Chapter Text
He’s kneeling in the antechamber of a massive temple, bedecked with orichalcum, moonsilver, emerald and ruby and decorated with stained-glass images of past triumphs enchanted to move in an eternal loop.
Of course, he’s not kneeling by choice. There’s a daiklaive hanging above his head, and gauntleted hands forcing him down onto the tile.
Oh, it was a long fight to get him here, but in the end one Solar against eight dozen Dragon-Blooded is a fight that will inevitably end in victory for the Dragon-Blooded. Terrestrial corpses litter the antechamber and the steps outside it, but his Essence is spent and his body bloody and bruised.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry it had to come to this.” the Dragon-Blooded holding the daiklaive says. Gleaming ice-blue anima shines like a bonfire from his body, mixing with the furnace-hot and thorn-sharp anima banners of his two surviving compatriots. “You were a kind master, but the curse of madness still hangs over your head, and no matter my personal feelings, my duty is to Creation.”
Suddenly, the ground begins to shake, and the building begins to collapse, glass shattering and tiles cracking. Columns topple, blocking both sets of doors and making the ceiling buckle under the increased strain.
The Dragon-Blooded looks at him in shock. “You…”
“Captain, did you really believe I wouldn’t have a backup plan? I’m not stupid. I knew I was going to die here.” He smiles, as sharp as the edge of a blade. “But this way, you can’t slaughter my family. This way, you can’t plunder my palace. This way, I win the war, even if I lose the battle.”
As ten thousand tons of orichalcum and marble tumble down upon their heads, he lifts his head, grinning brightly even as his demise approaches.
After all, his next incarnations will have all of his swiftness, wit and cunning, and no matter how many tries it takes, the Sidereals will regret their temerity.
Everyone knows not to go into the Undertunnels, especially alone and/or at night. It’s just common wisdom to avoid the underground ruins that are probably haunted and/or cursed and definitely infested with dangerous subterranean wildlife.
Of course, common wisdom fails to take into account the fact that Barry Allen doesn’t care about common wisdom.
Sure, this is technically unbecoming behavior for a member of the Gotham Guard, but frankly there are worse vices. Most of his superiors are taking so many bribes to look the other way they practically have to walk around blindfolded, not to mention the amount of guards of all levels selling confiscated narcotics, insider intel or prisoners that won’t be missed to whatever organization they’re in bed with.
Compared to that, an unhealthy fascination with archaeology is the pinnacle of sanity and morality.
He’s not stupid- he has a sword, he has armor, he has rations, he has spare parchment and pencils and he has the weekend off, plus Iris knows where he’s going, and to tell someone if he doesn’t come back by nightfall tomorrow.
Now all he needs to do is find an entrance. The one he used last should be around here somewhere.
Well, that’s one way to find an entrance, Barry thinks, looking up at the top of the hole he’s fallen into.
There’s absolutely no way he’s getting back up that fifteen-foot drop, but at least his only injury is to his pride, and all of his stuff is intact.
Sighing, he starts walking deeper into the Undertunnels, trying to stay as close to the surface as possible.
This turns out to be a bad idea, as he accidentally stumbles upon a bandit encampment.
“Sorry, I’ll just be leaving now…”
“Yes, of course you will.” The guard grins, yellowed teeth gleaming in the torchlight. “In pieces.”
“Uh…”
“What, you really thought we wouldn’t notice the fact that you’re still wearing your uniform?”
Barry belatedly realizes that even if he isn’t wearing his badge, the dark blue color of his buff jacket still obviously marks it as Gotham Guard standard issue.
“It was cheaper to buy used surplus?” he tries, and receives only a volley of arrows in response.
Barry swears under his breath and runs for it.
The torchlight really shouldn’t be that bright gold, Barry muses. And there shouldn’t be red either- Wait a minute…
He stops and blinks as he realizes that there’s a faint glow around him, a bright, rippling gold crackling with occasional crimson sparks.
Now that he thinks about it, he’s been running for half an hour without stopping, and yet he’s not tired even in the slightest. Actually, he’s less tired than he was when he started running.
Combined with the fact that he’s glowing, something supernatural is definitely going on.
He sits down and tries to think of the possibilities.
He hasn’t noticed anything supernatural going on, he doesn’t feel any sudden violent or unnatural urges and the glow’s definitely coming from him, so it’s probably not possession or a god.
He doesn’t have any supernatural or Dragon-Blooded ancestors as far as he knows, but he’s still not entirely sure, and from what he knows about Dragon-Blooded, glowing in fancy colors is normal when they use their magic enough. And he can feel the heat and light under his skin if he focuses enough, so distant Dragon-Blooded ancestry is probably the most likely solution here.
However, he knows exactly what happens to “lost eggs” when they get discovered by the Realm. Everyone knows the story of Alais Clovery, who had Exalted upon her sister’s death and was promptly taken away by Satrap Ragara’s soldiers to their Isle and never seen again.
This is going to be a problem. Fuck.
He sighs and looks up- directly into the lambent eyes of a trio of deepstalkers.
Well, double fuck. Glow must have drawn them near.
Deepstalkers are one of those aforementioned species of dangerous subterranean wildlife- man-sized bioluminescent lizards, distantly related to claw striders, that hunt in packs and are perfectly willing to go after travelers.
Barry draws his sword, but instead of attacking, the deepstalkers just sit there, shifting patterns of green light playing over their bodies. Eventually, two turn and run deeper into the tunnels, the third remaining behind and flicking its tail at Barry.
When he’s still standing there, the third gently tugs on his sleeve.
“You want me to follow you?” Barry says, feeling slightly silly talking to an animal.
The deepstalker bobs its head, mint-green light pulsing from its cheeks- about as affirmative a yes he can get from an animal incapable of speaking human languages.
Then it takes off, and Barry follows as best as he can. The tunnels gradually grow stranger, reflective mineral and gemstone veins beginning to weave through the walls and natural tunnels eventually giving way to the buried ruins of buildings built from a mixture of orichalcum, moonsilver and colorful, faintly glowing crystals.
Barry honestly didn’t know that the First Age ruins down here were this well-preserved, and he’s itching to stop and sketch the art etched and inlaid into the walls, floors and columns and the statuary littered around every corner.
As it is, he has to make do with occasional glances back at the scenes depicted in them- stylized depictions of two ancient Anathema fighting gods and monsters, leading armies and building magnificent wonders, or sometimes just standing there in various heroic postures.
Eventually, his guide stops, its companions already waiting patiently by a set of open gates.
Beyond them is a sprawling city packed within a massive vaulted chamber that he can’t see the edges of. A city designed for and by deepstalkers, echoing with the sounds of industry and deepstalker cries.
Barry knew deepstalkers were smart, but he never knew exactly how smart.
Buildings are built from bones, tanned hides, pieces of rubble and the discarded equipment of likely deceased travelers- a lot lower and flatter than ones designed for humans, with various little trinkets hanging from protruding parts of their frames and curtained archways for doors.
Deepstalkers walk through the streets, some dragging sledges laden with salvage and dead animals. Many wear harnesses of crudely tied rope and hide or various pieces of jewelry- though plenty don’t have clothes or jewelry at all, and the harnesses seem to consist entirely of pockets.
There are hatchlings kicking rocks back and forth or chasing each other through the streets, screeching and pulsing with bright flashes of green the whole time.
There are small groups of deepstalkers chatting away, often while eating or browsing shops.
There’s even a central square built around a twelve-foot statue loosely assembled from various salvage into the shape of a deepstalker rearing up onto its hind legs with a crown of swords on its head.
Barry slips inside the city behind his guide, and every deepstalker he passes pauses to bow to him, even if most of them only tilt their heads.
He’s led to the very edge of the city, through a straightaway that must have been designated at the founding of the city, and stopping at a set of gates ten feet high and inlaid with a side profile of each of the Anathema who ruled this city, facing each other with hands outstretched.
There’s a deepstalker waiting for him next to the gates. Barry is pretty sure they’re very old for a deepstalker, judging by the cracks on their scales and horns and their general gnarled appearance. Strings of colorful beads are wrapped around their neck, and several mismatched bracelets and anklets grace their tail, arms and legs.
“We have been waiting for you. Welcome, Grandfather.” they say.
“Wait, Grandfather?”
The elder deepstalker bobs their head. “You are. That is your title.”
“Um…”
“By the legacy of your Exaltation, not of your mortal self, but the Grandmother has been waiting for you.” they explain.
“Uh, what does she want?”
“Their last command, as with every other time they have slept, was that they must be woken if the Grandfather arrives.”
“And how do you know I’m the right person?”
“The Grandfather is a Child of the Unbowed Skylands Fire, with the mark of the Boundary Hours upon their brow and a veil of golden light and scarlet sparks.” They jab a single foreclaw towards Barry, directly between his eyes. “You were always meant to be here. You were always meant to find them.”
Barry doesn’t have much time to contemplate how unnerving that was, since they have further instructions.
“Step inside once the gates open, and do not fear when they close. The Grandmother's privacy must be respected, but the city must also move.”
The gates swing open slowly and in small increments as a pair of deepstalkers seize the handles of a pair of pulleys in their jaws and begin to turn them. There’s silence as seemingly every deepstalker in the city pauses whatever they’re doing to bow flat to the ground and look away from the gates, silence suddenly hanging throughout the city.
Beyond the gates is an elaborately decorated throne room, almost perfectly preserved, with a twelve foot tall throne made of orichalcum, rubies and emeralds, perched on a polished dais made of interlocking curves of variously colored marble.
The Grandmother reclines on the throne, a fusion of a deepstalker and human wearing elaborate forest-green robes and a twisting, jagged crown of moonsilver. Their scales are greenish-black, polished and gleaming, no sign of the typical bioluminescence. Their frame doesn’t seem even slightly feminine by human standards- but considering deepstalkers don’t seem to have sexual dimorphism, that’s not really that unusual.
Barry feels his breath catch in his throat. Gods always have an aura around them, and even sleeping, the Grandmother is absolutely magnificent.
The gates swing close behind him as the Grandmother stirs, eyes opening and head flicking upwards.
“I strictly instructed you that I was not to be disturbed from my slumber!” they snarl, inch-long fangs bared. A moonsilver sword with a blade as long as Barry is tall and an elaborately sculpted crossguard appears in their hands in a flash of silver light. “Leave!”
Barry steels his resolve and very carefully doesn’t let his hands go anywhere near his sword as he falls to his knees and tries to think of something to say to convince her that there’s been a misunderstanding.
Before he can open his mouth, the Grandmother pauses, gleaming emerald eyes raking over Barry. The sword in their hands falls from their grip and dissipates back into moonlight.
“Flash?...” they gasp.
“Uh, I’m not Flash, whoever they are?”
“Well, you are and…you aren’t.” She sighs. “What’s your name?”
“Barry Allen-West?” he offers. He could probably add a half dozen more clan names if he wanted to be extra formal, but he’s going to stick with the two he uses most often for less confusion. And right now, he doesn’t want even the slightest risk of confusion.
“Well, stand up, Barry.”
Barry stands up obediently, and the Grandmother gestures to the empty space beside them. “Now sit down.”
The throne is surprisingly comfortable, despite the lack of conventional padding, and it’s relatively easy for him to just push himself up onto it.
The Grandmother settles a hand on his shoulder. Surprisingly, it doesn’t feel much different from the hand of someone that’s been wearing gauntlets for a few hours- except for the fact that it doesn’t feel patronizing, unlike when his superior officers do it.
“I missed you.” they say, tone fondly nostalgic. “I missed you so much.”
Barry doesn’t say anything, because that’s the course of action least likely to insult the Grandmother. (He can’t exactly fight a god, can he? Okay, he might be able to, now that he thinks about it.)
“Still, you’re not him, are you?” the Grandmother says quietly.
Barry nods, deciding not to admit that he has no idea who the Grandmother is addressing.
Their gaze rakes over him apprehensively. “How did you Exalt?”
“To be frank, I don’t know. I only noticed after I started glowing.” Barry admits. “But I think it might have had something to do with running from bandits.”
“That is…unusual. If Exaltation was that easy, everyone would be Exalted.” They sigh, looking somewhat pensive. (It's hard to tell on a lizard's snout.) “However, the Unconquered Sun does not grant his blessings to just anyone, and you are definitely Solar Exalted. It’s unimportant in the end.”
“Um, what does that mean?” Barry hazards.
The Grandmother smiles. It's somewhat unnerving, given how it's on a giant lizard's face. “Oh, I have so much to tell you.”
Notes:
See if you can figure out with 3e Charms they're using. (I have full character sheets statted up, though I'm not really rolling dice except as a guideline as to what a character with those stats could do on average.)
Chapter 2: Hal: The Cycle of Slumber
Chapter Text
Flash seems resolute, but Hal can sense the turmoil within him. “I’ll hold them off.”
“They’ll kill you!” He's seen the armies marching against them. They're young, for Celestial Exalted, and that many Dragon-Blooded are too much to fight.
“They will. And you’ll take our children and grandchildren, and our most trusted servants to the lower palace, and engage the failsafe when I’m about to die.”
“I…”
“Do it, Hal. They will let you go if they cannot find you. They will hunt me to the edges of Creation.” Flash looks Hal directly in the eye, blue against luminescent green. “Please, Hal. Live for me.”
Hal nods. “I will.” he says.
There are no goodbyes. They will find each other again, somehow.
The safe room is barely large enough to fit everyone inside, especially since they brought all of the personal belongings they could snatch up on such short notice and they’re giving Hal free space to work.
With trepidation, Hal presses his hand to the first lock. Essence flows, and the sorcerous mechanism slips open. Above him, a flare of pain radiates through his bond with Flash- he’s been injured.
He pricks his finger on the needle of the second lock, and takes a deep breath before opening the third. Flash is still holding on strong, but he’s heavily injured and exhausted.
“Authentication Code: Seven Moons Daylight, Hundred Moons Fall, Six Thirty Four Five.” he says, trying to keep his voice from shaking.
“Authentication code accepted. Total Collapse Failsafe initiated.”
There’s a series of loud bangs, then a loud rumble that shakes the ground even miles below the surface. Then, silence.
Hal collapses to his knees, tears dripping down his face, as his bond with Flash snaps.
And the worst thing is that he knows that Flash died because of the failsafe, not because of the traitorous Dragon-Blooded. The timing and nature of his injuries spell that out plain as day.
“What have I done…” he whispers.
“What you had to do.” Sparrow says, walking up to Hal and bending down to wrap his arms around him.
“I killed your father, Sparrow…”
“You. Didn’t. Kill. Him. You killed his killers, and kept us safe. ” his eldest son says, mirrored by nods from those around him. “You did what you had to do.”
Zariel’s breathing is slow and labored and her skin yellowed and pale. Hal knows she will be lucky to last the hour. He’s seen enough mortals die of old age to know that.
It’s hard to sustain a population long-term when said population started with only about sixty people, most of them part of the same extended family. In the end, the population started to dwindle as fewer and fewer children could be born from fewer and fewer healthy bloodlines. Even then, they only made it three hundred years thanks to extensive first cousin marriages.
And now Hal is here, tending to the last of his mortal kin on her deathbed.
“I’m sorry for leaving you.” the old woman whispers.
There’s nothing more he can say to that. Hal grips her hand as gently as he can, as her eyes flutter shut and her breathing stutters to a stop.
As soon as the burial rites are done, he lets himself slip away. Skin turns to scales, teeth to fangs and hands to talons as human reason is washed away by animal instinct. He doesn’t want to think or feel, because that would mean confronting the fact that he’s alone, possibly forever.
No one is there to notice or care as they slip into the dark, the bioluminescence of their scales and eyes fading to dull greenish-black to hide them within the subterranean shadow.
They’re not alone, as it turns out. There are plenty of wild deepstalkers living in the tunnels.
Their interactions with them are more crude instinctual routines backed up by the subtle tug of their Essence, but the packs in the area all defer to them instinctively.
There is plenty to hunt, the herbivores and smaller carnivores down here incredibly numerous thanks to the chunks of Coast City’s sorcerous gardens that survived largely intact.
There is plenty of water, both from said gardens and underground streams.
And there is little that can harm them. Even the most dangerous mundane predators cannot truly oppose a Lunar, especially not one of their age.
Still, both the remnants of their human side and their deepstalker instincts cry out for a family and mate now dead.
Their Silver-Touched children number in the hundreds, and yet it’s not enough. Even the most magically powerful of their children will never be their equal or live for more than five decades, and their mates are by nature nothing more than beasts.
So they sleep, and wake to a city of their children that reveres them as their god, their Grandmother.
They rule for a time- take more mates, spawn more children, work sorcery to renew the wonders of their old city, teach their children of their fallen Grandfather and the arts and crafts within their grasp- but again they fall to despair and slumber, and again they wake to rule.
Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern, is still alive, but even if they remember being him, they do not want to be him until their true mate has returned to them. The closest they’ve come to being human in centuries is their hybrid form.
And so the cycle repeats, the city outside growing greater and their children more numerous with every slumber.
Until, finally, their true mate returns.
Barry Allen-West is painfully naive, but they are just as beautiful and kind and intelligent as their former self.
Maybe, just maybe, they can let themselves be Hal Jordan again.
Chapter Text
First, the armor, a red-leather buff jacket with a collar carefully disguised by feathers.
Second, the robes, two layers of red and gold silk carefully tailored to allow maximum mobility without exposing too much of what lies underneath.
Third, the mask, cunningly articulated bird-beaked metal likewise painted red and gold, framed by scarlet-dyed feathers.
Fourth, the cloak, laden with blood-red feathers and designed to trail like wings.
Fifth, the boots, carefully padded and sheathed with painted ceramic in imitation of a raiton’s clawed feet.
Sixth, the gloves, flexible leather fitted with sharp talons that could pop out or fold back with a flick of the wrist.
And finally, the seal of Essence, strengthening the image portrayed and subtly changing the body underneath- taller with sharper features, bronzed skin, long, wavy flame-red hair and a higher, more resonant voice.
Now fully costumed, Flamebird smiles, slipping out the window into the night.
It doesn’t take even a slight exertion of Essence to travel across the rooftops, given their innate athletic skill and Gotham architects’ fondness for arches, ornate architectural flourishes and roof-mounted statuary.
Tonight, Flamebird hunts. Warnings have been placed and ignored, and now it is time to follow through.
A voice calls, high and raucous like a raiton’s cry, rousing Gacerel from her slumber. “Cathak Gacerel, three times you have been warned, and three times have you turned your face.”
A bird-spirit of gold and crimson is standing over her bed, one hand wrapped around her throat and face impassive.
Flamebird, it seems, is not just an old wives’ tale meant to scare off an unwanted satrapial liason, but a real spirit. Real enough to kill.
A plea, or maybe a scream, rises in her throat. The sound is choked to a pitiful whimper by the spirit’s tight grip.
“You have made your choice, in ignorance and arrogance.” Flamebird continues, yanking her upward. “So be it.”
Claws unsheath, and stab directly into the soft flesh of her throat. She gasps and gags, crimson spurting from the wounds as Flamebird retracts their claws again.
Finally, her eyes roll back in her head, glazed over by death.
Flamebird lets the body fall back onto the sheets and lays a single crimson feather on the fallen Dynast’s breast. What a waste of a good monologue. At least that wasn’t improvised. I'd hate to waste actual creativity on a petty mortal Dynast.
Sighing, they wipe their claws clean on one of the tapestries lining the extravagantly decorated bedchamber, then leap from the balcony.
Essence buoys their flight as their cloak flares behind them, sending them shooting through the air to land on the rooftop of a building across the street.
They leap again, and again, no more than a flash of moonlit crimson if anyone below happens to look up at the right time- unlikely, given the late hour.
Once they are far away from the scene of the crime, Flamebird slips into the Undertunnels.
The tunnel they follow is shallow and winding, many parts adjacent to the foundations or basements of buildings.
The secret door into the cave below Wayne Manor opens with the press of a hidden button, and Flamebird sighs in relief as they finally reach their destination.
Finally, they let the disguise of a vengeful spirit fall away as they strip and stash their costume- Wally West, lowborn consort of the Wayne patriarch’s eldest heir, is left behind, harmless and supposedly asleep.
Obviously, he’s not actually asleep right now, but everyone in the Manor will attest that he most certainly was, and definitely didn’t just slip into bed a few hours before dawn.
Wally slips upstairs and into his bed, quietly nestling himself against Dick’s sleeping form. Dick stirs slightly, gaze taking in his husband’s features, then goes back to sleep.
Tonight was well-spent, Wally thinks, as he drifts off.
Notes:
Yes, I know it's been a year. I don't care.
Paradox_Crows on Chapter 1 Thu 10 Jul 2025 12:41PM UTC
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