Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
first released 25th March 2022

Douxie got in later than he'd planned. Barbara's car was in the driveway, but if he recalled correctly, she had an early shift the next day, so she should be asleep. He hoped she was asleep. He wished he was asleep, but he had a feeling that sleep would be hard to come by tonight.

"Hey," Jim called from the living room as Douxie put his skateboard and safety gear away.

"Hey." Douxie poked his head in. The TV volume was low, the screen replaying one of the older Gun Robot movies. Archie took one look at it, leaped from Douxie's shoulder, transforming mid-air, and glided to sit in the corner nook of the sofa. "I'm going to grab a drink; either of you want anything?"

"Pass," said Jim.

"No thank you," said Archie.

In the kitchen, Douxie opened the refrigerator door and looked at the contents for a moment. None of the various offerings (juice, soda, milk) appealed, so he finally closed it and pulled a glass out of the cabinet, going to the sink for water instead. His fingers lingered on the tap after he shut it off. He didn't want to have this conversation with Jim, but he knew he needed to.

He could get through it without another panic attack. He could. He would.

Jim, who'd probably never had a day of anxiety in his life beyond "how do I talk to a pretty girl" or "am I even still the Trollhunter", absolutely did not need to know about Douxie's... weakness. He already knew too much about everything else, he didn't need this too.

He drank the water. Squaring up his shoulders, Douxie wandered back to the living room and took a seat. "How went your date with Claire?"

Jim smiled at him, easy and happy. "Pretty good. How'd playtime at Krel's go?"

"Ugh." Douxie dropped his head back against the sofa's back.

"That good, huh?"

"After Zoe and Hiccup began playing nicely, things improved drastically," Archie told Jim from where he was meatloafed on the sofa, wings folded neatly back, eyes fast on the screen where Sally-Go-Back was racing against time to deliver vital information. "Unfortunately, that took some time."

"Eli showed up too," Douxie said. "He spent most of his time with Aja. Don't know when he left, actually."

"That... does not surprise me," Jim admitted. "I take it Zoe and Hiccup don't like each other?"

"Zoe doesn't like Hiccup," Douxie corrected. "And Hiccup takes a bit too much pleasure in needling Zoe. Not," he admitted, "that I'm her favorite person at the moment either. But she's always enjoyed a challenge, so Krel's in good hands with her planning a nuclear waste heist."

Jim stared, his blue eyes huge. "A nuclear waste heist?"

Douxie grinned. "Spoken like someone who didn't have his own personal police record in the last timeline."

"That's- you know what," Jim said, "I'm not sure it's entirely different, so I'll drop the protest. But seriously, nuclear waste?"

Douxie shrugged. "One of the parts of a daxial array is apparently a plutonium fuel cell. Since Krel said it didn't require either weapons-grade or power plant-grade material... well, apparently doing a bit of B&E to get some waste products will be a good deal easier than acquiring purer materials."

"Mm, and I daresay she will replace the missing plutonium with pinball machine parts," Archie intercut, never looking away from the TV. Douxie cracked up. "If she can source any, that is."

"Oh, for that joke, I'm sure she'll order them off eBay, if needs be." Douxie grinned at his familiar.

Jim, meanwhile, looked lost. "Pinball machine parts? Do I want to know?"

Douxie reached over and patted him on the top of his head, smiling. "It's from an old movie. A character stole plutonium from terrorists. There were pinball machine parts involved."

"Also time travel," Archie put in.

"Also time travel," Douxie agreed. "Which the plutonium powered."

"Riiiight." Jim eyed the two of them warily, then clearly decided to let it go. "So, other than planning out nuclear waste heists, did it go okay? You guys going to be able to fix the ship?"

"Ehh." Douxie waggled his hand, equivocating. "Maybe? Probably? Who knows."

Jim looked unimpressed by his answer. "All the stuff you and Krel banged together-"

"Which didn't have to be built to precise predetermined specs," Douxie argued. "There's a difference between experimenting with the juncture between magic and Akiridion technology, and using magic to recreate one specific piece of Akiridion tech. I think we're going to be able to do it, but it's beyond my personal capabilities. Which is exactly why I brought in the two best experts in their fields that I know."

Jim raised an eyebrow. "I thought you said Mary was stronger than Zoe."

"A stronger technomancer? Probably. More experienced, with the depth of knowledge a project like this requires?" Douxie shook his head. "In a decade, maybe. Right now Zoe is Krel's best shot at this, and if Hiccup can't manage actually forging the pieces needed, there's probably no one on the planet who can."

"So you're out, then? Of the project?" Jim clarified.

Archie snorted. "Hardly. He's project manager and touchy mage wrangler."

"Ah, the glories of job titles." Douxie flopped back against the sofa cushions again. "Can we talk about something more pleasant for a bit, please?" Something to let him work up his nerve to tell Jim what he'd realized.

Jim snorted. "I could tell you how I'm probably going to end up getting The Talk from my mom again at some point."

Douxie blinked. "Why's that so bad? I mean, you can tell her you already got the lecture last time around, and cut things short, right?"

"Yeah, but she'll want to check that she covered all the bases, and by then it's just going to end up being the same thing but a little to the left." Jim rolled his eyes. "It's easier just to let her."

Douxie regarded Jim's exasperation and had to smile. "You know it's because she loves you and wants you to be safe, don't you?"

"Yeah, I get it." Jim heaved a sigh, eyeing him. "You're lucky you're ace, or she'd probably give The Talk to you too."

Douxie snorted. "I think I'm a bit old for that."

Jim chuckled, then froze, his eyes flaring wide. "Don't tell me Merlin-"

"No," Douxie said vehemently. "Thank the gods," he added after a second's reflection. "No, Merlin never gave me The Talk. I don't think it was as much a thing back then, and, well, the odds of any girl liking the likes of me enough were infinitesimal anyway."

Archie snorted and looked away from the movie, his gaze narrowing as he considered his familiar. "You say that, but I know exactly how many girls-and boys-have given you a second glance over the centuries."

"There's a difference between thinking someone's pleasing to the eye and wanting to, ah, spend time with a known wizard," Douxie retorted. "Even if any girl in Camelot had been willing to risk having a brat who might carry on his father's wizardry, her mother or sisters wouldn't have let her. So, no. No sex talks from Merlin."

"The whores were educational," Archie said thoughtfully.

Jim choked. "Whores?" he demanded.

Douxie and Archie both narrowed their eyes at him. "Do I need," Douxie asked quietly, "to have a serious discussion with you about respecting sex workers, Jim?"

"No!" His brother hastily backtracked, waving his hands to stop the accusation. "No, I'm just... surprised, I guess. That someone like you who's ace hung out with, um, ladies of the night."

"Ladies of the knights, more like," Douxie informed him. He sighed. "No, I had little status, neither did they, we got on well enough. They were lovely lasses, most of them. Nicer than the real ladies."

"They liked causing him to blush and seeing if they could make the red reach his ears," Archie informed Jim.

"Yes, yes, precious moppet that I was." Douxie waved off Archie's betrayal of his secrets. "Whores are generally as kind as they're able," he told Jim. "That's one thing that's remained true across the centuries. When you're in the gutter and you don't have but a glimpse of the sky to sustain you... well, for most people, you form bonds, and let kindness, Cinderella dreams, and hope buoy you up. Because what else have you got, in the long run?" He studied his hands. "I'll take the company of whores and cutpurses over lords and ladies any day of the week."

"I... hadn't thought of it that way," Jim confessed. His voice was soft. Thoughtful.

Douxie sighed, feeling the weight of his day's realizations resting on his shoulders, pulling him down. He had to tell him. "Jim," he said, looking up from his hands to his brother, "I..." His voice died.

"Go on, Douxie," Archie urged.

He swallowed and tried again. "I don't think we have as long until facing the Arcane Order as we'd hoped."

"What?" Jim sat up straight.

"We figured out," Douxie said, gesturing between himself and Archie, "that they were likely tracking Merlin in the last timeline. It's the only explanation for how Arthur appeared in Arcadia when he did."

Jim thought about it for a moment, then his eyes widened, realization crossing his face. "And we woke up Merlin early."

Douxie nodded and swallowed. "We did. So the Order... they could descend on us any time."

"Or not for years," Archie put in. "It all depends on when Merlin returns."

"You think he's able to fend them off by himself?" Jim's brow furrowed, like he was trying to do a particularly difficult algebra problem.

"I think he has been, probably since long before I first knew him," Douxie said. "Though I don't think they were as driven to regain the Seals before Killahead, so... I don't know."

Jim frowned. "His staff's at full power this time around. Morgana didn't get the chance to drain it. That should help him... I think."

Douxie nodded. "Hopefully."

Jim looked at him then, really looked. "Are you all right, Doux?"

He breathed a laugh. "About the fact that the Arcane Order could come back at any time? Following the trail of Merlin, who's cast me aside? And that we are so not ready for them yet?" He shook his head. "Sorry, Jim. Being all right about that's a bit of a tall order for even me. I'm terrified. But there's nothing I can do about it, so onward we go."

Douxie really did not look fine. And for the life of him, Jim could not figure out why. Sure, the Arcane Order was scary, but they'd beaten them once before, and the goal this time was to do it again with less of a body count. Forewarned was forearmed or something, right?

"Why are you so scared of them?" he asked instead.

Douxie's eyes were wide, incredulous, as he looked at Jim. "You're joking, right?"

Jim shrugged. "We beat them, Doux. We know how to do it, and they don't know what they're up against. We're stronger now, and we have better plans. Sort of."

Douxie breathed, and gave Jim what might have been a smile, if only it hadn't been so fractured. "You're fearless, Jim. And that's admirable. But I'm afraid I'm not as brave as you."

"I'm scared of plenty of things," Jim argued.

"Oh, really?" Douxie raised an eyebrow. "Name one thing that scares you."

"Losing people," Jim told him automatically.

"Fair enough." Douxie granted that a nod. "But other than the death of your loved ones? You're not afraid of Gunmar, or the Darklands, or Bellroc... there's nothing that terrifies you, Jim. Or am I wrong?"

Jim thought about it. Really thought about it. But in the end... "You're right," he had to admit. "I used to be scared. But I'm not really anymore. Not even of dying."

Douxie gave something that might have been the ghost of a laugh. "Dying's not so bad, I've done it. I wouldn't recommend it, but it's nothing to be scared of."

"So if you're not scared of dying," Jim asked, clasping his hands in his lap, "what are you scared of?"

Douxie held a hand level in the air, examining it. Jim could see the fine tremble. "Failure, I suppose. That one's an old friend. And, I assure you, I am in fact a disappointment and a failure on so many levels." There was no self-recrimination in his voice; he stated it as a fact, like the sky was blue, water was wet, Hisirdoux Casperan was a failure. Before Jim could even open his mouth to argue, Douxie went on. "Being the cause of my friends' pain and anguish. That one is not lovely." His eyes met Jim's and he quirked a half-smile. "Falling from high places, I can definitely toss that on the list." His gaze tracked back to his trembling hand. "But mostly, I suppose..." A long sigh. "Being the weak link in the chain. The one that breaks under stress."

"Doux, you've never broken," Jim protested.

Douxie shrugged. "It has been a very near thing." He illustrated this with his fingers pinched close together.

"Bullshit." Jim was 100% rock solid on this. "You never stop, you never give up, you never give less than everything. So don't try to tell me you're scared because the Arcane Order's following Merlin around. They haven't got him, they haven't got Nari, they haven't got the Seals. What, exactly, do you think they can do?"

"It's not rational, Jim," Douxie snapped. "Fear never is. I can lay out reasons and rationalities like they're dominoes, but that doesn't matter to the end result, which is that my hands shake, I doubt myself, and my mind casts up a hundred thousand ways things will go wrong, convincing me that every single one of them has an equal chance of coming true. Fear isn't logical, it's just paralyzing, and that's something I have to fight against far more often than I'd like, because I'm not like you. Not in this."

"Doux-"

The wizard looked at his hand again, drew a breath, and drew his hand into a fist. "Sometimes I wonder," he said softly, not looking at Jim, "if the reason Merlin didn't give me my staff until he needed another master wizard to help make the amulet, is because I'm actually not constitutionally suited to mastery. To having the world's problems on my shoulders, with no easy solutions to give out, just ones that tear at my soul. If I'm only a master because of necessity."

"Does it matter?" Jim asked quietly. "I'm only the Trollhunter because I refused to give up. All that matters is what we make of ourselves."

Archie was silent and still, watching the two of them. Not even his tail twitched.

Douxie let out a long sigh. "If-when-I get my staff back, I'm certainly never letting it go again." His eyes met Jim's. "And even Merlin cannot unmake what has been made. So you don't need to worry on that score."

Jim thought about what he wanted to say, what he wanted to pound into Douxie's thick skull. "I've met three master wizards," he said, trying to find the right words. "And Merlin and Morgana are definitely cut from the same cloth. They're... arrogant. Proud. Woe to anyone who questions them," Jim said.

Douxie nodded. "Merlin always knows best."

"Merlin wants you to think he knows best," Jim shot back. "My point is... that's three wizards, Doux. That's not a great sample size. You can't draw any conclusions from that. Maybe there's more than one valid way to be a master, and you just can't see it because you don't know any of the other master wizards."

Douxie shrugged. "There have never been very many. Not since Atlantis, anyway."

"So you don't know," Jim pressed the point. "Maybe it's Merlin and Morgana who are the odd ones out, and master wizards are supposed to actually be more like you. Real people, in the thick of things, who try their best because this is the world they live in, too. Not princes in their towers issuing edicts and transformation spells from on high."

Douxie's smile was wan. "Wouldn't that be a lovely thought," he murmured.

"There's a saying about courage being not the absence of fear, but the willingness to do what is required anyway," Archie pointed out.

Douxie hung his head and laughed low. "Guess that makes me the most courageous man on this entire planet." He looked up, his gaze meeting Jim's, then rising slightly to the crown Jim wore, hidden under Douxie's invisibility spell. He seemed to draw strength from that, because his shoulders drew back and set. "I will not fail you," he promised, his eyes returning to Jim's. A small smile hovered at his lips, like he was amused by his own flaws. "Just don't expect me not to be terrified by the ride."

It was much later that night, after Douxie and Archie had gone to bed, after Jim had gone to bed, that Jim's bedroom door slowly creaked open. He lay there, silent and wary, his heart hammering as a dark shape slipped inside. Noiselessly crossed the room. Leapt up onto his bed.

"I know you're awake, you know," Archie said.

Relief flooded through Jim's veins with a gasp. "Oh, thank god, it's you."

He could just barely see a feline eyebrow arch. "And who else do you think it might be? Douxie's warded this house to the stars and back."

"I don't know!" Jim argued. "I've had enough creepy crap happen to me that the idea of getting attacked in my bed, even in a warded house, doesn't seem like that much of a stretch!"

"Fair enough. And do keep your voice down." Archie glanced back at the door. "I don't want him to wake up."

Jim propped himself up on his elbows, surprised. "Douxie doesn't know you're here?"

"He doesn't know everything I do," Archie countered, making himself at home on Jim's bed.

"But you're his familiar."

"No, he is my familiar," the dragon corrected. "And what that means is, I act always in his best interests. Even when he can't see clearly what they are."

Jim frowned. "That sounds a lot like 'I'm doing this for your own good'," he pointed out. "Which is almost never a good thing."

"Yes, well." Archie looked abashed. "I just wanted you to know that he trusts you enough to be vulnerable before you. And that if you betray that trust, Trollhunter or not, divine king or not, I will end you." A splay of claws in the light from the streetlamp outside illustrated this threat.

"I'm... not going to betray his trust," Jim protested, wondering where on Earth Archie had gotten that idea from. "He's my brother."

"Mm, and Merlin was his father, and we all know how well that's gone," Archie rejoined.

Jim's eyes narrowed. "I'm nothing like Merlin."

"I pray not," said Archie levelly. "And you? How are you getting on with this evening's revelations?"

Jim drew a breath. "The Arcane Order will come when they come," he said simply. "We're as ready to fight them as we can be at this point, and we're only going to get readier."

"Douxie still hopes there's a way to subvert the battle," Archie told him.

"Why?" Jim demanded.

Archie looked away. He breathed out a long sigh. "Because destroying gods seldom goes well for anyone."

Jim blinked.

"Deaths of gods," Archie said quietly, "bring about natural disasters. Eruptions or earthquakes, cyclones or floods... people die in the aftermath."

Jim swallowed. His mouth suddenly felt dry. "What?" he whispered.

Archie's eyes met his. The dragon shook his head and gave no answer.

"Why didn't Douxie tell me that?" Jim demanded. He felt cold. He felt angry. What was Douxie thinking, trying to keep him in the dark about this?! He'd said, once upon a time, that it was his job to keep Jim fully informed of his choices, and now he was pulling this kind of crap?

Jim threw off his covers and stepped onto the floor of his bedroom, fully intent on going to the wizard's room, shaking him awake, and demanding answers-

The crown on his head shone with sudden emerald light, pulsing softly against his skin.

A warning, freezing him in place.

Jim swallowed, his anger turning upside down and inwards. He suddenly felt sick as he realized what he'd been about to do. He slumped back onto his bed. His breath seemed to rattle in his ribs, heart pounding in his ears. His hands began to shake.

Archie's eyes were wide as he padded up and sat silently by Jim's side. Neither of them said anything for a long moment. Then, finally-

"It's good to see that Nimue's gift helps you keep control," Archie said.

"Yeah." Jim drew a breath, trying to combat the roiling turmoil of emotions churning in his belly. Trying to force down the nausea. "Archie, why didn't he tell me?"

"I do not know," the dragon said. "If I had to hazard a guess, however... he may not see a way around the confrontation. And he wished to keep your hands clean of what would happen after."

Jim swallowed. "So his big plan to reveal magic to the whole world, and stop the Order that way..."

Archie nodded. "He was trying to save the whole world. But remember what happened when he accidentally revealed magic to one restaurant's worth of people? He lost his magical support structure, and was ostracized. If they refuse to support him after a mere accident, he certainly can't count on them to help magic become mainstream."

"Hiccup still works with him," Jim protested.

"Hiccup is almost as much of an outlier as Douxie himself in the wizarding community," Archie said. His claws flexed briefly in the blanket. He sighed. "Douxie's always wanted to save everyone."

"And he's never accepted that he can't." Jim flexed his hand, looking at it. Remembering when it had been made of stone and Douxie had-numerous times-fought to save him. Even if he was Douxie's brother now, he hadn't been then. Jim had the feeling Douxie would have fought just as hard for anyone, not just the Trollhunter. He looked at Archie, at the dragon disguised as a cat, who was probably one of the smartest people Jim knew. "Archie, how can we make that goal happen? How can we show the world magic is real, without getting everyone who has it killed?" Because suddenly that seemed really important. More important than taking on Gunmar, more important than defeating the Arcane Order.

Douxie had been telling him all along what needed to actually happen. Jim just hadn't listened.

Archie shook his head. "Would that I knew."

Jim sighed. "We're in the business of doing the impossible," he murmured to himself. "We just have to pull it off one more time. Somehow."

Author's Note: The movie with the plutonium and pinball parts is Back to the Future. Which is also where the title joke (88mph) comes from. ^_^