The Doctors’ comm badges chirping simultaneously.

“Tom! Doctor, I need you in sickbay!” B’Elanna yelled. “What’s wrong?” Tom said.

“It’s time!” B'Elanna said. “Get your asses down here now, because there is no way in hell I am doing this by myself!” “You better go,” a smiling Janeway said. “And congratulations,” she added as Tom and The Doctor both bolted to the door. Once they were gone, Harry looked around the room. “At the risk of sounding like an ass,” he said, “are we going to wait until after the baby’s out to continue with the plan, or do we do it while we’re waiting?” “It’s a fair question to ask, Lieutenant Kim,” Janeway said, standing up, “but I think we'll wait until we’ve had a chance to say hello to our newest resident. Dismissed.”

---

Marla Gilmore walked into the Cyberman engine room, Vorik close behind her. Lydia Anderson waited outside, holding her phaser rifle so tight Marla was afraid she might break it.

Considering what we know about the Cybermen and what they’re capable of, she thought, I don’t suppose I can blame her.

She went over to the nearby console to begin the process of powering up the ship’s engines. As they began to operate, more lights came on in the room, allowing her a better look at the Cyberman’s faster-than-light drive.

She gasped. “Is there a problem Miss Gilmore?” Vorik said. “Vorik? I think I’m in love,” Marla said, smiling like the proverbial child in a candy store.

Vorik’s eyebrow raised, but he didn’t make any comments about humans and their ability to form emotional attachments to inanimate objects like many Vulcans did. Marla figured he was probably just used to it at this point.

“It is certainly an impressive feat of engineering,” he said instead. The sound of footsteps coming from behind them drew Marla’s attention, but the lack of phaser fire let her know that it was probably someone from Voyager, if not Lydia herself. She turned to see Captain Janeway and Seven of Nine enter. “At ease Marla, I just wanted to get a look at… at…” Janeway’s jaw dropped as she looked up at the full extent of the Cyberman engine. Even Seven of Nine looked visibly awed. “Oh, you are beautiful.”

“Miss Gilmore,” Seven said, “if you would be so kind as to direct me to the memory core. I was told it wasn’t on the bridge.” “Yeah, Cybermen don’t design their ships quite like any other race I’ve ever encountered,” Marla said. “The databanks are this way.” “Thank you,” Seven said. “On an unrelated note, I thought you might like to know that Lieutenant Torres went into labor an hour ago.” Marla smiled. “Remind me to give my congrats when we get back to Voyager,” she said. “How’s it going?” “I do not know the details,” Seven said. “The Doctor will inform us once the process has completed.” “Man, what a day,” Marla said. “We might get to go home 30 years early, and a new baby-” Tuvok’s voice came out of everyone’s comm badge, cutting off Marla’s comment. “Tuvok to away team. Long range sensors have detected a Borg cube entering the nebula. They will be in weapons range in approximately two minutes. Prepare for transport.”

“Wait,” Captain Janeway said. “Anderson, are any of this ship’s weapon’s operational?” “The main weapon is, yes,” Anderson replied. “But it can only fire in one direction. The Borg cube would need to be within 15 degrees of the front end of this ship.” “Get to the control center and get the shields, or whatever the Cyberman equivalent is, up,” Janeway said. “Gilmore, Vorik, get this ship maneuverable. Seven-” Marla heard the sound and shouted for everyone to get to cover. Several Borg drones transported right into the heart of the Cybership’s engineering sector. Everyone had their phasers out, except for Marla who didn’t have one. She felt someone grab her, and looked to see Seven pulling her behind a console. “Seven,” Marla said, pointing at a nearby metal arm that wasn’t attached to any body. “Lydia said the weapon on the hand is still operational and warned me not to touch it.” “Got it,” Seven said, leaping towards the arm.

---

“Commander,” Ayala said, “the Borg cube has started transporting drones over to the Cyberman ship.” Tuvok, sitting in the command chair, looked at the viewscreen. “Lieutenant Kim,” he said, “enhance the image of the cube.” “Sir?” “I have a hypothesis,” Tuvok said. “Do it.” The image on the screen zoomed into the approaching cube>

“I’ll be damned,” Harry said. “A Class-4 cube.” “Not just any Class-4 cube, Mister Kim,” Tuvok said. “Look at the location of the unrepaired scorch marks on the outer hull. That is the same cube we boarded during the Unimatrix Zero mission.” “Seven’s Borg Degradation theory looks to be accurate. That was a year ago and that cube still hasn’t fully repaired?”

“Ensign Brooks,” Tuvok said, “begin combat maneuvers. Mister Ayala, target the damaged areas of the cube and fire at will.”

“Aye, sir,” Ayala said. If I am right, Tuvok thought, we can provide sufficient distraction for the away team to activate and use the Cyberman weapons. That should even the odds in this battle, if not turn them in our favor.

---

Janeway, Anderson, and Vorik made quick work of the first wave of drones. The second wave, the same number of drones as before transported in, and only three fell, the other two shrugging off the phaser blasts. “They’ve adapted,” Janeway shouted. “Adjust frequencies.” “Captain,” Vorik said, “I believe it is worth noting that it took two drones more than it usually does for them to adapt.” “Noted,” Janeway said as she tapped the buttons on her phaser. Before she could finish however, a loud noise filled the Cybership’s engineering, and she looked up to see the two drones cut down by a volley of weapons fire she didn’t recognize. She turned towards its source, and saw Seven of Nine holding the arm of a dead Cyberman like a weapon. Seven raised an eyebrow. “Impressive,” she said. “To put it mildly,” Janeway said. “We need to get to the control center before the cube sends any more drones.” “The fact that no more have been sent already suggests the cube is planning to change tactics,” Seven said. “Tuvok to away team, are you alright?”

Janeway tapped her comm badge to reply. “So far,” she said. “Status report.” “We have engaged the cube,” Tuvok said. “We have determined it is the same Class-4 cube we encountered last year.” “Are you sure?” Janeway said, surprised at what she was hearing.

“Certain,” Tuvok replied. The damage caused by the core we overloaded remains largely unrepaired.” “The Collective is in worse shape than I assumed,” Seven of Nine said.

---

The Borg Queen largely ignored the weapons fire coming from Voyager, only firing back occasionally. A small amount of damage had been done to the armor plating, but it was nothing that couldn’t be repaired easily once this was over. She focused on scanning the two vessels her cube was approaching, looking for two people in particular whom she wanted to speak to personally.

“Scans have confirmed the individuals designated Captain Kathryn Janeway and Seven of Nine are on board the Cyberman vessel,” the Collective’s voice said, and the Borg Queen smiled. “Prepare a transporter lock,’ she said.

“Alert. Primary Cyberman weapon powering up.”

“This is not a concern. Our armor is more than adequate to…” The Queen stopped talking for two reasons. First, she realized that she sounded to herself less like the voice of the Borg and more like a leader; an individual. Second, she wondered why she was so unconcerned about the potential damage a Cyberman ship could do to her cube when she remembered all too well how many cubes she’d lost to the Cybermen when they’d betrayed their alliance. Her eyes widened. She gave the cube the order to begin evasive maneuvers. It was too late.

---

“Main gun is on-line,” Anderson said. “I have a targeting lock,” Seven said. Janeway leaned against the Cyberman ship’s equivalent of a captain’s chair, somewhat disappointed that it was far too large for her to sit in comfortably, but she didn’t need to be sitting to give her next order.

“Fire.”

---

Harry Kim couldn’t resist the urge to cheer as the viewscreen showed the weapons fire from the Cyberman vessel cut through the Borg cube’s armored plating, causing massive explosions all over it.

“Mister Kim,” Tuvok said, “Damage report.” “The cube got lucky,” Harry said. “A lot of the shots they took at us missed wildly, but that last one they got in hurt our shields, and knocked our forward phaser banks off-line. It’s repairable, but will take a full damage control team several minutes.”

“Good thing they’ve stopped firing,” Ayala said. “That blast from the Cyberman ship hurt them pretty bad. I’m picking up no signs of active weapons anywhere on that cube. Hull breaches all over the place, at least one of the armor plates is just gone.” “Lieutenant,” Tuvok said, looking at Ayala. “Prepare a full spread of photon torpedoes, and target the cube’s eng-”

“Anderson to Voyager! The Borg have the Captain and Seven!” Lydia Anderson’s voice shouted over the comm. Harry gulped. “Mister Kim, can you get a transporter lock on them?” Tuvok asked. “Negative, sir,” Harry said, looking at one of the monitors on his console. “Some kind of interference field was put up just a second ago. That must be where the Captain and Seven are. It’s crude, we can beam through it, but not out of it.”

“Mister Ayala, prepare an extraction team,” Tuvok said. “Mister Kim, attempt to open a comm channel to the Captain.”

---

Seven looked around at the corridors of the Borg cube. It was a mess, to put it mildly. The few drones that were still mobile seemed overwhelmed by the sheer amount of repairs. “Looks like we hurt them even worse than we thought,” Captain Janeway said. Seven hadn’t realized at first that the Captain had been beamed over with her, but she shook off the surprise quickly, checking to see that the Cyberman arm blaster she’d been holding still worked. “I would’ve assumed the Queen would’ve transported us straight to her alcove,” Seven said. “I wonder why she grabbed us instead of sending over more drones,” Janeway said. Seven gestured at the state of the corridor. “Probably didn’t have enough to spare.” “Tuvok to Janeway,” a garbled but still mostly audible voice came over Janeway’s comm badge. “Lieutenant Anderson told us what happened. Are you alright?” “So far,” Janeway said. One drone, it’s exposed organic parts showing signs of severe burns that would’ve had a human in too much pain to walk, approached them, assimilation tubules waving about menacingly. “Come,” it said, its voice garbled. “The Borg Queen,” Seven said. “She must be here.” “This may sound crazy,” Janeway said, “but I get the feeling her royal pain in the ass is going to try to bargain her way out of this. That would explain why we weren’t assimilated right away.” “That is just one possibility,” Seven said. “She may try to get us to surrender.” “Yeah, well, good luck with that. Tuvok, keep a lock on our signal, but don’t beam us out until I either give the signal, or our lifesigns fluctuate wildly.” “Understood, Captain,” Tuvok’s voice said.

“Lead on,” Janeway said to the drone, who, limping, turned around and headed down the corridor. Shrugging, Janeway followed it, Seven close behind.

When the two entered the room the drone led them to, clearly where the Queen had set up her central alcove aboard this cube, they knew why they hadn’t been beamed there right away. Even now, drones were clearing the floor. “Captain Janeway. Seven of Nine,” The Borg Queen said, stepping out of her alcove and moving close enough so they could hear her over the sounds of repairs. Seven, glancing around for signs of traps saw, several meters above them, the cube’s vinculum. One of its supports was clearly broken, and one of the others looked little better. The last was stable, or so it appeared. One well placed explosion…

“It would seem we are at an impasse,” the Queen said. “My weapons are badly damaged. But so are Voyager’s and those of your captured Cyberman vessel. I admit, I had not expected that you simple-minded organics would learn to operate their superior technology so quickly. Shame you were only able to get one attack volley off before I was able to disable the main guns.” “‘I’?” Janeway said, smirking. “When did this start?” The Queen looked confused for a moment, then shook her head. “We.”

“It’s getting worse, isn’t it?” Janeway said. “The Degradation. You’re starting to lose control over the Collective, aren’t you.” “Impossible,” the Queen said, defensively. “I am the Borg. We are Borg. This Cyberman virus has weakened us greatly, yes, but we will rebuild.”

Well, that confirms that theory, Seven thought.

The Queen stepped forward in an effort to look threatening. With her gaze focused on Janeway, Seven allowed herself to risk raising the Cyberman weapon slightly, focusing on where she’d need to fire. Now if the Queen could just take one more step forward…

“I will take that Cyberman vessel from you, Captain,” the Queen said, smiling now. “With it, we can cure this plague that has weakened our intelligence, our strength, made us a pale shadow of what we once were. And once that is done, we will begin anew our quest for perfection, bringing it to others in this galaxy.” “Whether they want it or not, of course,” Janeway said. “What makes you think you can just take the Cyberman ship from us though? If you could’ve, Seven and I wouldn’t be here. You’d be over there. Or on Voyager. Or both. I think you’re trying to bluff me into surrender. Just goes to show how much that computer virus from another universe has rotted your brain.” “We are Borg!” the Queen shouted angrily, taking the last step forward Seven needed, but now she was looking as much at her as at Janeway. Seven would only get one chance. She began doing the math in her head one more time. She was certain she already had the right firing solution, but for a shot this important, not just to her, or her family, or her crewmates, but possibly to the entire galaxy… “We have lost many of our voices, but they will be replaced. A newer, stronger Collective will rise. The Cybermen failed. You failed. And your crew will be the first of my new drones. But not you yourselves, no. You, Captain Kathryn Janeway, and you, Seven of Nine, will see the last act I take as the emotional, petty, being the Cyberman virus left me. My last bit of spite before I return to being what I was always meant to be, a creature of logic, a part of a hive mind, will be this; I will decorate my central alcove with your bones!” “Yeah,” Seven said, “Fuck you too.” She fired, hitting the one vinculum support, shattering it. The other, already damaged, snapped almost immediately from the weight. The Borg Queen moved to get out of the way of the heavy Borg device, but just as Seven had predicted, the Queen was unfamiliar enough with the concept of survival instinct, not having needed it for so long when she could just go to another body when the one she was in was destroyed, that she ended up stepping in just right the right place for the sharp bottom of the vinculum to pierce her skull. She didn’t even have time to scream. The drones however, they screamed, and fell over, and twitched violently. “We should probably go now,” Janeway said, taking Seven’s arm. “No doubt,” Seven said. “Janeway to Tuvok, get us the hell out of here.”

---

Janeway looked around, wondering why Harry had beamed her and Seven directly to the bridge, but she wasn’t going to complain. “Lieutenant Ayala, prepare a full torpedo spread,” she said. “Janeway to Anderson.”

“Anderson here. Glad to hear you’re alright, Captain.” “I’m back on Voyager. Target the Borg cube and prepare another round. We’re going to finish this.” “With pleasure, ma’am,” Anderson replied.

Janeway straightened her uniform, took her seat in the Captain’s chair, and looked at the damaged Borg cube on the viewscreen.

“Anderson, Ayala… fire.” The two vessels, one Starfleet, one Cyberman, cut loose on the Borg cube, tearing it apart within seconds. “Their warp core’s about to go critical,” Harry Kim said. “Back us off,” Janeway said. “Janeway to away team, can you get that ship moving?” “Somewhat,” Marla Gilmore’s voice replied.

“You’ve got…” she looked at Harry. “Five seconds,” Harry said.

“Damn it,” Janeway said. “Hang on!”

The cube exploded, the shockwave spreading out in all directions. Voyager shuddered violently as it hit, but even as she gripped the arms of her chair, she could see on the screen that, amazingly, the Cyberman ship held, knocked back, but not showing any signs of damage.

That doesn’t mean the people inside weren’t hurt though, Janeway thought. Especially if they weren’t secured. “Away team to Voyager,” Lydia Anderson’s voice said over the comm, causing Janeway to openly breathe a sigh of relief. “We’re alive. A little rattled, but alive.”

“Good to hear, Lieutenant,” Janeway said. “Good to hear.” ”Sickbay to the Bridge,” The Doctor’s voice said. “Go ahead,” Janeway said. “Is it safe to assume that the fighting is over?” “That’s correct.” “Good,” The Doctor said. “Then now’s the perfect time to announce that one Miral Paris has joined our crew, happy and healthy with her parents.” Cheers filled the bridge, coming from Ayala, Brooks at the helm, and Harry Kim. Janeway smiled, and even felt tears of joy well up in her eyes. “This really has been an interesting day,” she said. “Give the parents my congratulations.”

---

“When can we see the baby?” Naomi asked, practically bouncing with excitement. Seven just laughed, while Sam patted Naomi on the head. “When B'Elanna and Tom say we can, sweetie,” she said. “I am relieved the process went well,” icheb said. “It’s my understanding that the birth process, which is already difficult for many, is even more so for mixed species births.”

Sam winced, remembering Naomi’s birth and the unusual circumstances surrounding it. “Yes, I’m aware,” she said aloud. “It’s hard to believe it’s almost over. After seven years, this could be our last day in the Delta Quadrant.” “That’s not entirely accurate,” Seven said. “As fast as the Cyberman engines appear to be, it will still take us approximately six days to return to the Alpha Quadrant. Add an additional day if we choose to go straight to the Sol system as opposed to a deep space Federation colony.” “Well, still,” Sam said, “as happy as I am, it’s hard to not to have mixed emotions about this. It’s the end of an era for us, really.” “Understandable,” Icheb said. “I admit to having concerns of my own. I’ve never lived anywhere else than the Delta Quadrant.” “Same here,” Naomi said, “but we’ll be okay. You’ll get to join Starfleet, and I’ll get to meet my Dad.” “He’s going to be happy to meet you too,” Sam said.

“Seven,” Icheb said, “is the Captain planning to hold some sort of ceremony to mark the end of Voyager’s time in the Delta Quadrant?” “Not that I’m aware of,” Seven said, looking at Sam. Sam didn’t believe there were any such plans either, so she nodded her agreement. “Why do you ask?” she said. “In my lessons with The Doctor last week he spoke of a concept called catharsis,” Icheb said. “I believe that some catharsis for the crew prior to leaving the Delta Quadrant could possibly make it easier for them to readjust, or adjust in the case of myself, Naomi, Mister Jaffen, and Seven of Nine, to life in the Alpha Quadrant.” Sam smiled, while Seven put down her PADD to give the boy a hug. “That is an excellent idea, Icheb,” Seven said. “I agree with your assessment.” Icheb smiled, and even blushed a little. “Thank you. Would either of you be willing to help me present the idea to the Captain?” “I’ll do it,” Sam said. “Annie’s going to be on the Cyberman ship soon.” “Oh, hey,” Naomi said, “I was thinking when we get to Earth we could get a pet.” “Oh?” Sam said, wondering where this was coming from. Naomi hadn’t said anything about wanting a pet for years. “I’m thinking a bunny,” Naomi said. Sam tilted her head, and saw that Seven raised an eyebrow.

“Why a bunny?” Sam asked. “Well,” Naomi said, “bunnies are usually prey animals, right? But a pet rabbit on a starship wouldn’t have any predators. It could be relaxed all the time.” “Interesting,” Icheb said, “I had never thought to consider the bunny perspective before.”

---

Tom Paris leaned against the doorway to the bedroom of their quarters and watched as B’Elanna gently placed the sleeping Miral into her crib. “I’m amazed she went down so easy,” Tom whispered. “Especially after all the excitement we just had.” “Enjoy it while it lasts,” B’Elanna whispered back. “Most nights are not gonna be this quiet.”

“Well, luckily most of those nights are going to be back home,” Tom said. “Especially with you at the helm,” B’Elanna said. Tom sighed, hoping they weren’t going to have this discussion again. “I’m a new father,” he said. “Brooks can handle the Cyberman ship. Seven confirmed from the Cybership’s databanks we won’t run into anyone hostile on the trip home, not with the course with we’ve plotted. A few populated star systems might get a bit of a scare as we pass through, but we won’t be around long enough for them to shoot at us. And any anomalies along the way, we’ll be able to go around. Sue can do it.”

“I’m sure she can,” B’Elanna said. “But the fact is you’re a better pilot than her, and I do not want to take any chances when it comes to getting our daughter home safe. Talk to the Captain. Convince her to let you be on the team that operates the Cyberman ship.” Tom wanted to argue this point, as he had before, but he knew he’d only be repeating points he’d made several times before in the past two days. Time to graciously admit defeat, he thought. “I’ll talk to her at the ‘Farewell, Delta Quadrant’ party,” he said.

---

The cargo bays with their modular walls were the only place where all one-hundred twenty plus crewmembers could be gathered comfortably. It lacked the view of the stars that the mess hall had, but Captain Janeway wanted everyone gathered for this event; Voyager’s final day in the Delta Quadrant. And after all, right now the stars wouldn’t be visible in the mess hall viewports anyway, instead being filled with the gases of the nebula and the cold metal hull of the Cyberman ship that Voyager was now attached to.

For most of the gathering things had been light. The crew laughed and shared memories of the more amusing or bizarre events they’d encountered since the destruction of the Caretaker’s array and the merging of the Starfleet and Maquis crews. Static images of some of these events, taken from the ship’s logs and sensor records had been arranged on the walls like paintings, based on a suggestion made by Icheb.

It was inevitable she supposed, though, that someone would bring up some of the tougher moments they’d faced; the hardships, and losses. When that happened, Janeway tapped her glass of champagne, and quickly the rest of the crew turned to look at her while Jaffen placed a hand on her shoulder. “Before we start our final mission here in the Delta Quadrant,” she said, “let us take a moment to remember those of us who didn’t make it to this day. It’s in their memories that we undertake this last journey, using the ship the Cybermen left behind and its engines to finally see our homes again. I say their names aloud so that, if they can hear us somehow, they know that we have not forgotten them and that their sacrifice was not for nothing.”

Janeway cleared her throat. “For Aaron Cavit, Veronica Stadi, T’Prena, Doctor Jeffrey Fitzgerald, Mitchell Fayed, Aka-Na-Tak, Bobby Androjnik, Kopor the Climber, Stockbridge, Thomas Merlin, Nihlus Kryik, Peter Durst, …”

Janeway’s voice began to crack, frustrating her immensely. She hadn’t even gotten to the end of Voyager’s first full year, and already the names became harder and harder to get out. Tuvok moved over to stand by her, and without missing a beat picked up where Janeway had left off, starting with Kurt Bendera. Janeway was not surprised that Tuvok had decided to include Lon Suder’s name. He was a murderer, but even still in the end he had died saving the ship, making it possible to retake it from the Kazon. If any of the rest of the crew found his inclusion controversial no one said anything. By the time Tuvok made it to Commander Chakotay’s name, the cargo bay was all but silent, the only sounds being made by a handful of crewmembers and Naomi Wildman sniffling, all seeming to be trying as hard to hold back tears as Janeway herself was.

“To absent friends,” Janeway said, taking a sip from her glass. Those who held drinks followed suit. Jaffen whose hand had never left her shoulder squeezed it gently.

“That was beautiful,” he said quietly, his own eyes seeming to be tearing up when Janeway turned to look at him. “I’ve been on ships that lost people before. I wish they’d gotten a send-off as touching as that.”

“It would be better if I didn’t have to give a send-off at all,” Janeway said, she and Jaffen moving off to the side as normal conversation amongst the rest of the crew resumed. “Space travel can be dangerous even under ideal circumstances,” Jaffen said. “And you haven’t had ideal circumstances for seven years now. Yes, you’ve lost people. But most of the sentients under your command are going home today, and they have you to thank for that.” Janeway allowed herself a small smile. “I can’t take all the credit,” she said. “A captain’s only as good as their crew. Without these other people here, I would never have made it past the Ocompa homeworld, if that far.”

“Sure,” Jaffen said, “but that goes both ways. You needed them, and they needed you.”

“Yeah,” Janeway said, sighing. “That’s going to make it that much harder when we get home.” “What do you mean?” “I intend to step down when we get back to Earth. Maybe take on a teaching job at the Academy, maybe just retire to Indiana.” Jaffen briefly laughed, then covered his mouth apologetically. “I’m sorry, Kathy. But really, if I know you as well as I think I do, you’ll go crazy inside of a week if you do that.”

Janeway shook her head. “I’m just so tired, Jaffen.”

“So take a break,” Jaffen said. “I don’t know how vacation time works in Starfleet, but if it carries over you’ve probably got more time coming than I’ve ever had at every job I’ve held combined. At least that way, if you decide you want to get back out to the stars, it’s easier to come back from sabbatical than from retirement.”

Janeway smiled, remembering the stories of how many times the crew of the first Enterprise under James Kirk had ‘retired.’ “You’d be surprised, actually.”

“At least think about it,” Jaffen said. “Okay, okay, you’ve convinced me,” Janeway said. “I’ll wait until we’re actually on Earth before I decide between retirement or just a long vacation.”

“I look forward to seeing it,” Jaffen said. “In person I mean. I know that holovids can only do so much. And speaking of looking forward to things, I hear you’ve chosen to lead the skeleton crew that will be piloting the Cyberman ship for the last day.” “You heard right,” Janeway said. “The Voyager rumor mill does get things correct from time to time.”

“I want to be there with you,” Jaffen said. “I-”

“Okay.”

Jaffen stopped talking, looking surprised, and Janeway couldn’t help but laugh. “You thought I was going to argue with you on that, didn't you?” “Well, to be honest, yes,” Jaffen admitted. Janeway kissed him on the cheek. “I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have at my side when we reach Earth.” “And I look forward to seeing the look on your face when you see Earth,” Jaffen said.

---

The away team stepped onto the transporter pad, excluding Tom Paris, Marla Gilmore, and Vorik who had already returned to the Cyberman ship to for the final leg of the journey home. Janeway held Jaffen’s hand in hers and watched quietly while Seven hugged Samantha Wildman, and Megan Delaney tried to reassure her twin sister Jenny that everything we going to be fine. “Just remember,” Jenny said, “if you get killed, I’m telling Mom.” Megan laughed, as she stepped onto the pad. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “Don’t worry, sis.” “I love you,” Seven said to Sam. “Love you too,” Sam said. “Are we all ready?” Janeway said.

Everyone on the away team nodded, silently, except for Lydia Anderson who saluted before saying, “Ready to go, Captain.”

“Very well,” Janeway said. “Mister Mulcahey? Energize.”

---

Harry Kim yawned at his console. “Mister Kim,” Tuvok said, “if you require additional rest, I am more than willing to provide it.” “I appreciate the thought, Commander,” Harry said, “but there was no way I was going to miss this shift. Based on the calculations we did before shift change, we’ll be entering Federation space within a few hours, and Earth a few hours after that.” Tuvok raised an eyebrow. “Very well, but I will relieve you of duty if I feel that your reaction times are clouded by lack of sleep.”

“I got plenty of sleep yesterday, sir,” Harry said. Tuvok was skeptical, but he also knew better than to underestimate human resilience. Besides, it wouldn’t be the first time Lieutenant Kim had pulled a double, or even a triple shift. “Very well,” Tuvok said. “Ensign Brooks, alert the crew when we are about to enter Sector 001.” “Aye, sir,” Sue Brooks said from her seat at the navigation console.

---

The man from the other universe, the enemy of the Cybermen known as The Doctor has had many qualifiers attached to his name. Among these are terms such as “magnificent bastard,” and “chessmaster.”

The Doctor couldn’t think of any way that any Cybermen would be left behind in the universe of the Federation and the Borg, but regardless he left something in place just in case. The Earth of this place was not his Earth, his adopted home, but he felt obligated to protect it nonetheless.

The device was not hidden, but because of its origin no Starfleet officer or Federation civilian who stumbled across it in Sector 001 would think twice about it, leaving it be, unexamined. That would be true even at this moment, when for the first time since The Doctor had returned to his reality the device activated. It detected Cyberman activity approaching. The device began to power up in order to perform its designated task.

---

“We’re approaching the outer edge of Sector 001,” Megan Delaney said, looking at her jury-rigged console set up in the Cybership’s control center.

“How long? Janeway said, stretching. She hated the chair that had been set up for her, but decided not to just request a new one be sent over from Voyager. “Approximately thirty minutes ahead of schedule,” Megan said. “Thirty less minutes I have to wait to see my family,” Tom said. “Including my Dad.” “I imagine Starfleet Command will want to debrief us before allowing us to see our loved ones,” Seven said. “Oh, I doubt that,” Janeway said. “That would make Command look bad. They’ll probably give us at least a day.” “I’m more worried about the civilians,” Lydia Anderson said. “Didn’t Reg Barclay say we’re celebrities these days? We’re going to get swarmed by autograph seekers and excited schoolchildren.” “You might,” Marla Gilmore said. “If I’m lucky they’ll let me visit my nephew before putting me up before a tribunal.” “That was always a possibility,” Vorik said. “However, given the contributions you and most of your fellow survivors from the Equinox have made-” The ship shuddered. “I’m reading an energy spike,” Megan Delaney said. “I see it, but I can’t get a fix on its location,” Seven said. “What’s happening?” Jaffen said, looking like he wanted to do something, anything, to help but at a loss as to what. “We’re being pulled towards it, whatever it is,” Tom said. “I’m putting everything I can into propulsion but-” The ship shuddered again, more violently this time, throwing nearly everyone to the ground. “Janeway to Voyager!”

---

“Captain,” Tuvok said, responding to the hail, “a spatial rift has opened near our location. It opened as soon as we entered the solar system.” “Detach Voyager and get clear,” Janeway said, “then beam us out.” The final part of her order was understandable, but the signal had started to weaken. “Understood,” Tuvok replied. “Ensign Brooks?” “Already on it,” Brooks said. Voyager suddenly stopped shaking. “Commander,” Harry said, “whatever the rift is, it stopped pulling at us once we detached from the hull of the Cyberman ship.” “Is it still pulling the Cyberman vessel towards it?” “Aye, sir,” Harry said. “Bridge to transporter room 1,” Tuvok said, “the away team requires an emergency beam out.” “Yes, sir,” Todd Mulcahey’s voice replied. The bridge was silent. Tuvok touched a button on the arm console and the viewscreen switched to show the Cyberman vessel, struggling as it was pulled towards the rift in space that seemed to only effect it. “Mister Mulcahey?” Tuvok said. “I’m trying, sir, but I’m having trouble getting a solid lock.” “Janeway to Voyager,” the captain's voice said over the comm, still understandable but far more garbled. “Now would be a good-” Static. “Can you hear me Voy-”

“Oh no,” Tuvok heard Brooks yell as the Cyberman ship, turned violently and went engines first into the rift. There was a brief flash of light, and then the ship was gone. “Bridge to transporter room 1,” Tuvok said. “Did you retrieve the away team?”

“I’m- I’m sorry sir, I was only able to get a solid fix on two of them.” “Who did you retrieve?” Tuvok asked. “Seven of Nine and Megan Delaney, sir.” Tuvok heard Sue Brooks sob quietly, and saw both Lieutenant Ayala and Lieutenant Kim staring in disbelief at the viewscreen. He sat down quietly. His logic failed him as he tried to find something to say to the crew.

---

Harry Kim looked at the console, the computer registering the names of the Starfleet ships approaching them. He focused on the names and classes far more than he really needed to, not wanting to dwell on what he had just seen, afraid that the Cyberman ship had not just been yanked back to its universe of origin but possibly destroyed with both his captain and his best friend aboard.

The Galaxy-class ship Allegheny, the Prometheus-class Palmyra, the Nebula-class Sutherland, the Defiant-class Wolverine, and the one that he knew Samantha Wildman would’ve been happiest to see if she were on the bridge, her father’s ship, the Excelsior-class John Laurens.

Because he was focusing on his console he saw the light that signalled that one of the ships, the Allegheny according to the signal, was hailing Voyager. He told Tuvok. “On screen,” Tuvok said. A Quyth appeared on screen, his single eye a mixture of pink and yellow. The other captain was probably concerned that this wasn’t really Voyager but was part of some elaborate trick. If his memories had been triggered by seeing the Cyberman ship the way Voyager’s crew had been, Harry couldn’t blame him. “This is Captain Hokor the Hook-Chest of the U.S.S. Allegheny to Voyager,” he said. “Is that really you?” “This is Commander Tuvok,” Tuvok said, “it is… good to be home, Captain Hokor. We should be transmitting our IFF signal as we speak.”

“We’re picking it up on our end,” Hokor said, “but Starfleet’s a bit more paranoid than it used to be. I’m sure you understand. We’ll be escorting you back to Earth, where hopefully the necessary security measure to confirm your identities will go quickly and you and your crew can take all the time you need to see your loved ones.” Hokor’s eye blinked, and the color in it swirled and became partially translucent. “Commander,” Hokor said, “that other vessel, the one that was pulled into the rift we saw on our long-range sensors, I recognized it even though I’m sure I never saw it before.” “A Cyberman vessel,” Tuvok said. “That will require some explanation that can be handled in our debriefing.” “Cybermen,” Hokor said, shaking his head nervously. “Now I remember. I was still a Lieutenant when they attacked Delta IV. Glad it’s gone. I’m curious how your ship came to be attached to the side of one of their vessels.” Harry winced involuntarily at that comment.

“We found it derelict in the Delta Quadrant,” Tuvok said. “We were able to use its advanced engines to return to the Alpha Quadrant within days. A skeleton crew was on the Cyberman vessel while the rest of us remained aboard Voyager.” “I hope you were able to get all of your-” Hokor stopped, the color in his eye changing again. “Commander, where is Captain Janeway?”

Tuvok made a noise that Harry could swear sounded like a sigh, the closest to sadness the Vulcan had ever shown under circumstances outside illness or alien influence.

“I regret to inform you, Captain Hokor, that Captain Janeway, four other crewmembers, and a civilian were all still aboard the Cyberman vessel when it was pulled into the rift. We have no cause to believe they were killed in the process, but if they are alive I hypothesize that they are currently in the other reality, the one of the Cybermen’s origin. At this time, neither they nor we have the means by which to return them.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Hokor said. “I’m sure Starfleet will put their best people on trying to find a way to bring them home. “Captain Janeway found a way home once,” Tuvok said. “It is logical to assume she can do so again.”

---

Samantha was so relieved to see Seven of Nine enter their quarters that it took her longer than she cared to admit to see that Seven was crying. “Annie? What happened?” “You- you don’t know?” “No, I’ve been here the whole time. I heard we made it home, and there was the shaking but…”

“Something happened,” Seven said. “Megan and I were beamed off in time, but, the ship, the other ship…” Oh no, Samantha thought. Seven collapsed into her arms. “They’re trapped in the other universe, the one where the Cyberman ship came from.”

Samantha was about to ask who, but then she remembered who all had been on the other ship when they’d entered Federation space, and gasped. Tom, Marla, Lydia, Jaffen, Vorik, the Captain, she thought. “It’s not fair,” Seven said, “We were so close. This isn’t like falling down just short of the finish line, this is like getting shot at the finish line.”

Samantha just held onto her wife tightly, stroking her hair and whispering calming noise,. It was all she could to keep from breaking down in tears herself. Samantha felt two other pairs arms embrace her and Seven. She had forgotten that Naomi and Icheb were there too.

The four of them just held each other for a long time, no one sure what, if anything, to say next.

#a fire of devotion #Part 4 #chapter eleven #sam7 #fan fiction #star trek voyager

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