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squishmallow36 · 11 months

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It's all I wish to hear tonight, and you're all I wish to be, and this is how we all fall - Chapter Two

Summary: the garvar fic has turned garvarioli! We've done a bit of a time skip because I didn't want to write the dating and the blushing and the getting to know each other blah blah blah. So now they're just in a relationship and the fact I didn't feel the need to slowburn it is astonishing to me. Anyway Garwin's gonna be joining the Neverseen officially. Yeah that's pretty much the whole plot.

Word count: 3011

TW: drug mention, murder mention, implied sex, swearing. This is the farthest into pg-13 territory I've gone but these idiots demand it.

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @remember-me-in-another-time @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake

The people who aren't on my taglist and I'm sorry for bothering you but you lost your minds on the last chapter so uh you did this to yourself (?): @camelspit @tw-5

On Ao3 (users only because, you know, AI) or below the cut

Previous chapter in case you missed it, but you don't really need it to read this :)

“You know, if you ignore all the work camps, Sadlitzagvadtka is a lovely place,” Alvar remarks.

Ruy’s laugh drags Garwin’s attention from the bubbling Eventide River, bright green as it crashes against the rocks.

“I mean, you could say the same thing about the USSR,” Garwin muses.

“Yes, but we ignore those parallels, love. I don’t want to have to send you to the gulag.” Alvar replies, crossing one leg over the other as he takes a sip of his choyi.

Much like most of the foods of the non-Forbidden Cities, choyi looks nothing like how it tastes. The sludgy green slime is in a direct contrast to its strawberry lemonade milkshake flavor. Although how it doesn’t curdle is apparently “beyond human comprehension.”

That’s just code for “we don’t know and we don’t want to admit it.” It was annoying at first, but it’s kind of become a running joke.

What the rest of the Neverseen doesn’t seem to grasp is that he does the same thing to them whenever he doesn’t feel like telling them about some cursed human shit.

They absolutely lost their shit when he told them about Twinkies. If they can’t handle apocalypse-proof snack cakes, there’s a hundred other food crimes several points higher on a logarithmic scale they won’t be able to conceptualize without their pathetic little elvin brains shattering.

Like pineapple on pizza.

Garwin can’t physically have less of an opinion, but the idea of having to explain the concept to elves makes him want to jump off a cliff. And not in the Sophie-teleportation way.

Hey--don’t think about that bitch. First she’s accepted into Yale with a full scholarship and now she has four abilities. Apparently she’s some sort of science experiment. I hope they transposed a decimal place.

“What am I in for tomorrow?” Garwin asks after a moment of silence.

Alvar opens his mouth, but Ruy interrupts him before he gets the chance. “Cállate, mi vida. Sharing any details would be a violation of the Neverseen code article seven, section three, ‘the council is always watching so don’t discuss confidential shit in public.’”

“I call bullshit. You people are nowhere near organized enough to have an official code.”

“Well, yes,” Alvar concedes. “But it’s more fun if you don’t know what’s going to happen. Besides, I’m sure Fintan has cooked up some interesting changes from when we swore fealty, so anything we tell you could be completely wrong by now.”

“Yes, but I’m sure at least one of you have been involved in the planning,” Garwin argues.

“We can neither confirm nor deny that,” Ruy says, admitting his guilt.

Garwin rolls his eyes. I picked these dumbasses over going to a nice, normal, human, non-ivy league school ? I mean--at least there’s no finals. I guess.

He takes a sip of his choyi.

“I promise it won’t be that painful,” Alvar says in an effort to remedy the situation, earning himself a glare from Ruy.

Garwin leans forward, head resting in his cupped hands. “And when did you become such a goody little two shoes rule follower, Exilium boy?”

Ruy rolls his eyes behind his addler, because of course he has it on. We’re in public--well, sort of, as there literally aren’t any ogres in a hundred foot radius--and that means we’ve gotta wear the addler.

It’s like how Garwin also conditioned himself to wear the same sweatshirt almost every single day one school year like it’s his own personal security blanket but we don’t talk about that.

But now the elves have stupid capes, so that solves that problem. Even if he doesn’t have an officially licensed Neverseen cape until probably tomorrow. Unless there’s some elaborate scheme being planned. Which of course there will be. This is what happens when you take three or more gay idiots and tell them to plan something.

If it ain’t absolute batshit, what’s the fucking point?

Alvar’s smile falls as he pulls out his Imparter. He must be getting harassed once again. This is why Garwin doesn’t have one. Well, that, and the fact that he’s not a legal resident of the Lost Cities. Same thing.

“Y’all can see that I’m busy right now so I can’t answer a hail, right?” he says tiredly.

“Yes, indeed.” Garwin throws back the last of his choyi, smiling.

“The Fork Man wants me for some shit and I’m having a good day, so he will be getting ignored for a while. Are we really sure I can’t come out to the Bullshit?”

“Bullshit” is Garwin’s nickname for the Black Swan because it both represents their ideology and, at least in English, they can be abbreviated the same way. At least his pathetic short human life will be worth something, even if it is just an inside joke that’s more explanation than it’s worth.

“You know what Fintan’s orders are, and if you don’t wanna get burnt to a crisp, I’d recommend following them. Now, that doesn’t mean he knows what he’s doing. It’s just a matter of self preservation. I don’t make the rules around here. If I did, we’d have to replace more Councillors than just the one.”

Alvar rolls his eyes at his Imparter. “The Fork Man is being very insistent. I have a feeling I’m gonna have to drop you two off at home and talk to him. Be prepared for some shit to be going down soon, regardless of whether or not I have a chance to share details.” He turns to his imparter, inventing new swear words just to curse at the Fork.

Like he said, Alvar drops Ruy and Garwin off at “home”--their assigned room at a Neverseen facility Garwin’s not allowed to know any details about--to much argument. He shan’t be allowed to have all the fun without them but alas, ‘tis the way the world works sometimes.

The next morning, Garwin sleepily blinks himself back to the land of the living, snuggled into the crook of Ruy’s neck, but there’s no Alvar to be found.

He better fucking be okay.

Ruy’s hand absently twirls Garwin’s hair, and when he notices that Garwin is slightly less dead to the world than usual, he smiles. “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.”

“It’s still morning? Damn. Guess I gotta go back to sleep. Need my beauty rest.”

“Bitch, no amount of sleep is gonna help.”

Garwin huffs, turning away from Ruy. “Fuck you.”

“So soon after last night, mi amor?”

Garwin leans back to look at him. “You’re insufferable, you know that?”

“Yeah.” Ruy presses a soft kiss to his lips. God damn. If you weren’t so fucking hot, J wouldn’t put up with you. Love you, Rue.

Garwin kisses him again, pulling him close.

Ruy gently pushes him back. “Finny’s gonna be pissed if we miss the prescheduled time.”

“Fuck Finny.”

“Look, I get that you’re polyam. I know, no shit, Sherlock. But there is no way I’m going anywhere near him or near you again if you do. Man’s got his own harem.”

“Ooh, please do elaborate.”

“Let’s see…I’ve heard rumors that he and Bronte are or were a thing. Not sure if they’re still a thing though, considering the war crimes, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they were. And then have you ever wondered about the alliance with the Ogres? Dimitar. Fintan. Yeah. Then there’s Fallon, one of the original three Councillors. And I’m not completely sure on this one but there’s a prisoner in Lumenaria and I’ve got mixed evidence but I don’t doubt it. Uh, then there’s J.R.R. Tolkien. You might’ve heard of him because he’s a human. And how could we forget Shakespeare. He’s…also a human. If I remember correctly. I’m sure there’s more that I’m missing because I have actively tried to ignore everything, but yeah.”

With each name, Garwin regrets his life choices more and more. And more. “What the fuck do you mean Shakespeare? Like, the one of the William variety? The playwright?”

“Yeah. Sometimes Finny drops into iambic pentameter just to make us suffer. Are you really sure you want to be exposed to all of the Neverseen drama?”

“Might gouge my eyes out but, eh, whatever. Sounds fun. If Yale doesn’t want me I guess I’ll have to cause large amounts of havoc instead.”

Ruy smiles. “I’m going to go foraging for some semblance of a breakfast that doesn’t taste like dogshit. Don’t cause too much havoc while I’m gone.”

“No promises.”

Ruy shakes his head as he gets up, joints singing the song of his people--the Rice Crispy elves.

Garwin throws on some clothes and inhales breakfast before he’s led to a hideout he’s never seen before.

This one is really fucking bleak and really fucking disappointing. There’s probably tetanus on every surface of the grimy, ragged brick walls. It’s the exact kind of place where you should expect to have your body never found, but honestly if they’ve waited this long to kill him, that’s kind of their own poor planning.

A set of stairs leads into the even more murder-y looking abyss below.

Having no better options, Garwin slowly begins to make his way down without slipping on the mossy, uneven stairs and falling and bonking his head and dying.

At the bottom, he finds a room, larger than it seems like it should be, lit entirely by flickering, yellow candlelight. It catches on bottles of what appears to be wine set into racks every few feet or so.

He will never admit that this reminds him of a short story he was forced to read--and perhaps even enjoyed reading--in ninth grade English.

As Garwin steps closer to the middle of the room where a space has haphazardly cleared, he notices the first of many cloaked figures, white eyed lapels glowing in the dim light.

In total, around a dozen figures surround him, and he searches for Ruy in the crowd. Well, it’s not exactly a crowd, per se, but it feels like one in the cramped space.

It doesn’t take much effort to find him, with his long, dark hair curling out and escaping the hood.

That being said, Garwin can tell who most of the figures are without trying. From Umber’s absolutely sunny disposition to Fintan’s concave ass, it’s not exactly difficult. It’s just a little dissatisfying that Alvar isn’t there.

Fintan lowers his hood like it’s some huge reveal, whispering ominously, “Garwin Chang. You wish to join our order?”

Garwin nods. “That’s…kind of why I’m down here. Although these wine bottles do look like they could be some fun.”

A low, overprotective growl echoes behind him as his fingers trace the label written in fancy Trollish. One of the many, many languages not on Duolingo that no one bothered to teach him how to read. Hell, most of the time he can barely read English but that’s an issue for a different day.

“I trust you know you’re the first non-member of an intelligent species to join our ranks in a long while,” Fintan says. Garwin’s hand falls to his side.

“I wouldn’t exactly call Ruy intelligent, but okay.”

That got a couple of snickers out of the crowd and a death glare from Ruy despite most of his face being cast in shadow.

“Well, you got me there. I was prepared to make a convoluted line of reasoning like I’m hopped up on a cola before all of those pesky safety regulations were introduced, but you made it for me instead.”

Wait, is he an old man bitching about New Coke or is referring to when the recipe had cocaine? Or just…caffeine? And sugar? Any of the above interpretations are fucking hilarious, so it doesn’t matter which is true. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t an objectively best answer.

“The rest of the requirements are simple: do you promise to do everything in your power to help our world?”

“Yeah, sure. Why not?” Garwin shrugs, smirking.

“Convince me.” Fintan’s icy gaze stares into Garwin’s soul. A threat behind his words.

“I’ve been seeing Alvar and Ruy for months on end now. Do you really think I would go through all of that if I wasn’t committed? I could’ve blackmailed my way into a Yale scholarship long ago, but I’ve stayed. And for what? Because I almost care about this place not being a shithole. Also because there aren’t any taxes but we don’t need to mention that.”

“Yeah, the cost of living is real fucking low when you’re mooching off of Alvar,” Ruy mutters.

Cállate.

…Holy fuck, Ruy has infected my brain. I don’t like this. How dare he keep sprinkling Spanish into everyday conversation? It’s like he wants to prove that he’s not an idiot to this human idiot because he knows, like, four words in a human language.

In reality, it’s because he lived in an undisclosed Spanish-speaking country during his time at Exilium and hasn’t broken the habit. But why be reasonable when you can be petty and bitter because he knows more Spanish than you do even after taking it for three years?

To be completely fair, he didn’t pay attention and convinced a kid to send him pictures of the homework and cheated on the tests, but in his defense, he didn’t realize he’d need it later in life. At least Google Translate exists all of its glorious inaccuracy.

“I bestow upon thee thou official codename: Elay.” Fintan says, bowing his head. “Alvar came up with it so don’t ask me what it means. Normally each person gets to pick out their own, but he was insistent and it’s not important enough to me to argue with him.”

Yeah, that sounds about right. Gonna have to ask Alvar about it later. Maybe he’s avoiding me because he doesn’t want a full interrogation in the middle of this murder chamber. Yeah--let’s go with that. It’s better than imagining him in a Black Swan murder chamber.

Fintan takes a metal rod and heats it until it glows a faint red, bright in the dim light, knighting Garwin. And thankfully not sizzling his ears off in the process.

Fintan nods at a hooded figure Garwin only knows by his codename and that he’s a guster. “Trix, if you please?”

Trix hands Garwin a bundle of dark fabric, emblazoned with a bright white eye.

It unfolds like the little bitch folded things always are, causing unattached pieces of concerningly neon fabric to fall to the ground.

As Garwin reaches to pick them up, it becomes all too clear that they’re not only bright pink and orange but also a very, very 80s leotard and legwarmers.

What the actual everliving fuck?

…and also maybe Fintan did mean New Coke.

It’s up to the stars above to decide which is a worse revelation.

“You know, Ruy, if you wanted me to wear this, you could’ve just asked. No need for all of this.”

Ruy flips him off. He’s probably glare-smiling behind the hood though.

Garwin drapes the cloak part of the Neverseen uniform around his shoulders. It’s wonderfully heavy, like a weighted blanket, but surprisingly breathable. It’s probably made from a gnomish fabric which is weird because the gnomes hate their guts as much as plants are capable of hate.

And now I’ll finally be allowed to know why that is.

The crowd begins shifting around him, escaping slowly up the narrow steps and light leaping away to god knows where, and soon only Ruy and Garwin are left.

“I got an update from Alvar,” Ruy smiles mischievously. “This should be a fun first assignment for you.”

No fewer than three light leaps later, Garwin is in the Lodestar system, standing in front of a blonde boy with ice blue eyes. He’s immediately recognizable from Alvar’s stash of pictures he keeps to pretend like he’s still connected to his family.

He also knows Sophie, a regrettable decision.

“Meet our new son: Keefe,” Alvar says, mussing his hair.

Keefe flinches away. “Bitch, I’m literally only, like, six years younger than you,” he complains. “Also hasn’t my dad fucked your dad?” He puts air quotes around both uses of “Dad.” Fun family dynamic and it hasn’t even been five minutes yet.

“I do believe I was the one who told you about that.” Alvar turns to Ruy and Garwin. “I’ll take first shift babysitting.”

“Nonsense. I don’t trust Garwin nearly enough to be by himself and you’ve been up all night causing problems and destroying half of Ravagog--”

“--which is a perfectly normal way to spend an evening, thank you very much.”

“--so you will be going home and you will take a nap. I’ll make sure Blondie here doesn’t have any tricks up his sleeve.”

There’s a glint on Alvar’s eye that looks like he wants to argue, but a yawn cuts him off before he gets the chance.

Garwin almost has to physically drag him back home, partially from him being tired and partially from him not wanting to go to bed because some days he acts like a toddler.

“Sorry I couldn’t be at your coronation today.”

Garwin kisses his cheek. “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure sooner or later, Ruy’s gonna end up doing a whole reenactment except I actually get walled into the wine cellar this time.”

Alvar laughs halfheartedly.

“And, besides. It’s not like it’s gonna change much. Do I still hate the elvin government? Yes. Is the Bullshit still a bunch of useless dumbasses? Yes. Are you still going to tell me shit that’s way above my pay grade? Abso-fucking-lutely. It’s just now I don’t have to steal your cape when it’s cold out. But I will anyway for old times’ sake.”

“Unmapped stars, you’re such a little shit.”

Well, if you can’t make your boyfriend regret being with you, what’s the fucking point?

“And yet you’ve repeatedly chosen to not leave me to die in the middle of the neutral territories. So who’s the real winner here?”

Alvar sighs, shaking his head.

God damn, he’s cute when he’s annoyed.

#kotlc #garvar #garvarioli #kotlc alvar #kotlc garwin #kotlc ruy #alvar vacker #garwin chang #ruy ignis #kotlc fanfic

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squishmallow36 · 11 months

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It's all I wish to hear tonight, and you're all I wish to be, and this is how we all fall down - Chapter Three

Summary: Garvarioli but it's Alvar's character arc in Flashback and Legacy. Also please send help I accidentally made a character arc out of disconnected oneshots.

Word Count: 3040

TW: swearing, Alvar's troll goop illness, death

And bonus Garvar tags: @tw-5 @camelspit

On Ao3 (users only because, you know, AI) or below the cut

Previous chapter :) in case you missed it

Garwin stares up at his ceiling, watching the fan slowly rotate around. Yes, he gets blinded by the light being on at the center, but that’s preferable to reloading his Imparter screen every two seconds for an update from Alvar.

No less than three hours ago, he got summoned by Fintan, and the last time he was gone this long, he brought back a kid. That better not happen again.

Garwin doesn’t have the patience to deal with a child. Or Ruy. It’s basically the same thing, but at least Ruy can scavenge for his own meals most of the time.

He may have developed an unhealthy habit of going to the Forbidden Cities and flexing his extensive Spanish vocabulary at least three times a week, but, hey, at least he brings food home most of the time, so Garwin can’t complain.

How he’s able to get food with an addler on is also questionable. As is how he acquired human money to pay for it, cause it sure as hell ain’t coming from Garwin’s extremely broke bank accounts.

With that thought, the sound of a correct Duolingo answer echoes through the silent room. However annoying it may be, it keeps Ruy entertained, so, once again, Garwin can’t complain.

But sometimes he does anyway.

“Have you lost your headphones again?”

“No. I know right where they are. I just can’t move to get them with someone laying on top of me.”

That is a valid point, which is why it should be ignored at all costs.

“Oh no! Whomever could that be?” Garwin asks, shifting to his side to snuggle in closer. And stare at Ruy. Both things that are very important to do.

He’s so pretty.

Garwin may very well have dozed off much to Ruy’s dismay, because the next thing he knows, the orange light of sunset is shimmering through the windows.

Ruy and Alvar are deep in conversation, speaking in low voices presumably not to disturb him.

Ruy ruffles his hair. “Good evening, mi corazón.”

Garwin yawns. “What did I miss?”

Alvar opens his mouth to explain, but Ruy beats him to it. “Your boyfriend told Finny about his batshit amnesia plan.”

“Oh, he’s my boyfriend now? Why do I always have to deal with him when he’s being an idiot?”

“Because you didn’t get accepted to Yale.” Ruy presses a kiss to Garwin’s temple.

Garwin rolls his eyes. The first time it was funny. The 8123rd time? Significantly less so. Half of those were his own self-deprecating jokes, so he does share some of the blame, but that’s less satisfying than projecting his problems onto everyone else.

Garwin looks at Alvar. “You do realize this is a really, really fucking bad idea, right?”

“Alden’s hiding something. Unless you have a better plan, I’ve had more than enough of that man’s bullshit. Whatever the ‘Vacker Legacy’ entails, I’m sure it’s going to be messy, and I think the trade off is more than worth it.”

“What if you’re fucked up irreparably? What if something goes wrong with your memories?”

“Bold of you to assume I’m not already fucked up irreparably, and, well, I fell in love with y’all the first time. I’ll do it again if I have to.”

That’s the exact kind of answer Garwin was hoping he wasn’t going to answer.

That’s the exact kind of answer that isn’t going to take any form of criticism. And once Alvar has his mind set on something, it might be possible to stop him, but Garwin hasn’t figured out how yet and it’s unlikely he ever will.

Garwin looks at Ruy. “Bitch, I don’t know.”

Ruy stres into his soul, betrayal etched into every line. “Dude. You were supposed to fix him. Fix him. Make him, I don’t know, not an idiot?”

“What do you want me to do? I can’t convince him to do shit. I can’t even convince him to give me the fucking remote.”

This is a real, actual issue Garwin has to go through every single day. He suffers so much for it. He’s the human here, and it’s not like any of the intelligent species produce their own TV shows or movies or whatever. He’s the only one with any personal experience watching human media his entire life, and yet that isn’t enough to dictate what is and is not watched.

“Well, to be fair, your taste in movies is horrendous.”

“That’s not fair. That’s not fucking fair at all. And now out of spite I am going to leave you two to your own devices.”

He could choose to worry about Alvar, but worrying won’t accomplish anything. So might as well go along with his dumb shit because then at least you can have an idea of what he’s doing.

Then when he realizes he’s bad at making life choices, you can tell him I told you so.

And then you’re the moral high ground.

…At least until you do something stupid. And so the cycle continues.

The first week without him, it’s just like he’s on a normal Neverseen mission. Well, at least normal in comparison to other things they’ve done.

Gisela took over again, Sophie and co. fucked up Atlantis. The usual. Actually, technically, Ruy undid the force fields and Sophie found a hydrokinetic friend to just like. Hold the water in place. Because that makes logical sense. Fluid physics definitely works like that. But Garwin chooses to blame Sophie because he can.

One of the very few times Garwin wishes there was some form of news or social media in the cities is when Alvar is found by the Bullshit and promptly scheduled for a tribunal. You know, completely normal shit.

It’s ruled that he’s going to get to go back to Everglen. Which was the goal. So that is a good thing. Even if Garwin isn’t too excited about it because Fitz is probably going to slit Alvar’s throat in his sleep.

Why are the elves so pretentious that they have to name their houses? Eh, whatever. It’s probably more effort to ask than it’s worth.

At least it’ll be fun watching Mr. Golden Boy Vackerpants getting himself banished again or Exiled. Unmapped stars, that would be so fucking hilarious.

The real trouble with Alvar being gone is that it keeps going for literal fucking months on end.

Him moving in got postponed because Umber needed to practice with their shadowflux bending with actual people and, well, Sophie and Fitz were good targets. At least it can still be on schedule for the Lunar festival thing that happens during the lunar eclipse.

Ruy definitely didn’t have lasting damage from seeing that. Definitely. If elves are supposed to break when they see blood and/or gore, he should be so far gone he doesn’t know where he started, but maybe he’s just cool like that. Or the exilium training did that. Or the Neverseen has made him desensitized to things.

Or watching Sharknado every time Garwin manages to claim the remote…maybe Alvar and Ruy have a point about his choice in media to consume.

Nah. They just don’t understand the concept of so-bad-it’s-funny.

The Second One--no, seriously, that’s the subtitle--in all of its horrific magnificence comes out while Alvar is notably still absent, and while it may be sacrilege to watch it without him, the sharknado is too strong and Garwin is too weak to resist temptation.

The Celestial Festival finally comes on October seventh and eighth because nights do that sometimes so long as google is to be trusted to know what day it is.

But what happens during the Celestial Festival is nowhere near according to plan, instead being filled with fucked up troll babies.

Garwin is assigned the job of floating around in the crowd at the festival itself because he’s a useless pathetic human, so he gets the privilege of watching both of his boyfriends risk their lives in glorious technicolor.

Ruy escapes unharmed aside from a bit of splatter from Umber and a shit ton of inevitable nightmares, but Alvar is another story.

In all of the chaos, his memories are returned, so he’s left to figure all that shit on his own while avoiding mutant trolls, both the newly hatched ones and the ones named Fitz.

And it turns out, the one named Fitz is the one to watch out for. Who would have thought? This would have been a great time for an I told you so if it wasn’t so fucking terrifying.

Garwin starts praying to every single god he can think of, from human ones to the entire fucking troll pantheon and even Ogdy of the gnomes because apparently they have their own tree god thing, not just the magic four seasons tree thing.

If there’s such a being that can control the fate of the universe like that, he hopes it has a sense of humor because that’s the only way out of this.

He ignores Gisela’s screeching and leaps to Candleshade--their pre-discussed meeting place should shit go down--because shit has most certainly gone down and begins pacing. It’s not long before Ruy arrives, but it could’ve been hours for how long it felt.

Hours feel like years until the first rays of dawn begin flickering across the horizon and a troll goopy Alvar-shaped mound shambles toward them.

Garwin won’t admit it, but tears escape his eyes when he sees Alvar and tackles him in a hug that probably was a bad idea in hindsight.

A shower and a hot meal can do a lot to revitalize a person. That being said, the hot meal is Kraft mac and cheese, so it’s not exactly the most homecooked of meals, but it's better than burning a kitchen down. Even if Keefe would absolutely fucking love seeing its childhood home burned to the ground, it’s much more fun when the arson is intentional.

There’s no way to tell how bad the reaction from the Neverseen will be or if they’re even technically members anymore after everything that’s gone down. So, being the semi-responsible one of them by comparison, Ruy figures they should stock up on food, and that means human food because the gnomes are still pissed about the whole attempted genocide thing.

Which, in all fairness, does make sense.

While he’s gone, Garwin and Alvar make themselves at home by borrowing into one of the bedrooms, becoming so blanket burritoed it’s likely they’ll never be seen again.

Garwin cups his hand to Alvar’s cheek, whispering, “I’m glad you’re not dead.”

Alvar presses a soft kiss to his lips. “Thanks.”

Normally he’d be full of sarcasm, but this time it’s genuine and that scares Garwin more than he’d like to admit.

Because once the sardonic walls are gone, then actual emotions may have to be accessed, and that’s not fun.

“How are you doing? Considering everything?”

“Great.”

He’s fine. That means he’s fine.

It’s easier thought than believed though.

Alvar elaborates, “I mean I couldn’t really figure out why my brother hated my guts so much the entire time I had zero memories or why the fuck Darek was so hot because apparently I forgot gay was an option.”

Garwin laughs, remembering the near-fistfight that ensued between Ruy and Alvar over which of the councillors is most fuckable and let’s just say it became a forbidden topic. And also good motivation for taking the government down because they aren’t fucksble until that stupid no relationships rule is abolished.

Well, technically, nothing happens so long as you don’t get caught, but that’s beside the point.

And for the record, Darek’s the hot one. Ruy can suck Terik’s dick but that doesn’t change the truth.

“Lots of confusion overall. Still trying to put the pieces back together because they are nowhere near chronological order. Also feeling a lot of emotions in this Chili’s tonight and it’s been a while since I’ve had emotions so I’m still trying to deal with that.”

“Would you like me to go harass some other room in this place?”

“No!” he answers, too loud and too fast, terror shining in his eyes.

Garwin takes his hand, squeezing gently.

Alvar takes a shaky breath. “Don’t leave me alone. I don’t want--I can’t think about being in that place again. You’re a good distraction.”

“Everglen or the Troll hive?”

“Yes.” Alvar smirks. “Both of them have my murderous little brother, so is there really that much of a difference? Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of him for willing to do what needs to be done, but that anger can be aimed in a better direction.”

“I feel like it would be funny if you were like ‘I lived, bitch’ and then sent him ideas of how to be more of an anarchist.”

Alvar smiles--the first since his return. “Hey, Fitz, I know you tried to kill me but here’s a to-do list. One: realize like half your anger is just repressed queerness and you’re pissed because I have two whole boyfriends and you’ve got that probably comphet whatever the fuck is going on with Sophie. Two: fuck up that matchmaking system because damn the eugenics are strong with this one. Three: figure out how to ask out that Dex kid you were so insistent about for reasons likely related to item one. Four: profit.”

“Is the Dex kid the strawberry blond that’s for some reason friends with the Sophie?”

“Good job, you remembered one person’s name. I’m proud of you.”

He’s only at three-quarters the normal sarcasm level, which is, once again, honest-to-god terrifying.

He just needs time. Everything will be fine. He’s had a long day. He’ll be his usual asshole self in no time.

It’s just hard to not worry when he’s been gone for so incredibly fucking long.

What if something during that time has messed him up? He doesn’t seem to care that his brother literally tried to kill him, but what if he’s simply in denial? What will it be like when it becomes real?

What if Alden’s presence made him regress back into the closet? Nah. He seems just as gay as ever. That’s the only thing Garwin has any confidence in.

What about the council? They kept him in their prison for weeks on end and there’s no telling how many violations of the Geneva convention they could’ve committed, even despite the elves’ supposed inability to process violence.

Those councillors could’ve just wiped their own memories afterwards, and no one would be the wiser. Or used Goblins. And if Alvar chose to come forward about it--which seems unlikely now that he has his memories, he’d instead use it as fuel for his villain backstory--it would be his word against theirs, a surefire way to lose a legal battle.

“Hey, don’t hurt yourself. Think any harder and you might have smoke coming out your ears.”

See? Right there? He’s fine. But, once again, easier thought than believed.

He was fine after Dimitar’s torture, he’ll be fine after this. That’s what Garwin has to convince himself. Because he can’t let himself imagine what it means otherwise.

Alvar drifts off to sleep, and Garwin spends a long time studying his face, etching every last detail into his mind. His long eyelashes, his unusually unkempt hair, the stubble that’s just barely starting to make itself visible. His shamkniv scars.

He’s been through more shit than elves are supposed to be able to go through, but he’s still here.

And the cherry on top: he’s still an ass.

He is all right, at first. He’s all right for weeks. Some may argue that he’s even more insufferable than usual, but that could just be because both Ruy and Alvar became used to not having to deal with his snark every day.

Although, to be fair, they have had to tolerate each other, so it wasn’t that much of a break. It’s just funny when Alvar drops some deranged bullshit that’s a direct consequence of growing up with Alden. Like his stories of traveling in the human world. Man’s a fucking professional con artist to feed his caffeine addiction.

And then he starts to slow down, unnoticeably at first but accelerating faster than anyone would like to admit, taking more time to climb up the stars, his appetite going to shit, having a normal sleep schedule for once in his life. The occasional nap.

Garwin can see in Ruy’s eyes that he’s noticed the same things, but maybe if they don’t talk about it, it doesn’t exist.

By the time Sophie and Keefe come crashing over to look for god knows what, Alvar is barely strong enough to light leap. How he doesn’t completely fade away is anyone’s guess.

Garwin wishes he could just duct tape all of Alvar’s particles-cells-molecules-quarks together, but apparently that’s not how that works. Also duct tape probably wouldn’t be a safe choice for keeping an organic lifeform’s parts together, but that’s less of a concern.

And they’ve all simply agreed to not talk about it via the lack of talking about it because they’re all firmly in the first stage of grief and not going anywhere anytime soon.

To someone who hasn’t gone through losing a whole ton of people in his life, Garwin can’t help but draw parallels to when his grandfather passed away about a year before he came to the lost cities.

Three weeks in the hospital.

The day-to-day details are fuzzy, even having hope most of the time, unlike with Alvar. But Garwin never went to see his grandfather. His parents wanted to protect him or something. But that’s a luxury he can’t afford this time, watching Alvar slowly decay like a zombie in front of his eyes.

There has to be a cure or a treatment or something we can do. This is elvin medicine for fuck’s sake! They always advertize how advanced they are compared to humans, but they can’t fucking fix this so what’s the point?

I’d give anything for him to be alright. I don’t care what it takes.

I got a lot of people I can blame.

And Sophie, you better believe you aren’t going to fucking take anything else from me.

#kotlc #kotlc fanfic #kotlc alvar #alvar vacker #kotlc ruy #ruy ignis #kotlc garwin #garwin chang #garvar #garvarioli #tw swearing

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squishmallow36 · 10 months

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It's all I wish to hear tonight, and you're all I wish to be, and this is how we all fall - Chapter five

Summary: The entire spectrum of human emotions. Feel free to complain if you do not experience an emotion while reading this. Also. This is the last chapter so it's a great time to binge read all of them.

Word count: 3091

Tw: major character death, Alvar's associated illness, minor canonical character death, alcohol mention, drugs mention, swearing

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum

Bonus Garvar tags because you haven't told me to stop: @tw-5 @camelspit

On Ao3 or below the cut!

Previous chapter in case you missed it :)

Garwin spends every spare minute he can searching, searching, searching for the intersection of five rivers. And he has a lot of spare minutes.

Alvar takes a lot of naps.

The hope of finding it dwindles as time goes on and Alvar keeps declining. It gets to the point that sometimes Garwin is afraid to leave him for a moment to track down a new lead.

Soon, Alvar is unable to leave Candleshade, then his bed. His crackling breathing is sometimes the only difference between sleeping and worse--but thinking about that outcome doesn’t do anything to help the situation.

Ruy knocks on the doorframe to one of the many studies in Candleshade, entering without permission and sinking into a plush chair across from Garwin.

Garwin tries to smile at him. It probably doesn’t work.

Ruy’s eyes are rimmed with red, which does pair nicely with the chair. He smiles just as painfully back at Garwin.

“Doesn’t his highness need a chaperone?”

“I needed to talk to you.” Ruy pauses, Adam's apple bobbing as he swallows. “I know you’re determined to find your five rivers, but, Garwin, it’s been weeks. If you were going to find it, you would have by now. I don’t want you losing your mind over this.”

Garwin puts his book down and smooshes himself into the chair next to Ruy, wrapping an arm around him and burying his face in Ruy’s hair.

Hot tears prickle at the back of Garwin’s eyes. The futility of all of this has been going around in his head for a while and Ruy just put it perfectly into words. “I know. But what else can I do? I don’t want to just watch him waste away if there’s a way I can make it stop.”

“I don’t know.” Ruy takes his free hand and ruffles Garwin’s hair.

“I have one final theory. It’s absolutely batshit but if I don’t try it, then I’m gonna blame myself forever.”

“This better not turn into a cycle of ‘just one more thing’ and before you know it, it’s been a week and a half.”

“It won’t. I promise. I’m out of leads to possible leads after this.” Garwin pauses. “If I’m not back before bedtime for whatever reason, please continue the Chronicles of Timothman. If you don’t, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Well, there will be a definite end if--nope. Deny the truth and it doesn’t exist.

Ruy nods solemnly. “Hail me if you need anything. I’ll be here until then. And by here I mean this chair specifically. I live here now.”

“It is a nice chair. Or maybe you’re a nice chair. Either way, I should get going before it gets dark because I’m an old man now and can’t be outside the house after sunset.”

“Congratulations. Antivampires will now have to be added to the lore of Timmothman.”

Garwin smiles amusedly. “That’ll be fun.” He kisses the top of Ruy’s head before he stands up, joints singing the song of his people for reasons unknown. It’s certainly not because they hurt, well at least more than the human body simply falling apart because it’s an evolutionary dumpster fire.

He ruffles Ruy’s hair before he heads down to find a starlight bottler device thingy. There has to be one somewhere around here, and sure enough, there’s one on the twenty-third floor.

Garwin drags it to a window because getting it to the elevator and outside would be more work and starts looking at the night sky for the unmapped stars.

‘Unmapped’ is a tad bit of a misnomer when they’re in the human Hyperion catalog.

With the other hand, he holds a star app up to the sky, lining up the shot. It might not be dark out, but the starlight bottler device thingy works anyway. This was discovered after Alvar just fucking forgot he had a project in the Universe and had to scrape it together during his lunch hour.

It makes sense because the sun is just a really close star so as long as the sensitivity is adjusted correctly, it still works.

And, sure enough, they’re perfectly lined up, just like the calendar in the Alden shit predicted. It might be a funny coincidence or maybe the metaphorical and literal stars are aligning because someone out there wants Alvar to live.

Garwin flips the switches and collects the light into a very not official bottle, glowing faintly green.

He holds it up to the light before checking that his Nexus is turned on, and steps through the beam of light.

The usual feathery sensation of light leaping is replaced by a feeling of being crushed under boulders. It’s also significantly darker than usual, a deep green haze covering the world that stays in the corners of his vision even after he’s spit out at the other end.

He blinks repeatedly, trying to clear it, and wouldn’t you know it? It’s Sophie fucking Foster and her doofy friends.

Garwin’s hands curl into fists at the sight of Fitz, nails digging crescents into his palms, but he has to stay focused. Unfocus is not an option here.

But god fucking damn that kid has taken enough from me.

Garwin tears his eyes away from them and takes in the scenery. Specifically the fact that there are several rivers--maybe even five--intersecting. It’s also weirdly quiet. Sophie and co. are talking and not bothering to be quiet but they’re completely silent.

Even nature itself is silent, no fluttering leaves making noises, no burbling river. It’s almost as though it’s holding its breath, and so is Garwin, waiting for Sophie and co. to notice him.

They have at least one responsible adult chaperone--Vespera--with them, and she does some weird shit to a tree. The world around Garwin flickers like he bonked a force field in the Hunger Games and he hides behind a convenient tree to avoid confrontation.

Some sort of illusion probably went down because now Sophie and co. are both able to be heard once again--albeit quieter than expected--and they can see the rivers. There’s also a nice pile of rocks they’ve chosen to comment about.

C’mon Sophie, you’ve fucking seen rocks before. Those exist in the human world, believe it or not.

Garwin waits and watches the drama as it goes down--from waddling into the rock pile to Gisela deciding to join the party to Vespera getting exploded to some dwarves kidnapping a goblin man to an almost stabbing of Godzilla.

Sophie must be friends with a psionipath because it certainly isn’t Ruy who takes down the forcefields around their little group as they swarm Godzilla.

Unfortunately, a gray-cloaked figure steps out from where they were living under a rock, proclaiming, “My name is Elysian, and I am the power source you are all here looking for.”

That’s just a tad bit pretentious, one part of his brain thinks.

The rest is simply screaming. Mostly screaming about Alvar. The solution is right fucking over there and kidnapping isn’t exactly the most war-crime-y of things Garwin has imagined.

He lets out a huff and Elysian, whose only distinguishing feature is a pair of big fucking naturals, turns to him.

Garwin leans against the tree, channeling Alvar’s sass as he smirks. “Nice to see you, Sophie. It’s been a while.”

She looks confused for just a second, her photographic memory failing her. Then she blinks and she’s even more confused, trying to reconcile her worlds colliding.

“Hey, Keefster. Nice to see you too. Done any fun running away from your problems recently?”

Keefe breaks eye contact, finding something interesting on the ground to study while trying to not smile.

“How do you know Keefe?” is all Sophie can manage.

“They were the younger sibling I never wanted back when they were in the Neverseen. Thanks again for making me put up with your hellspawn, Gissy.”

Gozdilla rolls her eyes. She’s so much like her son sometimes it’s hilarious. Of course, neither should not be told this because they both correctly believe that the other is insufferable.

“How the Exile do you two know each other then?” Keefe asks, and it’s difficult to tell if they’re asking Sophie or Garwin.

Sophie answers, “he was in my class back when I lived in San Diego. What I can’t figure out is why he’s here.”

“Well, it has a little something to do with Fitz and a little something to do with troll hives and a lot of something to do with a vague half-baked hope that Ely here can do something to solve all my life’s problems.”

Garwin hears Alvar’s voice in his mind saying You’re gonna beg that bitch to let you into Yale? He almost smiles.

“What did I do?” Fitz demands.

“Oh, do you not remember forcing Alvar into a cell in a troll hive? Yeah. He’s my boyfriend. Well, one of them. I’m also dating Ruy if you guys know him. That’s beside the point.”

Fitz stares at Keefe, locked in a telepathic conversation that’s almost certainly, “did you know this?” “Ye.” “What the fuck.” “What’s it to you?” “You didn’t think of telling me that my brother was dating…him?” “There were bigger issues at hand.”

Garwin smiles callously. “Thanks a whole metric fuckton, Fitzroy. Really appreciate it.” He turns to Elysian. “So, all-powerful power source. Can you fix him?”

“I--think so?” she replies, breasting boobily.

“Gonna need guarantees here sooner or later, babe.”

Sophie glances back and forth at her friends at Garwin’s absolute audacity to order Elysian around. Godzilla doesn’t seem too thrilled either. But they can go fuck themselves. They aren’t on anywhere near as tight of a timer as Garwin and he, frankly, would not fucking care even if they were.

Garwin shrugs off the tree and begins approaching Elysian, a leaping crystal to Candleshade in hand. It was a home crystal, once. But Candleshade hasn’t been a home in a long time.

Ely steps back, deep brown eyes glinting golden in the sunset from behind their hood. “I can’t leave this place.”

Garwin stops. Nope. Not when I’m this fucking close. “Can’t? Or won’t?”

Maybe taunting them isn’t the best idea considering he’s a pathetic human and they’re basically the gray equivalent of the genie from Aladdin. Plus tiddies.

But you know what? Let him get blown off the face of the Earth. If saving Alvar means sacrificing himself, then that’s what he’ll do.

Elysian looks back at her pile of rocks.

A wave of calm seriousness, almost desperation, washes over Garwin. “What do I have to do? I’ll give you anything. Just--,” his voice cracks, “--please.”

“I’m sorry. Maybe if you could bring him here--”

Garwin holds the leaping crystal up to the light before they get a chance to finish their sentence.

It simultaneously takes a year and a half and a quarter of a second to run all the way to their bedroom. Is the elevator broken? Is that why it’s taking so long? Hurry the fuck up you stupid piece of shit technology.

He disembarks, finding Ruy in the hallway and time stops.

Ruy is curled up against the closed door of their bedroom. His shoulders shake with violent sobs.

Garwin’s mind puts together the only answer. Alvar’s gone. Passed away. Dead. The euphemisms can’t disguise the absolute heart-wrenching realization that he’ll never see Alvar again.

His knees wobble under him, and he slides down to the floor next to Ruy, too numb to register the door casing digging into his back.

Ruy leans into his side, trembling.

They hold each other for stars know how long. The sun finishes setting and the stars glitter in the sky.

Ruy wipes his nose on Garwin’s sleeve, whispering in a voice rougher than gravel, “He’s--he’s gone.”

Ruy’s words send a spear into Garwin’s already aching heart. He pulls Ruy closer with his free arm. “Can I ask what happened?”

“When you left, he had been napping all afternoon. I don’t know if you heard him complaining about being cold earlier, but he was freezing when he woke up for dinner. He got up to go to the bathroom and made it back to the door frame. He couldn’t fucking breathe.” Ruy stops, a sob burying his face in Garwin’s shoulder. “I didn’t know what to do.”

“Oh, honey. I don’t think there was anything you could do. I’m just--I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you.”

“Don’t be sorry. You were trying to help. I still don’t fucking know what to do now. It was just so sudden. One minute he was fine, or as fine as he gets, and the next he was choking on his own lungs.”

Garwin shifts himself into a shaky standing position, helping Ruy get up. “Come on, I don’t want to get stuck on the floor.”

They’re probably going to eat ice cream and get drunk until reality no longer feels so claustrophobic.

There were also some references in the Alden shit to some elvin plants that sound like they’d be interesting to smoke.

Ruy and Garwin collapse into the objectively best couch three floors down and Ruy asks, “How did your expedition tonight go?”

Cue reality and memory smacking Garwin in the face. “I found the place. And the thing that would’ve theoretically saved him. If I had been just an hour earlier, we would be having a very, very different night tonight.”

Garwin lets Ruy process that because it’s a lot. Even when you’ve been raised conditioned for the impact of death because it is inevitable when you’re a human, it’s a lot.

“Do you still have Gisela’s contact information?”

“Yeah,” Ruy shifts to pull out his Imparter.

“May I borrow that for two minutes or less?”

Ruy nods, handing it over before swiping a tear off of Garwin’s cheek.

Garwin navigates to the unnecessarily hidden texting feature that is obscured by a horrible UI design and lets her know that she and Sophie can fight each other for custody over Elysian. Their services aren’t needed here anymore.

She doesn’t reply but it is left on read. Rude but to be expected.

Garwin gives it back and bundles Ruy into a boyfriend burrito with the blanket that usually lives on the back of the couch for exactly that reason.

“So now what?” Ruy whispers.

“Would you like a finale to the Chronicles of Timmothman?”

Ruy almost smiles, and Garwin takes that as a win. His chest still feels like it has a gaping hole but seeing that glint in Ruy’s eyes appeases it just a little bit.

“Let’s see. Where did we leave him? Ah, yes. Kidnapping children as revenge. Not at all because their parents were pieces of shit. Just because his home village no longer exists doesn’t mean there aren’t more fucked up villages nearby. In doing so, he’s incidentally adopted, like, a dozen children. Most of them aren’t older than five.”

“Oh, stars,” Ruy whispers, terror apparent in his voice.

“And all of them are ankle biters of chaos. Because they’re five. That’s just how that works. So now instead of having a nice, fulfilling life with his boyfriends, instead he gets to herd cats all day. “

“We should get a cat.”

“Put it on the list. Those parents were none too thrilled with the magic tricks of their disappearing children, and, eventually, when a child of one of the members of the higher class--I don’t know how village governments work. The guy’s like ten cents richer than everybody else so he’s basically their god aside from the Christianity they’ve inherited by virtue of being vaguely based on nineteenth century Germany.”

“Would their currency be measured in cents then?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care and I don’t want to find out. You get the fucking point. This guy’s kid gets kidnapped and well this can’t stand so I guess we’re going to have to venture into the evil bad forest to go find him. Side note: the town believes the kid simply wandered away because there can’t be any child stealing monsters in the forest. But it is also evil. Don’t ask.”

“Sounds perfectly accurate. Unreasonable, but accurate.”

“Yeah there’s a whole mob that goes into the forest. Nobody wants to deal with them and they don’t find jack shit. One guy in the mob wanders off never to be seen in the village again. He joins the Erlkönig polycule.”

“Honestly, goals.”

“I know, right. I feel like the new guy needs a name.” Garwin pauses, thinking.

“Is it too soon to name him Alvar?”

Garwin’s breath hitches. It’s probably way too soon but the themes. The narrative demands it. He almost starts crying again. “That’s perfect. Alvar lives a wonderful, luxurious life in der Erlkönig’s castle with Timmy and some other people that weren’t important enough to receive names. And they all lived happily ever after. It’s said, to this day, that if you go wandering long enough in the woods and you’re deemed worthy of finding them, eventually you’ll stumble upon der Erlkönig and his castle.”

“I’ve lived in the woods for many years. Checkmate.”

“Either they weren’t looking for new members or it was the fact you joined the Neverseen at fifteen and that would’ve been a fucked up relationship dynamic if you had found them.”

“I could’ve been an ankle biter.”

“You were already nine when you were banished. That’s four years too ancient. You’d be a menace for someone’s kneecaps by that point.”

“Yeah, I guess. Now I get to be a menace to society.”

Garwin smiles, pressing a kiss to Ruy’s forehead.

As he begins to drift off to sleep, the cold emptiness where Alvar is supposed to be curled against his other side is notably, eternally missing. And there’s no replacing him.

But wallowing isn’t going to solve this, so the only option is to move forward.

Ruy suddenly jolts awake. “Wait, I forgot to tell you.”

Garwin makes an interested noise.

“Alvar made me promise to let him tell you, but now…that isn’t exactly plausible. But, it turns out, with enough bribery and some too-long essays and definitely not forged recommendation letters, you’ve been accepted into Yale.”

It takes a whole second for Garwin to process this. It takes another whole second for him to stop mentally screaming and come up with a coherent response. Even if that response is kissing Ruy.

The future isn’t going to be easy, and it’s certainly unknown. But he’s got Ruy. And that’s what matters.

#kotlc #kotlc fanfic #garvar #garvarioli #kotlc garwin #garwin chang #kotlc alvar #alvar vacker #kotlc ruy #ruy ignis #IT'S OVER IT'S FINALLY OVER #I'M FREEEEEEEEEEE #tw caps in tags

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squishmallow36 · 10 months

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As promised here's Timmy from Garvar chapter 4. If you even care btw.

I spent way longer on this than I'd like to admit (~7 hours for one guy. Don't like that.)

I tried a couple of new things with this - mostly the undulating throne thing. I couldn't exactly find a reference I liked but this was close enough.

Look at my sahelanthropus tchadensis skull. Look at it.

The red circley things are a reference to how Timmy is secretly Mothman

Timmy is to me what Keefe is for Shannon. But also mothman.

Historical accuracy? What's that? (Shoes don't match the suit thing, hair's probably atrocious, etc etc)

#kotlc #kotlc oc #garvar #garvarioli #kotlc Timmy #he's never gonna be seen again

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squishmallow36 · 10 months

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It's all I wish to hear tonight, and you're all I wish to be, and this is how we all fall - Chapter four

Summary: call me Shannon the way I'm being incredibly wordy and only revealing like. Three things. This scene wasn't supposed to be this long. Anyway Garvar bedtime story :) <- not a trustworthy smiley face btw

Word count: 2860

TW: swearing, violence mentions, sex references

And bonus garvar people who haven't told me to stop yet: @tw-5 @camelspit

On Ao3 or below the cut!

Previous chapter in case you missed it

Garwin takes the evening shift to watch Alvar that night to let Ruy get himself a little rest. He’s been running around like a chicken with its head cut off for days between the things the Neverseen are demanding he do despite the fact they aren’t technically part of the order anymore and gathering food and worrying about Alvar into the late hours of the night.

And the search for something, anything, that might mitigate that last item. But no matter how many trollish--and elvin and ogreish and gnomish and goblin and dwarven--physicians he harasses, no one seems to have any clue as to how to fix Alvar’s body rotting out from under him.

The mostly case is that the Troll goop itself is doing something to fuck him up, but even Garwin, with his medical degree solely earned from watching copious amounts of House, could come to that conclusion.

Yes, ‘goop’ is the technical term.

No one has ever seen a case of an elf being exposed to troll hive goop, and even if they had, it was genetically modified goop, rendering science useless at best and infuriating at worst.

And science is already infuriating. AP Enviro Science’s exam, known for being a blowoff, did not go great. It doesn’t mean shit in elfland though.

Garwin’s job has mostly been relegated to spot-treating symptoms and keeping Alvar entertained and optimistic, a feat that is becoming exponentially more difficult with each passing hour.

Which means, once again, the dumb fucking human can't do shit.

Garwin could rant for hours about it, but now’s not the time for that. Now is the time for yawning. And reflecting on life choices because everything you regret is amplified a hundred times when it’s late. And gender crises. Those are always fun at night.

But the truth is, he wouldn’t trade Ruy and Alvar for the world. He’d trade the world for them in a fluttering heartbeat.

As Garwin begins to doze off, Alvar starts making little groaning noises, meaning either he’s dreaming or waking up. Whether that possible dream is of the good variety or a nightmare is up for debate. Even if that debate is never going to happen because Alvar’s very adept at pretending to forget his dreams.

Alvar shifts onto his side, huffing. That much movement means he’s most definitely awake and that level of attitude this quickly means he’s mad about something his brain has conjured up.

“Are you okay?” Garwin whispers, cringing because he knows the answer is obviously no. It’s been no for a long time. But, well, okayness is relative nowadays. And that’s the best that can be done.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Alvar dismisses him with a hand. “Go back to bed. Don’t worry about me.”

“Alvar, I can’t just turn off the worry machine. It’s literally my job to worry about you.”

“What about leeching off my registry fund?”

“That’s a side hustle. A hobby, if you will.”

Alvar sighs as Garwin climbs next to him in bed, burritoing him as much as possible. Between Ruy the blanket hog and Alvar laying on top of all of them and choosing to not be helpful, it doesn’t go very well.

Garwin wraps an arm around Alvar’s shoulders. “Do you want a bedtime story?”

“I don’t trust you. I’m going to be scared shitless for the rest of the night.”

“I promise to keep the gruesome details to a minimum. I won’t talk about severing an artery with a pen like last time.”

Alvar doesn’t argue even if he wants to, laying his head on Garwin’s collarbone, which Garwin takes as a win.

“Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, it was a dark and stormy night,” Garwin begins, already using incredibly overused clichés but to be fair, he’s pulling a story out of his ass because he can’t remember actual fairy tales in a coherent order to save his life. So bullshit is the next best option. At least when it inevitably goes off the rails, it’s funnier.

“This only happened once? Wow. Must have nice weather there.”

Garwin shakes his head. Stars, you’re such a loveable little ass. “Shut up. I also don’t know where we are right now, so that part’s iffy at best.”

“Honey, we’re at Candleshade. “

Once again with those elvin estate names that are pretentious nonsense. “Can you find it on Google Maps? I didn’t think so. Now where we? Ah, yes. Just to be even more predictable, there was a boy--a farm boy of an appropriate age for the setting but vaguely a young adult, conventionally attractive, or at least the type I want to step on me, no questions asked.”

Alvar coughs. “Isn’t that everyone?”

“Shut your face mouth. Imagine him as you please. He lived in a small agrarian village next to a big scary forest.”

“Haven’t you ever heard of ‘show, don’t tell?’”

“Bitch, I don’t have a feature length animated film to show you. What do you want from me? I’m doing the best I can here. There are tons of cryptids in the forest, copy pasted from other stories because I’m not creative enough to come up with anything better than Mothman.”

“You’d let Mothman rail you.”

“Of course I fucking would. Have you seen the ass on his statue? Fuck me please. Anyways you’ve also got some Bigfoots?--Bigfeet? Bigfeet.--in the forest. And, uh, what else? The vegetable lamb of Tartar, of course.”

“What?”

Garwin ignores his question, deciding it’s best left to a Wikipedia search in the morning so the blue light from the screen doesn’t completely fuck over any chance they have for sleep. “The chupacabra. Der Erlkönig. Death worms. The usual.”

Alvar laughs, a rattling sound that’s become so hollow over the past few days it’s almost painful. “You know half of those are real and half are horseshit, right?”

“Fuck you and you elves and all your fancy cryptids ruining the fun for everyone. I know the ones I’ve picked are geographically challenged but who cares? I didn’t have the chance to Google shit, okay? We accept that this falls under reasonable suspension of disbelief because I’m a shit storyteller and you get to deal with it. That being said, we return to our main character. He needs a name. He seems like a Timmy.”

“Timmy?”

“Yeah. Timothy. Tim. Timmy boy. Now, our boy Timmy boy has a death wish.”

“No Timmy, don’t,” Alvar purposely makes his voice crack on the last syllable. Or at least it was probably intentional. It would be even funnier if it wasn’t.

“Oh, yes he does. He has an immense desire to just fucking go into the woods and live there like Diogenes. He’s the Greek dude that got himself a plucked chicken and went ‘behold, a man’ to mock Plato’s definition of humans. Ah, taxonomy. A bitch then and a bitch now. Stars, I really hope Plato hasn’t lived that one down yet. Although, to be fair, Timmy boy is less interested in philosophy and more interested in getting high on mysterious mushrooms. Here’s hoping Death Cap mushrooms aren’t too plentiful there.”

Death cap mushrooms are, like the name suggests, just a little bit poisonous. It’d be badass if they were venomous, but, alas, not enough fungi have evolved to be carnivores, which is a damn fucking crime against nature.

“There’s no way that can end badly.” Alvar rolls his eyes.

“However, there is a legend or tradition or whatever in the village that isn’t simply a result of my poor planning: if one goes into the forest and manages to not die immediately, coming back might not be the best plan because you will get exorcised and if that doesn’t work--which it won’t because demons are one of the few things not in the forest--you get yourself hung.”

“But Timmy is already hung,” Alvar protests, and it’s canon now. Of course, his headcanon clearly followed logically from the previous source material, so everything is fine.

“I know,” Garwin replies even more quietly than the whisper he’s still forced to speak in. “But, unfortunately, Timmy is very bad at making life choices.”

“Is Timmy a self-insert?”

“Shut up. You’re supposed to be going to bed.”

Alvar widens his eyes like a cat with the internal monologue of a Victorian child. “But I’m worried for Timmy’s safety.”

“Well, Timmy isn’t worried about you. Timmy’s got his own gay little problems.”

Alvar mutters, “Rude.”

Garwin ignores him, continuing, “Timmy likes going into the forest because he’s both dumb and stupid. When asked, he always claims there’s something that draws him towards it for a reason he can’t describe. For you see, hidden deep in the forest is a place no mortal has ever found and radiates an energy that few can sense.”

“This is literally just Star Wars. Admit it.”

“No, it’s not. That wasn’t a place. It had something with midichlorians. I don’t know, I blocked most of the prequel trilogy. Also it’s scifi. This is in a fucking forest. Probably in central Europe because of the Brothers Grimm and we’re basic.”

Garwin glances at Alvar, who mouths, “It’s a Star Wars AU,” earning himself a glare.

“The more time one spends in the forest, the more likely they just decide to wander off one day never to be seen again. Or that they get poked in the eye with a branch and now we have a Phineas Gage situation on our hands. So, of course, the government has to ban anything even remotely related to existing within a hundred miles of the creepy forest. This does piss off the forest creatures because of the part of the food chain dependent on eating humans but nobody cares about my man Mothman.”

“I need some Timmy x Mothman fic now…mothtim? Timmoth?” Alvar’s eyes open wide with a realization, stage whispering, “Wait a fucking minute. Timothy is Mothman!”

…because they both have ‘moth’ in their name? Sure, why not? Garwin laughs apprehensively even if he does enjoy the idea. “Keep quiet. We don’t wanna wake Ruy up.”

“I beg to fucking differ.”

“I don’t want to have to put both of you two back to bed.”

Alvar raises a mischievous eyebrow. I want to slit your throat. But only a little. Goddammit, you’re too cute for murder. Why didn’t I think this through? By ‘this,’ he means their entire relationship all the way back to that first day in the museum.

“Because Timmy has a habit of being dumb and stupid, he wanders farther and farther into the forest with each passing trip because he has too much free time because we’re in a small village and apparently there aren’t any other cute guys willing to fuck him and he doesn’t have any hobbies. So, you know, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do and if that’s Bigfoot, well, good for him.”

“Not my personal cup of tea, but have fun, Timmy.”

“One day, as you might expect, Timmy wandered off into the forest, never to be seen again. It took like a week and a half for anyone in the village to actually realize he was gone. He could’ve died out there for various reasons, from natural causes to being ripped to shreds by a death worm or bled dry by a chupacabra.”

“There’s so many fun ways to die out in the middle of nowhere.”

“And, of course, the villagers didn’t even bother to go look for his body because he couldn’t have ever gone into the creepy forest. Even if he had, it’s not like they can venture in there, and besides, he was working on turning all their sons gay so this is all for the best. He’s probably living out there with his husband Bigfoot or Der Erlkönig--.”

“Or both. Polyam Timmy could be canon--nay, it should be canon. Make it canon.”

“This is my story, fuck yeah it’s canon. Der Erlkönig’s castle--he has a castle because he’s a king and kings have castles--anyway, it burned down with its previous inhabitants still inside, so it’s most definitely haunted. Castles are surprisingly very flammable creatures. It also has a really nice moat of five rivers naturally making a roundabout around it because it’s extra like that. Why is that important? I don’t know. Setting the scene. Der Erlkönig’s castle’s creepy factor is the correct level of crumbling, mossy staircases and spider webbing in every fucking corner.”

“Sounds like a recipe for a spider-man.”

“No radioactivity. Only--wait. The castle is centered on the power source you accused me of borrowing from Star Wars. Maybe that could work. I’m not a biologist.”

“Yeah, you couldn’t even get into Yale.”

“Will you please stop with that already? I get it, I’m a dumbass. You’re more of a dumbass for dating me. Go find something else stupid I’ve done and hyperfixate on that for a while. The power source also occasionally attracts people of mostly humanoid shapes when Der Erlkönig gets a little…let’s say bored. So yeah, it’s definitely just a fucking orgy in there at all times.”

Alvar laughs.

“And Timmy, with his army of boyfriends that definitely went and arsoned his home village at some point, lived happily ever after.”

After a small round of applause, Alvar turns to bury himself even more into the crook of Garwin’s neck, and he prepares to get drooled on when a realization snaps Alvar’s flickering eyelids open.

“Wait--I know why that sounds familiar! My dad had some shit about some fucked up place that eminated weird power at a conjunction of rivers. Bitch, have you been binge reading the Alden shit again? I thought we agreed that made you crabby.”

The ‘Alden shit,’ as it is aptly named being that it belonged to Alden and has the same cultural value as the blue Avatar, is just a collection of scrolls and other documents that live at Candleshade for reasons.

Most of it is just leftover from when Alden and Assius were fucking, although why they had work-related things laying around at the same time is not a thought he particularly enjoys having.

Also the clearance levels required to view literally anything is way above Garwin’s pay grade, a contributing factor to how addicting they are. And the added challenge of translating from the Enlightened language to brain-English is fun. Sometimes, he’s even almost competent.

“I have not, but now I will because you called me crabby.”

“Fuck.” Alvar sighs, fully aware there’s no stopping Garwin now that he’s been given the slightest reason to relapse. “I’m going to bed now. Have a nice time spiraling this fine evening.”

Garwin gently extricates himself from being Alvar’s pillow, leaving him to drool on a bigfoot stuffed animal of unknown origin that most certainly wasn’t already in the house when they took over. Definitely.

So, the only logical thing to do for the rest of the evening is be a little chaos gremlin and search through Alden’s old shit for any references to weird power and multiple rivers. Without keyboard shortcuts. This is going to be a fun time.

Sure enough, come sunrise a many hours later, he’s deeply distracted in absolutely useless but nevertheless entertaining garbage. Half of these scrolls read like a Wattpad eleven year old bitching about the council and that eleven year old needs to be sold to One Direction for their own safety. Or whatever the elvin equivalent of that is.

The council has committed some fun little atrocities. After the dwarven plague coverup, one might assume that’s an outlier, but no. That’s just how they do business. For thousands of years. And it’s all mind wiped from their brains like the pussies they are, so no one is capable of making informed decisions.

After a few more years of searching, during which Ruy comes over and kicks him a few times to make sure he hasn’t perished on the floor, accidentally waking up his very-asleep legs, he finally finds what Alvar was alluding to.

There aren’t many details, but there are certainly lots of scribbles in pink glitter gel pen meaning one thing--Oralie was involved. Or Alden was feeling extremely gay that day. It doesn’t really matter either way, it’s just funny.

Turns out, Garwin’s story was strangely accurate, at least as far as this little magic piece of paper knows, even down to the intersection of five rivers. It’s also probable that it’s outdated, given that the paper is crunchy as all hell, but that could just be coffee staining or the fact that elves are notoriously bad at making timely decisions, instead letting them fester for a good millenia.

Gotta make sure it’s really a problem before thinking about alleviating it.

And this may very well be the sleep deprivation talking, but the kind of power that the magic scroll is describing could be able to be harnessed in a thousand different ways, ways that no intelligent species has been able to dream of until now.

And maybe--just maybe, when he finds it, it’ll be enough to fix whatever is destroying Alvar from the inside out.

#kotlc #kotlc fanfic #kotlc alvar #alvar vacker #kotlc garwin #garwin chang #garvar #kotlc garvar #garvarioli #(no ruy content tho sorry)#(i'm in the middle of a buzzfeed unsolved binge don't judge me)

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