[Fic] I Have Burned Your Bridges
Apr. 8th, 2021 07:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chirurgiqueTitle: I Have Burned Your Bridges
Fandom: Kingdom Hearts
Relationship: Luxu & Ava
Rating: PG
Content notes: weapons, fantasy gun violence, manipulation by an authority figure
Words: 1,350
Summary: Ava and Luxu are the only ones left who haven’t learned the Master’s newest Keyblade Formchange, so they’re going to have to work on it together. Which is kind of unfortunate, because for some reason lately they’ve had less and less patience with each other. Luxu can’t think of why that could be... after all, he’s been following the Master’s advice on the matter so well!
Of everyone, Ava was the easiest to trust.
For one thing, she was so prudent. That careful thoughtfulness of hers was working to their mutual advantage even at this very moment. Luxu stood back watching as she summoned her weapon and ran her free hand over it, muttering to herself.
It was a pretty swanky Keyblade. All of the other apprentices had gotten these one-of-a-kind originals from the Master recently, all colour-coded and on-theme like little declarations of their identity. Luxu might have felt a little left out, had it not been for the fact that the Master had expressly reassured him that Luxu’s own Keyblade was on its way, and it would be the most worth the wait of them all.
It was hard to imagine a Keyblade nicer than Ava’s, though. The waves and soft pearlescent twists of its cloud-like surface glowed and undulated under her touch. She must be almost there. Sure enough, the Keyblade’s earthly shape suddenly collapsed in a blossom of light, and, with a burst of wind and glitter ruffling her robes, it reappeared in her hand, reformed.
“Whoa,” whistled Luxu, impressed. What even was it? Ava hefted it so they could both examine it. Some sort of head-sized ring, with a curved guard arcing out the bottom to its perpendicular handle, and a long, thin pyramid shape looming from the front like a fang. It would have been pretty sinister-looking had it not all still been made of her Keyblade’s signature pastel nacre.
“Hmm... okay, your turn.” She passed him the instructions.
Luxu took the sheet of paper eagerly. From watching Ava work, he was fairly sure he would be able to work some magic right away. Sure enough, almost as soon as he had summoned his Keyblade — just a dull universal one for now — he was able to will it to leave its familiar form behind. He beamed at his handiwork as the new weapon solidified. The Master always told him he had a knack for transmogrification.
“So, it’s... a crossbow?” He turned the heavy weapon over in his hands. It was slick, intimidating but still kind of inscrutable. He didn’t hate it. “It seems sort of weird for a crossbow, though. Where’s the string?”
“It says here it’s called an arrowgun.” Ava carefully consulted the instruction sheet, covered in their Master’s messy scrawls, hastily describing this latest Keyblade Formchange he had cooked up. “I guess it doesn’t use a string to fire. Just a trigger.”
Luxu hummed contemplatively. Since he and Ava were the only apprentices yet to have learned this new trick, they were left to try to puzzle out its workings themselves. Gula had offered to go with them to give moral support, but Ava had waved him off, assuring him that watching his comrades learn a Keyblade form that he had already mastered would be a waste of his precious time, especially on a day where their group meeting had already run long, and that there was no need for him to sacrifice his own priorities on their account.
Luxu couldn’t help but wonder if a respect for Gula’s time had really been the only reason she had turned him down. Well, if it wasn’t, it’s not like Luxu would judge her for it. Learning in front of an audience wasn’t a prospect he relished, either. Too much pressure.
“I can see why Invi told us to go outside,” Ava was saying. “It’ll be pretty hard to actually test these out in here without damaging anything.”
Luxu looked around. This echoey, clockwork-filled room in the upper reaches of the tower wasn’t the worst training ground. The massive gears formed wide open platforms, performer’s stages of copper and aquamarine. There were similar rooms in the recesses of the tower that were much dingier, but this one was nice and airy, with lots of natural light spilling in from the windows, stained-glass and unshuttered both. It was a good enough place to test out blunt or bladed Formchanges, but projectile weapons might be another story.
Ava was probably right. And Ava was the easiest to trust. But he remembered well what he had been told about trust that came too easily.
“Well, this is where the Master left the plans. So that probably means that he’s fine with us breaking some stuff to train, right?”
She gave him a double-take. “What? No, that doesn’t make any sense. Why would he want us to cause problems for no reason when we could just go outside?”
Full of good ideas and good intentions. Too many to have room to see the bigger picture.
Luxu shrugged. It was times like this that he was glad that the hood of his cloak mostly hid his face from view. Being purposefully contrary always made his heart thunder with shame, his cheeks and ears light up red. “Dunno. But he never does stuff like this arbitrarily. I say we just take a few practice shots and not worry about it.”
“Luxu, come on.” She sighed a little exasperatedly. Luxu staved off the guilt over not working with her by leaning into a teasing older brother angle that he hoped still wouldn’t be too unfriendly.
“Can’t make an omelette without cracking a few eggs.” He contorted his face into a wolffish grin. “Or, maybe we can mix our metaphors and make it an arrow-through-the-apple affair. I bet I can fire one of these bolts right between your mask’s ears.”
“I am begging you to be serious.”
“Come on, please? Just to see if they work. Or, wait, are you thinking that I would miss? As if I would do something like that!”
Arrowgun still in hand, Ava crossed and uncrossed her arms. Luxu waved his around casually enough so that it was hopefully obvious he wasn’t trying to start a fight.
“But if you’re that nervous, then I’ll let you fire one through the ears of my mask instead! Oh, wait, I don’t have a cool animal mask like you guys, so I guess that idea’s right out.”
She sighed long and hard through her nose, shook her head, and looked away. He felt bad for trying to push her buttons, especially since it seemed like maybe he had taken it a little too far. But it really was best practices to keep someone like her at an arms length. If they teamed up, it would be way too easy to take Ava’s word as law. And Luxu knew much better than to think that two of them would ever walk the same path.
“So are you chicken? I thought you were a—”
She pointed the arrowgun at him. What he could see of her face was unreadable.
“—fox...”
There was a flash of light as she fired.
Luxu whipped his head around, too slow to track the bolt as it whizzed past his shoulder and through the open window in the wall behind him. He was only in time to see the afterimage of the streak of searing pink light as it stretched over the roofs and streets below and reached out towards the horizon, fading into nothing.
“Looks like it works.”
Before he could say anything, protest or apologize, she had transformed her Keyblade back to normal, neatly dismissed it, and turned to leave, the impatient clack of her shoes across the metal and enamel of the gears wordlessly signalling her annoyance.
Luxu couldn’t help but sigh a little anxiously, stomach twisting at how that had gone. He would like to be friends with Ava instead of baiting her, pushing her. She was as curious as he was careful, as diligent as he was resolved. They could be good friends if they were allowed, they had a lot in common. But it was because they had so much in common that there could only be one.
Luxu pictured the Master’s grin, imprinted on his memory, and heard his playful voice echoing through his head.
“Careful. Girls her age have many faces.”
Written for the prompt “Traitor” for Day 4 of KHUx Week! Brought to you by the fact that this quote keeps me up at night, the song “Gun” by CHVRCHES, and my wish to fight MoM in the parking lot. Thanks for reading!
Fandom: Kingdom Hearts
Relationship: Luxu & Ava
Rating: PG
Content notes: weapons, fantasy gun violence, manipulation by an authority figure
Words: 1,350
Summary: Ava and Luxu are the only ones left who haven’t learned the Master’s newest Keyblade Formchange, so they’re going to have to work on it together. Which is kind of unfortunate, because for some reason lately they’ve had less and less patience with each other. Luxu can’t think of why that could be... after all, he’s been following the Master’s advice on the matter so well!
Of everyone, Ava was the easiest to trust.
For one thing, she was so prudent. That careful thoughtfulness of hers was working to their mutual advantage even at this very moment. Luxu stood back watching as she summoned her weapon and ran her free hand over it, muttering to herself.
It was a pretty swanky Keyblade. All of the other apprentices had gotten these one-of-a-kind originals from the Master recently, all colour-coded and on-theme like little declarations of their identity. Luxu might have felt a little left out, had it not been for the fact that the Master had expressly reassured him that Luxu’s own Keyblade was on its way, and it would be the most worth the wait of them all.
It was hard to imagine a Keyblade nicer than Ava’s, though. The waves and soft pearlescent twists of its cloud-like surface glowed and undulated under her touch. She must be almost there. Sure enough, the Keyblade’s earthly shape suddenly collapsed in a blossom of light, and, with a burst of wind and glitter ruffling her robes, it reappeared in her hand, reformed.
“Whoa,” whistled Luxu, impressed. What even was it? Ava hefted it so they could both examine it. Some sort of head-sized ring, with a curved guard arcing out the bottom to its perpendicular handle, and a long, thin pyramid shape looming from the front like a fang. It would have been pretty sinister-looking had it not all still been made of her Keyblade’s signature pastel nacre.
“Hmm... okay, your turn.” She passed him the instructions.
Luxu took the sheet of paper eagerly. From watching Ava work, he was fairly sure he would be able to work some magic right away. Sure enough, almost as soon as he had summoned his Keyblade — just a dull universal one for now — he was able to will it to leave its familiar form behind. He beamed at his handiwork as the new weapon solidified. The Master always told him he had a knack for transmogrification.
“So, it’s... a crossbow?” He turned the heavy weapon over in his hands. It was slick, intimidating but still kind of inscrutable. He didn’t hate it. “It seems sort of weird for a crossbow, though. Where’s the string?”
“It says here it’s called an arrowgun.” Ava carefully consulted the instruction sheet, covered in their Master’s messy scrawls, hastily describing this latest Keyblade Formchange he had cooked up. “I guess it doesn’t use a string to fire. Just a trigger.”
Luxu hummed contemplatively. Since he and Ava were the only apprentices yet to have learned this new trick, they were left to try to puzzle out its workings themselves. Gula had offered to go with them to give moral support, but Ava had waved him off, assuring him that watching his comrades learn a Keyblade form that he had already mastered would be a waste of his precious time, especially on a day where their group meeting had already run long, and that there was no need for him to sacrifice his own priorities on their account.
Luxu couldn’t help but wonder if a respect for Gula’s time had really been the only reason she had turned him down. Well, if it wasn’t, it’s not like Luxu would judge her for it. Learning in front of an audience wasn’t a prospect he relished, either. Too much pressure.
“I can see why Invi told us to go outside,” Ava was saying. “It’ll be pretty hard to actually test these out in here without damaging anything.”
Luxu looked around. This echoey, clockwork-filled room in the upper reaches of the tower wasn’t the worst training ground. The massive gears formed wide open platforms, performer’s stages of copper and aquamarine. There were similar rooms in the recesses of the tower that were much dingier, but this one was nice and airy, with lots of natural light spilling in from the windows, stained-glass and unshuttered both. It was a good enough place to test out blunt or bladed Formchanges, but projectile weapons might be another story.
Ava was probably right. And Ava was the easiest to trust. But he remembered well what he had been told about trust that came too easily.
“Well, this is where the Master left the plans. So that probably means that he’s fine with us breaking some stuff to train, right?”
She gave him a double-take. “What? No, that doesn’t make any sense. Why would he want us to cause problems for no reason when we could just go outside?”
Full of good ideas and good intentions. Too many to have room to see the bigger picture.
Luxu shrugged. It was times like this that he was glad that the hood of his cloak mostly hid his face from view. Being purposefully contrary always made his heart thunder with shame, his cheeks and ears light up red. “Dunno. But he never does stuff like this arbitrarily. I say we just take a few practice shots and not worry about it.”
“Luxu, come on.” She sighed a little exasperatedly. Luxu staved off the guilt over not working with her by leaning into a teasing older brother angle that he hoped still wouldn’t be too unfriendly.
“Can’t make an omelette without cracking a few eggs.” He contorted his face into a wolffish grin. “Or, maybe we can mix our metaphors and make it an arrow-through-the-apple affair. I bet I can fire one of these bolts right between your mask’s ears.”
“I am begging you to be serious.”
“Come on, please? Just to see if they work. Or, wait, are you thinking that I would miss? As if I would do something like that!”
Arrowgun still in hand, Ava crossed and uncrossed her arms. Luxu waved his around casually enough so that it was hopefully obvious he wasn’t trying to start a fight.
“But if you’re that nervous, then I’ll let you fire one through the ears of my mask instead! Oh, wait, I don’t have a cool animal mask like you guys, so I guess that idea’s right out.”
She sighed long and hard through her nose, shook her head, and looked away. He felt bad for trying to push her buttons, especially since it seemed like maybe he had taken it a little too far. But it really was best practices to keep someone like her at an arms length. If they teamed up, it would be way too easy to take Ava’s word as law. And Luxu knew much better than to think that two of them would ever walk the same path.
“So are you chicken? I thought you were a—”
She pointed the arrowgun at him. What he could see of her face was unreadable.
“—fox...”
There was a flash of light as she fired.
Luxu whipped his head around, too slow to track the bolt as it whizzed past his shoulder and through the open window in the wall behind him. He was only in time to see the afterimage of the streak of searing pink light as it stretched over the roofs and streets below and reached out towards the horizon, fading into nothing.
“Looks like it works.”
Before he could say anything, protest or apologize, she had transformed her Keyblade back to normal, neatly dismissed it, and turned to leave, the impatient clack of her shoes across the metal and enamel of the gears wordlessly signalling her annoyance.
Luxu couldn’t help but sigh a little anxiously, stomach twisting at how that had gone. He would like to be friends with Ava instead of baiting her, pushing her. She was as curious as he was careful, as diligent as he was resolved. They could be good friends if they were allowed, they had a lot in common. But it was because they had so much in common that there could only be one.
Luxu pictured the Master’s grin, imprinted on his memory, and heard his playful voice echoing through his head.
“Careful. Girls her age have many faces.”
Written for the prompt “Traitor” for Day 4 of KHUx Week! Brought to you by the fact that this quote keeps me up at night, the song “Gun” by CHVRCHES, and my wish to fight MoM in the parking lot. Thanks for reading!
