othellovonryan | (no subject)

[There are whispers.]

[That is the first thing that happens when you enter the room. There are overwhelming whispers, they are filling your senses, and they promise so much. They promise knowledge, they promise power, they promise you death and destruction, they promise you the ability to shape the world how you want, they promise utter euphoric, all you have to do is give in and be one with them-]

[The roar of whispers taper off.]

[There is pink and metal and black and yellow. You find yourself standing on dark metal, that is interwoven with pink and blue tendrils of something pulsing and alive. Not simply existing in the same space, but truly fused together.]

[And there is a platform with something that may be a main console to this structure.]

[There is Donnie, sitting on the edge of it, eyes a vibrant yellow, sharp teeth even more prominent, arm pink and covered in something sharp and pink with a massive claw, a long tail curled around him with a scythe at the end.]

[He doesn't give you any attention yet. Tail flicking idly from side to side as his unclawed hand flicks through the air, working on something only he can see.]

[and the whispers hit a wall, solid in a Name even without the weight of that Name to grant that resistance power beyond her soul, named Catherine Foundling. a beast of nightmares and death and star-stuff, jaws wide and swinging shut around the heart of her. You are nothing to me, growls the center of Catherine Foundling, and it means it.]

[and externally, Cat's lip curls, like smoke curls disgustedly away from fire. power? glory? the chance to bend the world to her whims? like she could still want any of that?]

[All right, Catherine Foundling, she says to herself. You wanted to fix it, and you didn't care enough what it hurt, even if it hurt yourself, so now you're here..]

Cho Sve Noc, [she whispers, wishing she could feel the crows dig into her shoulders like they deserved to.] The mighty take, the worthy rise. No more talking for you.

[and she takes the can of herbicide in one hand and the Bits-Breaker in the other and launches herself, in a hobbling run, right at the Donnie hunched over the console, aiming to tackle him clean off it.]

Edited 2023-02-14 03:31 (UTC)

A very true sentiment.

[He doesn't move, because what comes out first is tentacles from the floor to wrap around her to try and pull her to the floor.]

[oh, she may have a bum leg, but she's going to try and leap over that anyway and swing at them with the saw-blade part of the Bits-Breaker, and to hell with how much landing will hurt after. nothing about the tentacles sounds good to her, not with what it looks like happened to Donnie from touching them already.]

[The tentacles whip up and while she does manage to mostly leap, one does get around her ankle, digs in]

Why fight when the answer is right there? Worlds made one, worlds made whole, worlds where people don't have to struggle against each other because they are all the same.

[Its not an overwhelming feeling, but it is Tempting.]

[But then she manages to force off the tentacle, though the corruption lingers.]

[she hits the floor hard, almost crumpling to the ground from the shooting agony that rides up her leg like electricity]

[it almost chokes out her ability to react to that flash of Temptation.]

[almost.]

... heh. I've - fought devils. You don't rate.

My - Name - is Catherine - ... Foundling. The Warden. Even here. You will learn what that means, you - angel's leftover pile of shit. You have something of mine.

I mean to take him back.

[and she surges back to her feet and shoves the spray into not!Donnie's face, aiming for the eyes as she squeezes down - and meanwhile, with a whirr, brings the Bits-Breaker down wide onto the console to do what it does best, and break the thing into bits.]

[at least, that's the plan.]

Its debatable if devils are real. [That is not Donnie's voice. Its something deeper, more menacing, with an undercurrent of Whispers.] The Kraang, however, very much are. You know, they're the source of the yokai back home. He didn't even realize he knew that until he was us.

[The figure seems unconcerned with her approach, not until she's close, the tail whipping out to wrap around her hand with the Bits-Breaker, goggles flipping down for the chemical because that in the eyes would sting-]

[Except oh, that is a BAD aerosol, actually and there's an inhuman shriek, the tail whipping her away with a surprising amount of strength as the clawed hand goes over his face.]

[it's a minor miracle that she doesn't lose her grip on the Bits-Breaker when he flings her away like he does, seeing as every nerve in her body just lit up screaming in agony from the way it yanked at her when the throw began and the way she hit the wall when it stopped her momentum, but she's always been a stubborn sort and now is no different.]

H-heh ... heh-heh ... hah. Remind me to thank Leon for the tip.

[she bares her teeth in a smile.] Let's see if I can't show you a real devil, then.

[she starts spurtingly spraying wherever there seems a free Kraangtacle to spray at, hobbling-hopping-hurtling her way back towards him, and towards the console - since he seems connected to all this, time to find out just how connected. feel that, hm? feel that screaming agony, maybe, do you?]

The blue one. He always has to make it difficult, I don't know why you-yes, yes, him too, FINE.

[That-]

[Is not fully directed at her?]

[There's definitely a chemical burn on the being's face and there's hissing as the fleshy bits of the ship definitely react with burning agony as the herbicide hits them, the Kraang-y flesh on Donnie writhing, bubbling over his skin.]

But I'm breaking this one if she won't submit.

[The ship is suffering, but tentacles are forming from the floor, the ceiling, the walls, and is going to start lashing out for Cat.]

Try it.

[she's just going to spray as many of them as she possibly can - she knows she can't get them all - so she breaks into an unsteady, wobbling pell-mell barreling run again, flailing with the spray in every direction even as she's bringing the Breaker back up and -]

[well. good news for Kraang (maybe): she's not going to hit the console with the buzzy saw part this time.]

[bad news for Kraang (maybe): she fully intends to carve off that ugly-ass clawlimb spot-welded to the rest of not!Donnie, regardless of how hard she has to fight (and how many blows she has to take) to get there.]

[The herbicide is doing wonders to damage the tentacles, that she's able to cross the distance.]

[Cat will get to learn just how vital that tip was because when the figure grabs the Breaker, its by the blade and it while it does dig into the skin somewhat-]

[Its not a lot. Whatever the Kraang are made of, probably a plant thing, it is disturbingly strong.]

The Warden, you said? Such a fancy title for an individual. I think you misunderstand, Catherine Foundling. Who you seek is no longer here. Donatello shall be the new host for the Technodrone and We. Shall. Be. Magnificent.

[Which is when they lash forward and and bites hard into her shoulder and]

[The memory plays.]

[The memory has leaked out at times. A few have seen it, but under it all, there is an undercurrent. A thing actively fought. Repressed. Because when Donnie realized he was the only one who could do this job, it was not an understatement. The undercurrent is the kind of the thing risks burning out the minds of people trying to process it if they're not particular good at processing information.]

[Or have a particularly strong will.]

[Donnie's natural mental self defense shoves it down and it was in lowering those defenses for information that has lead to the state Donnie is in now.]

[The Technodrone, however, does not hold back.]

[From the moment of connection, there is the active information. Everything that is happening inside and out, the movement of forces and his family, but the Technodrone is a ship, and Donnie is acting as the computer, and he has to sync the data to have the control he needs.]

[There are advancements, an intimate understanding of Kraang biology and how it interacts with technology.]

[The power of Empyrean. A substance that can touch the very life essence of all creation and steal it away.]

[How sound and force interferes with so called mystic energy.]

[And history.]

[Thousands of years.]

[Near countless worlds (worlds you can count because you are brilliant, because you are magnificent, because you are the pinnacle of Kraang technology, but the number sure is high)]

[How the Triceratons were such a devastating threat near the beginning, but how the Kraang adapted, survived, became powerful, and how they expanded.]

[You are destruction. You are creation.]

[You remake every world you touch, make it part of you, make it better.]

[You are power.]

[You are might.]

[You are strength.]

[And you will take and take and take until all are you, as all should be.]

[You are a gift]

[And when anything dares to spite you-]

[Well, the annihilation shall be beautiful as well. As it has been so many times before.]

Edited 2023-02-14 09:18 (UTC)

[Catherine Foundling, to Donnie's credit, almost buckles under the weight of it, too. shorn down to just herself, none of the extremities of her name to bear it -

it almost cripples her beyond all recovery. there's a moment where her grip on the Breaker slackens, her footing slips, and she stumbles, struck insensate from the force of it.]

[but before she had a Name, Catherine Foundling had her name, and all the things she'd learned she could do with it.]

[and at nigh-obliteration of all-that-is-her by the weight of thousands of thousands of years of all-that-is-not, the scabrous pink disease veining its way through Creation that is Kraang reaches the very heart of her, and its eyes will see what everyone who reaches so deep sees:

corpses, first, awash in brackish swampy water, slack with ebb tide. some of the corpses even still have skin - and the skin comes in all colors, pale, to brown, to dark, to many shades of green, even purplish-grey. the sheer countless number of them is crushing, and so crushed beneath each other many of them have become, but they pile on, and on, and on, till it becomes clear they are not just a mass grave but a foundation, and on that foundation a black throne lies, spare and unchallenged under a sea of stars blinking in the blackness of the Night above. and on that throne sits the thing that is Catherine Foundling.

and the thing that is Catherine Foundling sees the thing that is Kraang, and its lip pulls back from its ugly jaws as it rises from its throne and the Beast that ate empires and usurped the power of gods lands on its forelimbs, taking in all the Kraang have done, all that they are with a single wet sneering scent of the air.

and it says: "No. I think not."]

[Catherine coughs, briefly, aware she's losing blood, growing fatigued. she spits some of the bloody saliva in her mouth at not!Donnie, though, and forces herself to replant her footing, square up her shoulders, and keep going.]

I, [says Catherine Foundling, first of her name,] am no gift, Kraang. I am a curse.

[she grins, then - and - kicks the crafting table against not!Donnie's foot -]

[and - tries to combine the Bits-Breaker and the "herbicide" into one horrible thing, or at least spray the sawblade with the aerosol, while she still can.]

[The kick with the crafting table is enough to force the Technodrone back, and the crafting starts and-

[Time slows down.]

[Catherine cannot take any other physical action other than to utter a single word, but she is afforded time to think.]

[There is a flare of purple digital fire at the corner of her eyes, with a mix of two different shades of red.]

[Will you trust Raphael Hamato and "Ruler" Shirou?]

Edited 2023-02-15 07:19 (UTC)

[the realization that there's another one of Donnie's brothers here hits her like a punch in the gut. in a good way, perhaps, but it takes the wind out of her to process it all the same. she'll have to remember to meet him, later.]

[but that's more of a philosophical consideration than an immediate one.]

[and she thinks about Ruler - whose name she just learned, now, like this, is "Shirou" - thinks about his actions, and all the frustration they've heaped on her shoulders, the way his enabling of a bunch of overeager teenagers got her actually killed once -]

[and she smiles, without actually smiling because she can't, in this moment between moments, actually make the gesture, only the feeling.]

[there isn't any hesitation in her response; the only delay is one of sincere consideration - serious calculation. it's a pivot. the pivot. no turning back now. (and the Beast's jaw closes in a toothy grin.)]

[in a word:] Yes.

You are sitting on a board on top of a tree with your brothers and April. You are watching Raph and April talk with concern. He's put so much pressure on himself, and what's worse is you don't know how to help the problem.

"Its not all on you Raph. We're here for each other. Trust that," April said, voice that kind way you know is meant to be encouraging and reassuring.

"I do trust my family," Raph said with confusion. Which is fair. Raph does trust them? What does she mean?

"No. Trust us the way we trust you. Remember the first time you unlocked your power?" April continues.

"I caught Leo when he fell," Raph said.

April nods and uses that tone that means she knows she's about to be understood and she's usually a good judge of that. "Trust us."

"Raph, its gonna be okay. You'll figure this out," Mikey said encouragingly as all of you stand up. Still on the boards balanced on top of trees. There is a smile on your face because you trust that. April got through to him. Raph can do this.

"I know. Because I'm not alone. None of us are. We're here for each other," Raph said and there is something in his smile because this isn't take charge Raph, which is not expected. "Always." He's smiling, but dread fills you, what conclusion did he come to, what is he about to do?

"Raph?" You ask, uncertain you like where this is going.

Then Raph steps off the board, to fall off the tree and off the cliff-!

The three of you are already moving after Raph with thinking, shouting his name as you jump off the cliff after him.

There is fear, but determination. You are not losing your brother, you'll figure out the landing strategy when you get to him, you're going to save him like he's always saved you-

There's a spark.

A guttering.

Its like you're just on the edge of a signal, a few steps forward, and as your arms reach out for your eldest brother, the signal is there and its-

Warm.

Safe.

Powerful.

And-

The mystic has always eluded you. No matter what you did, you could not understand it. Your brothers did, to varying degrees, but they understood it enough to make it work. It didn't matter how much you studied it. No matter what scanning or testing or observation, it never made sense. The best you could do is recognize where it was and maybe determine a vague power level.

You still don't understand it as much as you would like.

But its in that moment that you finally have the first step. A force of the heart, is it?

Connection.

The fear is gone, replaced by certainty, as power radiates from the three of you, hands reaching out and out and out, far beyond your own physical hands.

"Saving like a boss!"

Because really, its how Raph deserves to be saved and he is more than happy to take your hands, the energy surrounding you as you land at the bottom of the waterfall, safe and sound. Celebrating as you realize you unlocked your family Ninpo.

[The crafting is complete. The bits break saw is running with a spray along the teeth, allowing for cutting and spraying the herbicide into the wound.]

[The Technodrone has stumbled back, but caught their feet.]

...a shame. You would have been a good back up pilot for when he will have other duties once our civilization is underway. But he is quite good at prioritizing, he will let go of a friend.

[The Technodrone straightens up and more tentacles grow out of the floors, the walls, the ceilings, a clear barrage of the dangerous limbs ready to just play overkill with Catherine-]

[Mystic Powers: Online]

[it's like the inverted sensation of a spark lighting a fire - because the Night can be nothing else, but the chill of wintry darkness against the back of one's neck, the gentle ache of breath turning to frozen mist on the crisp evening air, the precipitous drop in temperature as the sky burns in red and pink and purple and, finally, boils away in a sea of star-pricked twilight.]

[and it's something else. a weight in the narrative in play, here. a certainty. there is narrative power in trusting your friends, your family - power Catherine Foundling knows well. for she is the Warden, who watches over all those stories, and more besides.]

[she grins at him again, but this time the smile is like mercury - liquid, cold, and bright.]

... mmm. "Greater good", right. [close enough to it. she can make it work for the story pivot; time to finish the swing.] Too bad I don't care about greater goods, in the end, and I've always hated the idea of taking some bullshit miracle's sloppy seconds.

[she heaves herself to her feet, on a rush of pure adrenaline (and a fair bit more than that, as she feels the weight of the story shift in her favor - hers, and Raphael and Ruler's alike).]

I am a villain, you pathetic slimebucket. I live by one rule. I fight for what I want and I take what I get. I am given to cruelty and promised only misery. And you have something that belongs to me. You have my friend.

So now I'm going to take him back. Fuck you--

[she hefts the spitting and spraying Bits-Breaker in one hand, and raises - nothing - in the other. nothing except thumb and forefinger. Night comes at her call, an inverted flame. snap.]

--Burn. Be ash and be dead, like your toothless empire.

[blackflame undying bursts to burning life all across the pink flesh of Kraang's presence here, spidering outwards from wherever it comes close to touching her directly.]

[Catherine hadn't been able to See Donnie as of yet. Her judge of his character was very accurate, he admitted as much, but that's what it had been. A judge of his character. Not his narrative, not his story, not the things that have tied him to a greater fate beyond just a boy too smart for his own good sometimes. Whether that was the affect of the place, or the confusion of a boy whose soul is actively tethered to an entire family of ghosts, who can say, but in the Heart, it finally makes sense.]

[Give it to the Technodrone, they don't seem to be too intimidated by the words, but considering the age and knowledge, its probably also not the first its born witness to such things.]

[But as the fire lashes out, connects to the tentacles, something becomes clear.]

[The room is Donnie.]

[The Connection that happened came from Donnie.]

[There is another presence in the room that is Donnie.]

[The Technodrone Is Not Donnie.]

[Its not a memory. Not a manifestation of all that knowledge.]

[Its not even the snake.]

[But a spark of a soul for a new entity.]

[Donnie's influence is, however, tied into the Technodrone. There is a restraint in this being that kept them from immediately go for the kill option, and that can only be in Donnie because the creature itself does not know mercy nor patience for benefitless inconvenience.]

[And that is where something slots in about Donnie's narrative role.]

[He is a creator. He makes things no one else has yet, that no one else yet can in his world. It finds the edges of what is possible and he pushes those boundaries.]

[But less expected is the connection he has to the natural world. He is a wonder with plants. He has a way with animals that the others simply don't.]

[And despite how cold he can be, the pragmatist, the introvert, the one who can listen to a sob story and not care if the person had ever once hurt him and his-]

[He adores people. He wants for connection despite how difficult people are.]

[It is perhaps the combination of all these facts that lead to one surprising fact.]

[Donnie can create life.]

[There is a robot bear, terrorizing children in a pizzeria, bemoaning the injustice of his existence, and Donnie realizes all he wanted was his OWN birthday-]

[There is a voice over the computer telling him that he was to go to sleep an hour ago and he says snooze another hour, only to have his computer shut off as the voice insists and he realizes with a start that SHELLDON has gone against his orders when he knows he's not malfunctioning-]

[There is a bed, with missiles and blades bearing down on him, he's ready to fight...only to be called father, and well at this point, he just accepts it-]

[Donnie's mystic powers could make anything that Donnie himself can make. If he has an intimate understanding of something, he can make it, and the Technodrone had given him the knowledge to make aspects of the Kraang. And with it, the more he made, the more he poured into this work...]

[Just like several other works]

[It had started to live independent of Donnie's say so.]

[But knowledge comes fast and quick and there is definitely still a threat in the room.]

[The tentacles burn.]

[They do resist, the Kraang are no joke, but they are burning and twisting and their level of danger drops like a rock because trying to lash out while dying is far easier said than done.]

[The Technodrone hisses.] The child is overstepping his bounds, I see. Fine.

[And then the Technodrone rushes forward themselves, tentacles sprouting over their other arm, lashing out to wrap around Catherine's arm with the weapon, a deadly spike forming to head for her face.]

[see, the thing is. she understands the impulse. she really does. for all the grief she gave him about it (mainly because he left "the part where this doesn't cause a diplomatic incident with every country that eats pork as part of its diet and doesn't particularly appreciate the idea of a god of pigs walking around telling the animals 'stand up on your hind legs for your dignity'" entirely in her hands), it really does make her happy to see when Hierophant does genuinely insane things like raise a pig to godhood just because It Can Be Done.]

[and because she understands the impulse she understands, likewise - she can't erase the knowledge Donnie has learned from this. no amount of burning, or killing, will completely demolish the lessons Donnie has learned.]

[and she'd really like to avoid cauterizing part of Donnie in the process, but -]

[but this spark of life he's created - this burgeoning second soul. that's not Donnie's soul, but it was made by him, and allowed to grow in him like this, and could become something more - something worse - even if she leaves it at simply burning out the influence, anyway. which she doesn't want to do - think of what Donnie could make, left to his own devices, with all he's seen of this, freed of the risk of recreating the creature that inspired it all. think of it. she doesn't want to take that away from him, not if she can help it. she will if she has to - but she doesn't want to.]

[and it's like that, that she knows what she has to do. something worse - that's a villain's job. this isn't the first time she's eaten someone else's soul, after all. and it's not a complete soul yet, anyway.]

[Catherine lunges forward, ducking the spike, and utters one word.]

Mistake.

[You damned fool, thinks Catherine, with a laugh. On a pivot where I have all the cards because you overplayed your own already, you let yourself get close enough for me to grab you.]

[and she plunges her hand into the Technodrone's chest like through water and squeezes her fingers tight, like fangs of a terrible Beast's jaw closing gently and inexorably shut around the flesh of its prey.]

[And now I've got you.]

[and she rips the piece of soul that is "the Technodrone", and all it could've become, right out of Donnie's heart entire like she's ripping out a page in a notebook.

and she swallows it whole.]

[My problem now. Build something new out of the ashes, Donnie. It's what heroes like you do best.]

[The Technodrone does not expect the hand. Too confidence in its durability, in its strength, even with the influence of Sacrifice, the creature is strong and not so easily damaged. Its facts of the heart.]

[They don't expect the hand to go through.]

[Quick to try and divert the tentacle, to stab into her-]

[But its too late for the Technodrone.]

[As its ripped away form the place its made its home, that its used to grow and taint, to warp Donnie's mind until he would do what they wanted. The potential in the creature to start the Kraang civilization anew between his abilities and mind.]

[The tentacles that had been making their attack, but hadn't burned yet, all freeze in place. The ones that were on fire smolder to ash.]

[The room]

[Gets smaller.]

[Not so vast and ominous. Still the same make up of biotech, but smaller than it was. Dimmer. Quieter.]

[Tired, in a way.]

[All that really stands out anymore is the main console.]

[Catherine - clear of the pivot now, and the extension of herself it grants - sags, relief sucking the force out of her shoulders like an hourglass eating sand.]

[a rough swallow and a hand to her head.]

[then she laughs.]

Yeah. The Hashmallim were surprised when I did that to them, too.

[slowly she hauls her limping way over to the console, one hand death-gripped on the Bits-Breaker.]

Let's see what this thing does for Donnie now that it's not doing what you want it to.

[Welcome to the console and its]

[Ooey gooey disgustingness.]

[Horrifying means of connection.]

... I've shoved my hands in worse.

[she says that - but she knows what it did to Donnie, now.]

[and still -]

[well. nothing else for it. she shoves her hands in.]

Not sure what part of Donnie you are, exactly, but I need you to help me fix you.

[Yeah, those tentacles are definitely trying to dig into her arm rather quickly, burning as they dig in-]

[On the other hand, she doesn't have to reach far before she feels a glass lens, metal, clothes on a head-]

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