When asked to kneel, The Red Crown made the choice for them. The One Who Waits sees this as a betrayal leading to their battle and his inevitable downfall.
I haven’t drawn comics in ages. More beneath the cut!
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Too loud. Too bright. Too much. Even through closed eyelids and flattened ears. His head pounded behind his eyes. A rhythmic thumping so loud in his ears. A noise he was so unused to. A mortal sound.
Pain was a blinding experience when one was no longer numb to it. The One Who Waits could only huddle in one spot and cling to his own shoulders with claws he couldn’t not yet control enough to retract. He knew where he sat, but he was not going to allow the recognition to settle.
Hurt lanced across his chest, his wrists. He wanted it to stop. This was not how things were supposed to go. He’d planned for so long. How could this have happened?
Narinder chose wrong. He chose wrong. He chose the wrong vessel. His vessel who built him up, built a Temple in his name, raised devotion! His vessel who then tore him down and reduced him to this quivering mess of a new mortal.
How he wished they’d chosen to kill him instead. To have ended his millennia of suffering, not extend it further.
He chose wrong.
The physical hurt now ran in tandem with the emotional. How could they do this to him? When he saw them choose… he thought that maybe things would go right. He would be free and his vessel tucked safely in their own little heaven… but he saw them return the Red Crown to their own head. That damned Lamb!
The one he gave life to! The one he saved!
Betrayed by one he trusted so—
Now he was here. Now he was mortal. How foolish of him.
“…Narinder?” Faust’s voice was gentle, no doubt a front put on for the followers (they should be HIS) that he could hear hanging about in curiosity. (Insects to be squashed! How dare they look upon his visage and see him in this form!)
Narinder knew that if he were to open his eyes, he’d see nothing but hatred in theirs. After all, he ordered his vessel to sacrifice themself. And after all, this was not something his vessel was willing to do. Would such an ask not generate hatred in one unwilling?
Either way, the refusal… the betrayal… has generated hatred within Narinder and when he returned to strength… he would make them pay.
There was no point in putting things off.
Narinder cracked open an eye, blinking rapidly against the blinding light, prepared to see the Lamb standing before him with a weapon in hand. (They’d be foolish not to, what if he chose to attack?)
Instead, the Lamb kneeled before him (why kneel now and not then?), a bowl of water in hand and fake concern across their face. They were still covered in spots of their blood and Narinder’s ichor from their battle, fleece torn in places and wool sticking up in different directions. Yet, they were the victor and looked it. Narinder had no doubt that he looked worse.
He felt worse.
Light from the setting sun lit against Faust, brightening them in almost a halo. It would be beautiful sight… if not for the knowledge he had.
“Betrayer.” Narinder rasped. It came out wrong. He wanted it to be a hiss. A snarl. But it was a wheeze of air at best. His throat hated it. He hated it.
Faust had the gall to shake their head. They opened their mouth to speak, but Narinder beat them to it.
“Betrayer. I never should have chose you. A lamb that defiled my name. My Temple for their own!” He slowly devolved into a rant. A proper tantrum for the ages. Spitting insults that brought gasps of shock from those around them, a few being hands to weapons (garden tools at best), and yet Faust did not react.
If he had taken a moment, he would have noticed their eyes darken to sadness and a frown overtaking their features. He would have noticed the hurt. The Crown trying to get his attention that he had chosen the wrong subject for his ire. But he was understandably focused on his own.
“I wish not to see you! I wish not to be here! Kill me, Usurper! End the suffering you drag out further!” Narinder’s voice had torn by the end, quieted by the force he attempted to put behind it and sounding as if he’d been exposed to the smoke of fires for hours.
He’d begged at the end. Begged to be killed and put out of his misery. And again the Lamb ignored this.
When Narinder was done, panting harshly and lying against the ground as his body turned tired, Faust stood from their kneel and turned to a she-rabbit. They placed the bowl of water in her hands.
“Take him to a tent. I feel he would be calmer if I were not in his line of sight. Have someone come to me if he attempts to attack anyone. Make sure he drinks. Make sure he eats. Force him to if you have to, but be careful. He has not eaten in a long while.”
The she-rabbit bowed her head as Faust turned without a second look to Narinder and strode towards the Temple. His temple no longer.
Narinder could only squirm and attempt at clawing, glaring at Faust’s back as he was dragged away with the help of two other followers. Kicking and screeching, he vowed to himself that the Lamb would pay for this.
They all would pay.
— —
Quick Oneshot that may not stay canonical, or it may stay as a companion piece. The image will stay canonical as the first thing Narinder sees upon his indoctrination. For now, it’s a prompt for myself.
I plan to do the main fic series from Faust’s POV, but I wanted to play around with some of Narinder’s thoughts. I don’t know if it worked though, I have a hard time thinking how someone might react in hatred so I hope I got it close enough.
My lamb’s name is Faustitas, Faust for short. When captured for that final sacrifice, Faust was shaved of their wool. It took a while to grow it back. They have scars from the manacles that fade over time, but the neck scar from their first death, stays. Originally, the design of their fleece was the normal one you see in game, but they quickly decided it was basically a curtain that just got in the way and opted for sleeves. Dagger or claw preference in weapons.
Narinder gets to have a jumpsuit. As a treat. It’s easier to do physical work in them than the cloak that he spent the first five years of his indoctrination wearing. He has chain-rub shaped scars on his chest, wrists, and ankles. He spent the first decade or so absolutely despising Faust before he finally began tolerating them. In this time, Faust’s personality changed from bubbly (and thirsty for revenge) to withdrawn in the wake of his hatred. He was their dear friend before and Faust doesn’t quite get why he hated them so after being friends for well over a hundred years with him being The One Who Waits. So they feel hurt and betrayed. That and Narinder wanted to kill them for the Crown-
The plan is that, instead of the Lamb trying to woo babygirl, babygirl realizes he fucked up a bit and actually wants to get their friendship back.
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"Well, this is convenient." -Faust Ch.1
Ao3 Link Here
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The erosion was gradual, at first. Barely noticeable. A thousand years, then two, slipped by in a haze of anger and betrayal. A constant pulling of chains and pain. Time accumulated and with each passing moment, something slipped farther and farther from him.
His thoughts were once sharp and divine. A torrent of purpose and power. They became muffled with distorted whispers that faded into the echo of a voice that used to command.Â
Doubt crept in with a shift he could not name. Was he not once something more?Â
The question only lingered for but a spare moment. A last breath leaving a body. Was he leaving his body?
Power faded into a cold void of absence. Memories dulled; no longer sharp, no longer clear. Thought became irrelevant. There was no god left here. He was absence and yet, even this was actively slipping from him. No body to hold. No mind to guide. Was he a shadow left, lingering? Tethered only by the faintest pull of instinct? Time had stripped him of everything.
It was a hollowing. The edges of his thoughts are unravelling. Thread by thread by thread by thread by-
Each moment is slipping away like water through fingers. Wind through leaves. Fire through-
Flesh and power melted into nothingness. A vague impression of something once whole, now fragmented. He couldn't grasp-
There was something-
He hurts.Â
He has been hurting.Â
He will hurt.Â
The name is lost. The title is lost. There is nothing but time. Unending. Unyielding. All that remains is the primal pulse of instinct. The need to cling. To survive.Â
So he clings.Â
So he survives.Â
There is an echo of something that he was, once. He is less than he was. But more than nothing, he was drawn to a warmth, to a presence. He was not alone. Something had changed from the endless, endless, endless endlessendlessendlessendlessendlessendlessendlessenLESSNDLESS
A haze of confusion as the dissonant noise of his thoughts were interrupted by a something. By a newness trying to pass by. Its journey cut off in the Inbetween.
There.
A body. Chained. Cold. Unmoving. Wrong. Very wrong. Bodies were not meant to be like this. When did it arrive?
He could feel it. A pull in the emptiness. It should not be empty. There should be more. There should be something. But it is all gone.
The once-was crawls towards it. Or thinks he does. He could not tell what was him and what was not. His arms? Legs? Tail? Or none of it? The edges of him are blurred and slipping away like smoke across the ground. A shapeless form.
The body. There was a body. There should not be a body let alone a dead one. It should not be dead.Â
Dirty and shaved of wool. Neck separated cleanly.
The head. A body needed its head. He tries to grasp it by an ear. It slips. Keeps slipping. His fingers-No matter. He must fix it. It has to be fixed. Everything will be fixed if he can just fix this. If he could just grab-
He manages to slide the head closer, some how gripping the cold and lifeless weight. The head rolls. Its face is blank, a blank lamb. A blank slate. He pulls, dragging it nearer but something is off. He churns with faint confusion. Thoughts shatter and reform. The puzzle piece is not in the right order. The ends have to match.Â
He can feel it. The deep need to connect. To be.Â
A flicker of clarity.Â
The head slides into place as he aligns the neck with the body. There. Now he just needs to-
To-
To?
For moments-hours, years- he drifts. The void stretches, deep and vast. A place where time does not matter. A matter of nothingness.Â
A shift.
A tug.Â
A reminder.
There was a dead lamb. He needed to fix it. Yes. He needed to fix this to fix...what? To fix what? He needed to fix. How?
There was a hibernating power. Dormant and tucked away. Eye closed like a slumbering beast. Sleeping through the shatter. This is what he needed. This had power. Power he could use.Â
He called to it. He thinks he did.Â
He calls.Â
He calls.Â
He call-Â there. He felt a something. A correct something. Something awakening.Â
Red and black comes into being nearby, rolling as it dropped to the ground with nothing to catch it. No head to land upon. Eye still closed. He needed to give it to the body. That would fix it.Â
It takes time-time time time time time time- but he had it. He moved it, nudged it, to the body. A gift for it.Â
He watches through a haze of his shattered thoughts.
The Red Crown. The moment it touches the lamb's head its eye snaps open. The limp form it touched lifted into the air, chains breaking and clattering to the ground. The hands drop. The head twists, the neck realigning with a sickening, smooth crack.
The body jerks.Â
Power surges, red and untamed, through the air as the Crown claims its place.Â
In an instant, the lamb is no longer broken. Fixed.Â
A gasp, loud and painful sounding, erupts from deep within the lamb. Then coughing, choking. A cloak as red as blood settles over their shoulders and gleaming bell collar forms at their neck, clinking and covering the crude scar left behind. They stumble as their hooves touch the ground, collapsing to their knees as they hunch over, a hand to their neck as they suck in greedy lungfuls of air.Â
The dead body was now alive. His job done.Â
He is tired now.Â
Was.
Will be.
Darkness presses in with a blurring, heavy fog. He slips away, emptiness beckoning again. He manages to stir just a bit, instinct telling him to find somewhere safe. Somewhere to rest.
The cloak around the groaning-alive- lamb. Flared out, but enclosed. Dark. Safe.Â
He scuttles forward as the lamb is too distracted to notice and wedges himself inside. Shadow blends with shadow. The dark wraps around him. He allows himself to fade and sink into the quiet.Â
The connection to his purgatory, his jail, is lost.
Between one blink and the next, the Lamb finds themself kneeling, confused, atop the very chopping block where their life was taken. The stone is cold beneath them, still slick with the blood that once spilled freely from their body. The scene is almost unchanged, frozen in time as if no time had passed since that moment of death.
The air is thick, charged with an eerie stillness as their murderers gap in blatant surprise as the lamb they just killed came back to life in a twist and snap.Â
Power spills from the lamb, raw and unrestrained. Flooding the very air around them. For a moment, everything is still. Then, realization strikes and a sharp grin splits across the lamb's bloodstained muzzle. The Red Crown rises from atop their head and drops, now a sharp and dangerous dagger, into their hand.Â
"Well," the sacrificed lamb says. "This is convenient."
Their words drip with new malice as they drag the back of their hand across their lips, smearing a trail of crimson. In a blur of motion, they a whirlwind of violence, the sharp edge of the Red Crown slicing through the air and into the helmsman’s neck. The force of the strike is swift and unforgiving.
The lamb left the clearing that evening, blood covered and hungry for revenge. Unaware of what has truly happened. Oblivious to the passenger settled comfortably within their cloak.Â
And so, they walked into the night, a pawn of fate, unaware that the true cost of their resurrection had already begun.
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Have a Faust fresh off the chopping block! I really wanted to make a creature-coded Narinder fic and throw him into baser instincts. This is another branch off of the Choiceless AU with Faust. A "What if Narinder had never been given Aym and Baal"?