19,316Happy birthday to Xanxus! This is the very last prepped chapter I have.
Beta'd by the ebullient Insane Scriptist.
Of creation and distraction
Trish Black had not mellowed since leaving Hogwarts; if anything she was more intense and worrying now than she had been then. Rence didn't usually interact with her much, but the Box Weapons had brought her out of her private labs in the gardens and into the Sicily Estate's basement, her interest in Creatures, Flames and Arithmancy all coming together into a positive fixation for the possibilities.
Trish had not featured in the false future because she spent all her time on Warded land; Rence was getting the impression she was annoyed by this having denied her so much experimental data, not that she was saying that.
Obsessive research specialist or not, Trish did have tact. Especially where Rhea was concerned, because Rhea was Lady Black. So she hadn't actually said that -or even hinted at it, really- and stuck to interrogating Rence relentlessly on the simulation data, experimenting with the Storm Crossbill Box and arguing about the mathematics of the amplification circuitry he was currently experimenting with.
On the upside, this was generating a lot of data and Trish's dicta-quills had been modified sufficiently to accurately transpose the mix of Underworld and Mundane terminology as much as Magical. On the downside, Rence had to assist in data collection by defending himself from a highly focused Black who had determinedly monopolised his time for the entire past week; he had to invoke his Potter vassal duties to escape and throw the Things under the hippogriff as well, so as to redirect her focus elsewhere. There were two of them; they could take it in turns to have breaks.
She still had the Crossbill Box, of course; she was still doing new things with it and Rence was perfectly happy to let her keep it, given she was meticulously documenting her findings. Birds were an excellent Box Animal, as guided projectiles as much as for espionage; he was sure Trish would continue to find other ways they could be used, too.
He didn't want to think about what a Black Owl Box Weapon might be capable of; they didn't need Flames to be highly dangerous.
"Good morning, Rhea."
His Lady smiled brightly at him over her breakfast, today's dress plain medium grey with vertical pleats over the bodice, a black woollen shawl secured with a white clover brooch wrapped around her neck and shoulders. "Rence! You've been very busy."
"I have finally escaped Trish, yes," he agreed lightly, settling at the breakfast table next to Odile and winking at Marius and Cassie, who both ducked their heads and smiled into their own breakfasts at this reminder of how intense the cousin in question could get. "The Box prototype is still being tested, but the data so far looks very good." He caught Lord Potter's eye. "I'll arrange a copy for you."
Rhea's husband inclined his head fractionally, broadcasting his appreciation to anyone fluent in interpreting Zabini body language as he sipped his coffee.
"So, what have you been working on while I was being held hostage, my Lady?" Rence asked, serving himself from the middle of the table. "More historical geography?" Meaning the tunnel maps and what they suggest about the early days of the Vongola, which is what Dorea had been preoccupied with the last time he sat in her office with her.
"I'm taking a break from that, seeing as I've done all that can be done from the historical documentation," his Sky said steadily, glancing at him under her eyelashes then turning to give Daniela -sat in the highchair next to her- another torn piece of croissant to gnaw on, "so seeing as Daniela is old enough to start being weaned, I'm going to start a new potions' project. Well," her smile brightened, "not so new, really: I want to develop a potion that specifically focuses on tracking Titan heritage. The Zabini have various genealogy potions they use to determine siren heritage, so as to try and prevent the blood from getting too thick, and there are several different potions in use for untangling the finer details of magical heritage, so I'm sure it will be very interesting and productive. If I get it right it will work for those with non-magical Titan inheritance as well, which strikes me as very useful."
Given all their suspicions that strong Soulfire potential was correlated with Titan heritage, yes it would be. Especially since Titans were apparently behind a lot of the specialised Family Magic, which might mean non-magical Flame Users could also harness a little of that alongside their general Flame affinity. "Well potions are not at all my field," Rence admitted ruefully, "so I will stick to working on the Box Weapons, but I expect Frank will be interested and so will some of the others."
He'd still sit in sometimes, of course -he could chop and crush and do ingredient preparation just fine, as well as take notes- but so would Theo and Blaise and likely Dee and Tracy as well, all of whom were better at potions than he was. Yes, he was capable enough -Alchemy did involve potions after all- but he didn't have the instincts or the creativity for Potions Mastery that Rhea possessed.
He was much better with gemstones; gemstones weren't finnicky about what phase of the moon they were harvested in.
"And of course there's the solstice coming up, so I will be lighting a new Eternal Flame at noon in the hope of seeing more ashwinders," Dorea continued. "It's pine wood we're using now, so with so many fires I'm hoping we'll get another clutch of fertile eggs soon."
"Is there any particular timing element to how often the fires spawn ashwinders?" Rence asked.
"I think there's an astronomical component as much as it being about magical buildup; actual time between spawnings in each fire are semi-random," the Lady Potter said, pulling a face. "In that, there's clearly a minimum time and also a maximum time, but between that there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it so far. And we don't have enough data yet to clarify whether this is about time of year, phase of the moon, vicinity of one particular planet or some aspect of solar activity."
"Well, at least with so many Eternal Flames now burning, there being two ashwinders at once becomes increasingly likely?" Rence offered.
"Yes, there is that." Dorea smiled at him over her tea. "I'm planning for this to be the last Eternal Flame, but if there haven't been any more breeding opportunities by the spring equinox, I might cave and light another one."
"Careful, you might end up with phoenixes every few months if there are too many Flames," Blaise said drolly, glancing up from the newspaper he's reading where he's sat next to Hector. "The ones we have already are bad enough."
"One of them broke into Blaise's bathroom to use his shower," Odile confided with a sly smirk. "He was rather alarmed."
Rence could understand why; the white phoenixes were tall birds with broad wingspans and long necks, all of which was rather hazardous in a space as confined as a bathroom.
Across the table Lord Potter sniggered near-silently, the feathers dangling down his front swaying ever so slightly. Blaise snatched up a medlar off the table and threw it at him; the taller Zabini caught the bletted fruit in a careful hand, set it on his plate, cut it into quarters then put a slice into his mouth whole.
"Zee, you are setting a bad example," Dorea chided her sworn brother as her husband visibly enjoyed his ill-gotten gains.
"Sorry Rhea-dear; don't throw fruit at the breakfast table, kiddos, it's a waste and the house-elves will be sad." Blaise paused, making eye-contact with Marius and Cassie in turn. "Especially don't throw fruit if you're sure the other person will catch it, that is always when things go wrong."
Rence personally did not think that would be sufficient as a deterrent, but his liege-lady and her husband would deal with that when it came.
Xanxus arrived at the Varia to find the main door standing open and the air full of the distinctive Stormy tang of vapourised stone; evidently Bel had started his tunnelling project, finally. The delay had likely been taken up with making sure there were other people in his Divisions -and in Patrols generally- capable of continuing the work when he inevitably lost interest, and that those people the Storm Officer would be delegating to were fully capable of interpreting the maps, navigating underground to avoid the areas of more dangerous geology and also had the required Flame skills to burn the stone without accidentally creating toxic gasses.
Or, if they couldn't do that, were wearing the right masks with appropriate particulate filters and knew how to produce a lower intensity flame to powder the stone rather than burning it. Clearly Bel had also sorted out ventilation -another significant hazard of the process- even though that meant venting through the from hall and clearly half the basement as well. Not the most popular choice of December activity, especially given it was raining today, but given it was Bel most people were just finding things to do elsewhere.
Some people were busily convincing various Mists to come up with air purifiers for the vents in the various basement training rooms, so they could continue to train without having to taste burnt quartz with every single breath, but that was the Varia for you; every setback was an opportunity.
One of Xanxus's conditions for this was that Bel make it clear this was a security upgrade, so there was probably a poster in one of the breakfast rooms, or failing that several in the various most popular Division lounges. Which was another reason nobody was taking action against the Storm Officer: security upgrades were a fact of life and to be appreciated, not obstructed. No matter how inconvenient in the moment.
Not that anybody wanted to pick a fight with the Storm Officer when they could just avoid the side-effects of his latest hobby.
Of course, it wasn't just a security upgrade; it was also about improving local mobility and reducing central oversight. But those weren't really things that should be advertised, given that the Varia's in-Alliance image still wasn't great after so many years of the old fart's low-grade smear campaign. Yes, the Varia needed both those things for effective function -especially now there was magic in the picture as something else they need to hide, including from the Vongola- but they couldn't just tell people.
The Varia needed to be terrifying and inscrutable for the Vongola, especially in the current and worryingly unstable ongoing succession crisis. Things weren't going to settle down again until the old fart was dead, which could take years, and until the formal inheritance ceremony took place in January -regardless of whether the old fart was actually present in person for it- Samu wasn't official either. And Samu desperately needed to be official in order to take over on the diplomatic side of things. Which was steadily getting increasingly dire, but could wait a little longer.
Bel's new project was therefore practical, helpful and an extremely viable long-term investment; it was however also a distraction. Xanxus's Storm was extremely restless at having to wait another two weeks to meet his little sister for the first time -and, Xanxus suspected, also working through something relating to the simulated memories- so burning tunnels very conveniently allowed for a lot of Flame usage, the development of new precision techniques and a grab-bag of other specialist and technical necessities which would be both affirming and time-consuming.
The Varia Boss appreciated that the Storm Officer was self-managing rather than taking out his mood on the mooks. Xanxus was however keeping an eye on things, in case burning tunnels for rapid access across the region for Patrols to move around more discreetly turned out to be not distracting enough. It was unlikely that Bel would go out hunting hitmen with his sister's visit so close, which meant Prince the Ripper would turn to different hobbies, some of which were less socially acceptable than others.
Heading up into his office and glancing over the paperwork -pretty much as expected for this time of year, plus some confidential shit needing to be read through soonest- Xanxus poured himself a glass of wine and settled behind his desk. Bel had Sekti and plenty of minions; he'd be fine. The Varia Boss was rather more worried about his wife.
Dorea's distraction project was an order of magnitude more complex than Bel's; vastly more time-consuming and also rather more risky in terms of variables and moving parts. And most tellingly it didn't really have a set endpoint. It was clearly an interrogation potion of some kind, designed to reveal encoded data, and his familiarity with Information told him that developing an interrogation technique was never done. You had to keep tweaking it, because every person and situation was unique, and the variables were never quite the same person to person.
His wife might well manage to develop a potion that revealed her own -known- heritage, but as she branched out from there into people with unknown heritage there would be experimentation with different ingredients, developing indicators to clarify which potion version would be more effective in a specific circumstance, reduction of variables to create something less specialised but also more generically practical and so on.
All this less than three weeks before Christmas, which was a massive social event in his wife's calendar. It didn't bode well, but all he could really do about it was trust that her Guardians had spotted the problem too and leave mitigation to them. Because in this field he was nowhere near skilled enough to offer to help her out, so would have to settle to asking about her progress at mealtimes and entertaining the kids while she was busy.
And his wife hasn't committed on the matter of the twins attending Mafia Academy either; her throwing herself headlong into a complex technical project was very much like his vanishing into his forge for days on end, but it was significantly less easy to be patient when it was him having to wait around outside the door for an answer.
Any answer. Yes, the general drift of the conversation implied she was probably going to agree with it, but it still wasn't guaranteed and there was also the matter of how. There were a lot of different ways Dorea could go about arranging security, with the scale being not just overt to discreet but Flame-based to Magic-based and personal to collaborative. All of which were different axes, so there were more variations than he could even start quantifying.
And doesn't want to start quantifying. It's a damn waste of his time when instead he could be getting the paperwork done and then get stuck into plotting Squad reassignments, which was actually urgent and also important given he was going to have to send Lektor back to Japan to extract Lightning Girl from the Miura's, preferably this week so he had time to arrange the extraction before the New Year.
Pouring himself another glass of wine and extracting a file folder from the bottom of his inbox, Xanxus got to work. Most of these were mission reports and shouldn't take too long; Lektor had already had a measurable effect on the legibility of everyone's handwriting and the quality of their grammar, regardless of the language being written in.
Maínomai was pondering his retirement plans, not because retirement was in any way imminent but because he was Pýř's Territory and Pýř had committed himself to being Erica's Sky -and she was still Erica in private despite also being Svetníca now- yet Maínomai now also had a Sky so there was some very awkward juggling in their future trying to balance that out. On the upside, Erica did get along okay with Dorea and also with Boss -she still considered him her uncle despite the lack of blood connection and also his being much younger than her now- but on the downside, well.
Dorea was in Sicily because Boss was in Sicily. So when Boss retired from being Varia Head and went to be Principle di Sabina full-time -or whatever else he had planned- she would probably leave. The house would stay, but she wouldn't and neither would most of the staff.
That was a good way off, but Maínomai did have to think about it, so as to make contingency plans and also point this out to Pýř and Erica, so they could plan accordingly as well. He also had to think about his Sky's entirely justified antipathy for more general Vongola Alliance things, because that was absolutely a factor that would fuel her decision to move away from Sicily. As was the fact that in just under six years the twins were going to attend boarding school in Scotland, so she and Boss might decide they wanted to be a bit closer to hand than the far end of Europe. He could teleport, but that distance was a bit much for every day. He'd have to investigate how magical commuting worked and what distances were feasible.
He couldn't necessarily do anything about any of these things, but it was important to acknowledge them so they didn't catch him by surprise. And it wasn't just the retirement complications he had to keep in mind! There was the upcoming Solstice Ball -which Dorea had asked him if he wanted to attend with her and Boss seeing as he was a Lanza as well as her Guardian so he could present himself as officially a Guardian if he wanted- and also the schooling issues his Sky very specifically asked him to help with.
First she'd asked him to help her pick an appropriate German language tutor for the twins -and Hector by implication now he was three and getting better at paying attention- with the clear implication that Varia or ex-Varia was fine, which he'd been making good progress in before she came back to him with a rather different request.
It was this second request that was giving him problems. Not because he couldn't do it! He had plans and everything! The problems were to do with the whys and implications and also that his Sky was very unhappy about asking him at all and yet he couldn't kill the problem for her because the problem was her children and if he even thought about maybe scaring them into changing their minds about wanting to attend Mafia Academy Dorea would probably kill him. On principle.
So yes! Complicated. Also distracting, which wasn't great when they'd been tapped for a mission and Pýř was positive this was the last mission they'd be doing with this Squad lineup, because Boss had that look that said he was going to switch things up again when he handed over the briefing and Ghul and Vahn were speculating over what the changes might be. Maínomai didn't like that the Squad lineup was changing! He liked this Squad! But Boss was Boss and while he probably wasn't going to reassign Svetníca given she was Pýř's Sky and still didn't have a full set of Guardians, that still left Vahn and Ghul to get maybe reassigned and who knew who might replace them. If Boss replaced them at all; the Squad might just get smaller.
"Maínomai."
Maínomai blinked, shifted his attention briefly to the Alteration that recorded conversation when he wasn't paying attention -ah right yes, the 'and destroy the evidence' part of the mission- and nodded sharply. "Vahn and I locate the blackmail material and also the cat, you and Ghul take out the targets, Svetníca coordinates timing and monitors the security teams," he rattled off confidently. "Information indicated the possibility of one of the targets being aware of magic or possibly outright a wand-user, so we're to use Vahn's Aura Sight to check for traces and I might get to use my fun new Warding skills in the field to dismantle traps."
He personally thought it was more likely this particular target was like Bel -internally magical but not able to use it externally without resorting to blood and ritual- given they were entrenched in regular crime and even Maínomai's rather limited exposure to Magical society had made it very clear wizards were like Vongola Actives in being desperately snobby. Better to serve in heaven than rule in hell and all that, not that he particularly thought Magical society qualified as 'heavenly' given its myriad problems that Dorea was very upfront about. And Bel was a poster child for.
The Vongola Alliance absolutely was not heaven either, or at least not for anyone other than the scant handful of people at the top.
Pýř hummed, amused gaze making it clear he knew Maínomai hadn't been listening but perfectly willing to let it slide, given the evidence that the Mist's work-arounds are doing their job and enabling him to operate to a Quality standard in the field. "We'll give you time to dig in then."
Maínomai nodded, caught Vahn's eye -then his arm; Vahn was bad at Transportation- and then the mission was on. Everything else could and would wait until later.
Later arrived in just under twenty hours' time, leaving Maínomai to stare morosely into his hot chocolate in the early hours of the morning. It wasn't even his turn on watch! Well, he'd sent Ghul to bed because seeing as he was awake there was no point both of them being short on sleep, but still! The hot chocolate was helping but the problems were rather persistent!
He managed to remember to drink his chocolate while it was still hot -well warm but that counted- but he was still clutching his empty mug when Pýř settled next to him and he realised breakfast time had snuck up on him.
"Pýř, my Sky is not okay." It was safe to say it, nobody other than his partner could hear him, he'd made sure.
Pýř lowered his mug. "An ongoing problem?"
"Yes. No! Kind of?" Maínomai chewed absently on his lower lip, fingers tapping sharply against his empty hot chocolate mug. "There're several things and they're feeding into each-other, but there's one big thing and the big thing is making the little things hurt more and harder to process. Like, the hating the Vongola thing, that's a little thing: Boss is fine now, the kids have built up their relationships with him, horrible vengeance is coming for Ninth and the man's going to die in deliberately isolated obscurity due to his various Boss-related fuckups which are in the process of tainting everything he's ever achieved and will prompt everyone to put the least charitable spin possible on everything, entirely as he deserves. But like I said that's a small thing because while it does still hurt it hurts less than it used to and will eventually stop hurting entirely because like I said she has Boss back and he does love the Alliance so Dorea's gradually working through her generic prejudiced distaste and targeting her dislike more precisely. But that's not the real problem Pýř, the real problem is that she's grieving because her 'primary drive' in the simulation was something to do with kids -giving Boss a big family maybe- and so that's where most of her simulation-memories are focused and there were four entire extra children by the end there and none of them were real and they are probably never going to be real and she knows they weren't real and she probably knows they'll never be real and-!"
"Breathe," Pýř said, tone firm and completely serious; Maínomai took several steadying breaths.
"The Bazooka was created to project scientific development, Pýř," he whined, setting his mug aside to pull on his hair, "not, not family planning. It made the kids up wholesale and yes they were probably pretty two-dimensional but that's not the problem the problem is that my Sky remembers loving them." Remembering his partner dying had been bad enough; remembering extra children and them suddenly not existing would have been-
Pýř poked him sharply, grounding him.
"I just, how do I tell my Sky it's okay to grieve?" Maínomai asked plaintively. "Okay to cry over people who never existed and weren't even really people at all? How do I help her make space for that when she absolutely does not want to?" He could tell she didn't want to, just by how she'd talked about her new project over the mirror and in person before they left on this mission. She wasn't so angry about Hebe anymore -it was gone and done and couldn't be changed so she was trying to move forwards- but that didn't mean she was better!
Pýř squeezed his arm firmly. "You wait," he said quietly, "and you catch her when it hits. You won't have to wait long; four small children and all the other responsibilities, she won't be able to ignore it indefinitely."
"Pýř that's not helpful!"
His partner stared levelly at him. "That or bring it up on purpose."
"I can't do that!" That would hurt her he can't go visit Dorea and deliberately hurt her until she stops being able to deny she's in pain that's a terrible thing to do to somebody and she'd get angry at him over it and Maínomai certainly has not forgotten that time she half-killed Boss because he said something Dumb while she was pregnant and she lost her temper and cursed him! He's not Boss! He's not even an Officer! She might be sad afterwards but he'd still be maimed or dead!
"Then wait," Pýř said, tone final. Maínomai wilted; okay fine waiting it was then.
"I need to work out a really good Christmas present for her." He actually had something already but he definitely needed more than that given Christmas was the most likely time for her to fall to pieces; either during or right after. Right after, probably; the whole Hebe thing proved that his Sky could hold everything together in front of an audience, even when what was happening was objectively terrible, because she could focus on what needed doing. It was after there wasn't anything to do anymore that her feelings were allowed to catch up again. "Are you visiting your sister in the New Year?"
"Between Christmas and New Year; there's the Inheritance Ceremony in early January."
"Oh yes point." Everyone Varia was on call for that even though they weren't officially running security, due to how destabilising Iemitsu's attack on the Iron Fort had been. The Alliance had tried to keep it on the down-low but news had seeped out and now everything was unsettled. Again. Plus the confusion over who the Decimo candidate was now exactly given the rumours of a Ring Battle in Japan -the Cervello had been so unacceptably sloppy- but Reborn having been sighted on Mafialand recently and saying his contract with Nono Vongola had come to an end.
There were rumours of Boss being Decimo, of Boss being dead -ha not likely- of Squeaky Toy being dead and Iemitsu attacking the Iron Fort as revenge -hilarious when the scum cared more about Nono than about his own son- of Nono being dead and Boss covering it up, so really Maínomai was grateful most of the Allies and the wider Underworld seemed prepared to wait for the Solstice Ball to see which rumour they should believe. Well, the Ball or else the newly-announced Inheritance Ceremony, which was all set for January tenth and being frantically prepared for by Vonogla Housekeeping, parallel to the equally-frantic Solstice preparations. All in all, Maínomai was grateful to be an assassin and well out of all of that.
"I still want to get her something extra for Christmas," Maínomai decided firmly. He should ask Knight or one of the other Guardians about what kind of magical things his Sky would like to receive.
"Could ask Veritas," Pýř said, smirking at him knowingly. "They're cousins."
"That's a good idea, I'll do that," Maínomai said, determinedly pretending that thinking about Veritas was not making him go a leetle hot around the neck and ears. That just thinking about going Christmas shopping with Veritas somewhere magical wasn't setting off a dozen different wildly excited trains of thought that all careered off the rails into speculative lust before actually getting anywhere useful.
His partner patted him firmly on the shoulder, still smirking knowingly. "Breakfast," he reminded Maínomai, whose stomach promptly rumbled on cue.
"Yes, breakfast!" Breakfast and then travelling the rest of the way home and checking in with his Sky; he could mirror-call Veritas along the way, to ask about where magical people did their shopping. Unless it was all mail-order? Well, owl-order seeing as their letters were all owl-delivered.
Food first though; he might be short on sleep but food would help, and maybe he'd manage to nap in the car afterwards.