Knifecrow guardians AU

Tagged as Corvo Attano, Daud, Emily Kaldwin, Jessamine Kaldwin, Delilah Copperspoon

Creator: Hiaen

● The kid is Emily.

● Jess is a single mom.

● The Whalers and the witches are all angels with their own jobs.

● The Boss Angel in charge is Granny Rags.

● The outsider is technically their boss but mostly he pops up at meetings wearing a whale-patterned bathrobes and says cryptic shit. Most of the actual work is done by Granny Rags.

● Thomas is Daud’s current coordinator

● Billie was Daud’s coordinator but got promoted/left

● Delilah is in charge of Jess

● Breanna is Delilah’s coordinator

When Corvo and Daud find themselves both with the same assignment, Daud makes a few calls and finds out that Thomas (his new coordinator since Billie got promoted) actually flubbed his assignment. But he's terrified of Granny Rags, doesn’t want to report the mistake to her, so Daud and Corvo take pity on him and are like, ok we'll just both stay here, what's the worst that could happen? Like sure they're not super fond of each others but they're professionals, they can make it work.

Spoiler: they can't.

Delilah is currently in charge of Jess, she's a bit of a risk enabler but she'll also be here for support and guidance when things get serious. (she insists she's just "encouraging her to loosen up"). She witnesses Corvo and Daud bicker at each others for literal years and it's better than any tv show

Corvo immediately bonds with Emily, ends up being very emotionally close but kinda overprotective. Daud is more distant but always knows how to get out of any situation, no matter how bad. Which ends up being indispensable given how danger-prone Emily is.

Thing is, while Emily is probably a natural at finding trouble, the fact that Corvo and Daud never agree on anything makes things infinitely worse.

They fight about what consists a "reasonable risk". Daud will say that Corvo is overprotective and that a kid should be allowed to climb and run around. Corvo will say that there are better places for a 5yo to spend their energy than a rooftop, goddamnit Daud, what's the average life span of your charges, ten years?.

Emily ends up climbing out of the window to reach the roof, but gets startled by an original insult Corvo throws at Daud and she slips. It's just the second floor, but a broken arm hurts.

They fight about moral compass. Corvo will say that fighting the playground bully is not the way to go. Daud will say that everything will work out so long as none of the adults see them fight. Corvo will say that it would be way more rewarding and efficient to tie the bully's shoelaces so that he'll trip and humiliate himself in front of the class. Daud will stop for a few seconds, momentarily impressed, and then will suggest to steal someone else's money and plant it in the bully's bag to accuse him. They keep debating for several minutes with increasingly elaborate suggestions, meanwhile Emily has gone to punch the boy in question in the face and ends up getting suspended for it.

Emily once asks Daud where he got his large scar. Daud tells her that he got it during a skirmish against demon, millenias ago. Corvo tells her that he's a stinky liar and that he got it by violently hitting his head against a cupboard while blackout drunk. Daud will yell that "NO THAT'S THE OTHER SCAR STOP SLANDERING ME" "Wait so you did get a scar by bumping a cupboard?" "Listen Emily, it was a bit more violent than just bumping and- Corvo- Corvo stop laughing or Outsider helps me I will give you battle scars"

Emily goes to summer camp and shit and kids pick on her but she cant fight or else she'll get kicked out so daud is like psst put snakes in their beds and corvo is like no dont. Daud manages to convince her to get the snakes, but while she's holding them Corvo yells NO THAT ONE'S A VIPER PUT IT DOWN and Daud's like no you're holding it correctly right now it can't bite you but it will if you drop it but Emily has already dropped the snake and inevitably gets bitten.

Corvo and Daud immediately drop their argument and do their best to keep her calm and guide her through the motions without her heartbeat picking up too much. It's not too bad, she's sent to the hospital quick enough, but as soon as she's out of danger Corvo and Daud stop their miraculous cooperation and start blaming the incident on each other.

They have one super big fight and Emily gets so sick of them she locks them in a room together so she doesn’t have to hear them fight

It's an serious topic, Emily had an argument with a friend. Corvo wants her to go talk to them and admit to being partly at fault, Daud argues that Emily was in the right in that argument and it'd probably be better if she just dropped the friendship instead of risking becoming a doormat. A tough argument about communication and responsibilities and boundaries ensues, and it gets personal when Corvo asks what does Daud knows about friendships anyway, didn't he completely drove Billie away by being an uncommunicative jackass? And then Daud lists every single time Corvo got a discipline warning for directly stepping in his charges' lives instead of just guiding them, so Daud may not be the most sociable person but at least he does his job right. The argument turns into a string of personal attacks and Emily ends up locking them away in her room while she goes to ask Jess for advice.

Jess sometimes wonders what kind of incompetent angel got assigned to her daughter because she keeps getting into trouble. She once asks Delilah about it, but Delilah just bursts out laughing and manages to blurt out that she's not allowed to talk about other angels before getting back to laughing her lungs out.

By the time Emily goes back to her room in the evening, they're both sitting on opposite sides of the room death glaring at each others. Daud has a black eye, Corvo's craddling his wrist, both have ruffled feathers. She's also pretty sure they both have tears in their eyes, so whatever they yelled at each others must have cut deep.

She tells them to go away for the night, spend a few hours away from each others for once, go get patched up at the angel nurse or something, she'll be alright for the night and she can't fall asleep with their atrocious vibes anyway.

After Corvo and Daud fight, they both go away for the night. Daud goes to crash on Thomas' couch and steal an ice pack from him. Corvo goes to mope on his own and patch his wrist. The irony of him moping alone right after accusing Daud of being asociable isn't lost on him. The next day, Daud has substantially calmed down and finally feels like he can forget about the argument and never talk about it again. He arrives at Emily's early in the morning, ready to completely ignore any strain in his relationship with Corvo, only to find the guy himself tangled in his own shirt and struggling to put it on. "what the fuck are you doing" "I- fuck, have you ever tried putting that on with a wrist out of commission? Cut me some slack." "Emily managed that at age 5 with an arm in a cast." "Humans don't have wings to negociate with." "Why did you even remove it in the first place..." "Wanted to put my feathers back into place- outsider's balls you'd think after millenias we'd have invented more practical clothing-" Daud watches Corvo struggle for a bit longer, and eventually takes pity on the guy and offers to help him out - after all, he was the one who sprained Corvo's wrist. Corvo hesitates for a second - it's mildly humiliating to have Daud help him putting on a fucking shirt - but it can't get much worse than being caught tangled in a shirtsleeve. He'll allow it.

Daud helps him put on the shirt, he's going through the back buttons and neither of them are saying a word and it's awkward, he'll take the permanent bickering over the silence any day. And he does feel kinda guilty about the whole thing, so for the sake of a continuous working relationship he'll make the tremendeous effort of taking the first step. "I'm sorry I sprained your wrist." Corvo looks at him over his shoulder, half surprised, half expecting a next sentence, and when no "but!" comes from Daud he sighs and answers. "I'm sorry I punched you in the face." There's a beat, then, "and that I dragged Billie into this. I don't really know what happened with the two of you, I just wanted to throw you off. I went too far." There's another silence, Daud feels like there's more that Corvo has to say, and indeed it comes after a minute. Corvo mentions that he has trouble with attachment, and in addition to getting too attached to his charges, he also tends to project on them and is afraid they'll end up alone, so he encourages them to be trusting and never to assume the worst of people. Sometimes too much. Sometimes he pushes them into investing too much effort into a relationship that just isn't worth it. Daud's long done with the shirt buttons by now, starts fidgeting with his empty hands and eventually answers that Emily is really not the kind of charges he's used to. It's a relatively new job to him in the first pace - he stayed in the fighting squads much longer than most, only changing job when the fights against demons died down entirely. After that he was always given charges with especially bad living circumstances, those who would benefit from his non-nonsense brand of support. He was affected to Emily because of an administrative error - Daud is way out of his comfort zone here.

Archives:

“Mom come pick me up my angels are incompetent :(“