#apocalyptic!ko

Nvm more carpool without any contexts quotes

Sami Apocalyptic AU Ramblings, Part One of However Many There Will Be...

The general AU summary is that it's an AU where the villains end up winning. They, after well over decades of planning, end up finally succeeding and destroying and wiping out most heroes. With the bonus detail of KO and TKO being separated!

In today's submission, I'm going to be rambling about the KO and TKO separation portion of the AU, as that is currently what's bouncing around in my head. I absolutely will get to and explain the other general information about the AU at a time that isn't right now (considering it's 12 am as I'm writing this and I work in 9 hours.)

[Some details will be kept vague until I get a chance to ramble sone more later on.]

The AU takes place, and diverges, during season one. At least in a more noticable way. In a very simple summary— sometime roughly between We've Got Fleas and One Last Score, Shadowy ends up separating KO from his TKO, in the forest.

He used a weird kind of machine— cob knows how he got his hands on it— to physically separate the two. This... is absolutely not a fun experience. It's painful. Because he's essentially tearing apart their souls, cause KO and TKO share a soul in kind of a weird way? Words are hard! But it's absolutely one of the worst experiences both KO and TKO have ever experienced.

KO remembers more of the details than TKO, as KO was in control during the separation, but even then, KO doesn't remember much, except for the fact that he was separated and it HURT.

ALSO, ALSO, after the separation, the cage in KO's mind is absolutely just... destroyed. As this was season one, KO never got the chance to let TKO out of the cage, and this is part of why TKO resents him so much [will elaborate later!] The mind is never visited again after this, but the cage, the poor cage, man...

(WB doodle by freepaperdetective!)

ANYWAY, they both end up unconscious on the forest floor after they're separated. Because holy fuck, these two kids were kind of legitimately split in half in a way. It's honestly a miracle it didn't end up killing them [it definitely almost did, though.] Shadowy takes TKO and leaves KO in the forest while he's passed out, where he's eventually found by Rad and Enid, who definitely panic because KO suddenly won't wake up.

He's definitely alive, he's just... unconscious for a few days. He wakes up again a few days later all snuggled up in blankets, but this post isn't about him, so we'll skip that for now.

As soon as TKO wakes up, a few days later, much like KO, Shadowy wastes zero time in beginning to manipulate him. Again, I won't go too in-depth cause this is meant to be super short, but he ends up pretty much making TKO go from, "I hate KO for everything he's done but whatever" to "I absolutely HATE everything about KO and his existence, he's the cause of ALL my PROBLEMS and ALL of my bad feelings and thoughts would go away if I killed him." To put it simply, at least.

Of course, that's not all immediate. It takes like a year [roughly] of manipulation to get him to that point. At which, the apocalypse would've already been very much a thing, and that definitely adds to the problem. [The villains destroyed everything around the time of Villains Night Out/In, which was a few months after the separation. They're kind of connected but not really, TKO just helped. I'll get into that later.]

It's a good detail to mention that over time after the separation, KO definitely ends up feeling bad about keeping TKO in the cage. But as you'll find out, it just... doesn't matter. Cause by the time he does try talking to TKO, it's unfortunately not able to work. I absolutely will get into the little tiny teeny details when I can...

There's a stark contrast to KO and TKO, too, cause TKO is with the villains, and KO is with the heroes, and while KO is forced to hide from the villains, TKO is essentially living with and around them. The villains that destroyed everything. It absolutely affects him in a lot of ways and AUGH it's SO good, man...

Part two of Sami Rambling About Its Apocalyptic AU, with more stuff about a!TKO and a!KO! Strap yourselves in, this is gonna be a LONG one.

...

I mentioned last night that TKO is up with the villains, while KO is down hiding, underground, with the heroes. And there is so much information to this, cause despite being separated, there are so many similarities and parallels between these two.

Like...

KO is hiding in small underground areas, away from the villains while, like I mentioned, TKO is up with the villains. And while he's generally not forced to survive in a dangerous place in the way KO is, he definitely has to in a different way. Cause he's up there with the villains who caused this mess, including Shadowy.

TKO never had anyone there for him, either, unlike KO, even after separation. Cause he existed, was in the cage, and then with Shadowy after the separation and immediately manipulated. He never got to experience any kind of love or anyone even caring for him as a parent, just villains hurting other people and being so violent and literally destroying the world in order to win. There's, like, so little left.

I've imaged the sky being red, like how it is in the finale after the sun dies, cause the sun is dead. And there's just dirt and debris scattered around as far as people can see. Rocks and remnants of old buildings, broken sidewalks, and just... various things that just scream apocalypse. Absolutely little to nothing is left up there, and there's absolutely little to nothing underground. Both heroes and villains are struggling to survive, but the villains still take the win because the heroes are the ones hiding in fear for their lives.

You can get a general idea of just how it is for TKO by this general information. ESPECIALLY as a younger TKO that more recently started existing. The apocalypse generally has been a thing for about a year [in terms of timeline in regards to when a potential fic would take place], so he's been in this horrid environment for a long, long time. He's taught himself to pretty much suppress any feelings that AREN'T anger and rage, and has pretty much learned violence is what he needs to do to survive.

It's BAD. Horrible. And he's told and manipulated by Shadowy that if he killed and got rid of KO, that everything bad would go away. That he could be happy. And he believes him, because why wouldn't he?

When the apocalypse first started, there was a bit of that manipulation, but it wasn't as BAD. His first interaction with KO in the apocalypse is him attacking him with just a tinge of hesitance, but by the year point of the apocalypse, it's absolutely just cold-blooded, deep-seated rage. He's latched onto this idea that KO is GENUINELY the root of ALL his problems and unhappiness and torment, and the desire to kill him grows the more Shadowy tells him that doing that will make it better. It's like his purpose; that's what he believes. Murdering KO in the most violent way he can is his way out of misery and by cob, he wants OUT.

The thing is though he actually doesn't WANT to kill him. But he's suppressed that so hard that he genuinely believes he wants to, and even if he doesn't want to, he needs to. There's no other option in his mind. He firmly absolutely believes this is what he wants AND needs, and any doubt about him actually wanting KO dead is suppressed harder than KO ever ended up suppressing anything. This is, unfortunately, something he has to figure out the hard way, but I won't get into that...

KO is scared of him, though, and rightfully so. Because TKO wants him dead, and he knows this. Any interaction they had during the apocalypse, as very scarce as they were, ended up with KO getting hurt. And TKO being very clear about his goals. TKO absolutely terrifies the shit out of KO, because holy shit, that kid is ANGRY and he's POWERFUL.

I also sometimes think about how KO would've apologized if he could have. If he wasn't scared if TKO, he'd apologize to him for keeping him locked up in a cage. And just... everything in general. As he's a season one KO, though, he doesn't really know about TKO in the way other season two KOs might, but... still. It wouldn't have made it better or fixed it, but cob, the kid genuinely WANTS to apologize to him, but the sheer terror he feels when he simply hears his name is just... too much. It's SO good, man, I love the way these characters are.

They could've gotten along like siblings, honestly. If one wasn't actively seeking out to kill the other, and the other wasn't actively terrified of the one that wants him DEAD. AUGH... I love these two children so much, they deserve so much better. They're both seeking someone to love and care about them, in a way.

KO is stuck without a parental or even an older sibling figure for, like, a year (he's surviving with Colewort and Potato), and when he DOES have an adult show up, it's... it still sucks. He's alone and feeling super useless and just wants his mom, Rad, Enid, or SOMEBODY to be there. Even if the two people he's simply working with to survive care about him, he's... it still sucks, you know? I'll get into more stuff with KO in a different post though, he's got a lot, too!

But TKO is in a very similar situation. Except he's surrounded by villains who aren't anywhere close to good adult figures. All he has is Shadowy, who... is Shadowy. He may absolutely deny the fact that he really needs and wants someone to care about and love him, but that's absolutely something he does want. AUGH... one of my favorite things is that he just doesn't feel like he can call Carol his mom. He'll just call her KO's mom. And this absolutely lives in my brain so much. Cob, get this kid some blankets, please! Both of them. Blankets, hot chocolate, and lots of love.

One more detail I want to share before I send this off is the tape recorder.

They both have a half of the tape recorder in each of their subconsciouses. It's super, duper deep in there, and they never go to their minds, so they'll never know about it, but I do and I AM TELLING YOU.

It got split during their separation and it doesn't really work. It'll sputter and spit out some words and gargled static and noises, but otherwise, they're completely non-functional. But I love thinking about this, cause it has a lot of meaning behind it, which I absolutely SLURP up. And even if you repaired each one in their mind somehow, they wouldn't even be legible. Not very legible, anyway. Which is one of my FAVORITE things. I can't quite explain the entire way that this detail makes me feel, or how important this is in the grand scheme of viewing their separation and how it's affected them. But it's just... SO impactful, man.

Quick Sami Apocalyptic AU Rambles! This time it's about how the villains managed to destroy things! This is a more simple one cause it's super late :)

In short, the planning of destroying a lot of heroes dates back to years and years before it even happened. And them destroying everything wasn't even part of the plan, originally. Because what happened was that the idea was kind of like a game of telephone.

Around before the Sandwich Incident happened, a few villains were like, "hehe what if we attacked POINT." They ended up not doing much outside of discussing the idea in very secretive ways. Which ends up being unfortunately the big thing.

Over time, the idea goes from "hehe let's attack POINT" to "let's DESTROY POINT" to various other outlandish ideas over the couch of years, in secret, until it gets so far warped from the original idea that it's not the same one anymore. PV ends up hearing about it, and, by extension, Shadowy, and Shadowy pretty much does his snakey sneaky thing and absolutely latches onto that.

Keep in mind, again, this is over YEARS of keeping their communication secret from POINT. Shadowy probably picked up on the plot a WHILE before PV met KO, so the plan was already there and things to carry out the destruction of most heroes on the planet were in the works. Meeting (T)KO just kind of motivated him more cause he can use TKO to help.

Shadowy was not alone in the plotting, nor was he the originator of even the very warped version of the original idea. He just decided the other villains' who thought of it weren't doing much and took over the idea.

POINT eventually suspected SOMETHING was up. But they could never figure it out. And unfortunately they really couldn't have, cause then the villains destroyed everything. I don't have anything particular in mind for what they did but they definitely blew up, like, everything. Not all at once, it was definitely over the course of a lil' bit, BUT TKO being there made it easier for them to. Cause, yk, separation n' junk; KO and TKO have been separated for a little while by the point this happens.

PV never was interested in the plot to destroy everything, but Shadowy absolutely was. And once Shadowy got his hands on TKO, he kicked PV into the mind so he could focus on manipulating the boy and also continue finishing up things elsewhere. So PV is very unaware of everything happening. Fun!

I'm definitely not able to express the sheer amount of things that happened though and just how bad the destruction was. Part of that is cause it's super late, but it's just... augh, words. POINT was unprepared and they were destroyed first, so the help they could offer was beyond limited, because holy shit, their ENTIRE building was destroyed. And now EVERYTHING is being destroyed. It's... augh it's so much and it's horrible!