Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Two shifting eyes stared into his soul with the air of someone moving through a flea market. Picking things up and setting them down. Exploring hopes and dreams and failures and pain- more pain than any child should have to carry. They nudged at fragile emotions that seemed ready to shatter like the thinnest ice, boxes full of regret half packed in the corners of his mind as he collected more and more hurts and worries. 

They understand now. They had been dormant for centuries until Lucas shared his heart with them. They understand how this boy came to them and how he was shaped into the champion who pulled the final needle.

And now, with his help, they were awake. Now they had work to do, with the bleeding heart of that champion being both the blueprint of this new design of the world and as the cost of it. Already paid for so dearly.

The cost was heavy. The loss. It felt like a physical weight to them, and as always it was a surprise how much humans felt, how deeply, how earth shatteringly. And while even a speck of their power could lift it, bend it, cure it- they simply sat with it and him, because it was not their burden to ease. To erase his pain would be to disrespect his journey to them and how he became the incredible human that they will rebuild with.

Lucas stands in grass, an afternoon sun warming his back and a soft breeze tussling his hair. He stares at his family’s cabin, listens to the sheep outside and the chirp of birds and a dog barking in the distance. In his mind and his heart he knows that this is a memory, a memory from before this place started to feel hollow and broken. He can smell fresh bread baking. He can hear laughter. He wants.

A massive shadow looms over him. The dragon's head is the size of a mountain. He looks up, and they look back.

Lucas. We cannot unmake the past that shaped us, that crushed the islands in our chests to dust and regret. We can only take the fragile present and nurture it like a loving mother would, and eventually we may someday find ourselves in our future, whole.

But I want, Lucas told them. Another powerful human emotion. They come and they go like waves. But these waves are as errant as the sea in a storm. And want is a bigger, messier emotion than most.

But is it wise to take, they ask? Other humans have taken so much already.

But they took first, he cries, fat tears running down his face and his heart and his soul. The logic of a confused child, a lost child, a child, a child, a child. 

They took it from me first, he cries. Can’t I have it back now? Now that I’m finished?

Please, he cries.

You will always take more than you know. That is the human in you. 

I just got him back, he cries.

But you, Lucas, know how to give.

Please, he cries. Please.

Everything you need is within you, they say. 

Purple eyes slowly blink at him. A claw the size of a cliff reaches, the tip settling oh so carefully onto his small chest. 

He is afraid, but not of them.

We will begin.

Lucas opens his eyes and the cave is shaking terribly. The rock and crystal make an ear-splitting symphony of threats from every direction, all around. His friends are coming to, fear on their faces. Boney whines. His father has tears in his eyes, his lost boy in his arms, and all he can do is stare at Lucas with fierce pride as he finally steps away, the pin in hand. 

He examines the pin.

Lucas doesn’t want his fathers pride anymore. 

He drops the pin to the ground, his foot kicking it as he staggers forward.

“We- we have to get out of here,” Duster’s faint voice behind him. He coughs and it sounds wet. “The entire place- cavin’ in— Gotta get you to safety, Lucas-“

He doesn’t want Duster’s safety, his strong arms in a hug, not right now.

He walks past Kuma, who grabs weakly at his ankle. His stride doesn’t falter. He doesn’t need her strength and her ferocity right now.

His mind is white noise and static. He knows what’s going on around him but he doesn’t care. He knows he won’t be hurt.

He has everything he needs. He has everything he needs and it surges in his chest like fire. 

Lucas’ eyes are glazed over as he takes the Franklin Badge off his shirt and chucks it. He doesn’t listen for where it lands. He doesn’t make eye contact with his father when he stands in front of him, won’t acknowledge the tears brimming in his eyes. He has everything he needs.

He reaches and his small arms wrap around Claus, his brother growing cold without him. He hunches around him as he settles the weight into his lap. Muffled voices are around him. A hand settles on his shoulder and he twists to avoid it, clutching his brother to his chest and kicking his feet at the slippery stone beneath him to get away from everyone else.

We have to go!

We have to run, now, kid, everything’s falling apart-

“Everything is beginning.” Lucas replies, his voice toneless as he brushes a hand down his brother’s face. Claus always had more freckles than Lucas. His eyes were always greyer. They crinkled at the corners when he grinned, and he always grinned- full of light, never any reservation, never any holding back.

Lucas wanted.

Lucas wouldn’t hold back.

He clutches his brothers shoulders in both hands and stares into his ashen face.

Later, Lucas, later!

Another hand tries to grab him, but they retreat just as quickly with a shout when they come away burnt and sparking.

I won’t leave him here-

None of us are leaving him here, you geezer!

Lucas takes one shuddering breath and sighs it out. The pressure is building behind his eyes as tears spill down his face. Everything he needs is within him. Everything he needs is right here in front of him. 

It’s a scream that originates from a sob. It reverberates throughout the cavern, ripping from his throat. New shock lines scour the walls in bright bursts of white light. He’s only adding to the danger. Lucas and Claus are enveloped in lightning and wind and chaos and love, love, love, love, love.

The light goes out. The sparks die down. 

Please come back. Please don’t go. Not again.

He isn’t awake anymore when the claws jut up through the earth around the platform. He doesn’t scream in terror with the rest of them when eight massive, sharp, onyx pillars surround the group. They curve at the top and close them in.

There’s barely half a second to see the head ascending through cascades of rock and mineral and earthquake. Bright eyes in the darkness make the purples and reds and the blues in the chasms shine like diamonds before they’re all fully enclosed in the dragon’s careful grip, hearing the awful sound of stone and crystal break and shatter and suffocate around them.

They ascend.

Chapter Text

Lucas didn’t know whether or not it was always a part of the village or if it came about in the last few years along with the pigmasks, but the rumor mill was alive and well during the Tazmily rebuilding. Walking into the town’s bakery-turned-community-ration-center, Lucas heard an unfamiliar voice.

“I don’t like the look of that boy these days.”

A woman at the counter he’d never met, likely an old pigmask. There were a fair number of people that needed their own space in Tazmily. Their new homes were being built by Isaac and Lighter- they were comfortingly rustic compared to the order and sterility the town now carried. 

He was reminded of his father’s cabin, still perfectly in one piece despite the chasms and sinkholes that tear the land apart even now. Sometimes they still feel tremors underneath their feet as the earth settles and gets used to the new order of things, just like they do.

“He’s had a hard go of it.” Caroline says to her, clearing her throat as Lucas walks into the bakery. She smiles at him uncertainly, her eyes sliding past him to look out the window. He figured he knew who she was looking for.  

“A lot of us have.” The woman retorts, “You’ve seen it, though. He’s just got this.. dark look in his eyes.” Her eyes swing over to him, widen in recognition, and she takes that moment as a good sign to stop talking.

“Can I get you something, sweetheart?” Caroline asks Lucas, giving him a tired smile when she finally looks back to him. “Need anything for the family?”

“No..” He tries to keep his voice above a mumble. “Just wanted to see if you had any fresh nut bread left.”

Caroline’s smile is a little brighter at the request. She ducks behind the counter and immediately starts wrapping up a loaf. “It’s nice to see you, Lucas. Don’t be a stranger.”

“Thanks, Caroline,” He grabs the parcel she hands him and gives her a small little nod, eye contact included, and then quickly ducks out the door. 

Lucas takes a deep breath and walks down the street, making a hard left and walking through the town square. As the hub of a very disjointed community and one of the few places spared from earth’s shifting crust, it very quickly fell into organized chaos filled with stalls and work stations and supplies. It looks nothing like the picture perfect plaza it had under Porky’s reign. 

It’s impossible to avoid being called to or greeted out in the open like this, by Tazmily villagers and strangers alike. He is loved, after what he did. 

The feeling slips off of him like water on a goose. 

He smiles nervously as he ducks his head and doesn’t stop walking. He only feels like he can breathe again when he finally gets outside the town’s limits and greenery takes over the area. 

He starts passing trees, waiting patiently as he walks, and a few minutes later footsteps finally fall into place behind him. Lucas splits the loaf of bread in two and looks over his shoulder to offer half to Claus.

The redhead accepts it, blinking hard gray eyes at his brother. “Don’t trip.” He says, biting into the bread with an eagerness that betrays him. Claus likes eating- apparently he didn’t have to, before.

Lucas turns his attention around just in time to step over a tree root in their path. 

“I wasn’t gonna trip.” He says under his breath. He thinks Claus is amused. Just a little. It’s hard to tell, because Claus’ expression really never seemed to change. But just like when Kumatora’s nearby, Lucas’ PSI senses Claus’, right on the edge of his consciousness. 

However, this connection feels much, much closer than Kumatora’s PSI ever did. They can share things, he and Claus. There’s some level of telekinesis between them. Lucas thinks they both know why. Neither of them mind. They don’t talk about it.

They don’t talk about a lot of things. They don’t always have to.

The trip - while once, years ago, would’ve been filled with chatter - is now left in companionable silence. They do this, now. They go out and explore- Claus much more than him, he knows, but it’s another thing left unspoken. Lucas doesn’t always know where he goes. On days like this, when they walk together, Lucas usually just brings him back to old stomping grounds of their childhood and the places his journey took him. 

Today, however, Claus seems to be the one doing the leading.

They come to stand on a shore, staring at the center of the lake they used to swim in as kids. The water is still full of unrest. A cliff had risen behind it, and now there was a waterfall and foliage spilling over. 

His eyes are drawn to it almost immediately. A large, shiny metal orb hangs suspended there, wrapped in nature and vines and everything Porky tried to burn.

They stand in silence. They watch it sway gently in the breeze.

“I thought he disappeared.” In the cave, miles below the surface, nobody had thought to care for or look for Porky. In all of their minds, he was a thing of the past that they were trying to move on from.

Claus doesn’t respond. Something brews beneath the surface. 

A thing of the past in all of their minds, except maybe Claus’.

“It could be an act of mercy.” Lucas says uncertainly, breaking the silence again. “I don’t know. I guess it’s a nice enough view.”

Claus stays silent, his hands curling into fists. Nails dig into his palms.

“Maybe it’s a punishment.” Lucas continues, “Letting him watch the rest of the world go by and grow and get better without him. Poetic justice, Duster says.”

“Good.” Claus replies, his voice tight, “Let him rot in there.” 

He takes a step forward, his eyes seeing nothing but the orb. Lucas watches. “If I could, I would break that thing like an egg and kill him myself.” His chin raises, an ugly sneer on his face. “If I still had my wings, I’d go spit on the little freak.”

It was the most Claus had said all week. Lucas felt tired.

“What’s the point?” Lucas asks, looking at how the nature around it was slowly growing and taking over. Nothing else needed to be done, in his opinion. Porky had given himself a punishment Lucas couldn’t begin to imagine, and he couldn’t hurt anyone else. 

Lucas didn’t need to hurt anyone else. It was a nice thought. “It’s over, Claus.”

“What’s the point?” Claus’ voice sounded like a branch breaking. “What’s the point ?” 

Lucas looked over in surprise to a brother equally surprised, eyes intent on his face and looking , looking for something. But for once, they couldn’t tell what was on the others’ mind. Claus’ fists begin to tremble.

“You don’t get it.” Claus accused in an empty voice, monotone but shaking. “You’re too good to get it. You’re just so good .” The way he said it, it didn’t sound like a positive or a negative, but it was something he was upset about.

“I’m- I’m not-“ He was good. He was. That was why he pulled the needle and that was how he saved the islands. But that wasn’t all he was.

Lucas stared at his brother in despair, wondering how to tell him how he became so good. They locked eyes and Lucas wanted him to know . All the terror and anxiety, all the constant tears, all the fights and all the bullies, everything seeming to stand in his way and tower over him. 

But there’s the journey to good, and then there’s the journey to nothing. There’s terror and anxiety, there’s pain and there’s metal and there’s being called ‘it’ and a ‘toy’ and a ‘robot’, and then there’s… there’s nothing.  

Lucas lurched at the intensity of what they both shared. Claus’ connection, he was wrapped up in the flood of messages and emotions, but then it was suddenly cut off. Claus breathed in, out. 

“I want to rip him apart.” Claus said, his voice low and shaking. “I come here every night after dad nods off and think about finally breaking through the metal and tearing him limb from limb.

“I think of all the things I would say, all the terrible things I would say to him, all the things I wished I could say to him when I was just a thing to him.” The words feel pushed now, intense, and Claus can’t look at him anymore. “They would scare you and mom and dad. They would disappoint you.

“And I think about killing him. I think about killing him all the time. But he’s right out of reach.” Claus’ eyes drift back to the sphere, and they’re full of pitch black hate. And no matter how hard Claus clamps down on his telekinesis, some of it slips through and he feels it. The deep, black maw of unending malice surrounding so much pain.

“Claus..” Lucas whispers, tears brimming in his eyes.

“I don’t want poetic justice, Lucas.” Claus replies, his voice cracked and hollow, “I want the kind of justice where I have my fingers around his neck, me , the thing he taught how to kill , the thing he ruined getting the last laugh.”

“Y - you aren’t..” Claus’ head twitched to the side so he wouldn’t have to look at Lucas, unwilling to tolerate the mercy or pity. Lucas fell quiet, scrubbing tears from his eyes with the callous heels of his palms. “..would it make you feel better?”

“I don’t know if anything can make me feel better.” Claus admitted in a moment of clear honesty, “But I know it would feel right .”

Lucas can’t say anything to that. All he can do is step up and stand by his brother, and eventually work up the courage to press their shoulders together.