Disclaimer: I don't own Fire Emblem Awakening, all rights to the owners.
This was inspired by some of Rotciv557 suggestion for FE7 Robin. This Robin doesn't have any history here though (he has no former experience that he knows of), so it's not quite what he asked for. I just sorta took 'Robin with absurd magical power' and made something out of that.
Hope you still like it though. Alternative title is Robin: Man of War.
Thunder rumbles to Chrom's left, and on instinct he glances over to see the attack he knows is coming. The three Risen Great Knights storm across the field, silver lances ready to skewer even the most resilient of the Shepherds.
Thunder rumbles again, this time louder. The sky flashes white, forcing Chrom to cover his eyes, and a lightning bolt slams down from heavens. Even from a half a mile away the hair on Chrom's neck stands on end and he can smell the faint alchemic scent in the air. The three great knights are vaporized, their armor is charred and their flesh totally burned away.
Across the battlefield Robin smiles grimly. The tome in his hand, old and powerful, crackles with yellow energy as the tactician scans for his next target. Finding no good spot he changes back to his usual elthunder tome.
The best and worst part of Mjolnir is that it devastates a sizable area. That makes it great for large battles, but terrible for skirmishes. It also can't be used indoors without destroying everything, which is problematic. The Shepherds learned that the hard way after Robin collapsed the castle's east wing during the assassination attempt on Emmeryn
The Risen have been getting more and more dangerous lately. Generals, great knights, sages, dark knights... all the elite warriors are starting to show up more frequently. More and more often the Shepherds just have to run and let Robin drop lightning on their foes. It's concerning when even Frederick starts to have trouble against their enemies.
It doesn't help that they're missing Cordelia, another one of their best fighters. Her maternity leave couldn't have come at a worse time. Ylisse is technically at peace, but the Risen are as relentless as ever. The army hasn't seen rest with Gangrel's defeat, and even Plegia is getting plagued with Risen crossing the borders from Ylisse and Ferox.
"Miriel, Ricken, focus that general!" Robin barks. "Sumia, Virion, get on that sage! Frederick, Kellam, we've got another hoard to the west, move to intercept!"
The tactician nods as everyone dashes around the battlefield. To someone else it might look like chaos. There are no ranks, no battle lines, and the same types of units (mages for example) aren't grouped together.
Someone smarter might realize that those sorts of things would be an active detriment to the Shepherds. Unlike most other military teams the Shepherds thrived on individual skill, and trying to force everyone to do the same thing at the same time just didn't work for that sort of team. It's what made the Shepherds so deadly in small-unit combat, but frankly awful at large-scale battles.
This was for one simple reason: most of the Shepherds have a personal style. That doesn't work for a normal military where you need every single soldier to know how to do certain things in a very specific way. This is why the Shepherds can only do small fights, as full unit-tactics will almost always beat out individual tactics when each side is large enough.
That's why the Flavia and Basilio took point in the war and the Shepherds just did strike missions. We can't fight armies. It's sort of ironic, Robin's best weapon excels in destroying massive areas, but the squad he commands isn't suited to that sort of battle.
Such is fate Robin supposes.
###
Strictly speaking they had nannies for this, but Robin often found himself with little to do around the castle now that they weren't at war, so he volunteered.
Lucina was not quite the average child. Robin, having very little to do beyond the occasional bouts of planning tactics, had read up on the development of a child, and knew that at six months most children develop stranger anxiety. The blue-haired girl simply hadn't, and was comfortable with even large groups of people (so long as they were quiet). This was why Robin could easily care for her: she wasn't nearly as clingy as Owain.
With Lucina been weaned onto solid foods already, Robin was fully capable of babysitting her without assistance. She often sat in front of him, fiddling with a variety of small toys like wooden blocks, some rough wool, a smooth ball, and a rattle.
Robin often talks to her. Sometimes he narrates whatever he happens to be reading, often (he shamefully admits) just a textbook on one subject or another. He isn't sure if Lucina actually cares though, the little girl just seems to like listening to a voice regardless of what they say. She isn't very chatty, but gives a small "kaa" if Robin gives her a new toy or picks her up, and responds with babbling if he looks her in the eye.
Sometimes Robin wonders if his entire life really revolves around war. It's fairly telling that he can spend his entire day watching someone else's kid because Robin just doesn't have anything he wants to do.
"Gaf!" Lucina chirps, looking at Robin expectantly. The little girl has put down her toys, and is instead waving her arms at him. "Gaa..."
"Right, lunch." Robin murmurs, putting aside the book he was reading on various types of mousetraps. He picks the girl up, letting her head rest on his shoulder as he carries her. "The kitchens should have something made. Probably eel and liver again."
"Baf."
"Baf indeed." Robin agrees. "Good thing you're not an adult. You get mashed apples, I have to deal with eel. Yuck."
"Eee-uh, uff." Lucina mumbles back.
###
"Hi-yah! Lissa says, one hand outstretched and the other holding a fire tome. A small fireball flies out from her fingertips. It flickers uncertainty in its flight, and only barley scorches the straw dummy. "Aww…"
"Pretty good." Robin says, patting the girl on the shoulder. "You actually reached the target this time. That's an improvement."
The girl would improve quicker if she practiced more than once or twice a week, but she had a family to deal with including a four month old child so that's not a surprise. "It's so slow though!" Lissa pouts.
"You don't suddenly get good at magic overnight." The tactician chuckles. "I trained for years to get good at it."
"Really?"
"Well probably. Amnesia, remember?"
"Right, right…"
Lissa spends another hour or so practicing with the fire tome. Robin gives as many pointers as he can, but it's gotten to the point that practice is going to help the girl more than advice. She repeats the same action over and over, shooting fireball after fireball at the target. Half of them miss due to Lissa's poor combat abilities, the girl admitted to never having learned a weapon before so she doesn't have the coordination you might expect from even a normal soldier.
Robin wonders if he was ever like this. He doesn't remember of course, but it would be nice to know. He can only offer so much advice without knowing what learning magic is like himself. Sometimes Robin wonders just how much of his life is missing, how many important events will he never know about? How many experiences have shaped him that he just doesn't realize?
"Ahhh! Robin!" Lissa panics. She waves her hand at a tree behind the target. She accidentally struck it and set it on fire.
This was something Robin expected to happen at some point. He pulls out an elwind tome and uses the blade of green wind to snap off the flaming branch. It's a simple matter to stomp out the flames after that.
After that incident, both of them agree that perhaps they should probably stop for the day.
###
"Face it Robin, you're lonely."
The tactician raises an eyebrow as he looks up from his book. "Your daughter will be right here you know. Are you saying she's not good company?"
The prince rolls his eyes. "Very funny Robin. You know what I mean, you spend all your time reading or doing favours. If we didn't invite you to dinner so often, you would go a week without talking to anyone."
"Hey, I like reading."
Chrom gives him a flat look. "Really? So that 'Art of Cheese Making' book in your hand is really that enthralling?"
Well Robin wouldn't say it's boring… but it's not great either. "Okay, fair point."
"At least get a hobby or something."
"Re-"
"Aside from reading."
"But I don't like many things aside from reading Chrom." Robin sighs. "Unless you want a bunch of craters all around the countryside, in which case I'd be more than happy to practice more with Mjolnir."
"Well I can't say I encourage that." The prince coughs. "But you know what I mean."
The tactician grumbles, but doesn't disagree. "Whatever. Now scoot, you had some play to go watch right?"
"Right, right. Thanks again for taking care of Lucina." Chrom mumbles, and slips out the door.
"Need a hobby..." Robin huffs. He ruffles the little girl's hair, and she looks up at him curiously. "I don't need a hobby, right Luci? Reading is a great use of my time!"
"La!" Lucina chirps. She reaches up at bats at his yellow hair with her little fists.
"Exactly. Good to see you agree."
###
"Ah, greetings Robin!" Virion says, and gives a dramatic bow. "How does the day find you?"
"Just fine Virion." The tactician grunts, settling down in a nearby chair. "You called for me?"
"Indeed I did. I wish to consult you on a new plan I devised for our Risen patrols." The man murmurs, pulling out a familiar map of Ylisse.
For the next few hours the two tacticians pour over the map and the details for Virion's new plan. Where Robin is decidedly better in battle tactics, Virion excels in organization which includes patrols, supply trains, guard schedules, and so on. Really Virion is more well-rounded than Robin, it's just that Robin happens to be better at a very specific thing that attracts a lot of attention.
Really, Robin doesn't know why Virion asks his advice on anything but matters of battle. It's rare the yellow-haired tactician knows better than the rossannite, but time and time again Virion comes to ask Robin's opinion on one thing or another.
"I don't know what to tell you Virion, you've covered every question I can think to ask." The tactician admits.
"Nonsense, your insight has been valuable." Virion scoffs. His expression softens a bit, and without his usual flare he murmurs. "Besides it looked to me like you could use a distraction, no? Something to put that brain of yours to use. Heaven knows a few sporadic Risen raids, dangerous as they may be, aren't enough to focus on full time."
Robin releases a breath and sits back in his chair. "I'm that obvious, huh?"
"Subtlety was never a strength of yours my friend."
"I… I don't seem to have any other skills." Robin admits in frustration. "I know tactics and not much else. Maybe combat, but that's also for fighting."
"You are a man of war in a very literal sense." Virion agrees.
"I can't even help the military at all now that the war is done." Robin sighs. "I'm not great at training people and not good at organization. The only thing I could do is teach tactics, and despite my fame there are very few people willing to accept lessons from someone half their age."
"Indeed. Unfortunately many tacticians of Ylisse are old and set in their ways." The archer hums. "You claim to be bad at training other in anything but tactics, but aren't you teaching Lissa magic?"
"Yeah, only because everyone else wasn't willing to because Lissa can't practice very often." The man grumbles. It was true, Miriel wasn't willing to teach someone who couldn't put in the effort to get good, and Ricken got frustrated with Lissa's absurdly slow rate of advancement very quickly. That left only Robin, who wasn't a great teacher but was at least passable. "What do I do Virion?"
"Why that's simple." The man chuckles. "Learn a new skill. You have the time my friend, don't try to tell me you don't. Stop reading books on mousetraps and pick up a guide to carpentry, or if you prefer something more strategic I am fully willing to teach you the intricacies of running a country. I'm sure the captain would appreciate the help. You don't lack skill, you lack effort."
That was painful to hear, but Robin has to admit the archer is right. Robin hadn't really been trying, he'd been sitting around waiting for… well, waiting for a new war. He told himself he didn't want one, and in a certain sense he didn't. He didn't want to put his friends at risk, but war was the only time he was actually useful, and in recent times that was limited to the Risen patrols where he could gleefully obliterate them with Mjolnir.
"Alright." Robin mutters, sounding defeated. "I suppose I should find something else."
"You don't want to learn something else?"
"Not really." The tactician admits. "War is my passion, everything else sorta pales in comparison…"
Virion sighs and pats him on the back. "But you do enjoy helping your friends, yes?"
"Of course."
"Then use that as your motivator." The archer says firmly. "Perhaps there won't be the same rush as battle, but you can still satisfy yourself with being useful."
"Satisfy myself…" Robin mumbles. "I suppose there really isn't a replacement for war, huh?"
"Such is the price of being a man of war." Virion agrees. "When peace comes around your life is upended, and you may never find the same sense of purpose."
"I fought to stop the only thing that gave me direction in life." Robin sighs.
"For the benefit of your friends." The archer reminds him.
"Well of course." The yellow-haired man sighs. "I'll consider it at least."
"Good."
###
Virion's advice (and teaching) proves to be a good idea. Robin doesn't like it, but learning the ins and outs of running a country gives him something useful to do rather than just sit around the library all day. It isn't as enthralling as the rush of combat, but at least it requires some effort and is somewhat like combat. Maybe he isn't figuring out how to best take defeat packs of wyvern riders, but figuring out to fight poverty is at least somewhat similar.
Okay, maybe it's not that similar. They both take strategy though, allocation of resources, making sure not to weaken other areas… there are similarities, but that doesn't make them similar. Those sort of things are common to all sorts of organization, combat or otherwise.
Robin isn't sure if Virion told Chrom, but at dinner one night the prince asks Robin how his training is going. The tactician replies honestly that it's slow going, but at least he's making progress.
Chrom says, and Robin isn't sure how seriously, that when Robin is confident in his abilities that the prince wouldn't mind having his help because 'running a country is a pain in the backside'.
The yellow-haired man considerer reminding Chrom that he doesn't have the authority to hand him such a position, but quickly realizes that Emmeryn would be perfectly content to let him as well.
Robin smiles politely, thanking the prince for his kindness, but admits he's unsure how long it will take for him to reach an acceptable skill level.
The tactician's schedule actually isn't that different than it was before. He still watches Lucina once a week, he still helps Lissa whenever she has free time, and still spends a lot of time in the library. However, rather than looking at books about mousetraps or something he puts in the effort to find books on politics, economics, and the laws of Ylisse.
Maribelle lends him a book on the last one. Wanting to be a magistrate, she has plenty of material on all things law related.
However Robin has to admit a certain excitement whenever a Risen hunt is announced. He's adapted to his new role as councilman-in-training, but he doubts the rush of battle will ever be beaten.
###
"Time to tip the scales!" The tactician hollers, and decisively moves the piece representing his tactician to the front lines. "And I get… five!"
"My my, well done." Virion chuckles, removing his great knight. "Though I would mostly chalk that up to a lucky roll."
"Well yeah, this game is mostly luck." Robin chuckles. "But still fairly good. I still think War of Worlds is better."
"To that, I will agree." The archer nods. "Did you hear that they came out with a new addition? It brings units like manaketes, taguel, and the leguz into the rules."
"No kidding? We'll have to buy it then. Nowi was a terror on the battlefield, so I hope these rules do her justice." The man hums.
"My, so quick to downplay our dear Panne."
"Well she was good too, but she couldn't take twenty arrows and come out basically unharmed." Robin snorts.
"I will concede your point." Virion laughs. "Though perhaps her strengths merely lie elsewhere?"
"Obviously." The tactician scoffs.
Robin never had times for board games during the war, but he is very glad Virion introduced him to them. His battle tactics aren't useless outside of war! The two of them had tried out several strategy games from Chess to War of Worlds to Canyon Clash, and Robin takes great joy in finding the best team compositions in each system.
With these gaming sessions in his life Robin finds everything a lot more bearable. It scratches the itch he has for battle, and allows him to focus on his training knowing that he doesn't have to brood on when he can next flex his tactical prowess.
"In fact…" Virion says with a sly grin, pulling out a new box. "I went out of my way to purchase it a few days ago. Care to test it? We still have a few hours tonight."
Robin's grin couldn't be wider. "I'm gonna stomp you with dragons."
"You can try my friend. Let me remind you our winrate is fifty-fifty."
"That's because you suicide-attack my commander all the time!"
"Well it works, doesn't it?"
This chapter took a turn I didn't expect. I had originally planned this chapter to focus on the valmese war and put Morgan in again. Instead it ended up being a story about Robin trying to find purpose after his skills aren't really needed anymore.
It's weird how plans can change.
Scorin: I was actually treating Robin's manakete status as unique to her, meaning neither of her parents were manakete but she is due to being an avatar of Grima.
We actually do have a decent idea of how Manakete mature. Let's look at Tiki. Taking from the Fire Emblem wiki, we know she was born 500 years before the start of the archanean calendar (which doesn't give us a good time stamp), but she was a kid around the time of Marth so we assume (based on Nowi) that she's about one-thousand years old. This is reinforced by the fact that she was asleep for about a thousand years before she was woken up in Marth's time, so 1000 to 1500 years is a good guess for those games. Then, two thousand years later, we get Awakening. Therefor a young adult manakete is about 3000 to 3500 years old based on Tiki's appearance. We also know from Nowi's ramblings on event tiles that Bantu is possibly still alive in Awakening, so we don't know if old age can kill manaketes.
However, as a half-manakete Nah already looks as old as her mother, but her supports with Tiki show us that Nah will probably outlive all the humans in Awakening, so being half-manakete probably has its own life-extending qualities. Based on that I have to assume that, if Nah is the same age as the other future children, that half-manaketes age normally up until the age of about ten to twelve, and only then do they slow down. We don't exactly know if this applies to normal manaketes, but if it does then Robin could be a normal manakete who just happens to be really young because of their initially human-like development.
In other words: bla bla bla, research and shit, Robin could be half-manakete, a normal manakete, or whatever the hell you want to think she is.
I appreciate your advice for writing autism, but the chapter is already written. I was debating over whether it's a good idea to post it at all. Autism is a touchy subject, and some people might not appreciate me mangling it's representation.
That's a decent point for romance. I guess I just tend to overlook romance when writing male Robin. This chapter, for example, I was planning on having romance in. First I was considering Olivia (and then decided she would be back in Ferox because she wouldn't stick around after fighting in only one chapter), then Miriel (too studious, very few shared interests), and then Virion ( good chemistry, shared interests, but the story unfortunately flowed better without the romance).
Maybe it's just me though. I always sneak romance into the female Robin stories, so perhaps I just have to try harder.
XenoEmblem4TW: I ain't gonna do another manakete Robin just to make them male. But some other sort of shapeshifter might work. I'll put it on the list.
Invisible Prince: We'll see… M!Morgan tends to be left out because female Robin chapters focus on romance and having a random kid in there ruins chemistry. Don't get me wrong, I love M!Morgan too, and if this weren't a compilation focused on Robin we would see a lot more of him.
I'll see about adding him in, but there's a good chance he won't fit the story very well.
Guest: You misunderstand, the chapter is already written. I'm just hesitant to actually post it because some people are rather touchy about autism. It's not something I can just throw out there. I've done my research already, but thank you for trying to help anyways.
Added Pirate Robin to the list.