Chapter 101: Not So In Control
Varion's eyes opened to wind cutting across his face and shoulders. It felt the same as when air rushed over his scales in his combat form, but this time his body was larger and heavier than his own. His wings held him steady in the air and as he looked down he saw a very familiar island.
'Is that Tenrou?' He thought to himself as a happy feeling bubbled in his chest but it slowly faded as he took in its condition.
Tenrou stretched out below him, cracked and blackened in wide sections. The ground was torn in places and explosions marked the island. Near the coast in the most heavily damaged area a group of people stood in a circle with their hands linked. He looked over them and recognized the woman with red hair.
'Erza.' he thought as warmth flooded his chest at seeing her again.
Then he saw her face, she looked afraid and resigned. He looked at the others and barely recognized them; they looked far older than he remembered. Every one of them had the same look on their face. They weren't fighting, they were waiting, like their end was a certainty.
His body pulled in a deep breath, Ethernano gathered in the mouth, becoming dense and heated. It was the same pressure that appeared when he prepared a roar attack. He tried to turn his head, to force his mouth closed, anything but his muscles wouldn't respond to him.
'No. Stop.'
The energy condensed further in his mouth. He finally realized that his body wasn't actually his, it was covered in scales and the weight of it was wrong. He looked down and caught the reflection in the water below. His heart stopped as a cold spike of fear shot through him. He looked exactly like Acnologia.
He thrashed against whatever was blocking him from controlling his body. It was no use, it simply ignored him and continued on like he didn't exist.
'No, no, no, please. Don't do this.'
The energy reached its peak and left his mouth in a solid beam of energy that struck the island. The whole island was swallowed by a blinding light along with his family. He felt the satisfaction settle and that feeling made him sick.
'No—!!!'
He snapped awake. He was in bed. Prinz was pressed against his right side, one arm over his waist. Rimuri was on his left side and Luminous was sprawled across his chest like she owned it. His hands were fisted hard in the sheets and his throat locked up as he desperately held his emotions in. Tears ran down his face, but he kept his mouth shut and stayed completely still. He did not want to wake them. He laid there, breathing through his nose, and telling himself it was only a nightmare.
'I- I need to be alone for a bit.' He thought grimly as he swapped places with a body double.
He stood at the foot of the bed looking at all 3 of them resting peacefully. Then he turned quietly, opened a gate and stepped through into the cave where Veldora had once been sealed. The air was still thick with magicules as he glanced around then found somewhere to sit. He took a seat for a long moment. He just sat there and breathed and let the quiet settle around him.
'I need to get to the bottom of this, there has to be something wrong with me. Maybe I'm cursed or someone is manipulating me.' He thought grimly
The first thing that came back was the Walpurgis meeting. He had stood there and watched Rimuri take Clayman apart, the way he acted so pathetic as to beg to be spared. It had caused something warm to settle in Varion's chest, and the way he'd been smiling at it worried him.
'That isn't me. I don't enjoy watching someone break like that. I don't stand there and feel good about it, even if they wronged me. So why did it feel like that? What's wrong with me?' he thought to himself.
His fingers gripped his hair and his breathing picked up a bit. He tried to find another moment that felt the same so he could prove to himself it had only been once, a small lapse in judgement.
Then the massacre came back where he had killed 40,000 souls. He thought about how he had watched them scatter and flee at the death of their comrades. He felt that same warm pleasure settle in his chest while his attacks killed them. He stayed in the air and watched until the last of them stopped moving. The way he felt about causing this made him feel sick.
'But they deserved it, they killed my people, hurt my friends, they killed Prinz.' He thought to himself.
He pushed the feeling down and kept going. He needed to confirm that this wasn't just a fluke.
Then he went further back to right before launching the attack and froze. He was back to where he had to listen to that vile excuse for a human to speak about Prinz, what he had done and would have done to her. It made all reason leave him and his blood to boil all over again.
He remembered the exact way his anger had taken control of him and he full allowed it to swallow him, putting up no resistance. He remembered sealing that man in the barrier so he would have to watch every person around him die. The way the man's legs had shaken and the look on his face as he watched his friends die around him.
Most of all he remembered liking it, feeling that this was what that man deserved and that he would get far worse later.
Varion suddenly flinched, pulling himself from his thoughts. His hand came up and touched his own mouth, realizing the corners were pulled into a smile.
He dropped his face into his hands. "What am I going to do?" he murmured against his palms. "I can't keep doubting myself like this. I can't keep finding pieces of me that feel good about this and pretend they aren't there."
That man was still down there locked away in the dungeon. If he went and stood before him, he would see exactly what he was willing to do when the person who hurt Prinz was right in front of him. He would know whether he was still in control of himself or not.
He stood and opened a gate directly into the dungeon, stepped through it without a second thought.
Varion stepped out of the gate and stopped a few feet in front of the cell. The man was sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. When the light from the gate hit him, he scrambled backward until his shoulders hit the far wall in terror and opened his mouth. Varion did not catch whatever came out of his mouth. Instead all he could hear was the way the man had laughed when he talked about Prinz, the things he said he would have done to her body, and the high, cut-off noise he made when he mocked her final moments.
His mind was instantly clouded by rage so intense that His hands started to shake. Then his eyes bled into crimson red and his pupils narrowed to slits. Scales pushed up along the back of his left hand and kept going, covering his forearm. He took an unconscious step forward, then another, and another. His left hand slowly came up toward the bars, but right before his fingers reached the metal, his right hand shot up and locked around his forearm. He was forcefully holding it in place with a grip that was hard enough to hurt even him as both shook violently now.
Varion's head jerked backwards and he looked down at his feet and realized he had already taken several steps without noticing. He recoiled and his breathing turned fast and shallow as he started to panic. He grabbed at his face with his left hand and felt the horns that had already formed on his head. He had slipped into his combat form without meaning to. The realization hit and his whole body started to shake violently.
'I'm not able to control myself anymore.' He thought horrified at the realization
He turned away from the cell, opened a gate, and hurried through it to the first place that was peaceful, safe, and most importantly isolated.