I almost didn't get this done in time, guys. I was seriously getting up early (Which I never do) and going through this chapter over and over because my editor is an ass and decided to abandon me in my hour of need.
On a separate note, my birthday is just a bit more than a month away! I think I'll do a small extra chapter to celebrate, but until then; enjoy.
Ch. 19: I never
Darce, an hour ago:
I jolted awake.
I was sitting at a desk with a laptop showing the end credits to an episode of RWBY, the headphones wrapped snugly to my head were playing the gentle tunes of the outro. I sat up and stretched the kinks out of my back while taking off my headphones and yawned.
I felt….wrong. Like everything was dim and far away. I looked over to Gray, who was pounding at his controller with a look of concentration aimed at his Call of Duty game.
"Morning, sleeping ugly." He said without so much as looking at me, "You've been out for nearly an hour now. Mom's almost got dinner done, and I was starting to think I'd have to wake you. I get that, with the tests and all, you're a bit tired, but sleeping in the middle of your crappy show? That's just poor form."
"Yeah, I guess so." I mumbled, rubbing my head.
Immediately I froze. There was something wrong with my head, something missing.
"My ears…" I whispered, "Where are my ears?!"
Now Gray was sending me a curious and amused look.
"I think you're still half-asleep, bro. Your ears are where they always are, the sides. You're looking on the top." He chuckled.
"No," I said, confused, "No, you're wrong. They should be…."
'Wait, what am I thinking? Why would my ears be on the top of my head? I must be watching too much RWBY, thinking I'm a...that I'm a faunus.' I shook my head to clear it. The feeling of wrongness wasn't going away. As a nervous habit, I wrapped my tail around my leg. It was another shock to my system when nothing happened.
'Of course nothing happened, you don't have a tail.' I scolded myself.
"You okay?" Gray asked, concern and caution coloring his voice.
"No." I repeated with more determination, "This is wrong."
"What's wrong?" He asked. There was too much caution there.
A sudden clarity burst through my mind.
'Mad Mab, Lily, Cinder….my semblance, my sword, my brother the wolf….Gray, Blake.…'
"You say I was asleep for nearly an hour, but RWBY episodes are only a quarter of that time maximum. It was the middle of winter break when we were taken, there are no tests. And I would never fallen asleep in the middle of a RWBY episode. Three strikes, now tell me what the fuck is going on." I said hastily.
The fake Gray said nothing, only stared blankly at me.
"Whoever you are, you'd better have a good reason to hold me to this...this awful fake."
"Do you really want to leave?" It asked flatly.
"Of course I do, my friends need me!"
"You don't actually believe that, do you?" It raised an eyebrow, "Do you really think any of them need or want you?" I raised an eyebrow back.
"I've seen this scene in too many movies and books to fall for this. You want me to wallow in some self-pity party while my friends and remaining family need my help."
"Oh, come on Darce, I'm a part of you. That means I know all the times you've seen this, but it also means I know the thoughts you hide from even yourself."
"Do tell." I said sarcastically.
"You know Gray secretly hates you, Ruby's too nice to tell you to fuck off, Yang only likes to hang out with Gray and just tolerates you, you don't even really talk with any of your other teammates, Weiss is actively hostile to you, and if Blake felt even a fraction of what you feel for her she would have acted on it by now." Faux-Gray listed. I blinked.
"Okay, where the fuck did all that come from?" I said, surprised by the speed and length of its list.
"First off, Gray hates you because you're solely responsible for dragging him to Remnant with you, taking him away from his friends and family because of your selfish desire to be anywhere other than reality."
"That's not-"
"Secondly, Would Ruby tell anyone to leave her alone?"
"Well, no, but-"
"Has Yang ever sought out your company unless Gray was right next to you?"
"That's because-"
"Murphy and Aries probably wouldn't care if you died."
"You can't know-"
"I don't think I even need to explain Weiss."
"Not really, but that's-
"And finally, Blake doesn't care for you, and is probably creeped out by the fact that you hang around her so much."
And that was the last straw. The ground around me rippled and black tendrils lashed out at the fake Gray and slammed him against a wall.
"Alright, you little shit, I really can't decide if you're a construct of my mind like Dream or some side effect of whatever Lily's been doing to me. You seem to know so much yet so little at the same time."
I picked him up and slammed him against the wall again.
"Let me educate you on how my friends work. When Gray hates someone, he never ever hides it. Let Cardin be an example. Ruby has sought out my company and my advice on certain matters, and the reason that Yang, or anyone really, hasn't talked to me without Gray right there is because Gray and I are together all of the fucking time. Weiss is hostile to everyone, and if Blake was creeped out by me she would let me know. I will, however, give you Aries and Murphy. I don't really hang out with them a lot outside of classes and training."
The thing pretending to be my brother stared blankly at me for a moment before getting a wide grin and softly laughing. The laugh wasn't in Gray's voice, it sounded almost female.
"Well, I guess there's no sense in hiding anymore." This time its voice was definitely that of a woman's.
The room evaporated around me, leaving nothing but darkness. It was the kind of dark that didn't come from a lack of light, it was more like the background was just black. It reminded me of the "undeveloped dreamscape" that I had been locked in ever since I lost my body.
"It's very similar, yes, but not quite the same." Said a voice behind me.
I quickly spun around and saw a woman the appeared to be made out of light, yet was shrouded in ever-shifting darkness. Her long hair and business suit seemed to be made of shadows, and most of her facial features were almost completely obscured by it, but her skin was a glowing white. I remember Gray's description of the Glowing Guy, but he was, well, a guy.
"Who are you supposed to be?" I demanded.
"I've gone by so many names, but my latest one is Nox." She replied, amused.
The way she talked and moved reminded me of Cinder, like everything and everyone was so beneath her.
"Mab and Lily talked about you, you're like that guy who saved me back at the docks."
"What, Lumen? Oh, he has been quite the naughty boy lately, hasn't he? But I suppose I'm no better." She muttered distractedly.
"What do you mean?"
"What do I mean, I wonder?" She said cryptically, her barely visible mouth curling into a cheshire-cat smirk.
"Why does it seem that both of you guys have a penchant for never really answering important questions?"
"Well, where would be the fun in that? But, it's of no consequence now. I think I've sized you up enough for now, so I'll send you back. fair warning, though: You'll be quite… dizzy."
"What's that suppose to-" I started, but was interrupted by an unexpected rush going through my head.
My vision faded, and my mind was suddenly drowned by what felt like some thick syrup. My thoughts became slow and groggy.
'Dizzy...my...ass! This...feels...like my...mind...is...going through a….tornado!'
I opened my eyes and saw team RWBY huddled around me, and Gray towering over them. He was shouting something at me, but I couldn't quite piece it together. It was like I could hear the individual words he was saying, but I couldn't connect them into a sentence. He may as well have been mumbling really loud, for all I could make out. I did notice, however, how Gray stood above everyone like a cloud on a clear day.
I tried to ask him about it, but the words jumbled in my mouth. Weiss got that look on her face and yelled something at me, but again the words became just a loud mumble in my ears. Like, really loud. Didn't she know that my faunus ears are sensitive? I used my hands to muffle my ears against the offending noise, and tried to articulate my struggle into words. I heard a softer mumble and turned to see Blake.
I could feel how corny my smile was, but it was plastered over my face anyway.
"Hiya, Blake." I managed.
Yang mumbled something in a tone that was both amused and annoyed, and turned my head to face her. She looked like she was saying something important, so I tried to listen.
"...Left Gray a gun, riiiight?" She asked.
'Does she mean Aut?'
"Yeah." I answered
"...Gun...something in it…?"
'Something in my gun?...OH! That's right!'
"Yeah, the tracker! For if I lose my shit!" I declared. The fog was starting to lift from my mind.
"Alright...how...get it?"
I opened my mouth to answer, but I realized I couldn't remember. I looked around in my head and felt like it was at the tip of my tongue.
"I had a hint...what was it? The silence… the silence….risky?"
As the last word left my mouth, a sudden pressure clenched my shoulders and the room shook. Someone gave confused noises that might've been words.
And then we woke up.
Mab, Present:
I gently lead Amnesiac!Darce by the arm to the room Lily would be waiting in.
"Where are we going?" He asked, his brows furrowed in an adorably puzzled expression.
"Lily thinks she can restore some of your memories." I lied easily, giving him my best reassuring smile.
"Really?!" He asked excitedly.
I nodded happily and continued leading him to the room, which was just down the hall now. In actuality, Lily thought that she might be able to give him false memories. She couldn't go into too much detail, but it would be enough to keep him on our side, as well as give him a name. A name that I thought quite fitting for the role he would be playing for the rest of his life, if I had my way. I always get my way in the end. We came upon the door and I knocked firmly.
"It's ready, come in." My sister's voice croaked from within.
I quickly opened the door and pushed Darce through.
"Uuum, what's the metal table for? And why does it have straps?" He asked nervously.
"It's to stop you from hurting yourself. We haven't done anything like this before, so we're trying to be as safe as possible." I replied honestly.
"Uh, okay. Will this hurt?" He continued.
Lily shrugged and gave a noncommittal grunt. I shot her a look that screamed, 'We need him relaxed!'. She rolled her eyes, but played along.
"It's just a bit of brain-digging, it shouldn't hurt at all. Now strap in."
"Well, if you say so." He looked at me for reassurance, and I gave it.
"We do." I said gently, but inside I was growing impatient, 'hurry the fuck up!'
He lay down onto the table and we secured the restraints around him. He looked like he wanted to say something, but Lily silenced him by just getting on with it. She held onto the sides of his head, and darkness poured out of her hands and into his eyes and ears. He yelped in surprise and began to struggle a bit, but the straps did their job well and stopped him from doing anything. After about ten minutes of this, Lily stopped and stepped back. Darce panted for a bit before opening his eyes, showing that his pupils were so wide, that you almost couldn't see his irises.
"So, can you finally remember your name?" I asked after a moment of silence.
"Yes."
The shadows of the room seemed to pool at his feet.
"My name…."
In a flash of black, he stood upright, his restraints in taters on the floor.
"Is Puck."
A wide smile curled my lips.
"Welcome aboard." I replied giddily.
He gave us a wide smile before giving Lily a mock angry look.
"Oh, and you lied: That was excruciating."
And that's that, I suppose. Tell me how you felt about this chapter by leaving a review, don't forget hit those follow and fav buttons, and, most of all, send some questions my way in a PM. We still have nine days until I post the answers, so get crack'n.
See you lovely folks next week!