Empire of Shadows

frecklesandspice‌:

She blinked at how easy he understood without her even having to say it. Rubbing her eyes again she nodded a little. “Bad memories, bad life choices, bad people, well person.” Her shoulders shook and she squeezed her eyes shut, cuddling up close to Fritz. Melzors what had she done to deserve him.

He nodded along to her words. “That happens but it’s gone. You’re here now. I’m not letting go,” he murmured rubbing her back tenderly and nuzzling top of her head. “Would you like to sit down?” he asked, scanning around for someplace comfortable for her. Maybe it would be best to go back to the flat. “Inside? Or outside?”

Freya considered this. A spar certainly sounded interesting, and he looked like someone that could give her a good run for her money. She proceeded to pace around him, weighing him up as she thought about it, finally looping back around to face him. “Very well. Make it worth my while, I haven’t stayed in an etiquette lesson since I was five.” This perhaps explained a few of her less than princess-like habits.

He didn’t comment on her skipping classes habits which indeed explained like a lot of her behaviours to him. Probably a bit too much even. 

Freya smirked. “And you thought wearing boxers under your pants would help with that?” She giggled and jumped up to wrap her arms around him and nuzzled his neck. 

“Trust me, you’ll be fine,” she told him once she’d pulled back, fixing his collar and grabbing the tie from the dresser.

“Oh all sorts of places,” she reached for the pile of journals and selected out a couple. “Ancient Greece was a favourite of mine,” she opened up a book and flicked through it, showing detailed sketches of greek style foods and places and people with annotations. 

“But I also saw the Giza pyramids being built, the first Disney Princess film showing in the cinema, talked to Winston Churchill, chatted up some samurai warriors after I kicked their asses.” She shrugged, “Usual time travelling stuff.”

Going through her journal on Egypt she frowned a little. “I was rather upset I couldn’t save the library of Alexandria.”

“We can only observe and interact on a superficial level,” Papino put in, “nothing that would alter the course of time. It is not our history after all. For changing time… well that’s a whole different type of time travel.” 

Fritz nodded in understanding. He knew the dangers of time travelling all too well. It was part of his job sometimes. Changing was easy - fixing the mess it could create wasn’t. 

Freya chuckled a little. “Yeah I guess, I have uh, extensively studied a lot of Earth’s history so I do know it wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows… and that it still isn’t in some places,” she shrugged. “But that’s just another reason to try to spread as much happiness as you can right? So don’t worry, I don’t plan on turning into a pessimist any time soon.” 

She smiled across at him, and opened her mouth to say more, but stopped as the waitress arrived with their food. Freya thanked her and got stuck in, for once actually trying to remember what little she’d learnt about etiquette. Not that this was a big deal or anything. Of course not.

Clearing her throat, Freya twirled her fork around to spread the sauce. “So, which would you consider yourself. Um, optimist or pessimist,” she clarified, realising there’d been a rather large gap in the conversation.

Lotor nearly choked on the water. “Please promise you won’t make jokes like that with people around, at least?”

He paused to think. Which was still a little tricky, but getting easier. “…A bit of all those things, if I’m honest. We heard rumors of the tomb, and about how it was supposedly cursed. No one wanted to go near the place, so no one had ever found the treasure. We seek knowledge first and foremost, but… money and glory are nice perks.” He chuckled. 

“Hm?” she looked at him with an innocent duck face, blinking couple times. “Ah yes, 20s internalized homophobia. Fine, I’ll try to remember that.” she sighed, as always dramatically. 

Freya smirked. “And you thought wearing boxers under your pants would help with that?” She giggled and jumped up to wrap her arms around him and nuzzled his neck. 

“Trust me, you’ll be fine,” she told him once she’d pulled back, fixing his collar and grabbing the tie from the dresser.

“Well I was very young when I first arrived, the equivalent of nineteen, so a lot of my early travels were…” Freya frowned, “well let’s just say that’s where the majority of my scars come from, but they were still fun!” she insisted.

Across from them, Debbie looked rather concerned - she hadn’t heard any of these tales. What with her refusal to look at her mother, Freya didn’t even notice.

Papi took it upon himself to answer Fritz’s second comment. “She was our number one source on geology and the history of early human civilisation, Lili here,” he nodded at Halina, “gave… Amelia,” he’d hesitated a little before using her Ephedian name, but decided it was best not to make a big deal about it, “a bunch of tempraeteras.”

“Time jump amulets,” Freya put in for Fritz’s benefit.

He snorted. Of course she’d say that. Still it was good to hear it. Then his attention turned to Papi. The name of the amulets did cause him a confusion but he nodded grateful at Freya’s explanation.

Audrey opened her mouth to call after Argyle to ask exactly what she shouldn’t be doing but the snicker coming from Lotor got her attention. She grinned at him.

“You sly dog,” she giggled. “Not nice of you to play your boyfriend like that.” she cocked her hip a little and tilted her head. “How you feeling, hmm? No headache?” She switched one leg over the other and brushed the dust from one pant sleeve. 

“First of all, he’s not my boyfriend” Lotor took another swig of water, the movement a lot more controlled than his earlier attempts. “…And better. Not great, but better. I am still I little out of my head, but I began regaining my senses a minute ago.” He glanced down at the wet front of his shirt. “…Spilling water all over myself helped.”

Argyle was making a strange face that was half frown and half wince when Lotor turned to him with eyes practically alight with excitement. He sighed, beaten. Even if Lotor were sober, he’d probably have said the same thing in different words. Argyle couldn’t deny him something he cared this much about.

“Fine, yes, we’ll work together, okay?” Argyle got up and marched to the tent entrench in a huff. “Can’t wait. I’m going to go supervise. Lotor, drink your water and snap out of it. You…” He trailed off, glaring at Audrey. “You just… don’t.” With that blanket statement, he stormed out.

Lotor snickered into his canteen, his smile a lot saner than the one he’d worn a moment ago. “I thought that might work,” he muttered to himself.

Audrey opened her mouth to call after Argyle to ask exactly what she shouldn’t be doing but the snicker coming from Lotor got her attention. She grinned at him.

“No-” Argyle began, jumping at the idea of ditching the vampire. 

Lotor promptly interrupted with a half-gargled “YESH!” getting water all over his shirt. He thankfully had the sense to swallow before continuing. “We have questions! About history and eternal life and stuff! You promised!”

“Lotor, you can’t expect to hold her to that!” Argyle made an effort at damage control.

He pouted at Argyle and gave Audrey a pleading look. “Pleeeease, just work with us for a month or two?”

Audrey at first blinked  at Lotor’s outburst taken aback but then a very smug mile bloomed over her impish face as she slowly looked at Argyle. Then back to Lotor.

He listened to her fascinated. He heard something about that whole DNA thing from Tom who was talking about it during a lunch-break. She was so enthusiastic about it all. And he really liked the sound of her voice. He had a small smile on his face as she talked.

“What’s your planet like?” he wondered why she didn’t like her world. “I heard some stuff from Hugo but what is it like to you?” He really was looking forward to listening to her a bit longer.

She sighed, she’d been afraid he’d ask that. 

Freya frowned as he made his excuses, her green-tinged eyes unwavering from his. “You had better be more trustworthy,” she warned him. “One word gets out about this place to my mother, and it won’t be her fury you have to worry about,” she pulled his head back so she loomed above him. “Understand?”

Letting go of him, Freya landed back on solid ground, her expression and eyes blinking back to normal. “Now then, if you insist on being a bore I suppose you could escort me to a class or something.”

Once there, she had every intention of escaping of course, but he didn’t need to know that.

He swallowed hard. Welp, he got himself into something here alright, but he had to be firm. He didn’t know how to resolve this thing aside of only one very Calix one solution. Any other option might get him in bigger problems or undermine his position. Either way his job would get even harder than it already was. He just had to have a reason for her to trust him one way or another.

Sleepily, Freya nuzzled her way towards the closest source of heat, frowning when she felt fur. Had one of her cats gotten into her room again? But no, this seemed too big and the texture was all wrong. She opened her eyes and found a mountain of brown fur in front of her. She jolted back as she realised who it must be and scrambled for her glasses. “What the heck, Nikolay!” she got out, squeaking as she realised she was topless and snatching the quilt to cover herself with.

She’d only been dating the guy a couple of weeks or so; and sure he was attractive, but she hadn’t planned on sleeping with him so soon. And she certainly hadn’t planned on waking up with no memory of how he’d got there next to her.

Freya blinked, stepping towards her daughter’s room cautiously. “Minou?”

The little girl peered out, uncharacteristically cautious herself. “Are feeling better now, Mommy?”

Not knowing what Kitty had experienced but nodding anyway, Freya crouched and held her arms out. As soon as her had Kitty in her arms, she pressed her face into her daughter’s hair, drying the tears before they fell. She was home.

~

In the future, older Freya was also home. As soon as she blinked back she threw some harmless but tenacious magic in Margot’s direction. “That’s for not getting me back sooner,” she muttered. After that she rushed to her family, and pressed her forehead to her boys’ heads gently, leaning against Fritz. “I missed you,” she mumbled.

Margot jumped away from the magic beam and blew a raspberry at Freya. “What did I say, no gratitude these people, ouch!” She rubbed the back of her head whacked by Marigold.

“We’ll be going now. Have fun you two,” the vampire smiled tenderly at the reunited family dragging the smaller woman back.