April Fool's Prompt: would you ever write smol!Slav
A smol request? Only for you, onions. Only for you. (For the 2018 April Fools Prompt Day)
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There’s an enormous, thundering crash from the adjacent room, followed by a high-pitched squeal of surprise. Shiro groans as he looks around, and sure enough, his charge has disappeared again.
But not for long. Five ticks later, something comes skittering out of the room on his right, surprisingly fast for its small size. The slinky creature scuttles on multiple legs and makes a beeline straight for Shiro’s foot.
In any other situation Shiro might think it was some sort of giant alien space-bug, and reacted accordingly. He knows better now, though. He resigns himself to his fate as the creature reaches his boot, claws its way up his pant-leg like a particularly insistent kitten, slithers across his back, and comes to rest curled around his neck.
“What did you do?” Shiro asks sternly, once Slav is safely situated over his shoulders again.
“I didn’t!” Slav—a much, much tinier Slav—squeaks in a much more high pitched voice than usual. “It fell. It wasn’t safe at all.”
Shiro sighs in exasperation. They still have no idea why Slav appears to have gotten so tiny, or so much younger. Coran says Slav certainly looks like a young bytor, and not just an adult that was shrunk. Based on his behavior he acts a lot younger, too.
But nobody knows how it happened. The Olkari reported heading for Slav’s lab to check in on the status of a project, only to find the engineer much, much smaller, and cowering away in the corner. He’d howled whenever any of the Olkari came near him, and the paladins—more specifically, Shiro—had been called in to fish him out.
The Olkari are working with Coran, Hunk and Pidge to try and reverse-engineer the instruments in Slav’s lab to figure out what happened. But in the meantime, they—more specifically Shiro, once again—are stuck with a much younger Slav until the situation can be remedied.
And if Slav was a handful as an adult, he’s nearly impossible as a child.
Shiro sighs. “What were you doing to make it fall?” he clarifies, as he pokes his head into the room. It’s one of the project rooms, where Pidge and Hunk frequently fiddle around in their spare time for useful enhancements, or just for fun. Some sort of device is now tipped over on its side on the floor, and parts are scattered everywhere. He winces despite himself. They aren’t going to be happy about that.
Slav hesitates. Shiro can feel him trembling, just slightly, against his neck. “I just wanted to see how it worked,” he whines, after a moment. “I could improve it. I bet it’s not efficient.”
That’s the problem with a younger Slav, really. Even young as he is, it’s clear his intelligence is still through the roof, and his vocabulary and basic understanding of science are exceptional. Unlike his adult counterpart, he’s still got the wildly curious nature of a child, and an inherent desire to get into and take apart absolutely everything—only to inevitably scare himself when it goes wrong.
“That’s not for you to take apart,” Shiro scolds. “You need to ask, first.”
“I could make it better, though,” Slav insists, stubbornly.
“Well, we’re not going to do that without asking,” Shiro says. “But you can talk to Pidge and Hunk later about your, uh…improvements. Maybe they’ll listen.”
He steps forward to at least clean up the mess and put the device upright again. But the moment he does, little Slav screeches directly in his ear, and digs all four sets of tiny hands into Shiro’s neck. He’s never been so grateful for his undercut, or he’s sure Slav would be pulling at fistfuls of hair. “No! Don’t go near it! It’s dangerous!”
“Ow! Stop that!” Shiro reaches around by feel and manages to find the scruff of Slav’s neck, plucking him—carefully, with his left hand—from his shoulder. Little Slav almost automatically curls like a pillbug, stubby little tail twirling into his multiple arms. “We talked about that. That’s not nice.”
Little Slav only looks the tiniest bit contrite. Most of him seems more concerned with checking how close to the device they are. “It fell! It tried to kill me! That means it’s dangerous. There’s a chance that it could still be dangerous!”
Little Slav hasn’t quite graduated to estimating by percentages exactly what the danger level is, nor has he rambled about realities—those must be things that he’ll develop later—but he is still a nervous little thing, when his excitement and curiosity don���t get the better of him. Shiro sighs. “Okay. Fine. We’ll leave it for now. But you ask first, next time, got it?”
Slav nods.
Shiro doesn’t expect much to come of it. The next time a distraction comes up, this will happen all over again. They haven’t even had Slav for a full quintent yet and he’s already gotten into more trouble than Shiro thought possible.
He’s already completely disassembled one of Coran’s handheld monitors, a holopad, the spare controller for the Mercury Gameflux II, and the food goo machine. The last had resulted in a complete mess in the kitchen, but when Slav had learned a bath was involved—in water—he’d fled into the Castle’s ventilation system. Then he’d gotten stuck, and squealed until even the mice had complained, and Pidge had been forced to crawl into the ducts to find him and haul him out. Figuring out how to clean the dust and the food goo off of him without submerging him in a tub (or, at his size, a big bowl) of water had been a veritable nightmare, and even cleaning him up with a wet facecloth had resulted in him screeching about everyone trying to drown him for the duration.
Keeping him still would be ideal, but activities that would keep most children occupied for hours don’t seem to interest him. Lance’s idea of hide and seek had turned out to be terrible—Slav had squeezed himself into a cabinet of tools, gotten stuck, and screamed bloody murder until Allura had found the codes to let him out.
“At least he was easy to find?” Lance offers sheepishly. But while not wrong, he’s banned from further babysitting. Which is a pity, because in any other situation, it would be easy to foist off most kids on Lance.
Movies don’t work either. Slav is indifferent to most cartoons, having little interest in animated animals from a planet he doesn’t know anything about, and bored with the songs characters burst into every twenty minutes. When they try other classics, he complains.
“The science is fundamentally unsound,” he squeaks, in the middle of Star Wars. “That doesn’t make sense. Hover technology doesn’t work that way!” He whines and complains through all of it, fidgeting incessantly, until Shiro finally gives up on that route—mostly to save Slav before somebody murders him for insulting a classic.
Coloring works, sort of. They find crayon equivalents in the Castle of Lions, and settle Slav down at a table to play. The crayons are half as big as he is, and take three sets of arms for him to use, but he draws happily, for a little while at least. Until Shiro eventually realizes it’s not a drawing of his favorite animals or people he likes or anything else kids normally draw. Instead it’s a surprisingly technical document detailing the schematics of some sort of machine, measured and labeled in meticulously precise detail.
“I think it would actually work,” Hunk says, bemused, when he sees the drawing. “Although I…don’t actually know what it does.”
“Should we put it on the refrigerator?” Lance asks, scratching his head.
But not even drawing keeps little Slav’s attention for long, and eventually he gets antsy. And starts disappearing on them, when his curiosity gets the better of him—only to come running shortly thereafter, when he realizes whatever he found is actually pretty scary. And considering how tiny he is compared to everything on the Castle of Lions, most things turn out to be pretty scary.
At least Shiro can sort of keep track of him. He’s not sure Slav actually remembers him from Beta Traz, but he does seem to trust Shiro over the others. More importantly, Shiro is the tallest person there. And when Slav gets scared, he climbs the tallest thing, where he’s safe. Which, most of the time, is Shiro, so he’s fairly easy to keep track of.
(A few times it’s not Shiro. It’s shelves, or crates, or on one occasion, one of the Lions. Once he gets up, he can’t get down, not unlike a kitten, and he wails until someone comes to get him down. Shiro’s almost glad it’s him most of the time; it saves everyone the hassle).
Like now. With a sigh, Shiro settles Slav back down on his shoulder, where the little engineer immediately sidles up to his neck again and curls around it as much he’s able. Adult Slav is long enough to curl over Shiro’s shoulders and around his torso like a python, but little Slav can’t even wrap fully around his neck from tip to tail. He’s still shaking a little, which guarantees he’ll stick with Shiro for at least ten doboshes or so. Until he forgets why he was scared and gets distracted, anyway.
Shiro needs to figure out something to keep him from getting distracted. Slav’s so small—annoying as he is, quite a few things on the ship could hurt him, and at some point he’s going to get himself into real trouble. “What do you want to do instead of that?” he asks, as he leaves the project room and closes the door behind him.
(A closed door won’t do all that much, unfortunately, not if Slav really wants to get in. He can squeeze into far too many place for his own good. But Shiro needs to at least make an effort).
“Experiments,” Slav says promptly.
Shiro blinks. “Experiments?”
“For science,” Slav says, and his high pitched little voice seems to get higher with excitement. “You can do all kinds of things with science. But you have to experiment to figure out how to do them.”
“What kind of experiments?” Shiro asks, cautiously.
“Building things!” Slav says. He slithers across to Shiro’s other shoulder in excitement. “Like a machine that can make you invisible. Or like your robot arm!”
Shiro rolls his eyes. Slav’s fascination with his arm has continued even as a child, although Shiro has to admit it probably is pretty cool from a kid’s perspective…provided they aren’t trying to pull it apart to see how it works. Which little Slav had already tried. Twice.
But this could be something he could work with. “Or the thing you drew earlier? What would you need to build things like that?”
“Yes!” Slav rattles off a number of tools and parts excitedly. It doesn’t sound terribly complex, and it might keep him occupied for a little while. Shiro considers, but eventually detours to a different project room. Slav seems curious and seriously ready to clamber down off of Shiro’s shoulders to explore, until a machine in the far corner makes a loud bang, and he presses close to Shiro’s neck again with a screech of surprise.
“It’s okay,” Shiro promises. “And we won’t stay. Just getting your, uh, supplies for your experiment, and then we can go back to the lounge. How does that sound?”
“Acceptable,” little Slav says. “But hurry. There’s a high chance that things get more scary the more we’re here.”
Shiro doesn’t waste any time, mostly because Slav is apt to forget why he’s scared if they stick around long enough for him to get used to the noise, and then Shiro will have to find him again. He grabs a hover tray and a box, and fills it full of tools, screws, interlocking metal pieces, and other bits and bobs when Slav points and says, “That, too!” Once he’s done, he takes the whole mess and pulls it back to the lounge, where he dumps it carefully over a table.
“There,” Shiro says. “Is that enough?”
“Yes!” Slav says. He sounds positively delighted, and swarms down Shiro’s arm like an excitable ferret, diving into the mess of parts. Shiro’s never seen his adult counterpart seem so enthusiastic. Even building the things he’s known for, like his gravity generator, seemed to bring a sense of accomplishment, but never this level of outright wonder. It’s almost endearing—if one can forget Slav’s numerous eccentricities and bad habits.
Shiro is surprised to find his last-ditch effort actually works. Slav seems enormously content working on…whatever it is he’s working on…screwing things together, dragging things around, measuring and reorganizing. On occasion he’ll demand Shiro’s assistance with a wrench that’s too big for him, or instruct Shiro to weld two pieces together with his ‘robot arm,’ which mostly consists of pinching two bits of metal together and lighting up for a few seconds. He’s a bossy little taskmaster, but it’s still infinitely preferable to him disappearing, or getting himself stuck somewhere and screeching until somebody gives him attention.
In the end, two and a half vargas later, he’s built a…a something. Shiro’s not really sure what it is. It resembles the thing Slav had drawn, but like Hunk said, it doesn’t appear to have any practical purpose. It has a few moving parts that click and hum in a not unpleasant way, and it’s maybe as long as Shiro’s forearm, but that’s about all that can be said for it.
Slav seems pleased with his work, though. He preens as he crawls all over it, and gives Shiro a superior look. “It’s complete!” he says excitedly. “My experiment is a success.”
“It’s…very nice,” Shiro says, for lack of anything else to say.
“Because I made it,” Slav says, with his usual lack of tact, only amplified by his much younger age. Then he yawns. Apparently having worn himself out with all his science…ing…he scuttles over to Shiro’s Galra hand on the table, pushes it over so that it faces upward, and curls up in the palm.
“Wait,” Shiro says, “that’s not—“
But it’s useless. Little Slav, worn out by his very exciting day, is already fast asleep in Shiro’s hand.
“That can’t even be comfortable,” Shiro says, mildly exasperated. His hand is metal. Surely Slav would be more comfortable on something softer.
But little Slav seems content enough where he is. Two sets of hands are wrapped around Shiro’s metal thumb, not unlike a child hugging a stuffed animal close. The rest of his little hands curl close to his body. He’s just slightly too big for Shiro’s hand, and his tail and back legs flop awkwardly between Shiro’s other fingers.
It doesn’t look comfortable, but Slav is already snoring, and Shiro doesn’t want to risk waking him now. Little Slav is a terror by himself. A cranky little Slav would be infinitely worse. He supposes Slav can stay put, for now.
…Although that means Shiro is also stuck where he is. If he moves, Slav will surely wake.
He sighs. It’s going to be a long quintent.
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some more questions for you/Jokir
- armor set you find yourself using most often
- favorite follower that is not your spouse
- between you and spouse who (as far as story is concerned) fell for the other first
- first impressions on various guild members (ie mage college, companions, etc...)
- first impressions that the various guild members had for you
- most sad kill
- most satisfying kill
- biggest "oh crap" moment
- favorite guild member for each guild
- least favorite guild member for each guild
Farkas from the Companions of Jorrvaskr
Enthir from College of Winterhold
Syndus from Thieves Guild (kind of)
Gabriella from Dark Brotherhood
Agmaer from Dawnguard
Jorn from Bards College
- armor set you find yourself using most often
I actually changed my armor a lot. Savior's armor probably is the one I wear the most. I also wear Thieves Guild armor and Dark Brotherhood armor when I'm stealing or stabbing.
- favorite follower that is not your spouse
Teldryn has cool personality and is a strong fighter. I also love him doing his eternal flame thingy. It just works.
- between you and spouse who (as far as story is concerned) fell for the other first
I never think of it, but as I can remember I always talked to him until he only answer with "Huh?" "Yes?" AND I'M STILL VERY HAPPY. So yeah. That will be me.
- first impressions on various guild members (ie mage college, companions, etc...)
When I joined the Companions everyone acted like an alpha chad, and I'm just some guy. I was definitely intimidated by them.
I vibed with magic school people so much I don't know why but I love them! Want to make friendship bracelets for college trio.
I think Thieves Guild are shady people squat like slav all day under the sewer.
And I was so surprised by how friendly and not edgy the assassins are. Most of them just sit all day. That's epic.
I only drew the classic four guilds because I can't think of anything fun to draw with Dawnguard and Bards College. They're like: Yeah, you're vampire hunters. Yeah, you're arts college.
- first impressions that the various guild members had for you
I joined most guild at low level so I'm a noob everywhere, but fellow thieves from Thieves Guild is really eager to share their stories with me. I just walked pass them and they'll call for me to talk.
- most sad kill
I first started fighting with magic is accompanied with Erandur. One time we fought a dragon and he moved in front of my ice spike. I reloaded without hesitation. I may be losing my progress but I won't be losing my friend.
- most satisfying kill
I don't think I have done any epic kill before, but one time I killed a spider so fast my hubby Farkas didn't even had time to pull out his sword. I protected him epicly.
- biggest "oh crap" moment
The Season Unending quest was already making me feel horrible and Delphine came and I was like: "Oh no pleas not now."
- favorite guild member for each guild
I don't know why but most of them are minor characters with one line that make me like them more than the others.
Farkas: Big man with big heart.
Enthir: Has cool backstory with Gallus and Karliah. (also I bought a lot of daedric hearts from him)
Syndus: Said the thing.
Gabriella: Like unicorn.
Agmaer: Just some guy try to save the world like me!
Jorn: Plays drum.
- least favorite guild member for each guild
I hope I didn't offended too much people. Most of them are people who are mean to me. My smol heart can't handle people with mean attitude. They scared me. Others just like: meh.
Thank you for sending me these fun ask. Love you~
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