Fantasy the rise of hope | ely & sof.

[heartstringss]

Over two dozen individual eyeballs sat on marble plinths throughout the room, each one fixed and staring creepily at them. Arlo absorbed the skepticalness inside the stare of all those eyeballs… and though the inhuman quality of some did, quite frankly, make their skin crawl, they didn’t turn away. Instead, they stared blankly right on back.

Truth be told, they’d gotten used to being stared at. Everywhere they went they collected stares because they were an outsider. They couldn’t go anywhere without being balked at, not the public bathhouses, not the markets… Suppose they just had that sort of look about them: the look of someone whom society deemed uncivilized; that because they were nomadic they must have nothing useful to contribute, no valuable coin or tradeable knowledge, only scraps that they could barter. Nothing to do but beg, steal, loiter, cheat, or vandalize... It wasn’t true, of course. They were plenty strong and capable enough to work if they desired, not that that mattered considering they didn’t [desire to work, that is]. People’s minds were small, perhaps arguably smaller in Asiria due to the fact the borders had been closed so gods’ damn long.

For what it’s worth, Arlo fortunately was not small minded. (Perhaps that’s why their head was still miraculously whole and solid, despite this titan so annoyedly insisting that it should have melted.) They’d wandered the soil of this dying planet for what felt like centuries and never had they shied away from horror. The experiences they’d had since meeting the titan were unfathomable, their Fate and purposes uncertain… but they’d had plenty of odd experiences in the waking world before. For all they knew they could have still been dreaming.

“I know Delphine,” they answer shortly, biting their tongue rather than arguing with the woman since she clearly thought that they were stupid. But that lifetime of the princess had been over centuries ago, by now the royal line was long irrelevant and whatever came of Delphine’s child was no more than rumors passed through generations. (There was no record to show if the child had survived themselves; they’d simply disappeared to the timeline and become a ghost. It could be anyone, their mother told them. The royal line could always rise again.)

Being told that Delphine had nothing to do with them felt like it should have been an insult somehow. (Were all Asirians not meant to feel intricately connected to the royals? Ah yes, they were supposed to wish they could rewrite history and go back to the time the planet had “respectable” leaders.) Quite frankly, Arlo didn’t care the slightest what had become of the royal lineage all those years before. How could it possibly be good for one family, one person to have all that power? …Yet they had also just felt Delphine’s heartbeat in their own chest mere minutes ago due to one of this very same titan’s strange memory timelapse-like illusions. Had their souls not been entwined right then? Were her feelings not their own?

“He tried to kill Delphine,” Arlo remembered, speaking once again of Soren. “In the fortress. He tried to turn her against you first, though. You were her mentor. He said you led her astray.”

It didn’t matter what they remembered of the visions or what questions they still had–the titan’s mind was clearly elsewhere. She was so frazzled that for all they knew she might not have even heard them. Arlo wanted to understand, they really did… at the very least because there seemed to be no other option. Regardless of relevance, they were stuck in this place–they couldn’t will themselves away; there was no door or exit lest it be controlled by something else. This could have been a dream but all the same it made them oddly curious.

It was that same morbid curiosity that had them nearly touching things they shouldn’t. Their fingers danced along the edges of the plinth, not retracting all the while the titan rambled and she dawdled. They’d been afraid of her, once, when her form had been more intimidating and more otherworldly–less ridiculous–less human. Now that she was mostly human (even with still having otherworldly powers and some physical attributes, like the temple wings, that they couldn’t quite explain or fathom), they weren’t afraid but merely… well. Just curious.

When the woman swept across the room, suddenly towering over them, and slapped their hand away from the closest plinth of eyeball(s), Arlo took a sharp intake of breath. They’d noticed her eyes before, of course, but not experienced the true depth and gravity of their inhuman color this close before now.

The woman’s anger stuns them for only a moment. Within seconds, their whole demeanor shifts. They stand up taller, straightening their spine to reach and grasp the woman by her shoulders. (Assuming this un-human woman could even feel temperature and sensation like a normal person, Arlo’s metal left hand was likely a bit cold and biting on her skin. The other hand was warmer… in fact, its skin was tingling, turning almost feverishly hot the longer that they maintained contact with the titan's skin.) They leaned in until they were close enough their breath tickled the titan’s ear. Their voice took on a distinct quality that was not their own.

“I know your name,” they whispered gently. Teasing, almost. “Would you like to hear it?

Were they stupid? Crazy? Reckless? Brave?

“ . . . B r o n t é . ”​

As a matter of fact, they were.

 

[starboob]

Rare is for the all seeing to be stunned to silence. In her surprise, her mouth hangs open in a small 'o,' as the name summons a flood of memories; ones buried under the burden of the past and the disaster that turned Asiria from a once lush forest with overfull oceans and rivers that carved the ravines into a desert grasping at Life.

Of all the names she held onto, she let herself forget her own;
The one she came to prefer to the weighty one Father and Mother gave to her.
One only a silly mortal could come up with.

Her eyes sear in the same way they would if she were in a staring contest with the Sun himself. The ones on the plinths rise a few more inches then, all at once, they plummet and splatter across the marble. The wet puddles bubble and with each burst, grass grows; high enough to tickle Arlo's abdomen as they sway with the sea breeze that sweeps up the cliff side.

Small white flowers wave with the grass and the titan stands among them, her white robes rippling behind her; licks of fire wave out from her rich brown hair, dotted with eyes. There is a child in the grass, arms out and running with a smile that could break all the sadness in the world.

"Is Bronté even a word?" she had asked once. Not incredulous; only amused.

How her voice carried such fondness for the young princess, the hope of Asiria. 'It was a mistake…' She knew her destiny too early and robbed from her was the chance to just be. If just one thing had been different, could that have been the difference between bounty and ruin?

The waves that should have been below the cliff, rise over it's ledge and crash over the grassy terrain — though Bronté does not flinch. Salt water that would have frozen anyone's bones if it were real wash over herself and Arlo. As the water pulls away, they stand on the deck of a ship. A babe still taking its first breaths is shoved into the titan's arms, a bundle of warmth — hot like the Sun; like its wretched father. "Delphine, you should have told me. You could have told me."

Even in spite of her own duress, she remembers. She remembers how she had held onto that bundle, that precious package her champion insisted she steal away and hide (protect). With nothing but its mother's scarf and the golden medallion — bearing neither the royal seal nor Ilyos's sigil, but something entirely new (something they must have forged in secret) — she promised to ensure the babe lived.

As much as the titan could afford, anyway. All powerful and even she knows not the fruit of that effort or if it became a burnt sapling.

The Titan Lord of Wisdom and Sight stares a thousand yards into the future, the past, the present. The ocean waves freeze, the ship pauses at a slant while the crown of her brother's head starts to surface at the ship's bow. (She had not sensed him then; she does not sense him now.) Even in this freeze frame, she carries that bundle tightly to her chest. It does not breathe. It does not howl. A small curl of dark hair pokes out from its swaddle; that is the only feature Bronté recalls.

"Who told you that name?" Her voice is low, though she is unmistakably addressing the junkrat who stubbornly remains with her through these memories. She holds tightly to the bundle that is both real and not — real in the sense it had been, not in the sense she hid that child away long ago and burned the memory of where.

"How dare you speak to me as if we are anywhere near equal," she spits, turning on Arlo. While she might tower over them, while her wings may fan out in warning, her bark lacks any bite, in spite of it all. "You come here and sully these sacred grounds with your filth and dare taunt me, your Titan Lord?!"

With one arm still wrapped around the bundle, she uses the other to reach for Arlo's head, aiming to twist her fingers into those infuriating dark curls. "I am your superior, you insolent brat." Her ire may not even be how they speak to her, but that their words even have the power to get under her skin at all. "Who told you those things!"

What did they see?

She clutches the bundle tightly to her chest while still keeping her hold on Arlo. Though the babe is still frozen with the rest of the coming shipwreck, the medallion around its neck weaves through the fabric of the scarf and stretches towards Arlo like a brilliant shiny button. "Don't. you. dare."

 

[heartstringss]

Arlo wasn’t sure exactly what they had expected to happen after revealing to the Titan they had knowledge of her name, but it certainly wasn’t this. (Most likely they hadn’t considered the consequences of their actions in the slightest–at least they would be on par with their general trend of thoughtlessness.) They watch from the corner of their eye as the woman’s mouth falls open in a tiny ‘o’ of surprise, and at first this makes them smile… but then the woman’s eyes sear brightly and a rush of panic floods their veins instead. Their attention flickers to the closest surplus eyeball when they notice movement out of their peripheral vision, at which point Arlo looks over just in time to see the plinth eyeballs rise then plummet and splatter all across the marble. It’d be disgusting if the resulting vision weren’t so damn magnificent.

Grass! So much grass, and oh, how it sways in such a pleasantly warm and salty breeze.

Arlo’s hands drift off the Titan’s shoulders. They reach out and touch the brilliantly green growth where it extends beyond their waist, capturing and running (but not plucking) the blades gently through their callused fingers. Their eyes glisten with wonder as they spin around and see the flowers, then they gasp noticing the Titan (nearly forgotten somehow) standing tall and proud amongst them, her elegant white robes and flame-tinged hair both fluttering softly with the breeze.

They don’t see the child until that echo of the Titan’s name clatters like a pin-drop in the stillness of their mind.

“Is Bronté even a word?” The titan asked, to which the young princess chortled her response, “it is now.” A child’s logic–simple as that.

She dances to the Titan, her fingers clasped around a small bouquet of three white flowers and a single blade of grass. She presses these into her lord’s hands and then disappears back into the tall grass, her laughter rising to a cry as one memory fades and the next one soon takes over.

Against all logic of one getting caught up in a rising tide and receiving a facefull of seawater, somehow Arlo doesn’t drown nor does the water sweep them away, freeze them or clean them of their filth (...unfortunately). When the last salty licks of sea foam finally pull away, they gasp to find themselves standing on a ship in the middle of an ocean beneath a brilliant many star-flecked sky and twin moonlight. They watch as an older version of the princess stomps distraughtly to the Titan and presses a warm bundle into her outstretched, waiting arms. They spot a hint of rosy cheeks and dark curly hair but can’t make out too many of the baby’s other features. Arlo feels their chest tighten as they look into that bundle and catch sight of a distinct, oddly familiar shiny gold medallion.

When the infant’s mother speaks her voice is filled with so much urgency and distress it borders on hysteria. “You must protect him, Bronté, please! Take him away from here and hide him. As long as he’s with me I fear he won’t ever be safe.” She doesn’t respond to the Titan’s urging that she should have–could have–confided in her sooner. Her already-teary bright blue eyes turn away in shame; it isn’t long before the tears give way and spill down her cheeks.

(In that moment, Arlo remembers an important detail of the royal family they’d been told once as a child: all the firstborn children prior to Delphine’s child had been Daughters. The broken lineage, what the legends called the start of a curse–fall of an empire–came with the rare first birth of an Unroyal Son.)

The scene grew eerily quiet the longer Arlo pondered this. Eventually they noticed that the waves' movement had frozen and the princess’s sniffling abruptly stalled–all was still except the silhouette of a large, spiked head and single eye slowly emerging from the sea beyond the point of the ship’s bow. Delphine’s eyes were frozen wide and so were Arlo’s–the titan woman for her part, however, seemed wholly unalarmed by this development. When her mouth next opened it was clear that she was speaking directly to Arlo this time, her fury unrelenting towards their presence as a once-again uninvited memory-dweller.

Arlo stumbles back when the titan turns on them suddenly, they nearly trip and fall trying to get away but no matter how they try they just aren’t quick enough. Their eyes squeeze tight as the woman grabs them by their hair and pulls them close. They whimper with the sting of pain, hands balling to fists at their side (although they wouldn’t dare lash out or strike her). “You came to me, you brought me here; I didn't choose this!” Their eyes tear open, shoulders shaking as their gaze mirrors the form of Soren with his fists raised over the boat posing to strike.

Considering the impending doom it didn’t seem much worth getting into how they’d actually heard the name from Soren in Bronté’s own memory. Even if they had wanted to explain, the movement of the gold medallion weaving out of the infant’s swaddle and stretching up towards them was quite distracting. The gold of the medallion shone brightly in the moonlight, its glare reflecting off the barest hint of honey flecked throughout the scavenger’s dark eyes. They reached for the medallion as if being summoned, so transfixed they barely noticed the slow descent of Soren’s fists nor Bronté’s warning.

Their fingers fold around the small medallion like it is the only lifeboat in the universe that had any chance to save them. As Soren’s fists crash to the ship and splinter wood, the princess falls in odd slow-motion. Her body tumbles across the deck, fingers digging in the wood leaving behind deep grooves from her nails and leaving behind streaks of bright red blood. Her voice strangles over the cacophony of chaos and echoes even as the scene dissolves:

“You must save him! My Lord, you promised!”

Arlo squeezes the medallion tight at the horrifying development of Bronté’s many-numbered hidden eyes suddenly bursting wide. The fabric of time and space shreds all around them and washes the scene with cold, bright light. They try not to cry when the woman’s fingers pull their hair and scratch their scalp.

The medallion hums and seems to vibrate. It appears they’ve formed a link of sorts–a bridge connecting past, present and future. The scene that emerges combines fragments of memory from all.

A curly-haired toddler hobbles through the narrow living area of a shabby, poorly lit mud structure. A woman sits cross-legged in the middle of the floor, arms outstretched to catch the child when they lean too far and start to fall. She sits them down in her lap and lets them pull her robe aside, a hungry mouth fast upon her breast. Sounds of nursing and the woman’s humming fill the air of the single-room household and are only briefly interrupted when the mother coughs. When her mouth pulls away from the sleeve of her elbow she finds the fabric flecked with bright red spots of blood. She sighs, for fortunately by this point the child is already fast asleep inside her arms.

(...)

A young boy sprawls across the ground inside his family’s sheepbarn. His body is long and gangly, his hair a wild nest of untamed curls. He looks just like his father besides the fact that he’s inherited his mother’s nose and smile–not that he would ever recognize either one of them in person. He shares enough physical similarities with the faraway palace guardsmans’ other children to not raise too many questions. Except one mystery remains: The weight of the gold medallion that sits atop the boy’s sternum, a treasured heirloom which has never left his sights for long. In silent ritual his fingers trace the grooves and ridges of the medallion’s elaborate gold face. He’s committed the sigil to memory so thoroughly that even when the medallion winds up getting stolen in the market one day, he still doesn’t ever forget its gold plate’s etching. However, it takes decades before he finally unravels the puzzle that his mother carved into its unique sigil.

(...)

A pre-teen Arlo wanders through a ruined camp. Their bare feet kick at stones and toss red dirt into the air. They bend down to grip a sheet of metal and nearly exhaust themselves trying to flip it over one-handed. When they finally manage to lift it up enough to look beneath, they nearly dance with joy to find an old pan with a bent handle, some metal spoons and a small crust of bread. They gobble up the bread most hungrily, use their toe to push the pan and metal spoons out from the rubble of the fire and then drop the sheet of metal back onto the ground. After this they pull a satchel from around their back and use their one good hand to shove the new cooking tools inside. They can worry about cleaning the tools later, for now they must find food…

This search for food leads them reluctantly into a village. They’re nervous around people but their hunger has gotten to the point of urgency they can no longer deny how hard it’s gotten to hunt since—

[THE VISION BLACKENS MOMENTARILY WHEN THE MEDALLION-HOLDER’S MEMORY GLITCHES IN ITS HASTE TO COVER UP REDACTED TRAUMA. WHEN THE PICTURE STABILIZES THE YOUNG PEASANT CAN NOW BE SEEN WEAVING THROUGH A THRONG OF BODIES AMONG A DENSELY POPULATED AFTERNOON STREET MARKET. THEIR FINGERS DANCE IN AND OUT OF SHOPPER’S POCKETS. DUE TO THEIR STATURE THEY GO LARGELY UNNOTICED… UNTIL]

Later in the night, they happen on the storefront of a building with its windows open letting out a mouthwatering sweet aroma of roasted meat and fried potatoes. The shop has a few tables outside littered with trinkets that are currently unmanned and it's here they linger, their fingers flitting over all the shiny bits of metal, odd-shaped stones and fossils. The stuff on the table isn’t likely worth much unless its viewer was a bird or some (other) type of collector, but in all fairness most children seem to be a little bit of both. They grab an odd piece of dented metal from the table and turn to run off before anyone can notice–only to turn and crash right into the store’s keeper.

“Where ya’ goin’, kid?” A man’s deep voice rumbled, hands catching on the peasants’ raggy clothes and dirt-caked hair. The child screamed with healthy lungs and twisted violently, without stopping, until at last they managed to tear themselves–and their shirt–free of the large man’s grabby hands. They turned back to spit and also dropped their treasure. Diving for it, the man thrust his boot into their stomach while they were down and the child vomited with pain. As soon as they had collected themselves enough to no longer feel their vision swimming, they bolted to their feet and took off into the night. Despite their ribs hurting and the stomach growling, they didn’t stop until they finally landed themselves back into the safety of the desert. ​

When the vision fades to black, they shortly find themselves returned to Bronté’s sanctum. The infant is gone but the titan’s hand is still fisted in Arlo’s hair. Without speaking a word, they reach up and take the woman’s hand gently, prying her fingers open to release and free their hair. They then step back, rolling their neck and shoulders to release a series of sharp pops from all the bundled knots and stiff muscles that had developed in the interim of the last few minutes… or however long it’d been.

“So it was Soren,” they said finally, “He sunk Delphine’s ship… he killed her, didn’t he? That’s where I heard your name as well. He said it in the other-- whatever these things are. Memory or vision, hallucination, I don’t know. Whatever you call them.”

It felt like an invasion of privacy that their own memories had been emulated in the Titan's dreamscape. Was that how Bronté felt with them peeking into her head so unwanted? Well, it wasn't like they'd done so willingly but of course that hardly mattered now.

Before she could get too angry with them, Arlo reached into their shirt and withdrew a necklace on a long bit of frayed leather cord. Hung on the end of the cord was a tarnished gold medallion which had certainly seen better days. The metal was littered with a series of deep scratches and no longer brightly shining, its sigil near unreadable. They pulled the necklace over their head, struggling for a few seconds when it briefly got caught in their hair. Once they'd freed the prize, they held it out unto the Titan.

“I guess this technically belongs to you.”

 

[starboob]

In truth, Bronté never knew the bastard child or what became of him; nor did she try. It was to no fault of her own. It was only ever her responsibility to find him protection.

"Take him away from here and hide him. As long as he’s with me I fear he won’t ever be safe."

Just as the bastard would have been in danger with his mother, he would have been in danger with the titan. The path she chose for him was for the sake of Asiria. That it failed to include what he might have wanted or wished for from his Life is hardly of concern to the Titan Lord of Wisdom and Sight. It is unfortunate, but sometimes personal want must be sacrificed on the altar of survival.

Delphine should have known that. Bronté is certain that she had and shirked her responsibility anyway — even after the titan tried to massage her champion's fate.

Bronté did what she had to do. Besides, the skies had darkened over Asiria shortly after Delphine perished at the hands of Soren. Even if she had wanted to know the little bastard, it would have done nothing for him, ultimately.

Had there been the Time to bond, however, Bronté would have made no different a choice.

It was for the best.

Millennia had come and gone as Asiria fell to waste and it was still and always the surest path to take: To wait for the crystalized version of her champion to awaken the sleepwalkers and restore order.

This is what she tells herself.
She has made no mistakes. She is a titan
And titanblood is true.

“You must save him! My Lord, you promised!”

In her clearest eye, she knows she saved him.
And in her clearest eye, that is all she ever did.

That knowledge fills her with something as cold and as heavy as Balthmor's core. An ice lump forms in her throat and it takes several swallows to ensure she does not choke on that guilt. What she had done may not have ever been enough and she may have always known it.

When Arlo's hand paws at hers, Bronté releases without fight. Somewhere in the supercuts of her past, the small bundle she once held evaporated and slipped through her arm like sand. Now her arm hangs limply at her side with only the ghost of his warmth left.

Her fingers tent over her chest and close into a tight fist over the fabric of her robes — a surprisingly mortal gesture for a titan who will insist that she is above it all.

"Memories. Not hallucinations." This may be the softest her voice has been when addressing Arlo. It's as far away as she wishes to be. "This is my life — at least the last some odd decades of wakefulness, before we all became sleepwalkers."

It's hard to say what possesses her to offer a candid explanation. None of this will ever pertain to the junkrat. She found them by chance, by some odd —

"I would never own something so ugly." Her nose wrinkles at the sight of the tarnished medallion — something about it is offensive enough to snap her back to her usual self. She has half a mind to slap it away. She even puts her wrist in position to do so, but somewhere in the motion to strike she changes course and grabs the leather cord instead.

"I swear, you must make it a competition to speak as offensively as possible. How could this ever…" She continues her mutters, but speaks too quietly for her words to make any sense — that and she switches to the incomprehensible language of the titans. She flips the disc of garbage over in her palm, flips it between her fingers, and rubs her thumb over the grooves before she brings it closer to her eyes. The wings at her temples fan out, spreading out the feathers so that all of her present eyes can see.

"I — " For a moment she is quiet. The eyes on her wings shift rapidly between Arlo, the medallion, the scenes from the bastard's Life to Arlo's, and then she laughs.

It's a melodious sound, peels of it coming freely from her throat with such hearty force that tears spring in her eyes and she doubles over, clutching the stitches in her side. It has been too long since she had a good laugh and for this junkrat to be the cause — why, it's a rather large relief.

Because now, here in this seemingly insignificant object is her answer: Arlo is not the crystallization of Delphine. They merely found this piece of scrap metal and that, for whatever reason, was enough to awaken the titan.

Hope for her champion remains!

"Oh my — " She hiccups, wiping her eyes carefully as if she is trying to keep the makeup she is not wearing from smearing. "For a second I really thought you were a relative to the princess." Though she resisted the notion, it is true that pieces of her were willing to accept the unfortunate possibility. "But it merely is her heirloom you have ransacked! It is but simple and mere chance that you be the curse breaker."

And with this piece, she is a step closer to finding her scepter. Now they must find the blood of Delphine to open it. Simple! "Ah, for once you do good, junkrat." She musses through their hair in a manner that may have been affectionate if her tone were not so condescending. "I am sure we can find leads in a city or settlement — I am sure no heir of Delphine's would waste in the lone desert."

With spirits higher, she claps three times and the flashbacks drop like a veil, placing them back in Soren's outpost. The body of hers that initially caused the spillover of her power disintegrates into glitter that dances in circles on the floor before sweeping over to the titan herself, collecting in her skirts and taking the sallow look of her away. "Your little wheeled contraption still works, no?"

 

[heartstringss]

The life of a bastard son is never sure to be an easy one. Nasir had found that out the hard way growing up on a farm with limited resources, his adoptive parents already juggling several other hungry mouths long before he’d come along. He’d been handed off as an infant with very little details shared to the family who’d agreed to take him in the first place–”a healthy boy,” they’d been told, “in need of parents.” Of course, there were rumors and suspicions everywhere the boy turned… but following Delphine’s disappearance and the founding of her shipwreck, it was all anyone could do to simply grieve–in death there was no tolerance for disrespect. The Princess had been greatly loved throughout the galaxy, so with her illicit lover mysteriously disappeared unto the wind, her child was simply rumored to be lost–either taken by its father or perished among the shipwreck with its mother–either possibility suited the kingdom well.

Despite the monthly allowance extended to the family who agreed to feed and clothe that extra mouth, Nasir’s adoptive father had strict rules for all his children. “The boy must earn his keep,” he’d tell his wife before rattling off a list of chores to be completed all before he ‘earned’ his breakfast. Such responsibility was thrust upon him much the same as it’d been thrust upon his mother–yet of course his mother reaped the benefits of growing up loved inside a palace, and Nasir, comparatively, was merely tucked away in shadow. He’d still known love but not enough to ever fill the hole of what his life could have–should have–been, especially once he learned the truth of the medallion and what terrible shame and misfortune the circumstances of his birth had ultimately wrought upon his mother and the palace.

Oh, how easily a life can fall to sand and become lost to the annals of time.


/ / / . \ \ \​

The human response of the Titan’s pain, the shadow of her guilt, is not lost on Arlo. They watch her fingers tent over her chest and turn to fist above her heart, that ache inside her voice so clear and raw. (It’s all they can do to remain quiet through their resulting discomfort – they make no effort to console her, not sure they even could if they knew how.)

When the woman insults and makes to swat at the medallion, a flash of indignation crosses their face in response. The gold disc has been within their possession for a long time so even though they’d initially joked about returning it to the woman, they weren’t actually looking to give it up at all. They release the cord only reluctantly, their hand remaining in an upward palm while they wait (not so patiently) for her to give it back. Their dark eyes watch the Titan carefully, their mouth a thin, tight line making clear the fact of their discomfort. (It’s certainly amusing watching Bronté’s disbelief shift to surprise, but where normally they’d tease and laugh, the agitation at losing their treasure takes great precedence over that right now. That hunk of metal was a piece of them just like their arm. It had nothing at all to do with where it came from and everything to do with what they’d lost.)

When the woman begins to laugh, they startle with a marked abruptness. A flash of heat travels up their neck and molds their skin to earthy clay. It’s not the matter of supposed lineage that embarrasses them as even they do not believe that to be true; rather it was the Titan’s condescending tone, that awful way she kept looking down her nose at them, the pure “hilarity” of present circumstances… that all in all just made them feel like a squashed bug. When the Titan ruffles her fingers through their hair like an elder would a child, Arlo openly sneers and rolls their shoulders as if meaning to shake her off. They didn’t bother trying to flatten their hair back down (which would have been a laughable effort surely), and when at last her hand retreated they reached out their own and swiped the medallion from her open palm.

“I never claimed to be the heir,” they muttered hotly, now slipping the cord over their head and tucking the medallion safely back inside their shirt. Its metal is a welcomed coolness on their hot, flushed skin, its weight a stone that helps them feel more grounded.

Well, until the Titan claps her hands and the scene dissolves into thin air. They try not to vomit with the transition, their hands fold over their stomach and their eyes clench tight. A second later their senses settle and the desert aroma fills their nostrils. They breathe it in like life, even dropping shortly to their knees to kiss the very earth itself. They lift their head just in time to watch the Titan’s former body disintegrate and turn to glitter, the sparkles dancing lifelike right before their very eyes.

At this point, Arlo rises to their own feet, watching transfixed as the glitter sweeps across the desert floor and disappears into the layers of the Titan’s skirt. Their eyes track over her form slowly, eventually landing back onto her face at which point they then purse their lips and even gradually start to turn away. It’s a second later that she beckons them about their bike, their curly head now turning back to look upon the Titan with surprise.

“Oh, you… want me to go with you?” Or was she simply trying to use them for their bike? “I thought you made it rather clear I do not matter. After all, I’m just a junkrat.”

Even as they said this, Arlo turned and walked on to their bike. They heft its body upright, muscles straining beneath the thin material of their dusty tunic. Leaning its weight against their hip, they check the water pump under the motor and the gauges for the homemade solar panel strapped onto the bike’s rear mount. It was coated in filth and much like its owner was in desperate need of a thorough wash, but other than that… a couple hard twists of the handlebar and the engine roared to life! Arlo smiled, patting the chassis like a favored pet before they shut the engine off. They look back on the Titan with a smirk. “So you want a ride into the city? And I should help you why?”

They'd help her anyway because they had nothing better to do and they were a good person, but she didn't need to know that.

 

[starboob]

"Are you being so serious?" If Bronté thought the junkrat worth her Time, she might have attempted to inflect some incredulity into her tone. This is no specific offense to the junkrat themself — at least this Time — but in the days of old, a mortal would understand the honor of assisting a Titan. The Titan.

She does not even look in their direction and instead sends off two eyeballs from her form to give herself a once over. This new form is almost the perfect image of her last, save for two less arms and two more wings — which she did decide to keep, finding them rather stylish. (Maybe her style alone can inspire the rest of Asiria to crawl out of this dark age it has found itself in.) She primps her feathers with the tips of her fingers while she waits for Arlo's apology and subsequent groveling.

When that does not come, however, even after the engine shuts off (it is far too loud for her tastes, but she supposes she can fix that later if it is even needed) she blinks, brows furrowed. It takes her a moment to find Arlo in the outpost, as if she has somehow lost their location. She snaps her fingers, disappearing the disembodied eyes, and places her hand on her hip. Now she is incredulous. "It would be your honor to assist a Titan, might I remind you, for then you would have a chance at becoming a footnote in the annals of history and perhaps not be a forgotten junkrat. This is your chance to be something. I think it's rather generous, hm?"

Though she falls short of outright claiming their Life is insignificant, it makes no difference. Her meaning is not likely lost.

"But if you refuse to see logic, I am happy to provide threat." She grins. Though she lacks fangs and sharps rows of teeth, her smile is plain enough in its meaning — she would be happy to end Arlo. It would be as easy as it had been exploding those raiders' heads. "If the earlier demonstration of my power was not enough, I am happy to show you more of what I am capable of."

Never mind that extending herself any further could be catastrophic. The human does not know that. Probably.

"Truthfully, I should be taking that medallion from you since it really has no business being on your person." She shrugs. "But you seem over fond of it and, quite plainly, I would rather not get anymore gore on my person." That she can change her appearance but the gore remains is wholly annoying. "So I shall let you hold onto it until we part ways."

She finishes fixing her feathers and starts toward Arlo and their bike. "Shall we?"

 

[heartstringss]

Was Arlo …supposed… to care about honor? If so, they must’ve missed that memo. The Titan’s incredulity makes them snort, watching how she primps her feathers (of course she kept those damn ridiculous temple wings) and juts her hip out, hand perched like rather she was the princess and not Arlo. If they had to guess they’d say Bronté probably wasn’t used to not being constantly fawned over, her every wish and whim delivered at first beck and call. But then it’d been how many generations since the last waking Titan had existed? Arlo loved them, sure, respected them, of course, but worshiped them? No. To them, the Titans were merely a manifestation of the planet’s traits and values, for instance there was Father Asiria, the fabled tree giant who at one Time had been storied as so full of Life (who was now thoroughly desolate and ravaged, his branches barer than the planet), and Giatha with his big-boulder shoulders, literally a walking mountain in himself. What was it that Bronté represented? Arlo didn’t even know. Was there a Titan for pretentiousness and snobbery?

Alas, they couldn’t deny the Titans were a set of beings much more powerful and all-knowing than themselves, and this one especially they knew to be all-knowing, all-seeing and all-powerful. She could have surely wiped them from existence anytime that she desired. (And did they want to be wiped from existence? Fuck no!)

Anyway, it sounded like adventure and adventure was fun. Not like they had anything better to do with their Time.

They remain quiet while the Titan weaves her web of threats. The weight of their bike still rests upon their hip, one hand perched on the chassis, metal fingers gently tapping, while the other cards through the shaggy mess of curls on their head. When she gets to speaking about the medallion, they tune it more visibly and in fact look up, their gaze a warning in itself. Their hand goes to their breast, callused fingers thumbing the hard ridges of the medallion through their shirt. The threat that she would take it from them seems to impart much more of an emotional reaction than any of her other threats before. Were they ready to fight for the medallion? Die for it, perhaps? At that they weren’t so sure.

Their posture remains guarded even though she’s offered to let them keep it for a little while longer, at least until the time they truly parted ways. However, there was no way of knowing when that time would come. When they reached the nearest village, what came after? If she didn’t find what she was looking for there, would she choose to drag them with her further still or simply go off on her own? (If this Titan had awakened, could that mean that there were others? What did she need them for if so? Then again, perhaps her mission was more personal.)

In the end, they didn’t argue. They looked at her unsmiling, their hand still guarded protectively overtop the medallion. When she started towards them, Arlo stiffened briefly then nodded, turned and tossed their leg over the bike. They scooted up the bike as far as they could manage to make room for the Titan, their shoulders becoming cramped up near their ears, face twisting in a grimace when they felt the woman slide onto the seat and settle in the space just behind them. If there seemed a bit of hesitance to touch it was likely because this very moment they remembered the last time they had been on the bike together how Bronté had, at that point, been sporting four arms. This time she was down to just the two, which they thought was probably for the better seeing as last time she’d place one hand over their shoulder and that hand had quickly made its way up to their hair and even obscured their vision for a time during their fight with the raiders, nearly killing them both as a result.

They wait to start the bike until Bronté is settled. “Just around my waist this time, don’t touch my shoulders,” they instruct her gently. Once her arms circled their waist, Arlo tests their ability to lean and then adjusts the placement of her hands so that her grip was firm but not so tight they couldn’t breathe or move. “Try to lean with me when I go into a turn. It makes steering with your added weight a little easier. If you need me to stop, give my shirt a tug.” They try to ignore the feeling of heat radiating outward from all points her body touched. To say it’d been a long time since Arlo had last touched another person would have been an understatement. (Did it make it better or worse she wasn’t a person but in fact a god?)

“This is gonna be a long ride because we’re really far from any villages. So um, ya know. Just stay holding on.”

Hopefully they wouldn’t run into any problems like they had the last time.

With that, Arlo started up the motor and kicked off.

 

[starboob]

It was a three day's journey to the nearest settlement — settlement being a rather generous word for the abysmal shanty town that had nothing to offer them other than guns to their heads. Never mind that Bronté had demanded tribute upon arrival and, when no one budged, threatened to steal away the first born daughters as punishment. Really, it should not have gone so sourly!

"This would not have happened during the Premiera," she had said, sulking on the back of the junkrat's motorized vehicle. Bullets whistled past their ears as they (Arlo) outmaneuvered the mob chasing them, and all Bronté could think about was the gall of those uncultured townsfolk. She prattled on, counting off on her fingers, "I should be received by the highest ranking official, their priestesses, and offered whatever it is I might require. The absolute lack of respect…"

She had gone on like that for a day and only stopped when she noticed that Arlo was fast asleep beside the campfire. Thankfully (for the junkrat), the Titan had exhausted herself on the topic by the morning.

By morning her attention was on a sandstorm some hundred or so miles away. It hadn't been there yesterday nor the day before. It was a dark line over the other wise beige horizon, gradually growing thicker as it swallowed the distance separating them from it. She kept her eyes on it and, when she decided it was getting far too close for comfort, she pulled on Arlo's shirt and pointed in the direction away from the storm. "That way. Don't stop."

This detour would cost them another four days on the road. It would also only serve to delay the inevitable, but any second of Time she could take from Soren could prove to be the minutes that would win this protracted war of kin. Bronté would risk nothing.

Those four days on the road were quiet, at least. The Titan occupied herself with her thoughts, carefully plotting out her next several moves and countermoves. Occasionally she would break from strategizing to observe the blurred landscape and the various sleepwalkers she could make out in the distance. Still, even this was to find friend and foe.

Giantha was hidden by Soren's storm, but she could still make out his hulking figure even through the dust. He appeared to be going against Soren's current, heading off towards the mountains. The gilded dragon with her three heads and six wings had also flown off in that direction a couple days prior. Bronté would have thought nothing of this until the giant tarantula with a woman's face was spotted stalking off in that same direction. Her eyes narrowed, never straying from the mountains. 'Hmm.' When they stopped for camp that night, she had sent off a several pairs of eyes towards the mountains. Giantha, Calista, and Valry were not to be trusted together — not until she knew where they stood.

By that point, they were a day out from Quila, a once minor port city turned last remaining bastion of Old Asiria. Bronté stood over the fire like a statue. It might have been unnerving, but she had stood like that every night since their journey began, keeping watch over their camp and ensuring the medallion did not leave Arlo's neck. And, perhaps, she was also protecting the junkrat.

"When we arrive in Quila," she starts, breaking the long silence between them. "The first thing I wish to do is bathe. You are to join me, for your stink trail is certainly going to get us found out." To be fair to Arlo, they both are covered in a thick layer of caked on gore, dirt, and sweat. Tragically, even Bronté's feathers are looking dull. In their current state, she really would not blame the denizens of Quila for thinking of them both as two cockroaches of society. "Then we shall get you a gun."

That bone toothpick they carry will no longer be sufficient now that they have likely been marked as the Titan's accomplice, regardless of the veracity of that assessment. It shall not matter to Soren when he wakes in a week's Time. "And while I gather intel, you ought to consider upgrading that 'bicycle' of yours." She uses scare quotes around the word bicycle, because her tone certainly doesn't do enough to convey what she thinks of the piece of junk. "And when was your arm last checked out? Your parts look out of date and I haven't even been awake for more than a week. Can it even shoot lasers?" She lifts a brow, ever doubtful.

 

[heartstringss]

Arlo hadn’t had too high expectations for the first village they rolled up on, but after Bronté had insisted that they stop, they gave in (albeit reluctantly) and pulled the bike off in the direction of the little shanty town peeking from the shadow of the Gorshé Mountains. They could recognize landmarks better than they could villages, but generally speaking they knew that most settlements the smaller that they were, the less welcoming they usually were to outsiders. Of course it didn’t help that Bronté, with all her fine silk and gossamer and sparkly gold adornments–even bathed in filth as she was–essentially looked like a rich tourist. Their stomach filled with dread the instant they climbed off the bike and saw that dozens of villagers had emerged to greet them not with smiles and hello’s but rather guns and alarmed suspicion. That hostility escalated quickly the moment Bronté opened her mouth and demanded to speak to whoever was in charge about her “tribute.”

Even Arlo felt a rise of heat flood through them, remembering through their childhood all the many incidents a gang of thieves and criminals (or otherwise pompous blowhards as surely there were instances and occurrences of both) had rolled through their parents’ village and demanded residents pay “taxes” if they wished to continue living safely and freely.

“You idiot, you can’t just–” but of course there wasn’t much time for introspection when you were having to dodge bullets and also consider the safety of those very same villagers who were flirting with danger in the unpredictability of a newly awakened Titan who could easily destroy their village with a single clap if she desired. Grabbing the Titan by her shoulders, Arlo steered her back to the bike and forced her to get on. Only once she was seated did they also seat themselves and then hastily make to leave the shantytown (fortunately they’d left the bike running and hadn’t ventured far). A cloud of dirt kicked up in the wake of their tires peeling out, sending the mob into a blind coughing fit which wonderfully also bought them time. Still the bullets whizzed on either side of them, throwing sparks where they bounced and ricocheted off of the bike’s already heavily dented metal. It was a wonder they made it out alive with so few injuries, not that Arlo experienced any real relief knowing the high probability this wouldn’t be the last time they’d have to outrun an angry mob.

When nighttime came, they were grateful to sit by the fire and just relax a little, only looking up and responding occasionally while they largely tuned out the Titan in her endless prattling-on about ‘the gall of (those) savages.’ They made a simple broth out of some dried meat and ate straight from the pot, later removing their shirt to disconnect the harness for their metal arm so they could give their stump a break (and much needed airing-out) before they fell to dozing by the fire.

Beyond the shootout at the shantytown, the trip was pretty uneventful, really. Bronté pointed them in a different direction at one point and although they knew the detour was going to cost them another four days on the road, they didn’t argue with her either. It was hard to imagine the planet had ever been more than this decimated rock, but of course they’d seen it in the Titan’s visions–that living, thriving land of vast oceans and widespread greenery before Asiria’s landscape had become war-torn and drought-ed, its civilizations now dwindling and largely disconnected from each other. They passed ruins of Old Asiria on occasion–a crumbled monolith of some old palace; the dusty, sun-bleached hand of a fallen monument grasping for breath out of the sand–but if the Titan was mourning any of this (and they sensed she was), for once, she said nothing at all. (In truth, that was likely for the best because Arlo didn’t have much experience consoling emotional women to begin with.)

An estimated one day out from Quila, Arlo sat down by the fire and sipped their usual broth while sorting through their bags. They ticked things off on their fingers, muttering beneath their breath while they worked out a list of what supplies they were running low on and what others they could potentially use to buy themselves more trading power. The gold medallion must have been itself worth a small fortune, yet somehow even through all their various trials and tribulations, Arlo hadn’t ever found themselves so desperate to need–or want–to sell it. (This was also why they often kept it hidden–as with most things, the less the raiders saw the better.)

When Bronté spoke, Arlo looked up, and at mention of her number one priority they flatly laughed. Okay, they couldn’t really fault her for wanting to bathe–they were both caked in gore and even Arlo was starting to itch–but after the way she’d upset the last villagers giving her “demands”, they honestly dreaded how she might do the same and cause another confrontation with the next. “There’s a few places in Quila I know that I can safely stash my bike, we’ll have to do that first so I can trade some things for coin or credit and then we’ll be able to hit the public baths and market.” They raked a hand through their sweaty, dirt-encrusted curls and scratched at their itchy scalp. Despite their obvious discomfort they somehow do not feel the need to argue.

“A gun, what–” They sputter at the thought of how much a gun will likely cost. Looking down at their belongings, they know they have enough excess (read: hoarded) scrap metal to turn a decent profit should they need to sell it, but they’d never needed more than the bone knife to get them through their daily ventures. Other weapons they’d collected over all the years of solo living mostly sat in storage just collecting dust. Before they can argue too far though, she continues on with her demands, next choosing to insult their bike. “I–I can do most of the work myself,” they say, brow furrowed at the thought of letting another person touch their singlemost prized possession. Their arms fold over their chest defensively, the tarnished bronze of their prosthetic clinking with the tarnished gold of the medallion, which is likely what inspired the Titan to insult their arm next. Arlo’s face flares red with equal parts embarrassment and rage. “I can do that myself too, I just need–”

…money. The truth of the matter was they just didn’t have the money to replace and tune and fix all of the things that needed fixed, least of all to upgrade the shabby hunk of junk that was their decade-old homemade prosthetic arm. They blink at the woman’s last question when she asks them if their arm can even shoot lasers, their mouth falling open while they stare at her dumbfounded. “What, do you think high-tech laser equipment just like falls out of the sky?”

It was laughable, really. “You know what, I think when we get to Quila you should actually just follow my lead. In case you haven't noticed, whatever luxuries you might've had a couple thousand years ago when your precious princess was alive are all but gone now. You can’t just walk in a place and demand whatever you want, that’s not how things work anymore.” Nevermind that if the Titans really were starting to wake up, surely there would have to be a reckoning for humanity at some point; it was simply unavoidable. “Do you want people to respect you, worship you or fear you? Because you've got to pick one, you can’t have all three.”