Author's Note: References to darkness are to the dark/light struggle, not to Wishology. The author doesn't really remember Wishology and it hasn't happened yet in this timeline.
I hope this chapter suffices and you guys like it. :D
Chapter Two: Red Rum
The constant drip threatened to drive Timmy mad. To placate himself, he ran through the gamut of Crash Nebula games and where the next game ought to take place in the established time line. Cosmo whined and coughed, his broken legs twitching. A more medical minded person might have wondered whether the legs would heal properly, with Cosmo's accelerated healing capacities and their prior set. A more medical minded person also probably wouldn't have secured himself faerie godparents and therefore, would never have ended up in the situation. Timmy wasn't the type to pontificate on the what-if scenarios, regardless. All he knew was he was ensnared in a small, cemented cell with his only escape chance wounded and whining in pain.
A length of time passed, but its exact span was unknown. Time had no meaning here; it meandered at its own rate and Timmy floundered, unable to keep a level head. His ears were attuned to any unusual sounds and his body was keyed to another presence. Cosmo shuffled on his lap and rose partially, moaning and nudging Timmy's chest.
"I thought you were going to rest," Timmy reprimanded.
"I don't wanna rest," Cosmo said. "There were wolves."
"They're not here now," he said derisively. "And your leg isn't going to heal if you don't sleep."
"I don't wanna sleep," he repeated. "There were wolves and they were half breeds."
Timmy scoffed. "I thought there were only faeries, anti faeries, pixies, elves, gnomes, and dragons."
"No…" Cosmo said and maneuvered his body to a more comfortable position, which entailed squashing Timmy to the floor. He rested his head alongside him and Timmy sincerely hoped the hard packed dirt contained no insect life or vermin. Then again, he had no idea where exactly they were, so it could really have anything in it, including giant worms. He shuddered.
"There are half breeds," Cosmo said. "We never mentioned them before 'cuz the last time anyone saw them…" He gulped.
"Yes?" Timmy said, a trifle irritated.
Cosmo fidgeted and accidentally whacked one of his broken legs against the other. He screamed and clawed Timmy's chest; Timmy yelped and shoved him away, an unconscious reflex prompting the faerie to howl. He'd accidentally pushed Cosmo against the wall and…Timmy's stomach churned. On his knees, he inched toward his faerie and ran his fingers along Cosmo the wolf's spine. The tail was still missing. Surely, this portended nothing. After all, faeries didn't normally have tails, so if Cosmo didn't have one now, it wasn't going to affect anything. Right?
"Dude, don't claw me and I promise I won't smack you into the wall," Timmy said. "Deal?"
Cosmo whimpered and tucked his head into his chest. Sighing, his conscience bothering him, he rubbed Cosmo's head in between the ears. Cosmo had clamped his mouth shut and a low, guttural noise issued, but Timmy didn't know if it meant he'd further harmed his godfather, or if Cosmo derived comfort from the affection. He gulped.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"The last time this happened," Cosmo said, his voice breathy thanks to the renewed suffering. "The last time, Wanda was here too."
"Wait," Timmy said, frowning, "this happened before?"
"Not everything," Cosmo swallowed hard and whined again, "not everything that happens…"
Catching his breath was cumbersome and Timmy waited until his godfather could speak again. The drip was driving him insane and he gritted his teeth, throttling his temper. Snapping at Cosmo wouldn't help. He'd already done enough damage aggravating his injuries, and he'd seen the wolves break the bones. Cosmo shuddered, perhaps ruminating on it too, and licked his lips.
"Jorgen doesn't always know," he finished.
"Great," Timmy said. "There go my other plans for getting rescued."
Cosmo flinched, kicked the wall, and howled again. The sad fact of the matter was there was almost nowhere in the cell he could stretch out and not smack one of the walls. In wolf form, Cosmo's body was extended, anyway, and his hind legs stuck out. Timmy tugged Cosmo's head into his lap again and sighed.
"Could you not hurt yourself for five minutes?" Timmy hissed. "Seriously."
Silence resumed, as silent as it could be with the infuriating drip. Cosmo attempted to control his spasms, angling his body to prevent inflaming the injury. Timmy resumed stroking Cosmo's fur, since it seemed to pacify him. Despite his apology, guilt squirmed within him. Two broken legs had to be excruciating, regardless of how quickly one healed. Cosmo seemed to bear the pain well, too, although it might've been because Wanda wasn't here to mollycoddle him.
Another stretch of time passed. Timmy shut his eyes. There was no point in keeping them open when the only thing he saw was black, with faint green shimmers from his godfather. Cosmo's breathing was heavy and stressed. He rubbed his head against Timmy's thigh again and stopped, bursting into tears again.
"Timmy, it hurts…" he sobbed.
"How did you guys deal with pain without your wands before?" he said.
"We…didn't."
"You guys regularly get smacked around and hit," he argued. "And you don't cry about it then."
"Magical injuries…" Cosmo paused, pacing himself because speaking whole sentences taxed him, "are different."
Timmy groaned. "You can't do magic at all without your wands, right?"
Cosmo panted and spoke so low Timmy had to strain to hear it. "…there's…a way."
"Then why didn't you do it before?" Timmy snapped, losing his temper and regretting it instantly, because Cosmo cowered and curled in on himself. He forced himself back to calmness. Yelling at Cosmo wasn't going to help. He'd do more harm than good upsetting him.
"The only time…I've seen it…" Cosmo shuddered and then went limp. Timmy hissed and rubbed Cosmo's eyelids, which were closed. The time for his godfather to actually be a fountain of information was nigh and Cosmo had chosen to pass out rather than help him.
He'd never tried calling on Jorgen before, since Jorgen's arrival usually foretold the end of whatever wish Timmy had enjoyed, despite Da Rules. He wasn't even sure the Fairy World leader would hear or answer.
Wherever Wanda was, however, he sincerely doubted she was capable of coming to their aid. She would have done it already if she could have, if not for Timmy's sake, then for Cosmo's. Cosmo shuddered and chomped his teeth down so hard, he was fairly positive it had sent a corresponding ache down his body.
"I don't know if you can hear this, but, uh…" Timmy swallowed hard. "Cosmo's really injured and we don't know where Wanda is. Jorgen? Now would be a really good time to come and bother me."
"Jorgen?" his voice echoed in the cells and a steady drip from heaven only knew where was his only reply.
Someone, probably Ms. Doombringer, had bound Wanda to a sterile iron table. Iron. Wanda's teeth chattered and she shuddered, loathing the feel against her fur. The wounds on her stomach and torso had stopped bleeding, thankfully, though her right hind ankle throbbed. A bright light obscured her vision and she was stuck on her back in wolf form; she thrashed, knowing it was futile but attempting it anyway. All it did was tighten the strap around her throat.
"You may have been wondering how we found you," Ms. Doombringer said, her voice echoing strangely.
Wanda didn't answer. She concentrated on healing her injuries. Before she could contrive a way out of here, she had to be capable of walking. Also, the throbbing and unpleasant pressure on the wounds was having a marked impact on her thinking capacities. The pain had forged a mental block and rendered any higher thinking impossible.
She sensed the human moving forward and growled, snapping her jaw. A sharp, vicious pain ensued from the wound in her stomach and she saw a glint of steel. It had to be a knife. Ms. Doombringer plunged it deeper and Wanda stopped fighting, stopped moving entirely. She breathed shallowly, aware the knife wound would have healed faster without the magical wounds exacerbating it. Fear coiled itself tightly around her and she knew the only way to escape was to keep her mouth shut. Help would come, eventually, because it had to.
"I know you talk, little faerie," she scoffed. "You were talking to Cosmo."
Wanda gasped. She couldn't help it. Her whole body tensed and Ms. Doombringer chuckled.
"You, Timmy, and Cosmo really shouldn't talk to each other, or at least use your real names, when there are people within earshot," she admonished.
"People…who are…eavesdropping…you mean…" Wanda said. Speaking strained her further, but it wasn't like this would end up harming her further. She knew as soon as she said it it'd amuse her captor and she was right. Ms. Doombringer laughed.
"I could tell you how I went through the Dimmsdale faerie network to locate you, and how someone else who's in love with you betrayed you, but that'd be no fun at all," Ms. Doombringer said. "I must tell you, it is quite amusing how easily you faeries are corrupted."
She twisted her arm and white flesh mixed with sparkling red blood. "I love how it sparkles when it captures the light."
She rubbed Wanda's torso and dug her knuckles into the scab forming. Wanda hissed and she stopped, punching her in the face. Again, she snapped her jaws at her and Ms. Doombringer huffed.
"That's really not going to work, Wanda."
A chill went down her spine and cold spread throughout her body. No one should know her name aside from other faeries and her godson. No human should speak it, certainly, other than Timmy. In the olden times, names were things of power and could command someone to do their bidding. They'd done away with that a long time ago, because it'd been abused. But ordinarily, a human knowing a faerie's name meant they could summon them at will, hence why only the godchild knew.
"Cosmo's with Timmy, but I suspect you already knew that. He won't be for long."
Wanda didn't acknowledge the statement. Part of her was still reeling in shock from their names repeated and the other part knew she shouldn't goad her on.
"You really aren't going to talk to me? Should I have left you with Timmy and taken Cosmo?"
Ms. Doombringer rubbed Wanda's hind legs against the iron and she hissed, coiling her legs closer to her body.
"I know all the old tricks. I know in the past, faeries were allergic to iron. I know they still don't like it. I know about butterfly nets, as you recall. I know about ley lines, but I suspect you don't."
She concentrated on sending magical sparks to the affected areas and ignoring the mental block. Ms. Doombringer yanked on fur near her torso and she shuddered, gritting her teeth and swallowing back the cry.
"Wanda, Wanda, Wanda. How many times do I have to say your name before you answer me?"
Swallowing again, she thought of her father. Big Daddy hadn't been big on torture, at least, when Wanda was around, but she'd seen enough sessions. The memories resurfaced and she retreated into her mind, unable to quell a thought that if Big Daddy were here, he'd probably have Ms. Doombringer murdered immediately.
"I'll bring Juandissimo in, then," Ms. Doombringer said. "I'm sure he'll love to have you all to himself."
She wanted to ask how she knew their names, but it wasn't worth the trouble. Instead, suppressing a groan, she sank into herself again. Considering Ms. Doombringer's prior gloating, she had no hope Juandissimo would help. In fact, she expected the exact opposite. The garish light faded and she sighed, funneling her energy into healing herself.
She wasn't alone for long.
"Mi amor," Juandissimo purred and she blinked, red spots appearing before her eyes. She thought his eyes had turned red, which had to be a side effect from the light blinding her for so long.
Juandissimo kissed her hand and her vision settled again. It hadn't been an apparition. His eyes glowed red and darkness eclipsed him, not like the anti faeries, whose powers generally leaned toward mischief and occasional cruelty. This power bespoke true dark power, like that of necromancy and thoughtless slaughter, magic derived from blood. She squirmed.
"Join us," he said. He stroked her head fur and she growled, baring her teeth.
"Or else."