Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The chilled air forced Sorcus awake, leaving a shiver down his spine as he sat up. The hard metal surface he was lying on sapping his body heat. Eyes snapped open at that fact, with steel walls and harsh white lights being the things to greet him first.

“Fuck…” Sorcus grumbled, rubbing his eyes trying to adjust to the overwhelming lights. What the hell happened? The last thing he remembered was… trolling? Maybe? He was busy throwing bombs around and when he looked down he saw that one had gotten a little too close and then there was a bright flash and-

Shit.

He got blown up by a stray bomb.

A loud sigh escaped him as he started stretching, waking up his body from well, kinda death. The feeling wasn’t exactly new to him but it wasn’t a welcome one, it always made him feel stiff and made it hard to stand still for long periods. Maybe he should ask around to see if anyone knew a good way to avoid the feeling, outside of drugs or something similar.

Looking around the place finally, he could see that the walls were barren and grey with tinted windows along the top of the far wall from him and a secure looking door off to his left. Standing up felt… easier than it should have been. His legs moved more smoothly than they normally did but he could've just been unconscious for a few more days than usual. Nothing big. But what if he didn't?- Nope! He won’t be entertaining that thought right now!

Looking around his surroundings got him the same result, with the only things in the room looking to be the metal table he woke up on, his clothes, and himself.

Wait… his clothes???

His eyes snapped down to his legs, expecting the worst, but somehow, seeing dragon legs instead of his regular ones were infinitely better than he could explain with words.

“Holy shit.” he mumbled out. Staggering backwards only to gain a new sense of shock as he realized way, way too much of his body looked to be made out of scales rather than skin.

He would’ve started spiralling with feelings he just couldn’t name if the screeching of an intercom didn’t spook him as much as it did. Man this room is way too fucking quiet…

“Sorcus! Welcome back to the living!” The voice boomed out, “Now, we know that you're probably disoriented right now because you’re used to the whole ‘admins respawn’ thing, but the fact that you’re up and moving right now is proof that our idea worked out!” Sorcus scratched his head, the voice sounding familiar to him but not seeing the face to it really messing with him.

“And the idea was…?” He questioned.

“The idea that’ll help other robloxians! I know you signed that contract a few months ago that said, in the event that you die, we’d be allowed to take your body and experiment on it so that the ability to respawn infinitely becomes accessible to the everyday person!”

They were right about that unfortunately if his hazy memory about that whole interaction had anything to say about that, but they’re neglecting one major drawback.

“And it was intentional to make my body dragonlike?”

“Ah- ummm, no, it wasn’t sir. We didn’t intend for that part, but we think that if you respawned as you normally would, you would return to your normal self immediately.” Sorcus caught that ‘hopefully’ mumbled, but he couldn’t help but realize that it came from another voice.

“Anyways! How do you feel right now?”

“I’m fine, outside of wanting maybe some of my dignity and balls back maybe? Other than those though, I think I can continue just fine for now.” He joked as he dressed himself, realizing that digitigrade legs and a tail really don’t help with putting on pants. “I’ll just ask Dusekkar if there's a spell he could whip up to hide the lizard bits or something.”

“Oh… wanting to… leave already?”

“I mean yeah, assuming you got all your testing and shit done already while I was unconscious, I got things I want to do and people to fuck with soooo…”

“I'm sorry but… we can’t just… let you go.”

“What.”

Somehow that… pissed him off. By a whole lot more than it probably should have.

“We umm.. We want to observe you while you’re awake! Just to make sure that there aren't more uhhh… side effects.” Sorcus couldn’t help but catch the hesitation and.. Fear? In their voice.

But someone yelled something out behind them that the microphone just barely catched. Something like, ‘He’s up!’ but hearing the name Stickmasterluke somehow caused him to be even more pissed off.

“Why the fuck did I hear Luke’s name?”

“How did… Sorcus, see? You’re hearing things! All the more reason to hold you for a little longer!”

“You fucking told me that I was the only admin offered this, just incase it didn’t pan out as expected, someone who currently works for Roblox wouldn’t get hurt.” They specifically said that to him. He’s a former admin who dies repeatedly so that would mean him disappearing for a bit wouldn’t be that uncommon and even expected. But an active admin?! What the fuck are they thinking?!

“Sorcus, please. Calm down. Luke is fine, we don’t know what you heard but-”

“BULLSHIT.” He roared, this feeling like the most rage he’s felt in his life, but another feeling accompanied him. One he just couldn’t name.

One that had a grin tear its way onto his face.

“Don’t know what the fuck you're doing, but by 2x2 I’m not letting it happen.”

He pounced towards the tinted glass and just as he was about to break through… it all went black for him.

Chapter Text

Builderman

The bunker door swung open, letting out a thunk that rang out for a minute when it slammed down onto the concrete, echoing off of the towering worn concrete buildings that made up the alley way. Builderman stared off into the darkness that laid inside it, the blueprints of the layout filling his vision as the doubt began crawling back up into his mind as it had been the whole time he’s been searching.

Thoughts of if none of them were strong enough or if he just didn’t get there in time or if they were changed or if they were- Return to HQ. It isn’t safe out in the public for the foreseeable future. The thought barged into his mind like the unwanted intruder it has been for the weeks he’s been looking. The command almost caused him to close the file of the blueprints again and make him lose it to the sea of projects stored in his mind. His low grumble about it almost being blown away as the night breeze picked up down the alley way.

A brief glance up to the stars rewarded him with glimpses of silhouettes wandering among them, the occasional bursts of color being the only other indicator they were up there. “Guess it’s time for me to head in ‘fore Dusek comes and picks me up himself.” He mumbled out loud as his gaze returned to the void-like darkness before him.

Resolutely, he walked down into it, the unnatural light blue glow from his eyes being the only light source in sight down there. He could feel the pressure down the stairs increase as the wind was cut off fully, like the magics themselves couldn’t handle… whatever is down here. He observed as his position on the map slowly reached the bottom of the stairs after almost 3 minutes of walking.

There should be a light switch right about… here. He let out a little hum as he flicked the switch on, the light above him slowly flickering on as the electricity hummed lowly. The now illuminated room looked like it had seen better days, the floor looking like someone just clawed out of it and the walls were weirdly deformed at about the top portion of it, with its own accompanying claw marks, them being larger than the ones on the ground. The three hallways connected to the room didn’t look much better, as there were a few knocked over carts, destroyed tubing, and the distinct scraping of the bottom of a bucket on the top of one. He saw more blood than he would expect to be in a supposed lab facility on the ground, albeit there only being minor amounts of sprayed around.

A slam at the top of the stairs made him jump, the sudden lack of any natural light causing unease to build up in him as the glance up the stairs showed that he was essentially trapped now. He would sigh, trying to maintain his resolve and not thinking about freaking out about how none of the admins know about where he exactly is and that he’s about as off the grid he can reasonably get. Clutching his lightly shaking hands he’d walk over to the hallway that looked the worse out of the three.

The scraping on the ceiling had gaps as it went down the hallway, pieces of bright red fur clung to the walls, almost making the scene before him almost look worse than it actually is, he took a small tuft off the wall and inspected it. Analyzing it didn’t take long, as a simple algorithm was able to bring him to the closest match of it that he knew, and the person was, Doombringer? What’s he doing here? He’s supposed to be in the Banlands dealing with some of the more rowdy rulebreakers this month. The minor warping of the walls makes sense to him now though, If Doom was stuck as the minotaur then it’s reasonable that he’s forcing the world to accommodate him. The whole room appeared empty aside from the few notable things, I guess it’s about time I started heading farther in.

An almost deafening screech for the size of the room was the only warning he got as something pounced on him.

A mouth clamped down on his arm, hitting the metal that lay below his skin. The sudden pain was almost blinding as he smelt his own flesh burning almost as soon as whatever it was put its hand on his shoulder. He thrashed around as soon as his mind caught up to the situation trying to get whatever had latched onto him off but it refused, clamping down harder and tugging his arm away from him.

He pulled his arm back with all of his will and strength that he could conjure, trying to stomp on its feet to try and catch it off guard, but the more he struggled the deeper it bit, the harder it pulled. He could practically hear the fans in his body pick up speed by the second, as his mind was riddled with warnings of a limb becoming compromised until it just-

Ripped. 

His body slammed off to his left, causing him to go straight towards the wall and hit his head, barely being able to comprehend what just happened as he felt his arm spasm just before it was cut off from his connection. The deafening sounds of his own fans overtook his hearing as he raised a shaky hand to his left arm. All he felt was the bloody exposed wound of the torn flesh that remained on his body.

Shakily he stole a look down at what jumped at him and the sight is even worse than what he pictured. Stickmasterluke? Luke did… this? The dread crawled up his throat as one of the current admins stayed crouched in front of him snarling and tearing into his arm, Luke, one of the admins that had missing for about a month now sat right in front of him and looked almost unrecognizable if it weren’t for his, now bloodied, antlers and dominus. His wings laid limply behind them almost as if he barely had enough strength to try and raise them up in hostility. The monstrous teeth on his face gnashed as he ate the flesh straight off of the arm, coating his face in what looks like even more blood.

Luke glanced up for a second, that finally spooked Builderman out of his minor trance as the pain from the flesh finally died down to a dull throbbing. Taking this opportunity of distraction, Builderman took off running down the dark hallway, trying his best to stop the bleeding from the wound to prevent Luke from being able to follow his blood trail if he finds any kind of safety.  

The hallway was indescribably empty as he ran, the only things adorning the walls being tubes and piping, the occasional sign and arrow, and more frequent claw marks on the walls. He could feel his systems overheating as he continued running, currently running blindly through the corridors trying to find any sort of doorway he could dart into and hope Luke isn’t nearby.

The sudden opening of a door and the light from inside flooding out blinded him for a moment, preventing him from seeing who opened the door, and he was immediately dragged into the room, with the accompanying slam as the heavy metal door was pushed closed. The second slam was Luke running straight into the door, causing him to let out a yelp as he scratched uselessly at the outside of the door.

Shedletsky

He sighed as the faint scratching slowly grew quiet. Luke has probably walked away by now, meaning that they’re safe for now for as long as Doom doesn’t get any ideas. He looks back up from where he’s standing by the door and gets the confirmation that he wished didn’t. Maybe this is the chance to take Shedletsky. No, it’s not, and it never will be for as long as we’re trapped down here. Builderman struggled to sit up, Shedletsky could see how he tried to move an arm that was no longer there.

“You… Alright?” Shedletsky asked kind of dumbly, knowing the answer well before Builderman could even say it. His wing covers his chest before Builderman has the chance to see it. Fighting the urge to not inhale was hurting way more than it should.

“I just got my arm bitten off Shed. And it was by Luke of all people too, I’d always thought yer’ more likely to go mad like that.” He replied with the usual relatively flat tone. “Now, do you have bandages here or something? I’d rather not become pruny”

“Heh, yeah you’re right there. I think Sorcus found a few first aid kits a while ago.” Shedletsky redirected Builderman’s attention towards the now waking Sorcus. He’d slide around, taking care to make sure Builderman didn’t see his back. Of course you distract him to the Liar. Telamon can’t believe this is what you do at the most opportune time. Telamon is complaining about not being allowed to kill a friend, prevented by the oh so horrible Shedletsky who doesn’t like bad things happening to him or people he cares about.

“Builderman? What are you doing down here? Who let you go out and find us?” Sorcus half mumbled out as Builderman walked over to him.

“No one, gave myself the command.” he stated proudly, “Now if I could have gauze?”

Sorcus stretched with a yawn, him tossing over a first aid kit from his inventory, “Yeah sure. Go knock yourself out Builderman.”

The conversation really does die quickly with those two Shedletsky supposed. He rarely ever saw them talk when Sorcus still worked there, the most conversation between them probably being short e-mail chains only about work and Builderman’s occasional scolding of Sorcus’ trolling habits. 

“You need help with applying it Builder?” Shedletsky walked towards Builderman after getting to the opposite end of the room.

“If you could.” Builderman said, taking the gauze out.

“That was a genuine question though Builderman. How did you find us?” Sorcus spoke up after watching the two for a bit. The curiosity almost dripped from his voice.

“More guessing than I’d like to admit,” The roll ended, causing him to pull out another one, “It’s mostly compiling of the pieces that the other admins found and my own investigations into the places you were before here, minus the Banlands, that would just be asking to be killed.”

“You’re pretty much already doing that just by being here.” Shedletsky mumbled.

“What was that Shed?” Builderman looked at the bird-man with suspicion, Sorcus glared at him briefly.

“It was nothing Builder.” Shedletsky gave his most reassuring smile he could muster.

“Anyways, Sorcus, could you explain the… whole lower half of your body?” Builderman looked away from Shedletsky, looking at Sorcus’ legs, them definitely being more dragon-like than the last time he probably saw him.

“Oh yeah. That. I kind of just, woke up like this? Not sure how to explain it.” Sorcus scratched the back of his neck. “Did you happen to find a map of the building when you were looking or are we all still going blind through this?”

Builderman winced for a second as Shedletsky pulled the bandage tight, “Well I… did…” his eyes narrowed in thought, eyes darting around as he looked at files Shedletsky guessed. “... And I lost the file…”

Sorcus groaned, “Well that’s just great. Did you at least map your path when running?”

“And I was supposed to think that before or after I was literally pounced on?” Builderman almost growled out, with the neutrality leaving his voice.

“Can we not fight right now? We still have to find a way out and I would rather that we haven’t ripped each other to shreds.” Shedletsky huffed out, his feathers puffing up in annoyance.

“Fine.” The two also huff out, the annoyance thick for Sorcus and coldness for Builderman.

Shedletsky took in a deep breath and let out an equally deep sigh, he looked over to the monitor in the room. He was glad the power was still somewhat active, it was essentially the only reason why he could save Builderman. Telamon knows that you can feel that too, that he has the strongest connection out of all of us here, that if someone did something They would come in seconds. And that's not something that he’ll be testing anytime soon, not confirming any thoughts of someone with bad intentions.

Currently the display showed that outside the door was perfectly clear, the only visuals in the camera feed being the dark empty halls and the sensors perfectly clear. “We should head out now, only a matter of time before Doom smells Builder’s blood and goes to investigate it.”

“Good call.” Sorcus stated as he stored the sleeping bag he was using earlier, “We should head left this time, don’t need to continue walking in a circle.”

“Are you sure? Everytime we go left I think we’re just getting farther and farther from where we need to go.” Shedletsky worries his hands with the wing that’s covering his chest.

“You have been saying that for the past 20 lefts we’ve taken Letsky. We can’t always go forward or right, sometimes we just have to take the left.” Sorcus stated as he heaved the door open just enough for the three of them to get through.

Shedletsky sighed. “That’s true.”

The three trailed out of the room, Builderman ending up in the lead with his robotic advantage of better night vision working out for him. Shedletsky ended up at the back, with the dim light from his halo still doing nothing for lighting, looking at the same dark corridors that are unfortunately becoming more familiar the longer he stays down here. God, this place is more restrictive than it ever should be, can’t even stretch.

Another for the worryingly short list of reasonable thoughts Telamon has had in here. However, Shedletsky has to disagree with the thought that there’s not enough room, the ceiling is a good 4 to 5 feet above him and he’s the tallest in the group.

A snort gets his attention as they pass a cross section. Shedletsky looks down at it, vaguely making out a large… shape? Looks very animal-like to him. Drawn out scraping is the second sound to reach his ears. The third sound being the voice of Builderman with the sound of dawning horror.

“Doombringer?”

Doombringer charged forward wildly, letting out a shout of rage as he did. Shedletsky jumped backwards, forgetting for a moment to hide the gaping hole in his chest. He could see that Builderman and Sorcus had dived forward, and then Doombringer slammed into the wall, letting out another yell as he struggled to wiggle himself free. Shedletsky couldn’t see a safe way around Doombringer that didn’t risk him either getting stomped or kicked.

“I’ll meet up with you two in a bit! I’ll go around, just RUN!” Shedletsky yelled out, Sorcus quickly listening to run while Builderman hesitated, “That was a command Builder!” He put more force behind that than he feels he should have but it works. Builderman ran away without fully realizing yet that his choice had been overwritten for a moment.

Shedletsky turned around quickly, seeing that Doombringer was beginning to wiggle free from the wall. He turned down the first corridor he came upon, continuing to run at full pace when he knew that he should be out of breath, that he’s missing necessary fatigue that comes with running with full force.

Only when the air finally stills is when Shedletsky slows down to a walk, letting out a heavy sigh as the worry of getting crushed by hooves becomes the worry of another time again. Taking care to not make a 3rd left, he continued forward, keeping his ears open as well he can and the dim glow from the halo being the only thing comforting right now. Telamon was worryingly quiet, not even uttering a word as he walked.

Shuffling caused him to pause. Slowly he turned around and he helplessly watched as Luke was in the air above him, having pounced with his mouth wide open, eyes the tiniest of white dots as he reached forward with his hands lit ablaze.

The final thing he hears from Telamon fills his ears, Behind. 

Builderman

He ran, ran as fast as he could, trailing behind Sorcus and leaving the angered grunting and growling of Doombringer behind as they ran away. This whole situation has been overwhelming from the moment he was pounced on. The biggest thing has been learning about the current status of Sorcus and Shedletsky. For Shedletsky, he looked terrible, blood was caked into his feathers and he was extremely defensive about his chest, he even covered half of his face with a wing, by 2x2 he could only hope that what he couldn’t see wasn’t worse than what he could just see. Sorcus looked better than Shedletsky but only by a margin, the horns on his head looked like they more than doubled and everything below his elbows were entirely different, orange and yellow scales of the dragon-like body that replaced his legs and forearms were marred by circular scars in the middle of each limb. Even his face was altered, having a darker air to it than he ever expected.

They both dipped through a door that led into a relatively large storage room. “We should be safe here for a bit.” Builderman said as he began grabbing heavy boxes and moving them to stack them in front of the door, just in case Luke decides to come in for whatever reason.

“Yeah, safe.” Sorcus was distracted, more distant than he should be in this situation. Builderman could see that he had focused his attention on something he didn’t see. It looked like there was something he was holding in his hands that Builderman just couldn’t see.

“Sorcus, c’mon, help me out here these boxes can’t move by themselves” Builderman heaved up another box, securing one side of the doors. Hopefully Shed is ok… He doesn’t get it, he could’ve helped, yes he’s not sure how exactly he could’ve exactly made a difference but he knew that he could’ve done something, but he can’t change the fact that the command to run away already did what it wanted him to do. He knew it would be way too dangerous to run back out, who knew how close Doombringer was, but that doesn’t change that Shedletsky was still in danger. “Hey Sorcus, I think I know how to-”

An axe came straight down where his head was before he turned around to look at Sorcus, and as he looked at him, Builderman saw the manic look in Sorcus’ eyes, the simple face on the cloth covering his real one wore a sadistic grin that quickly turned to a scowl as he looked Builderman in the eyes. Sorcus growled as he reeled back the axe again but Builderman snapped himself out of the shock quickly. Builderman pushed Sorcus backwards, causing him to stumble and growl again as he regained his footing. Builderman darted out, knocking over a few of the stacked boxes towards Sorcus as he ran.

Damnit! Does everyone here have the goal to kill me?!

Shedletsky

Luke’s hands grasped around Shedletsky’s shoulders as he pushed him down. Luke would rear up, jaw opened wide to bite Shedletsky’s face off. Before his mouth could get close as Shedletsky’s wing would push him off, using the full force of his strength at the moment. Using the momentum he’d roll over to his side and stand up quickly.

The searing pain from the fires dulling as the adrenaline finally started kicking in, he’d look over at Luke who was also quick to get on his feet. Luke let out a low rumbling as he readied himself to attack again. Shedletsky raised up his fists and puffed out his feathers, trying to ignore the desperate flight in him and the antagonizing voice of Telamon to fight.

“Only one of us will walk away intact Luke.” Shedletsky stated, steadying himself for the fight.

Luke would roar, charging forward with his head low, and the moment he got close enough to Shedletsky he’d swing his head to try and hit Shedletsky with the pointy side of his antlers. Shedletsky catches them, feeling the force Luke had behind them as a few points dug into his hands, drawing blood. Luke bent down further, biting down into Shedletsky’s leg. That drew out a shout from him, he tried to recoil from it and ended up releasing Luke’s head, Luke immediately took advantage of his heads freedom and let go the leg, going and rearing his head back to the other side and slammed the antlers straight into Shedletsky’s side, causing him to choke, coughing up blood as he staggered to the side.

Shedletsky’s vision started going dark, he could barely stand up straight. He looked over to Luke and he could’ve sworn he could see Luke smiling from under his hood. Luke reeled back his fist aimed straight for Shedletsky’s face. He wasn’t going down without getting at least one hit. He knew that much. The moment Luke was in range he uppercut Luke, getting hit by Luke’s fist at the same time.

Shedletsky’s vision blacked out, he could feel himself hitting the ground and the exhaustion was overwhelming. He hoped his passing out here wouldn’t be the last time he did. These hopes would go unfounded, as Luke stood above his body, rubbing his chin with a laugh almost bubbling to his throat.