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Sweat pooled at the back of Molotov’s neck. One thing they certainly didn’t miss about Banland was the sweltering heat. The entire complex was carved out of blackstone, so the volcano’s heat just rose up from under the floor and turned the interior into a glorified oven.
But, from what they remember, it wasn’t as bad back when they were on the other side of the bars. Those summer days when they’d walk down these hallways with a checklist, making sure all the prisoners were in their cells, with an alarm strapped to their belt in case of emergencies.
If nothing else, they were sure nobody else had a summer job quite like theirs. In fact, nobody has probably even had a life anything close to theirs. The circumstances of their childhood were just too odd for it to have been anything other than an original experience.
A semi-deity growing up in a loving two-parent household? Unheard of. For starters here was their father, whom they called ‘baba’ for most of their childhood. Known as the big, scary son of Windforce, the tyrant, uncaring demigod that ruled over Banland and laughed as he plunged criminals into the lava below.
He wasn’t really like that. Molotov doesn’t think he ever was. Maybe he was a little eccentric, maybe he was kind of rude and egotistical. But he cared. He cared so very much. He cared about his job, about the everyday inphernals that his police force and prison protected. He cared enough about them to keep doing his job, even when they hated him in return.
Molotov remembers the days, when they were practically newlyspawned, when their baba used to run over and squeeze them in his arms every time he got back home from work. When he used to throw them over their shoulder and demand they tell him verbally that they loved him back. And they did, of course, because why wouldn’t they?
Their baba taught them how to play the electric guitar. He was the one who showed them all his favourite heavy metal bands. He was the reason they became so, frankly, alternative and ‘punk rock’ or whatever. Because their other parent, their dad, would always be ripping his ears off whenever he played it in the car.
And speaking of their dad, they were honestly always closer to him. He was a mortal. A snarky mortal with a seemingly magical ability to say the funniest thing possible, while also not understanding why what he said was funny. Their dad was more serious than their baba, he was more focused. He was blunt, but never in a cruel way. In the way that he never stopped complaining, and his complaining never stopped being amusing.
Because their dad was so gentle and loving and warm with them. They remember being curled up by his side on the couch, staying up late every Sunday night to watch the animal documentaries on TV. And he would drape a blanket over their shoulder, and mumble fun facts about whatever creature was being broadcasted.
Their dad wasn’t known for saying much. He was actually very quiet with the vast majority of people. Yet somehow, despite this fact, he seemed to know every single trick in the book for staying calm. Plant your feet firmly on the ground, take deep breaths, adjust your posture and wait for the serenity– or, at least the facade of it– to wash over you.
He always pushed them to be better than what they thought they could be, he encouraged them to study as hard as they could. And every good grade got stuck to the fridge, and every award that they earned was kept, tucked in a drawer in alphabetical order for him to go admire at any given time.
Their dad gifted them with their love of books, their love of nature. Whenever they came home with tears in their eyes because they got a bad grade, or they were picked on for being related to their baba’s divine family, it was always their dad that was there. Open arms, no judgement. Just quiet comfort and reassurances that it didn’t matter, that everything would be just fine.
Both of their parents loved each other, too. They bickered like an old couple, sure, but when it really came down to it they were always there for each other. Arguments were settled pretty quickly, there was always a safe place to go, there was always warm food on the table. Their life was so easy.
Molotov’s reminiscing is interrupted as a guard banged on the bars, ripping their attention away. “You’re going in for questioning.” The guard explained as she began unlocking the door. “Don’t try anything.”
Making a bolt for it wouldn’t get them anywhere. Even if they got past all the guards, they’d either have to swim all the way back to Crossroads or run down the busy highway. That, or they’d forget their way around and end up burning to death in lava.
They knew they had to get out, find a way to get back to their friends back in Playground before any Banland guards sell this story to the press and everyone finds out who they really are. But that’s all assuming that the warden manages to recognise his own daughter after they’d been missing for six years.
Keeping their head down, Molotov didn’t struggle as the guard led them through the halls in Banland. They could tell prisoners were glaring at them as they walked by, ascending up a few flights of stairs to reach interrogation rooms.
They’d actually never been in this part of the complex before. Their baba took a million precautions when they were working as an intern here, including completely forbidding them from entering most sections of the prison.
The guard pushed them into one of the rooms and gestured for them to take a seat, before securing their handcuffs to the table and making her exit. And Molotov, alone with their thoughts once again, continued to reminisce.
The good times in their childhood were often outshined by the bad. Despite their attempts to shield Molotov from it, the hate that was building against the Swords still crept into their life. While in school, everybody knew who their father was, and all of those kids’ parents taught them how to hate before they taught them how to walk.
They didn’t hit them. Their cruelties were silent. Never wanting to pair up with them for projects. Always scooting the chair as far away as possible when they sat next to them. As a child, they didn’t understand why everyone seemed so afraid or disgusted by the thought of being their friend. But by the time they were in high school, they understood.
They understood that being related to the deities was a crime worse than murder. Because surely, the cruel acts of their grandma and great-uncles defined who they were for the entirety of their life. Just another stuck-up deity that views mortals as dirt under their shoe. And being related to Firebrand surely meant that they supported the scorch. And being related to Windforce meant they supported throwing newspawns off of cliffs. And being divine meant that they were supposed to be somebody crueler than what they were.
Not that anybody would ever believe that Molotov was different from them. Nor, would anybody believe that their father wasn’t the exactly raging tyrant he so foolishly claimed to be.
It was lonely. Too mortal for the divine. Too divine for the mortals.
But at least they had their parents. Well, they had their dad. Their baba, especially in the years before they ran away, was extremely busy. He had to manage Banlands as a prison, supervise all the police forces and deal with the public treating him like he was a clueless nepo-baby that was the cause of all of their problems. He was never home because he was trying to convince the press that he can both love his family and not agree with all of their actions, that there was a yin to their yang.
Their dad was a teacher at their school. He taught physics and biology, but thankfully, they never had him as a teacher. When he could, he tried to stand up for them, encouraging students to pair up with them. But nobody really listened to him. Despite the fact that Molotov and thier father shared quite a few features, and often spoke during school hours, it seemed that practically nobody figured out that they were related. Molotov remembers feeling glad for that. Because students were far more likely to respect him if they didn’t know who he was married to.
Every day, Molotov found themselves feeling like a sheep in wolf’s clothing. But the clothing wasn’t to scare others away, it was instead sewed into their skin like an inescapable warning sign. They were too scary to interact with, they thought. The very few that didn’t hate them were too terrified to speak to them.
After the school day was finally over, they’d sit in their father’s office and study until he got off work and they could go home. Their father only had one eye, so he couldn’t drive. So instead, they caught the bus together. They never spoke much on the ride home. It was so silent that some people might have mistaken the two of them for being complete strangers. But Molotov didn’t mind. They never minded sitting in silence, especially with someone they loved so much.
Or maybe they had just grown too used to the silence.
But once they walked through the front door of their home and kicked their shoes off at the door, Molotov would flop down on their bed and feel exhausted. Like they had any right to feel exhausted at that age. Life was so goddamn easy. And still, Molotov still found a way to feel tired after each day.
They’d then sit up in their room, which was covered wall-to-wall in posters from bands they liked, and do homework or practice on their guitar until their baba came home and made dinner.
They had one of those families where everyone had to gather at the table for each meal, but not the kind that holds hands and thanks the deities before each meal. In fact, despite their baba’s divine heritage, Molotov fails to think of a single time where their family prayed or asked for blessings or gave thanks. If there wasn’t already enough proof that the deities don’t care anymore, Molotov thought that was pretty solid evidence.
And it was always their baba doing the talking while they ate. That man could talk for years and his tongue would never grow tired. Although, in the later years of Molotov living with their parents, they couldn’t help but notice how he got quieter as time went on. With each day that trudged past he got more and more tired when he finally came home. Their dad comforted him, but never when Molotov was close enough to hear any of their conversation.
Molotov was pulled from their thoughts as the door clicked from behind them, the metal clattering as the door creaked open, before being promptly slammed shut. Heavy footsteps pounded their way over to the other side of the integration table. Covered head to toe in thick armor, the warden’s looming figure slumped down into the seat opposite them.
And for the first time in just over six years, Molotov made eye contact with their ‘baba.’
His face was serious. So serious in fact that it nearly knocked Molotov off their guard. His eyebrows were deeply furrowed, his nose slightly scrunched, all four of his eyes staring down at them like a hawk catching a glimpse of its prey. It was in this split moment that Molotov was finally able to see why people used to assume their baba was so cruel. The inphernal sitting in front of them now, was quite a far stretch to how their baba remained in their memory.
He tossed a file onto the table between them, it smacked loudly against the table as his muscles tensed under his armor. A storm of furious emotions seemed to be crashing down like lightning in his head, flashes of his pain occasionally glinting through his sharp, dark eyes.
They watched in real time as he looked them up and down, and then up and down once more. He examined their horns that faded from a dark navy at the base up to a baby blue where they tapered off and curled slightly outwards. They observed as he noticed the fact that they had Medkit’s eyes and nose, that under all that heavy gothic makeup was somebody he used to toss over his shoulder and giggle with.
His bearded jaw dropped slightly open as his eyes widened, before quickly furrowing his gaze once again. Molotov remembered him being quite easy to read, but that seemed to have changed since they last saw him. Thick, scarred fingertips scratched against the table as he stared forward at his child.
“I thought-...” He trailed off, his body finally relaxing as he turned into something a little more like what they remembered him as. “I thought they were bluffin’. Or maybe just mistaken, at the very least.” His deep, gruff voice was nearly shaking. It was a weird thing to hear.
Molotov stared forwards at him. They kept their face stoic and blank, something that they had accidentally learned from their dad. A good poker face is the starting gate to being a brilliant liar. It makes all the dark shadows of your life so much easier to hide. All those traitorous feelings, much easier to ignore.
“Batty.” He called, like that was their name. They hadn’t gone by that in a very long time, they hadn’t heard anyone actually call them that in an even longer time. “Don’t just fuckin’ stare at me like that. Say something. You made it all the goddamn way back here, talk to me!”
As a prisoner, that was probably an order. But as his daughter, it sounded more like a plea. Someone as powerful as the warden begging for anything sounded more than completely ridiculous. He could have practically anything he wanted, and yet he still looked at them like the only thing he wanted was to turn back time and drown himself in the past.
“That’s not my name.” Was the reply they chose. “That hasn’t been my name for a long time.” With their free hand, they dragged the file on the table closer. He didn’t even seem to notice, his gaze still busy with looking at Molotov like they were a puddle of spilt milk. “See? Not my name.” They opened the file and pointed to the top part, where their name was printed.
Banhammer, warden of banland and a child of a deity, had an expression so sour that it nearly broke Molotov’s facade. “Well that’s what we called you, wasn’t it? Your full gear was such a tonguetwister.” He trailed off with a scoff, eyes squinting at Molotov like he just couldn’t believe it. “I don’t know who you think you’ve become, but I’m not calling you that bullshit name.”
Maybe that stung a little, but Molotov knew it wasn’t worth the risk to let it show on their face. They just clicked their tongue and continued to speak. “Then call me Battle Bottle. Full gear name, or Molotov. I’m not going to cooperate if you treat me like a newspawn.”
And Molotov watched as his nose scrunched up, because he was probably still thinking of them as his little spawnling or whatever. He was still under the false notion that ‘Batty’ still existed somewhere in their heart. That name, that little snot of a child, was practically dead and buried. They had no doubt that he mourned them, but Molotov didn’t feel like digging up corpses to appease his sentimentality.
Molotov was the survivor that rose from their ashes, somebody capable enough to survive outside of the world Batty knew. The world of comfort, the world of petty arguments and living in blissful ignorance, a life of what was, quite frankly, more privileged than they probably deserved.
“Fine.” He growled, ripping the file back and opening it. He was biting his tongue, swallowing his words. It was so unlike him but, then again, they had never seen him this desperate before. “You’re in a… Playground street gang? The Ivory thorns?” He scoffed, his lips pulling up his cheeks into a forced grin of disbelief as he laughed dryly. “What kind of name is that?”
Tapping their black-painted fingernails against the table, Molotov shrugged. “I’m not the one who named it. And don’t pretend like I don’t have a solid case. There’s no jurisdiction in Playground, which is where all my ‘crimes’ took place. Unless I bother ol’ grandma enough to make her want to punish me, my work, and my life, is none of your business.” Their voice remained as stoic as their face.
A pause filled the air as Banhammer continued to read through the file, occasionally sighing and shaking his head like a disappointed parent. Although, that comparison may not have been the best one, considering that’s exactly what he was. “I’m not putting you in prison, Battle Bottle. I would never be able to live with myself if I did.” He grumbled softly. The name he called them felt weird to both of their ears, but Molotov wasn’t going to waste hope on him agreeing to any other compromise.
A slit eyebrow raised as they rose from their seat. “So I’m free to go? I’m glad we agree on something for once.” They raised their hand which was cuffed to the table, and shook it to rattle the cuffs. They way they looked at him, expectant and also completely uncaring, seemed to shake him a little, and anger him a little more.
“Sit back down.” He ordered gruffly, raising from his seat with hands tensed into fists. The grip he held was so tight, that Molotov could see his knuckles going pale and the veins popping in his wrist. “What makes you think you can just get up and leave? It’s been six fucking years since I last saw you. For the swords’ sake, we didn’t raise you like this!”
If you asked Molotov how they felt in that moment, they would deny that they were scared in the slightest, but when the warden glared at them like that, they were suddenly able to feel the humid air sticking to their skin, and the bones underneath their skin digging into the uncomfortable chair beneath him. They expected him to be angry, but still, seeing him like this was more than a little intimidating.
But maybe it had just been too long. Maybe Molotov’s gift for reading their parents' emotions had faded over their absence.
His hulking figure loomed over as he stood in front of them, daring them to keep the fierce eye contact between them. And then, it was possible, for just a split second, that the fear and worry embedded in their soul seeped out into their physical body, in just a brief softening of their gaze as they looked up at him.
Molotov wasn’t sure what they were expecting. Him to shout, maybe? To leave the room and hiss air through his teeth until he had calmed down enough to not destroy the furniture, perhaps? But they certainly weren’t expecting how he suddenly grabbed at their shoulders, crouching down to be eye level.
“Stay.” He begged through clenched teeth. His grip was tight, tight like he simply couldn’t bear to let go. Still, that desperate, almost wild look in his four eyes remained. But it was no longer intimidating, it was vulnerable, deeply vulnerable. “Come live with me, I’ll wipe all of this away. A clean slate, a restart on your adult life. You can start again. We can try again.”
Molotov could only assume that was meant to be an apology. An apology for all the times he wasn’t there, an apology for burying himself in responsibilities when Molotov needed him the most, an apology for all the times he and them would scream at each other, completely failing to see anything close to eye-to-eye.
They furrowed their eyebrows. Not soft. Not vulnerable. And certainly not forgiving. “There is no we, warden. I’ve chosen my own family, far, far away from here, and it will never include you. Never again. The thing about the past is that it’s always already gone. It’s gone, and only idiots think they can somehow have it back.” Maybe their tone was a little too snappy, but their blood was boiling with offense.
It was clear that those words left deep cuts on Banhammer’s heart, his fingertips trembled and his nose wrinkled once again. “Fine! Maybe not me. But what about him? We might have been the dysfunctional part of this family, but there was always him to glue us back together. Do it for him!” He was shouting now.
They can’t help but bite their lip, suppressing all the mighty and awful words they so desperately wish to say. They force the mostly stoic mask back on and take a single deep breath, grounding their feet against the floor while they straighten their posture. “Banhammer, I have no parents.” The insults they wished to scream were nearly dribbling out of their mouth, but they knew those four, simple words would hurt him more than any of them..
And if there was even a chance that all of Molotov’s prodding left him unphased, that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. He bit his lip, gripping tightening on their shoulders before letting go. He was too calm to actually be calm. He paced the room for a second, and a strange shiver ran up Molotov’s spine.
Their baba’s body was nowhere near as thick and plump as it used to be. He was always pretty muscular, but now he had lost that silly dad bod that they always remembered him having. Now, his muscles were obvious even through his armor, his face was so much darker and worn, his hands seemed even more calloused. He was undeniably scary.
Sinking back in the seat a little bit, Molotov froze when the warden ended his pacing, his face sunken with a fury that threatened to burst out from his eyes. “I get that I’ve caused you problems. I get that you don’t like the divine side of your family. But he was mortal. He was mortal and he died trying to keep you safe.” His fingers clenched into a fist again, knuckles cracking louder than faint bubbles of lava from outside the building. “But still, you--...”
The way he trailed off nearly made Molotov want to reply. They wanted to admit that they missed their dad so much that they couldn’t watch a nature documentary without getting teary-eyed. But then they remembered that they didn’t owe him anything, and he especially didn’t deserve to be trusted with their emotions and thoughts. He wouldn’t get it anyways. He wouldn’t understand why they had built a separate identity around being naturally spawned, nor why they liked that ego better.
“–.. You still deny him? Like he never even existed?” That look was something between disgust, disbelief and fear, which was odd, because Molotov would never imagine that they looked particularly threatening in that moment. But maybe he was just afraid that Molotov was simply a lost cause, ruined and unfixable forever. That would be helpful. It would make it much easier for him to lose hope in whatever ‘rehabilitation’ he wanted to subject them to until they conformed to what the world expected them to be.
Molotov shrugged. “I don’t think about it much. Any of it. Not you, not him, and certainly not what happened.” Maybe that was a little too obvious of a lie, but their face was so straight that they were fairly convinced he would believe it. “You would think I’d care, but I don’t.”
Apathy was such an easy emotion to fake, because any time somebody mentioned something you didn’t want to hear, there was always an easy exit available. You can just say ‘I don’t care,’ and everything that makes you uncomfortable goes away. You can’t force me to do anything, because I just don’t care. I won’t change, because I don’t want to change, because I just don’t care. It wasn’t true, and it meant that most arguments Molotov had ended up with the other person fuming in frustration, but all those silly secrets that would ruin everything Molotov built for themself? Those would stay perfectly protected.
The truth is, Molotov cared about a lot of things, they cared about pretty much everything. Justice, politics, equity, others’ feelings, their own feelings, and believe it or not, they cared about their biological family too. But the only thing that came from being near their baba was fighting and negligence, and an invisible barrier that stopped either of them from opening up. It was the way the two of them had been for a long time.
It started about a week before their dad died. They were tired of Banhammer treating his family as secondary to his work, and tried to fight against him, which didn’t go over too well– their baba was never a big fan of criticism. Maybe he was just stressed from all the publicity, but still, it really pissed Molotov off. It always had. Ever since then, especially after the loss of their shared mediator, it just got worse and worse until Molotov couldn’t take it anymore, and ran.
Whenever their baba did try to reach out, which was certainly not very often, he was horrible at it. He could only really think about himself and their dad, like Molotov’s perspective was too foreign and out of reach for him to begin to comprehend. Maybe them running away was a little extreme, but they don’t regret it. They’re happy. They have friends who love them, despite their flaws, and people who they trust enough to speak to vulnerably.
It didn’t matter what the warden did. Molotov wasn’t going to forgive him for abandoning their emotions like that.
Speaking of the warden, he had muttered something that Molotov couldn’t understand, and then left the room. They could hear him vaguely in the hallway. They silently hoped they didn’t make him cry. Molotov still cared, they just needed him to understand that his little ‘Batty’ was never coming back.
They’ve moved on from the past, and things got better. He just needed to do that too. Especially considering he’s immortal, he was going to have to get used to letting things go. He had to let them go, because they didn’t want to come back. It was better for both of them to be apart. They were sure of it.
Completely and utterly sure. Not even a single doubt. This was the right thing to do. They wouldn’t give up. They were going to push and shove and make sure that Banhammer thought that they were really as disgusting as they seemed.
Until he looked down at them, and didn’t feel pity, or guilt, or whatever form of grief was making him continue to cling to hope, and instead, he’d just feel nothing. If they could, they would erase his memory, so that their childhood never crept back up into their adult life ever again, to the point where not a single living soul remembers the useless snot that they used to be.
They would push him away until he gave in, until he gave up.
And then, he’d one day move on. And be happier, with a new family. One that wasn’t just a bunch of loose pieces of shattered glass, with the frame missing forever.