So I wrote this chapter. It is pretty enormous, as expected. Hope you really like it. Thanks for everything.
Noon30ish: Thanks so much, haha :) I don't even know whether this story is supposed to be cute, or tragic, or action-packed, or whatever, but as long as people are enjoying reading it and I have fun writing, it's kind of okay I guess… Yes, Rapunzel and Flynn's plot is getting increasingly entangled (pun totally intended) but some things are going to clear out when they join with the others, including about Punz's constellite-related abilities. I wanted to have her storyline start on another continent from the rest, so I had to cover a lot before having her meet the other cast members. I was a bit daunted by writing for her character at first, as Tangled was probably one of the films I don't like as much, but I really enjoyed writing the chapters with her and Flynn.
faisyah865: Lol, eggs are cool, so, yeah. I don't even like eggs that much in real life; they're an okay source of food. The plot's getting pretty messy with someone believing that others are dead in an accident while no one knows that some people have been killed etc. A recap of the mess is coming soon in one of the next chapters. Seriously though, thank you loaaaaads.
Chapter 13, where pyramids are featured, a strange plan happens to work pretty well, a series of curb-stomp fights follow and the author is still trying to make Jack and Hiccup look cute. Human!Alpha
CW: violence, racism, death, mention of human sacrifice and genocide, mention of homophobia
Jack could not believe any more. The day died at his feet with his last certainties, bleeding light as crimson as the blood of his fallen Guardians, over the steps of the Pyramid of the Moon at the end of the long mournful avenue that was the Huacans' cult centre. The site, aligned with the course of the sun along a single axis following the precise calculations of the Ancients, resembled an immense hovercraft when viewed from above. How old it was, Jack would never find out, as its stone pyramids had been standing for far longer than any Drifter tribe had ever been assembled, even longer than the colonists' zeppelins had ever floated over what was now known as Eastern Extremesia. The Huacans, usually nomadic and scattered, were reunited there only on great days of religious ceremonies, and this particular rising full moon marked the start of a brand new cycle.
"For tonight, he will pay for his crimes," announced Drago Bludvist, his proud ebony dreadlocks falling onto his tawny, scarred square shoulders as he slowly paced around Jack. "The Feathered Snake, the silver-haired invader come from the ocean who pretended to be a god and crowned himself a sun, will pay for misguiding and enslaving our people. For corrupting our souls and erasing the wealth of our past. Look before you, Huacans, and admire what our ancestors have built. Why hide away in an infertile and toxic stone quarry the White Ones have built, when we have been capable of such splendour? Why not live like our people have always lived, strong and proud of our traditions? It has been too many years we have been hiding away from the enemy, striking in the dead of night, retreating to our unnamed lairs. Too many years we have lived in fear from the White Ones, and see where that fear has led us: into veneration. Look at the Feathered Snake before you, which you accepted as a father and a leader. Look at him. He played with you and tricked you, mocking your hopes and your dreams with his mischievous smirk. You saw a god in him, you believed in him, and it came true."
And he was right, Jack thought with the last ounce of sarcasm that was left to him. What people believed in came true. Their visions became their beliefs, their beliefs became their visions. The crowd behind him and Drago was grunting and cheering in approval. The Huacans, the old and the new, joined their voices in support. The former Guardians stood amongst the ranks, without manacles or ties, garbed just as any other Drifter present. Jack could not see any of their faces, but he pictured their eyes gleaming with excitement and passion. A subordinate of Drago's maintained him onto his knees, hands bound with rope behind his back and wings savagely slashed, looking away from the audience onto the ritual site's avenue and the bloodied sunset.
"O Feathered Snake, look yourself and see that your time is revolved. The old day is falling and the new full moon is rising. Now is time for another sun, now is time for the old rules to return. In another life, Feathered Snake, you taught us the old rules and showed us an example. Now is time for you to leave us with just that again. According to the old rules, you tore off your heart as an offering to the one sun, the one true sun, for it to continue its journey across the sky and relieve us from the darkness. The sun wants blood, O Feathered Snake, and the Earth will drink it."
Their thirst may never be quenched, but Jack had seen enough blood. He had seen children of his tribe choking on their tears as crimson liquid poured out of their rose lips, just because they had been pale in complexion. He had seen Monty's juvenile shape pouncing off a branch onto the enemy camp, his frail body splayed out like a flying squirrel against the hard stony floor and his small spine fractured in an impossible posture. He had seen Pippa dangling off a creeper, her puny white feet suspended in mid-air, her pale face so calm she looked asleep as the liana strangled her. He had seen Claude, his brand new staff abruptly shattered still in his hand, fallen against the gleaming backdrop of the constellite tree he had attempted to protect. And of course, he had seen North, both sabres unsheathed, guarding the children fiercely until the last second, slashing at the enemy, ducking, parrying, stabbing, pouncing, slicing through wood and bone. He had seen him carve his way through the dense jungle of Huacans, taking no notice of the long shards of wood that poked through his leather outfit. He had seen the wondrous anger in his dark eyes, the menacing swing of his bloodstained beard, the lethally symmetric metallic dance of his blows. He had seen his blood, just as red as that of any human of any colour, pooled at his mighty feet. He had seen the last breath cross his tanned lips as he staggered against a wall, his last opponents slain before him. He had seen the rictus of victory sculpted forever onto his dark traits. He had seen a protector, a mentor, a father die right there in their camp, before his own eyes. He had seen the Huacans burning their dead and leave the fallen Guardians to rot. He had seen all that blood stain the sand, poured by his own hands. Jack had been vain, selfish, reckless. He had tried to prove himself to one that would never come back, one that would always despise him, one that all the ways of Nature forbid him to love. He had given away the lives of all his clan for a pair of green eyes and the silhouette of a glider he would never see again. And all he deserved was to stand and see the blood one last time, the blood pouring from his own chest to pay for the crimes he had committed in his carelessness.
"People of the Huacan, watch and believe. When his blood stains the steps erected by our ancestors, when the last rays of the golden steps vehemently burns it, when the coldness of the moon washes it away, the world will be reborn anew, under the light of a new sun. The Huacans will live as one, not scattered but assembled, not hiding but shining in the full sunlight, tall and powerful as the descendants of the builders of pyramids. The sun will be bright for us, and so will the winds. The hurricanes will blow away their filthy zeppelins from our coasts, the rains will pour until there is nothing left of their gold mines but mud, the ground will tremble and the volcanoes will erupt until the last of their companies is long dead. We will fight them, to the last drop of our blood and that of our ancestors, and we, people of the Huacan, will win. Then the Earth will be healed, the trees will regrow, the birds flutter and the snakes slither in safety once more, and we will be restored to our past splendour under the light of our benevolent sun, sated with the blood of the White Ones. Then, what we believe will truly be what we see."
Even as the shadow of himself, Jack could recognise the good words of a leader. Drago was a man who knew how to unite his people against a common enemy, who knew how to feed on their memories to grow their wonder into dreams, and their dreams into hopes. He was a visionary chief, one that could raise an army of Drifters to chase away the colonist invader. Even if he did not believe in the mythical delusions of his own words, he could ignite the flame burning inside every native and promise them they would see what they believed in. And as the last scrap of freedom he had, the silver-haired teenager closed his eyes in the blinding twilight, refusing to believe.
"Look, the sun is coming down to our feet; Quetzalcoatl is falling, stained with blood and shame. Look, the night is rising, even the fog is settling now."
And indeed it was. It was too befitting to be true. A hazy mist drifted from the sky onto the Pyramid of the Moon and the Avenue of the Dead. A fresh feeling of numbness invaded him, and with a small smile he felt himself gently drifting into sleep. It was a dream, just a dream, and he would never allow Drago to impose his reality to his oneiric realm. The crowed, bewildered, progressively fell into silence as the vision of the hovercraft-shaped site faded away in the steamy air, through which only the sunset's iridescent halo penetrated.
"Don't you dare passing out," sneered Drago's underling, giving Jack a painful shove. "They're here for the whole spectacle of your pain."
"Alphen," snapped his leader. "The blood of Quetzalcoatl is for the new sun, not for you. Go get me that Valkyrie."
With a somewhat wary grump, Alphen the Beast walked away through the brown-skinned audience. Jack suppressed a sigh of meagre relief. At least Drago's right hand man would not be pestering him during his last minutes of life. It was too good to be true. As he raised his tearful eyes to the sky, he decided he definitely be dead or dreaming. And frankly, it hardly made a difference to him. For the familiar shape of Toothless was discernable through the thick mist, hovering right above his head. A dark shape dropped from the airship to the ground, with a small sound of detonation. Instinctively, Drago and the Huacans stepped back, towards the rear of the pyramid, all eyes focused on the dark shape that emerged through the intensifying mist.
"Do not kill him, barefoot Jack Frost is not the Feathered Snake you are looking for," said a calm, velvety voice Jack immediately recognised. Through the misty veils, the slender upper body of the newcomer grew increasingly visible. Jack revised his own status to completely dead. For the Hiccup that stood in front of him, as ethereal as a cloud, was so beautiful he was unrealistic. Jack knew, for having fixed his aeroglider, that he always kept a formal suit with him, but this particular one defied all expectations. The thick navy blue waistcoat, strong but supple, was richly ornate with golden gears and cogs masterfully imbricated, each exquisitely embossed with the emblem of Berk Steel. Jack had failed to recognise its stylised version on the porcelain mug, but found it plainly obvious on the suit. A white shirt, embroidered in circuit-like patterns in the finest golden threat, emphasised his elegant arms, assorted with a pastel green scarf around his well-shaped neck that was of the most precious pearl-studded silk Jack had ever seen. Draped over his shoulders was a jacket matching the waistcoat, as dark as the wings of a nocturnal dragon, its material just as smooth and stiff. Each of his cufflinks was a unique treasure of its own: miniature pocket watch, automaton multifunction screwdriver and repair tool, crystal lenses of a tiny folded spyglass and minuscule geometry of a brass compass. In place for a flower, in his buttonhole beamed a fountain pen made out of solid gold, its many parts perfectly imbricated into each other. His crafty hands were covered in white gloves that stopped at each wrist to reveal an ivory bracelet sculpted in a fashion so delicate it resembled a ribbon of lace. A dark top hat completed the ensemble; gorgeously sitting atop the gentleman's dashingly combed auburn hair, tall and proud. It bore a single brooch, a blue diamond sculpted into the shape of a snowflake, the old sigil of Miseralia, the most remarkably symmetric and precisely masterful piece of handiwork any of the Drifters had ever laid their eyes on. His emerald eyes shone with the greatest detached calm, staring into the fog's nothingness, the very image of the accomplished white gentleman and businessman from Centralesia.
"Jack Frost is but a child of the streets and a prankster of the dark slums of the Old Continent. He has been an irresponsible leader, but he is not the one you want. He is not the one the gods are claiming the blood of. The gods hate those haughty bourgeois and aristocrats who dare hunt on their own sacred lands, under the light of their sun and moon, who cut down their forests and poison their rivers. Your suns will only accept the heart of one of them, that poor boy Jack Frost's will only increase their anger."
Drago Bludvist took a hesitant step towards the dark-haired young man's silhouette, his calculating eyes judging the intruder through the fog that had become impenetrable, unsure of what to think. Even the youth's voice sounded otherworldly, slightly metallic, slightly superhuman.
"I am Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, heir to the Berk Steel company of the Eastern Extremesian Colonies, and I have come to sacrifice my blood to the new sun. Take me in his stead. That barefoot man's heart is worth nothing compared to mine."
The Huacans, somehow increasing confused, saw him as the object of all their hate, their scorn, their disgust. He was one of those rich, spoiled children of the White Ones whose feet had never touched the dark ground beneath their arrogant zeppelins, whose alabaster skin had never been burnt by the merciless glare of the sun under their expensive parasols. He was a boy who lived off his family's revenues, whose new automaton toys and precious jewellery was paid by the sweat of the natives' brows, the blood of their feet and the tears of their eyes. He was one of those who mocked them casually, regarding them as less than human, as they paraded waving their beautifully embroidered handkerchiefs. They saw him as that picture, and they lusted for his blood and pain. Drago, however, saw that the challenger made them believe exactly what they wanted to believe, and looked at him in defensive defiance. The tall, cloaked and helmed figure of the Valkyrie by his side stood perfectly immobile, unreadable, contemplating the vision of the young gentleman through the fog.
"Take my heart, and the suns will be sated. Take my blood, and they will give you your revenge. Take my body, and you will wreak havoc in the whole engine of those merciless companies who cannot suffer a single hair cut off one of their most precious children. Take me, and you will see everything you believe in and have always believed in. The years of hiding in fear will be washed in purifying water."
The young man was as brave as he was clever, both Jack and Drago immediately perceived it. He had observed amd learned from both Drifter leaders, and he could talk a people into belief without a single drop of blood being shed. The Huacan and Guardian leaders stared at him, their eyes suddenly tired, attempting to decipher his plan in the hazy mist of his green eyes.
"Tlaloc, this is not yet the time of yours…" let out Drago in a wary breath.
By giving him a mythological coating equal to that of Jack, as the gentle god of rains and waters, the native chief unleashed the desire of fantastic vengeance in the mind of his people, expecting them to request the sacrifice of both the White Ones. The Huacans and Guardians believed what they saw and heard, and Jack still refused to.
His extremities felt numb, the pain of his wounds and bruises eased, and the Drifter drifted for the last time towards a death that seemed as calm as sleep. None of this was true. He was hallucinating, and none of this existed. The fog, the Drifter audience, Drago, Alphen and the Valkyrie, Toothless and even Hiccup. Especially Hiccup, with that serene smirk over his delicious lips, standing in the distance at the edge of the pyramid. Especially Hiccup, for through his foggy head, in the darkness of the rising night sky he could see the moon.
Darkness. That's last thing I will remember. It was dark, it was cold, and I was scared. But then...then I saw the Moon. It was so big, and it was so bright. It seemed to, chase the darkness away. And when it did... I wasn't scared anymore. Why I was there and what I was meant to do, that I've never known, and a part of me wonders if I ever will.
Jack looked at Hiccup again, slowly, from head to foot. And as his sharp eyes reached his knees, he saw them vanish into empty mist, through which he could barely distinguish a characteristic shape. The flower-like corolla of the horn of a gramophone. It was connected to the small square box of a radiomessenger, gleaming very dimly in constellite light.
The Drifter opened his young, acute ears, and he heard. Beyond the murmuring crowd, over the back edge of the pyramid, softly grumbled the motors of Toothless, forgotten by all as they tiredly stared at Hiccup. Diffused by the helices' wind, wafts of steam were blown towards them, enveloping them in the hazy blur that bore the slightest but trademark scent of Sandy's morphium. From the regular breathing and soft snore amongst the audience, Jack could tell that most the Huacans closest to the aircraft and furthest from himself were already asleep. Focusing further, he heard the typical spin of Sandy's Dreamometer, the hand-churned mirror machine rendering an image that was reflected right in front of everyone by an additional looking glass that Tooth was holding in mid-air above their heads. Jack ever so slightly smiled when he perceived the familiar buzzing of her clockwork wings, hovering atop the middle of the pyramid. The mirrors were oriented in a way to project onto the screen of mist before their eyes the image of Hiccup, who stood in his dining suit, radiomessenger in trouser pocket, atop the glass ceiling of Toothless.
Forcing himself not to inhale the sedative morphium, Jack could not help internally smirking. Hiccup, the green-eyed Hiccup had returned for him. He hardly cared whether that was true or not, he liked to believe that such a crazy plan could only be the young inventor's work.
Bludvist's sleepy mind took some time to realise what was going on. It was only as he stumbled to his knees that he had the notion of looking backwards into the fog, and see the vague silhouette of an airplane.
"Alphen, cover your face and get that ship!" he yelled to his right-hand man at the back of the crowd.
Immediately, the Drifter obeyed. Tossed onto the pyramid's hard stone surface, Hiccup scrambled to his feet. Impervious to the effects of the morphium thanks to the adrenaline-boosting herbs Tooth had given to him, he slid up his trouser leg to extract his constellite-powered plasma cutter from his prosthetic leg. Turning a knob, he extended the indigo jet to twice its usual length. The fast left-handed slashes of his incandescent weapon managed to surprise the native man and push him onto the dozing crowd. He raised his obsidian-bladed sword to block the blows, projecting a myriad of violet sparks into the misty air. As the larger man counter-attacked, Hiccup readied his guard. As his brain tried to find a way through, his fighting reflexes took over. Strike. Bend down. Block the blade and push it away. Attack the bare chest. Retreat. With the sun in his eyes and his metallic foot slipping over the stony floor, he was progressively outmatched by the superior strength and experience of his opponent. Aiming and the head and hitting his metallic leg, Alphen managed to make Hiccup fall onto his rear, his prosthesis rolling away from him. He could only raise his arm over his head as the massive shadow of the Drifter brought down his blade over him…
He barely heard the Huacan grunt as someone dragged him out of the way. Jack had knocked him unconscious using Hiccup's metallic leg, his ropes cut off by Tooth's sharp wings. The healer was engaged in combat against Drago, wielding and throwing her scalpels while hovering in mid-air, the Huacan simply deflecting her attacks with his spiky arm and knee protections. His Valkyrie had just taken up to confront Jack, who raised Hiccup's metal leg in protection against her long obsidian-pointed spear. The aviator, from the ground, loaded his crossbow and waited for a window. In a second he saw Drago's scarred hand grab onto Tooth's thin ankle and drag her towards him violently. In a second he saw the Valkyrie disarming Jack with an agile swing of her weapon. In a second, he shot.
His dart rebounded against the Valkyrie's spiky helm, causing her to stumble and turn around, with a whirl of her dark capes.
She looked at him, silent.
Drago looked at her, somewhat surprised.
In the short confusion, Tooth flipped a lever that accelerated the flutter of her wings, through a mechanism of imbricated cogs and golden torsional springs, dragging the Huacan leader up into the air. He hardly had any time to scream, before she pricked his hand with a needle-sharp blade, causing him to let go of her leg and fall onto the pyramid's rocky side.
Hiccup still looked at the Valkyrie, confused.
Both stood without a movement.
Then Tooth flew over the masked Huacan's head, a golden scalpel in each hand, ready to protect Hiccup and Jack. Immediately, the Valkyrie whirled her spear around, barely missing the healer's legs. Both fighters were exceptionally well-matched. The Guardian's rapidly fluttering mechanical winds and the surgically precise strikes of her short blades were met by the Huacan's ample spear swings, spinning near as fast as a glider's turbine, and her swift long strides concealed by the movements of her cape. The smaller woman propelled herself against her opponent's weapon's hard wood to acrobatically flip in the misty air, her colourful hair and ribbons floating around her as her blade-sharp wings sliced off the tallest spikes of the Valkyrie's helm. The dark warrior pounced upwards, locking her spear against Tooth's neck with both hands on either side, ignoring the glasstring wings that tore her cape into strips. Tooth attempted sink her scalpels into her enemy's fingers, without success. Her feet kicked ineffectively in the air at the taller Drifter.
Hiccup loaded his crossbow again, but Jack was faster. Springing onto the Valkyrie from behind, he locked both his bare feet onto her back and pulled off her helmet from the spike stumps, revealing a mane of tumbling caramel hair. Before Hiccup had time to react, she retaliated, hitting the white-haired boy with the blunt end of her weapon. Somehow, the aviator managed to catch him as he was tossed onto the floor. Tooth saw the diversion as an opportunity. She pulled out a knife from her belt and laid its blade over the other woman's white bare throat. Emerald eyes warily looked down at her, and in a split second she fell to the floor, the leather straps of her clockwork wings sliced off by her enemy. Her violet gaze was filled with fear as she saw the Valkyrie, blood dripping from her neck, look down at her in silence, spear in hand.
With a blast of indigo power, Toothless glided right over their heads, knocking the Huacan warrior over. Piloting unsteadily with one hand, Sandy opened the aircraft's door, reaching out to Tooth. The healer gladly seized her mate's hand and was pulled into the cockpit. Still holding onto a half-conscious Jack, Hiccup fumbled with the settings of his prosthetic leg. Rotating one of the multiple switches, he shot up a magnetic fish hook that locked onto the door handle. He pressed in the button, causing the rope to retract, pulling him upwards feet first along with Jack's weight he barely managed to hold onto.
Both young men landed inside the vessel, breathless and haggard. Hiccup let out a visible sigh of relief as the teenager's ice blue eyes fluttered open and the slightest shadow of a mischievous grin parted his parched lips. Jack saw the reassured emerald eyes, barely containing the overwhelming emotions that flowed out from him. The aviator's warm fingers wiped off the blood on his temple, their agreeable touch sending electric tingles across his scalp. Even covered in sand, sweat and blood, clothes torn and hair unkempt, he looked ravishing. Hiccup's mature traits were illuminated by a tender smile.
In that instant, Jack decided he was alive. He hardly knew what he believed in or not, for all he felt was a hope somewhat fulfilled, as he lay there just breathing, the inventor's hands gently playing with his thin silver hair. His eyes counted the trace of every freckle over Hiccup's face, like one counted snowflakes by a window in winter, afraid that the moment, beautiful in its unique imperfection, might melt away into a memory. The Man in the Moon had only given him a point to start on, and from there Jack could start drawing his own reality, on a page as white as pristine frost.
"Do you believe in me?" whispered Hiccup teasingly, interrupting his thoughts.
He felt the plane accelerate into the sunset and away from the morphium mist, an increasingly confident Sandy in control. Amber sunrays drifted through Toothless's roof onto Hiccup's face, lighting up the fiery reflections of his auburn hair and making his forest-tinted irises shine like watery suns.
"I don't know," he responded, playfully nipping the aviator's nose. "But I believe in us."
Fun fact: This isn't an AU for no reason ;) I advise you against using this as your sole mythological reference, would you be tempted to. The Teotihuacan does have a spacecraft-like shape terminated by the Pyramid of the Moon, at the end of the Avenue of the Dead. As a divergence from 'real' myths, Quetzalcoatl, the second sun, is generally depicted as a bearded individual, unlike Jack in this story. Other resemblances are conserved though: (recapping from previous A/N?) white hair, coming from the sea, loving of his people as they are, opposed to human sacrifice, (in some other story) offered up his heart for the sun to continue its course. Drago matches Hiccup to Tlaloc, the third sun, the supreme god of rain, for his blue and green colour scheme, his association with water and mist and his benevolent nature. However, Hiccup is, under this semblance, more similar to (the black) Tezcatlipoca a.k.a. 'Smoking Mirror' in this chapter at least, the first sun, for his missing lower leg (that his suit conceals at first) and for his usage of mirrors in strategy. Throughout the story there will be more about which one of the two he is more like… Alphen's weapon, an obsidian-bladed sword, is actually a symbol of Tezcatlipoca's, volcanic obsidian being quite commonly used in weapons. Alphen is the human version of Drago's Alpha Bewilderbeast. The Valkyrie… is just being the Valkyrie, and I'm sure you can have a guess at who she is. I quite enjoy woman-vs-woman combat, which is easily more fast and fun than guys hitting each others with sticks. I do believe in some interdependence between Norse and Aztec pantheons, as supported by the Ericsson-Quetzalcoatl-type theories, and it is played up a bit in this story. I also think there should be some (more?) Big Five/Five Aztec Sun fanfics, just as there is fairytale or Egyptian or Norse AU king of things… it seems funny. Sorry for long author's note.
Announcement: I added a general disclaimer in the first chapter of this story, so there will be no disclaimer at the start of every chapter, unless there is anything not already covered by the initial disclaimer. I can't be bothered to remove the disclaimer before each existing chapter though, so yeah. Please R&R, F&F, constructively comment, so much love xxx