Jack had left the apartment early that day, entrusting that Jade would be fine by himself. The Raven had yet to emerge from his quarters and Jack was confident that he would be back by the afternoon. With Pepper at his side, the mechanical feline trotted happily, traversing with the dragon as he always did. An endless companion for a timeless creature, handcrafted by Darnath himself, Jack was rarely without Pepper in some form or another. Hells, even a feline who greeted Jade with happy meows, unwavered at the heat the man produced.
Outland was the journey's destination, an old outpost where Ethereals liked to still trade. While Darnath may have been excelling in prosthetics and bringing life into mechanical companions, Jack's tricks stayed closer to his branded 'Ethtech', engineering by Ethereals that he had studied for years before even meeting those in his life today.
The day had been filled with trading and tinkering, gathering the supplies he needed before he was off to Pandaria with Pepper still in tow to head to the Timeless Isle once more. A few weeks there was a mere few hours in the rest of the world, and it would give the dragon time to relax and work quietly by himself.
Each little piece and part was spread out in a familiar cave he and the raven had spent their time in together and one by one, each gear and gadget was placed together, building the perfect shape of something spectacular. Hands became greasy and worn as he worked feverishly for weeks.
Pepper often slept and relaxed nearby, once in a while playing with gears and rivets that rolled around. Jack had begun to wonder if that's what Dar or even Dicenne felt like while working and Jack entertained himself in their workspaces. Such brought a small smile to his face.
Memories flooded his brain during work, some things that he hadn't thought of in a long time, some that he was still angry about, and some that still brought a tint of red to his cheeks even then. He wondered how his friends were doing, those he hadn't seen in ages. Sana, Onyx, Cay... Those important in his life one way or another that he hadn't kept in contact with while 'sorting himself out'. Mayhap a party or a visit was overdue.
By the time he finished his work, Jack packed up the new egg-shaped item and hooked Pepper under his other arm, using a portal to get home once they were clear of the Timeless Isle's magic. He'd set his own companion down and just as he was getting ready to enter, a notification went off on his Tart comm.
Deagra? What did he miss?
"Hey uhh... think I hurt myself a bit in the practice room... little help guys?"
Sent 4 hours ago.
Furrowing a moment, Jackary chewed his lip at having missed the message and typed a quick reply to the group, balancing the attempt to open the door and carry all of his supplies at the same time. A simple 'Everything okay? Just got this' and a hope that someone had gotten to it already.
Naturally the moment he stepped into his apartment, his nose twitched at the scent of the place. Burnt salt, sugar, cleaning products, baked goods, sweat, and ashes... Whatever had happened in here, he was honestly unsure if he really wanted to know.
"Jade?" As he called out and stepped in, his toolbox was set off to the side, followed by Pepper who went bounding into the house to climb his cat tree, initiating weeks of pent-up ZOOMIES all over the house. The mechanical egg was carried over and when he paused at the cookie plate and note scribbled in front of Darnath's door, a small smile crossed his features. With the same amount of care, the item Jack had been slaving over was set in front of Jade's door before he moved his way into his own room. After all, he certainly needed a shower.
The night had been lively and perhaps the dragon had clung to those he recognized a bit too hard and a bit too long, Tris and Dice had been the center of his attention and world and even when Jack had met several new folk to pass the time. But in the end, when the party began to die down and Jackary found himself laying back on the deck of a familiar ship, his blurry vision was hazy, drunken in alcohol that he had consumed well after he’d returned to a private ship deck.
Now alone and with his thoughts, he pursed his lips, wetting them in recollection of what he remembered versus what he had awoken to. The last time he’d been on the ship, it was an invasion not much unlike the Legion and the Broken Shore, but of Horde and Alliance searching for the blood of Azeroth herself. It was a difficult time in life, Jack refused to return to land to face his grievances, his miscommunications and fears of his own partner all while fiercely guarding the demon’s hard work and company headquarters. Perhaps if he had put more time into Darnath than the man’s company out of his own insecurities and fears....
Drunk, alone, even his entire crew was gone, off celebrating a victory that Jack knew nothing of. His eyes began to grow heavy until lids fell closed, but the idea of falling asleep again had him snap awake, inhaling deeply to try and pull himself back into being fully awake. He sat up, groaning from the dizzy sensation before hands moved to course through blonde and green locks, letting the spiky mess fall to whatever direction it wanted to go.
No one home. Feral island, it was all the beast could do to rub his face firmly and think about where to go. “Damnit...” Came a low growl until finally he mage stumbled to his feet and began to trip himself forward. He knew he had one friend, one place he could track down and the Blacksmith’s scent was still on him, still easily tracked. Though he’d never truly been to Dicenne’s place, intoxication would not deter Jackary from showing up at the Elf’s doorstep to knock upon it, truly a hunter in his own right.
Invasion of privacy, or at least a friendly face, one that he trusted enough to try and place the past few years together. Of all things, he just didn’t didn’t want to face the reality of being alone, a fear that would still haunt his waking visions from being quite displaced. He could only hope in that moment, that at least someone would answer.
Crusted iced over snow folded and held. Lyren breathed out, peering out from the crest of the hill into the valley of stone and ice. The howling windows and storms might start up again at any moment and for now, they had a few moments. As Darnath's attention was taken up in engineering, Lyren had offered his help to strengthen the enchantments around the tournament grounds. It helped to keep busy.
But when there was a moment of quiet like now where Darnath was still distracted and he had a sudden spare moment there was nothing to do but think.
Snow and ice and howling winds, nothing but rocks for color. Even he dressed in more muted tones to blend in. It made sense then, that everything, everyone was just a little bit colder. That was the reasonable argument his mind brought up to explain away growing oddities.
It was also absolute bullshit. He knew it. Darnath knew it.
Which was exactly why the death knight distracted him every time he started expressing alarm over a growing number of things Lyren had noticed. And most likely there were several things he hadn't noticed.
Surreptitiously trying to ask the other death knights about… anything, really, related to their health and physicality did not normally get him anywhere. The new dragonsworn were a bit more polite about it. But their newer loyalty was more like - Dragon, Ebon Blade, Darnath, with a strong possibility of the latter two being flipped if Darnath spent enough time around them.
Not that Lyren was advertising he was asking because of Darnath either which was as much the problem. No, no, he was a mage, it was perfectly natural magical curiosity! If any of them guessed otherwise, well, he was stubborn on his point.
And so he wouldn't give away a possible weakness of Darnath's, and they wouldn't give away theirs.
He snorted, quietly, exhaling heavily to watch the air steam with heat and disappear.
Below, the scourge teamed and grew and with every push the Argent Crusade made to contain them, more dragged themselves up from beneath the ice. Or worse, if someone fell on the battlefield they need not await broken snow and dirt. Not to mention the creatures that looked like dark val'kyr that came down from the broken sky and brought forth long dead enemies that needed crushing waves of the Crusade forces to bring down again.
Behind the tournament grounds held strong, but never not in danger if too many slipped up, if anyone weakened. Spellcasters threaded defenses and early alarm systems that Icecrown's very nature worked to disintegrate. It had taken days even to get a stable enough grip on everything to create anchored portals.
And above… above Atlas' Aurora hovered, usually hidden out of view. It was exactly where Lyren should be right now, having eked out a tiny break of time. He should curl into the warmth Darnath provided for them with the wonders of engineering created heat and rest.
One of them should.
If not rest, then call the kids. Call Javinth. Call Sunsoul.
He did every day. But usually with Darnath. There were things he couldn't mention or even hint at in front of his daughters. Star was especially sharp and Arenlia still remembered when he had disappeared for a month. Either of them would pick up on the slightest hesitation in tone.
He wished they could be with them, that it was safe. He wished they were back with them. He especially wished Darnath was there, back on the island. If he thought there was any way Darnath would leave, he would have tried to arrange it. At this point, he would rather accept one of the teenagers being out here instead of the death knight.
Because something was wrong with Darnath. And it was now, in these moments of quiet, that he could let it terrify him.
Not the snow, the ice or the cold. All of them could hurt him, if he wasn't careful to keep his temperature up, if he let ice magic into his core. But he wasn't frightened of that. It was a known issue.
Darnath wasn't. It was something growing worse the demonic death knight didn't want to talk about. Because clearly that would only have worried Lyren.
Problem: Lyren was already worried.
Solution: Distract.
It was easy to say he shouldn't let himself be distracted. But the other problem was the distractions weren't always normal Darnath distractions. The problem was there were very serious problems in Icecrown.
The newest problem was the longer something was wrong with Darnath the less Lyren cared about the giant hole in the sky. The backup dream of gathering everyone up and getting off this insane planet was getting more appealing by the moment.
Crunch.
Snow shifted beneath him. Too close. Snow was melting around him before he had fully acknowledged the ghoul that had been crawling its way up an incline of snow toward him.
Flames curled at his fingers, swirled into a dense ball of yellow and orange. He let it get hotter, larger, as the ghoul came closer, snarling now like it knew it was doomed.
It was a flick of his fingers, not a throw that rolled it out of his hands. The ghoul was close enough the ball of fire dropped more than it flew, engulfing the ghoul in bright warm tones for a brief moment before there were only flames.
The crackle of fire was louder to Lyren than the ghoul's death screams.
He stared behind it as it burned. No one had been posted up here. No guard. ...The storms had piled snow and ice on the other side of what he thought was a "hill" and should in fact be a cliff. And now they were coming up this way too.
It was tempting to try melting it away. He probably could. But fighting Icecrown's nature would have him down and out for likely the same amount of time it took for the storms to fill it in again.
So, here it was. Another distraction. Something else to figure out. And as tempting as it was to try and drag Darnath out of Icecrown altogether until he knew what was wrong, in a battle of wills about this -
(The mark on his back was a warm comfort beneath his skin and in his mind and why would he want to fight Darnath on it anyway?)
Jaylith would certainly be a dolphin. Intelligent, playful. and kind of an asshole, her playful yet clever personality is basically equivalent to a bottle-nose.
As a fruit, Jaylith would be a cherry. Sweet, though bitter if plucked at the wrong time. Still, she’d be rather delightful with some whipped cream or something cold. Just like her.
As a vegetable, she’d be an eggplant. I’m not explaining this one and just assume it’s because of a terrible inappropriate eggplant themed joke. Yup.
To Sunspire the titan tower lit up with runes, glowing brightly all the way to its tip top as the energy charged creating a dome dampening field inside. Magic would generally be deflected and suppressed inside. It knocked out much of the power within Sunspire, Rizzy’s new power lines and street lamps going dark as the sun went down over the port and slowly took to being replaced by the old lanterns and torches that had once decorated the town. Portals would be impossible, projectiles softened in the their strength, only a real invasion force would have a chance walking into Sunspire now.
None of them knew how or why the dome suddenly appeared. The few with knowledge of how it worked would be thankful or curse the trade-lord and his mechanical marvel. None who looked upon it as it went up would know the real story. That at the heart of the ancient power and giants stood a very small, scared, and secluded monk, wrapped in his secrets and humility, he hoped it to always stay that way.
Rizzy stood alone again.
He sent Luce and Teera out into Sunspire to search for weapons and explosives. Vel was off in the distance handling her own fears and planning her side of things. Saeris was still on his own journey, unreachable for a reason. Mavas was at Atlas and while him and the Commander were on their way it would be hours before the Aurora would fly overhead, days before the massive Calypso joined the air defense.
Kurel was mitigating his own side of the issue in Erudition. Defending Demy and Ilyea as was necessary and planning the next step in the chess match against the wolves. Killian was suddenly quiet on the comm, and could be no help considering his tenuous position between the two factions. Even Leona who had become a bit of a sounding board for the assassin, was distanced safely in Pandaria. There was no one to reach out to.
Standing within Kurel’s home - standing among his things that felt nearly as intimate to himself as they did to their owner - was almost too much. Things he had restored with killings and effort, added finances to in just the last few days from similar exploits. Things he was heir to in many ways. He had worked so hard for this. Fought at every pass, forged patience and skills he didn’t know he needed, why was he so terrified?
This isolation. Was this what Kurel felt all the time among them? The weight of the crown as it was often put; it was different than leading an operation or even running the port in ways that made him not Trade Lord, nor Captain, nor Purveyor, but perhaps nearly as important as all three… This was still different.
Riz pulled the titan disc from his pocket, shivering all over with the task at hand. The stone was created to be bound to one blood for life. It would obey that owner’s will no matter where on Azeroth they roamed. They would always be intrinsically linked to Sunspire, and perhaps the first shreds of honor to creep into Rizzy’s skin, or his budding sense of devotion forced him to understand there would be no running away after this.
The monk shut his eyes tight, bowing his head as silent tears fell down the sides of his cheeks. A silent apology reached out from his chest as if Saeris could feel it. Not that he would need nor request it, but Riz had promised him the chance to think about it. The veto power to keep their lives from settling down.
“We don’ settle down. We jus’ keep on ‘avin’ adventures then!” The redhead had soothed him.
“Promise?”
“Absolutely.”
Rizzy slipped the shadow dagger from beneath his sleeve.
“Promise?”
“Absolutely.”
The knife bit into his skin with hardly any pressure. He wouldn’t feel pain until the air hit his exposed insides, for now all he knew was the wet and the red.
“Promise?”
“Absolutely.”
From his forearm the blood dripped over the titan stone, the soft blue glow of ancient mechanics taking life, connecting to him and only him for the rest of his days. Surely if they needed to… someday it was plausible to reset the tower? Perhaps Phantom would succeed in his attempts to destroy it. Perhaps the whole thing would crumble in a decade and fall to dragon fire, who the fuck even knew.
“Saeris… promise me this is the right decision.” He spoke aloud. Riz had never had any gods, it was the closest thing to a prayer he could conceive of.
“Absolutely.”
“Alright tower... show us y’stuff, activate an close down the port.”
The locals were stirred. Worried. Rizzy should be out there comforting them, showing reassurance and strength he blatantly didn’t possess any more… but he knew Riz the Rigmaster now. He even knew Riz the Prince of Sunspire. He could be a ‘grifter’ as Demy called him and play his own face a while. He could be the nameless and hide his fears. He was the Unbreakable Reed after all and he was merely up against a third rate assassin by the title of Phantom. His first duty was to protect Vel. Second was to settle the startle around Sunspire.
The monk bandaged up his wrist and packed away the stone to handle the rest of the evening.
In Azeroth, it was known as The Madness, The Darkening, the Dragon’s Sickness... The Nightmare. In many worlds, in millions of languages, it had endless names but it always meant the same thing. A corruption, often brought on by nightmarish feelings or situations, that ate the being alive, twisting it into something else entirely. Dragons fell particularly hard to such a toxic curse, especially.
This was no exception.
“DO NOT LET HIM GET INTO THE FOREST, WE’LL FUCKING LOSE HIM FOREVER!!”
Lokitan screamed as a mere handful of the Heran army raced upon war-bred Granondo, a clove-hooved type horse with coiled horns, best used to ram incoming enemies. Terrifyingly fast creatures that feared nothing in the heat of battle and yet they could not quite keep up with the terror streaking through the rotting fields of a dying wasteland and seemed even less inclined to get anywhere near it.
The target they hunted was a slithering creature running on all fours, bones twisted and inhuman with long tendrils of muddied hair, making the thing look even more sickly in the way that it hung over the face. Now and then, piercing silver eyes would dart back to see just how much closer its pursuers had come in the wild hunt, noting the way the warriors had begun to flank it. If only it could reach the edge of the forest, the beast would have a far better tactical advantage and a speed increase, let alone an easier time to attack those that hunted it.
“Loki!” A voice called out and soon a female rider pushed her steed up to the Dread Prince himself, eyes narrowed, glancing over in his direction. Fire blazed all around her, the snowy locks of her hair wild and free as a hellish set of crimson eyes flitted to the dark-haired rogue. “What do we do if it gets to the forest before we can reach him?!”
“You pray to your mother that we take him down before that.”
Chaos.
It was absolute chaos and he had just told her to pray to the deity that created it.
Inch after inch, Lokitan pressed forward, signaling the General’s finest men to continue flanking the beast, heels dug in harder into his skeletal Granondo to push onward and finally close in the distance of the skittering cretin running on all fours. Once close enough, the agile Prince pushed himself to crouch atop the saddle; he lunged, flickering through the very shadows to reappear right on top of the nightmarish beast. He dared not draw a weapon.
Not against this one.
The clashing form was greeted by the muddied, anemic animal twisting itself to bite hard at its would-be attacker, using the momentum to kick Lokitan right off and send him flying. That mere few seconds to protect itself was costing its safety to get into the forest. A loud shrieking cry pierced through the veil of carnage, knowing the chase was quickly coming to an end. Claws grabbed at the deep red mud below, years of war and corpses all around, the thick blood of countless soldiers meshed together with protected soils and painful, bitter rain. The slick surface had the creature try another attempt to break free, slipping the first few steps.
It was so close… The forest was but a hundred yards away.
Lokitan rolled through the slimy fighting ground, catching himself to snag at the beast’s ankle, yanking it back to throw it in the other direction. He was doing all he could to buy the warriors more time to position themselves and close in on the fighting pair.
“It doesn’t have to be this way, Jack.”
Melted silver raised from under the long strands of hair while the beast hunched itself further, a deep snarl and razored fangs revealed themselves in a warning. The aggressive display had Loki push himself to stand and raise his clawed hands, exposing that he was as unarmed as he could possibly be. He stared down at the nightmare-fueled version of his cousin, his best friend who he knew was in so much pain that he had allowed the darkness to consume his heart.
“Look at me, Jackary… I don’t want to hurt you, hn..?”
There was a brief pause and for a moment, the world stood still. Even the droplets of sweat and foul mud froze in place for a fraction of a second while the thing Lokitan referred to as ‘Jackary’ mulled over its choices. Heavy breaths of air pushed out, bellowed in smoke pouring from its twisted jaw that was filled with acidic drool that flopped to the ground in large globs - a clear sign of the beast’s stress.
“Let’s get you home… Let’s get cleaned up…” A leather-clad hand dared to reach for the unholy creation but within a blink of an eye, time sped back up. Teeth snapped at the grasp, claws raised to full-on attack the one being that kept the beast from the forest it was trying to get to.
“FUCKING--!” Loki found himself head to head with the writhing mass of acid-spitting, half-transformed wyrm, a Beast of Insanity that wore a Prince’s crown and who was upsetting the balance of life and death. Without one, there couldn’t truly be another. Every snap of the jowls and swipe of talons was blocked or barely dodged, up until Lokitan lost his footing.
Slipping, he found himself under those wild jaws, hands clasped the wide-open maw above him that threatened to clamp down on his face and bite his skull clean in half. Muscles ached, his posture shook from trying to push what was once his peaceful, loving cousin off him. It wasn’t until another bubbling mixture of acid was seen dripping from under the beast’s tongue that the rogue knew he was in deep trouble… He was going to have to hurt the beast or die.
One hand released the mouth and in a split-second decision, the palm shoved up hard to strike at the creature’s jawline, his intensely sharp claws sliced the beast’s right jaw, stunning and pushing it away, jarred in surprise. It left Lokitan with just the smallest leeway to raise his hand up in the air, giving a hidden signal.
The Insanity-addled creature hissed loudly but before it could turn to lunge the last few steps to disappear into the forest and become a haunting ghost, a slough of chains and ropes fell atop it, blanketing the wild creature. The engineered nets implanted themselves into the dirt below, radiating pulsations of electrical charges to stun the captured beast into a horrifying submission. The haunting screams of agony, half-human, half-dragon rang out in a near ear-shattering volume.
Only when it stopped struggling to even stand did the shocking currents of energy cease their barbaric, but effective, handling.
“Are you hurt?” The woman from earlier charged forward, sliding down from her fiery warsteed to help Lokitan up from the wet earth.
“No,” Lokitan spat out, snagging the hand to be hoisted up, wincing when it indeed hurt to put any sort of weight on one of his legs. Glancing down at it, he was sure there was likely a fracture somewhere... But now wasn’t the time to dawdle.
“Well, you’re not dead, dear brother, so…” Musing, she helped at least support the Dark Prince, glancing down at the wheezing, now bleeding beast. “This isn’t curable, you know. When someone falls to the Insanity, they don’t come back.”
“Untrue,” Loki quipped, hobbling over with his sister’s help until he was able to ease down and sit next to the captured animal. A gloved hand reached forward, pushing the black hair from its face to indeed reveal a half transformed Jackary, the silver spiral of his eyes a dead giveaway at the corruption. “There was a Priest once who fought it and contained it. Rumour has it he wanders around with a single spiral eye, hn? Fucked up shit.”
The woman sighed, almost huffing while a hand motioned down to what remained of Jack. “Look at him, Lokitan. Half transformed, his brain isn’t fucking in there anymore. Put the thing out of its misery and let the avatar of Life be passed down elsewhere. It’ll rebirth by tomorrow, save your own ass.”
“No.” Lokitan took a moment to grip the skull before him, pinning the dragon further as a small crimson glow overtook his eyes. “He was never meant to hurt anyone, it was her that drove him to this.”
“Yeah, well, she’s pretty fucking dead, now isn’t she?”
A hand waved the antsy woman off, freeing Lokitan to simply focus on the inner workings of the beast before him. It was a rare trick the Rogue had up his sleeve and normally it was used to delve into someone’s memories, to unlock what terrifies them the most to use it against them… But what if, he thought, what if he could use it in reverse?
Time ticked by, allowing the dark, shadowy tendrils of his own essence to seep into Jackary’s form, filtering through and plucking every little bit of the corruption to neatly gather it within. A simple box was made at first, deep inside the dragon’s brain. Soon it was locked away and chained relentlessly to his psyche. A personality that he could never escape from, one that in time, would briefly show a fraction of itself and be referred to as…
Naga.
“M’sorry…” Loki whispered while he worked, remolding and melding Jackary’s very essence and memories to pull him from an otherwise impossible return. It was an attempt to do this or be forced to kill him and Lokitan wasn’t sure he inwardly had the power to do that. “You were designed to never forget.. But if you always remember, there is no saving you from the corruption that has been planted within you.”
Lokitan frowned, rubbing his thumb slowly, sweetly along Jackary’s forehead, the beast had long since stopped trying to fight back. It was lethargic.
“I am taking this from you, Jackary. This thing that turned you into something you aren’t.” Lokitan cooed, almost fondly at his twisted cousin as each memory leading up to a certain event was plucked and stolen away and yet what Lokitan hadn’t realized was that in making such a small hole in Jack’s memory, it served as an endless void. A slow-drip leak that would cause him to forever forget things after a while. A blessing and a curse in the future, but at that moment, when Lokitan gazed down and saw the beginnings of Peridot return to those eyes, he knew it was the best decision he could have made.
---
Darnath quietly clamped the journal closed with a small squeeze to the spine, the entry had been written in a far different font and form which made him think that perhaps Lokitan had written it instead. But... Where the memory that had been stolen was placed was beyond the Dragonsworn.
Stormy grey pools glanced at the snoozing blond curled against his side. Jack, in an elven form, had been cozying up for a small nap while his Knight read, blissfully unaware of what haunting stories Darnath had been refamiliarizing himself with once more. The Champion glanced to the spine of the journal, noting the number upon it, and raised his vision upward. The book he was really looking for must have been the one right before this… Maybe that one held the answer he was looking for.
