Guess who's back, beitcheeeesssssss?!

I have a strong feeling this story will be just fine. I have a general story line planned, and the style and method in which I want to write it. I have done similar things before, and I had been pretty successful in them, even if they were riddled with hiatuses.

Oh yeah: there WILL be HIATUSES in updates. The simple but 100% honest reason is: my motivation and inspiration changes over time and I often switch between them and leave projects to rest for months at times. But I can say this now:

This story will NOT be dead, unless I SAY it is dead. If there's no "Author's Note", just silence, that means that I merely allow it to rest for a bit.

Anyway, screw all this nonsense I'm sprouting. You are here for the story. And I hope you'll enjoy the ride. ;)

Diablo (c) Blizzard


Chapter 2

Never before had Lyndon been this happy about a failed mission.

They did not find Mephisto, no matter how much they looked, how meticulously they searched. It was safe to say that the Lord of Hatred was not reforming in his own Realm. Either that, or he was actually clever and self-conscious enough to hide himself well. For all they knew, maybe the Seven Evils really were completely merged together now, and only Anu knew where they (it? He? She?) would show up again. In the end, the band of heroes had to retreat because their bodies began to feel the negative effects of the Burning Hells.

Johanna was furious at this. She raged in their camp, screaming curses at the Evils, her anger so great everyone shied away from her. Even Shen shut the hell up and wisely lied low in his tent, a feat Lyndon originally believed he was incapable of.

The scoundrel himself had another good reason to keep himself as far away from the Nephalem as possible. The little light dumpling… bird… whatever, kept on pulsing steadily in his pouch, having a barely registerable weight, but all the more heat in return. It wasn't hot, far from it, yet its constant radiation was disturbing after a while. Lyndon figured he may have had one more day before his (quite incredible, thank you very much!) poker face failed and he would be found out. Looking at the Crusader, slipping out of her usual character completely, Lyndon's every instinct screamed at him that he cannot allow that to happen.

He needed to get this… angel (it was still an angel, right?) back to the High Heavens. Maybe there they could do something, give him back his body?

Seriously, how did angel anatomy even work? All Lyndon knew was that angels were surprisingly light for their sizes, even that jerk Imperius barely had the weight of Kormac (despite being 3 times his size, at least), mostly made up from the armor he wore. That would explain the weightlessness of the light dumpling.

Then, in the middle of the night, as everyone was preparing to go to sleep, and even Johanna let out her fury, Lyndon felt his pouch move. It was just a slight twitch, but it immediately raised the alarm in his head and he realized he had to get out of here before anything else happened. So Lyndon gathered his own stuff silently, and while everyone went to sleep, except for Kormac who kept watch, he slipped away like a shadow. The Templar had no chance of noticing the thief in action, and Lyndon, as a self-imposed rule, always travelled lightly, with a maximum of two bags.

The scoundrel marched through the forest until he reached a road, then he turned in the direction of the closest village. He kept on walking throughout the night and into the next day, allowing his inner compass, memorized map and general sense of direction to guide him.

Finally, after the exhausting fast-paced marching most of the day, Lyndon arrived to a small town called Seram. He was completely covered in dust by then, even if crossbow looked battered, and his treasures safely tucked away in his bags, so he looked like any ordinary traveler. The village wasn't exactly big or famous, all Lyndon knew about it was that it was supposedly pretty goddamn old, one of the oldest towns out there. But that was pretty much it.

The most important thing was that it had an inn, thankfully, and not even that bad of an inn, apparently. The bed he paid for didn't crawl with bedbugs, at least, and that was enough for Lyndon. He placed his belt with the pouch onto the small night table by the window, then practically fainted into his bed and fell right asleep, not even bothering to close the curtains so the afternoon light filled the room completely.

The pouch twitched again and it opened, the seemingly lifeless light dumpling sticking out of it, touched by the afternoon light and the buzzing of the street below.

oooOOOooo

Lyndon had to ask himself: why couldn't he have normal dreams, like other people?

Instead of the usual dumb pictures and stuff that made no sense, he had a debate with himself, trying to explain the events of the last few days.

Why did he do this? Why did he touch the tortured angel?

Because the poor bastard was in great pain and possibly shock. Lyndon just wanted to calm him down, before he hurt himself, and the scoundrel had found during his travels that physical touch was the best way to anchor panicking people to the ground and hopefully quell their outbursts. Granted, people before this did not tend to blow up into a million sparks then gather into a light dumpling. Why did that even happen? Was the angel dead, and now Lyndon was carrying around his remains in some gruesome way?!

But no, the bundle had definitely moved in his pouch last night. That, and it kept on pulsing stubbornly, like a heart. That had to mean it was still alive in some weird way! Lyndon wrecked his brain until something hazy surfaced: Tyrael mentioning that angels were made up of light and sound. Interestingly enough, they still apparently had some sort of skeleton, if Urzael's pretty brutal death had been any indication (Lyndon vividly remembered the angel's spine and ribs exploding from his back). However that anatomy may have worked, maybe it was possible for an angel to somehow survive this… radical shape-shifting. Maybe it was like… a coma? Hibernation? A cocoon? Okay, whatever. At least the angel was (possibly) still alive, which was good. Pleased with that answer, Lyndon moved on.

Why didn't he trust Johanna? Why did every instinct of him screamed "danger", "stay away!", why did he feel he needed to keep this light dumpling away from her?

Hard to explain with words, but Lyndon was always a person who didn't ignore his own feelings and sixth sense. Johanna changed. Why? How? Lyndon didn't know, but it wasn't for the better, he was sure of it. That horrifyingly close call with the wicked flail had only confirmed his suspicions. It wasn't just a slip-up, a snap, an outburst. The Johanna Lyndon used to know would have never done something like that, let alone act this way. She had been adventurous, heroic, a true altruist, even if she possessed a surprising level of sarcasm, maximalistic outlook, and gentle cynical humor. Never this… this raging madwoman, obsessed with the hunt for evil. The change was sudden for him, too. Perhaps because he didn't spend that much time around her anymore and only saw her occasionally. But her change in character was drastic. Brutal, even.

It should be here. What was that all about? Did Johanna thought they would find Mephisto inside that weird mirror hall back in the Realm of Hatred?

Lyndon somehow doubted that. She sounded so… completely lost. As if she was certain she would find a certain thing in there, yet when she saw nothing, she lost her footing. And… she also immediately assumed Lyndon had found something there. It wasn't "Did you find anything here?", it had been "What did you find here?"

"What did you find here…"

She knew something had been in the hall. Perhaps even what that something was, exactly. How did she know? Why was it important for her?

Was it her original goal to find the angel in the first place, and Mephisto's murder would have been an added bonus? That would explain her rage at the end, when it became clear that they had failed. But why keep it a secret, why not tell her group that they had two targets?

Lyndon didn't know. However, his inner voice telling him to distance himself away from the Nephalem became all the louder now. She must not get her hands on the angel. He didn't know why, exactly, he just felt this way.

And when his sixth sense, the one that had bailed him out of countless horrible and seemingly hopeless situations and traps before, told him to keep the bundle of light away from her, then by all the gods, he would do it!

Still, it would have been nice to know just why he felt this way. Lyndon could feel the answer pounding in his head, trying to break out and show itself.

Wait.

Something was actually pounding on his head!

Lyndon's eyes fluttered open and the first thing he beheld was two red eyes staring down at him from pure darkness.

oooOOOooo

He woke.

He didn't know where he was. He didn't know anything, really.

It wasn't dark, though the light was fading in this place. Was something bad going to happen?

He didn't want that.

He looked around in fear. He had to hide. From—from them, him, her, everyone. He only knew this. But where?

He saw the form lying not far from him. It looked similar to him: two arms, two legs, one head. Yet, it still looked weird, different.

But as he watched the figure in the growing darkness, a certainty bloomed in him: he had to remain close to it. So he crawled towards it. Then the surface disappeared from under him and he fell.

Before he could scream in terror, he smacked into another surface that was somewhat, but not too terribly deeper than his original place. He pushed himself up, mild pain throbbing in his head. He shook himself and kept on crawling towards the figure that now seemed to be higher than him.

He felt fear grabbing and choking him. He didn't know what everything was, what was happening! The darkness was deep now, it would swallow him and he would be taken back to the place—the one with himself staring back at him a thousand times. They would take him back there!

The stranger. He had to reach the stranger! He was a friend, yes—he could help him.

Mewling in fear, he crept faster, struggling to climb up to the strange pedestal the figure was lying on. His little legs kicked and dangled in mid-air, but eventually he pulled himself up there somehow. He climbed onto the torso of the stranger and stared down at the… face?

He recognized this face. It was a friend. It didn't try to hurt him. It said everything would be alright. He was so happy to see it again! But…

Why wasn't it moving?! Didn't it feel the coming darkness and the cold it brought?!

He sobbed as fear took hold of him again.

He wanted to be safe! He wanted to hide!

In desperation he raised his little hands and began hitting the face with them. Wake up, he wanted to scream.

Wake up!

I'm afraid!

Help me!

The darkness is coming!

Wake up!

Finally, the stranger's eyes fluttered open and two brown orbs looked up at him.

oooOOOooo

Lyndon's first instinct was to scream and punch whatever the hell had crawled all up in his face. Instead, his battle-honed senses took over and he went very very still, not breaking eye contact with the thing above him.

He realized it was night time, probably just after sunset, meaning he slept only a couple of hours. Still, the growing semi-darkness did not explain the bottomless darkness that was looming over him. It was a small pool of absolute blackness, with two light red, almost peach-colored eyes staring out of them like two small beacon fires. It was also framed by small locks of surprisingly white hair that shimmered in the semi-darkness, and at the top sat a strange gold tiara-like ornament with two little wing-shaped twigs growing out of a tear-shaped center.

He had definitely seen this before…

Then the darkness let out a pitiful mewl, and Lyndon realized he actually saw emotions in the red eyes: they were full of fear, confusion and uncertainty. Okay, so it wasn't a mindless beast ready to tear out his eyes.

Finally, Lyndon's memory came back from the deep sleep and he recognized the white hair and the gold tiara. It was the same, only smaller, as in the case of that maimed angel back in the Realm of Hatred.

The scoundrel decided to take his chances and he started moving slowly, pushing himself up from the bed so he could assess the situation better. The little alien thing moved in sync with him, pulling back, but refusing to leave his chest. Lyndon saw a small, almost toddler-like body belonging to the deep darkness and the white hair. It had stubby arms and legs, small hands with fingers curled up in agitation. Also, it glowed in the darkness. There was a soft light that the white-ish blue-ish skin emitted, allowing Lyndon to even see anything in the growing darkness. There were small tendrils of somewhat stronger light growing out of the thing's back.

Lyndon realized he was staring at a miniature, absolutely naked angel sitting on his chest.

- What the hell? – he blurted out the only thing coming to his mind at the moment.

The dwarf angel mewled again in clear desperation. Lyndon moved to sit up, but instead of tumbling down, the little visitor lunged forward and buried his face into the clothes, short arms and legs encircling his torso as best as they could. He wasn't going anywhere, that was for certain.

Lyndon sat on the bed like an idiot, with a mini angel stuck to his chest, and he had absolutely no idea what to do. A myriad of questions buzzed in his head, making it shut down, and he just stared dumbfounded at the small creature who barely weighted anything at all.

How did this angel even get here?! Why did he cling to Lyndon like the human was his lifeline?

Helpless, Lyndon glanced at the pouch on the night table. It was empty. Panic racing through his entire body, he made a move to jump up and look around frantically, but a thought stopped him on his tracks.

The small angel stuck to his chest looked kind of like the large maimed angel in that mirror room. And the light bundle appeared when the large angel blew up. And now the light dumpling was gone and instead there was this small angel that looked like the large angel.

Sooo…. this small angel was that large angel?

- Is that you? – Lyndon looked down at him.

He looked back with fearful eyes, but did not answer.

- The angel from the mirror room. It's you, right?

Only a pitiful whine came as an answer and the angel buried his invisible face back into the fabric of his shirt. Lyndon got the distinct feeling that he was afraid of the dark. Well… angels were creatures of light after all, so he couldn't really blame him for that.

But seriously though, where did that large body of his go?! How did he even change into this toddler from the light bundle?

Lyndon thanked his sixth sense for goading him into leaving his old team behind. He could not have imagined the chaos that would have broken out if the little angel appeared in the middle of the camp. He quickly snatched up the thin blanket from the bed and bundled up his guest in it. He didn't know if angels could actually feel cold, but he figured he could never be too careful. This seemingly calmed down the little one a bit: he snuggled into the cocoon until it appeared he would sink into the wrinkles and disappear forever. The red eyes finally closed and only a pair of barely noticeable slits remained.

Mind reeling from this new situation, Lyndon gently set the bundle down onto the bed and made a move to stand up.

The angel burst out in an earsplitting wail at this, and scrambled out of the blanket.

- He—hey, calm down! Before everyone hears—! – Lyndon shouted but he was quickly tackled by the little one, small arms encircling his torso once more.

The scoundrel sighed heavily, then covered him up again with the blanket.

- Okay, I get it – he mumbled. – You don't want me to go.

Surrendering to his fate, he lied back down onto the bed with the angel on his chest.

- What is going on? – he mumbled to himself.

He absentmindedly patted the white-haired small head and the angel purred in return.

This was just ridiculous, the scoundrel decided. But he appeared to be neck-deep in this for the time being, so he might as well go with the flow.


I pride myself in being a reasonable fangirl in most things: I don't force ships that doesn't make any sense, I'm trying my damnest to stay true to the characters when I write/draw about them (level of success may vary, though), and I put a good story above all else, so I put effort in my works. Again, level of success may vary, though.

So for those who might be worried that chibi-Inarius has no reason to be like that, fear not, it does have a reason that will come up later. I've tried to make sense out of this choice.

Smaller trivia: that bit about angels being really light-weight is actually simply my addition, I based it on a strange notion I always get when watchign the Imperius vs Diablo cinematic. Blizzard is the undisputed KING at making amazing cutscenes, there is no doubt about that, yet for some reason when Diablo sends Imperius flying with her tail, the way he tumbles across the ground and smacks into a pillar seems so... floaty to me. As if Imperius weighted a fraction of what he actually looks like. That's where this idea comes from, but it isn't actually canon.