Work Text:
When the explosion sounds and the Indoline titan shrieks and falls to its death, it’s Nia who insists on retracing their steps.
“Nia,” Pyra says gently, “That blast… there’s no way he could have…”
“How many times has Shellhead swanned off over a cliff and we’ve had to go pick him up?” Nia snaps. “He’s been fine every time, hasn’t he?”
“I don’t know that it’s exactly the same thing, Fleabag.” Zeke says.
“You’re both blade eaters,” Nia insists. Zeke’s eyes widen in shock, but it’s a testament to the situation that no one is surprised, not really. “And he’s got a whole bloody core crystal, not just a piece. If anyone could survive that, it’s him. But he’ll need healing.”
There’s silence, cold and metallic as the Tree around them. Mikhail had been kind to her, her first few days with Torna. Jin had tried his best, but wrapped up in his plans and his demons as he was, Nia rarely saw him. Patroka snapped at her, Akhos teased her relentlessly, and Malos ignored her entirely, and so Nia often found herself deep in the Marsanes, Dromarch in tow, watching Mikhail rattle on about nothing in particular. Out of all of them, even removed from his dealings with Indol as he was, he seemed to understand that the silence made everything worse. Nia worries the edge of her glove, and sees the thaw on Rex’s face even before he speaks.
“He saved our lives, just now,” Rex says. “We owe it to him to at least check.”
“It will widen the lead Jin and Malos have on us,” Mòrag points out, not unkindly.
“If he’s alive and we leave him down there, we’re no better than Amalthus,” Rex clenches his fist, determined. “I’ll go back alone if I need to.”
Nia rolls her eyes. “All right, no need to be dramatic.”
Pyra transforms in a flash, turquoise and imposing. “You’re not going anywhere without me,” she says, and maybe it’s Mythra speaking now, maybe not—the higher up the Tree they go, the harder it becomes to tell the difference. “I can speed up the elevators, I think. We know the path to take now, and Amalthus is out of the way. Returning won’t take nearly as long.”
Mòrag nods. “Then I have no objections.”
True to her word, Pyra has them back to the base of the tree in under an hour, roots stretching out into the Tornan titan. Nia’s not sure exactly what she expects when they step out of the elevator—a mangled body, or worse, nothing at all—but it’s certainly not Mikhail, sitting at the edge of the pool in the Megaflote base and swinging his legs.
She gasps. “Mik! You’re alive!”
He looks up, casual as can be. “Hey! How you doing?”
“Huh?” Rex says. Eloquent as ever, Nia thinks dryly.
“How are we doing?” Brighid asks, aghast.
Mikhail’s eyes widen in understanding. “Did you think I was dead? Even I thought I was dead. Might as well have been, really. There was no way I was getting back up there without an Aegis or a ship.”
“Mikhail, you…” Pyra says.
He shrugs, noncommittal. “Patroka told me not to die. She said she wanted to be the one to kill me. I couldn’t just die after an order like that. Honestly, I’d be scared of the consequences. But what the hell are you doing all the way down here?” He asks, suddenly furious. “You think the rest of them are just standing around waiting for you? If you don’t catch them and talk them out of it, they’ll get to Elysium and—”
“I told you I had an answer, didn’t I?’ Rex says. “This is part of it. Blades, human, we’re all people. We have to look out for one another, keep each other in check—no matter why the Architect created us.”
It’s sickeningly sweet and heart-wrenchingly earnest, just like Rex always is, and the hopeful smile Rex turns on Mikhail is blinding. Nia’s stomach turns. For all his friendliness and quips, Mikhail is cynical, stony under his bravado. Patroka’s contempt and Akhos’s condescension for humanity are clear as day, but Nia suspects Mikhail wanted the world to burn long before Jin ever found him.
Which is why her mouth drops open when Mikhail sighs and seems to come to a decision. “I meant what I said before, you know,” he says. “I think about it all the time. What things would have been like if the people I loved were still around. But I don’t think that’s all that fair of me.”
“Mikhail?” It’s Mythra for sure this time, brow furrowed like she’s trying to work something out. The hairs at the back of Nia’s neck begin to stand.
“The others,” Mikhail continues. “I’ve been with them for years—for hundreds for years, some of them. Maybe there are still people I love. So maybe things can be different, this time around. That’s what you realized, wasn’t it, Mythra?”
Mythra’s hand flies to her mouth. “Mikhail?” she asks again, voice shaking. “You mean you’re…”
“500 years can sure change a guy, huh?” Mikhail laughs humorlessly. “I look a little different than I did then, I’ll give you that. I gotta say, I thought you’d already remembered.”
“A lot happened,” Mythra says faintly. Nia looks back and forth between them, truly lost at this point, and catches Mòrag’s eye. She shakes her head minutely, and Nia sighs, adding another few hundred questions to the list she’s got going.
Mythra pulls at the end of her ponytail, begins to extend a hand, then retracts it. “Mikhail,” she begins.
“Save it,” he cuts her off. “I don’t want to hear your apologies, I want you to make up for it.”
“That’s the same, at least.” Mythra murmurs.
“Hey, I’m not that different,” Mikhail stays. “I’m still following Jin around after all this time, aren’t I?”
No one seems to know what to say to that, and Mikhail lets out a forced little chuckle. “Well then, Rex,” he says, without missing a beat. “I guess you’ll have to let me along to take a look at the rest of that answer. Architect knows the rest of the guys aren’t going down without a fight.”
“What?” Rex nods dumbly, shaking himself back to reality. Nia takes comfort in the fact that there’s at least one person more lost than her. “I mean... yes! Come with us. Please, Mikhail.”
“Can I? I can?” Mikhail’s chirpiness is back like nothing had changed, and Nia only has time to exchange an incredulous look with Dromarch before he’s speaking again. “All right, let’s get a move on, Aegis. Much as I’d like to hang around all day getting to know the Special Inquisitor over there—” Brighid hisses, and sparks fly from the swords at Mòrag’s waist. “—we’ve got a lot of ground to make up.”
With a wave of her hand, Mythra reopens the elevator, and their group piles back in, one member larger. It whirs to life, they begin to travel up, and within a minute, the silence gone from comfortable to unbearable. Nia’s a hairsbreadth away from unsheathing her scimitar and pulling it on Zeke just to cause a scene when Mikhail clears his throat.
“Hey, little guy.” He says, poking Tora in the side.
“Little? Tora is very big for Tora’s age!” Tora says, flapping his wings indignantly.
“Huh, I guess so.” Mikhail says thoughtfully. “I might just be used to that huge green one.”
Tora squeaks again, and Mikhail cuts him off before the protests continue. “Anyway, I wanted to ask—it was your dad that came up with the artificial blades in the first place, right?”
“Yes-yes,” Tora says, puffing out his chest. “But Tora made modifications to Poppi’s design when designing. Grampypon made mode change function, but Tora designed each mode!”
“Wow, so you’ve really gotten in there, huh?” Mikhail leers at Poppi, and she takes a step back into Brighid. The air in the elevator grows a few degrees hotter, and Mikhail holds his hands up.
“Hey, hey, not like that!” He looks back down at Tora. “Assuming we survive… all of this, you mind showing me your schematics some time? There were a few quirks with our blade bots I just couldn’t make sense of.”
Tora flaps his wings again, this time with so much enthusiasm that he hovers a few peds off the ground. “Blondiepon want to talk shop with Tora?! No one ever wants to talk shop with Tora!”
“If the Architect really is waiting up there, he has one hell of a sense of humor,” Pandoria says in an undertone. Nia hides a snort. They keep rising.