bakerstreet | Hey, can you tell me what year it is?

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[meme] prompts

Hey, can you tell me what year it is?

Ah, amnesia. The old standby for soap operas, it usually involves a good knock on the head and a complete loss of memory. Ever wanted to do that to your character? Well, now's your chance.

1. Comment with your characters!
2. Others comment. Optionally, go to RNG and roll the scenario. (As to who gets knocked on the head, well, that's up to you!)
3. ???
4. PROFIT.

1. HEAD-ON COLLISION - ...whoops. It was an honest mistake, really! You didn't see that car/tree/post/person/whatever coming, but now you're stumbling out of the wreckage sans memory. Better ask for help.

2. WAIT, WHO ARE YOU? - Okay, so a while ago, you got into...something that caused you to lose your memory. Fortunately, you managed to get by and create a new identity for yourself. Unfortunately, someone new has just entered your life. Or should I say, someone who's a little too familiar...

3. RINSE AND REPEAT - Sigh. Really, this is just so inconvenient. You wake up everyday with no memory of who you are, and have to figure it out over the course of the day, only to fall asleep and have to do it all over again the next day. Good thing someone's there to help you out, right? And what's with all those post-its and notes?

4. THIS ROOM'S TOO WHITE - Welcome to the hospital. You've got an "Unknown" tag on your wrist, a healthy diet of bland hospital food, a steady trickle of doctors coming in to check up on you, and a TV, and nothing else. Looks like someone's coming to help you today, though! Here's to hoping they knew you before you lost your memory.

5. I'M SUPPOSED TO DO WHAT?! - Oh, crap. There's something only you can do right now--that is, the you who didn't lose your memory, anyway. Better figure out a way out of this mess and how to control your strange abilities before it's too late.

6. FIGHTING FOR THE WRONG SIDE - Uh, oh. Looks like your enemies decided to take advantage of your confused state and convinced you that you're on their side. Here's to hoping your allies can get you back to yourself before you cause some serious damage.

7. JUST TOO TRAUMATIC - You just saw something that's so traumatic you lost your memory because of it. Unfortunately, right now, you have to remember it, or else something really bad happens. Hope you don't regret remembering this!

8. I DON'T WANT THIS - You've been living a peaceful, ordinary life, for a while. And you'd rather it stay that way, because you're not sure if you'd want to remember what went before. Unfortunately, something's coming, and the key to stopping it lies in your memories.

9. NO SUCH THING - Maybe you were a wizard, or a werewolf, or an angel, or a demon, or something else entirely before, or maybe you just knew about the masquerade. Sadly, you've been knocked on the head and now believe yourself to be a perfectly ordinary person. Magic? That doesn't exist, right? Anything can be explained with science, after all! Right?

10. I'M WHO?! - And who the hell are you? Basically, this is the wild card option! Combine one of the above or make up a new one or whatever you want! Go wild!

Credit:

jading

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Lucas keeps forgetting it's there, is the thing. The computer doesn't acknowledge it, and he can barely feel it, and then-- a long fang slices through it, and Lucas seizes, twitching in a pile of blood and viscera. The hydra falls back, limp and bleeding out, while Lucas has a very inconvenient seizure.

"Shit!"

Forget going easy-- Nyx throws himself headlong into the fray. In the space of a couple breaths, all of the mutant creatures are frozen solid or lying in twitching pieces on the floor, and Nyx is kneeling next to Midnighter, an arm beneath his head and the other gingerly brushing his cheek, all thoughts of new names and bad memories and instinctive rejection gone clear out of his mind.

"Midnighter? Fuck, stay with me, M."

Midnighter opens his eyes. He's two people, too many people, all fake, all masks and lies and blood and fear. The computer is having an interface meltdown. Midnighter wants to hide his face until it's all over.

"Take it out," he gasps, looking up at Nyx. It's a vulnerability, but it's Nyx. He can show that to Nyx, right? "Nyx, take it out, it's turning me back, I don't wanna be him anymore." It's plaintive, begging, before his eyes roll back in his head and his body begins to thrash again.

There he is. The man Nyx l-- the one he was looking for all along, terrified and desperate in a way that makes his heart clench up.

"Midnighter, I-" What had Lucas said? That he'd seizure and black out, wake up plugged right back into the damn machine. Long enough for the fuckers in this facility to tinker with him and put him back in his cage. Nyx would like nothing more than to rip the fucking thing right out of Midnighter, but he's not strong enough to carry the man the rest of the way out, two floors down, and he can just barely drag him, fighting and protecting him the whole way.

"I don't- I can't let you get captured again." If nothing else, Nyx won't let that happen. Nothing else matters. He grits his teeth, hating himself in this moment. "I can't... I'm not strong enough."

And suddenly this asshole is crouching over him. Lucas pushes him away with no respect for his own strength, using too much, probably, and really not caring. "Back off, Artemis."

He stands up, walking away, sluicing some of the blood and melted skin off his arms and sides. "Looks like you packed a punch. Let's get out of here."

Nyx gets knocked back on his ass, startled as he looks back up at Midnighter. Or no, it's Lucas again. He swallows hard, glad to have the other man's back facing him, if only so he doesn't see the expression on Nyx's face.

As soon as the two of them are out, he's gonna rip the cords right out of that thing, tear it to shreds. Get Midnighter- the real Midnigher back. Not this... fake shadow of him with a half assed name. But in the meantime. Nyx casts around for something, anything to say as he follows Lucas into the next room.

"So, why Artemis?"

Lucas finds a locked door, and rips it clean off its handles. He uses it to decapitate a dying killer ferret before tossing it aside. The blood sprays his legs and feet, sizzling and bubbling once more. The pain tells him he's alive, and that's got to be something. "It's mythology. Figured you'd read up on that crap when you were making up your fake as shit name."

"My fake as shit name," Nyx repeats after him, voice flat, feeling the sizzle of the blood through his boots. "Of all the fucking things that could've crawled up your ass and died, it's my name? Don't know what to tell you, buddy, 'cause I didn't pick it."

Another long hallway full of white rooms, this time laboratories full of shining glass and metal, enormous incubation chambers with row after row of petri dishes set in careful alignment.

He turns quickly, grabbing Nyx's wrist. He's a fighter that relies on finesse and speed; Lucas has seen it. In a moment of inexplicable mercy, he doesn't break the man's wrist, just gives it enough pressure, pressed up to the wall, to sprain and bruise. He can still fight, if he's not a total fucking baby about it.

"You got a problem with me? You can fucking leave. I didn't ask for your help. This is who I am." He lets go of Nyx's wrist and turns away, walking back down the hall. "All I am." If Nyx hears regret in his voice, well, he can get fucked.

"No it's not," Nyx snaps back, and they're back to the not smart, not wise school of decision making, but he doens't give a fuck. His wrist throbs-- Lucas had definitely sprained it, but Nyx doesn't give a shit about that either.

It makes him sick, hearing Midnighter talk like that about himself.

"And you did ask for my help. Why the fuck do you think I'm here? 'Cause busting up some shitty laboratory full of assholes is my idea of a day off?"

That gets another snarl from Lucas, expression caught in a feral whirl. His voice is on the edge of anger, teeth bared. "I don't remember that." It's a threat, or a warning.

"Yeah, somehow I figured out that much."

Nyx has to bite back further sarcasm, sucking in a deep breath. It's not Midnighter's fault. None of this is, and Nyx knows that. It's just... he figures that it probably means something, that the memories of him were some of the first to go.

Shouldn't that be a relief? Shouldn't it be something Nyx already knew in his heart?

"...Don't worry about it. We'll get you out. Nothing else matters."

"Fuck you." The anger in Lucas' eyes is tinged with something dangerously close to grief. He squares his shoulders, clenches his fist, makes every step a stomping motion, trying desperately to radiate confidence and strength. "Why the fuck do you care so much?"

But it's more tentative than he means. More shit he doesn't remember. Does he even want to know?

Nyx looks up to meet his gaze, and his eyes are just... tired, weariness in every line of his face, in the crooked curve of his smile.

"Does it really matter?"

Exhale, and he turns away, rotating his wrist to test its range of movement.

"Here's the only thing you need to know, and it probably won't mean shit to you. But I won't betray you. That's it. Now let's get a move on."

"Stop it with this shit," Lucas hisses, his temper rising again. He hates this little man with his ferret face, not giving answers and looking at him with these fucking expectant eyes. "I asked. I deserve a fucking answer."

That's what Andrew said. It's okay to ask for things. It's okay to deserve things. Good things. He already knows he deserves a lot of bad.

"Betrayal? Shit. That's different to everybody. Here's what I know." Because this 'Nyx' bastard probably thinks he's some ignorant idiot. "You want me out of this facility. You know the bullshit designation Bendix gave me when he cut open my fucking head. You know what that sounds like to me? You're trying to sell me back to him. Probably think it's not betrayal, the monster belongs back with its maker. And you know what? And I'm gonna let you do it. Go ahead, sell me. I want the opportunity to twist off Bendix's fucking head. And then I'll come for you."

Expression set and blank, Nyx glances back at Lucas.

"Fine. You called me, about a week and a half, two weeks ago. I came, like I said I would. And I've been trying to track you down ever since. That's what happened, even if you don't remember."

As for the rest of it, all that stuff about Bendix and getting his head cut open and being sold, Nyx also has a feeling that maybe... maybe he wasn't supposed to know this. Midnighter had always talked freely about his past, about what he is, hell, had given Nyx the rundown on it after their first fucking night together. But this is all new information, private, none of his damn business.

Doesn't stop him from opening his big mouth though.

"...And you're not a monster. I don't know a damn thing about the rest." And I don't give a shit, he almost says, but that seems too dismissive, almost, too selfish. None of that matters to Lucas.

Lucas, the man using a name he made up in a gas station during a thunderstorm, hunched next to a trashcan and counting cigarette butts in a mud puddle, has an endless capacity to believe in the fault of his memories. He stills, and the break in his composure shows. The doubt is there. For the first time, he feels the slightest embarrassment in his nakedness.

His voice isn't hushed, but it's certainly closer to it than it was moments ago. "What do you know about me?"

You can pick me up like it's nothing. You've got a fantastic ass. You'd never been to a museum before, never danced, never gone to a festival, and you like trying new things. You give the best damn blowjob on this side of Eos. Maybe in the world. Worlds. You fight for other people, even when you don't have to. You want me to stay in the mornings.

You said you loved me.

"Uh, you were kidnapped when you were a kid, something about making a super soldier, but you're not a soldier now. You're strong," Nyx lets out a little huff of amusement, as if recalling a warm memory, "Hell of a lot stronger than me. You don't eat, sleep, or drink much. You heal from shit that would put me out of commission for weeks. Computer brain. You don't dance or sleep on beds, I don't know why."

That's the basic rundown, he thinks. Maybe Nyx should mention the Doors? Although if Lucas was able to use those, he'd be long gone and escaped from this shithole.

"All that sound about right? It's all stuff you told me so if you were lying out of your ass, I guess this is when I find out about it."

Lucas swallows, and the expression on his face grows more and more worried. Doubtful. "I don't remember you." Why would he tell this man all of these things if he wasn't important? Why wouldn't he remember him? It's... it's got to be these fucking scientists. It doesn't make sense. Lucas doesn't understand.

"I don't sleep on beds because I was homeless," he says, and there's something new in his voice: shame. "And I was homeless because I don't remember... a lot from before. Before I was kidnapped." Anything. But he hasn't even told Apollo that. "I dunno why, I-" Why I'd call you and not Apollo. But, no, he can think of a few reasons, and considering any of those feels like the end of the world. He doesn't want to talk about it.

"Whoever you are-- fuckers here must've wiped you." He reaches up to the back of his head, fingering a lose wire sticking out of his skull. "Might've been on purpose, if I called you. Fuck. I've been playing into their hand this whole fucking time."

Anger is safer than vulnerability. He punches a wall, and his fist goes right through it.

Nyx's turn to still, exhaling a shaky breath. He'd never even considered it, that he might have been taken away from Midnighter on purpose. One more item on the long, long list of things that had been snatched away from him. Fury courses through him, forms a tight, vicious knot in his chest but he shoves it aside as soon as he catches sight of the lost expression on Lucas' face.

Nyx is no fucking good at this-- soothing, offering reassurance, but he reaches out all the same, intending to set a ginger hand on Lucas' arm.

"Hey, easy. Come on, we'll figure it out. But first we gotta get you out of here." They'd been on B6 for too long already, and Nyx is beginning to get a paranoid itch between this shoulder blade. It's been too quiet, too long between attacks.

Lucas looks down at the hand on his shoulder. The fuck does that mean? Apollo is the only one who's ever done that to him, and-- is Apollo dead? Was he made to forget that, too? Or did they... Lucas would never leave Andrew, but Andrew can do better, they both know it. Andrew's never punched a microwave, or had a panic attack from a power tool commercial. Andrew isn't a fucking freak.

Lucas doesn't want to think about that right now. The hand on his shoulder is calming, despite it all. The advice is better. "Yeah," he says. "Let's get the fuck out of here. Lead the way, Nyx."

Right, left, right, and he nearly misses the doorway leading to the next set of stairs down. The card key doesn't work on this one either-- probably not high enough clearance, so Nyx just burns his way through it as well, gritting his teeth as sweat runs down his brow. Never was much of a mage. The magic isn't his, but he's running low all the same, tapping the well dry with a gasp as the heavy metal doors fall away. Jagged scorch marks flare and fade over his cheek, jaw and fingers as he shakes bloodless hands to restore some of the circulation.

The final floor, B7, is again all done up in painfully white florescent lighting. Whirring machinery and equipment are nearly arranged through the large room, and at the far right side the wall is lined with glass tubes containing various people, various pieces of people floating in bright blue liquid, heads and severed spines attached to cords, viscera, free floating arms and legs. Nyx has a strong stomach- he kind of has to, doing what he does, but it's enough to make him queasy. On the far end of the laboratory, behind a thick glass wall, is a short, weedy looking man with glasses and a pristine labcoat, leaning over something half-hidden behind a platform. He looks up, blinking at the sight of the two of them-- Lucas, naked, drenched in blood and gore, and Nyx, dressed but not looking all that much better, and his thin lips pull into a wide smile that looks wholly out of place upon his face as his gaze falls with laser-sharp focus upon Lucas, as if he's already forgotten Nyx's presence.

"I'll have you know, your timing couldn't have been more perfect." He straightens up, and the motion reveal his hands, bloody to the wrist. "The prototype has just been completed and all the necessary information mined from that poorly programmed brain of yous, backups and updates completed, so we're quite out of uses for you, Asset M. By all means, come and meet your replacement."

Behind the scientist, something picks itself up from the floor- something human-like in shape alone, over seven feet tall and skinless, oozing blood, as if someone had taken a giant and flayed him, left him with eyeballs rolling in open sockets and mouth contorted in a rictus grin. It looks Lucas and Nyx over with cold, cold blue eyes, and begins striding forward.

"The ah, aesthetic component hasn't been completed yet, but... finishing touches, you know."

There's something very appealing about this.

Lucas is angry at himself, angry at this entire situation he's gotten himself into, angry at the monster he is. The chance to destroy that creature, a hulking clone of himself, that's suits his self-loathing just fine. Seeing what he feels like inside and beating it to death? Count him in.

Lucas smiles at the creature lumbering toward them with the same knife-edged bloodlust he's always used, will always have, can't escape from.

"Bring it on. I'm gonna kick your ass, Pygmalion." And he's rushing forward, roaring angrily as he swings for a punch right between the thing's eyes.

"Midnighter, wait!"

The thing, the giant, the monster-that-isn't Midnighter, makes no effort to dodge, just takes the punch without a noise or reaction, not even a flinch at the sheer brutal force of Midnighter's blow. The scientist had immediately turned tail and fled for the exit at the first hint of combat, but he pauses to gloat, eyes bright with sick pride.

"Ah yes... one of the many upgrades we made- its muscles can repel kinetic force or absorb it and turn it back upon its enemies. Please obser- augh!" Forget the monster, go for its handler. Nyx warps across the room in a flash, catching and slamming the scientist against the glass wall of the room, just as the creature punches Lucas in the gut with a blow like a sledgehammer. It looks up at the scientist's pained cries, back down at Lucas, and then casually turns away as if in dismissal, lumbering toward Nyx.

Lucas is all fury, being sent sprawling back and scrabbling up for another chance to fight. It's all he can think of, putting his fists into the pain of this, destroying everything until there's nothing left, until the blood drowns them both. But Nyx is smarter and faster, and he understands instantly why he would have asked for his help.

He also understands that his leg is shattered. Well, what else is new. He lopes after the creature, not caring how his leg sticks out wrong, fresh blood oozing out of rips in his side. "If you hurt him, I swear to god-"

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