Chapter Text
A million thoughts raced through Varian’s head, eclectic and chaotic and frantic and oh so disorganised. He had to keep pushing on, he couldn’t give up, he could still win yet, but Rapunzel was somehow controlling the black rocks and no it wasn’t magic - magic isn’t real. His mecha automaton had been knocked over by the force of the explosion of energy and he had lost his hostages, but he hadn’t lost control of the mech and he sure as hell hadn’t lost his iron resolve.
He had to carry on. He had to make them pay. He had to make his father proud.
With a cry of effort, pushing through the pain of his aching muscles, Varian slammed the gearsticks forwards with far much more force than what was necessary. The air inside the automaton was hot and heavy and stifling, he should’ve installed a better ventilation system but he didn’t have enough time and it was too late now anyway.
As Rapunzel skewered the rest of his automatons on the jagged black rocks, Varian didn’t feel fear. What he was feeling was most certainly not fear, it couldn’t be, because he wasn’t afraid, he couldn't be afraid. He was brave. He had to be brave.
It was an awful sound as Rapunzel tore his mech limb from limb, the screeching groaning of twisting metal, the force rattling the whole machine and shaking him to the bones. A screw came loose somewhere above him and ricochet off of the dashboard in front of him. He grit his teeth. The window was becoming foggy with his ragged breath - from overexertion, not panic. Definitely not panic.
The last leg came off of the automaton and he was jostled around as it span and landed with a heavy sound on the ground, kicking up dust and rock and other debris. A crack began to form in the glass of the window.
Varian’s head slammed against the dashboard, making a sound that did not sound at all healthy and most certainly leaving a quickly developing bruise. He wiped his bloody nose with the back of his gloved hand, only succeeding in smearing it all over his face rather than wiping it away.
He focused intently out of the window, his vision impaired by the fog and large crack in the glass and perhaps his vision was swimming somewhat after his head injury but he was sure his vision would return to normal soon enough.
There she was, Varian could see Rapunzel, hair glowing gold and face determined. He wanted to wipe that expression right off of it. How dare she! How dare she stand her ground and not crumble as she saw the lengths she pushed him to go to!?
The arm of his automaton reached out to grab her. A black rock shot up from the ground below and he lost connection to it. His fists hit the dashboard and he cried out in anger. He couldn't loose! Not now - not ever! He had come so far…
Apparently, immobilising him wasn’t enough for Rapunzel, and Varian braced himself in the split second in which he could feel the rumble of the ground beneath him. Then there was the awful screaming sound of wrenching, twisting, tearing metal, high pitched and grating and oh so close to him.
That split second did not allow him to prepare for what happened as the large, jagged pillar of rock burst through the metal floor beneath him. Nothing could prepare him for it.
For a moment, his eyes screwed tight shut, sweat covering his body and shaking almost feverishly, Varian did not feel a thing. He didn’t feel the couple shards of glass from the broken window that nicked his skin or even the ones that became embedded within it.
He didn’t even feel his arm.
He didn’t feel as his arm was impaled by the rock, right above the elbow. He didn’t feel as the violent rattling knocked him from side to side, pulling his body further away from his arm, pinned in place by the rock stabbing through it. He didn’t feel as fragments of bone shattered in sickening cracking sounds and nauseating wet sounds as this movement pulled his arm from his body and his tendons from bone and muscle from skin.
At first, in that moment, everything was white, all he could do was shut his eyes tight and listen to the creak and rumble as his automaton settled, and the persistent ringing of his ears, and then he could smell salt and copper and some kind of sickly honey sugar sweetness and he opened his eyes and realised it was blood that he could smell and that was all that he could see c oat ing e v e r y t h i n g an d t h en-
Then all that he could feel was pain.
White hot, blistering, searing pain, hotter than the boiling of his anger at Rapunzel. His whole upper arm ached, slow and dull and blunt and he couldn’t feel his lower arm at all. It hurt so much it overstimulated him and looped back so it hardly hurt at all. The adrenaline that was no doubt coursing through his veins and body in a state of shock, numbing the pain.
Nothing was processing.
It took him a second and then he screwed his eyes so tight they hurt but that couldn’t stop his tears, stinging his eyes viciously with salt, his body wracked with sobs and shaking in shock and he felt like he was going to choke as his crying and screaming stole his breath and his nose was blocked with mucus.
Varian had no idea how he hadn’t passed out yet.
There was a sound as the hatch to his control room was unlocked and he was overstimulated - it hurt, the sound hurt his ears and he went to cover them only to find that he only had one arm to do so with anymore. Then this reminded him again of the blinding pain and he just couldn’t think.
He didn’t know what to do if he couldn’t think. Thinking was all that Varian was made of and if he didn’t have that then he didn’t have anything. He was just some ordinary kid without his mind and he had to be anything but ordinary or else he was just a failure.
Varian heard a soft gasp. Even that felt too loud. He thought he was going to throw up as he felt hands on his shoulders. He could hear voices but had no clue what they were saying. He felt a rush of air as someone swung a sword down on the last few bits of muscle and tendon holding his arm together, and then he was being pulled out of the automaton.
He opened his eyes for a moment, it took far more energy that what was in any way reasonable for the simple action.
The look on Rapunzel’s face was amazing. Shocked and pale in a sickly way that made it clear that she was almost going to be sick. Her eyes were wide and lips slightly parted and Varian could see she wanted to look away but just couldn’t tear her eyes away from the disgusting, visceral sight.
And that was enough of a victory for Varian, in that moment. He let out a weak laugh, mouth twisting into some semblance of a tiny smile, and then he let his body faint.