Work Text:
“Nimona, be careful with that!”
“Oh come on, Boss, you can’t show me a shiny thing and expect me not to want to play with it.” Nimona said, admiring the little silver ball-shaped thing in her talons. The game she was currently playing was throwing it up into the air as one creature, and then shifting into another one to catch it. It was a good test of her reflexes.
“Well, it’s technically government property, so please don’t break it.” Ballister chided. “Do you know how much explaining I’ll have to do if Ambrosius finds out you got your hands on it and then destroyed it?”
“What Goldilocks doesn’t know can’t hurt him.” She shrugged, catching it between her squirrel paws before tossing it up again.
“Besides, we don’t know what it does yet. They’ve only just found it in one of the Institute’s old research centers.” Ballister said. “It could be dangerous.”
“I’ll be fine, Boss. I know how to handle weird magic-y science stuff.” Nimona said, but Ballister still looked uncertain. “Dude, you’ll burst a blood vessel with all that worrying. I’ve got things under control!”
Just a moment later, she caught it in her jaws as a dog and felt as a brief wave of electricity rolled over her tongue. She barked out in pain, dropped it, and shifted back to a girl, shaking her head. “Nimona!”
“I’m okay!” She said quickly, popping up to her feet. “It was just the, uh, metal was cold on my tongue. I didn’t expect it.”
Ballister seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. “Good. I was worried for a second.”
“No need to be, I’m all good!”
“Well then, how about you put that back where you found it and get ready for dinner.” Ballister said, turning back to his desk. “Ambrosius should be home soon.”
“Okay!” She cheered, warily scooping up the ball once he wasn’t watching before sprinting back towards Boss and Ambrosius’s bedroom.
—
The next day was the ceremony for Ambrosius’s becoming Captain of the knighthood, and while Nimona still had a certain distaste for knights, she also knew that it’d be much better in Ambrosius’s hands and out of the Insititute’s. Besides, Ballister had said this was like a weird right-of-passage thing in Ambrosius’s family and while Nimona would never understand why people thought being a descendant of her childhood best friend turned enemy was such an important thing, she couldn’t exactly change it without the realm getting even more crazy than it already was after the fall of the Institute. Also, also, Nimona secretly thought Ambrosius would make a pretty okay captain, all things considered. He couldn’t do much worse than the Director, at least.
Nimona sat uncomfortably in the audience as the newly appointed Queen gave a speech about the work Ambrosius had put in and how big of an honor this was. She didn’t like crowds, especially when those crowds were composed of people who would’ve liked to see her head on a pike not that long ago. Which was why she was grateful that Ballister was beside her and not up on stage like Ambrosius had asked him to be. She was also grateful that Ambrosius had been understanding when Ballister said he’d rather be in the audience with Nimona, but that he would be loudly cheering him on from the front row.
Which he was, for the record. He was probably the loudest person in the crowd when the King stepped aside and made way for Ambrosius, which was surprising considering he wasn’t usually the loud type. Ambrosius seemed happy with it though, smiling at the two of them before looking up at the crowd and camera crews.
“Citizens of the realm, thank you so much for joining me here tonight and for your undying support.” Ambrosius smiled, that charming one that most of the realm knew him for, but Nimona couldn’t really see the same knowing how he actually smiled. “I know we as a community have faced a very tumultuous time as of late, and I know how scary it’s been to see change this rapid. We are very lucky to have the smart, good-hearted people we do keeping us together, and I am lucky to be joining that force. I hope that even as we are forced to confront a lot of our past beliefs, you can still find something concrete to believe in, no matter what it is. I believe—”
Nimona was half tuned out for most of the speech, and so it was a bit jarring to hear the background noise suddenly cut out. To hear a loud booming sound erupt from so close to her. She felt her stomach drop as she watched a blast of green energy rip through the air.
The reverent silence of the crowd turned to screaming almost instantaneously, and she couldn’t focus on what was happening as suddenly people were running and swarming and freaking out. She could hear Ballister yelling beside her, looking like he was two seconds away from vaulting himself onto the stage to get to Ambrosius.
Ambrosius, who was no longer standing proudly at the podium. Ambrosius, who she could no longer see. Who had been standing on stage in front of everyone when the blast happened. Who very well could’ve been the target—
Nimona transformed into a wolf before she even knew what she was doing, and she didn’t hesitate to run forwards and jump onto the stage. She bodied past a knight when it seemed like they weren’t going to let her through, and she pushed her way into the crowd surrounding the podium, transforming back into her human form.
She stopped herself short when her eyes caught on the large burn wound spread across Ambrosius’s chest. His eyes were open but unblinking, glassy and hollow. His face was frozen in muted shock. There was a knight nearby yelling for a doctor, but one look and Nimona could tell it was no use.
Ambrosius was dead.
Over the din of the screaming crowd and her own panic, Nimona could vaguely pick out Boss shouting for her and Ambrosius both. He didn’t even know.
Nimona backed up quickly, stumbling away and backing up as far as possible before suddenly the world crashed down on her. Her head was spinning, and everything suddenly felt far away. She could only vaguely register the sensation of falling before everything went black.
—
“Nimona!” Ballister’s voice sounded from behind her, and Nimona’s racing heart didn’t stop for a second. Her tongue felt numb and she stared in shock at the weird metal ball thing sitting on the ground in front of her. Ballister’s metal hand landed on her shoulder. “Nimona, are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“Uh.” Nimona gawked, trying to piece together what was happening. Just a few moments ago, she was standing there watching someone she was only just starting to consider family die, and now she was sat in front of the strange contraption from yesterday. Yesterday. “Wait, what day is it?”
Ballister’s brow furrowed, obviously extremely confused and concerned. “What?”
Nimona shook her head. “Is Ambrosius’s captain thing tomorrow?”
“Yes? Nimona are you alright?”
Nimona, despite being “magic” herself, didn’t fully understand it. She also definitely didn’t understand science all too well. What she did understand was that somehow, in some way, she had traveled back in time. Which meant she might be able to fix things. Nimona stood up quickly, grabbing the ball. “Yep, I’m fine! Hold on, let me put this back!”
Ballister watched in confused silence as she ran away, and Nimona knew that for reasons probably related to the weird magic-science-experiment-ball, she’d been given a second chance. She’d have to make the most of it.
—
Nimona spent the entirety of dinner trying to argue, rather unsuccessfully for the majority of the time, why they absolutely could not go to the captain thing tomorrow. It was only when she made up some lie about her overhearing rebels in the outercity threatening Ambrosius’s life that they finally relented. Even still, they couldn’t get the event to not happen, and all that was promised was an increase in security.
Nimona didn’t think it would be enough, and she was proven right when the green energy blast interrupted Ambrosius’s speech in the exact same place as last time. She didn’t even bother moving this time. She already knew what happened, and she didn’t particularly want to see his body again. Instead she just stood there until, eventually, that overwhelming dizziness came back and swallowed her up.
—
“Nimona!” Third time’s a charm.
“I’m fine!” She said quickly, grabbing the ball. Clearly, she needed a new plan. It was pretty obvious this wasn’t going to end until she got things right. “See you at dinner!”
“Wha—Nimona!”
That time, Nimona transformed into a large bird right before she knew the blast would come, but all that succeeded in doing was getting Ballister to grab and question her seconds before it happened all over again. The next, she’d told Boss to say yes to Ambrosius letting him stand on stage, which got them both hit when he’d tried to save him in a last minute act of ‘bravery.’ Then she asked that she be allowed on stage with them so she could turn into something to block the blast, hoping that being closer to the action would mean not being held back as easily. That time, she returned to the day before sore and with a dull pain in her side.
It seemed like nothing she did was working, and she had lost track of how many times she’d tried and failed to stop it from happening. If she tried to save Ambrosius then she died. If she tried to get him not to go then somehow Boss died in a freak accident. If she did anything that didn’t 100% prevent the green blast from happening then Ambrosius died. Which brought her to her new plan: find out who was firing that blast, and stop them before it could even happen.
After rushing upstairs after the ball fiasco—she was now certain that that was what was causing time to loop all weird—she spent hours and hours searching the internet for any threats or movements against Ambrosius or supporters for the Institute. She’d decided it had to have been done by someone who still subscribed to the Institute’s propaganda. The signature green magic the Director used for weapons was a pretty major calling card, after all.
Eventually, after multiple loops of searching on the internet and sneaking through the palace—because just one didn’t give her enough time—she found what she was looking for. Some crazy knight-in-training who seemed to still trust in and believe all of what the Institute had said. Nimona had found posts online of them hinting that they didn’t agree with society’s acceptance of monsters, or the support of Nimona and Ballister as heroes. And when she’d snuck into the barracks to search their belongings and found a strange looking weapon hidden beneath their bed, Nimona knew she was right.
All it took to get an investigation launched was for Nimona to disguise herself as a guard and inform one of the knights that there was insurrection brewing among the knights-in-training. That she’d overheard talk of mutiny against Gloreth’s descendant and that one had made an off-hand comment about how the Director should have killed him when she had the chance. Every knight-in-training would be questioned and kept from attending the ceremony until their innocence was proven, which meant even if she was wrong about which exact knight it was, there’d be no chance for them to kill.
Nimona was anxious sitting in the crowd as Ambrosius stepped up to the podium. She was sure she’d never been this nervous before. “Citizens of the realm—”
Nimona was too jittery to stay tuned in throughout the speech, but she paid special attention to the part where the blast usually interrupted, and felt herself relax when nothing happened. She did it.
That night, after they’d come home from a celebratory dinner and still no one had died, Nimona had beelined towards Ambrosius and Boss’s room.
She grinned to herself when she saw the metal ball contraption lying broken on the floor. Sparks and wires spilling out. Boss’s voice called out behind her. “Nimona?”
She turned around to look at Ambrosius and Boss, and smiled in a way that was probably at least a little unsettling. Ambrosius seemed to survey the scene for only a few seconds, a suspicious look on his face, before he gasped and rushed over to the remains of the ball. “Nimona, what did you do? You know this was government property! By Gloreth, I told them it wouldn’t be safer at home with me. But does anyone listen to me? Of course not! Goodness, do you know how bad this will look? And on my first day as Captain no le—”
Nimona tackled him with a hug mid-sentence, and he froze immediately. She felt as he hesitantly brought his arms up to complete the hug. The tension seemed to seep out of his shoulders. “Nimona?”
“I’m glad you’re here.” Nimona decided on after a few seconds of hesitation. It wasn’t really what she wanted to say, but it was still the truth. And it was still way mushier than she usually let herself be.
“Oh.” Ambrosius said, clearly taken aback by this sudden and nonsensical display of affection. He was silent for a few seconds before he hugged her a little tighter. “I’m glad you’re here too, Nimona.”
Nimona hopped away from him, smiling. She had no time to react before suddenly Boss was hugging her from behind, blubbering something about how he was so lucky to have both of them. She let him cling to her for about fifteen seconds before transforming into a bird and slipping out of the grasp. She watched as Ballister made Ambrosius his new target, laughing a little bit, before scooping up the metal ball and flying out of the room. Neither of them seemed to notice.
She took it out past the wall and abandoned it in the bottom of some tunneling creature’s hole. She kind of hoped a groundhog would get its grubby little paws on it. Really bring things full circle.
That night, she asked what movies they had about time loops, and then proceeded to confuse them by calling out all the cliches and inaccuracies. She could tell they were both itching to ask how, exactly, she knew so much, but they both seemed to agree on not going down that rabbit hole. Nimona kind of wished they would, though she knew they probably wouldn’t believe her anyway. She was okay with that, as long as nothing like it ever happened again.