#ciquest au

Can you tell me more about the Four Chimes AU?

the four chimes verse is essentially an amalgamation of my want—need—for badass max, max angst, elumax angst, just general party and co angst, apocalypse four shenanigans, several unexplored character interactions and dynamics, the four horsemen of the apocalypse concept, and everything else that comes with this plus things i wasnt able to mention its very self indulgent ngl

but yes, it's about the apocalypse four (max, patrick, fred, and chrissy) and how they get turned into the upside down four horsemen of the apocalypse aka the four chimes of catastrophe by vecna, and they become his way of furthering chaos and destruction in hawkins, while also using them to get rid of his thorns aka the party and co

nobody's having a fun time lol

i've already got a lot of it planned out, i just need to write it lmao asufhaishdf

its funny because this all started when finn sent an ask to his friend about how the four victims of vecna are paralleled to the four horsemen of the apocalypse

on top of me already thinking about this, i saw the ask and pretty much ran with it

also, here's a bonus just for you! the following are the arc names of the og four chimes au (and technically still the general arc names regardless of the sub aus, tho ofc with some differences here and there):

pre-shattering

during catastrophe - the four chimes

during catastrophe - contact to familiarity

during catastrophe - jailbreak

during catastrophe - void dark

during catastrophe - escape the dark

during catastrophe - resonance

during catastrophe - the end

post-apocalypse

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What paths did you originally have planned for Robin? I wanna see how close my own ideas are lol :D :D :D

so robin is very feral yes AHSIFUHASf

im pretty sure i explained it a bit before but robin got hit by an arrow that was meant for nancy in the ciquest au, and because of nancy, she's able to find the will to fight back against the infection instead of succumbing to it, making it her own

One and the chimes sees how she's evolving and don't like it, so lence's suggestion of getting nancy takes priority, and so it happens

nance becomes quest and now the battle is on

robin is obviously devastated and the gang is slightly in shambles because of how much nancy brings to the table, and now she's gone—no, worse, she's being used for the other side

so robin steps up to the plate in multiple ways, trying her best to fill the void nancy was forced to leave behind

the burden on her is so heavy considering she got a power she technically never expected to have nor wanted, but now it's on her to make the most use of it

she usually questions why it was her who was in this situation and literally not anybody else who she thinks could definitely do better

lots of questions and wondering for her

now, unlike with renegade, she doesn't lose herself technically, but she gets close, like a lot

though should i mention that there was a little kidnapping that happened? the person who was kidnapped in question being someone who is very important to robin and may have caused a some strain and conflict for her and the chimes?

yeah, the chimes kidnapped steve to lure robin to them so that they can take her down

it was conquest's idea :)

robin was very much not happy about that btw

lots of things happen and as said, robin was very much close to losing it so many times but she doesn't for a couple of reasons

renegade is a completely new take and direction of ciquest and just four chimes in general, and im so interested in seeing where it goes, so very interested <333

i feel like im not able to tell robin's full story here, both because we want to keep some things hidden and also because my brain is kinda not working rn AHSFUHASF mb on that one

but yeah, that's generally it, tho if you got more questions, feel free to send an ask to either me or finn, and if we remember something in particular, we'll make sure to mention it

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And tell us more about the Chimes themselves please? Like what are they like? What kind of abilities do they have? I may need some ideas for a fight scene… hehe

here's the longest part because...lore dump yes

the chimes our beloveds <33

so the chimes. in our 68600 messages (as of the moment) of a four chimes dump, we've built up the characters and personalities of the chimes, and somewhere in this thread is the scattered information on them

now, i unfortunately dont have the time and patience to go through the thread to find all of the little information, but we'll do our best to give a good rundown of their characters

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here you go with the characters and personalities first:

famine

wields throwing knives

very loyal to One (meaning he gaslit her so much for that loyalty to come to be, a consequence of being his first chime)

wants to be the leader because she thinks (and is gaslit to think) that she deserves it (One really likes to cause discord between his chimes)

having no prior connection to the main gang—or thorns as they call the gang—besides eddie who is dead and a spectre here, so she's the one who has the least moments of "remembering their past life" before

is very brutal and ruthless and likely the one the gang got the most injuries from in a general sense

death

wields a large scythe

my secret blorb

most likely to actually defy One, and fun fact, he has an au called the runaway au where he, a chime in the middle of the battle between the upside down and right side up, got to run and escape from One before certain things happened, which then causes a chain reaction in this au ofc

he's a coward, and this plays a lot into his actions and interactions

technically had a connection with nancy in the gang, but with conquest here, it gets harder for him to connect, but robin actually steps up to the plate here

war

wields a sword

is the most balanced out of everyone when looking at his loyalty and his defiance to One, in the middle of the pack in that sense

his past life of abuse shows up a lot when it comes to One, so he tends to throw others under the bus to not get caught in the crossfire (not that he wants to do this, but he also doesnt want to gain One's ire)

just generally very chill, the most chill out of every one here

is the medic of the team because of how he's the personification of war

has a connection with lucas in the gang, so that's something that gets him to "remember" some stuff in a way

pestilence

wields bow and arrows

finn and mine's blorb

leader in og, former leader in ciquest/conquest

if you can only see the rambles we have on her…it will take days to get through

will take the bullet for the other chimes when it comes to One's ire

vec has a tighter hold on her because she's max

literally connected with everyone, will have a lot of moments where she feels familiarity (and will subsequently get punished for it later)

second most gaslit by One in a way, which is big oof

conquest

wields a sawed-off shotgun

the leader in ciquest/conquest aus

very protective of all the chimes and especially lence

vec also has tighter hold on her because she's nancy

last one to fall, was suggested by lence to be taken

more aware of things than the other chimes, but still completely controlled by One

same case as lence, but even more so considering she's been there since the start of it all (does her best to take most of lence's punishments as her own when One goes after them)

gets very hyperfocused with robin (vaguely aware the thorn makes her weak in some sense but quest doesn't care), but is frustrated she cant hurt her too much because lence will get hurt too (and maybe another reason deep down, but she doesnt acknowledge it)

all of them

they're all dog coded

One can summon them/call them whenever and its shown through the shivering cold in their necks, like what happens with will

One wants them to be just the way he wants them, meaning the way they died and got transformed into chimes must be how they are no matter what (this includes clothes, hair, weapons, and everything in general)

the only new addition he accepts them to have are new scars :')

the chimes have such a complicated relationship, but at the end of the day, post-vec, they love each other

note for them individually: there's a lot more that i want to add but my brain is blanking a little and i am probably forgetting some things, but here are some of the important things to note (remember this is incomplete to everything we wanna add ASFHUIASFh)

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some relationship notes (by pairs, groups are another story)

min clashes with death when it comes to lence, but otherwise are fine with each other, neutral in general but are connected as the first two chimes of One

min and war are not quite friends, more distant than friends but closer than allies… (very interesting when you note how they were in their Before)

has a very one-sided antagonistic rivalry with lence, especially when it comes to the leadership position (this changes a bit when quest is in play as she's the leader, but there's still the rivalry with lence despite not being leader in ciquest/conquest), will be very callous in a way with her, but they actually work well together, especially as the similar twin concepts of famine and pestilence

quest is able to take min's bitterness mostly in a stride and keeps her in check from being too antagonistic when it comes to leadership roles and just generally (helps because quest understands them in a way, though she doesnt understand why she does)

death and war are more or less chill with each other, most cordial relationship out of every single chime relationship and the least tension filled, just vibing so real (though war knows death is a coward and death knows that war knows it)

death and lence are surprisingly close, only second to quest for lence (and death too technically, which is inspired by their Before), this relationship is due to the fact that in canon, max got to see and technically interact with chrissy, patrick, and nancy, but never with fred, so we saw it and ran with it and now they're close here

death and quest are more or less okay with each other, and their Before helped them understand each other better, unlike the other chimes' Before affecting their relationships in another way

war and lence are complicated, since war throws lence under the bus the most (especially in og) to avoid One's ire, and lence understands why, because of her own Before (and it doesnt help that she takes bullets for the other chimes), but they're both fine more or less

war and quest are similar to min and lence with the similar concepts, war and conquest, fire and lava, war follows quest to the T (just like he does with lence in og but more so here with quest), and they work well together because of their similar concepts

lence and quest are the closest out of everyone, helped by their Before and their instincts with each other, confides with each other a lot and are just helping each other no matter what, tho ofc this comes with the consequence of One seeing this "weakness" of theirs and using this bond between them to punish them when he sees fit

although here's a note about this too: finn said "honestly tho their relationships r So complicated its hard to capture in a few sentences", and i agree, what you just read is just some general thoughts on their relationships, but god is there so much more to them all, and if we want to really show you the relationships in full, we would have to ramble it all out ASHUFIUASHF but yeah

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here you go with their abilities:

famine

knife throwing, very fast and precise

the fastest of the chimes

can cripple the energy and power of a person

takes down the food supply and wilts crops

can take the energy and vitality of a being and/or object

death

scythe proficiency

is the slowest of the chimes

everything related to death

teleportation through the shadows

summon bone beings

forming shadow tendrils kinda

exudes the ambiance of the end of life, striking a deep sense of fear

war

fireeeee

flame sword, very proficient with swords

second fastest of the chimes

use the molotovs and flamethrowers against the gang because fire for real

hot skin, literally

can cause a sense of crisis and rage in those near

lence

causes sickness (through arrows) and disorientation of people (through aura exuded)

poison arrows

has a balisong (one she had as max—this is an hc we have) and uses it as an extra weapon

second slowest of the chimes

infect people to insanity or to do her bidding

also wilts flowers and plants in general

aura vision (she's blind because of her interrupted transformation due to el but she can see the sort of "auras" of beings, especially the upside down ones)

quest

gun proficient (obviously)

very precise shots

her gun can either fire in a scattered way like a shotgun or only one bullet at a time, it depends on quest herself

lava (we were thinking mix of fire and earth for conquest, hence lava)

also hot skin, literally

in the middle of the fast and slow spectrum

can summon different types of guns, smaller guns takes less energy for her actually, but One doesn't like that so she doesn't do it much, if at all

all

sort of intangibility (only works when they're full on chime mindset, if their anchor selves start waking up and breaching the surface, they become vulnerable and the intangibility doesnt work)

connected to One's power

summoning their weapons

connected to their hounds (their horses)

faster healing

technically immortality (as long as One is around)

and bonus!

robin

connected to lence, draws power from her

trying to infect her even more causes robin to grow stronger and lence to grow weaker (this is important to note heheheh)

means she's a bit more feral though (she gets close to losing herself but doesnt fully)

becomes more durable and stronger and the best at dealing with the chimes in the long run

also faster healing

another note: i am very sure i forgot some things so yeah, assume this list is incomplete AHSFIUHASF but thats what we can remember off the top of our heads

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anywho, yeah! that's pretty much a lore dump and a half, except i also know its not complete and there's still so much more we want to say but are unable to mention it for several reasons

but maybe those are asks for another day (wink wink, go check out @lumaxramblings' askbox too yesyes)

thank you for the ask! and i hope this helped with the renegade au yesyes <33

...eventually :)

hehe, but yeah, it's a wild journey. the au is actually technically already more or less complete with the story line, both the og and the ciquest version, i just...haven't written it completely HASFUIAHSF

but, that's an eventually too, because my love for this au will always be strong, no matter the hyperfixation i have rn

about robin's controlled infection! well, in mine and @/lumaxrambling's minds, controlled infection au and conquest au are intertwined (because ronance ofc yesyes), hence why its named ciquest au. why am i explaining this little bit?

it's because the reason why robin can control her infection is because of nancy :D

in the ciquest au, pestilence (max) suggests to One/Vecna to get nancy to their side, because she feels that it would really help them out (but also because nancy was also put into a trance by vec, so it goes full circle, doesn't it?)

One/Vecna agrees, but tasks pestilence to hit nancy with her poison infection arrows first to test her

and so the chimes go do that...except robin intervenes and takes it for her

however, instead of becoming infected and losing herself, robin's desire to protect nancy boosted her during her fight against the infection, leading her to take it as her own

in the og au, there is no suggestion to One/Vec, but there is still a moment where someone gets hit by an arrow. i will say now that ogfc!robin...does not have the same luxury as ci!robin

but anyway, yes, back to ciquest au, robin is able to control her infection, which then technically gives her an advantage as she has "taken" some of pestilence's powers to use against the chimes and Vec

ofc, this au is called ciquest for a reason, so seeing how robin is possibly becoming more of a threat, Vec sends the chimes to forcefully take nancy to level the playing field

hence her becoming conquest :>

(oh robin definitely won't blame herself for this, not at all :') much angst hehe)

as for robin almost losing her humanity...well, she gets close for quite a few times

but yeah :)