So, let's talk about the baby...
This is the AU in which Ion raises the baby. I decided that he doesn't know it's Bumaro's.
Ion will not put his plans on hold because of the child, on the contrary, I think it will make him less chill than he is in canon untitled series because he will want his child to live in a better world, right? But he will not go fully back to his old ways because he did learn something during his imprisonment, and he is open to Nadox's advice, and a few other spoilery reasons.
Also both him and Lovataar (who is the mother, as far as they all know) and also the rest of the family will all be very protective of the child. Of course they will. So when he (the child is a he, it seems) is little, they won't want to take him with them as they travel the world, that's too dangerous. Besides, Ion is not very comfortable with the way his followers worship him and he would rather his baby doesn't encounter this so soon.
So, where does the kid stay while his parents are travelling trying to make the world a better place? Where is the safest place for him to be?
The kid spends a long time in the village. It's good for him, he has kids his age to play with, he gets to learn a few different languages, and Nadox homeschools him (Nadox doesn't always travel with the others because he has obligations in the village and a husband he doesn't want to leave, it's canon, and in here he gets the chance to teach the baby just like he taught his father once ;u;).
Of course, he does spend a lot of time with his parents and the other Klavigar too, they make sure of it. Many times Lova wakes Saarn up in the middle of the night to ask for a ride (via teleportation) so she can check up on her baby (even as the baby grows). For every month they spend away, they spend another in the village or in some other place with him. And as he grows up, they start taking him on trips to places that they consider safe.
And the kid loves his parents and loves the Klavigar, who are kinda like his parents too. But one of his favorite adults is Derdekeas. He follows Derdekeas around in the village all the time, and is fascinated by the machines he builds. And Derdekeas loves the child too, he loves children. And since everyone seems chill with it, he does show the machines to him and let him watch him work.
Inevitably, at some point the boy will want to learn to build machines too. Of course he will. And Derdekeas would be happy to teach, but he feels this would be crossing a line, so he tells him he has to ask his parents first.
So he does. Lova, visibly shaken, says she needs some air and flies off to freak out away from her son's eyes. And Ion can't possibly allow this if Lova reacted that way, but he doesn't want to have to explain things that he somehow managed not to explain so far, so he tells the kid that he is too young for it, maybe when he is older. Hoping that he will lose interest.
But he gets older, and he still wants to learn, and he sees mekhanite children that are younger than him learning. And it doesn't seem fair. And idk if his parents finally let him - they had time to adjust to the idea - or if he tries do something in secret, but he's a teen already by now and it's in this context that his technopathy starts showing.
Everyone freaks out. At first, Lova blames Derdekeas, like this could happen just because the kid spent too much time with him. She knows this is not how it works, but she wants to blame someone and not have to think of worse possibilities.
Ion on the other hand dismisses it as unimportant, people are born with strange powers all the time, it doesn't mean anything. While trying to convince himself this couldn't possibly have anything to do with what happened in the pocket dimension. What happened in the pocket dimension, stays in the pocket dimension.
And if he asks Nadox if the village's library has anything on Mekhane's ichor, that is just because he wants to know his possible future enemy better.
But the truth comes out and the kid learns it in the worst way possible - by overhearing his parents arguing about it. He also overhears other things that he hadn't known, things about the war and he feels so lost and confused and betrayed and sad and angry, so he runs away.
And this is as far as I got the details down.
After this, the kid - who is at least 15, by the way - travels a lot, learns about the world and so many things he was "protected" - and I mean normal things, mainly! Like sure, he learns about the war and all that, but he also learns that there is a whole world outside of it. That most people have no idea who either of his fathers are, despite them seeming to be such a big deal. He also gets to explore his own powers, in secret of course, since he doesn't want his family to find him or to end up in a box.
He manages to stay hidden. Saarn has taught him a thing or two - back when she thought he could need some day to hide from the Foundation.
My idea would be for him to show up in the finale, when both his fathers are ready to fight, and be like "what the hell, are you really doing this again??". And then the finale goes on as planned.
Another possibility for what happens after he runs away is that he goes after Bumaro. At this point, it is known to everyone on the Nälkä side that the priest is Bumaro, so he could find out. He's not expecting a warm family reunion, he knows Bumaro doesn't know about him and if he learned, he would hate him. But he wants to know him.
The only way for him to get anywhere near Bumaro though, would be by joining the Broken Church, and so he does. It's a reality shock, to learn their beliefs, and to get to Bumaro he needs to learn it all so he can climb the hierarchy. Fortunately for him, and unfortunately for me, the Broken Church doesn't use augments, but I did imagine a scene of him being super scared of like replacing his arm, and trying to comfort himself telling himself that after he is done with this, he can just grow a new one (of course, he had never done anything like this before, but he does know fleshcrafting!).
He gets there, and gets Bumaro's attention, who sees in him something he can't explain. And due to being so involved with the Church, he is expected in the finale. There, his other family recognizes him, and there's time for some angst before the finale happens.
My only problem is the timing. He ran away at 15~18, if he goes straight to the Church, he will spend like 60 years there until the finale, and I can't imagine him wanting to stay this long unless he is specifically waiting for the events of the finale, which isn't the idea. Also, he would have to visibly age normally or else the Church would know something was up with him, which would make him end up looking like he could be his parents' grandpa in the end. Nothing wrong with it, it would just look funny.
(I think it is within his abilities to revert the physical aging, but I don't see any reason for him to do it.)
It would be interesting, though, if Bumaro could tell something was up with him and helped him hide it from the Church. Like, if he noticed he doesn't age, and said "yeah, he doesn't, it's my blessing" or something. I still haven't had the time to think about their relationship in this sub-AU of this sub-AU, I will figure something.
