Work Text:
Near the Escape Bay, Pinniped's Lament
“Reyna? Reyna!”
It would be a warm day on Bliss before Reyna Valeria forgot who the owner of the shrieking voice that was assaulting her eardrum.
“Toby…” She said, or at least attempted to. What came out instead was a pained groan. Someone grabbed onto her wrists her and gently pulled her up into a sitting position. When she finally had the strength to open her good eye, the leader of the Rogues was staring up close into the face of one anxious avian. Behind Toby knelt an equally worried Ghalt and Phoebe. Reyna let her head sag forward still exhausted by whatever the hell happened to her.
“Reyna! Are you hurt? Do you need a medic?” Toby started panicking. “We need to get Alani or Miko! Or Kid Ultra! Phoebe, go get-”
The Valkyrie shot forward clamping the avian's break shut with her hand. “Toby! Shut up.”
Reyna let go of Toby just as Miko teleported into the escape bay of the liberated ship. Toby stepped back, looking embarrassed at the ground. Miko's healing beam washed over her and eased her aches and bruises, and soon she was able to sit up unaided. Ghalt helped her get back on her feet but she still leaned into the UPR commander.
“Gauntlet… Eye-patch.”
“I'm sorry my dear. We don’t have it.” And just like that all her aches seemed to disappear. She pushed herself up onto her feet and glared down at the heiress. “Who ….has it?”
“You tell us,” Ghalt declared as he put himself between the two woman, “The last time we had any contact with you was on Bliss. Then you went dark. Next thing we know is that your signal is coming from this ship.”
“I….I,” she clutched her head as a headache began to form. “I can't remember.”
“Reyna, do you know a Thaddeus Wishingbone?”
Reyna shook her head. “Don't sound familiar. But if he's the one who kidnapped me, it looks like we’re going to need to have a little chat.” She ripped a piece of her shirt off and wrapped it over her left eye.
“Now How do we get off this ship.” Before the commander could explain their plan, Reyna caught sight of the escape pods and headed to the room. That was until something grabbed onto her side. She looked down and saw Toby without his helmet sniffling and holding her waist for dear life. “I'm sorry Reyna.” He looked up at her with tears in his big brown eyes. “This mess is all my fault.”
Reyna patted his head. “I highly doubt it Tobes. Unless you sent him to kidnap me.”
The tiny penguin shook his head. “No! Never! But…. I did make it worse.”
“He's kinda right,” Phoebe wilted under the glare. “Thaddeus wanted Berg in return for you. But it didn't go as Toby planned it well.”
“What happened?”
“That idiot megalomaniac stole Berg and is making copies to take over Solus.”
“He took my eye-patch. He took my gauntlet. He made one of my favorite people cry. And he's trying to take over my home. Oh, It’s on.” She pulled out her pistol and shot a few rounds in the wall, smiling as the recoil jerked her hand. At least that stupid seal didn’t leave her totally defenseless. She holstered her weapon and walked towards the escape pods.
She climbed into one just as Ghalt started to yell after her, “You’re not taking the whole fleet without your gear! Especially not while injured.”
Reyna spun around in the tiny vessel and sneered at her teammates as she shut the pod. “Watch me.”
“Reyna get back here!” Ghalt’s cry fell on deaf ears. Yes, she was gauntlet-less but that didn’t mean that she was any less dangerous. Hell, Ghalt could’ve sworn he witnessed her beat a Bonecrusher Thrall with her spiked shoulder guard.
He sent Phoebe back to Nova to try and replicate Reyna’s eye-patch and gauntlet before they began their raid on the next ship in the fleet. But Reyna wasn’t waiting for anyone. She had only one goal: Make that pompous seal rue the day she messed with the Valkyrie. Ghalt almost felt bad for the the minion or thrall that stood in her way.
Almost.
As she watched the fifth fake Berg self-destructing from behind one of the conveniently placed crates, Reyna wondered how far she would be able to push herself. She could feel her body starting to protest and her pain was reaching noticeable levels. Maybe she should fall back and let the others-
“Reyna! Look!” Toby brought the Valkyrie out of her internal strife and motioned towards a small room right before the escape pods. In an unlocked storage room on one of the shelves sat her eyepatch and her command gauntlet. Grinning, Reyna took her equipment and put them on. It was like she had recovered a lost limb. She fired a test overshield at a Ghalt. Ghalt glowed purple and gave the shorter woman a thumbs up and a grin.
“Much better. Now let's get this SOB.”
Reyna sighed as she read the same datapad for the fifth time, trapped in Nova's medical wing. She winced as let the pad drop onto her chest and onto her damaged ribs. The Hoodini perked up for a second but as soon as it saw that Reyna was still in bed, the mechanical bird went right back to sleep. Marquis placed him there after the Rogues’ leader tried to escape the medical wing despite several broken ribs and a possible concussion from "the Rings of DOOOOM". On the other side of the bed Miko left a special mushroom that was attached to her heart monitor would put her to sleep if her heart rate climbed to high or to fast.
But that didn’t matter to her. Her secret was out. Every Battleborn knew that she was a fraud. Whiskey assured her that the Rogues’ didn’t care about that. It wasn’t like she had betrayed them to the Varelsi.
“And so what if your appearance is built upon lies,” Whiskey said as he lit another of Oscar Mike's love letters in the trash can, “I don’t care and neither do the others. All we care about is you getting better because who else is going to organize a shard run? Because it ain’t going to be me. ”
She knew that the tough old clone was just trying to make her feel better but her mind could only replay Toby’s reaction to the truth and all she could remember was seeing the look of disappointment on Toby’s face and to hear it in his voice.
So she threw herself into the final battle with the Lorian’s fake Berg to show him that she would be the leader the Rogues needed. Was it a dumb maneuver? Yes, yes it was. But The Lorian was dead, Berg had been recovered and Reyna was now in Nova’s hospital wing with several broken ribs. Not her most shining moments but what was done, was done.
A cough from the doorway of the room made her lift her head. Toby was in the hallway, holding his helmet.
“Hey Toby. You can come in.” She straightened her legs and waved him over. He waddled into the room.
“Hey Reyna.”
She moved over in the bed and patted the empty space next to her. Toby placed his helmet on the side table and, with a little trouble, got onto the bed. The two of them sat there facing forward, staring at the doorway, waiting for the other to speak.
“Look I'm-” Toby started.
“Listen. I-” Reyna began to explain.
They both stopped, looked at each other and burst out into laughter. The laughing died down and Reyna began to speak once more, “Toby, I wanna say sorry again. For keeping you in the dark about the Lorian. I thought I could handle him. Keep him away from the people I cared about. But it seems it didn’t end that way.”
She winced and touched her side gingerly.
“Does it hurt,” Toby asked, he made sure to stay on his side of the bed.
“Only if I decide to drop another datapad on my stomach. Or if Orendi tries to climb on top of me.”
“I'm s-s-sorry for doubting you,” Toby stuttered, “ I should’ve known you had your reasons for keeping us in the dark.”
“But that’s no way a I'm sorry you almost lost Berg because of me.”
“I'm sorry that I-”
“Are we having a pity competition? Cause I’m pretty sure you’ll win.”
Toby looked over at the injured woman in shock. All her saw was a grin on Reyna’s face before she began laughing again. Toby crossed his flippers and huffed.
Reyna groaned and held her injured side. Who knew a little thing like laughing would cause her so much pain. As soon as he saw the pain in her face, Toby began to worry. “Oh no! Are you okay? Of course you’re not okay. Ahhh! What do I do? I l know! I’ll get Kid Ultra! He’ll know what to do! Don’t you-”
The rest of his sentence was cut off by Reyna holding his beak shut.
“Toby I’m going to let go of your mouth and you need to be quiet. Okay?” Toby nodded as best as he could. Reyna let him go. “I don’t need Ultra okay. Besides it looks like Miko’s little mushroom is kicking in.” True enough the small mushroom was glowing purple sending out a cloud of spores into the room.
“Is that safe? “
“Yeah, it’s fine. It’s only going to knock me out for a few. Don’t let me sleep for too long, ‘kay?”
“O-okay.”
“And Toby, “ the penguin looked down at his fellow yawning Rogue, “I’m sorry you…. almost lost Berg because….of me.”
“It’s okay. Because now you know you have people who you can depend on,” he proclaimed loudly shaking the flipper that wasn’t trapped under Reyna. “And you got me. And there’s nothing we can’t do. Right, Reyna? Reyna?”
The lack of response made Toby glance down to only to see that Reyna had fallen asleep. The avian looked around the room before snuggling close to the sleeping Valkyrie And that was when he heard Reyna’s sleepy reply.
“Right Toblerone.”
(Toby fell asleep only moments later cause spores know no distinction. Pendles took pictures of them sleeping and was about to have Nova distribute them among the Battleborn but Reyna has him destroy them under fear of doing things to him involving a shard and a minion’s severed hand)