[fic] [Tales of Arcadia] Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet 135/?

[sakon76]

Your Future Hasn’t Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
released 17th March, 2023

Douxie talked to the egg until he'd run out of words. Then he just sat, feeling the emptiness inside himself... ease.

It wasn't the same as being with his partner, of course. This egg wasn't Archie yet. But it would be, and that was almost enough.

"Knew I'd been missing you," he murmured, still not daring to lean forward and press his hand against the egg's shell. He liked his hands, needed them for music and magic, and didn't fancy losing them if he should get caught. Also, he'd given his word, against the strength of his wizardry, and that sort of vow wasn't one you broke. Ever. "But I didn't realize it was getting this bad."

He dropped his head and sighed. Because at some point he was going to need to leave. And not just this room. Because he and Jim needed to keep moving, to find whatever disturbance with the trolls it was Jim was meant to deal with.

"At least I've not made a pathetic poppet this time," Douxie muttered. Mostly for lack of materials, he admitted. They needed his hoodie for bedding, and even if he'd been willing to sacrifice his shirt, he didn't have scissors or needle or thread to work with. "We've got to stop getting caught on opposite sides of time rifts, you and I," he told the egg. His fingers drummed on his thigh as he thought about that.

"Oh, Merlin," Douxie realized, his palm smacking his head as he groaned. "I just abandoned Taliesin's lute, didn't I?" At least it was safe enough on the bed in the den. But even so, it spoke poorly of him as a musician and a magician that he'd done that. And it showed even more clearly how much he'd degraded in a mere six days.

Thinking of....

He twisted around to look. Jim and Charlie had apparently cleared out at some point, leaving him alone with Archie's egg. Which surprised Douxie. Well, not that Jim would trust him. But that Charlie would. An unknown wizard, full of fantastical claims, alone with the dragon's only child? If it had been him, Douxie wouldn't have left his own nascent child alone for anything.

Which... rather implied that Charlie knew he wouldn't hurt Archie.

Which implied that Jim had let slip Douxie and Archie's exact relationship.

"Oh, Merlin," Douxie groaned again, head meeting palm once more.

Well, it could be worse, he supposed.

Charlie could have taken it badly.

"All right," he told himself. "I need to get up. Find them. Figure out our next step." Because as tempting as it was to stay with Charlie long-term, they needed to keep moving and kind whatever knotty little trollish problem Jim was meant to solve.

He looked up at Archie's egg again. "You'd tell me I'm dawdling," Douxie told it. "And you'd be right." He was capital at stalling on things he didn't actually want to do. "I should get to it."

One minute passed. Then another.

Douxie forced a deep inhale. "The sooner I go," he murmured, "the sooner I get back to my own time, and the you who knows me. So! Up on my feet." He stood. "Go find Jim and Charlie." He turned, and walked to the door to the room.

At that egress, he turned and looked back at the dragon's egg. "I'll be seeing you in six hundred years," Douxie told the egg, or the dragonling within it. "Love you... Archie."

Biting his lip and forcing back tears, he turned into the darkness, leaving his familiar-to-be behind.

The park was still littered with statues of dead Gumm-Gumms, but most of the smaller rubble had been cleared out and the streets were actually open again. Which meant that Stuart was once more parking his truck in the town square, making it a natural place to convene for lunch on a Saturday. The team, except for trolls, time-travelers, and Varvatos and Nana, who were dining at the cafe, had assembled.

"Okay," Toby said, brandishing his taco, "hear me out: is a taco a sandwich?"

"No!" Steve said automatically. "No way. Wait. Maybe?"

Krel rolled his eyes. "This debate again."

"Wait, I do not know this debate," said Aja.

"You were on Akiridion-5," Krel informed his sister. "It is a basic nomenclature discussion: should a food item be defined by its contents, or the shape of its wrapping? For instance, a hamburger is obviously a sandwich, but what about a hot dog? Does the hinge in the bread mean it is not a sandwich?"

"Well, I mean, you have pita sandwiches," Darci put in. "And that's entirely filling in a pocket."

"Ooh, good point!" Toby gestured at her. "So if pitas count as sandwiches, tacos have to as well, because they're open on more sides than a pita."

"But what about an open-ended burrito, then?" asked Eli.

Mary rolled her eyes. "What I want to know," she said, gesturing around the park, "is how the city's been cleaning up those broken Gumm-Gumm statues so fast."

"Uh." Claire bit her bottom lip. "It's not the city. My mom was ranting about the vote against increasing funding for the parks department. And without the extra money, they can't rent the equipment to move the statues." Because alive or dead, trolls were heavy.

"It's not the trolls either," Toby put in, shaking his head. "They're as squeamish about dead bodies as we are. Well, less so about fleshy dead bodies, more so about stone ones. So I guess that evens out."

Next to Toby, cuddling with Sally on the picnic blanket, Gnome Chompsky raised his thimble of Kool-Aid and chittered.

"You think so, buddy?" asked Toby.

"What did he say?" Eli asked.

"Chompsky thinks there might be some gruesomes around doing the cleanup work."

Half of their party recoiled. "Wait, like the goo guy at the museum?" Steve demanded.

"Gross!" Darci agreed.

But Eli shrugged. "Douxie said scavengers were a vital part of the ecosystem."

Glances flew around the group. "I guess if they're doing the cleanup work for us, we should leave them alone?" Claire said hesitantly.

"I do not understand. What are gruesomes?" Aja asked.

"Goo monsters that eat dead trolls," Darci told her.

"Ah, so like norvlaks, then," she said sagely.

"Oi, shove over an' make room," said the littlest troll carrying the biggest umbrella.

"Hey, bro." Claire shifted aside.

NotEnrique fiddled with his umbrella, and plopped down in its shade like it was a beach tent. "I see how it is," he grumbled. "Have a picnic in the park an' don't invite me."

"Well," Krel pointed out reasonably, "it is the middle of the day and you are a troll."

NotEnrique pointed a clawed finger at the prince. "Do not count me in with the rest 'a those losers," he said. "I got imagination. Which the lotta them lack." Rifling through his crossbody bag - a child's purse, sparkly purple - he pulled out his own lunch.

Well, Toby assumed it was lunch. It was a sock clearly stuffed with something. Something that wriggled.

"Uh." Toby didn't know if he wanted to ask.

Eli apparently did. "What's in that?"

"Frogs," NotEnrique replied, unconcerned.

"Frogs?" Claire demanded. "Where did you get frogs?"

The ex-changeling smirked. "That's for me ta know, and you not ta find out."

"If any frogs end up in my bed, I will know exactly who to blame," she warned him.

NotEnrique looked insulted. "Oi! I would never waste good food like that."

Chompsky interrupted this sibling banter by standing up, pointing at the sock, and chittering.

"Oh, sure." NotEnrique untwisted the top of the sock, fished around inside, and pulled out a small frog. He handed it to the gnome. "Here ya go."

Chompsky held the frog in both hands. Its vocal sac inflated a few times as it struggled. Then Chompsky bit off its head.

"Ugh!" The rest of them, bar NotEnrique and the Akiridions, recoiled.

Chompsky chewed thoughtfully, then gave NotEnrique a thumbs-up.

"You just bit its head off, man!" Steve complained to Chompsky.

"What is the problem?" Krel asked him. "You eat meat."

"Yeah, but not live!"

"Ah, so it is the time of death that matters," Krel mused.

"No, it's more the fact that we're not used to doing the killing ourselves," Claire told him, her eyes still wide.

Aja snorted. "Given the battles we have been in with you? You are being hypocritical about killing."

"Also, humans don't tend to eat raw meat." Eli looked a little pale. "We cook it."

"Exceptin' sushi," NotEnrique put in, refolding the top of his sockrito. "That stuff's good. Anyhow," he redirected his attention back to Chompsky. "Wanted ta ask ya a favor."

Chompsky pointed at himself, question large on his small face.

"Yeah. I'm plannin' ta go inta the Darklands and rescue whatever changelings-to-be I can. My ma," and here he rolled his eyes, "wants me to take someone with me ta watch my back. And all the rest of them heroes," he said with a wave around their group, "are too big to fit through a Fetch. You innerested?"

Chompsky crossed his arms, still holding the frog by one of its, and asked a question.

"I dunno. Fame and glory?" NotEnrique's gaze slid sideways to the Sally-Go-Back doll. "The admiration 'a your doll friend there?"

Given Chompsky's expression, that one actually held some weight for him.

"Hey," Toby said. Chompsky looked up at him. "You'd be a hero, helping save all those little trolls." Toby smiled, looking at Sally. "Sally has a thing for heroes," he reminded Chompsky. After all, they'd watched all the Gun Robots movies together. Even, ugh, Gun Robot 5.

Chompsky considered this for a moment, then nodded his head decisively and stuck a hand out toward NotEnrique. Troll and gnome shook on the deal, so to speak, before Chompsky returned his attention to eating the rest of his frog, and NotEnrique turned his toward devouring a whole sock full of them.

Claire leaned over toward Toby. "Did you tell anyone about the two of them going into the Darklands together?"

"No," Toby murmured back. "Did you?"

"Nope. Maybe Jim...?"

Toby shrugged. "Maybe." They'd have to ask him when he got back. "Or maybe it's just one of those things that's meant to happen."

He went not for Taliesin's lute, though it begged, but instead in search of Jim and Charlie. Douxie found them, as expected, in Charlie's kitchen. As much as the den was the heart of the dragon's home (though, at the moment, it could definitely be argued that the hoard room was even more so, holding as it did a treasure beyond price), it was the kitchen where Charlie truly thrived.

As did Jim.

Douxie was amused to find them both there, Jim talking Charlie through stir-frying. Douxie leaned against the doorway, watching, and imagined, just for a second, Charlie wearing a chef's toque, with Jim atop his head, beneath it, directing his actions by pulling on his fur.

"Not everyone can become a great artist," Douxie murmured, "but a great artist can come from anywhere." And to be sure, neither Jim nor Charlie's cooking styles were haute cuisine, though the Trollhunter's verged closer than the dragon's, but they were both made with taste, care, and, most importantly, love.

Flames billowed as he watched. Ingredients sizzled in the bathtub-sized pan, aromatic clouds rising, giving effusive praise to the choice of ingredients. "Oh, yes, I see now," Charlie murmured with fascination, jogging the pan so that ingredients flipped and tumbled. A generously sized spatula aided in their endless migration. "You simply sear the outside, sealing the flavor within."

"Exactly," Jim agreed.

Douxie smiled, and left the two of them to it. He made his way instead back to the den, and Taliesin's lute, which he had so callously abandoned. It sat there waiting for him before the fire, cushioned on the mattress made of Douxie's hoodie. He sat down on the bed's edge, and picked up the ancient instrument.

It certainly didn't look ancient, he thought, examining it in the firelight. A few years old, yes; there were clear marks of use on the satin smooth wood, a few minor dings and the wearing away caused by fingers and handling. But nothing that indicated the lute had survived nearly six and a half thousand years.

The preservation spells in its case might be partly to blame, but Douxie couldn't shake the feeling that the cause was deeper than that. He set the instrument down across his lap and ran his fingers down its mithrilium strings. "Verum Oculis Meis."

Silver glyphs ran down the surface of the instrument, but not runes, oh no. Nothing he could read.

Douxie glared at the instrument. "Funny," he complained at it. Then, "Also, useless, Taliesin."

The opal around his neck swung free, as if in reminder. "Thought you were supposed to help me understand this," Douxie told it. "Because I can't read Atlantean." He grabbed the pendant.

And all of a sudden, he could.

Blinking, Douxie let go.

And understanding vanished again.

"Wait," he told the pendant, "you're skin-contact enabled?"

Rolling his eyes to high heaven, he tucked the necklace inside his tank top and sat up straight, letting the opal rest against his skin.

A faint buzzing sensation and a glow attracted his attention; apparently the opal being in contact with his skin also lit up his tattoos, not invoking their spells so much as providing a faint light show. He rolled his eyes again, but returned his focus to what was truly important: the Atlantean glyphs that he could now, for the first time ever, understand.

Barbara was bone-tired. It had been a long shift, with higher than usual numbers coming into the ER. Most had been the usual run-of-the-mill accidents and idiocy. But there had been one college kid brought in, whose friends thought he was high out of his mind, jumping at shadows and seeing demons everywhere. His blood work had come back clean, so on a hunch, Barbara had called Fragwa in from the maternity ward. The kid had jumped, shrieking like a banshee, and said "IT'S HIM!" So they'd finally been able to nail down the cause of his neuroses to a higher-than-usual sensitivity to the supernatural. A trawl through the rather unusual contents of Barbara's phone contacts had led Zoe to come in, talk the kid down, and (probably) either find him a mentor or a part-time job in the back rooms of HexTech. It had all taken a long time, and run past the designated end of her shift.

So right now, despite the broad daylight, all Barbara wanted to do was sleep.

But there was something she needed to do first.

She made a brief stop at the bakery. Once home, she set her purchase on the dining table and rummaged around in the kitchen drawers until she found where Jim had stashed the birthday candles. There was a set, still in their wrappers, numbered 9-1-8, because Jim had joked about the possibility of making a cake big enough to hold 918 candles, then quickly shut the idea down in favor of a normal sized cake.

She left those in the drawer and picked out a simple blue wax candle instead.

She approached the oversized white cupcake on the table and gently pushed the candle in.

"You didn't forget," Archie said, taking his own seat opposite hers as Barbara sat down, folding her arms on the table and resting her head on top of them.

"Of course I didn't forget," she replied.

"He'll be back," Archie said. "They both will."

"I know," Barbara said. "Do you want to light it?"

Archie nodded, and breathed a jet of fire above the cupcake. The tiny candle caught light, a flame holding steady.

"Happy birthday, Douxie," Barbara whispered, and watched the candle burn.

Jim found Douxie not in the hoard room, still talking to Archie's egg, as he'd expected, but rather in the den, quietly playing music. "Huh. So you managed to tear yourself away," he said, sitting down by the wizard.

"Shove off," Douxie replied, with no real heat. His fingers never stopped moving on the instrument's neck and strings. The tune was nothing Jim recognized.

"So, is that magic?" Jim asked, indicating the instrument.

"Yes and no," Douxie answered, which didn't clear up anything. "'S got some spells inlaid - apparently crafting this was Taliesin's master work, can you believe it?"

"'Master work'?" Jim sought clarification.

Douxie gave him a sly sideways grin. "The work which proves one is fit for mastery."

Jim turned that over in his mind. "What was yours?"

Douxie's expression darkened; he turned his face away, letting his hair hide his eyes. "The Trollhunter amulet."

Jim blinked. He knew Douxie had had a hand in making the first one, but he'd thought it had mostly been Merlin's work. "So was making the second one with you Krel's master work, then?"

That startled Douxie into looking back at him. "No. At least, I don't think so...?" He blinked several times in rapid order. "Huh. I'll have to talk with him about mastery and staves and such, once we get back. See if he even wants that."

"Once he gets over his hissy fit about being a wizard," Jim agreed, winning a grin from Douxie. "So. Charlie's checking on Archie's egg, and once he's done with that, we'll all have... brunch, I guess, and talk over plans."

"Yeah, plans." Douxie's fingers stilled on his new instrument. "I know we just got here yesterday, but we do need to get moving."

Jim made a face. "Back into Herne's territory."

Douxie waved this concern away. "Between us, I think we can take him."

"Yeah, because you're out of your mind." Jim looked inquiringly at Douxie's charm bracelet. "How's your burn mark doing?"

"It's improving," Douxie clipped out. But he didn't turn his arm to show it to Jim, which solidified Jim's conviction that it was still angry and painful. Douxie had a bad track record of hiding when he was hurt, so Jim had come to expect it of him.

"Yeah, not buying that," Jim told him. He sighed, looking at the fire. "You don't have to lie to me, you know."

Douxie was quiet for a minute. Jim could as much as see him curling up, inside, going quiet and defensive. "It's not life-threatening," Douxie said eventually, quiet. "And it's not something you can help with. Therefore, there's no need to bother or burden you with it, Jim." His smile was small and... something. Jim didn't know what to name it. "You've got quite enough big things before you to be concerned with, and I'm quite good at taking care of my own idiocies, after all."

Jim leaned against Douxie, shoulder to shoulder. "There's no 'I' in 'team'," he pointed out, feeling like Coach Lawrence for a minute.

"No," Douxie sassed back fondly, "but there is a 'me'."

"Well, then!" Charlie boomed, entering the room, carrying a huge tray. "Shall we break our fast?"

The knock at the door was unexpected. "Company?" Archie asked.

"Probably the kids," Barbara said. She stared at the candle a heartbeat longer then blew it out, shoving to her feet. She'd wanted better than this for Douxie's birthday, she thought as she walked to the door. She'd wanted both her boys home. Jim would bake the cake and cook Douxie's favorites, while she'd take Douxie shopping for some actual new clothes. The boys were going to have their friends over, and she was going to give Douxie the printouts of the Yosemite reservations....

On other side of the front door, dressed, as always, like a college professor, stood Walter.

"I thought," he said without preamble, "that you might require a distraction."

Barbara's exhaustion, both physical and emotional, clearly showed on her face, because he held his hands up. "Just a brief trip, I promise."

She sighed. "Short?"

"Positively minute," he swore.

"All right. Will I need anything?"

"Only your own lovely self." He offered her his elbow, presumably to escort her to his car waiting at the curb.

Barbara nodded, pausing only to grab her house key and cellphone, tucking them into a pocket. "Hold down the fort?" she asked Archie.

"Always," he told her. Gold eyes watched as Walter closed the door behind them.

In his car, she slumped bonelessly into the passenger seat.

"Barbara," Walt started after a moment.

"Don't," she said, not bothering to open her eyes. "It's been a day, and I really don't want to take it out on you."

"All right." He fell silent.

She must have dozed as he drove, because the next thing she knew, he was shaking her shoulder to wake her. "Where are we?" she asked muzzily.

"Don't recognize the place? I'm surprised, Doctor," he teased.

She rolled her eyes at him and got out of the car. "Not that I'm complaining, but why are we going to the woods?"

"It's a surprise," Walt assured her. "I thought a lovely, refreshing nature walk might restore your spirits."

Barbara narrowed her eyes. "Uh-huh." She was not buying whatever it was he was selling.

But Walt merely smiled at her, keeping his secrets. "Come along, my dear. It isn't far."

"Sure." She followed him, just sleep-brained enough to accept his hand over the rough bits. Knowing the man, whatever he was bringing her out here to see could be... well, anything. Monsters. Dead bodies. Otherworldly or eldritch artifacts. Really, it was all fair game.

Which was why she was surprised when he stopped in front of a tree.

"Wait, is this...?" Barbara put her palm on the scarred trunk. She'd heard of the kissing tree, of course. What Arcadia parent hadn't? But she'd never been here herself. Never seen the need.

James had never brought her here.

"I thought," Walt began, his tone carefully light, "that we might carve our initials into the tree."

She stared at him. "Like a couple of teenagers?" Barbara asked dumbly. "Aren't we a little old for that?"

His expression fell, just the tiniest bit, before he hid it. "A childish thought," he said, and turned to go.

"Walt--" Her hand caught his arm. "I'm sorry. Being overworked and," lonely, she didn't say. "It makes me stupid sometimes."

He relaxed under her touch. "As I said, it was a childish idea. Unworthy, perhaps, of an adult affection."

"You've never had anyone to carve initials for," she guessed.

The way he stiffened let her know she'd hit the mark.

Barbara looked back at the tree, wondering if she'd recognize any of the initials. "Jim's father never brought me here," she said softly. Her fingers drifted over initial pair after initial pair, crude hearts carved with penknives.

Walter turned fully back to her. She looked at him, a smile on her lips. "I would love to carve my initials with yours," Barbara told him softly, knowing it was true. Wanting to give him this, as a gift, as much as he was giving it to her.

"Right next to Young Atlas'," Walt asked her, nodding at the letters under her fingers, declaring the love of JLJ for CN, "or elsewhere?"

Barbara felt a laugh bubble up. "Let's find another spot," she said. "Embarrassing your kid is requisite; traumatizing him, probably less so."

"So," Charlie said thoughtfully, teacup in hand, once they'd finished their repast, "you need to find trolls."

"Yeah," his son's future familiar said. "I mean, that's really all we've got to go on, that one picture in a book that isn't even written yet."

Charlie hummed in thought, taking a long sip of his drink. "Unfortunately," he said, returning cup to saucer, "I'm afraid I don't have any dealings with trolls myself. I wouldn't even know where to begin looking for any."

"Not even Zong-Shi?" asked Jim.

Charlie blinked in surprise, setting his cup down and leaning in closer to the young mostly-human. "Have you had dealings with him?"

Jim grimaced, left hand kneading at the palm of his right as if soothing a ghost of remembered pain. "Unfortunately." Douxie's hand landed on his shoulder; he looked up at the wizard and relaxed.

"Nevertheless," Douxie took up the thread, "I don't think it's the TrollDragons we're after. Just regular trolls."

Charlie hummed again. "I'll have to take you to the hedgewizard, then," he decided. "Or at least as far as I can go. I don't care to leave my den alone for long, these days."

"Understood." Jim nodded.

"This hedgewizard - he has dealings with the trolls?" Hisirdoux asked.

"Oh yes." Charlie nodded. "He's always trading with them, spells and cantrips and the like for raw materials. He has quite the stock of precious metals and gemstones. He's quite the tinkerer and inventor."

"Sounds like quite a guy," said Jim.

"Oh indeed. However," Charlie looked up at the roof of his den, "it seems there's a bit of a storm rolling in, up there. Best to leave in the morning, once it's blown itself out, I think."

"Jim?" asked Douxie.

"Works for me," Jim agreed. "Now, you going to play something for us to listen to, or is that new magic lute of yours just going to sit there looking pretty?"

"It's hardly my lute," Hisirdoux hedged.

Charlie laughed. "Of course it's your lute, my boy. Taliesin, I am quite sure, left it here with you in mind."

The wizard looked surprised. "Are you sure? I mean, it's got to be quite valuable, Charlie, and it's a reminder of your old friend and all...."

Charlie splayed his claws, displaying their enormous size relative to the instrument in question. "It's not like I could very well play it, is it? It's meant for human hands. Besides." He smiled. "An instrument is a living being. It deserves to travel, to have its voice heard. Far better that, than moldering away in the corner of a dragon's library, dusty and unloved."

Douxie swallowed. "Thank you," he said, with a bow. "I shall take good care of her, and let her voice be heard far and wide."

"Excellent." Charlie settled down. "Now, will you play?"

"It would be my pleasure," Hisirdoux Casperan said. He hauled the Atlantean lute onto his lap, wriggled his fingers, and began to play.

Eyes half-lidded in pleasure, Charlemagne watched the boy's fingers move on the strings. Watched the lute's enchantments wake.

Watched, as bardic talent began to flower.

Author's Note: Apologies for frog decapitation. However, looking at gnomes' razor teeth, it's pretty clear they're supposed to be carnivores. Douxie briefly imagines Jim and Charlie as Remy and Linguini from the movie Ratatouille, and subsequently quotes from that film. And, there are a few great fanfics (OMSocks' A Little More Than Nineteen Candles, and Eli_Eli_El's Heirs to the Arcana both come to mind) wherein Jim does make Douxie a birthday cake big enough for a ludicrous number of candles; this, sadly, was never going to be one of them.