I Am Thy Creature

[hat_writes_stuff]

Title: I Am Thy Creature
Author: Almighty Hat
Fandom: Transformers Mystic Tales AU
Characters: Shockwave, Blurr, Shockwave, Blurr (don't worry, new names are coming)
Word Count: 11,469
Rating: G
Pairing(s): Shockwave/Blurr
Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, Angst And Fuss, the particular horror of being replaced

Author's Notes: I don't know, I don't feel like I got any of the viewpoints balanced, and like I said some of the things I wanted to say in Love And Fear in this one, and I know I meandered in a couple of places. Shockwave's section feels like it ends very bluntly. I have burgled dialogue for scene dividers from canon, from places that are either temporally-immediate or thematically appropriate.

Oh also I am going to hurt you with mushroom puppets again. At the very least, I'm going to make re-reading certain comics very painful.

Summary: Exact words are important, and it felt necessary to take some of what happened in Love And Fear and make it a bit more canon compliant, given recent updates.

Also, the demon chooses a name.

---

"You come back home with me. And I don't kill your friend."

"... Promise me you won't harm him. And. You'll make sure he gets that doctor's help, before you leave him alone."

"And in return you will not resist and go with me willingly."

"Yes. Yes I will."

---

The false crossroads burned away around them-- around him, Mirage wasn't really there-- and a pair of puppets sprang up from the ground, twice Blurr's mass each. "Really?" Blurr asked. "I gave my word, too."

"This is just to make sure you don't dawdle on your way home," Mirage said. "You don't think I'd leave you entirely unsupervised? No, no, I won't make you promise more than you can keep, but I'm not giving you any opportunities to get distracted, or to summon another demon, either. You won't resist, I'm sure, but I'm enforcing promptness."

There was a low growl from the underbrush, and Blurr, out of sheer reflex, drew his sword.

He wasn't going to defend Mirage's puppets from-- from whatever, from wild mechanimals, but he'd defend himself, and--

And then--

And then what launched out from the undergrowth caused Blurr's processor to error out, freezing him in place as he tried to make impossibility make sense, because that was Shockwave.

That was Shockwave.

That was a demon, and that was Shockwave.

He destroyed one puppet by landing on it, crushing it under his weight even if his touch hadn't started dissolving it; the other he stabbed with his claws and tore apart like a fidgety mech playing with polyfill candy, and then he turned to Blurr.

All Blurr could manage was, "Shockwave?" as his sword slipped from numb fingers. Maybe-- maybe-- the way he'd spoken about Amalgamus Prime, maybe he'd learned something, maybe he'd found the strength, the magic, to change--

"Is that my name?" Shockwave purred, and Blurr felt like his spark shattered. "I like that."

"Your memory," Blurr said, and reached to cup Shockwave's face, to touch his neck, vaguely aware Mirage was saying something that he should definitely pay attention to, but hearing an echo instead--

I believe that gift is the sole reason I can still remember my own name.

Blurr made-- some kind of sound-- he should care that Mirage could see this, but it had always seemed like Mirage could see any damned thing, if he put the effort in. It didn't matter, not in the face of this. This loss. He wrapped his arms around Shockwave's neck, and Shockwave purred again, a deep rumble that should have been terrifying, and wrapped Blurr up in those long, strong, familiar, wrong wrong wrong arms, and Blurr sobbed. Shockwave did that thing Blurr loved so much, stretched his head down so his neck wrapped around Blurr, too, thick and graceful and elegant, and Blurr sobbed again, harder. Shockwave still felt something for Blurr, memory or not, but he'd be grateful for it later. "I'm so sorry-- I should never have left you alone I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm so sorry--"

"What in the hell is going on here?" Mirage demanded, safe behind his illusions and his fairy rings, and Blurr snarled, twisting out of Shockwave's embrace.

Not all the way out of his embrace.

Just far enough to glare at Mirage's sending.

"Liar!" How. How had he-- how-- "You call this unharmed?" he demanded, gesturing to Shockwave, demonic again, with his memories gone. "I fixed this! How dare you try to deal in bad faith!"

"Mind your manners, debtor," Mirage bit back, waving fingers that dangled the strings of his magic. "I can see your ragged little mech."

"Then you have the wrong mech, you sent your puppet to the wrong mech, because I'm touching mine-- the results of what-- what Sentinel did to him-- all this time and you haven't paid any attention to my demons, have you?"

"What is 'Sentinel'?" Shockwave asked, claws petting down Blurr's back.

Oh, no, he needed to know that, too, immediately. That was more important than yelling at Mirage.

"Who not what. Sentinel-- is an enemy. A knight. Blue and gold armor, wings, he wants me dead so he can summon you himself." Blurr wished he'd just killed the guy when he had the chance.

"He wants what," Mirage said, flat and sharp as a blade.

"Sentinel wants Shockwave," Blurr said. "He wants him under his absolute control. He wants to break him, to hurt him, to make him do things he'd never do, never want to do. I fixed this," Blurr said, again, gesturing to Shockwave again, "and Sentinel did it again, and this time, this time? This time, Sentinel wiped Shockwave's memory, too."

He hoped that sounded familiar to Mirage.

"You are my summoner," Shockwave told Blurr, firmly. "You summoned me. Not the lying knight-- Sentinel. I've seen him. He tried to tell me I was his, then he tried to get me to lead him to you."

"You do somehow inspire loyalty in your thralls," Mirage said, folding his arms. "You gave your word, however."

"I don't know who your hostage is," Blurr pointed out.

"Neither do I," Mirage admitted, lightly. "But whoever he is, he knows you. Perfectly happy to let 'you' cuddle up with him. Does it matter to you which one of your little fair-weather friends I'm willing to stab a few times?"

It mattered more-- would have mattered more-- if it had actually been Shockwave, but-- "No. It doesn't." Damn it all, this was no small part of why he'd started summoning demons-- wait. Wait. "Does it matter to you that I'm not leaving him?" Blurr nodded toward Shockwave.

"You promised to come willingly," Mirage said.

"Neither of us specified that I'd come alone, and I'm not leaving Shockwave. Alone, wiped, demonic? No. Never. You want me? You get him, too."

Blurr wondered what a demon could do, loose in a fairy realm.

Nothing Mirage would put up with, he bet.

"I hope he's not too tall for the doorways," Blurr added, trying altogether too hard to look innocent.

"Absolutely not," Mirage said, predictably enough.

"I will not leave my summoner until he dismisses me or dies," Shockwave said, simply.

"And I'm not dismissing him-- I'm not letting Sentinel win." Mirage clenched his jaw at Blurr's words-- visibly, through the sending, so it was a concession and he wanted Blurr to know it, but he didn't want to agree to it.

They did both hate losing.

"You said you fixed it," Mirage said. "What did you mean by that?"

"That I put together a potion that... could have destroyed him completely, if anything went a little differently, but it... it got the mech out of the demon," Blurr said. "And before you ask, yes, I probably could do it again, but it took weeks to get all the ingredients and I'm not sure-- I'm not sure I could use the same sources again. Not with Shockwave like this, without his memory."

"But you will find sources for your ingredients, won't you?" Mirage asked. "Because being a demon means he's always in danger, should anything happen to you."

Blurr... would, probably. The loss of memory-- it wasn't right, it hurt, he wanted to hide in Shockwave's arms about it, but that didn't change that he wouldn't leave Shockwave (wouldn't leave anyone) to be in Sentinel's thrall. On the other hand-- Blurr had asked, the first time. He suspected Shockwave had only agreed because he hadn't thought Blurr could do it, could turn the potion from pure liquid death to something more complicated, but Blurr did ask, and Shockwave did agree. "If he wants me to, I will."

"I'll expect you very shortly afterwards," Mirage said. "You gave your word-- you'll come home to me willingly and without resistance. All this has bought you is time, so long as whoever's so cozy with 'you' remains alive and unharmed by any action of mine. And neither of us did specify that you had to come alone-- you're quite welcome to bring your pet along," Blurr bristled, but that was why Mirage had said it, "once he's no longer a demon. I'll even promise you he'll be safe and comfortable as your pet, once you're back home, so long as he behaves himself."

There wasn't much of a way out of that. Blurr had agreed to come willingly and without resisting. And just because he didn't know who it was Mirage had at his mercy didn't mean Blurr was willing to... Well, if it was a friend of Blurr's, he didn't want the mech killed by one of Mirage's duplicates in particular.

Blurr had enough problems without adding 'murder suspect' to the list.

So he just nodded.

"I will give it all due consideration," Shockwave said, and Mirage looked at him like he couldn't decide if Shockwave had done something interesting or appalling. "He said-- if I want the change, he'll do it. If I want it. If I make that decision, I would be a mech, and we would go to live with you, yes?"

"Those... are the effects of this bargain on you, yes," Mirage confirmed. And understated, more than a little.

Shockwave leaned forward at Mirage, Blurr still tucked under one arm, that long neck stretching out and the other hand's claws bracing on the ground very, very close to Mirage's sending. Mirage didn't quite flinch, but then Blurr wasn't sure if Mirage would feel Shockwave deciding to snap or swipe at the illusion. "Then the outcome of this bargain depends on me. On my choices. And I will choose carefully. I need to learn a great deal about what life as a demon is like, and what life with you would be like, as a mech. I will give it all due consideration."

"Then add this to your considering," Mirage said. "Your dear summoner owes a great many debts that are long overdue, and he has been using demons to avoid collection. Whatever your relationship, whatever your feelings, know that Blurr summoned you into his life to renege on his bargains."

"How does that work?" Shockwave asked Mirage, more curious than menacing.

"Take a closer look at what you did to my puppets," Mirage told him, and Shockwave bent to examine the blackened, dissolved remains of the enforcers Mirage had made up. "The magic that animates you is incompatible with mine."

Shockwave looked to Blurr. "Is your magic like his?"

"Doesn't matter," Blurr assured him. "The magic that binds us is a third kind altogether, and demons can't harm their summoners."

Mirage swore.

"Are you serious right now?" It wasn't really a question, and yet. "My main defense for years and you never bothered to look up how demons work? You're gonna lose your right to insult my intelligence, because I do occasionally open a book."

"And what would an extensive study into demonology teach me that experience hasn't?" Mirage countered. "They're indestructible," they weren't, if you had access to death-bringer magic, "they're vicious," that varied based on personality, "they melt through my magic like acid that is also on fire," that was true and an endless source of relief and petty satisfaction for Blurr, "somehow, they're never fooled by a puppet," because a puppet's incidental orders and casual questions didn't feel like a summoner's, "and they're ridiculously loyal, no matter how difficult it is to get to someone."

"Hm. That last must just be Blurr," Shockwave said-- saying Blurr's name with a certain extra weight. "I feel nothing compelling my loyalty. Demons must just like him."

Blurr liked that idea. "I never have had to leave standing orders to come rescue me," he admitted, with a more than slightly smug grin.

"Which would be interesting if it weren't so damned annoying," Mirage said, glaring at both of them. "You will come home. You will give me what I'm owed. You're mine, and I have a lever to press, now. I can be patient."

And Mirage's sending burned away, too, magnesium fire in blue, because of course he had to have the last word, of course he did.

"Bastard," Blurr hissed-- and buried himself in Shockwave's arms again. "I'm so sorry," he said. "If I'd summoned another demon immediately, Mirage would never have tried this, there would have been protection to keep Sentinel away from you-- I'm so, so, so sorry, Shockwave."

Shockwave petted at Blurr like he was something precious. "I'm very confused," he admitted. "I know Sentinel woke me, but I don't know how he made me into a demon. You wanted a mech, instead?"

"... I wanted you alive, and... being a demon with your memory intact, with the things you had to do and all the baggage attached... it was making it hard for you to want to live. I thought, as a mech again, maybe... maybe it would help. And it seemed to be!" Or possibly a Primal vision helped, but being a mech again, being free, didn't seem unimportant. "It seemed to be helping. But your-- your mortal frame had some damages, so I went to get a doctor and... I haven't even been gone that long. Half a day."

And now the den was compromised, too, unless Shockwave had gone looking for Blurr and been found then.

"... Half a day," Shockwave said. "But I woke in the gray shrine more than ten days ago."

"You what?" The gray shrine. Where they'd-- but--

"The lying knight-- Sentinel, who doesn't deserve such a good name-- woke me. Before that, I was at rest. I thought you'd left me there to confuse him away from you and the injured mech."

But that meant-- Blurr pulled away, grabbing one of Shockwave's-- or maybe not Shockwave's-- claws. "Come on I need to get to the den he might-- he might be okay--" Except Mirage had one of his puppets with him. "Am I even in the right place anymore?" The road looked familiar now, but...

"This way," the demon said, leading Blurr. "I knew how to find you, I can find him, too. He's this way."

Blurr decided to trust him, and let his demon lead him.

---

"Was it boring?"

"Yesssss."

"Heh."

"Wake me up in a couple of hours, okay?"

"Sure."

---

His purpose had shifted on him a few times, but the base of it was still be Blurr, and so he was, and would be, Blurr, to the best of his ability. He had to convince a mechanism who'd spent nearly two years at Blurr's side, barely parted for more than an hour or two now and again, that he was Blurr, and instead of until the time comes to kill him or until a definitive don't-call-on-me end to the relationship is needed, the deadline was now until further notice. Apparently this wasn't the right mech (which didn't line up with what Blurr knew), but Shockwave was right enough. So long as he was both in Mirage's grasp (through Blurr) and unharmed by Mirage's actions, the real Blurr, the original Blurr, was won. A brief delay while he did something with or to his current demon, but he'd given his word to go to Mirage.

And Blurr would work on keeping Shockwave safe, and getting him properly repaired, and generally being the best Blurr he could be, despite the fact that he had a few... limitations. He couldn't move as fast as the original, and he knew everything Blurr had ever seen, done, read, written, touched, tasted, felt, smelled-- but not his thoughts. He had to interpret for himself, unless his maker had an interpretation he was supposed to use. Playing sick would cover the lack of speed-- Blurr hardly ran around Shockwave, anyway-- and hopefully there wouldn't be a fight until Shockave himself was properly repaired. Blurr doubted he'd get much benefit from memories of Blurr's knightly training when he hadn't done any of it himself.

Eventually, he would have to leave Shockwave. Dying in a fight would do it, and keep any suspicion off Blurr's maker, but if he could parlay 'cold and lethargic' into 'a wasting illness,' he could die by degrees and keep Shockwave's rather sweet care for him during the process.

Blurr could want that.

It was allowed.

He was Blurr, after all, and Blurr clearly loved Shockwave. No matter how annoying Blurr's unmanageable feelings were to his maker, they sang through his frame and his actions, and he was here, now, to be insurance, to keep his maker's word. In the morning, he'd take Shockwave to the doctor Blurr had found-- she'd fix his hands, and his optic, and his poor cheek with its emergency patches, and his wings. Blurr would... well, he'd do what felt natural, he supposed, but Blurr liked spending money on Shockwave, so why shouldn't Blurr splurge on some nice paint for him, or a new cloak that wasn't repurposed blankets?

He'd find places to lay groundwork for the eventual ending, of course. It was never too early to work on that, but from what his maker relayed while Blurr 'napped,' curled up on Shockwave's thigh, tucked under his warm wing, he'd have at least a few weeks to draw things out. He'd hardly need his maker, for most of that time, he was sure, and that would let his maker be free to keep eyes on the actual Blurr.

But it was good, at least, that the demon was going to be somewhere else while the actual Blurr was working on turning that one into a mech, too.

Blurr wouldn't survive a brush with a demon.

And then Blurr felt Shockwave stiffen, and heard his own voice say, "If you touch the puppet-- it doesn't even have to be violent--"

"Blurr," Shockwave hissed, putting a hand on his pauldron. "Blurr, wake up!"

Another voice, one that shot right through Blurr leaving behind a trail of love and wanting and also, so much fear, said, "If someone killed a duplicate of you in front of me, and I wasn't very sure where you were, I'd find out if I could tear off both of their arms and their head at the same time."

What were they doing here?

Blurr and the demon-- they were supposed to be-- they had a quest, didn't they?

But there was some confusion over who Shockwave was in all this.

Who Mirage's hostage was.

It made a certain amount of sense to Blurr that they'd come here and check.

"I'm awake," he whispered, and worked at struggling to sit up. "I-- I feel like scrap, but I'm awake." Because if it came down to a fight, Blurr was really good. And Blurr was uniquely vulnerable to demons.

Shockwave really didn't deserve to watch another loved one die under a demon's claws, even if he wasn't the one wearing them at the moment.

"If you don't think that will work, we're in trouble," Blurr's voice said, and Shockwave stood, slowly, drawing Blurr to stand with him, "because neither one of us has any good way to prove we are who we say we are."

And with that, Blurr led his demon into the living area of the den.

Blurr clung to Shockwave's arm, and... tried to ride out a lot of conflicting emotional responses in a believably Blurr-like way.

"That's not me," he said, and the actual Blurr was slightly battered and scratched, his tippets oddly dark (when had he changed them?), but it was the demon that demanded his attention. "That's not me, that's not me," tall, so tall, arms as long as Blurr was tall, and he knew those arms he knew the sense-memory of being in those arms, held close, held easily as a toy, as a turbofox kit, the sweeping neck that made the best pillow, the shoulders broad and strong enough to ride on, the raw Blurr feelings of love and want and security and anticipatory grief-- "that's not me that's not me--" And he could never feel that again-- never feel it himself instead of knowing it from Blurr's memory of it. He knew the oily smoky bitter smell of demon and it would never mean safety to him, it couldn't, because if he listened to his memories, if he played his part that way and threw himself into Blurr's demon's implausibly long arms, he'd dissolve away into a steaming black puddle of slime. "That's not me that's not me that's not me--"

Panicking seemed like a pretty reasonable middle ground, so Blurr did that.

"We are not here to hurt you," the demon tried to promise. "I will not touch you."

"Why would that reassure him?" Shockwave asked, wrapping a wing around Blurr protectively.

"Oh," and the demon moved forward much too fast, circling Shockwave. "Your wings look better than they did in the dream! They move now!"

"In-- the dream-- how could you--" Shockwave stared, and sputtered, but as much as he didn't look as defensive as Blurr might hope, he also kept the bulk of himself between Blurr and the demon.

"'Does it still fit?'" the demon said, with an air of quoting something. "I don't understand all of it, but-- were you me? Was I you? Blurr is my summoner but you-- you are my-- my something else. We were with each other, weren't we?"

"... It was... only me," Shockwave said, carefully reaching up to touch the demon's face. (Blurr couldn't.) "Me, the-- the nearly-dead mech at the core of a demon. With only that dark magic keeping my spark going."

"I am not a living thing," the demon agreed. "I am-- I am ash and dust and magic, as far as I can tell. There is nothing at the core of me-- but if it was you, that makes sense. The first thing was being parted from something alive."

"The first thing?" the actual Blurr asked, so at least everybody was equally confused.

"It is not a memory-- that starts later," the demon said, "but the first thing I am aware of. Heat, a low hum, a smell of flowers, and being parted from a life."

Shockwave stiffened, and Blurr-- carefully, not getting too near the demon-- tried to hug him about it. He understood the significance. Predacon flames, a destructive voice, and the scent of touch-me-nots. "Did it hurt you?" Shockwave asked the demon, and that massive head shook a bit, nuzzling at Shockwave's bandaged hand.

"No. It was mercy, and camaraderie, and love. I missed you," the demon said, "once I was awakened, and knew I had people to miss. But I was not hurt. I thought you must have left me behind to confuse your enemy-- Sentinel, Blurr explained him-- but meeting the two of you has left you so confused..."

"I am certainly confused," Shockwave agreed, "but-- but." His palm flared white, just a bit, where it touched the demon. "But you feel right. I know you, I know your magic."

The demon closed his face and nuzzled into Shockwave's hand. "I--" then something about his 'expression' crumpled, and he pulled away. "I have to be careful of... this Blurr. But I'd like to-- your hands were so kind, in the dream."

"... Why do you have to be careful of Blurr?" Shockwave asked, properly suspicious again.

Blurr could make this work.

He could.

"I can't be touched by a demon I didn't summon," Blurr said. "I-- it would--" hurt him, if not kill him. He had no memory of a demon's touch not killing a puppet, but then most of the puppets weren't gently patted by demons, in Blurr's memory. There was a lot of vicious rending. "... Hurt."

"Our magic is incompatible without that barrier," the demon said, simply. "This Blurr didn't summon me. That one did," and he pointed at the actual Blurr.

"This is why you were saying you can't prove who you are?" Shockwave asked-- both of them, heedless of how dangerous they were to Blurr.

But he kept Blurr tucked under his wing anyway.

"All we can really prove is that I summoned him," the actual Blurr said, "and that he could hurt... that. Uh, that Blurr. The rest is... somebody could be lying, or wrong, or we could all be fakes-- I was worried you wouldn't believe him," he said, gesturing to his demon. "I didn't know about the dream thing."

"Would it be so bad to... not prove anything?" the demon asked, sitting back on his haunches, head tilted thoughtfully. "What's the worst that could come of two Blurrs, besides some name confusion?"

"He's a spy," Blurr said, "Mirage can see through him, hear through him-- act through him."

"Mirage swore," the demon said, "that no harm would come to Shockwave by his actions."

"There's a whole other side to that," Blurr said, rubbing at his arm, awkwardly.

"What did you promise this Mirage person?" Shockwave asked.

"... To go willingly to him. No resisting. But I can't take a demon with me-- the magic issue-- and I'm not leaving him, or dismissing him. Mirage... Mirage expects me to... to do what I did for you," Blurr said. "But there's no mech at the core of this demon. I don't think I actually can do it again, so..." He shrugged, expansively, and gave Blurr a rather slag-eating grin. "Stalemate."

Oh, his maker was going to be furious.

"... And who is this Mirage person?" Shockwave asked, darkly.

"That's... a long story," Blurr said.

So Blurr said, "Mirage holds some... some debts. But it's-- it's nothing you have to worry about, Shockwave, I promise." Because he wouldn't be called on to pay it, because Shockwave wouldn't have to lose Blurr. Just the demon.

"You have a debt?" Shockwave asked, seeming thrown off by that. "Blurr, you spend money as though it means nothing to you, either you can pay off this debt or you really need to start budgeting--"

"It isn't that kind of debt," the actual Blurr said, "and I'd argue a lot of it wasn't done in good faith, if anything except the actual terms mattered. I'm not mad about the stalemate. Mirage saw him. Mirage knows I'm not leaving him or dismissing him. Mirage said he was content to wait."

"We both know he won't want to wait forever," Blurr warned him.

"Oh," Blurr said, smiling again, "I'm ready when he is, I'm just not leaving my demon behind. If Mirage is willing let him come along even though I can't make him a mech again because there's no part of this demon that ever was a mech, off we go!"

"Just the two of you?" Shockwave asked.

"... I wouldn't ask you to," Blurr said, "but-- I wouldn't tell you no."

"Don't," Blurr told Shockwave, instead. "You don't know what you're offering, and he won't tell you."

"Will you tell me?" Shockwave asked him, and it was--

It was so gentle.

Blurr wanted to trust it so badly.

"I-- shouldn't," because Blurr wouldn't. Blurr didn't talk to people about things like this, probably out of shame, but it was hard to figure out.

Shockwave cupped his cheek, and Blurr leaned into it, because he couldn't think of any reason not to. "Will you tell me," Shockwave asked, still so, so gentle, "who you are?"

"I'm Blurr," he promised, optics shuttered. "I'm Blurr."

"He's a puppet," Blurr said, flatly. "Mirage might not be controlling him all the time, but he can."

"Please," Shockwave said, again, "tell me who you are."

What did he want him to say? What was the right answer? He only really had one true answer, and one half true one. "I'm Blurr," he repeated, looking up at Shockwave and hoping he looked pleading enough. "You can ask me anything, I'll prove it to you."

"And I could give you the same answers," Blurr said. "I don't know how he does it, but Mirage's duplicates know what I know."

Blurr couldn't hold back a small, distressed whine. Failing at being Blurr wasn't an option! "I'm Blurr," he insisted. "Please-- please believe me, Shockwave. Please."

He was Blurr. And he was still useful. There had to be someone-- someone had to be in reach of Shockwave in case Blurr ever said outright that he wasn't willing to go to Mirage, to pay his debt, someone had to be there to--

-- to use Shockwave as a hostage, as a lever to press. To hurt him. To remind Blurr his deal concerned more than himself, now.

"The trouble is," Shockwave said, "that I suspect if I asked our demonic friend here when Blurr summoned him, he wouldn't tell me it was today--"

"Demons can lie to people who aren't their summoners," Blurr pointed out, hands on Shockwave's wrist.

"How long ago did I summon you?" Blurr asked his demon, and oh, frag-- demons couldn't lie when their summoners asked them a direct question.

And the demon purred about it, which was weird enough to distract everybody for a moment. "Nearly two years ago," he said. "Shockwave and I were still one, then."

"Blurr didn't die," Shockwave told Blurr, "and he didn't dismiss his demon, when he separated us-- when he destroyed the demon Shockwave, and restored the mech, and... left the demon to become his own person. So you cannot be his summoner. You can't be Blurr. If you're some innocent... please. We can work on protecting you. But I need your honesty in this. Who are you?"

"I'm Blurr--" but Blurr was also talking--

"Shockwave, he's a puppet, not a person under an illusion--"

"He's too real," Shockwave said, and that was--

That was--

That was something.

His maker still needed hands on the lever.

"I'm Blurr," he said again, but also, "I was made to be Blurr. I don't have anyone else to be."

"Except Mirage," Blurr said.

"That's different. That's Mirage being me. I can't be Mirage-- I can only be Blurr." It wasn't that complicated, really. He was Blurr, unless Mirage was actively using him, and even then, Mirage would probably be trying pretty hard to be Blurr.

His maker wasn't delighted about him lifting up the curtain, but he hadn't had his strings cut yet.

"Do you mean any of us harm, Blurr?" Shockwave asked, and something tense in him uncurled at hearing Shockwave call him Blurr.

Still.

"Blurr bargained for your safety," Blurr said. "If he goes with Mirage, willingly, without resisting, you remain unharmed by Mirage's actions, and I have to take you to see the doctor Blurr found before I can leave you alone. They amended the deal, noting that Blurr doesn't need to come alone if he comes willingly, but his demon isn't welcome while he's still a demon. So if something ever destroys or alters the demon... Blurr has to go. Or Mirage is free to harm you."

"Through you," Shockwave said, and stroked at the wing on the side of Blurr's helm, traced the line of Blurr's cheek with his thumb.

"I'm here," Blurr agreed, nuzzling into Shockwave's touch.

He felt the little flare of magic, but couldn't parse it. "Do you want to do me harm, if it's at this Mirage's command?"

It would be reasonable, a little poetic, to confess his feelings right then, to say that he loved Shockwave (he did, oh he did) and let that imply that he'd never hurt Shockwave-- but it was also something Blurr wouldn't do, wouldn't say. So Blurr came up with a reasonable substitute:

"I'm meant to be with you for the rest of my existence," Blurr said, and reached up, himself, to gently touch Shockwave's cheek, his chin, the patches plastering the right side of his face. "That's supposed to be weeks. I'd love to get all that time. I'd love to get more, if I can."

"... Do you know how that sounds?" Shockwave asked him.

"I was aiming for hopeful and affectionate?" Blurr said. "Is-- is there something wrong with wanting all the time with you I can get?"

Still nearer the door, the actual Blurr made a small, wounded sound, getting everyone's attention-- "Sorry," he said. "That's just, uh. A familiar feeling. Only you were the one who wouldn't... be staying," he told Shockwave.

"'I would be happy if you stayed,'" Blurr said, as Blurr had said once before. "Only-- I want to stay. I can't be Blurr if I don't feel the things Blurr would feel in my place," he said.

"How... how much me are you?" Blurr asked. "I've figured out some things-- I've had to-- but I don't know how you know so much. If Mirage can do all that..."

"I'm..." Hm. Well, his maker could learn things, from this, and Blurr was... the actual Blurr hadn't told his demon to kill him, yet, anyway. And Shockwave looked interested in the answer. "It has limits," he admitted. "I remember everything you've ever done, or heard, or said, or felt-- physically or emotionally-- it's experiential, though. I can't remember your thoughts. I have to do the thinking, unless Mirage is thinking. And I only have the memories up to the moment I was created. ... What I know about your new deal I know because it changed my purpose so I had to be informed."

Blurr let out a vent, at that. "So at least I get privacy inside my own head."

"Can I stay?" he asked. "Please? You-- you'd at least know what you were getting, from me." He would be Blurr, and not some other puppet. Not someone pretending to be a friend, not a new person who they'd have to get to know.

Shockwave and Blurr looked at each other, and Shockwave left Blurr to go to Blurr, to reach for his hands. To touch his damages. To be tender to the real Blurr and oh, oh Blurr wanted that, he wanted to have that, to be there--

-- but if there was any chance they'd let him stay and not just end him early, he'd have to learn to like looking at it, too. "I don't like that he's... essentially an access point for this Mirage person," Shockwave said, and Blurr shrugged.

"I've never been able to stop Mirage from seeing what I'm up to." Which might, Blurr thought, have to do with some of their past dealings. Blurr tended to promise too much-- which Blurr thought Shockwave had to know well.

"What wards have you tried?" Shockwave asked, with a light in his eyes-- he wanted to experiment, to learn, and he was so beautiful--

"I mean, the most effective thing I ever tried was summoning demons," Blurr said, shrugging, and leaning into Shockwave. "But if you want to keep Mirage's puppet, cutting him off from Mirage's magic is probably a bad idea."

"I'd like to trust him," Shockwave said, and Blurr could have danced. "If I can't trust him, I'd like to know where he is," and that was fine, Blurr could live with that.

Blurr offered Shockwave an attempt at a smile. It wasn't a very good attempt, in Blurr's opinion. "So you don't just want two of me?"

"What he remembers doing," Shockwave said, cupping Blurr's face, "you did. You were the one to save me, to free me. Before that, you were the one to give me reasons to live, to want to be saved, over and over. You let me out of my end of our bargain, too-- didn't I promise to do whatever you'd summoned me for?"

"... You promised to do whatever I wanted," Blurr said, quietly, nuzzling into Shockwave's bandaged hand. "That's not the same as doing whatever I'd summoned you for."

"You wanted me to live," Shockwave guessed. "To want to live?"

"I want-- mmh." Blurr bit down on his lips-- and ducked in to hug Shockwave. "Nope. Not yet. I have to wait. When you're-- when you're all repaired and in good condition again, when this is set right all the way because I didn't have enough time before-- separating you destroying the demon Shockwave, to just stuff you full of good fuel and all the healing potions. When you're not held together by patches and hope. Then I can ask for what I want."

"Oh," the demon said, suddenly. "When Shockwave can say no, and not suffer for it."

"That's more than just keeping your word," Blurr said, as though keeping one's word weren't everything.

And with a terrible gravity that would have infuriated Blurr's maker if he were paying closer attention at this point, Blurr said, "Some things are only worth having when they're absolutely freely given."

---

"It was. Me. It should still be me."

"... Is it? You've come so far. You've changed. So much. Grew to have so many scars. That face. That old shell. Does it still fit?"

"It's... who I was. Who I always dreamed of becoming again... One of the nicest memories I had."

"Devoid of who you are now. Tell me. Do you still fit in it?"

"... No. Not really."

---

Shockwave could argue that it was logical to keep the copy of Blurr, sensible, practical. This way they knew who was watching them, and it was someone who-- when he was himself-- didn't bear him, or Blurr, or even the... other part of Shockwave, any real malice. And he strongly suspected he'd be able to tell if or when it was ever this Mirage person using the duplicate Blurr as a mouthpiece.

But he'd also asked, "What happens to you if we send you on your way?" and the poor creature's face had just fallen. He hadn't even been the one to explain.

It had been Blurr.

"He's a puppet, Shockwave. If he outlives his usefulness, Mirage will cut his strings. If he needs another fake Blurr, later, he'll make a new puppet."

So it felt kinder to keep him.

It was difficult not to feel a degree of sympathy for the false Blurr, so long as he was the puppet, and not the puppeteer. As sparkless as a golem, with fewer choices than a demon, and apparently as much intelligence and depth of emotion as any mech... with not only his purpose and his actions dictated by a master's whim, but his lifespan and ownership of his own frame, as well.

Shockwave didn't like to define people by their abilities, but apparently Mirage considered his creations entirely disposable.

If Shockwave had discovered that the puppet wasn't really Blurr, that Blurr was in danger somewhere, he would have considered the puppet disposable, too-- but he wasn't Shockwave's puppet, not a piece of Shockwave's magic given consciousness, independent thought. If he could make people on a whim, even sparkless people he could control as though he were wearing their frames, a long lifespan for one of them would be measured in vorns, not weeks.

... So perhaps he was judging Mirage not by his abilities, but by how he used his abilities. That, at least, felt more fair.

He was less certain what to do with the puppet than that they should keep him.

It wasn't like the demon, who had been part of Shockwave for so long that he felt comfortable to be around, who was a very practical protection for Blurr against Mirage's magic, and who could, though Shockwave would feel guilty to do it, make for remarkable bait for Sentinel. The puppet, as it turned out, lacked Blurr's own skills, and being animated by magic, likewise couldn't use magic, for all he'd been educated in it-- or remembered Blurr's education in it.

"We can figure out how it's going to work after you see a doctor," Blurr said, to cut the debate short for the night. The puppet had, in an attempt to be diplomatic, gotten Blurr a healing potion from Blurr's absent friend's stores, which Blurr had accepted with an awkward, gracious nod. He sipped at it as he explained that he'd only left to find a proper doctor, one who'd come close enough for Shockwave to walk the distance, and to arrange somewhere they could meet.

Blurr was spending money wildly again, but this time, Shockwave could hardly argue that it was a waste. Everything either ached or was numb, and the medical supplies were useful in keeping that bearable, but...

Shockwave had enemies.

Blurr had enemies.

And now Shockwave felt a need to protect not only the demonic equivalent of a newspark but a puppet sent to either kill him or erode his relationship with Blurr.

Shockwave needed to be in better condition, quickly.

"I suppose the first things we really do need to work out," Shockwave said, instead of any of those thoughts, "are a couple of new names." Possibly new color schemes. Could the puppet take paint?

"New names?" the demon asked, as curious as he had been about... everything, so far.

"It's confusing enough that these two look so similar, without them both being called Blurr," Shockwave said, "and it will be just as awkward for both you and I to be Shockwave."

"But I don't have anyone else to be," the puppet said, edging toward distressed.

"So be Blurr," Blurr told him, "just-- answer to something else. A nickname. You could change your paint," he suggested, following Shockwave's own line of thought. "There's a store near the office I found for Coilspring, they sell paint and cloth and some bespoke things. Everybody knows one of us is you-- we don't have to look identical, anymore."

"I... I don't know..."

"If you wear a knight's armor," the demon said, as carefully far from the puppet as he could be and still be near to Blurr and Shockwave, "mechs will expect you to be able to fight like a knight. And there will be fighting to come."

"I'll change something if you will," the puppet said to Blurr. "I don't know if paint will stick to me, but-- I can change armor and clothes."

"Paint sticks to me," and Shockwave found himself oddly alarmed at the idea of Blurr being any color other than blue. "Black accents, maybe? Maybe not true black, maybe navy or pthalo..."

"Names," Shockwave reminded, "or are we introducing ourselves to Coilspring as Shockwave and Blurr and Blurr and Shockwave?"

"If I kill Sentinel," the demon said, and Shockwave noted he wasn't the only one to look to him in alarm, "Can I have his name?"

"What. What-- will you-- no, I gotta go what for a minute, I can't find the question," Blurr said. "What?"

"Where did that idea come from?" Shockwave asked, and Blurr waved at him in frantic agreement.

"It's a good name," the demon said. "'Sentinel.' A guardian, watchful. I like the name, and I like how it feels, and the Sentinel we know doesn't deserve a name that good, that he won't live up to. But he is the Sentinel we know, so two Sentinels would be confusing... and he's an enemy, so killing him would stop him from being an enemy and let me be named Sentinel without it being confusing."

Primes help him, that was, somehow, an adorable justification for murder.

"Unfortunately," Shockwave said, trying to keep a straight face despite being out of practice with the face he was wearing, "Unfortunately, Sentinel isn't the root of the problem he represents, so much as the face and sword arm of it..."

"If you want to be called Sentinel, then you can be," Blurr said, "and we can switch to calling Sentinel-- what was it you were calling him at first? The liar knight?"

"The lying knight," the demon-- possibly the new Sentinel-- said. "Hm. 'No, I'm Sentinel, you're the lying knight.' I suppose I could just take his name, but it isn't as satisfying if he's still alive to hurt us, or try to."

"There is, unfortunately, an entire council of mechs granting Sen-- the lying knight," Shockwave corrected, and definitely found himself smiling over, "his political power. Whoever they blamed for his murder would be arrested and demonized, and we are not really prepared to undo that as neatly as Blurr did for me."

For one thing, Blurr had no backup of his own mind, unless one could count the puppet.

"Can we kill him eventually though?" the puppet asked. "The lying knight wants Blurr dead and Mirage wants Blurr alive, so no conflict there for me. Plus!" he said, gesturing between himself and their new Sentinel, "We have some really good bait."

Blurr stared for a moment, and then, entirely deadpan, said, "Help. I'm starting to like fake me."

"Lianes," their Sentinel said. "As a name-- as something to answer to, for you," he added, nodding to the puppet.

"... It's pretty," the puppet said. "Why...?"

"You're pretty," Sentinel said, shrugging his great shoulders. "You're also dangerous to us, but I don't blame you for that. We're all dangerous to each other-- Blurr would be safer dismissing me and summoning a demon S-- the lying knight doesn't want. Together we may be strong enough to withstand each other's dangers... except that I can't risk touching you. I can offer you names, though. If you don't like Lianes, maybe I can think of others."

And a liana was a vine that stole fuel and light from the tree it climbed, putting it in danger from the loss, but helping to anchor it against strong winds, too. Trees with lianes bore less fruit, but they were as much a part of the forest as the trees themselves.

It was perhaps a very pretty way to call the puppet a parasite, but it didn't reference speed he didn't have, or refer to him being a copy.

"It's not Speedy or Zippy," Blurr told the puppet, wry. "I think you should take it."

Blurr and the puppet, probably remembering the exact same experience, exchanged nearly identical chagrined looks, and Shockwave wanted to sweep them both up under his wings.

"I'll try it on for size," the puppet-- Lianes said, airily. "It's not your fault that's-- that we can't touch," he told their Sentinel. "I keep wanting to touch you. The memories of your arms and shoulders are unfairly tempting."

A climbing vine that couldn't climb, poor thing.

---

"... Was he the one who did all this to you?"

"What?"

"The joints are damaged by the lack of proper movement. Half of your plates were bent a long time ago and weren't fixed. You look like you've been kept in a basement."

"Oh. OH. No no. I. I mean it wasn't him! If anything, he got me out of there."

"All right then. There's another thing I needed to discuss. The wiring in your arms is severely damaged... by dark magic I assume. As well as around your right optic. The problem is, I can't attach new wires to the ones that were affected by dark magic. Usually I would just remove the altered wiring first but I can't do that right now."

"Let me guess. Because the entirety of me is altered?"

"Somehow, yes."

---

The doctor Blurr found, Coilspring, sent them away even though she and her assistants were already examining Shockwave. "All three of you! Get. Out. Now."

Lianes was the first to move to obey. Blurr said, "Sentinel, it's all right," but before he could turn his, "we have to--" into an order, Sentinel shoved his head under Shockwave's arm, under his wing, disrupting the examination.

"I don't like it," he said. Insisted. Did not whine. (Or at least, from what he now understood, only Shockwave would really hear it as whining.) "We shouldn't leave him alone. None of us should be left alone." Anything could happen to any one of them, alone. The lying knight. Mirage. Anything.

The doctor, Coilspring, was giving Sentinel-- and then Blurr and Lianes-- a look he didn't know how to read, but Shockwave was petting his head with his bandaged hands. "Sentinel. Sentinel, it's all right. Here, back away for a moment, please?"

Sentinel didn't have to. Shockwave wasn't his summoner.

But Shockwave was his core. And he was being gentle, and the medical people were looking concerned.

Sentinel stepped back.

Shockwave shuttered his optic, and twitched his fingers, and-- pulled.

At Sentinel.

"Can you feel that?" Shockwave asked him, and Sentinel nodded. "If I'm in any trouble, I'll do just that, and you can come get me."

Shockwave wasn't his summoner, so Sentinel looked to Blurr, even if he knew what the answer would be.

"Oh, no, blanket permission," Blurr agreed, immediately. "If Shockwave needs you enough to ask for you, you can go right to him."

"Regardless of anything else you want me to do?" he asked, just to be truly sure.

... Just to let the doctor and her people, if any of them were suborned, know he wouldn't be delayed.

"I trust you to prioritize," Blurr told him, smiling. "But I promise-- I found Shockwave a doctor who isn't connected to any-- anybody problematic. He's safe here and we won't be far. He's going to be okay."

"And if I know Blurr and Lianes," Shockwave said, "they're going to go off and spend ridiculous amounts of money. They may need you to help them carry all their purchases."

"Oh, we're going to need him to wear some of them," Lianes said, brightly. "Circumstances have been circumstances, but he at least needs his own cloak."

"Go," Shockwave urged, smiling and warm, and Blurr held out a hand for Sentinel.

It wasn't an order. He owed that gesture no obedience. But as an invitation, he couldn't resist it, and folded his claws around Blurr's small, neat hand.

Sentinel let himself be led away, though he caught Coilspring muttering, "That explains a few things," before the door closed between Shockwave and Sentinel. Between the doctor and the city.

It was, Blurr had promised, a small city, but it was full of more mechs than Sentinel had ever seen, and he was concerned about his ability to protect his people from so many potential threats. Especially since demons here seemed expected to follow behind their summoners. That might make sense if one's summoner was slower than Blurr, but-- Sentinel was Blurr's demon. He could disappear in a moment, and although Sentinel could follow, he didn't dare grab Lianes to follow, in case that just killed him.

Destroyed him.

Killed him?

Was Lianes more or less alive than Sentinel?

He'd have to ask, later, when it was a sensible time to mention that Lianes was questionably alive at all.

Blurr wanted paint first, towing Sentinel and Lianes into the shop they were both so eager to visit. "I'm thinking, gesture of trust," he said, to Lianes, while comparing several nearly-identical shades of almost-black blues. "We can get some good cleansers, and some paints, and do a big clean-up-and-detail session at the den. You paint me, I paint you. I want to look just a little different than you-- you're right that we can use what we look like to our advantage--"

"You mean I'm right that I'd make great bait for anyone looking for you," Lianes said.

"The lying knight can't tell who summoned me," Sentinel agreed.

"He can stab the lying knight before he does anything permanent to me, right?" Lianes asked Blurr, pointing at Sentinel, and that was fair.

"Any plan where he can't is a plan you're going to be in on and agree to," Blurr told him. Which was also fair, though Lianes didn't like it much, from his expression. "How much permanence would you take for Shockwave's safety?"

"No, you're right, I love him," Lianes said, and Blurr--

Blurr hissed in a vent.

"If you never say it," Lianes warned, "he won't know it. People need to hear things, Blurr. Shockwave can't read your thoughts any more than I can."

"Do you want to try some paint, when we get back to the den?" Blurr asked him, instead. "I think green might look nice. Just a few highlights. Maybe something with a little metallic flake?"

Lianes put a hand on Blurr's shoulder-- but he let the subject stay changed. "You know what? If we're experimenting, I actually think I'd like to play with a little bit of true red."

"Oooh-- where?"

The pair went back to browsing for paints.

They wouldn't be painting him-- he liked his purple, and if Blurr wanted to see if he could still drop down into dust without losing a coat of paint, Sentinel would ask to test that where Lianes couldn't see, because Lianes hadn't seen that trick yet, and it was apparently new. Most demons couldn't do any such thing, because they were just raw demonic magic wrapped so tight around the mechs at their cores that they were the same person.

He might drop clothes, too, but clothes were easier to pick up than particles of dry paint.

And Blurr and Lianes both had the same opinion on and struggle with finding anything for Sentinel to wear-- to them, the long tabard Shockwave had worn felt right, but neither wanted to dress Sentinel in a Shockwave costume.

Fortunately, Sentinel had a plan for that.

"I want," he told them, "a thick cloak. Very thick-- heat and cold don't bother me, so I want one that I can use to keep someone else very warm, or to make a tent for shelter or shade." One that might be thick enough to touch Lianes through, if he had to grab him in a hurry. Then, because he'd seen that most people wore something around their hips, "And I want a sensible tabard. You two can pick colors."

Lianes and Blurr flashed him identical gridwolfish grins and began happily arguing with each other about the merits of one textile over another, leaving Sentinel to feel very smug as he watched them.

Blurr was wonderful; Sentinel knew this. Sentinel had felt that, from the moment he'd realized he'd had a summoner, from the moment an impression of Blurr had occurred to him. Blurr was not without his flaws, but he was wonderful.

Lianes was not Blurr, but he was very much like Blurr.

And Sentinel felt as though he'd gotten away with an interesting trick, because if Lianes was Blurr, then Blurr could hate him for trying to take his place, for being Mirage's creation, and he might not be wrong to hate him for that. But making him into Lianes, into a new person who happened to be very similar to Blurr? Well, if Blurr could like himself, he could like Lianes. That they could be civil to each other, and compete mostly-playfully looking to clothe Sentinel, seemed to be a good sign.

(But if they couldn't agree and each brought him different options, he'd be sure to choose one from each, anyway. Blurr was his summoner, bright and vibrant and beautiful and true, but Sentinel knew they were at an enemy's mercy, for Lianes. Mirage was proud; how long would he put up with the three of them doting on his puppet? It would be good to have something Lianes had chosen for him, to keep such a thing, he thought.)

In the end, Blurr chose a cloak on the basis of his experience traveling; it was gray and a little dull, but thick enough to trap heat and block light, and soft enough that it draped over Sentinel reasonably well, and Lianes chose a tabard that demonstrated his good aesthetic taste, woven with smoke-like curls in different sheens of black.

"After a lot of debate--" Lianes started, but was interrupted by Blurr.

"Which was, I won't lie, weirdly like arguing with myself--"

Lianes rolled his optics and went on, "We decided that although we might like to see you in fancy metalware, you might want to start with something easy to handle."

So the cloak clasp and belt were simple brushed-steel affairs that didn't feel worryingly small in his claws.

Lianes, in the goal of looking less threatening, less like a knight, found a length of blue fabric with bold red borders, and a series of clasps to fashion it into a chiton.

With their bounty paid for, there was just time to dress Sentinel and Lianes before going to meet Shockwave.

Belts were logical things, but cloak clasps had a learning curve, at least when you had claws, and only a little under two weeks of practice using them for fine work.

Lianes tucked his duplicate tabard, pauldrons, and cuirass away somewhere, took Blurr's advice to keep the greaves and bracers as they were useful while traveling, and let Blurr help him space clasps down his arms, and gather fabric into his belt, then asked, "Should I leave the...?" while gesturing at his back.

Blurr bit his lower lip, and Sentinel wondered if this was a thing he could soothe.

"Are they just a fashion thing, for you?"

"They're what they are for you," Lianes answered. "Made that way, remember? But yours are dark."

"That happens," was Blurr's explanation. "If you want to keep them as-- as tippets I guess-- it's sort of a cultural thing, isn't it?"

"You could explain it that way," Lianes agreed, "and I guess we only want to be a little distinct."

So with Blurr and Lianes distinctive, and Sentinel (not decent, he'd been assured, there was nothing indecent about not needing armor or clothing, but it refleted a lack of status on a mech and a lack of care on a servant, golem, or demon, so it was more that Blurr wanted him) looking more civilized, the three returned to Coilspring's temporary offices.

Blurr and Lianes chorused, "We're back!" unrehearsed, but then sort of stood there, arrested.

Shockwave stood, in heavy pauldrons that felt familiar, all his plating repaired and smoothed, his wings elegant and, Sentinel thought, very carefully mobile. And he was painted, in sober, cool shades of gray with thick teal borders, the red of his forehead charm standing out bold and brilliant as a demon's eye against them.

And Sentinel got to be the first to speak about it, as Blurr and Lianes were still staring at Shockwave, besotted. "Oh, you look well," he said, and ran careful claws over new bracers, over the curves of his wings. "You don't look quite finished, but you look well."

His hands were still bandaged-- re-bandaged, very professionally-- and though his face had been repaired, Shockwave's right optic was covered by a neat dark patch.

"That's because you have an assignment," Coilspring said, briskly, and pressed a packet into Sentinel's hands. "Your friend here explained that the two of you were captives together?"

Ah.

"For a very long time," Sentinel agreed.

"So, being in such close proximity to a demon for so long has altered Shockwave's frame, physically. For the foreseeable future, he won't be able to accept standard replacement parts, because demonic magic is a dark magic that isn't usually compatable with healing," Coilspring began, and Sentinel felt his claws tighten around the package.

"I hurt him? Just by-- being so close to him?"

"No," she said, very firmly and a little like Sentinel was an idiot, which was oddly reassuring. "You being so close to him changed him. Whoever broke his hands, put out his optic, crushed his wings, and bent most of his plating is the one who hurt him. Extremely neutral healing magic, potions and painkillers and the like, will still have the intended effects, but any repair that needs spare parts is going to need your help."

Sentinel actually looked at the package. "This is spare parts?"

"The replacement wiring I need to repair Shockwave's hands, arms, and optic," Coilspring aid, with a nod. "I'll have Shockwave back right here in a lunar cycle, and all that time? I want you carrying that parcel with you. If you can somehow be extra demonic now and then, that might help. Hopefully that will be enough time to soak the wiring in enough of your specific magic to be compatable with Shockwave's frame as it is now, but we'll see in a month."

"I will keep it very close," Sentinel promised. And if he tucked the parcel away inside himself, in the hollow where Shockwave had once been, he at least tried to make it look the way it did when Blurr and Lianes put things away. "I'm glad I can be any help."

"You got your new summoner to find him and get him out of there," Coilspring said. "I'd say that was a pretty big help."

Oh, that was a nice story. He'd have to ask Shockwave to tell it fully. "Demons are most often summoned to cause harm," he told Coilspring, instead. "I'm glad for any chance to help, especially as Shockwave is very dear to me."

Coilspring looked at him for a long moment, ultimately concluding, "Huh," before pointing between Blurr and Lianes-- who had finally found some words to use to admire Shockwave. "Which one of you two is paying for this?"

Blurr raised his hand, and went to do so.

And signed the paperwork in the wrong place.

Twice.

Shockwave, painted by Coilspring's team and having been brought a tabard by one of her less-needed apprentices, didn't need to shop for paint or clothing, but he had a list of his own, which required a trip to a library, and to a stationer's.

"Do you remember how to read or write?" Shockave asked him, and Sentinel had to shake his head.

So along with a pile of books about circles, and summonings, and other topics that made Blurr excited and Lianes cringe, Shockwave made sure to collect a primer, because he would not leave Sentinel illiterate any longer than necessary.

"Are you trying to refine that ritual?" Lianes asked, when Shockwave decided he had all the books he needed.

"I intend to," Shockwave said. "The potion worked incredibly well, but the spellwork was--"

"A little bit improvised," Blurr admitted, "leaning heavily on sympathetic magic, which isn't consistent between casters. And then there were the surprise side effects." He gestured at Sentinel.

"It won't work on me a second time," he reminded, just in case this was for Mirage's benefit, somehow. To keep Blurr's promise that, if Sentinel decided he wanted to be a mech, or something other than a demon, Blurr would help him to achieve that and then...

Surrender. Without resisting.

"You, my dear Sentinel, are not the only demon in the world," Shockwave pointed out, and that-- was true. There were many demons, each with a suffering mech curled crushed at their core, as Shockwave had been. "And on top of all that, you don't deserve to live your life in bondage. Blurr may be a good mech, but most summoners..." He shook his head.

"Oh," Lianes said, suddenly, "I guess there actually is going to be a quest."

"It's my quest," Shockwave said. "I won't drag any of you along-- and I have a great deal of prep work to do anyway. I want to try to build repair into the separation aspect of the spell, so that there's no need for--"

"For barrels of healing potions and a week of good sleep and rich fuel," Blurr said. "Because we can't count on having that kind of lead time every time we free someone-- we didn't even have it for you. So while you work on that..." Blurr bit his lip. "I'll work on figuring out what the lying knight did to wake Sentinel, here."

"You want to make more demons without mechs in them?" Lianes asked.

"I'd've done it myself if I'd known it could be done," Blurr told him. "I am deeply disappointed the first person he got to meet was that lying crankshaft."

"Blurr, if you'd done more dark magic after everything you did to free me, you would have collapsed," Shockwave scolded, gently.

"I would have carried you both," Sentinel said. And he would have. He could have, easily, and he would have wanted to, his summoner and his core, his mechs, his anchors. "Shockwave, mechs do not deserve to be made into demons, but... demons do not deserve to not-exist."

"... If I tell Mirage," Lianes mused, "when he wants updates, if I tell him that this is all... this is all necessary to destroy the power base the lying knight has-- so that he doesn't kill Blurr and so nobody turns Blurr into a demon, which is all Mirage will care about-- then... then probably he won't be too angry..."

"As an example," Shockwave said to Sentinel, "of a more demanding master than Blurr."

And then they passed a window, and Shockwave lost half a step, and caught everyone's attention.

"I'm fine," he promised them. "I just-- caught my reflection. It keeps changing on me, lately."

"Do you fit in this one?" Sentinel asked him, and Shockwave offered up a wry smile.

"I... think I may keep the patched optic," he said, hesitant and a little sheepish, to curious responses from Blurr and Lianes. "I'm not used to binocular vision, anymore, and... it feels sort of... rakish? Rogueish? I wouldn't have dared, before, I needed a flawless public image, but now..."

"Now," Blurr said, "you're playing a different game, with different rules. You're traveling with a knight, a demon, and a... changeling. You can afford to look a little dangerous."

"If you can be a little dangerous," Lianes added, because not being dangerous enough was why he'd tucked his own armor away. To avoid looking like a fair target.

"I'll be pleased to have a little more recovery time," Shockwave said, "and to have my hands repaired fully-- but yes, I think I can be just as dangerous as Blurr, if I put my mind to it."

And Sentinel was a demon, strong, clawed, and difficult to hurt. That left only Lianes who would need protection-- and Blurr was looking at him, brow furrowed.

"What?"

"If you worked at it," Blurr said, "could you... er. Fruit mushrooms?"

"Why? Just because you all know doesn't mean I'm supposed to give up every illusion."

"Because if you can do one kind of mushroom, maybe you can do other kinds of mushrooms," Blurr said. "Maybe as a last-resort sort of thing to smash in an attacker's face and poison them, or knock them out, or distract them with hallucinations."

"Even if you can't," Sentinel said, and couldn't help how warmly he said it, "I am going to amuse myself by picturing you doing that to the lying knight I stole my name from. It makes me very happy to think of him reaching for a victim only to fall over giggling about things only he can see. Or dead or sick," he admitted, "but if we can't kill him yet? Humiliated is good."

"... Point," Lianes conceded. "I-- I don't know. And I doubt. But I'll see what I can do."

"None of you have to come with me," Shockwave said. "I don't expect any of you to come with me. Our Sentinel has so much to learn, and Blurr still has recovering to do-- don't pretend you don't," but Blurr only shrugged, "and Lianes--"

"Is supposed to stay with you," Lianes pointed out. "I don't want Mirage to use you as a lever against Blurr, but I'm no use to him if I can't stay where he can use me to push that lever. Also? For myself? For me? I want to be with you as much as I can. Where you go, I go, if I get any choice."

"And you have a month before you see Coilspring next," Blurr added. "That's more than enough time for me to recover completely-- I'm used to handling dark magic, Shockwave, I know my limits-- and I might like Lianes when he's himself, but I'm not leaving you alone with somebody who could suddenly be Mirage if I mess up. And I also want to go with you. You might have missed it over the last two years, but I like wandering all over the map with you, no matter what the goal is."

"Where you find Blurr, there you find me," Sentinel put in. "And I'm glad he wants to go with you. You're my core. I've wanted nothing more than to be with both of you since I learned you existed. None of us should be alone, without the others, not for longer than necessary. Let us be four for as long as we may be four."

"... All four, then," Shockwave said, smiling in a strange sort of way, fond and sad at once. "If any of you change your minds..."

Blurr slipped in and wrapped his arms around Shockwave. "You're stuck with us for the foreseeable future," he said, as Shockwave folded his great wings around Blurr. "Sorry."

His summoner didn't sound sorry in the slightest.

---

END NOTES: Things you might wonder while reading this fic, that I certainly thought about while writing it:

Is Blur fae? Canonically I have no idea, so I tried to keep that thought out of the heads of characters who might know for sure.

Can the fae lie? Young shockwave believes they can, but there's folklore that says they can't, or don't. But I figure the fae can be wrong. (Also, I don't think we've ever seen Blurr lie. Tell selective truths, play pretend (street theatre), sure, but not outright lie.)

Does Blurr have wings like Mirage does? Does Puppet Blurr have wings if Blurr does? Not a goddamn clue! (I actually suspect Blurr dealt his away.) But they have tippets, so I had to mention them. Vaguely.

Is Blurr breaking his word to Mirage? Not technically and certainly not yet! Because he never said he'd come alone, just that he'd come willingly and without resisting. Mirage didn't tell him to come alone, just that if he came, Mirage wouldn't hurt Shockwave. Mirage, for several now incredibly obvious reasons, doesn't want a demon in his backyard... but is still mostly under the impression that "Shockwave" can be turned "back" into a mech. (Or maybe he's been paying closer attention and wants to see how this plays out. Or maybe he's going, "Are you seriously trying to adopt my puppet?" and waiting for the angstiest possible moment to cut the strings and render Lianes into cream of mushroom soup.) And Blurr's second condition, that Shockwave get 'that doctor's help, before you leave him alone,' isn't yet fully met-- until Coilspring has had a chance to check that demon-steeped wiring for compatibility and can consider Shockwave repaired to the best of her ability, Mirage's end of the bargain isn't fulfilled enough for Blurr to be said to be reneging on his end.

Do I want to ruin this update in particular for all of you? Yes. Yes I do. Look at him. Look at that guy. Look at him, he's so scared, he's trying so hard. He loves Shockwave so much. He's Blurr-- he doesn't have anyone else to be. The person he was made for, the mech he loves, is hurting him hurting him hurting him-- and then the colors snap to Kill It colors and that's not Blurr anymore, is it? (Also-- Kill It colors. Oh, that's not just a visual indicator of what a hot drink on a cold day feels like, is it, Keferon? That's a harbinger of doom.)

Should I have named my half-a-demon Sentinel? Probably not, it's confusing, but they were in a situation where new names seemed important, and I have found that when a character insists that their inconvenient name is, regardless, their name, it's just best to go with it. And my baby man up there doesn't think Sentinel deserves such a good name. He wants that name. He's Sentinel now. He's on his way to Hasbro's offices to enforce this, possibly.

Am I going to kill Lianes? I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing here, this series gets upated when something makes me go "Oh! Yes, that's what my boy would do." But Lianes is ephemeral, and he's only got a place at Shockwave's side as long as he's a useful asset for Mirage, and I genuinely do not know if Sentinel could accidentally kill him by patting his back. Sentinel doesn't know that. That's why he wanted a cloak thick enough to build a yurt out of, just in case.

Is this a threesome? A foursome? What is the state of the shipping here? Once again I am not at all certain! But I do invite you all to picture Blurr and Lianes, clothes and armor stripped off and scattered around them in an orderly fashion, carefully adding little paint details to each other's bodies to confirm their individuality... while Shockwave watches two incredibly pretty people having a display of trust (no painting Kick Me on Blurr's back, Lianes) and intimacy.

... I wish I had more to say about recent updates, honestly, because they've been so fantastic, but they've been so fantastic that I'm sort of white-knuckling it a little? I am not just cooking in Keferon's kitchen, I am on this ride with my hands, arms, feet, and legs inside the vehicle until the ride comes to a complete stop (or Snowbots starts, I guess). I hope Keferon is having fun doing all the little piecemeal reveals, giggling at those of us who wrote AU stuff that came close but not quite.

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