Chapter A.6: Strachomir's Downtime

On the evening after the adventure with the weird, Strachomir sits alone on his bed in his dorm room. He’s supposed to be resting. Eustace had all but dragged him here and threatened to extract a promise to rest the entire night. And he did rest! But after hours of weaving in and out of consciousness, he remembered that there was something else vital that needed to be done.

Strachomir calls his brother. Twice. Thrice.

He hadn’t responded to the texts he sent earlier either. Neither Snapchat, Discord DMs, or even email. The contacts that have gotten back to him say that they haven’t heard from his brother recently either. His brother hasn’t been in contact at all since months ago when he was helping Strachomir fill out his college applications.

But this was actually an emergency. There was an Unsleelie in that lab that was on a hair trigger! The Listener could feel it on a hair trigger as clearly as the hairs on the back of his neck.

So, Scratch slips off the bed and pokes around in Eustace’s supplies for what he needs. (Eustace has the better stuff. Dear ol’ Mr. Clay can handle the embarrassment of his son and Scratch dating, but not the embarrassment of his son using sub-par spell components.)

A simple summoning. He’s done it before (foolishly) to meet Mother. It should work on his brother. It’s not compulsory, but is an invitation that should be impossible to ignore.

Strachomir speaks his brother’s full Name to the best of his ability, leaning on the connection like his sister showed him to convey intent and context through the bond.

The summoning hangs for a minute or two before it goes through, like a phone call taking too long to connect to the network or having to bounce through multiple redirects before it can connect. Rather than the man he was trying to call forth, someone else steps into the circle, silver earrings catching the light as he emerges from the ether, straightening a fine waistcoat woven of shadow and starlight, his wrists and forearms twined with red strings that form an elaborate lattice before they curl around his fingers and fade out of sight. His fingers stretch to catch a few stray threads from the air as he looks around, lighting them up in verdant green as he gets his bearings.

This… shouldn’t have happened. “Where’s Frank?” Strachomir demands, wary..

Strachomir's Faerie In-Law tries to keep things calm, head tilted and dark eyes focusing in on Strachomir in a brief flash of surprise. "Hey, Scratch, sorry about this, uh, your brother can't leave what he's in the middle of right now, things are kind of... delicately balanced. What's going on?"

The changeling frowns, but there’s nothing else he could do to actually contact his brother at this point, and his brother’s partner might be able to defuse the wrongness just as well. Scratch describes the thing he saw in the lab. His description is melodramatic and a little rambly. He tells all stories like they were ghost stories, and this one even more so because it is true.

The Weaver is quiet, thoughtful, and bites one of his thumbnails as he considers the situation, free hand skimming lightly over the weave of the world around him, grounding himself in the reality of the mortal world. "...are the doors to the lab locked back up? I want to take a closer look, maybe there's something to be done about it. Worst comes to worst... I know someone who can help resolve the situation."

“Yeah.” Scratch pauses, considering if he actually wants to go near that thing again. The horrible old boy who was a monster waiting to happen. “Can I come with you?”

"Definitely. I've never been here before," the Fae smiles, eyes glittering. "How many people do you think would be alarmed to have me ask for directions to an experiment we're not supposed to know about?"

He steps out of the summoning circle, letting his clothes shift from court finery to more mortal trappings, nice boots and a black shirt with black jeans and a black denim jacket with a painting on the back of a fantastical place full of spires backed by a sunset. They make him look more human, though his skin warming from black marble to a far more human mid-brown does plenty of heavy lifting, too. "How are your classes going? Is your boyfriend still being good to you?"

“Of course he is.” The two set out into the dark damp autumn evening. A light drizzle had come once the sun vacated the sky. The light pollution of Arkham lights the night with an unnatural glow, a collective effort of hundreds of thousands of lights spilling power into the night and blocking out what was originally there.

And Scratch rambles about his first semester at Miskatonic University, the people he’s met, and how right Arkham feels in comparison to his hometown. If he loses the thread a few times, it’s because he had used his mind as bait only a few hours ago. But kids are plastic and bounce back remarkably fast.

"Good," Martin grins, all sharp teeth, genuinely pleased to hear of Scratch's continued good fortune, idly running his fingertips along the local weave as they walk, getting a feel for Scratch's new hometown.

His smile widens, not enough to split his face, but certainly too wide for human comfort as he asks supportive, interested questions about Scratch's studies and acquaintances, what he's been enjoying the most, what little things are itching and catching at his edges in ways that are difficult to put into words until someone asks to fill in the gap of conscious and subconscious discomfort.

"It does feel like this town would be a good fit for you - the vibes are very..." he considers, fingers twitching and eyes glinting. "Spooky. Do you know if this place used to have gaslamps? It feels like the kind of place that should."

Scratch grins and tells of the legends he’s heard about the gaslamps.

Martin considers. "Are you expecting the lab building to be locked up by now?"

Scratch tilts his head back and forth, recalling the planning he did earlier in physics class, before they all were distracted by the weird. "I think they lock the doors after the last class, and there's an evening class at eight. So, not yet. The lab doors are going to be locked."

"Alright. None of them should be a problem for The Opener Of Doors," he pulls a business card from his pocket, holding it out to Scratch. "Keep this in your wallet, in case of an emergency. I'll introduce you when we get to the first door we need opened."

Scratch sniffs the card. It smells of tamarind. He puts it in his wallet.

The first set of doors are indeed unlocked. The two slip up the stairs and down the hall. The building barely whispers of their progress. Lights are unneeded and unwanted; their motion-triggers persuaded to stay asleep.

They arrive at the lab, the lock only has traces of hints of tampering from earlier.

The Listener is on edge, ears perked and straining to sense the danger he knew was there.

The Weaver has plenty of practice aiming a summoning. The door into the outer lab locked in as his target, he reaches out and pulls on a familiar thread, calling on The Opener Of Doors.

In hindsight, the mischief aspect in Scratch may have pulled the summoning a little to one side.

He dodges to the side as the door comes off the hinges, revealing a tall, well-built man with very, very sturdy hiking boots.

"....I summoned you to open the door, not break it!" The Weaver complains.

Scratch scuttles to the side, grinning impishly.

"Hello?" A voice from the room calls out. The shape of a boy on the cusp of adulthood, clad in clothes much older than his apparent age, standing in a bright cell of mirrors. A tenuous tether. A forced mask.

The newcomer looks behind him, towards the sound of the voice, ignoring The Weaver's complaints. "....hello?"

"Oh, Cold Stars," The Weaver hisses, launching forwards to grab The Protector's arm before he can approach the source of the noise. "Hey. Hey. Hey. Slow down. Slow down. There are parameters here. Keep your feet on the floor! Scratch, do you mind filling the details in?"

"You would know more, but I think that's an unseelie? It's like… a tornado of fear all wrapped in on itself, coiled like a spring. There's too much anticipation around it all on a hair trigger. It's the biggest idiom of a loaded gun I've seen yet, and it is pointed way too close for comfort." The Tall Teller reports truthfully.

"And it's behind that door, so we are not going to open that door until we know how we're going to deal with the problem," The Weaver pulls his summoned companion over, gesturing to Scratch. "This is Scratch. I told you about him before. Do you remember?"

The deep frown of concern on the man's face vanishes as he studies Scratch, turning slowly into a smile. "Oh." he says after a moment, laughing quietly. "His little brother? Nice to meet you, Scratch. That almost makes us family, doesn't it?"

The Weaver hisses again. "Hush! Back me up, you boulder," he huffs. "Scratch, I'm going to take a look at it, see how it's made, if it's something that can be fixed or not, and if we can't fix it..." he clicks his tongue. "Well. We'll find a solution. A loose unseelie is no good, but one locked in a box feels like a ticking timebomb - or a loaded gun, as you say."

Scratch merely mutters, “I guess…” at the big man before the smaller interrupts. Family is a real hit-or-miss proposition in a tree of relatives like his.

“Ok… what do I need to do?” His fingers curl. He itches to tamper or to hide. He still hasn’t fully recovered from baiting the weird earlier today, but like hell is he going to show it.

"Be patient while I get my fingers into the weave. Trip my twin up if he tries to jump the line, just kick him in the back of the knee or something," The Weaver snaps his teeth at the larger man, then turns his attention to peering at the weave of the local area, threads winding around his arms and hands and fingers as he begins to look.

The other fae shifts from one foot to the other, sighing heavily. He glances down at Scratch, waiting for him to notice before rolling his eyes. "...I know he can pick his own locks without calling me."

The Weaver finds the snarl of the imminent Unseelie. The boy’s mantle solidified and nearly cut free of all mortal fibers. A single strand remains, what’s left of the changeling as he tried to back out of the metamorphosis too late, reinforced only by the constant reminder of what his mortal face appears to be. Nearly everything else of him has withered to dust.

“How come they let you out?” The shell of the boy says.

"I was never inside to begin with," The Weaver says, examining the remaining strand of mortality. What is it that he clung onto that halted his change? It... might be possible to reinforce it, to protect it while trying to unwind and trim back the worst and most dangerous tangles...

It... might be possible to break the crystal formation, it isn't complete, but... it's dangerous. Especially with a witness.

The other question is if it would be worth it to even try. "Can I have your name?" He asks slowly.

Unlikely to work at all, but worth a shot for any possible leverage.

“No.” There is hardly any inflection to the tangle’s words. “I don’t have it.”

That catches The Weaver's attention. That... it's interesting.

Everything should have a name. Those who reject their names become vulnerable and unmoored...

That... might actually be a factor. To stop the process is to reject oneself, and to reject one's name....

He whistles low.

He's seen the effects of someone rejecting their Name before and being given a new Name ... but... what does this look like?

The Weaver turns his perspective to look along that particular line, to pick at that particular knot of how a dropped Name has unraveled the rest of the boy's identity.

Now, everything has a Name, of course. A thing couldn't exist without one. At the very least, a thing would have the tally of threads composing it and descriptions of its patterns; a long, unwieldy, boring Name. And which, yes, this remainder of a boy has. And if The Weaver wanted to inventory each thread, he could spin a handle for that Name, but there are more interesting things to be doing for the next hundreds of years.

Normally, the more interesting things, like people, have denser patterns woven in and around and back in on themselves, forming a core Name that is at once simpler and more descriptive and easier to use to track patterns as they unfold in the grand tapestry of the universe. Mortal patterns evolving chaotically stitch by stitch, sometimes becoming better described with a new Name, while Faerie patterns progress with the same regular structure, unending, unaging, never deviating from their Name.

This tangled remnant of a boy had a Name. Had a changeling Name that had started to transition into the reinforced, resonating, unyielding crystal of a Faerie Name, but the pins had been pulled before the pattern could complete. A single mortal thread was left, piling in on itself and preventing the regular crystal pattern from forming.

That thread has none of the protections an identity usually has, it barely is enough of an identity to self-reference! And even that was tenuous. All it would take is a single tug or a single snip, and the Mantle pattern would be unhindered to complete.

Which would mean... it was hard to tell the exact shape, but any faerie that finished crystalizing would have sharp edges and rough snarls. Definitely not a trooper. Not Seelie.

Iron Teeth and Silence, this isn't good. It isn't the worst possible outcome, but it's not a task that the Destiny-Shaper is looking forwards to taking on.

He is particularly daunted at the prospect of keeping Strachomir safe from an early onset of adulthood if he slips up and says the wrong thing. Changelings are so difficult, sometimes.

Worth the effort, though.

"Guardian," The Weaver says quietly, voice a musical hum. "Protector of the Young. I need you to protect something for me, there is a youth trapped within the Unseelie, being used by it to grow a physical form that would allow it to grow into a more formidable foe. The meal was interrupted, but neither can break free of the other without intervention... I may be able to cut the Unseelie back enough to free him and destroy it, but there's very little left of him and one stray move could finish the Unseelie's work."

The other stares, eyes wide, and stalks forwards. "... show me where, I'll do my best."

Scratch shrinks back, though he is fascinated. The Weaver just danced around something, Scratch only noticing the void by the metaphorical wind stirred from the faerie's shift due to anticipation. The smallest trace of fear. Immediately Strachomir’s mind leaps to what has happened to his older brother. Out of everyone, only the Weaver seems to know.

The twin faeries set to work, teasing apart and protecting that which is left to protect. The Unweaver might have been more well suited for this particular task, but alas, he is indisposed.

The mortal boy would have been an old man by now if not for his locked state. Returning mortality to him is not easily done without the sort of side effects those who slander the Fae sow and reap with their words.

What is left, hours later as the wan autumn dawn threatens, is a nearly comatose mortal boy, stripped of all but the finest roots of his malignant mantle.

The Weaver leans against the wall, exhausted and aching from the extensive time and caution required, eyes shut. "Well. It's done."

"It's not completely done," the Guardian replies, settled on the floor and checking the boy over with gentle hands. "Who is he now?"

The Weaver cracks one eye open. "What, not eager to give him a Name, Guardian?" His voice is tired, half-teasing.

The Guardian looks towards Scratch. "....do you know if they have any papers that might tell us what his original name was? He'll need a new one, his is..."

"Gone," The Weaver interrupts. "I could try to take all his remaining bits and try to form them into a new one that's a natural fit, but that'd take far more time than we've got. What we do got is three heads that can make him a new one."

"You think the old one won't work?"

Luck-Spinner laughs darkly. "Only if you want to weigh him down with the luck that led him here in the first place. No. He'll need a new one. Using part of the old one to put a new one together is fine, and three parts will work nicely," he looks at Scratch. "If you want to learn how it's done. With all Luck, you'll never have to patch someone's name or lack thereof up again, but knowing the way it's done could be of use."

With their work finished and fatigue allowed to set in, the twins both settle into appearances much more human than when working deep in their Aspects. Black marble skin is merely a mid brown now. Eyes again host sclera. Needle-teeth and saber-fangs tucked away.

Scratch rouses from where he was dozing. He had tried to follow along as best he could, but he lacked the appropriate skills to follow along without getting underfoot. And his mind was still patching itself up.

He blinks and nods to the Sidhe. “How’s it done?”

"Giving a **Name **to someone whose **Name **has been lost is... easy and hard, all at the same time," the Guardian says slowly. "Without a **Name **people are easy prey, they're... malleable. You have to be careful."

He stretches, then folds one leg into his body, resting his chin on his knee. "I've had to do it before, when someone rejected their own name."

Luck-Spinner grins, all sharp teeth again. "He panicked. He copied part of his own name and used it, and made himself their new parent without meaning to."

The Guardian gives a disgruntled hiss at the other Sidhe. "...which is why you have to be careful."

"You going to do the same with this one? Or just foster him?" The smaller man laughs quietly.

The Guardian looks to Scratch. "...can you help look for any files that might have an old name on it? We could start there. It's... part of it is instinct. You look at them and you try to see who they are or you try to call out to them, and a **Name **or part of one may form as you do. To make it in a group, we'd want to all focus on them and each offer one piece for their Name."

"Parent or legal Guardian." Scratch jokes. He nods and rifles through the filing cabinets.

He's a particularly good Finder.

He finds the notes tracking the academics' study of the boy. The researcher's names — first Professor Whateley then Professor Varghese — pepper the papers. Strachomir digs deeply into the oldest records and finds marginalia that seems to hint that the boy and Professor Whateley shared a mother. That the researcher who had first put the boy in the cell had once considered him a brother.

Family always was full of strife.

Scratch mulls it over before bringing his finding back to the faeries.

The Guardian goes faintly pink at the joke, unable to deny its accuracy!

The Weaver stares at Scratch, visibly uncomfortable, throwing a look at the Guardian, whose expression darkens as the Luck-Spinner makes a cruel, flippant joke about the risks of overprotective siblings. The joke falls like a rock. He winces as his attempt to hide his own discomfort just makes it all the more visible.

".... maybe it was the only way to keep him alive," the larger man says quietly. "Maybe it was only an opportunity to further his studies. There's no way to know without asking. He isn't here to ask, and the only value in trying to find it out would be for ourselves or for him, once he's person enough to ask again."

"Do you think he looks like a Simon?" Luck-Spinner asks Scratch, tangling his fingers in his shirtcuffs.

Strachomir looks at the sleeping boy. "I suppose... what does it mean?"

He taps into his phone to look up the name. "To hear." He answers his own question. He taps some more. "How about 'Menander'? It means either 'to stay or last' or 'mind-strength-force' and 'man'. Maybe a good middle or last name. Aspirational."

"You going to make something new, or make him family?"

The Guardian looks flustered, looks down and smooths the boy's hair out of his face. He considers giving him the name Arroway, for a moment. Pulls out a phone in a battered case, tapping at it with a focused expression, then nods slowly.

"Simon Menander.... Chance? Clemence? Or... Wren. Simon Wren Menander?" He looks at The Weaver. "Is it enough? Maybe Simon Wren-Ellis Menander? Ellis for benevolence?"

His twin nods slowly. ".... to counter the time with the Unseelie? That sounds like a good add. Why Wren?"

"....vibes." He mutters.

Luck-Spinner looks at Scratch, smiling slightly. "What do you think? Good name, or too much?"

"Eh, if it is too much, he gets to pick his own nickname." Scratch says.

The Guardian slowly nods, then leans over the boy, focusing, breathes in, breathes out, and lets his I'm The Dad Who Stepped Up Aspect take hold.

"Simon Wren-Ellis Menander," he intones, speaking with care, watching the boy, seeing if the Name will take.

A success was rolled

The **Name **settles on the boy, conferring a space and self in which the boy may heal and build. A center point and nexus for a sense of self and key by which the spoken may touch on the soul. A name which his **Name **may coalesce upon.

Simon stirs, then relaxes into a deeper, more natural sleep.

For the first time in many many years, his eyes begin to move under their lids as he dreams.

The first beam of true morning sunlight rims the blinds and transforms the murky lab with soft rays that glint off dust like stars.

The Guardian sighs, slow, and pulls the young man up into his arms, supporting his head against his shoulder. "...I'd better get him home." He looks to Scratch, smile warm and friendly. "Do you want me to introduce you, when he's ready to say hello again, or are you content?"

Lost brother. The thought bubbles up in Strachomir’s mind. Though it was implausible that Simon was another brother of Scratch’s if Simon's mother was the mortal. They had grafted Simon somewhere. In the thicket, it was hard to see if it was his own family tree. Then again, not all family was bad.

"Yeah, I think I would like to meet him once he's up for it." Strachomir says tentatively.

The Opener Of Doors hands him another of his cards, this one with an actual phone number on it. "I'm in and out of service a lot, but if you leave a message, I'll get back to you."

He'll usher Scratch and his sibling into the main lab, then turn, carving one of his signs into the door that led into Simon's holding cell, pulling it shut before opening it back up, revealing a pathway that leads to a large, comfortable-looking home surrounded by woods.

He kicks it shut behind him.

The Weaver tilts his head, waiting for his sibling to leave before he picks up a pen and finds a clean sheet of paper to write on.

He's tempted to leave some nasty snarl behind for the Professor to deal with, but... they've been containing one for years. He doubts they would have survived if the Unseelie snarl had broken out of observation - or that his brother could find someone who could have helped without killing him, at least not without a cost that he couldn't afford to pay. Some problems aren't black and white, and he's managed to keep enough of the grey shades in his sight.

The message is neat and clear.

The boy is healed and has been set free, the monster is defeated and gone. We know of your work. We know of the dangers.

You were Lucky. If you try to make another test subject, you'll never be lucky again. If you find one, remake the sign carved into your door and speak of what you've found.

I'll be keeping tabs on your work and your lab. 🙂

He tosses the pen back onto the table and looks to Scratch, then turns to the door out of Professor Varghese's lab. "....come on, you've got class today, right? Let me buy you breakfast, I'm sure there's something in this town worth trying. You can even invite your boyfriend, if you want."

Dawn has come to Arkham. And the light finds it a bit more right.

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