"Execute Chapter 66."

"It will be done my lord."

Four Walking Disasters: Christmas Special

First of Morning Star, 4E 194

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"All I want for New Life…iiiiiis…yooooooou~

...I said certified freak! Seven days a week! Wet ass—"

"XANDER! NO BAD LANGUAGE!"

Thirteen year old Alexander Meteuse broke down laughing, ducking away from the firebolt flung by his younger sister Cassia.

Julius leaned over the dining table and caught the blast in an open palm, giving them both a stern look. "Cass, no fire magic in the house. Alex, no swearing in the house. Just because mum and dad are out this evening doesn't mean you can break the rules."

"Careful, you two. He's in dad mode." Octavia chuckled from the harpsichord in the corner of the room (she had been playing). "Let them have some fun, Julius, its New Life festival."

"Hey, I'm all for fun! That's why I froze the river over." Julius protested, glancing back at his two squabbling siblings. "That was cool, right? That was me being cool?"

"Yeah!" Cass beamed, jumping up into her chair and swinging her legs. "We got to go ice skating! And then Oct tricked mum into going on, and then she fell over, and then I fixed her bruise!"

"We know, you've said it fifteen times!" Xander protested.

"But it is still very impressive." Octavia reassured, moving back to the table and picking up one of the leftover pigs in blankets. "Restoration magic at eleven? With no training? The Synod is going to love you."

Cassia grinned. Xander just rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, very cool." He grunted. "Still gotta go through high school first. Maybe then you can learn to swear. Everyone does it."

"There's a time and a place for everything." Julius interceded, producing a cheeky smile. "Speaking of which…I think we're in the right time and place for presents, aren't we?"

Xander and Cassia both gasped, looked at each other. Then launched out of their seats, sprinting upstairs.

Julius chuckled, watching them go.

"You're actually enjoying this." Octavia said. He turned, saw her looking at him curiously while peeling the bacon off the sausage.

"What, is that not normal?" He tilted his head.

"Not for you. I'm used to you spending as much time as you can locked up in your room." Octavia popped the treat in her mouth, adding around it "This is the first New Life I've seen you actually contributing."

"Stop doing indecent things to that sausage, Octavia." Julius warned, making her snort and swallow it. "I…I don't know. This is my last year at the Synod. This summer, I go off and get a job, and then who knows how often I'll see you all."

"Aww~. Look who's getting sentimental!"

"I'm not sentimental!"

"Yes you are! You hear that everyone? Julius has feelings!"

"Oh, you can shut up, miss 'I can't smile outside the house'."

At which point Xander and Cassia burst through the doorway, elbowing each other to go first, each carrying wrapped boxes. Octavia waved a hand, revealing that her present had been invisible in her lap the entire time.

Julius clapped his hands together, sitting down. "Alright! Let the inter-sibling secret St. Alessia—"

"Not-so-secret St. Alessia, since we all know who's getting things for who." Octavia pointed out.

"Yeah, whatever. Who wants to go first?"

"Me!" Cassia shouted, full-on hurling her package at Xander. This, he did not dodge, and it caught him full in the face.

"Ow!" He complained, barely catching the gift and starting to open it. "What, did you get me a bruise for New Life?"

"Nope! Well, maybe yes, but I can fix that now." Cassia tapped her fingers together. "So…I know it's a whole thing that if you pray for a gift from the divines the night before New Life, you'll receive it. Well I couldn't pray for you to get, you know." She coughed. "More magic, because, uh, I was already praying for me to get more magic…"

"Uh huh." Xander said, slightly choked.

"So I decided to do the next best thing!" Cassia pointed to the present. Xander opened it to reveal…a glass figurine. Swirls in the surface made up a rough, slightly misshapen figure of a man in robes, with a triangle in his arms.

"It's, uh, Julianos." Cassia said, now looking down and blushing. "I did some independent research, and I found that mages who worship him average higher in intelligence and magicka stores than mages who don't. So I thought, maybe if you did, you could…"

"Right." Xander gulped, sniffed, and wiped his face. "Y—Yeah, thanks, Cass. I just might—"

"And then I made that by using fire magic to heat the glass!" Cassia immediately steamrolled over him, leaning forwards and pointing. "So I just, like, got a big block of it, and then heated up my fingers really hot and—"

"You did what?" Octavia demanded, at the same time Julius said "Please tell me you didn't do that in the house—Is this what all those burns were about this last fortnight?"

"Eheheh." Cassia scratched the back of her head. "Uh, my turn! Oct, what do I get?"

"I cannot believe you…" Octavia rolled her eyes, and tossed over her package.

Cassia caught it. Shook it once. Frowned. "You got me a book?"

"You won't know until you open it."

"I know what a book feels like, Oct, mum and dad always get us books." Cassia started tearing into it. "This better be good, because—"

"It's on advanced restoration techniques." Octavia said, leaning back in her chair.

"Ooooh, you got me a healing book? But you didn't even know I could heal until this morning!"

"Nope." Octavia's grin was a little too smug. "I got you a book on blowing things up. I stole this from the remaining records of the Dawnguard."

Cassia's eyes doubled in size, and she immediately opened the book and started reading.

"Guess that makes it my go." Xander (who had been staring somewhat listlessly at his new sculpture for the last minute) coughed, and extended his present to Julius. "Here. So, since your birthday just has to be on New Life, you damn prophesy child—"

"There aren't actually any prophecies about me, I've checked—"

"I had to make it something special. It's a…well, you'll see."

Julius took it, raised an eyebrow, and tapped it once, causing all the packaging to fall away. Inside was a…very strange thing. A contraption made of bronze-gold metal, glass, and magic. It had a circular 'face' with twelve numbers arrayed around the edge, and two stick-things that were pointing between them.

It ticked.

"Oooh…" He said, tilting his head. "This is Dwemer, right?"

"Yeah!" Xander scooched closer. "They call it a 'clock'! It tells you what time it is! I found it in that place I accidentally destroyed three months ago? I've been trying to fix it ever since."

"Fix it?" Julius turned to him. "You spent three months learning to repair Dwemer technology?"

"Well, two and a half months, the rest was—"

He didn't get chance to finish, because Julius crushed him with a bear hug.

"And now it's my go." Octavia crossed her arms. "I can't help but notice that you aren't carrying a present, Julius. That had better be because its too big to fit through the door. Or because you bought me a whore for the night—"

"Is my presence not enough of a gift, my dear sister?" Julius asked, releasing Xander once he started squirming.

"Absolutely not, no."

"Damn. Well, good thing I have something else then." He walked over to Octavia, leaning in.

"Whoa, whoa!" She leaned backwards. "This had better not be a hug, Julius, you know I don't like hugs—"

"It's not a hug," He promised, "now remove that illusion, I need to be able to see."

"What illusion? What are you doi—"

"Oct? Trust me."

After a few seconds, still visibly uncomfortable, Octavia sighed and snapped her fingers. The features of her face blurred and shifted ever so slightly; the bags under her eyes became more pronounced, spots appeared around her forehead where she tended to rest her hand…

And a split appeared in her top lip, running up to her nose.

"You better not be about to put me in an emergency room," Octavia warned, shifting about as Julius leaned right into her face, "Because there isn't any healer in the Empire that can heal this, we've tried them all—"

"Because you're not damaged, Oct." Julius said, face focused, as he brought one finger up to her mouth. "So you don't need to be healed. But you would quite like to be changed, right?"

"I…yes."

"Which makes that my department. Stay still."

Xander and Cassia looked on silently, both holding their breath. Julius moved both his hands up to Octavia's face, his fingers glowing a rainbow of colours. A few seconds passed where nothing seemed to happen, then—

"Agh!" Octavia jolted backwards, "What did you do? Did that—"

"No no no, it's fine! I'm done!" Julius pulled away as well, spreading his arms. "There. How's that?"

Octavia blinked, then reached up to her own mouth.

Any sign of the cleft lip was gone.

"You…you…" Octavia looked up at Julius. "…How long have you been learning to do that?"

"Been a while." Julius admitted, scratching the back of his neck. "Had to hunt down this woman who called herself the 'face sculptor' and convince her to teach me a few things, then get some practice in with some poor sods around the city. I only got confident I could do it without issues this last month."

"You—" Octavia froze. Her eyes narrowed. "You've been able to fix me for a month?"

"Uh." Julius gulped. "Well, yes, I could have—"

"You could have fixed me a MONTH AGO and you let me walk around with an illusion on my face just so you could do it on New Life?"

"Well when you put it like that, I—"

He didn't have chance to finish, because Octavia had hurled herself at him, wrapping her arms around his back.

"Thank you." She sobbed into his shoulder, shaking. "Thank you, thank you, thank you…"

Julius' expression relaxed. He didn't say anything, just smiled, and wrapped his arms around her.

Xander and Cassia looked at each other, then ran in to join in on the hug.

First of Morning Star, 4E 196

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Hjarnagredda woke up and felt like absolute crap. She groaned and rolled over on her cot, getting her hands underneath her and trying not to throw up.

Her entire body felt like a furnace. Her head was throbbing—actually, scratch that, everything was throbbing. She inhaled and regretted it, as the smell of her tent and her own sweat was suddenly the most pungent thing in the world. Matter of fact, just about every single one of her senses was screaming at her.

She didn't know if she wanted to eat, sleep, piss, have sex, run laps around the campsite, or all of them at once.

"OW." She summarised, staggering out of bed on unsteady legs. She rubbed her eyes, finding her vision to be much blurrier than usual, and glared at the shrine in the corner of her tent. An empty wolf skull stared back at her.

"This you, Hircine?" She asked. "You mad? I pray for you to fix my body for New Life and you break it harder instead?"

Hircine, as always, did not reply.

"Godssakes…" She rubbed her forehead and shoved aside the tent flap, walking outside.

The fresh air was a relief, and she took a moment to breathe it in, enjoying the breeze on her face and the dew in the grass between her feet.

It was winter, and should have been bloody freezing, but whatever affliction was making her feel so damn hot didn't relent just because she was outside, making the chill of the mists feel downright comfortable.

Hjar glanced around at the Forsworn camp. It was that dim, grey sort of early morning where the sun hadn't really risen, so there was barely anyone about. That, combined with her headache (and the fact that it was a Forsworn camp) meant that she didn't really give a damn that she was outside buck naked. Only one person actually noticed her, a friend of hers who was sat tending a Hjar.

"Hail, Hjar." The young woman raised an arm in greeting. "Happy New Life, and all that. You're up early."

"Need a piss." Hjar's stomach suddenly cramped and she winced, adding "Or something. Heading down to the river."

"Alright, but be careful. Wolves have been about all night, apparently."

"Hn." Hjar waved, unconcerned, and set off at a jog.

What in Oblivion is wrong with me today? She thought, blearily, as moved through the rocks and trees. Is it that time of the month? I don't think I'm bleeding…

Turned out she was. From the nose.

Well, that's reassuring. Okay, logically, its got to be some sort of illness. Not standard cold symptoms though, so I probably caught something nasty from some—

—Some, uh—

Hircine, I can't even hold my damn thoughts together!

Worse, the fact that she was running towards a destination seemed to have made her all excited. Her adrenaline had shot up and her breath was out in pants, she was grinning like an idiot for no good reason, and at some point she'd shot into a full sprint. She'd been desperate for the toilet before, sure, but this wasn't anything like that. It was like she was being chased, or chasing something, tension building and building in her gut, like a drumroll that only grew louder between her ears as she rounded a corner and reached the valley of the river—

There was a rock outcropping ahead of her and the water was over twenty feet below, and Hjar should have turned here and taken the sensible path down the valley to the water's edge, but she could barely even think at this point, with the only thing left in her head being that she'd set herself a target and she needed to get to it NOW—

Something happened.

Her body…split. She screamed, her skin scratching and tearing and growing as her fingers cracked and lengthened and her vision whited out and her hands hit the ground and her nails dug into the stone and propelled her forwards and her visions snapped back into reality sharper than they ever had before and she JUMPED—

Weightlessness.

The wind was in her ears. She felt it in her hair, which somehow seemed to be all over her, and she looked down to the river. It wasn't flowing very quickly, and with her eyes the way they were, she was able to piece together her reflection in the surface of the water.

She wasn't looking at the image of a pale, nude, Reach-girl.

What she saw was a great white wolf.

Huh. Hjar thought.

And then she hit the surface of the water with a splash.

First of Morning Star, 4E 197

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"Cheers!"

"CHEERS!"

Mugs clacked together, and laughter filled Mor Khazgur.

"Where is she? Where's my favourite family member? Not you—" Borgakh shoved her father Larak aside, making him laugh, and jogged away from the party at the front of the longhouse. There were only a few spots where her target might be hiding, and she found her at the second; sat beside the currently unlit forge.

"There's my little sis!"

"Stop calling me little!" Protested a fifteen year old Dulurza, growling as Borgakh grabbed her about her shoulders. "I grew half a foot this year! I'm almost as tall as you!"

"I don't care if you grow taller than Snow Throat, you'll always be my little sis." Borgakh fended off Dulurza's resistances and dragged her away. "Now come on. We're partying. Join in."

"I hate parties." Dulurza grumbled, digging her heels in.

"Why? You like fighting, eating, and drinking, and that's basically all that happens."

"You're forgetting the talking. I hate that part." Dulurza crossed her arms and huffed. "It's just sitting around with a bunch of Dad's friends, until they get drunk enough for the actual fun to start."

"You have got to learn to talk to people. You can't stab or smelt every problem you come across." Borgakh grinned, and leaned closer. "How're you gonna pull a pretty Orc lass if you can't talk to her first, eh?"

"Shut up, shut up!" Dulurza shoved her away, blushing furiously. "Why in Malacath's name did I even tell you about that—"

"Relax, its not a bad thing. Think about it, when you grow up, you're going to be stuck with a Chief and a harem of other women. It's gonna make things a lot easier for you, spending time with your sister-wives~"

"Oh, piss off." Dulurza huffed. "First, I'm already grown up."

"Oh, so you're not getting any bigger?"

"Shut it. And second, you don't get to talk to me about romance, 'Steel Heart'." It was Dulurza's turn to smile. "How many other chieftans have you scorned in the last two years? All of them? You come of age this month; how's father going to marry you off to one of them, huh?"

"Oh, don't get me started." Borgakh glowered into the middle distance. "Marriage. Eugh. I'm fine without it, thank you. I can shag someone already, thank you very much, why would I want all the nonsense that comes with—"

"Wait." Dulurza held a hand up. "You've shagged someone?"

Boragkh froze. "Uh—"

"You're not married! You're not even courting anyone! You're not supposed to—"

"You don't tell the chief about that; I won't tell him you don't like men. Deal?" Borgakh offered.

Dulurza stared at her suspiciously for a few seconds. Then grinned, stretching her hand out. "Deal."

Borgakh shook it, laughing. "Nice. Now come on. Whatever you've been cooped up in here making, you're clearly finished. Now you have to socialise."

"Fine, fine—Oh, right!" Dulurza turned, rushed into the forge. Borgakh tilted her head in suspicion, but her sister emerged a few seconds later, carrying…

"I, uh. Made this. For you." Dulurza said, holding out a wicked looking orichalcum dagger. "It was gonna be for your coming of age ceremony, but I got excited, and figured it was New Life anyway, so…"

"It's perfect." Borgakh took the dagger, testing its weight and grinning. "Dulurza, you…you didn't have to."

"I wanted to." Dulurza shrugged, looking away. "You're my…my…"

"Say it~"

A sigh. "My big sister. So I thought—"

"Oh, come here!" Borgakh crashed into Dulurza with a hug.

First of Morning Star, 4E 201

8˂

Blood spilled on the floor of a manor in Morrowind.

The sound of the body hitting the floor alerted the other two guards, but by that point the killer was already on top of them. A kick to the head disoriented the only one that was fast enough to even reach for his sword, allowing the figure in dark red chitinous armour to swipe twice with their claws.

Two more bodies fell.

L'laarzen stepped calmly between them, as the last man in the room spun to face her.

"Good evening!" She greeted, smiling beneath her mask and waggling her fingers.

"Stop!" Shouted the wide-eyed Dark Elf, his shaking hands clutching a crossbow. "Or I'll shoot!"

"Oh, well, we mustn't have that, could we?" L'laarzen stopped in the middle of the room. "Khajiit must say, you have a lovely home my good sir. I can see why your opponents want you dead."

"What in Oblivion is wrong with you?" The Dunmer demanded, voice cracking.

"You know, people keep saying that." L'laarzen huffed. "As though this one is somehow doing something badly. Ja-kha'jay and Jode, look, look how cool that was! Khajiit is doing a very good job, isn't she? Seriously, if there are issues with the technique at play here, please say so."

"You—You killed my men!" He protested. "You're supposed to—"

"Only kill targets." L'laarzen nodded. "Fortunately, they were! This one has been hired for a complete cleanout of your household, good sir! Though, perhaps 'clean' is the wrong word. Khajiit is very sorry about your carpets."

"You're a monster." He whispered, stepping backwards.

"Really? But Khajiit is not the one giving the orders." L'laarzen's eyes sharpened, not that he could see. "You know, this one actually did a job for you, some years back? If you people stopped wanting each other dead, Khajiit could have just become a hairdresser instead."

"What in Oblivion is wrong with you!" The man roared, clearly in shock at this point, training the crossbow on L'laarzen's face.

She tutted. "That is not the important question right now, good sir. The question that matters is:

How are you still holding onto that weapon?"

The Dunmer's brow creased in confusion—

And then there was a flash of steel.

The crossbow fell from his arms. So did his two hands.

He probably would have screamed, if L'laarzen hadn't darted up, covered his mouth with one hand, and slit open his windpipe with the other.

"…Has anyone ever told you you're incredibly hot when you do that?" Said an aristocratic voice from behind the corpse.

L'laarzen grinned, tossing the body aside and looking at the other Morag Tong assassin, stood behind the target cleaning off his daggers. "L'laarzen aims to please. Hello, darling. You're done with the rest of the house?"

Vendil Ulen pulled down his face mask, also smiling. "Done. As of right now, we're the only two people alive in this manor, and will be until sunrise. Want to take advantage of that? They have a lovely master bedroom."

"You are insatiable." L'laarzen laughed, pulling down her own mask and leaning in to kiss him. "You know, there are words for people like you, who get so excited at the thought of women with fur."

"Then I suppose I should be grateful that my wonderful girlfriend is kind enough not to employ them." Vendil replied, in that charming way of his. "And that you're willing to tolerate me being insatiable, despite your disdain for the…what do you call it? 'Squishy bits'?"

"Oh, no, you're fine. L'laarzen enjoys the faces you make." She stroked his cheek, kissed him once more…then giggled.

"What?" He asked.

"Sorry. This one has made a mess again." She wiped down her still wet claws on her armour, then licked her thumb, and wiped away the blood she'd accidentally smeared on his cheek. "Now come. We do have time, and Khajiit knows how you get after a mission. You can have your fun."

"Actually—" Vendil coughed, posture shifting from flirtatious to awkward. "Setting all that aside, there's…something I need to ask you."

"Oh?" L'laarzen tilted her head. "And it cannot wait?"

"There are enough ears at the headquarters that someone would hear it." He winced. "This is, somewhat awkwardly, probably the most privacy we'll have for a while, and I'd rather not do it with someone here to listen…"

"My dear Vendil Ulen, are you nervous?" L'laarzen asked, giggling.

"Yes." He admitted, which did surprise her. "L'laarzen…we've done pretty great together, haven't we?"

"We have." She agreed, unsure what he meant. "We work well as a team, we make a lot of money, and you are a wonderful romantic partner."

"Exactly, yes." Vendil nodded. "And I've got my old holdings back, and we're both frankly rich, so we…we could retire, if we wanted."

"Eh?" L'laarzen squinted at him. "Stop? Why would we stop?"

"Well I mean we don't have to, I just thought that maybe you might like the chance to relax, and—"

"Relax?" L'laarzen repeated. "Vendil, are you calling poor L'laarzen old?"

"No! No, no no no, I'm saying this wrong, I…" He sighed. "L'laarzen…you told me what happened to your parents. Back in Elsweyr, before everything went wrong, before you had to come to Morrowind…do you ever miss that?"

L'laarzen looked down. "…Yes. Sometimes, yes. It was…the guild is nice, but, Khajiit misses being part of a proper family."

"And would you like that?" He pressed. "To be part of a family again?"

She blinked at him. "This…Yes, L'laarzen would like that very much. But she isn't sure she understands what you mean."

Vendil breathed in. Breathed out. Then pulled something out of his belt, and got down on one knee.

"L'laarzen," he said, "I love you with all my heart. Will you marry me?"

And he presented her a ring.

L'laarzen gasped, freezing on the spot.

They were in the great hall of a manor that had recently become a tomb, in the dead of night, bedecked with weapons and tools of charlatanry, not two feet from the body of a man she'd just killed. And suddenly, she didn't care about any of it.

"You…you are proposing to me on New Life day?" Was all she was able to say.

Vendil smiled, nervously. "It was the best time I could think of. If—If you say no that's fine, we can—"

L'laarzen reached forwards and clasped his hands with hers.

"Yes!" She said, beaming. "L'laarzen would be honoured!"

Some of the leftover blood on her fingers rubbed off onto him. But neither noticed.

I should not have done this. I have things to do this holiday. I have to get the rest of this fic written before term starts in January or I am in trouble.

But here I am. Writing this.

*sigh*

Look, Christmas day and New Year's Day are both chapter days so I had to do something.

Sod it, it's fun. Have some backstory. Yes, this is canon. Yes, 'All I Want For Life Day' and 'Wet Ass Khajiit' are canon songs in Skyrim, look them up.

Merry Christmas, you nerds. Actual chapter drops at normal time tomorrow.