RealAgeAU Drabble - Snowed In
Okay. Seeing as I have been spamming you guys with the new AU. I think it is time for a little treat :3
Ever wondered how the Gang and the Danielle's became such good friends?
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edit: damnit I forgot to summon you! @spotaus
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Horror watches as Cross looks into the chimney "any luck so far Dust?"
Some clanks and curses "No."
That isn't good.
Horror had never been in the AU for as long as now. And never in the winter months.
He hadn't known that a blizzard could hit out of nowhere.
They had been snowed in very quickly and most electricity had shorted out.
Which honestly wouldn't have been that big of a deal if it hadn't been for their chimney getting clogged with debris. Meaning they couldn't start a fire and risk getting their house smoked out, or worse actually burned down.
Dust had climbed up it to see if he could fix it but he hadn't had much luck. aparently it was really stuck and Dust only had so much room to move around in up there. and if he used too much force it could cause damage.
Horror was fine, he is used to the cold. Same for Dust. Cross is trained and could manage as well. Killer already runs a lot hotter thanks to his strange soul situation and overwarm mana.
Nightmare however?
Horror walks over to the nest and pulls a blanket up slightly. The little made den only holds Killer nad Nightmare at the moment, Killer's soul lighting up the tiny hiding place.
Horror looks at the two as he tries to appear calm even if he feels so afraid and worried "and?"
Killer is rubbing Nightmare through the extra blanket they have him wrapped in. Killer shoots him an anxious look "He is very out of it. I didn't think the cold would be this bad for him."
Horror frowns and mutters "fragile magic." not only that but he is also a tree spirit who was originally form an AU where it was always spring or summer time, or some curious combination of the two. Nightmare was literally not made to deal with winter.
Killer frowns as he tries to share the body heat he has. Nightmare mumbles some words and opens his sockets. looking exhausted.
Killer however looks excited "Hey there tiny boss! How are you feeling?"
Nightmare frowns and looks confused before muttering an reply "tired..."
Killer frowns "Yeah i get thtat. just stay awake for a bit longer okay?"
Nightmare mutters unhappily as he shivers. Nightmare pushes himself close to Killer and Killer locks both his arms around him again as he stares at him "please tell me dust almost got it fixed?"
Horror sighs and shakes his skull. It isn't fixed. and that is the issue.
Killer looks afraid as he looks down at Nightmare "Maybe... maybe we need to make another jump? To a warmer AU at least? Get him to warm up?"
Horror agrees but also the idea of Nightmare making a dimension jump now? while he is already fragile? Horror is afraid it will just make things worse and-
Knocking on the door.
Killer looks up and stares "who the fuck visits people in a blizzard?"
horror frowns and shoots Killer a smile "I will check." he rises to his feet after tugging the blanket in again as he makes his way towards the door. Cross is by his side and looking at it with distrust.
Horror opens the door a tiny bit and stares in shock.
Dani stands on their porch. Dressed in some winter clothes but it looks more like she is dressed for a day of snow fun in the park over standing in a blizzard.
Dani notices he opened the door and grins "Snow carepackage delivery! What you needing?"
horror doens't have the words but luckily Cross does "what the fuck?"
Dani grins as she points a thumb over her shoulder towards the drive way "special snowday delivery."
Horror looks over and sees a very old off road truck standing on their porch. The tires are halfway deflated but gigantic and horror can spot the silvery chains all over them.
Dani must see the confusion and sighs something in the air and Horror can see Ellie give a sigh back.
The truck turns off and Ellie climbs out and towards the loading area of the truck and starts searching through stuff.
Dani steps into their house and clsoes the door before she frowns "fuck it is cold in here. What is wrong?"
Horror is once again all out of words as Cross mutters "chimney got something stuck in it. Dust is trying to fix it but... well... we hadn't finished isolating the whole house..."
Dani nods as she grabs a very old walky talky from her belt. she turns it on and speaks "Dani to Ellie. over."
a moment of silence before crackling "Ellie to Dani, hearing you loud and clear. over!" there are clear sounds of wind on the other side.
Dani grins "Dani to Ellie. We will need tools and blankets. any spare winter clothes is also a must. Over."
a moment before an answer "Heard you loud and clear! Getting it all ready! over and out!"
And Dani puts the walky talky back to her belt before she answers "Each year winter hits hard here. the first year we got here we noticed this and started going around to check on our neighbors. Gerson especially when he still lived here. We kept the habit up." she looks around "anything else you need?"
horror shakes his skull "Nothing really. Just too cold for Nightmare." and didn't that just feel like a failure? To not have been prepared.
Dani nods "You still got enough wood for when the chimney works fine?"
Cross nods "We should."
Dani looks relieved "okay that is good. Lets check to make sure it is all dry while Ellie grabs the stuff."
Dani lets Cross lead her to their wood storage as Horror quickly updates Dust and Killer. both voice their surprise about the sudden visit but one shiver of nightmare and neither say much more on it.
Neither likes to be in debt to others but if it is for their babybones? Yeah. Horror gets it.
Some nkocking on the door and Horror rushes to open it.
Ellie looks even less dressed for the snow as she just stands there with a warm sweater, snowpants, snowboots, a scarf and some earmuffs. She walks in but before she fully steps in she hits her boots together and against the outside doorpost to kick off the snow.
Now that he thinks about it Dani did the same.
Ellie walks in and grins "okay! Winter jacket and sweater. air tight and water proof." she holds it up "Probably a good idea for your kid. Kids always have trouble regulating their heat." she she hands it over.
Horror quickly leads her and all her stuff next to the nest where he raises the blanket again. He shows the jacket and Killer snatches it quickly to wrap Nightmare completely in it.
Ellie next holds up a very large woolen blanket and a fleece blanket. She holds up the woolen one first "This one first. all around him. Then wrap the fleece blanket around that." Horror does as told as Ellie continues to speak.
"What we are doing. As long as there is no outside heat. is trying to form an isolation for him so his own body heat can warm him up. We found that these things work very well."
They end up having nightmare all wrapped up and back in killer's arms before putting another fleece blanket on top of the blanket already covering them.
Ellie shows some thermo clothes next for them to wear and stay warm but Horror mentions they are mostly fine. As long as they stay out of the wind and snow that is. Ellie accepts it and puts it on the pile to take back to their truck.
Dani and cross reappear from their wood pile "Looks fine. you guys also still have enough fire starters so you should be golden. oh nice you brought the tools!" Dani checks the stuff and pulls out a mallet and some rope before going to go towards the chimney and start talking with dust.
Cross stares at Ellie "what?"
ellie smiles as she waits for her wife to finish "We do this yearly. Dani and I are made for the cold. She being a malamute dog monster and I am actually a snowshoe hare. Not exactly bunny but I don't mind being called a bunny monster." she shrugs with a grin. "When the first blizzard hit it meant that we were both excited and went for a walk in the snow together. it was great to be in these temperatures again."
she frowns "As we were walking we realised we didn't see smoke come from the direction of one of our neighbors. where we grew up you just kinda relied on each other in the cold months. You kept an eye on your neighbors and if they lit their fires on time. We decided to check it out and found out that one of them had gotten surprised by the cold and the the house's heating had gotten damaged."
Ellie waves off the worry "Everything was fine in the end. we helped our neighbor back to our house and let him stay while we grabbed some supplies and decided to walk around and check on the others. We made it a habit and made sure that our truck was easy to prepare for winter and rough weather." she grins.
a loud clank and they turn to see a large piece of wood and branches at the bottom of the chimney. Dani grins as she looks up into it "check the top and if the closing and opening mechanism is stillwhole! You guys will need that to keep the snow out."
a moment of silence before confirmation that it is still moving and seems whole. Dani nods and says she will test the handle and to say if anything sounds weird or seems to move weird. They get through the test and moments later dust is down with them.
Dani grins at Ellie "My lady. if you could."
Ellie grins as she walks over to the fire place and with just a few quick hadn movements the fire is ablaze.
Cross blinks "you have fire magic?"
ellie giggles "nah. just the skills to start one!"
dani nods "she is a born arsonist. sadly she is lawful good." ellie nudges her in the side.
Dani grins as Ellie giggles before she shoots them a smile "You guys good? We need to be on our way to check the others. there are always people with little wood or food or blankets and we want to check everyone."
Dani nods "We just came here first because... well it is you guys's first winter here. if you didn't expect the blizzard it can cause for issues."
Horror shakes his skull "we are good." whihc is when they hear sleepy mutters from their nest and killer actually pushes the blanket back to show nightmare rubbing his sockets with a tiny frown. clearly free from his forced half hibernation he had been almost kicked into.
Horror lets out a breath of relieve and mutters "we are good..."
Dani and ellie share a look and nod before leaving a very cheap looking phone with them "in case of you guys need anything else."
Cross frowns and points at their land line "the phone is out."
Dani nods "we know. that is an upgraded walky talky."
ellie grins "while the phone towers can be knocked out these babies are sturdy! They also are limited though. which is why you can only call us using that one but we are by far the most mobile in this weather." and she puffs her chest up proudly
Dani smiles "just give us a call if you need anything." she nudges Ellie "we need to get moving. we don't want to have to drive through a dark snowstorm."
and the two leave again. They both climb into their truck, which really is just their normal truck but with large wheels. before the drive off. huh. seems like the almost flat tires give them drip to get through the loose snow and over the icy roads.
Horror makes a mental note to find a way to thank them before acutally makign a note on their to-do list instead.
afterwards they sit in their nest and just listen to the fire crackle as the storm rages on.
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FUCK what I said about the majority of significant changes to dialogue in Re:CoM being to adjust Axel's characterization, the most egregious change is actually this
(GBA CoM)
(Re:CoM)
if I had to guess, the reason for this change was because in GBA CoM, The Superior was a spooky, unknown being at the head of this Organization we had very little knowledge on, and for Vexen, the guy who runs his mouth constantly about how much better he is than the others, to be terrified of him, he must be some pretty scary dude. But then after kh2 we know him, it's Xemnas, he's very dramatic, he likes to talk to the moon, and the effect of your mind filling in the gaps about what "The Superior" must be like is gone. So it wasn't really necessary anymore, right?
(rest under cut because it's long)
Except... the way they changed it is so weird. In the GBA version, what's happening is pretty clear:
Marluxia tells Vexen that his project is a failure
Vexen demonstrates that he does not give a shit about Marluxia's opinion
he does care very much about The Superior's opinion, though, and Marluxia uses this to blackmail him into eliminating Sora- an action which is nonsensical, as the entire point of what they're doing needs Sora alive, making it clear to everyone in the room that he is deliberately sending Vexen to die
and then after that, when Vexen shows up to fight Sora, he goes "if you want to fight me for real you've gotta do it in the memories from the other side of your heart lol bye" and Sora goes "huh? other side?" and then it cuts to a scene on the top floor:
and then this gets more into subtext but here, Vexen has realized he's totally fucked and his only hope is to mess directly with Marluxia's plans (well, they were the Organization's plans, but it's pretty obvious by now Marluxia's abusing his power for his own purposes) by giving Sora more information than he should know. This does get the traitor gang worried enough to send Axel to go kill him (as opposed to just letting Sora take care of him, which was presumably the original plan)- he very specifically cuts Vexen off to keep him from saying too much (this is retained between the original and the remake)
Anyway, what happens in Re:CoM sort of follows the same order of events, but everything is changed slightly in a way that just makes things more confusing.
Marluxia tells Vexen his project is a failure and Vexen demonstrates that he doesn't give a shit about Marluxia's opinion, as before
Marluxia threatens Vexen with a weapon, rather than threatening to tell the Superior
this, notably, does not seem to faze Vexen very much. he continues to run his mouth while having the scythe pointed at him.
Xemnas is still leveraged- Marluxia points out it was the Superior who entrusted him with the castle
...even though reasonably Vexen would already be aware of this, and has still demonstrated that he has zero respect for Marluxia despite it
the lines about betraying the Organization being a capital crime are retained, probably because it's super relevant later, but then that line of thinking is abandoned in favor of Marluxia and Larxene just taunting Vexen instead
The part where Marluxia says "do it. you won't" could be seen as a sort of threat... if not for Axel's line: "You give a challenge like that to Vexen and he'll seriously want to eliminate Sora." It frames it all as though Vexen went to fight Sora out of some sort of pride.
And look, Vexen may have a temper and a superiority complex, but he's not stupid. They're obviously baiting him. Plus, what happened to him seeing himself as above the others and countering things he doesn't like with "well actually I'm higher ranked than you and also you're an idiot"? Is he that insecure in his fighting capabilities? I could deal with characterization changes doing him dirty if it didn't also make no sense in the context of the plot.
So now we have Vexen going to try to kill Sora, something that really makes no sense to do, out of pride. What was the purpose of sending Sora to Twilight Town? Also pride, over the fact that he managed to get that information? Giving the writing the benefit of the doubt, I could say that these nonsensical actions can be explained as evidence that Nobodies can have hearts and people with hearts do strange and rash things, but that just feels like a reach, which is bad because what they had in GBA CoM worked perfectly fine and made sense without any reaching for the "idk emotions make you do strange things" explanation.
It continues. After Vexen gives Sora the Twilight Town card in Re:CoM and Sora wonders about what the "other side" means, this is that version of the conversation the top floor members have:
...what? "If Sora disappears, that would mess up the Organization's plans"? what are you worried about? the only reason Sora would disappear is if Vexen killed him. there's no way they think Vexen being in Twilight Town would give him an advantage, right? they know he's a pathetic fighter. "Vexen has clearly committed a treasonous act against the Organization" HOW? HOW IS IT CLEAR? they don't express any worry about Sora learning too much, up until Axel says "I came to stop you from talking too much" when killing Vexen- and that being there makes it seem like they were worried about Sora learning to much, but if that's the case, why would they replace the perfectly serviceable lines in the above scene? it's just... baffling that they would want to lean into the narrative that Vexen going to kill Sora (which he'd been goaded into doing) is the problem here, because it just makes so little sense compared to what it was originally.
once again giving them the benefit of the doubt: Marluxia's real plan was to take over the Organization, and he saw an easy way to pick off one of the members, so he took it. the motive for stopping Vexen doesn't actually matter.
buuuuut it's the same as with Vexen earlier. Marluxia may be too self-absorbed and power-hungry to notice Axel is scheming against him, but he, too, is an intelligent man. he's plotted for a while, getting into Xemnas's good graces in order to be put in charge of the Castle. this is incredibly sloppy for him. I guess it could be said that getting so close to his goal would make him sloppy, but again, if they'd just left things the way they were in GBA CoM, I wouldn't even have to be saying this
in conclusion: GBA Chain of Memories' intra-Organization strife subplot is so tightly woven with calculated moves on all sides that Re:CoM changing certain things without taking into consideration the consequences makes certain parts of the plot fall flat and become far more confusing than in the original story
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