AN- Haven't used this website in a long time, but figured I'd crosspost here from AO3 for old times' sake. Using a new account though, because I don't want to have to look at the embarrassing shit I wrote when I was twelve. Old one was Twilight Joltik if you're curious, but like, don't be.

Anyways, this is just gonna be a self indulgent project as self care during COVID and all that. Weird High Fantasy/Urban Fantasy Smash fic with characters I like and ideas that appeal to me. I'm not sure what pairings yet, but probably mostly not straight ones. Hope you all enjoy it, whatever it ends up being.

Prologue

Coming to the border of Dharka alone was a foolish decision, but Lucina was willing to make it. Invitation in hand, she let a leaf-covered trail guide her to an all too familiar destination. What had once been a grand manor was now ruined and ransacked, with half the windows broken and the other half covered in a thick film of dust. Still, she walked into it, through the door that had been left open, be it by the one she was meeting or whoever had last looted the place.

Many years ago, this house had been where the nobles of Galea had stayed when visiting their neighboring nation. Lucina had stayed there a few times in her childhood, alongside her cousins, younger sister, and sometimes other children of their court. She had thought she was coming here to meet with one of the latter, but her eyes told her that she'd been very wrong on that front.

The man standing before her was not Pit, she was certain of that much. Pit had been someone she'd once considered a dear friend, and had nothing but fond memories of. When receiving a coded letter from someone claiming to be him, she had been willing to recklessly set her doubts aside on the off chance perhaps he had survived the attack, and was earnestly requesting her help. Her heart tensed at the sight of this stranger, souring at the prospect of having been tricked.

Still, she did not attack, nor did she flee, because as certain as she was that she was not looking at her childhood friend, she was most certainly looking at someone related to him, if nothing else. The resemblance was uncanny- same unkempt hair, same too-small wings, even the creases when he smiled were the same. But that smile, it was unfamiliar- cocky and distant, matched with eyes as intensely red as Pit's were blue.

"Who are you?" Lucina demanded, hand resting on the hilt of the blade at her side. "Some illusion? Tell me and perhaps you'll live to tell the tale of how you dared to taunt the Princess Knight."

A strange noise came from the twisted copy, followed by a deluge of she then identified as laughter. "I'm sorry, what did you just call yourself? Princess Knight? Gods, you haven't changed a bit."

"You dare insinuate you know me, only to mock me further?" She was caught off guard with a sense of outrage, faltering her grip on her sword. "Identify yourself at once, or you won't be laughing for much longer."

Through his laughs, the angel shook his head. "Come on, even if I look a little different, you seriously don't recognize me?" His voice was much the same as the one her childhood friend still had in her head, but deeper with age and distorted in an uncanny manner, as if echoed back from somewhere far away at the same volume.

"I recognize that you're pretending to be someone I once knew, and doing a very poor job at it," Lucina countered verbally, drawing Mercurius out of its sheath. "And I'm sure you recognize this facade has gone on long enough."

With a deep sigh, the shade of her former friend pulled something from behind him. Lucina prepared to strike, expecting it to be a weapon, but instead, was met with an achingly familiar sight. She couldn't help but gasp. "Palutena's staff…"

She was tempted to kneel at the very sight- she had never seen the former High Queen without it, after all. Though on its own, it was all but powerless, she'd seen Queen Palutena do spectacular things with it before her untimely demise. Pit had been the last person to have it, attempting to salvage it from his adopted mother's lifeless body, but it had vanished alongside him.

"See? Real deal, just… under new management," Pit(?) said, taking a step closer to her.

Despite wanting to trust that her lost friend had returned to her, she took a step backwards. "But… your eyes… What happened to you? I'm sorry, but I need more of an explanation to be able to trust that your words are true."

"I can understand that," the angel conceded. He sat down on the toppled-over legs of one of the long abandoned chairs in the house. "But, I need you to give me your word that you won't tell a soul what I tell you. It's… potentially sensitive, to say the least, and no one can know. Not even your own family- no, especially not them."

That was a hard promise to make- should this information be truly vital, and it be found she did not share it, she could be prosecuted for treason, or at the very least, scorned by her loved ones. But, she needed to know, as selfish as it could prove to be, and if it was something that concerned her nation and her family, she could find a way to solve the issue on her own. "I- I swear to it, upon Mercurius," she assured him.

Pit smiled at her. "Mercurius, huh? So you didn't end up with Falchion after all- I'm sure you're still great with what you have, but I'm curious who ended up with it."

"Marth got it," she explained, turning over another chair back onto its feet and delicately sitting down, feeling it creak with the slightest bit of weight put upon it. "And no, I am not exactly pleased about that, but considering his parents died in the invasion, I can't exactly bring myself to voice that."

"Sorry to hear that," Pit said, not sounding all that sorry, really. "Emmeryn was a nice lady, good at her High Priestess... stuff. But, we can catch up later- I really should hurry up and tell you how I'm here talking to you, huh?"

Lucina nodded, and Pit attempted to lean back in the toppled over chair, nearly falling over. "So, I can't exactly tell you everything, mostly because I'm pretty in the dark about this all too, but from what I understand, I did, in fact, die in the invasion, and then a bit later I got brought back to life."

"You were resurrected?" Lucina's shock grew. "I didn't even know that was possible! But… who could have done that? The only ones strong enough to even begin to do that are long dead, aren't they?"

"Not quite," he corrected, pulling the half glove covering his left hand to reveal a familiar insignia- a crescent moon with a dot between the points.

"Queen Bayonetta?" The Umbral Queen, who ruled over Dharka for countless years before being deposed in a bloody civil war, leading to the new regime which had invaded Galea, killed their High Queen, and, despite being ultimately driven back, started endless fighting between the two. She would have had to die before Pit had, but she supposed if Pit was alive, she could buy that Queen Bayonetta had somehow lived, not to mention her brand of magic would explain the odd differences in his appearance.

"Please, tell me how she survived," Lucina implored. "I must know! And why did she choose to resurrect you? Such a feat must have drained a great amount of her power. Not to imply you wouldn't be worth it, of course! I just don't understand why she of all people would do so…"

But, to that, Pit just shook his head. "Sorry, that's one of the things no one's bothered to tell me. I'm not sure how she survived, and I'm not sure why she chose to revive me of all people."

"That is a curious question…" Lucina tried to consider her reasoning. Perhaps it was as simple as the fact that Queen Bayonetta and Queen Palutena were close friends, so given the opportunity to bring someone close to her back to life, she took it. But, she doubted such a cunning woman would act on simple sentimentality. No, she was sure she had a scheme in mind.

"Do you think she could intend to have you take the throne in Galea?" She suggested after a moment's thought. "You would have a decent claim to it- even if you weren't named as an heir, I'm sure plenty of people would rather you be next in line than Marth or my father."

He looked surprised by her assertion. "No, that's not what this is about at all! I don't intend to take power from anyone- wait, Marth or your father? Wouldn't they have decided an heir by now?"

"It's… complicated," Lucina explained, glancing out the dusted-over window. "People were split as to whether the Knight Captain or High Priestess should be next in line, especially since Aunt Emmeryn is no longer with us, so it was decided that my father should be regent until Marth comes of age, and after that, it would be decided which of them should rule."

"That's skipping a lot of people, isn't it? What about you? Or Owain? Or Marth's sister- Effie, was it?"

"Elice," Lucina corrected. "She's the new High Priestess, so she's ineligible. And as for myself and Owain… I mean, we would be within our rights to challenge Marth, technically, but Owain intends to become the new Knight Captain once Jagen retires."

"And you?" Pit leaned forwards a bit, really testing the limits of how he was using that chair of his.

And her… she was to fight in the shadows of her cousins and her fathers, not to step into the light. She wasn't even exceptionally gifted at healing like Brady, or at strategy like Morgan. She was only skilled at the blade, and even then, not enough to be worthy of the holy blade passed down by her family. Mercurius was a consolation prize- it was Aunt Lissa's last minute idea to keep her from bursting into tears at the ceremony where she wasn't chosen for the billionth time in her life. It was a powerful and storied sword, but it meant nothing to her family. The only reason they even had it was because it had been stored in the palace for a few generations, all but forgotten, just as she was doomed to be.

"I have nothing," she finally admitted, staring down at her hands. "Everyone else has a brilliant future laid out for them, but any path I wish to tread is already taken by someone far more skilled than myself."

Pit stood up suddenly, knocking the chair halfway across the room in the process. "Then forge your path!" he exclaimed with a fervor she'd not seen from him, neither in the past nor this conversation. "You said yourself that you could challenge Marth, didn't you?"

"I could never do that to him," Lucina said, looking away from his intense gaze. "He's been through too much- losing his parents and his best friend… If I were to betray him, it would break his heart. Even if I am resentful, he is still my family, and beyond that, one of my closest friends."

He sighed at that, leaning against the dilapidated wall. "Shame, I had hoped for a moment this wouldn't be so hard on you."

Her heart seemed to stop for a brief moment, as did all the world around her. "What wouldn't be so hard on me?" she asked, unsure if she wanted to know the answer.

"Let's say… I had called you here to share some information with you about your dear old cousin," Pit asked, sounding not at all hypothetical about it. "Let's say I heard that he was about to do something very reckless in his own self interest. He probably thinks this could be good for everyone, maybe even end the war between Galea and Dharka, but mostly he's doing it for selfish reasons and not thinking it all the way through. And, there's no chance to talk sense into him. What would you do then?"

Eyes widening, Lucina gripped Mercurius's hilt, not in defense, but to try and instill the sense of security that came with a weapon in her hand. It didn't work. "I… Why? What is this?" She felt her hand shaking on Mercurius's hilt.

"I can't tell you that unless you tell me something first," Pit began, coming closer to her. "If we go down this path, chances are we're going to eventually come to blows with him, and perhaps with your entire nation, if we can't stop things soon enough." He extended her hand to her. "Can you accept that? Accept fighting your own family if that's the only way to save everyone?"

As desperately as she wanted to take his hand, she stopped herself before their fingers could meet. "What about you?" she asked. "What are you planning to do in this all?"

"Queen Bayonetta is going to be the one trying to stop him- I owe her my life, so I'll be on her side," Pit said, only looking more intense. "I understand if this is too much to ask of you, but I felt you'd be the only one with a chance of stopping things peacefully."

"But you said there was no chance-"

"There's no chance without you," he clarified. "And even with you, it's a slim chance if anything. But, it's the only chance we have to talk any sense to him."

This would be called betrayal should anyone find out about it- the Regent's daughter, conspiring against the Crown Prince? It could all so easily be a trick, meant to destroy Galea by pitting its royals against each other. But, would Pit betray her? He was so far from the cloyingly sweet and honest kid she once knew, but then again, she was far from the child he knew as well.

No matter what she chose, she stood to lose everything. If this was a lie and she trusted it, she would be ruined. If it were the truth and she denied it, her whole kingdom could be destroyed.

She told herself her choice was based on selflessness, that it was better for her own name to be disgraced than to risk her entire family and kingdom falling to ruin. But, deep down, she knew there was another reason. If Marth truly was poised to do something reckless, and should she stop him, she would finally prove herself better- ascend into the heroine she'd always dreamed of being.

She took Pit's hand.