Chapter Text
Gehetag 4, Sixth Lunar Disappearance, 50 CE | The Bonesborough Carnival
Luz stared at the spot where her father's ghost had been. She didn't even get a chance to really say goodbye to him. There was so much more that she wanted to tell him about, but that five minute timer had ran down too fast for her liking, and now her dad was gone. Again.
Taking in a slow, shaky breath, Luz scooped up King in her arms and gave him a tight hug. While the tiny demon initially retaliated against the move, he eventually gave in, wrapping a paw around Luz's back.
Returning to the Resurrections R' Us stand, Luz found that Willow and Gus were there waiting patiently, though Luceritus was nowhere to be found. Noticing Luz's somber look, Willow pulled the girl aside. "Are you good? You aren't looking the best."
Luz took a deep breath, trying to figure out how best to explain that her entire childhood had just been flipped on its head. "I, uh, talked with my dad, and he told me about.. everything." She forced a smile. "But hey, at least I know who I got my basilisk side from. Woohoo." Her fake enthusiasm didn't even convince herself.
The basilisk licked her lips, as they'd gone unusually dry. "Is it okay with you guys if I head home? I've got a lot on my mind. I don't think I'm really up for more carnival fun."
"What? Of course that's fine, Luz," Willow responded.
"Yeah," Gus agreed. "I know that if my life got a bombshell dropped on it then I'd spend at least the next three days cooped up in the house eating eye scream and watching cringe-worthy CB shows."
Luz laughed. A real one, this time. "Thanks for that, guys." She then turned to the demon who stood beside her. "Come on, King. Let's go find Eda and free her from whatever carnival jail she got caught in."
Miraculously, Eda had avoided getting sent to carnival jail and was still running her scam stand. Once the Owl Lady saw the two approaching, she shooed away all her customers, threatening the last few stragglers with a whack from Owlbert.
"So, how was your day at the carnival?" Eda asked, propping her elbow up on the table.
"It was... fun," Luz answered slowly. "King and I met up with Willow and Gus and had fun with the bumper carcasses and stuff, but then we went to the necromancer lady."
"Necromancer lady?" Eda questioned, not familiar with who Luz was talking about.
"Yeah," King answered in Luz's stead. "Miss Lucy-tus or something. She said that my soul looks funny!"
"Right," Eda responded. "That's definitely normal. What about you, kiddo?"
"Oh, y'know, I just talked with my old man," Luz said in a nonchalant tone, doing her best to hide her true emotions. "He told me that he had kept the fact that he was a basilisk from both me and my mom our entire lives, so I'm doing just peachy!"
Eda could tell that her kid was definitely not peachy. "Say, how about we blow this Popsicle stand and head home? There's probably some trashy CB shows we can watch."
"Yeah," Luz replied. "Yeah, I'd like that. Thanks, Eda."
"Eh, don't sweat it kiddo."
Kriegstag 4, Sixth Lunar Disappearance, 50 CE | Hexside School of Magic and Demonics
“1, 2, 3, 4, I declare a thumb war!” Luz and Willow chanted at the same time before starting the battle proper. Both contestants had smiley faces drawn on their thumbs, though the ink was smudged from the numerous battles. While the two thumbs grappled, Gus kept close watch on the contest, as he had been appointed referee and was tasked with counting the pins.
As the battle wore on, Luz found herself slowly being backed into a corner, with Willow managing to pin the basilisk’s thumb every time she tried to escape. Then, though, Luz got a sneaky idea. As Willow pinned Luz’s thumb yet again, Gus started the three count, only to stop when he realized something was off: Luz’s thumb was gone. Since her thumb was no longer being pinned on account of it not existing, Gus called a ceasefire between the two parties and called the match in Willow’s favor.
“What! That’s such bologna! She never got the three count!” Luz protested when Gus announced the decision.
“Yeah, but using your abilities to cheat means you lose,” Gus countered.
“How was it cheating, though?,” Luz said, trying to plead her case. “There’s nothing in the rule book that says you can’t morph your thumb out of existence.”
“There is no rule book, and since I’m the ref I get to decide what’s cheating, so you cheated and Willow wins,” Gus explained.
“Fine,” Luz pouted, before turning to her opponent and offering a handshake, her thumb having magically reappeared. “Good match, Willow.”
“Yeah, that was fun!” the plant witch said with a smile. “Just the right amount of stupid, if you ask me.”
“Well would you look at that, it’s Half-A-Witch and Half-A-Sac,” an annoyingly familiar voice said. “Maybe if you two merged together you could form a competent witch that can actually do magic.”
Luz turned to face Boscha. “I’m sorry, do you want to repeat that? What is it that you just called Willow?”
Boscha laughed, haughty and high pitched. “Please, I’m pretty sure my magical abilities are weakening just by being near you two.”
“I can show you weakened,” Luz threatened, taking a step towards the bully, only to find that Gus and Willow had grabbed a hold of her to stop her from doing something incredibly stupid.
“Oh no, I’m so scared,” Boscha mocked, before laughing again and walking off. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to go be around actually talented witches, not you gutter dwellers.”
Once Boscha had rounded the corner and been gone for nearly half a minute, Willow and Gus finally let Luz go. “I wanna punch her right in her stupid face,” Luz commented.
“We all do,” Gus replied, “but her moms are some of the biggest private funders of the school, so they could probably get us expelled in minutes.”
“Well, if it’ll make you feel better, at least you and I have got photo class today,” Willow said.
That certainly piqued Luz’s interest. “Ooh, are we going to be taking pictures of cool things we can find around the Isles?”
“Not necessarily,” Willow said. “Bump only pulls out photo classes when a teacher goes down and nobody can cover for them. Since Mr. Skullcrusher is still recovering from the pixie attack yesterday, Bump said we’d have photo class instead.”
Luz nodded. “Alright, alright, I’m picking up what you’re putting down. So, what do we actually do in photo class, then?”
Willow smirked. “You’ll just have to wait and find out. I don’t want to ruin the surprise.”
“I’ll have to admit, this was not what I had in mind,” Luz said as she prepared for Willow to extract a memory from her head.
“What did you have in mind?” Willow asked as she cleaned off the memory tweezers.
Luz just shrugged. “To be honest, I’m not really sure. So, are ya ready to pull out a nice juicy memory?”
“Yep,” Willow said. “Alright, Luz’s brain, prepare to be picked.”
As the tweezers entered Luz’s ear canal, she fought down the urge to shudder as the cold metal pressed against the inside of her ear. Suddenly, though, she felt an oddly warm sensation.
“I got one!” Willow said happily.
Was this the physical manifestation of a memory that Luz was feeling? Heh, it felt weird. When Willow fully removed the tweezers from Luz’s ear canal, the two watched as the viscous blob of magic formed into the shape of a photograph. Unfortunately, neither of the two could make out what was actually in the photo, as it was just a mess of different shades of whites and grays.
“Well, phooey. I wanted to see a cool shot of myself looking like an action hero or something,” Luz lamented.
Willow called over the teacher, intent on finding out why the memory was so odd looking. “Excuse me, Ms. Daguerre? Why does the memory look… fuzzy?”
The triclops scuttled over to the pair’s table and eyed the photograph. “Well, that’d be because the memory is very influential. Since it is more detailed, it’ll take longer to develop than a less significant memory. I’d suggest you try again, but go for something less… impactful. Oh, and just as a warning: when you extract a memory, be very careful as to not damage the photograph. Damaging the photo will damage the memory itself, which could cause nigh irreparable damage.”
Luz nodded and gave a thumbs up to show that she understood to not tamper with any of the pics. “Got it. Thanks, teach!”
As the minutes passed, more and more memories were extracted from Luz’s brain and turned into photographs drying on the line. There were a few that Willow recognized from their adventures together, such as the moonlight conjuring debacle and the time that Luz snuck into Hexside as her abomination. Then, there were the memories that Willow hadn’t personally been a part of but Luz still had a fond recollection of, such as one where she had gone through her first shed.
However, as more memories were extracted from Luz’s brain, a worrying trend started to appear. Most of the memories that took place on the Isles were positive ones, but memories related to the Human Realm were almost all negative.
Overdoing it with the practical effects for a play. Grossing out the others during her attempt at joining the cheer squad. Getting banned from art class for having an anatomically accurate griffin taxidermy. Being rejected after asking a girl out to some weird version of Grom.
As the class drew to an end, there was room on the drying line for one final photograph.
“Alrighty, let’s see what we’re gonna end with,” Luz said, rubbing her hands together in anticipation. When Willow inserted the memory tweezers into Luz’s ear, the basilisk had a weird feeling wash over her. It was like the tweezers were going deeper than normal. Extracting the memory, the two watched as it formed into a photograph, though this was one was another blurry mess.
Luz didn’t need to wait for this one to finish developing for her to know what it was from. “Oh.”
Willow paused as she moved to hang the photo. “What do you mean ‘oh’?”
“That’s from –” Luz swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. “That’s from my dad’s funeral. It was a few years back and, that was the first time I really understood when Mami said that Papi was gone.”
She then put on a happy facade. “I’m totally fine, though. Like, it was years ago, so it doesn’t affect me anymore. Besides, I talked to Papi’s ghost yesterday and he revealed that he’d been lying to me my entire life about what I am, so I’m definitely not going through a mental health crisis right now.”
“Right.” Willow responded, not fooled at all by her friend. “How about we go get some lunch? I’m pretty sure the lunch ghouls are serving ratworm today.”
Luz forced a smile. “Sure. I could go for one of those bad boys.”
When Amity was walking to the lunchroom, she would have never expected to see a picture of herself and Luz hanging in a classroom, yet that was what she saw right in front of her. Looking around, she made sure that no one saw her before she stepped into the room.
Approaching the picture, Amity gently pulled it down from the line. The picture was of that trip the two had taken up to the Knee. Specifically, the photo showed the moment when Luz had found that silly little flower and tucked it behind Amity’s ear.
(The fact that the flower was a gift from Luz had absolutely no bearing on the fact that Amity had saved it.)
Still, there was no way that Luz actually reciprocated the feelings that Amity had for her. The two were friends, and that’s all they would ever be. Amity knew what she had to do: destroy the evidence that suggested otherwise.
Summoning a flame at the tip of her finger, Amity held it up to the picture. As the photo caught fire, the witch lamented that she would be burning one of Luz’s memories.It was for the better, though. If Luz never knew that Amity had feelings for her, then the two could go on just being friends and there would never be anything that would challenge the status quo of their relationship.
Once the photo had been sufficiently torched, Amity blew on the picture to put out the last remaining flames. While the borders of the photograph had remained intact, Amity’s blushing face had been burnt from existence. Her dirty deed complete, Amity turned to leave. After all, lunchwaited for no witch.
Amity sniffed at the air. Was something burning? Turning around, she saw a horrific sight: the Knee memory had somehow reignited, and now the rest of the memories hanging on the line were at risk of catching fire as well.
“Oh no.”
For some inexplicable reason, Luz was very hot. She also had no idea where she was, but that was a problem for later. It was like her insides were on fire, but also not at the same time. It was a weird feeling.
Ooh, there was a glass of water in front of her. Maybe that would help. Sending out a mental apology to whoever’s water this was (Maybe it was hers?) she downed it in one gulp. While the agua did help a little bit, she could still feel the heat, and it was spreading .
“Luz, are you, uh, okay?” Someone in front of her said.
“Huh?” Luz oh so eloquently replied.
Blinking fervently to make her eyes focus, Luz eventually saw that there were two people across the table from her. One of them was a shorter kid, while the other had a pair of glasses on. Also, both of them were elves.
“I said, ‘Are you okay?’” Glasses repeated.
“I mean, I’m a lil hot, but nothing too bad.” Luz responded, brushing it off like she couldn’t feel the fire inside of her spreading. “Is this some kind of dream, Miss Elf Lady?”
Glasses looked over at Shorty, a worried expression on her face. Glasses then asked Luz another question. “Luz, what’s my name?”
Well dang that was a curveball that Luz wasn’t expecting. “Uhh…Tatiana?”
Glasses scowled. “No. That’s – that’s not even close. My name is Willow.”
Shorty then decided that it was his turn to ask Luz weird questions. “Ooh, ooh, Luz guess what my name is.”
Before Luz could answer, Glasses Willow had elbowed Shorty in the side. “Now is not the time to be messing around, Gus! Luz’s memory is all… Wait a minute! Luz’s memory is all messed up! ”
“Your name is Gus?” Luz questioned, her brain not yet having processed what Willow just said. “I pegged you as more of an Isaac.”
Willow waved her hand in front of Luz’s face drawing no reaction from the basilisk. “Yeah she’s not in the right state of mind, and I think I have an idea why.”
Grabbing Luz’s arm, Willow then dragged the very confused human with her out of the lunch room and down the hallway. Gus, not wanting to be left out of the fun, ran after the two.
Stopping in front of some random door, Willow then threw it open. A billow of smoke poured out from the top of the door frame. Inside is a weird place for a campfire, Luz thought. Willow then pulled Luz into the room. There were two things that stuck out to Luz inside the room: one was a set of pictures that were burning (Huh, so that’s where the fire is coming from, she thought.) and the other was the girl that was busy trying to put out the fires.
Cute elf hehe. Luz was pretty sure that she had never seen someone so absolutely adorable.The human was transfixed by the sight of the emerald-haired elf.
“Amity?!” Willow gasped, snapping Luz out of her daydreaming session.
Cute name for a cute girl, Luz added mentally.
Amity, as the green-haired elf was apparently called, yelped in surprise at being caught. “It’s not what it looks like!”
“Really?” Willow snarked. “Because it sure looks like you set Luz’s mind on fire.”
“Well when you say it like that it makes it sound bad,” Amity said.
“That’s because it is!” Willow shouted. “Did you not think even for a second before you decided to set Luz’s memory ablaze?”
“HEXSIDE FREE PRESS! Everyone put your hands where I can see ‘em!” Gus yelled, leaping into the room with a dramatic flourish.
Amity complied, raising her arms above her head and dropping the photo she held in her hand. As the memory fluttered to the ground, a stray ember landed on the photo, burning it into a pile of ash.
“Why do memories have to be so flammable,” Amity lamented.
“Don’t worry, cutie.” Luz said, slinging an arm over Amity’s shoulder. “The only thing burning more than my memories is my heart.”
“Ok, we need to get you to the Owl House right now.” Willow said, dragging Luz out of the room.
As Willow, Amity, and Gus carried Luz to the front of the Owl House, they were stopped when Hooty snaked his face (Or was it his neck?) over to the group. “What are you four rascals doing outside of school?”
“Hooty, let us in. Luz needs help,” Amity pleaded.
“Woah. Am I a mermaid? Hehe splish splash.” Looking down, Amity saw that Luz’s legs had fused together into a tail, forcing Gus to adjust his grip on the basilisk’s lower half.
“Please, Hooty,” Amity added.
“Hmm… Okay!” Hooty said cheerfully. The front door swung open, and the quartet carried Luz into the Owl House proper.
“Hooty, what have I told you about letting people –” Eda called out as she went to see what thief the bird tube had just let into her house. When she saw who was standing in her living room, though, she rushed over. “What the - Luz?! What's going on?”
As the kids deposited Luz onto the couch, Amity took it upon herself to explain what had transpired. "I... umm... so you see... I may have burned up most of Luz's memories. By accident. Mostly."
Eda blinked as she processed what she had just heard. Then, she grew angry. "Mostly? You mean to tell me that you set my daughter's mind on fire on purpose."
"I'm your daughter?" Luz questioned. "Does that mean I have two moms?"
"Ah muck, you weren't supposed to hear that. That's a question for later, kid. Sleep spell!" Eda said hurriedly before casting the mentioned spell on Luz, causing her to collapse back onto the couch face first.
Eda then turned to the remaining conscious kids. "If any of you mention that I referred to Luz as my daughter I will skin you alive, got it?"
Three heads quickly nodded.
Eda took a deep breath, then exhaled. "Alright. You three are going to be doing something that is incredibly dangerous and also highly illegal: I'm going to send you into Luz's mind and you're going to repair the damage."
"All three of us?" Gus questioned.
"Well I'm sending in Blight to make sure she fixes all the chaos she caused, but you and Park are going to be there as well to make sure nothing goes haywire," Eda explained.
"I'm not getting out of this, am I?" Amity said softly.
"No," Eda deadpanned. She then summoned a bell and handed it to Willow. "Once you three have sorted everything out, give that bell a ring or two and I'll pull you out."
Then, Eda remembered one final piece of advice. "Oh, and be on the lookout for the Inner Luz. She's the gatekeeper of Luz's memories, so she might be able to help you out. Alright, that's everything. Good luck and try not to die!"
With that final warning, Eda drew a spell circle that encased the three kids before it shrank down and floated into Luz's brain.
Kneeling down, Eda put her forehead against Luz's. "You better make it out of this thing in one piece, kid."
