#altno.12

It’s a matter of time before they come to a confrontation, and Sakari is not entirely confident that he is going to win. 

He can fight, sure, but he doesn’t have his gun and this guy seems really motivated to catch him. 

He does get caught. He skids around a corner and suddenly he’s face to face with his former pursuer. This takes him by surprise, and he’s slow to react. 

The guy drops to the ground, quick as anything, and sweeps Sakari’s feet out from under him. 

He hits the ground hard, the wind knocked out of him, and then there’s a boot pressing into his chest. 

“You shouldn’t have come here.”

Sakari doesn’t say anything. He’s wishing he hadn’t come here, either. 

“Now I’m going to have to teach you a lesson. It’s your own fault, really.”

Sakari tries to get up, to struggle free, but the guy is putting practically his whole weight atop his chest, making it all but impossible - and quite painful besides - to try to move. 

He’ll wait, and maybe he can take his opponent by surprise. 

The guy starts talking about privacy and Sakari thinks about how best to escape and wonders whether anyone might soon be coming to look for him. Sofia and JP do know where he is, after all.

And then, with no warning whatsoever, his captor shifts his weight and Sakari wonders why and then his hand feels like it is on fire. 

The man trapping him has one foot on his chest and one foot on his left hand and Sakari can’t breathe and his lungs are burning and his hand is also burning but in a different way. 

Eventually, the pressure goes away. He lies there, stunned, trying to take deep breaths which are incredibly painful. 

He’s not trapped now, not by the other man’s weight, but he feels like he can’t move. And then his opportunity is gone, anyway. 

He’s pushed over onto his stomach, and then his arms are wrenched behind his back and he yells in pain as a pair of handcuffs is secured around his wrists. 

He kicks his legs to no effect while they’re being tied together with what feels like a thick piece of rope, and then he’s pushed back over, lying face-up with his wrists pinned beneath him, hurting horribly, metal digging into skin, and he’s staring up at his captor. 

“What the fuck,” Sakari wheezes out. 

The man above him just shrugs. And then he kicks Sakari in the ribs. 

He tries to curl his body around the pain but the guy kicks his other side so that there’s really no point. Defeated in this regard, Sakari lies still and tries to ignore the pain. 

He really doesn’t know what this guy wants, except to teach him a lesson, whatever that means. Does he mean to kill him? Or just rough him up a bit, then let him go?

He doesn’t want to stick around to find out that it’s the former. 

“What do you want?” he asks, not really sure whether he’ll get an answer, whether it’ll be something he can believe. 

The guy smiles down at him. It’s unnerving. And then he winds up his foot to deliver another kick, and Sakari can only shut his eyes and try to turn away. 

The man’s boot connects with the side of his head. Pain explodes in his temple for all of a second, and then everything goes black. 

--

He wakes up to shouting. His head is pounding and he can’t quite make out the words, but he knows the voices. Sofia and JP. He lets his eyes slip shut again. They can handle this one without him. 

Someone taps him on the face. He opens his eyes and finds himself looking up at Sofia and JP. 

“Is he…?”

“We’ve got him,” JP reports, jerking a thumb over his shoulder to indicate where. “Handcuffed. He shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Can you…?”

They both understand what he’s asking, even though he doesn’t finish the question. JP grabs his shoulders and helps him sit up. The change in position makes him dizzy and for a second he thinks he’s going to pass out again. 

Sofia is untying the rope around his ankles. JP unlocks the handcuffs. Sakari wonders, briefly, where he’d gotten the key from. 

And then he’s free. He sits up a little more, shrugs off his teammates’ hands. 

His wrists are scraped and bear the indentation from the cuffs, pressed into his skin by his own body weight. His left hand is swollen and with the blood flowing to it again, it throbs in time with his pulse. 

“That looks broken,” JP says, helpfully. Sakari ignores him. Wants to ignore the obvious fact he’d stated. 

“How’s your head?” Sofia asks. 

Sakari shrugs. It hurts. 

“Did he kick you?” JP questions. “You’ve got a mark.”

Sakari unconsciously touches his right hand to his head, as though he’ll be able to feel said mark. He doesn’t answer. He’s pretty sure JP knows, anyway.

“I called an ambulance already,” Sofia tells him. 

“Okay.” He doesn’t particularly want to be poked at, touched, asked a hundred useless questions. But he’s probably concussed and his hand is broken and some of his ribs might be, too. So he knows it’s for the best. 

“Should we go outside?” This is JP. “It’s kind of a maze in here.”

He has a point. And Sakari would really like to get out of this place. 

They all get to their feet. Sakari’s head spins again, and for a second his vision goes black. He starts to stumble, and then there are arms behind his back. 

“Alright?” JP asks. 

Sakari nods, very slightly. 

“Let’s go, then,” says Sofia. 

They keep their arms around him the whole time, preventing him from falling. Their arms stay around his body even when they’re out of the building and standing on the sidewalk. 

He’ll never say it to their faces, but it’s incredibly nice.

“It does you no good to blame yourself, your Highness,” he said as he crouched before the bed, taking her hands in his. “It’s been weeks.”

“And I still regret ordering him away,” she admitted, averting her gaze so she wouldn't have to see the look of disappointment that she hated so much. “Ravio was my friend. I should have treated him as such.”

“He could not see the dream you have for Lorule. There is no shame in turning away those who do not have your best interest at heart.”

Ravio would have moved mountains for her, but that argument did not find a home upon her lips. Instead, she pulled her hands back to herself and crossed the room to the divider in which her dress was hung upon.

“Your Grace, he would have had you continue a tireless search for a solution–we have a solution, do we not? The Triforce. You know the power it holds. You know how much glory it could restore to us. It is best that he left–”

“Is it best that he is dead, Yuga?” Hilda asked, spinning to face him with a venom she didn’t mean. Not towards him. “Is it best that Ravio left my castle betrayed and upset, only to turn up a body in a barren wasteland, likely with the thought that no one cares enough about him to keep him around?”

Yuga bowed his head to her in apology as he joined her to take her hands again.

“That is not what I meant, Hilda. I would never rejoice in something that causes you so much pain,” he told her. She had no reason to disbelieve him, so she sighed and gave his hands a squeeze, trying to dissipate her anger. 

“He was dear to me. But so are you. It just… it will be different without him around.” 

 Hilda inherited the throne to her kingdom at the age of fourteen, when her parents disappeared without a trace. Yuga was nothing more than a mere sorcerer, an eye into the life of the common folk, when word spread of the disappearance. He’d been so kind to come and look after her, acting as caretaker in the absence. She trusted him more than anything, and then there was Ravio. He was a boy with a knack for trouble, always trying to earn a quick rupee by finding or inventing silly little tools to help with odd, ridiculous problems. Their unlikely friendship blossomed quickly, but now, he was no longer around to make her smile or laugh or roll her eyes. 

“That is why you must carry on with our plan, to prove to him that you know what you are doing. Make him proud of you.”

“He would not be watching over me,” she argued, pulling her hands away again to grip at her nightgown, bunching the fabric with a frown. “Not after what I did to him.”

Ravio did not deserve what had happened to him. By giving him the choice to leave, she’d made him feel unwanted, unloved, and now he was dead. She’d killed her best friend, and really, she shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d never been worth much of anything, had she? With a kingdom in such a state of disrepair and an absence of people to care about her, fate had long since deemed her something lonely and broken. Something undeserving of love, of family and of friends and of all the things good in the world. 

But she could bring it all back, couldn’t she? If she could get her hands on a Triforce, if she could wish her entire kingdom to rise from the throes of desolate destruction, could she also revive? Could she return Ravio to the world, to the happy person he was always supposed to be? Or would the world not pity her enough for that? Would the world laugh at her, tear her last remaining hopes to shreds?

She hadn’t realized she’d been crying until Yuga was pulling her to his chest, cradling her into him like he’d done when she was a child. It was so much, the pressure and the grief and the guilt and the blame– did he blame her, too? Did he blame her and her ancestors for the fall of the kingdom? Did he blame her for the death of the merchant he’d always argued with? She couldn’t fathom it if he didn’t, but he should. That was something she was deserving of.

She should have never sent Ravio away. She should have never spoken down to him. She should have kept that bracelet, the last little keepsake of the boy in the bunny hood that she loved so much.

“Yuga,” she spoke when she’d gathered her bearings, wiping harshly at her eyes. He’d said nothing when he was offering her comfort and for that, she was very appreciative. It was embarrassing enough as it was to be caught grieving in his presence. “Have you made any progress in locating a Triforce? I am in much need of some positive news this morning, it would seem.”

“Actually, Your Grace, that’s precisely what I wanted to speak with you about.” The way his entire demeanor changed was curious. He was no longer staring down at her in pity, stroking her hair and assuring her through his presence alone that things would be better. No, he was lively now, a hint of excitement sparkling in his eyes, and it would seem that maybe, things were going to start looking up after all. 

“Well, speak,” she encouraged, nudging him in her excitement before she dipped behind the divider to change at last. It was something she should’ve done as soon as she’d woken up, but only now did she have the energy to do something other than sit and think of all the things she’d done and regretted.

“I’ve uncovered a world that seems strangely similar to our own. It’s called Hyrule, I believe, and I have every reason to think this kingdom has a Triforce,” Yuga explained, and she could hardly pull her dress on with how badly her hands were shaking.

“And?” she asked, prompting him to continue speaking. She needed to know more.

“It may be difficult, though, I’m afraid. It would seem that Hyrule’s history is as extensive and dramatic as that of Lorule. Their triforce was split long ago, and the piece that they refer to as the Triforce of Power is inhabiting a creature they’ve long since sealed away for crimes against the kingdom. If we have any hope of stealing their Triforce, we are going to need a plan to open the Sacred Realm of Hyrule and release the being called Ganon.”

Hilda frowned, tugging at a lock of hair as she thought. She was certain many key details were missing from that story, but it was worth a shot. How hard could it be, really, to revive this Ganon and steal the triforce from him?

“Where are the other two pieces?” she asked as she stepped out from behind the divider, crossing to her vanity so that she could refresh her makeup. 

“One is held by the kingdom’s princess. The other… well, I’m sure we can find it.”

She pursed her lips, applying the purple lipstick to them, then glanced back at Yuga through her mirror.

“How are we to get to this kingdom, exactly?” she asked curiously, furrowing her brows. “It sounds as if Hyrule is a parallel. Is there a way to cross the boundaries?”

Yuga’s smile was wide and certain, sending a wave of excitement through her again.

“Just leave that to me, Princess. Say the word and I will do as you command. There is hope for Lorule yet.”

Ravio would be disappointed in her. Ravio would shake his head and try to convince her otherwise. But he was not here, and if there was even the slightest possibility of him one day returning, then she was going to do this.

“Invade Hyrule,” she said, a smile tugging at her lips. “Bring the Princess to me. I would love to meet her.”

--------------------

Tim swings across to the next roof, bolts over it, and then hurls himself down towards the water to land on one of the wharves. The two men have hauled their burden halfway along, and are debating in muttered voices with no idea that he’s coming up fast behind them.

“Here’s fine,” one of them hisses.

“’S not deep enough,” the other replies. “This is Red Hood. You wanna half-ass it?”

“Stop,” Tim says in his Red Robin voice, and they freeze. “Let him go.”

Unfortunately, at least one of them isn’t as stupid as they look, trying to get rid of a Gotham vigilante by tossing him in what can’t be more than twenty feet of water. He takes one look at Tim, and then, in one mighty heave, shoves Jason away from himself and into the water.

Then both of them turn on him, draw guns, and start firing.

Tim would like to hurl the both of them into the harbour after Jason, weapons and all. However, he has priorities, and the top of that list is not dealing with Bruce if he lets Jason drown. He leaps off of the wharf, puncturing the water in a smooth dive amidst a veritable hail of bullets.

Underneath, everything is muffled, even the gunshots. It’s dark and he’s loathe to give away his position by turning a light on, so he relies on feel rather than sight as he swims forwards. Jason is mostly muscle, so it’s not surprising Tim’s fingers hit leather closer to the harbour floor than to the surface.

Winding an arm around Jason’s chest, Tim pushes for the surface with his legs and remaining arm. For a moment, underwater, it feels easy - it’s only when he breaks the surface underneath the wharf that he realises that he’s possibly in trouble.

He’s a strong swimmer, of course. However, the water is choppy with the wind, and it’s hard to keep Jason’s head above the surface as well as his own. He curses until he realises it’s letting too much dank water into his mouth - oh god, he’s going to mutate into Killer Croc’s skinnier brother.

He has a rebreather in his belt, but if he grabs for it the choice is to let go of Jason or stop swimming, and neither of those is great options. Also, there’s still the odd bullet hitting the water, because apparently these idiots being terrible shots isn’t a good reason for their boss to not give them plenty of ammunition to not hit things with.

Just as Tim’s contemplating his poor life choices, Jason jerks in his very professional life-saving hold and regains consciousness fighting.

They both go under immediately. Tim pushes Jason away from him in the black murk, and barely catches sight of the silvery flash of a knife before it hits him. 

He surfaces, Jason doing the same just outside of arm’s reach. Tim sputters, “Fuck! It’s me!”

“Red?” Jason asks, shaking his still-masked head. The thing has got to be at least a quarter full of water, but he doesn’t seem bothered by it.

“Yeah. You know, your brother?” Tim says. Jason is swimming pretty well for someone who is either drugged or concussed, but Tim is keeping a close eye on him even so. If he has to go under for a third time tonight, he’s staying down there. By choice.

“I know who you are,” Jason mutters.

“Jason,” Tim says, “You stabbed me.”

“Fuck. Did I?” 

“You didn’t get through my armour,” Tim admits, “But still.”

“Thank god,” Jason says, with a degree of relief that doesn’t make sense until he continues, “Imagine what you’d turn into if you got this water in your bloodstream.”

“I hate you,” Tim mumbles. There’s yet another gunshot above them, this one fired through the wharf and into the water less than six feet from Tim. “Shit!”

He moved towards the stairs, intent on heading up to locate one of the others and make sure nobody was accidentally sleeping in the bathtub again, but as his foot touched the bottom step a torrent of water practically knocked him off his feet, failing only as a result of Logan’s instinct to grab the handrail. His eyes flickered to the stairs and then back to the carpeted floor which was now all but obscured, analysing, hypothesising, gathering data. But none of it made sense.

There was no feasible way for the water to be rushing down in such a huge volume, much less rising from the floor. The only ones with the power to construct something as… improbable… as this, would be the twins.

And Roman would never, not when he knew Logan was down here, and especially not when a number of his sketchpads still lay sprawled around the living room, now gathering water.

But Remus? ...Remus would.

Logan sighed.

“Remus! It is in both your and my own best interests that you stop the flow of water.”

He would have said there was silence, but the roar of water now up to his ankles made it hard to even remember what silence sounded like—or didn't, he supposed, as silence was defined as the absence of sound. Momentarily closing his eyes in annoyance, he instead sank out, hoping to gain a little clarity in a more familiar—and quieter—environment.

And all of a sudden he couldn't breathe, water inside his mouth and his ears and his nose and splintering his vision.

He was back in the main room barely a second later, now completely soaked, and beginning to feel concerned. Had something gone wrong?

He took off his glasses and dried them off quickly, before trying to duck into Roman’s room to see if he could reverse this—but Roman’s door must have been locked, for he couldn't get in.

Remus’s was empty of Remus, but was full of water much like Logan’s own before, and Logan couldn't help the jolt of…something that went through his chest as he began to fear predict the worst. But he wasn't afraid. He couldn't feel fear. Fear was an emotion. He had not emotions. Of course.

Deceit’s was locked too, which didn't exactly surprise him, although it did perturbe him slightly. He was running out of people who'd be able to fix this.

Even Patton’s was locked, which was surprising, as Patton was always very clear that he would leave his room open as often as he was able in case anyone ever wanted to talk.

Virgil's room was the last he tried, already expecting it to be locked as it practically always was, so you can imagine his surprise when he found himself in the centre of the dimly-lit room. His confusion only heightened when he did not find himself completely submerged in water, nor even up to his knees, and when he squinted down to examine the floor and found dry carpet he was even a little suspicious.

No matter. He was here to check on Virgil, not analyse everything he saw when it didn't react as he expected it to.

“Virgil?” he called softly, treading gently towards the bed squashed into the corner and trying not to let his dripping clothes form too large of a puddle, eyeing the mound of blankets that may or may not be a figure.

The blankets suddenly sat bolt upright and Logan stopped in his tracks, frowning and wondering if he'd spooked the anxious side. “...Virgil?”

Two pinpricks of light appeared where eyes should be, and before Logan could react Virgil’s voice filled the room, loud and all-encompassing as it always was when he became anxious, except shriller, piercing, and unlike anything Logan had ever heard before.

“Wake up!” yelled the voice. “Logan! It's the bottom of the ocean!” it shrieked, growing more shrill and inhuman with every letter and Logan winced, pressing his palms into his ears in an attempt to block out the noise.

It only seemed to magnify it, sharp and penetrating as it continued to shriek, cries echoing around the room and seeming to bounce around Logan's very skull. “Wake up! Wake up!”

“Logan!” it cried, before the blankets began to sink, the sound of the voice reverberating around the room as echoes bounced off the walls, and it took Logan a moment to notice the sound of running water.

The blankets fell away entirely, now just a heap on the bed and Logan stepped forward, arm outstretched towards where Virgil had only just been, ears still ringing and the banshee cries playing over in his mind.

He realised with a start that the water was pooling from the blankets where Virgil had been situated, a gushing torrent that was slowly filling the room. Logan panicked, already knowing where this was headed and trying to sink out.

But he couldn't.

The water was up to his hips already, spilling over the top of the bedframe and soaking everything on it. He span towards the door, trying his best to wade through the water, but his steps were slow and the water was rising, only a matter of time before it overcame him.

The door didn't budge, and all Logan’s knowledge of physics was telling him of course it doesn't move, the pressure against the door is greater than that outside; you have to wait for the pressure to equalise before it can be opened. But the pressure wouldn't equalise, because the fact he couldn't open the door meant there was less water beyond the door, which meant there was no way the pressure would ever equalise because all the water was in here.

Abandoning the door handle, Logan instead began to beat against the door, hoping to create a hole to drain the water from.

But of course, Virgil’s door was made of iron, because of aesthetic of whatever it was Virgil claimed, and there was no way he was going to even make a dent in it, let alone a hole.

Logan's was somewhat aware that his breathing was worryingly high, but he didn't have time to think about that as the water surpassed his shoulders.

And there was nothing here that could help him, he realised in increasing distress, because the water was rising and it didn't look like it was going to slow down, and the only things that were floating were all too small to help him, and the two ways out of here were both blocked.

He tried to sink out again, trying every room in turn and even Thomas in the physical world, but none of them worked, each barred from him, and Logan was beginning to realise this wasn't a problem he could solve on his own.

“Roman?” he called to the room, hoping the creative side would hear him and perhaps come to his rescue; he would be the best option for helping in this situation anyway, Logan thought as he began to tread water.

“Remus?” he tried, any previous reluctance dissipating in the face of imminent drowning.

“De—” he began, but a thought suddenly struck him. If he called for one of the others and they did come, that would only mean they were stuck too. Which would certainly not be ideal. Logan wasn't even sure where any of them could be, as he had entered every room in the mindscape by this point and each one had been empty of the others, but they couldn't have just disappeared. That wasn't how this worked. That wasn't how any of this worked.

Logan was very glad Thomas had learned to swim as the ceiling came closer and closer, his head knocking against it with the rising water.

He braced himself and, taking a deep breath, dove downwards.

He tugged at the door handle, hoping beyond hope that maybe, just maybe, things would be different this time, but the iron remained steady, not even straining under the pull. He kicked towards the surface, breaking the top and almost hitting his face of the ceiling as he took a gulp of the two or three centimetres of air still left, and dwindling fast.

He dove down again, heading to the door in one last, desperate attempt, but instead of moving towards the door he was pulling away. Spinning around, he held a hand over his mouth to prevent gasping in surprise at the large whirlpool situated in the centre of the floor, grasping at him with water currents that steadily drew him nearer.

He tried to kick away from it, feet flailing wildly as he watched various CDs and notebooks disappear into the abyss, but no matter how strong of a swimmer he was the whirlpool was more powerful, and it was only seconds before he was inside the mouth. And then he was sinking down, down, down, spinning nauseatingly as small objects bounced against him. Somehow, his glasses remained—not that there was anything to see in the blackness anyway.

And then everything was calm. He had stopped moving.

He forced open his eyes, and looked around, only to see he was surrounded by water that only seemed to stretch on no matter which direction he faced. Alone.

He was in the ocean.

As soon as he processed this, he was suddenly very, very cold and everything went very, very dark.

He was acutely aware of his lungs screaming for oxygen, and he could feel the water pressure crushing him, liquid forcing itself down his throat and into his mouth and eyes and ears, and from somewhere in the inky depths below, something roared. He looked down, a shoal of fish flitting past as they moved to escape whatever was below, but Logan could only sit and watch.

A huge mouth appeared, wide open, hundreds of rows of teeth lining the maw, each the size of Logan’s torso as fish who were not fast enough were swallowed whole.

This was it.

Logan looked up, towards where he was sure the surface must lie, and praying that the others were safe, wherever they were.

He only wished he could have had one last look at the stars, as the teeth obscured his vision and his lungs gave out.

And suddenly he could breathe again, shooting upright and holding a hand to his chest to feel his rapidly beating heart. Still alive. Still alive.

“Logan!” said Virgil’s voice, and Logan almost cried out, sure this was all just a cruel repeat, and any second now he was going to be back in the water, unable to breathe, unable to cry out, with no idea if the others—

“Logan. It's Virgil. Take a breath. You had a nightmare. You're safe.”

“I— what?” Logan said, voice breaking. It made sense. It made sense, but, how had, how— Quietly, unsurely, he whispered, “it seemed so real.”

“I know,” said Virgil, perching on the edge of Logan’s bed. Logan was suddenly reminded that yes, of course Virgil knew, because he always knew whenever any of them had a nightmare. He was Anxiety, after all, and selfish as Logan felt for thinking it, he was glad Virgil had come. “Want a tissue, Teach?” Virgil added softly, offering one off-handedly before looking away to examine the ceiling.

Logan took it somewhat confusedly, before he realised with a start that his face was damp. He had been crying. Hurriedly, he dried his face, thankful that Virgil had chosen to look elsewhere whilst he sorted himself.

“I'm sorry,” he said after a moment, locating his glasses from the bedside table and feeling a sense of relief wash over him as the world became clearer. “That was uncharacteristically… emotional of me.”

Virgil seemed almost to laugh, a withheld smirk flashing across his features. “I know you have emotions, Logan, and that's okay; you don't need to hide them. Do you want to tell me about it?”

Taking a deep breath and lying back onto his pillow, Logan’s eyes drank in the stars and constellations in his ceiling, the night sky Roman had put into place for him twinkling comfortingly.