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illumwriting · 9 months

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Secret Santa for @bruisepristine! How To Entirely Muck Up A Good Thing (A Guide By Lalna Jones)

semi-canon compliant, references Voltz Episodes 16-18, liberties taken with how everything is made/slight order of events content warning for light descriptions of infection, slightly more detailed removal of an arm 4,019 words! Cross posted to AO3 as well <3 Preview: Lalna spends far too long chasing the chicken around. His aim is suffering, and he tries to play it off with laughs as Xephos' voice from the base drifts out sharply at him to "Just aim!" when the relentless barrage of blasts makes the bunker shake despite the lack of environmental damage. Lalna checks behind his shoulder to make sure no one is watching as he switches to his sword to take the blasted thing out. His arm feels heavy, weak, and itchy.

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Lalna had planned for building the power arm. Tireless trips to the Nether with Honeydew's apprehensive help to gather the materials, leaving Xephos to work on the base and its machines on his own.

They had suffered a series of comedic mishaps recently, especially with the uranium cells. They had been needed after the events that led to the treaty and the rumors floating around of even more weapons stockpiled in their immediate neighbor's base. Lalna had taken the brunt of the deaths and poisoning, with an easy laugh and the brushing off of any more protection besides the rubber of his gloves between him and the radioactive material. Truth be told, the side effects soothed the aches in his bones and left his head clear to think. Not something he would admit to the others.

Spreading the components across his workspace, Lalna makes a low hum of satisfaction. The metal glints without a trace of the recycled dulled parts that had been melted down for it. The core is cradled gently in stasis, rotating slowly with little light blue sparks that skittered across the surface.

He pulls on a fresh set of his gloves, lowers his goggles that help to sharpen his nearsighted vision- officially, on record he didn't need glasses. Snapping the parts together is assisted by the modifications installed on this world, making it as easy as following the blueprint that had come in the manual. He clips an additional ground wire to himself, erring on the side of caution. The core had been expensive to create. There's a soft hiss as he opens the chamber and reaches in to cradle the core in his fingertips and transfers it to the lined compartment. It makes a crackling sound as it arcs out and attaches to the nodes around it before settling into a steady green glow. Lalna takes a wide step backwards from it, his breath holding as he waits out any possible secondary reaction. When none occurs, he exhales and closes the cover, twisting the bolts into the corners with his screwdrivers to hold it in place. He unclips himself and shucks the gloves off onto the table to run his hand along the arm. He can feel a slight warmth coming from it. He trembles only a little with excitement as he hefts the arm off the table and fits it over himself.

He's glad he sized it to the largest on the specifications. It's still snug around his forearm. He flexes and lets the grin spread across his face at how responsive it is. The fingers curl just like his own despite the added width and the strength contained in them is dangerous. He can hear Honeydew and Xephos' voices filtering up through the confines of their base, and he quickly scoots outside to test it.

The brilliant flare makes him glad to still have his goggles lowered, and he takes half-assed aim at a nearby mob and sends it flying. In the wake of the explosion, a small crater in the earth remains, along with the mob, chunked down to almost dead.

Delighted, Lalna doesn't bother with even turning it off as he rushes inside to show Xephos. The spaceman is streaked with grime and sweat, his thick eyebrows knotted together in annoyed worry as Lalna chatters and starts to form a sphere of energy in his palm, ignoring all the delicate machinery that lines the walls.

Lalna only really realizes his mistake as Xephos is shoving him outside with a firm chiding. Lalna corners Honeydew instead, dragging him outside and fiddling with the dials and firing off blast after blast in the dark of night, the glow even more entrancing with nothing to dim it. Lalna barely notices the tired that has seeped into his companion's voices, the resignation in Honeydew's that all the dangerous trips to the Nether had been for a personal toy, the lingering frustration from Xephos that he'd been left alone to handle the frequently unstable components and repetitive crafting processes that were needed to create a power source for the base that wouldn't be rapidly consumed.

No, Lalna only knew a heady delight as he ran back inside on low health, his head spinning with after-images from the flashes of light and the dizziness that tried to warn him to drink or eat something healing. He leaves Honeydew and Xephos without a second thought, retreating to his workbench to fine tune the arm and dodging Honeydew's baffled question of "What're you gonna be able to do with it, now?"

They humor his strings of unhinged laughter and destruction of the land around them, Honeydew even brushing off the floor of his farming hut being broken into bits. They tease him about it, calling him a maniac when he attracts the attention of too many mobs and winds up dead with his items scattered across the ground. They care about him enough that Honeydew lingers outside to watch Lalna's stuff until he gets back.

Days later, they finally get Lalna's focus back again. It had been sparsely gained, to assist with power cabling, but then lost again to the giddy glee and attachment Lalna felt for his newest creation. Xephos and Honeydew had discussed it briefly, while Lalna was well out of earshot and the humming of the fusion reactor was loud enough to obscure their voices. "Didn't even really build it himself." Honeydew grumbles, still sore about being dragged into the heat of the Nether. Xephos sighs. "We didn't really build this either." He slots another part into the reactor, the turbine making a soft click sound to affirm the correct placement, and reaches down to Honeydew to take the next from him. "The shininess of it will wear off, eventually."

Honeydew mumbles it under his breath. "Can't come soon enough."

True to Xephos' words, Lalna had slunk back in like he hadn't been devoting every scrap of time to his power glove. He tries to make up for it by hovering close, insisting on helping with every little thing. Normally his overcompensation wouldn't rub the other two the wrong way, but Lalna's oddly frantic about it, sweat plastering his hair down as he carries the cells and parts from the chest into the reactor room. He's relying on his new arm to lift the additional weight that Honeydew could easily handle unassisted, and Xephos quietly notes the whine that comes from the stressed joints.

The first time of switching the reactor on goes poorly- Lalna distracted by his intermittently firing toy, Honeydew corralling him away from the more fragile sections. It melts down, and Xephos makes a distressed sound as he and Honeydew rush to put out the fires that stem from it and survey the damage. Luck is on their side, and the missed bit of enclosing glass only costs them the neighboring panes.

The next morning, after a long night, Xephos drags them down to the room again to show off the corrections. Lalna sheepishly passes over a smaller model of his glove to Honeydew for digging the tunnel Xephos needs. Honeydew grouses at first, but eventually mutters to himself as it cleaves through the rock easily that he can see the appeal in it.

The reactor is rebuilt, and only with a small mishap that Lalna is not privy to, only hears the shouting between Xephos and Honeydew and sees the aftermath of shattered glass and fusion cores as he takes himself outside for fresh air. He catches sight of a chicken, and with a deep inhale, he sets his sights to it. Easy dinner.

Lalna spends far too long chasing the chicken around. His aim is suffering, and he tries to play it off with laughs as Xephos' voice from the base drifts out sharply at him to "Just /aim/!" when the relentless barrage of blasts makes the bunker shake despite the lack of environmental damage. Lalna checks behind his shoulder to make sure no one is watching as he switches to his sword to take the blasted thing out. His arm feels heavy, weak, and itchy.

He has to wait until night and soft breaths of his companions to steal away to his workbench. He detaches the power arm and hisses at the unexpected stab of pain that comes as he pulls it off. In the lack of clear light, he can see that his skin is peeling, welted… and darker. He steadies himself against the table and clicks the lamp on.

It's awful. The green has snaked in unnatural patterns into veins and muscle, tinting his arm up to the elbow. The light catching on the lines creates a glowing effect that mocks him, and the pink wristband he'd made to help the arm stay in place stands out sharply. Lalna prods with his gloved hand, and furrows his brow. He can't feel the sensation anywhere along his forearm or hand. He wonders how long it's been like this. Days, probably, with how he pushed off any sort of warning signs on a typical day when he'd worked himself into exhaustion.

A shudder passes through him as he thinks it through. The radiation and chemicals, crawling past the barrier of his gloves, into the sweat and his pores, and then festering inside the glove. Intensified by the constant warmth of the power glove's core- a perfect petri dish to form an infection without him noticing. Everything he tried to avoid.

He considers his options. The easiest solution would be to send himself through respawn without the glove. He'd avoided death since the first night he'd worn the glove, so without it on, his body should reset itself. He resolutely pushes his stool back and stands, shedding his items into the nearby chest. There were plenty of mobs outside, and he makes sure that the ire of the skeletons ends him swiftly. His bed catches him, and he holds back the sharp wheeze that always afflicted him when the rush of life came back. He can't see well enough, doesn't want to look here, not even touch the arm. He'd left his lamp on, and immediately he understands that this problem is going to take more than that to correct. His arm hasn't improved at all.

Lalna sinks down onto the stool. Runs his good hand through his hair and furiously whispers to himself. Sure, he could crawl to the others on the world to ask for help, but battle lines had been drawn that made it impossible. No reason to involve Xephos or Honeydew either- they would only fret over him and suggest the route of talking to Ridge.

The lamp bounces as Lalna slams his fist against the table and then furtively glances to make sure it hadn't woken anyone up. "Fuck." he whispers, and hits the table again with more restraint. "Fuck."

He can't put the glove back on. Even thinking about it makes him nauseous. He tests how well he might be able to pass it off with a regular glove over it, but on their own, his fingers struggle to even grip a pencil with the strength needed to write. The peeling skin sticks to his glove as he removes it, and he nearly pukes then and there. His chest feels tight, and there's nowhere safe to escape to. He's trapped, in this little box that is his workspace, between his dying flesh and his worst fears. The gears whirr in his mind, scraping against each other roughly and then clattering out of track. He has the best and worst idea all at once, and only thoughts after that are the how.

Even weakened, two hands are better than one. He stumbles in a haze through their base, supporting himself against the wall as he rifles frantically through the chests for the supplies he needs. His inventory barely holds it all, and he has a few close calls as dropped chest lids and metal scraping against metal almost wake Xephos up.

He sorts it into neat piles back at his workspace, and glances at the clock. 4 scant hours until sunrise and Honeydew's internal alarm clock going off to get up and make breakfast.

First, the smaller arm he'd made for Honeydew. Requisitioned, and only smelling slightly like him. Lalna purges the thing with alcohol and works additional wiring into it, along with one of the control panels and some padding meant for his power suit's helmet. He tries to blend the changes into it but without an underlying blueprint, it looks chunked together and not nearly as smooth and seamless. A leather strap to go over his shoulder is added, to help support the weight and keep it flush.

Second, the matter of his arm. He tears into the fabric of an old rag, and ties it off just above where the infection seems to end at his elbow. He replays every show he'd watched where someone's arm had been removed, and is grateful that he can't feel anything there right now. He slots a bit of leather between his teeth, lowers his goggles, and flips on the handheld laser they'd used to cut sheets of metal.

Nothing could make this better. The smell hits first, acrid. Then the sound- bubbling and searing. Then the pain. He makes it past his epidermis and then everything explodes in white light behind his eyeballs, a harsh pounding that screams at him to stop. The laser clatters from his hand onto the table, automatically switching off, and Lalna sobs into the leather and tastes blood where his teeth had caught the corner of his tongue. He fumbles the laser back into his hand, shakily thumbs it back on. He feels like he's floating just behind himself, guiding the beam to cut into himself. It shatters everything inside of him, disgust and horror twisting into some sort of fascination as he's split open and apart. The very last of his nerves send shocks up his arm and into his brain- if they weren't so rotted, his arm would be twitching and spasming wildly. The intense heat of the cauterization is a blissful relief and reminds him of the heat of the radiation that had rotted him from the inside out while making him feel on top of the world.

The thud of his arm hitting the table and oozing out greenish-reddish-turned brown fluid from the not quite closed spots is what finally tips him over the edge. He throws up into the trashcan until he's dry heaving, clutching the stump of his arm with firm pressure until the rags come away sharp red instead of brackish. He feels faint, but he forces himself through it- making sure that the small wounds on the stump- it has to be the stump, he cannot think of it as his- are closing and not where the new arm will attach. They aren't. He wrenches the arm on, and has to stab an additional hole in the repurposed belt to cinch it properly close. He is drenched in sweat, his face streaked with tears as he sniffles back a runny nose. The glove on his right is ripped off by the cuff using his teeth and joins the mess in the trash. He holds his breath as he flicks the small switch on the underside of the arm and thinks move. The fingers seize into a closed fist. He whimpers, stares despondently and begs the machine with barely moving lips to work. He's coming down from the high of it all and everything hurts. He could pass out then and there, but he has to clean up, and haul himself back into bed. The arm twitches. He focuses again. "C'mon, you." He whispers, stroking his remaining fingers over the warmed metal.

It works. The fingers uncurl, then curl again, and the arm lifts off the table. It's enough. Lalna fumbles his way through cleaning up, and manages to not puke again when he has to deposit the remains of everything in their lava pit. Some strange part of him, the delirium, probably, says "Goodbye, arm!" as he watches it be consumed. The pink wristband is in his pocket, along with a mental note that the neon green and pink had looked good together. With that, he staggers back to his bed and passes out.

They let him sleep. He'd smelled of alcohol and vomit, and they assume that he'd had a few too many late night drinks. Not the first time, but odd, since they'd not found any bottles anywhere. He wakes up in late afternoon, groggy. It's not until he splashes his face with water and feels the slight delay of his left arm's movements and then metal that he realizes that it had not been some sort of nightmare. The day rolls by easily, with Xephos only insisting that Lalna drink more water and Honeydew making him a strong cup of tea that is bitter, but soothes the headache that was biting into the back of his skull.

Lalna keeps care of this arm better. The firing capabilities had been reduced to allow for the connection to him, but he's steadily learning that with the direct attachment, he can treat it more like his actual hand. The glove had been an extension, sometimes unwieldly and too large. As the surreal feeling fades, it is replaced by his usual giddy curiosity. He tinkers with the arm, ironing out little problems like the random spasms that would cause him to snap or crush whatever he was holding.

Just when it's become second nature to him, Honeydew notices. Lalna isn't sure how long Honeydew had noticed for, with his sharp eye for things out of place when it came to his companions, but he'd been polite enough to at least wait until Lalna no longer looked like death warmed over. "So." Honeydew starts, as they're both alone in the resources room and Xephos is below them, tending to his reactor. Honeydew's tone is simply conversational, and he nods at Lalna's arm. "where's the rest of ya?"

Lalna freezes. He swallows hard and turns slightly to catch Honeydew in the corner of his eye. Honeydew's face is neutral as can be. "I… It's… Erm…" Lalna stammers, so Honeydew keeps talking.

"Cause' unless you suddenly shrunk your arm down, and my power thing-a-ma-jiggy turns back up… well." Honeydew straightens from the chest, and leans against it to pin Lalna down with his direct attention.

Lalna doesn't know what to do. He should tell the whole truth, but he loathes being scolded by Honeydew more than Xephos. Of course, Honeydew could give him sympathy instead, which always left Lalna even more unsure and stiffly awkward.

*"You don't gotta say anything. Just roll your sleeve up."

That he can do. Lalna folds the loose arm of his lab coat up, to the point above his elbow that he had been avoiding raising it to, even though it was where he preferred it to be. The skin around the connection is still slightly reddened as it adjusts to the daily wear, but there's no trace of the infection.

"Huh." is all Honeydew says, before he hollars down the hole to Xephos. "Lalna cut his bloody arm off!!"

"WHAT?" Xephos yells back, and there's the sounds of annoyance as Xephos puts down whatever he's working on and climbs the stairs up. "Lalna cut what?" He repeats when he's just around the corner and stepping through the gap between the trophy room and where they are.

"Arm." Lalna supplies weakly. He's standing with his arms limp by his sides, gaze flicking nervously between the two of them as a laugh forms in the back of his throat.

"Goddamnit." Xephos puts out a hand to steady himself on the same chest Honeydew is leaning on, looking about as ill as Lalna had felt that night. "For fun… or?"

"Erm. Infection."

"Uh-huh." That's Honeydew, eyebrows raised in judgement. "Any particular reason you didn't wanna share that with us before lopping the thing off?"

"Yeah." Xephos echoes the sentiment, staring at Lalna like he's a madman. It's worse than when they call him a maniac.

"….. I needed to fix it. I did fix it." Lalna gets defensive, moves his hand up in front of him to flex the metal fingers. "See?"

Xephos blinks. "Your. Arm. Is. Gone."

"Yeah, and? This is way better." Lalna giggles, mostly unintentionally. He wants this topic to be over. They have things to build! People to bomb!

Honeydew opens his mouth to say something far less kind than he should, and only Xephos' light touch to his back stops him. "Whatever." is what comes out instead, but still just as irritated. The rest of the thought remains unsaid as Honeydew turns and pushes past Xephos to retreat to his tunnel. The stomp of his feet on the stairs makes Xephos sigh.

"Lalna. You have to tell us things like this, before…. before you take drastic measures. We could have-"

"gone to Ridge!" Lalna's tone lilts mocking as he interrupts and glares at Xephos. "Don't wanna. Besides, I fixed it."

Xephos turns and leaves without another word. Still, Lalna can hear his voice as he descends, soft frustrated words. "Not the point."

The tension hangs in the air between them all for a while. Lalna is more than fine to pretend it never happened, while Xephos and Honeydew talk it out between themselves and come up empty-handed on what to even do about it, except to let Lalna continue with whatever this was.

It's Honeydew, again, who extends an olive branch. Lalna is getting frustrated with his arm, one of the panels he hadn't been able to bolt down flush catching on "every blasted thing around me!!" Lalna is red-faced and yelling, looking like he might either throw something or break into tears. Likely both.

"I can fix that, y'know." Honeydew says calmly from across the room, back to Lalna. Lalna punches the wall. Honeydew repeats himself, louder.

"What?"

"I said, I can fix that. The panel." He waves the spanner in his hand in the air in a friendly manner, and feels Lalna approach him cautiously and step to his side.

"You would?" There's relief and hope in Lalna's voice, and he almost chatters on about all the other things that could use fixing, but Honeydew stops that before he starts.

"If you say sorry."

Lalna pouts. "For what?"

"For- blimey, Lalna, you cut your arm off overnight and didn't even think to wake me up!"

"You would have stopped me!"

"Maybe!!! Maybe I woulda made sure it fit you better! You dunno, cause' you /didn't/ say anything!"

Lalna considers it. It takes him a minute, and the fingers on his metal hand flex unconsciously as his mind works on other things. "I… I guess I coulda." He finally admits, then plunks the arm down on the table in front of Honeydew, and draws out the ask with his typical whine. "Please, can you fix it?"

Honeydew grunts, and set down the spanner to run his hands over the metal. "Sure. But you have to tell me exactly what happened."

Lalna does.

Xephos comes up partway through, and joins them, dragging over a chair and then promptly excusing himself again as Lalna begins to go into far more detail than needed about the removal. Lalna blusters out that he's… "sorry, I guess-" when Xephos returns again, and that earns him a pat on the shoulder and the insistence that he take the arm off to let Xephos look at the remains of his arm.

Despite the lingering frustrations between them- the half-finished projects, the things that had led to this, Lalna finally feels like he can breathe easier with his companions voices taking up the space around him. Even if they were chiding him. Even if they were telling him that he was a moron for doing this. He feels safe.

He still thinks the arm is cool, though. Eventually he'll get Xephos and Honeydew to agree. Eventually.

#yogscast #yogfic #lalna #xephos #honeydew #swyogs #my art

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