Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
first released 15th September 2021

Claire sat on the floor, her back against the sofa, contents of an In'N'Out bag scattered across the coffee table. "I still can't believe you like yours animal style," she told NotEnrique, while picking at the bun of her own burger. It went unsaid how weird it was to see someone troll-shaped eating human food. When Jim had been half-troll, he hadn't been able to stomach cooked meat. Changelings, she guessed, were just different.

"Man, the mustard's so tangy," NotEnrique enthused, licking his lips before taking another bite. "Nothin' like this where I'm from."

"Gross little troll," she told him, but her heart wasn't in it.

"Your parents do this lots?" he asked.

"Go out to schmooze and leave us home alone? Yup," she told him. "I think I had babysitters more nights than not, growing up."

"Growing up!" he scoffed. "You can't even drive yet, sister."

"True," Claire agreed. "But I'm old enough that they leave me to babysit you now." Her eyes caught on the grandfather clock across the room. Its ticking was echoing in her ears, driving her nuts. Ten minutes past nine o'clock. They were fighting Bular at the museum now. She should be there. She should be helping.

Her shadowmancy was still too weak to be useful, and her muscles were not yet used to the weight of a polearm again. She would only be a liability. She best helped by staying at home.

She knew this, and she hated it.

NotEnrique put down his burger and took a long slurp of his milkshake before eyeing her and asking "So what's got you so worked up tonight?"

Claire swallowed. She was officially on 'keeping NotEnrique out of the way' duty. She was being useful. She was.

And even if she told him now, they were too far away for him to get to the battle in time.

"They're taking out Bular tonight," she told him softly.

His milkshake hit the floor. "WHAT?!"


The briefest glance as he ran revealed that Draal was lodged in the wall, caught in drywall and pinned by steel framework. Aaarrrgghh was helping dig him free, but all Toby could care about at the moment was the speed of his legs and how fast they could get him away from Bular.

He hit the main hall where two other trolls were going at each other while Douxie stood to one side, haloed in blue light, waiting for an opening.

The wizard's eyes caught on Toby. "Toby, springboard!" he yelled and suddenly there was a glowing blue platform in front of him that Toby jumped on-

It launched him skyward-

He was totally flying-

He grabbed onto one of the banners hanging from the ceiling, and tried to remember his training. Weak spots. What were Bular's weak spots?

Bular burst into the room.

Toby climbed.


"I will enjoy your death, traitor," Scaarbach hissed.

"I would enjoy you shutting up," Waltolomew grumbled. They danced around one another, slashing and striking. The polymorph had an armament advantage, sporting bladed arms and a nightmare tail at the moment. But Waltolomew had wings and wasn't afraid to take to the air, giving him a three-dimensional advantage.

He swooped around the banners hanging from the ceiling, buying himself a moment as... was Domzalski climbing one?

Waltolomew stared. The pudgy armored figure was indeed climbing the banner, showing no signs of strain.

I must congratulate Lawrence on his teaching methods, he thought as Bular's roar echoed off the walls.

Below the deafening sound, though, there was a grunt that snapped his eyes back to the floor.

Bereft of Waltolomew as a target, Scaarbach had switched his attention to Casperan. The wizard's glaive was whirling, keeping the snakelike tail at bay, but unfortunately it stretched long enough that Scaarbach himself was behind the boy, so he was trying to defend himself on both sides.

Waltolomew snarled. Scaarbach had to be a drama queen and pick the most monstrous form he could imagine, instead of taking on his opponents with skill alone. "Pathetic," he spat, and swooped down, letting his momentum crash him into the polymorph's back.

The serrated back plates, he discovered to his regret, were hard and sharp, not mere decorative flanges. They ripped through his leg, coming halfway to severing it.

Waltolomew cried out in pain, crashing to the floor.

"Strickler!" the wizard yelled.

"Pathetic," Scaarbach mimicked Waltolomew, drawing a bladed arm back for a final strike.

Casperan's eyes glowed blue as he dropped his weapon. "Tenebrius Exilium!" he shouted.

Light blasted Scaarbach from the room.

Teeth gritted, the wizard knelt before Waltolomew, between him and Bular. His hands drew an arch in the air above them, which translated into some sort of blue protective bubble. "I'm no good at healing," he said. "Will a tourniquet help?"

Waltolomew looked at the wreck of his leg, at the cold green ichor pumping sluggishly from it. "Possibly."

The wizard shrugged off his hoodie, tied its sleeve around Waltolomew's leg. He pulled off one of his pendants, used its cord to tighten the wrap further. "Just hang on," he instructed, eyes on the Gumm-Gumm prince and the Trollhunter who dangled precariously over his head. "If you die before she gets to chew you out, Barbara will be pissed."

Laughing weakly, Waltolomew slowly, painfully, awaited his fate.


Lots of the words Toby wasn't supposed to say were running through his mind. Oh, Nana Domzalski might look like a sweetheart on the outside, and she mostly was, but she was also one of the few people in the modern world who actually believed in the literal, physical "wash your mouth out with soap" routine. And while Toby could stomach a lot of things, soap was just nasty. Ask him how he knew.

Douxie had helped him get up here, but now Douxie was pinned down, protecting an injured ally. God only knew where Jim was. Maybe dealing with the museum lady. Hopefully Draal was up again and taking care of that other changeling.

But the thing was, for all Bular's roaring about how he could smell Toby... he wasn't looking up.

No one ever looks up, Toby thought. He could see the top of Bular's head from up here, could see the little spots of black blood that flecked the floor as he turned, trying to find Toby.

The Gumm-Gumm literally had a blind side now.

Toby began to formulate a plan.


"I can defend myself," Nomura whispered harshly to Jim.

"I know you can," he replied. "That's not why I'm here."

"Why are you here?"

"Do you really think," he asked, "that the battle's going to stay where it started?"

She scoffed and drew breath to open her mouth-

-something crashed through the doors and into both of them.

Ow, Jim thought, levering himself up. Screw discretion, I want my armor-

He froze.

There were two Nomuras.

They stared at each other, then one museum lady snarled and shifted to her troll form.

So did the other.

Crap. Which one's the real Nomura? Holding his borrowed sword, Jim stood, eyes flicking back and forth between the two changelings.

How can I tell which is which?


There, Toby thought. Right where his horns meet. A bare gap existed between them atop Bular's head, a thin thin line of a target.

He silently summoned Daylight to his hand.

He just needed Bular to stop roaming, to stay still.

To let Toby literally get the drop on him.

"Come on," he breathed. "Come on..."

Douxie's gaze flickered up to him, met Toby's, then shifted away just as fast before Bular could note his line of sight. But Toby could see the wizard smirk, see his subtle nod.

"Butcher!" roared Draal, stepping into the entry hall.

Bular spun.

Now!

Toby dropped like a rock.


"It's me," one Nomura insisted.

"No, it's not!" the other refuted. "It's me!"

Jim couldn't tell them apart by voice.

Howhowhow-?

Suddenly he remembered something. Oh.

When we were imprisoned in the Darklands...

With a smirk, Jim hummed a few bars of In the Hall of the Mountain King.

For a second, both Nomuras stared at him.

Then the one on the right whistled the next bit of the tune.

Jim grinned, and sprang at the imposter on the left even as his Nomura, the real one, unleashed her crescent blades.

He struck from the right; she struck from the left. And he was never going to like the sensation of a blade hitting living flesh or stone, but the high, shrill scream of his enemy as the polymorph changeling exploded into rock dust was satisfying.

"Eugh." Nomura flicked yellow ichor off her blade before regarding the debris field around them. "I always hated him. Toady bootlicker."

"Glad you decided to fight on our side," Jim said.

"No one steals my face," she snarled.

He blinked. "...Ironic much?"

She had the grace to blanch. "Zel is perfectly fine and happy in the Darklands," she said. "I check on her daily."

Jim nodded. "I believe you," he said, remembering how gentle the changeling had always been to her familiar in the Lake nursery.

Nomura looked sidelong at him. "How did you know that song?" she asked.

Jim had to smile. "A friend whistled it to me once."


Draal could not believe his eyes as the Trollhunter plummeted from high up one of the hall's banners, bladefirst.

And the blade-

The sword of Daylight-

Draal's father's sword-

Sank deep into Bular's skull, killing the Butcher before he could even roar.

Toby hit the ground and kept rolling and rolling across the floor, not coming to a stop until after Bular had fully turned to stone.

"Ow," the Trollhunter complained, flat on his back.

"My stars," Blinky gasped, peering around a doorway. "Is that...?"

"Wingman did it," Aaarrrgghh said.

Bular the Butcher... was dead.

Draal fell to his knees as the wizard dropped his shield. As the Trollhunter pushed himself up to his arms. As Jim and Nomura, their faces grim, stalked back into the room.

It should have felt galling, that it had not been he who avenged Kanjigar. But instead Draal felt... relieved. That Bular, the bane of so many Trollhunters, was no longer a threat. That his father's work had been finished.

That he had had a hand in doing it.

"I did it? Toby asked. "Ya-hah, I did it!" he cheered, his arms in the air.

"Great work, Tobes," Jim said, a hand on his shoulder.

He got grabbed in an enthusiastic hug. "Jim, I did it! I totally did it!"

Nomura walked over to the stone corpse. "What to do with this..." she murmured, finger tapping her lips.

Suddenly Draal had a lovely, lovely idea. He stood, and stepped beside his former... whatever they had been. "If I might make a suggestion."

She side-eyed him. "I'm listening."


Unsealing the museum was the work of five seconds. Douxie ignored the sound of stonework going on behind himself as his phone buzzed with notifications. "I'll call Barbara," he told Jim. "You ring Claire?"

"On it."

Barbara answered on the first ring. "Douxie?"

"It's done," he told her. "Jim's safe. But we need a medical assist at the museum."

"I'll be right there."


"Leave the security footage to me," a purple troll was saying to Blinky as Barbara stepped into the museum, Archie darting in beside her.

Barbara's eyes flitted over the group. Three teenagers, intact. Aaarrrgghh, also okay. Draal looking dusty but uninjured. "Who's the patient- oh." Her eyes caught on a green, distinctly nonhuman form sprawled over to one side.

"He was injured defending me," Douxie said, kneeling by the troll. "I did a tourniquet on his leg, but I don't know much more."

Archie, examining the injury, winced. "That does look bad."

"I don't know anything about troll medicine," Barbara protested. "I don't even know a baseline for his vitals-"

"If we can get him to switch-" Jim said.

Douxie nodded. Light sparked around his hand; he touched it to the troll, who jolted awake.

Yellow eyes opened, and focused on her. "Barbara?"

Her eyes widened. "Walter?"

"No, you mustn't look-"

"Strickler," Jim overrode him. "We need to get you to a hospital. We need you to shift form."

A pained, panicked gaze flitted down the troll's body to his leg, then back to Barbara's face. The troll gritted his teeth and nodded. "My apologies, my dear. I never meant for you to see me like this." Then his eyes closed again and an expression of intense concentration crossed his face. His shape flickered, shifted-

-and it was a human man laying before her.

"And he's out cold again," Douxie said.

"We need to get him to my car," Barbara said, standing.

"I'll carry." Aaarrrgghh picked up the unconscious man with a delicacy that belied his size, and followed Barbara back out the door.


They left the bulk of the two trolls' bodies behind at the museum, in the care of Zelda Nomura, who had a particular gleam in her eyes that Douxie resolved not to ask about.

"We can't leave Strickler's car here," Jim said, contemplating the vehicle.

"The keys are with him. You know, at the hospital by now?" Toby asked.

Hisirdoux narrowed his eyes at the vehicle. "Give me a few minutes and I can probably hotwire it." He'd figured out how to do it long ago, before vehicles were as prevalent as they were now. The mechanics couldn't have changed that much over a century, right?

"Uh, do you know how to drive?" Jim asked, looking at him.

"...Not one of my strengths," Douxie had to admit. Popping the locks, that he could do and did, sliding into the driver's seat and pressing his hand against where he thought the key went. He closed his eyes, feeling with his magic. If this clicked here, and that sparked there...

Archie jumped up beside him. "Don't forget the-"

Douxie refocused. "Got it, Arch-"

"I can drive," Toby said, as the engine sputtered to life.

Douxie shook out his hand and slid out of the car. "You dropping that off," he asked, nodding at the prize Draal was holding, "or should we do so?"

Draal grinned nastily. "Leave it to us," he said.

"See you guys at home, then," Jim said. The three trolls, Blinky carrying Douxie's glaive, vanished into the night as Douxie slid into the vehicle's back seat. Adrenaline and candy bar boosts could only take him so far, and now he could feel the evening's work catching up to him. He closed his eyes as Toby and Jim took the front seats and Archie jumped into the back, a warm, comforting form by Douxie's side. The world slowly slipped away into quiet and dark.


"You know, Jimbo," said Toby, keeping half an eye on the wizard passed out in the back seat and the familiar curled up against him, and half an eye out for cops and other arbiters of traffic laws, "if we leave Strickler's car parked in front of your place, people are going to assume things."

"What, like that he spent the night with my mom?" Jim laughed. "Tobes, if that's the worst fallout that happens, I think I can handle it."

"Okay." The car was quiet for a minute as Toby concentrated on driving. "Hey, we did pretty good tonight, didn't we?"

"Tobes? You did /awesome/," Jim said. As they slowed at stop sign, Jim held his fist out.

Toby bumped it.

"Good work," said Jim, "Trollhunter."


Author's Note: Since moving out of SoCal... I miss In'N'Out Burger. Though unlike NotEnrique, animal style was not my favorite. Curious, as I'm usually a mustard lover. Toby's line about "No one ever looks up" is a callback to my days in the X / CLAMP fandom, where many of us held that as a truism.