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The Antarctic Empire is under attack.
Phil isn’t much concerned. It’s a small city-state rebelling, that’s all. It would be easy enough to crush them, but they’re his people after all. He has to at least try to negotiate.
Which is what the purpose of today’s meeting is.
Phil’s seated on the throne, every fold of his emerald robes draped neat and precise. Wilbur and Techno are sitting beside him- they’re only ten, and Phil wouldn’t have brought them here, but they insisted. And besides, Wilbur is the Crown Prince; he needs the experience.
(not that Phil plans on dying any time soon. actually he probably never will, given that he’s Kristin’s Angel. but still, Wilbur needs the experience.)
The negotiations have been dry and dull, thus far. Honestly, Phil’s bored. He can tell that the twins are, too, though they’re hiding it well. Barely fidgeting.
And then, in an instant, it all goes wrong.
There’s a raw-throated yell. “We will never submit! For Las Nevadas!”
Phil’s on his feet in a second, wings flaring out to try to protect his sons as he searches for the source of the cry-
An explosion rocks the room, and everything goes black for an instant.
Phil coughs up dust. His ears are ringing, and he shakes his head. His left wing flares with pain when he tries to fold them back.
“Techno?” Wilbur whimpers.
Phil shakes the strange emptiness from his ears, blinks to reset his vision. Voices clamor around him, nobles and visitors, friend and foe. Phil ignores them, searching for his sons, dread growing in his stomach at the sight of the rubble on the dais-
No.
NO!
Wilbur’s kneeling over his twin, shaking his arm. Phil looks at Techno and nearly vomits.
He’s seen death, he’s seen this before, but nothing can soften the sight of his son lying with his skull half caved in, blood pooling on the ground.
“Wake up.” Wilbur’s whimpering is a small, pathetic sound. “Techno, wake up. Wake up-”
Phil can’t breathe. He can’t breathe.
He pulls Wilbur off of Techno’s body, covering the older twin’s eyes with one hand. Wilbur goes feral, squirming and screaming in his arms.
“NO! Techno! Tech, wake up, wake UP-”
Death is a harsh, complicated, unforgiving thing. Phil has tried to prepare his boys for this, but he never could bring himself to tell them what, exactly, it might look like.
“He’s not sleeping, Wil,” Phil manages. His unbroken wing unfurls, brushing over Techno. Hiding him, sheltering him.
It’s too late for that.
“Dad, Daddy, please, fix it.” Wilbur wails, small fists pounding against Phil’s chest. “Make him better, Daddy.”
He can’t. Gods he wants to but it’s too late. Techno’s dead, he’s dead, he’s gone-
No.
Phil’s died before, more times than he can count. He’s married to Lady Death Herself, for gods’ sake. Wilbur and Techno are Her sons, Her babies.
“I’m going to try,” Phil whispers, throat aching as he speaks words to give Wilbur hope when he barely has any himself. “I promise.”
Wilbur goes limp in his arms. Phil shifts, adjusting his grip on his son.
“Wilbur,” he says, forcing the words out. “I need you to do something for me.”
His boy (his brave, brave little boy) blinks up at him, choking out an answer through his sobs. “Yes, Daddy?”
Phil shrugs off his outer robe. Tucks Wilbur under his broken wing, ignoring the sharp pain. “Stay there. Just for a bit, little one. Keep your eyes closed.”
Small hands curl into his feathers, and Wilbur nods.
Phil tries not to look too closely as he lifts Techno in careful hands, wrapping him in the emerald green robe (quickly staining red, and that’s his baby’s blood-). He’s so small. So small.
The chapel, Phil needs to get him to the chapel. He needs to pray. He needs to speak to his wife.
He shifts Techno’s body in his arms, carefully nudging Wilbur with his wing. “Hold onto me,” Phil says.
“Where are we going?” Wilbur blinks up at him, brown eyes tearful.
“We’re going to go talk to your mother,” Phil says, because that’s the easiest explanation his grief- and terror-addled brain can find.
“But you said we couldn’t hear her anymore.” Wilbur comes along beside him anyway.
Phil picks his way through the rubble. No one approaches him; he supposes that if he could see himself, he would do the same.
“No, we can’t. But She can hear us.” Phil glances at his precious burden, already beginning to plead with Kristin. Save him, please.
The chapel is silent and cold. Phil kneels, lowering Techno’s body carefully to rest on Death’s altar. Then he takes a few seconds to extricate Wilbur from his broken wing, look him over.
He is, miraculously, unhurt.
Phil presses a kiss to Wilbur’s forehead and turns back to rest his folded hands on the cold stone, bending over the body of his ten-year-old son.
Techno’s dead, he’s dead-
“Daddy?” Wilbur whispers. “Should I talk to Mom now?”
Phil sucks in an aching breath. “Yes, Wil,” he manages, struggling to do anything other than think Kristin, please, heal him. Send him home.
Wilbur kneels beside him, clasped hands resting on the edge of the stone. “Hi, Mumza,” he says quietly. “Dad says you can hear me, even if I can’t see you.”
Please, my Lady. Save him.
“Techno’s really hurt right now. But you can make him better, right?”
Please. Please, I’ll do anything you ask, if you just give him back to me.
“Please make him better, Mummy.”
Kristin, if you can hear me, please, give me a sign. Please save our son.
~~~
All Techno can see is red, red, red.
He hurts. Everything hurts, but especially his head. He reaches his hand up, and his fingers come away sticky, stained with more red.
He’s scared.
The last thing he remembers is a loud sound like an explosion, and then his head hurt, and now he’s here where everything is red, red, red.
“Dad?” he whispers.
There’s no answer, save for the murmur of distant Voices.
They’re getting louder, moving closer, and Techno feels tiny and scared. He curls up on himself, trying to pretend it doesn’t hurt, and makes himself as small as he can.
Maybe, if he’s small and still and quiet, the Voices won’t find him-
“Techno.”
He looks up, looks around for Her. “Mom?”
“I’m here.” She sounds far away, and he can’t see Her. “I’m going to help you, darling, but I’m having a hard time finding you. Just try to be patient.”
The Voices are getting louder, and Techno whimpers. “It’s so loud.”
She doesn’t answer, and he curls his arms tighter. “Mom?” he asks again.
“What do you see, darling? Tell me what you see.”
“It’s red,” Techno whispers, shaky. “It’s all red.”
There’s a sound like breath being pulled in. “Do you trust me, Techno?”
He nods, not knowing if She can see him.
“I know where you are now. You’re going to be all right. My brother is going to save you.”
The Voices grow louder, and he whines, tucking his hands over his head. “Who is He?”
Fingers brush his head, his mother’s hand, he thinks, though he can’t see Her.
“The Blood God,” She whispers. “I’m sorry, darling. But you are going to be alive. Remember that.”
Techno’s scared, he’s so scared.
The Voices cry for blood.
~~~
It feels like days that Phil kneels there. Wilbur’s gone silent, slumped against his side in sleep.
“Please,” Phil whispers aloud. “Send him back. Let him live.”
His voice is hoarse from how long he’s been praying. He can’t pull his gaze away from the motionless form shrouded in his robes.
That’s his baby lying there, dead.
Phil’s grieved before, many times over the long centuries of his life. It is a fact of life that Philza loves people, and that they die. He’s Death’s Angel; he’s blessed (cursed?) with life unending. Others are not.
But this pain is far, far worse. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to live like this. How he can even be asked to entertain the thought of having to live without his son.
Techno is ten years old. He’s so young, he’s barely had the chance to live, and here he is lying, dead, on Lady Death’s altar.
“Please,” Phil sobs, laying his head down on the slab. “Kristin, please, I can’t live without him.”
He feels the brush of familiar magic on his wing, the broken bone snapping back into place, and he flinches. The next light touch comes as a whisper in his ears, two words forming in perfect clarity despite the pain of a stilled heart.
“I’m sorry.”
Phil’s breath catches, hands seizing on the edge of the slab as his heart beats again.
No, no, She can’t mean-
Kristin, he thinks, a desperate prayer, please.
The first harsh inhale has his heart leaping, fingers scrambling to tear the cloth away from Techno’s face. Praying, pleading, let him be all right-
The bloodied side of his head shimmers with magic, Kristin’s purple mixed with blazing red.
Phil only has an instant to wonder about the unfamiliar color when Techno surges upright, dark eyes overtaken with red and his mouth open in a bloodthirsty snarl.
Phil barely manages to snap one wing around Wilbur in time to stop Techno from grabbing him. Small hands twist into feathers instead, yanking hard. Phil’s vision whites out with pain for a second before he manages to grab Techno’s hands and pry them away.
Techno screams and struggles, snaps his teeth at Phil’s throat. Phil spins him around, pinning his son’s squirming body against his own chest.
He’s seen this before, a few times in his long long life. As he is the Angel of Death, Her chosen vassel, so too has he met the Chosen of the Blood God. Phil knows the bloodwrath, the way a red mist descends upon His servants and they are driven to kill and maim and bleed.
He recognizes it now, in his own son, and he grieves all over again.
Wilbur’s pulling at Phil’s feathers now, not hard enough to hurt, but he keeps the wing wrapped tightly around the older twin. If Techno gets free, he could hurt Wilbur in the haze and not even know it, and Phil can’t risk that.
“Come back, Tech,” he says, keeping his arms wrapped tight. Fingernails gouge bloody streaks in his arm, and tears burn Phil’s eyes for a completely different reason. “Come back, baby, come back. You can do it.”
“Daddy?” Wilbur’s voice is teary, muffled by Phil’s feathers.
He keeps the wing pulled tight, keeps Wilbur hidden. “Stay quiet, Wil,” he snaps, and Wilbur stills, huddling into silken feathers.
It feels like an age passes while Techno snaps and snarls and claws Phil’s arms. Phil just holds him. Repeats the same words, over and over again.
“You can come back, Tech, you can do it. I’ve got you. Come back, come back, come back-”
Techno’s screams die down, his struggles slow. Phil doesn’t shift his grip until his son goes limp against him, breathing harsh and painful-sounding.
Then, Phil dares to move one hand, just enough to tip Techno’s head back. To see his eyes their normal dark purplish-blue.
Phil lets out a long exhale. “Can you hear me, Techno?” he asks, throat tight.
His baby blinks, a whimper escaping his raw throat. “Dad.”
Phil breathes easily again, keeping Techno’s head tilted back against him. “Oh, thank the gods. Thank you, Kristin.”
Wilbur’s still pulling at his wing, and Phil lets it unfold. Wilbur scrambles around in front of him, grabbing at Techno.
Phil seizes his hand. “Careful, Wil.”
“Dad,” Techno whines again. “Hur’s.”
“I know, baby. I know.” Phil shifts Techno into a more comfortable position in his lap, grip more comforting than restricting now. “I have you. You’re-” The word sticks in his throat- he can’t tell Techno he’s okay, because he’s not and likely won’t be for a very long time. “I’m here. It’s going to be all right.”
Techno whimpers, turning his face into Phil’s shirt. “They’re so loud.”
The Blood God’s Voices, that call for blood and death and destruction. Silent tears slip down Phil’s face as he rocks Techno gently.
“I know, Tech. I’m so sorry.”
Another whisper of magic, stopping his heart for a few precious seconds. “I couldn’t stop Him, Philza. I tried.”
He closes his eyes, sending back what words he can as the pain fades. It isn’t your fault. And Techno’s alive.
He’s alive. That’s what matters, it has to be.
Techno’s sobbing now, clinging to his father’s shirt. “I’m scared, Daddy. Make it stop, make it stop-”
“I can’t.” Phil aches. He wants to. “I would if I could, Techno. I can’t. I’m sorry.”
He sobs harder, shoving his face into Phil’s shirt. Wilbur crawls into Phil’s lap beside his twin, wrapping his arm around Techno.
“You’re bleeding, Daddy,” Wilbur whispers.
Phil glances at his arms, the blood congealing on the nail gouges. “I’m okay, Wil.”
He has to be. Techno is going to need all his father’s strength.