Chapter Text
You are numb, and you are floating. For an unmeasurable moment you are aware of nothing but your own weightlessness, and of a cushioning mass underneath and above you. It's silent, but it's a silence with substance; it sits heavy and muffling in your ears.
It's water.
Consciousness returns in small chunks. You've fallen asleep in your ablution trap before, though admittedly waking up in those circumstances involved a great deal more panic than you feel capable of producing right now. Your mind is a blank, and you are incredibly tired, and you don't know why you're not sinking back into sleep yet.
Vague, faraway sounds carry through to your ears, distorted and muffled. You wonder if they're what woke you up. Are those footsteps? Is that clicking? Is that a clang? Something is resonating through the trap, making the water itself thrum. Your subconscious raises a flag, but you're too tired to make sense of it.
Still, you're past halfway awake now, and the floating limbo doesn't feel quite right. Maybe you'll open your eyes. Eventually.
You can feel the exact moment the water subtly changes. The lethargy — yes, that was the word, that was what you were under — starts to fade, leaving behind a much more visceral, unpleasant feeling of weakness. The thrumming resolves into the blunt aftermath of pain. You register light beyond your eyelids. The sound of sloshing becomes clearer, and you become aware of the flutter of your gills and the water running through them... and you.
That's never a good sign. Once you notice you're breathing water, it's only a step until you start panicking about it. It's such a dumb reaction. It's like becoming aware of the act of breathing, and then hyperventilating. Which, granted, you also do sometimes. Better leave the trap before you start choking for air; play-drowning is over.
You barely move an arm before a warning tightness in your back digs up some extremely unpleasant recent memories. Shit.
You breathe very slowly, very carefully, and crack your eyes open.
Your reflection stares woozily back at you, broken into a thousand shivery fragments. Currents brush your skin in familiar patterns, and your inability to recognize them drives you distantly, muzzly crazy. A thin dark tendril floats up into view from somewhere around your torso. It's very disquieting, and you are disquieted.
Shadows lurk behind your reflection, and your sleepy face wavers and disperses in wild zigzags. Your blood curls and floats around you like every nightmare you ever had. Hands break the surface of the mirror, reaching out to clutch and pull at the red curls—
And lift you up, gently, steadily, the firm surface at your back causing little more than vague discomfort. The world becomes brighter, the caressing currents fade, gravity asserts itself by pressing you down unpleasantly; a cool wind blows on your nose and mouth, and before you know it your body has shifted from gills to lungs with minimum fuss.
You're reclining somewhere now, and it takes a lot of staring before you notice you're surrounded by colorless shrouds. One of them leans over you, eyes like two round holes into nothing; there are gestures, sounds. Some waiting.
Then an acidic, invasive smell burns the little hairs straight out of your olfactory cavities, spreading inside your lungs like scouring bleach. A flower of coherence blooms in your head; the nurse looks satisfied with your boggled face, and changes your breathing mask back to blessed, blessed artificial wet air.
"Please answer me, O Night of the World," he says, thankfully without the theatrical fervor usually attached. Still you feel compelled to answer "I have a name", though to your ears it sounds more like "Um fwm vm numm". Moving your lips is as awkward as smacking two flapping slabs of rubber into each other.
"Looks like he's still confused," says another nurse, her finger pressed rather uncomfortably on the thin skin under your wrist. "Maybe we should administer more—"
"Mm good!" you manage to spit out, though the effect is somewhat lost under the mask. You try to tug your arm back away from the jabbing finger, but two attempts prove to be about as much as you can handle before the world starts listing to the side.
You lie back on the wet ceremonial shroud they hoisted you with and attempt to take stock of your body. You feel heavy and floppy and clammy, even though there are three nurses daintily patting you down with warm towels. There's some shit glued to you — uuuh, electrodes? or whatever — that they're tugging off one by one with lots of fiddling and biting of lips. Your brain is awake but only just, fizzling like a novelty firework and probably for as long as one would last. Despite your brain fizz, your skull feels almost hollow. So does your face. There's a weird pitter-patter in your ears like a couple of fairies took residence; it's probably your pulse. It's probably not supposed to do that.
Your fingers feel like rubber. Your toes feel like rubber. A lot of you feels like rubber. On the other hand, your back feels like slightly achy rubber, and not much else. You'll probably appreciate that in the fullness of time.
"Wuzz goin' on?" you slur, trying to focus on the light-gray figure. You recognize him, he's usually in charge of your health checks, but his name escapes through your brain-fingers. Healer Chemist? Potion Thingy? Medi-Farma? Did you really just think about brain-fingers?
Dude Who Specializes In Drugs pulls down your lower eyelids, slides something in your ear. "I apologize for bringing you back so rudely," he says somewhat conversationally, as he pulls the thingy out of your ear and twists his mouth at it. "But the Elders say you must be seen awake. The Hive is being evacuated, see."
"Hn," you say. And then you say, "Whu?"
"Apparently the Investigarrotiers saw fit to send eight adult flaysquads to comb through the passages," he says, snapping white gloves on. "Last I heard they were spread in the Jade Maze. Anyway," he starts filling a thin syringe with the contents of a thumb-sized container, "this will put you back on your feet for half an hour, so long as you don't pull any stunts. Trim Bell," he says, and a troll stands by with an adhesive bandage as he pricks the back of your hand.
You don't feel the needle go in, and you don't feel it come out, but for some reason you acutely feel the adhesive as it's applied. A belated twinge makes itself known. Warmth spreads through your body, little by little.
"The— the evacuation, though—" you mumble, and then you pause in surprise at your own voice not sounding like you're talking through an egg.
"Oh, it's not anything that dramatic," says the other nurse, her finger still jabbed in your wrist where she's monitoring the fluttering fairies. "It'll probably take them the whole night to notice they're in a maze that goes nowhere. Scraped straight from the bottom of the barrel, as always. We have plenty of time to clear the place."
You don't know what's more unreal: The fact that they're all so calm, or the fact that you're even alive in the first place. What happened to the awful cut on your back?
You brace yourself to sit up, but before you can expend any effort the nurses operate some miracle under the recliner and it slides smoothly into the shape of a chair. The wet ceremonial robe you were lying on flops on your shoulders with a splat.
The next few minutes go by in silent bustling. The nurses help you up from the chair, and once you're on your feet you find that you're nauseous and dizzy and clumsy. Some tugging and poking goes on behind you, and then Trim Bell wheels off with a cart full of pink bandages while the other two pepper your back with spots of renewed numbness until the new bandages feel like they're being applied through fifteen layers of silicon. Then you're wrapped in a warm towel and magnanimously endure having your leggings replaced and new sandals fastened. You're brought the sable tabard with silver threading, which greatly lifts your spirits; it's discreet and warm and you hardly ever get to wear it lately.
You're shivering violently by the time they're done. The warmth is still in your veins, but it just makes the rest of you feel colder in comparison.
Trim Bell has an auscultating bell to your wrist, replacing the jabby finger, and she makes a dubious face. "He really shouldn't be out and about just yet," she says, tugging the bell's earnubs out of her ears.
"It's only for a short time," he says — Healer Luk, you remember now, a sensible guy — but he doesn't sound very happy about it himself. He takes one of your hands and rubs some warmth in your numb fingers, an echo of a thousand previous Health Checks you've undergone in sweeps past. "You're being transferred," he says, and his voice is soft, almost mournful. "We can't guarantee your well-being during the evacuation, so we're putting you in trustworthy hands."
Something about this sentence twigs you as strange, but you can't quite put your finger on what it is. "Er," you start, blinking away your dizziness until something comes up, "what about the pupas—"
"They left ten hours ago," says the third nurse (Healer Braider!), approaching with your ceremonial shawl; it's incredibly warm as she lays it over your shoulders, folded thick and smelling like it was freshly ironed. The silky folds slide over each other and down your back, diminishing in warmth but increasing in coverage; you clutch it around your shoulders and bask until it suddenly hits you.
"Ten hours!?" you splurt.
"You had a lot to sleep off," is all Healer Luk says, tugging his gloves off and touching your forehead with the back of his fingers.
"I've been half-dead for ten hours," you repeat, numb. Your eyes stray towards your basin. The water is constantly filtered and cycled, so the light pink sheen has got to be your paranoid imagination, right? Right?
"Hah, more like twenty!" says Healer Luk, rather too cheerfully. "We had to administer a very strong relaxant to counteract the paralytic poison, but then it turned out that the muscle stiffening was actually holding back the worst of your blood loss, so once the first hurdle was jumped we had to redo your bandages and add some glue and basically you've been marinating in alternating phases of physiological serum and extra-oxygenated water mixed with sleeping draught since then, to counteract the fluid loss and breathing impairment brought about by the lack of—"
Twenty hours! No wonder the Elders want you to be seen out and about. How are your overly impressionable zealots even dealing? It must be bedlam out there. You've probably died three times already in their little minds, spewing holy blood out through the mouth like a grisly sacred geyser. You take a few uneasy steps; oh good, if you drag your sandals you can shuffle with a measure of steadiness, and there's only some uncomfortable tugging at your numb back when you move. Nobody will mistake you for hale, but you might be able to pass for really tired rather than really mauled.
"I'm going... to find... Tavros," you mumble uncertainly under Healer Luk's ongoing medical exposition. You're half-expecting someone to tell you he's been evacuated already, but Trim Bell just nods, and so you shuffle along experimentally towards the doors. It's doable. You can do this.
You have no idea how you're going to open the doors.
Despite all the mechanical sliding entrances used for convenience all over the Hive, practically every block that's related to you has a set of hinged doors instead. Some of them try for imposing, but even in this downright luxurious cave there's only so much zazz you can add to some wooden planks hiding a hole in the wall. When it came to the Cradle of Righteous Rage, however, they went all out: iron, carvings, arched top, even some decorative glass. The hinges are so perfectly equilibrated that you could probably open them with a touch, if only they didn't open inwards for whatever dumb reason. And the nurses know you too well to offer help.
You try a feeble knock, and as feeble goes it is exceptionally so. Against all expectations the knob does turn, though, and the door freezes an inch away from your nose to the sound of a gasping chorus.
You shuffle backwards awkwardly, circle the offending plank and maneuver around a frozen guard. "Good evening," you mumble to the floor and half wave at the usual retinue of decorative guards lined down the hall, shambling along with all the speed of Elder Plucker with a cramp. For once, the gobsmacked guards stay where they are instead of following you.
The Hall of Pools is eerily silent, and, you belatedly notice, dry. You slowly cross the Iron Bridge over the field of blasted craters that was once your personal water park; without water the pools are revealed as the constructs they truly were, with polished bottoms, artfully arranged river stones, turned-off filters and dripping pipes. Artificially built to appear natural. You knew it and you never used to care, but now the sight and feel of it unsettles you to the core — no more rushing water, no more mechanical hum vibrating at the edge of your awareness. The place feels increasingly deader the longer your limping trek takes, and the vertigo you feel when you glance past and down the iron arc is only partially related to your weakened state.
It's only after the Hall and past a junction that you finally find evidence that, yes, there is an evacuation happening, and it's incredibly noisy. Even as you watch the walls are being stripped of tapestries and scrolls, and ornamental light fixtures are being put away or replaced with weak portable sources. There's a lot of gray capes and scarves running back and forth, sometimes carrying objects, sometimes waving sheets, and all in all there's a feeling of great aimlessness and confusion as well as a stifling smell of sweat and fear. You stand there for some time, surprised at how reassured you can be by such a depressingly humorous sight.
Of course, you haven't stood there for ten seconds when the whole thing dies down and you become the focus of many open-mouthed stares.
"Hn," you grunt under your breath, but in the sudden silence it's perfectly audible and you could swear it even bounces off the bare walls. You ignore it and the loudness of your dragging sandals as you resume your shuffling walk towards the crowd.
There's a collective intake of breath as you approach (which you ignore), followed by scattered sources of rapid-fire prayer (which you ignore even harder), and, as soon as your small steps reach the throng, a bubble of unoccupied space manifests around you (which you appreciate for the first time in your life). Somewhere behind you there's a crinkling of paper, some whispers, and a sigh spreads; some sort of spell is broken, and the crowd starts moving again.
Their eyes are still on you, of course, always; but you shuffle along through the shifting bustle, hunched under your ceremonial shawl and paying no heed to the gasps and murmurs that follow your passage. You're wearing your black tabard, and the black tabard means it's your day off.
Yet the effect your presence has on the hurrying cultists is undeniable. Wherever you go, the somber atmosphere turns electric; downcast eyes are widened; every now and then the flash of a picture device flares. Some approach shyly and peer from afar, while others are daring enough to brush your shawl with a finger before skittering off amid breathless gasps. The halls feel hollow and strange, emptied of fixtures which had been an overlooked constant in your life, but in that initial moment when your presence is noticed the air is filled with familiar awe.
You have to be seen. You have to be alive and palpable and real. You appear to have spontaneously generated a pair of busybodies holding up the trailing ends of your veil.
"...fuck you doing?" you hiss when you catch on to their presence. They drop the shawl in surprise when you (slowly and painstakingly) turn around to look at them, and you barely get to initiate your shooing protocol before they hurriedly stumble off. They're hardly three steps away when you hear them whisper to each other about your virtuous humility; you wish you had the energy to run after them and whip their legs with your fluttery silky abomination.
Tavros turns out to be in the Foyer of Friends, currently a resonating echo-chamber of chaos. He's not particularly hard to find, however, since for whatever reason he's also surrounded by a radius of holy breathing space; he's sitting on a gleaming new wheeled device, and seems completely absorbed by the murals.
The Foyer is where secret and not-so-secret allies are registered, generally after death. There had always been a few of them every other generation, you are given to believe — people who thought the philosophy was cool and all but the pacifism and religion and hiding were dumb — but the Empire being what it is, lowbloods rarely bothered with secrecy and went down hard and fast, and highbloods had a much bigger shot at being useful by nudging things quietly in high places. Therefore, the murals in that particular block had an unfortunate bent towards cooler colors, those being the ones more likely to stick around long enough and get far enough to make ripples.
This trend is usually offset by a variety of red decorations, and their removal makes the place look eerie and just very slightly off.
Tavros doesn't react to the sound of your dragging sandals, and you stand woozily by his wheeled ride and catch your breath with slow shallow inhales until he does a double-take at you.
"Hey," you croak.
"You're awake!" he seems almost offensively surprised. "A-are you really okay? Should you really be out here?"
"Yes," you rasp. "Not really, and yes. Look," you swallow through a drying throat, "They didn't harass you about our friendship, did they?"
"Huh?" Tavros looks thoroughly confused.
"They didn't get in your case about my life on the surface, or who else I talked to or anything?" he shakes his head. "Oh, good, though seriously I find that hard to believe, so it's probably incoming. I'm pretty sure you're sick of hearing about my ancestor by now, and you can probably tell these guys make a huge deal out of him, and because of that they can be a bunch of entitled little fucks about what they think is my well-being sometimes." Your voice is growing progressively scratchier. "They'll probably interrogate you like the nosy fuckers they are, and you don't have to tell them fuckall, you hear? You have my express permission to be as tight-assed as a constipated clam. If they get pushy about anything private just call it a secret with capital S, they eat that shit up. Okay?" He nods vaguely. "Good."
You let go of a breath you didn't know you were holding, and your back prickles as your shoulders relax. A sourceless tension ache starts to make itself known. You swallow a couple of times, feel your throat stick to itself. The silence between you two starts to get awkward. Are those little fairy wings embroidered on his button shirt?
"Um," you say, right when he decides to say the same thing. He shrugs and settles back, which is very inconvenient as you have no idea what to fill the pause with.
"Uh," your eyes stray around for a topic, and you finally wave an elbow at the murals. "So what were you looking at here?"
He quirks his lips minimally, as if your question was amusing but only halfway, and points to the centerpiece of this wall — a large depiction of the Summoner in flight, framed in bronze foil. It dominates this particular mural so thoroughly you've long since stopped registering it, even as you keep finding some new ancient spy dude in a corner.
But it makes sense, you think, Tavros did always love fairies and the suchlike, and the Summoner is basically the giant brown fairy of his dreams only instead of some fairy-dust slinging weenie he's this hardened badass who wait wait wait wait—
A jolt runs through your brain and it jumps in gear as if it had been half-asleep all along; a veil you didn't know was there is lifted from your sight, and you stare at the mural, really, really stare as you have not since your earliest sweeps; and you finally understand what you see.
"Oh, fuck," you say, with feeling.
"Uh?" he stares at you in confusion.
"Oh my fuck, Tavros, I am so sorry." You shuffle around to face him full on, wincing a bit when you go too fast. "Ungh. I really, really had no idea, I feel so stupid, I never even noticed, all these fucking tapestries went right over my fucking head, and I even brought you here! And the Summoner is such a big deal, too, I mean, they probably made it obvious to you already, but some of these dudes think he's an envoy from the, uh, Thrones and that's about as crazy as you can get before they start bringing in space fireballs and other such retardities, god I hope they haven't tried to cram all that shit in your head yet."
"I, I'm good," he says, but he looks a bit anxious so you keep on trucking on.
"Okay, look," you limp a bit closer to him, "these assholes have probably tried to lay the guilt-trip on already, right?"
"Well—"
"You know, the thing where they look like starving barkbeasts in the rain while asking for some vague-ass wisdom, or even some vague-ass salvation, and then they look crushed if you so much as make a sudden movement."
"Actually—"
"Well, don't you take any of that bullshit!" you pant a little from the very energetic hand-shaking you punctuated this exclamation with. "You're just enabling their asshole illusion of your supernaturalness which you don't actually have and never claimed to. Just tell them straight away that you have no answers to give, and don't you ever apologize for it. Ugh."
You lean a shoulder against the Summoner's image. Acid started to crawl up your chute during your rant, and you were barely hitting your stride when it made itself impossible to ignore. A few shaky breaths push the burning back down, but by then you've completely lost track of what you were going to say. Being hurt sucks, you think. Somebody write that shit down. Wisdom for the ages.
Tavros stares at you with his eyebrows rising progressively higher, and finally raises a hand in alarm when you sag.
"Calm down," he says, patting the air softly in the standard reassuring maneuver, no-touchies edition. "It really hasn't been much of a problem, as they've been very polite, and I have duly marked my boundaries, which they've respected as well, and..." he scratches the scruff under a horn, "well, certainly they've been trying to get me to dress in some outrageous things, which I presume were in fashion around my ancestor's time, but I let them know I had my own clothes, which I was satisfied with, and that I had a preference for discrete items in mostly black, and now they just hand me normal items of clothing with subtle adornment, much like this one..."
He smoothes his button-on shirt with a hand, seemingly satisfied with the line of tumbling fairy wings embroidered in shimmery bronze thread. They look like they've been severed to you. You'll have to find someone to shout to about slapping creepy depressing imagery on your naive friend, or at least speak very sternly about it, but for now you don't have the heart, or the energy, to crack his happy little face.
"Anyway," he continues, "I had prior warning about all of this, and it was from you, actually."
"Huh?" you blink a couple times. It feels like your brain got all tuckered out from the heavy-weight ranting you put it through in the last thirty seconds or so.
"Yes," he says, and leans forward as if to study your hunched form from a better angle. "I assume you were delirious, since you don't seem to remember, but you told me about my ancestor while you were on the weird healing table, having your wound sewed shut, and your gills washed with special water, and drinking some sort of tea—"
"What? No," you shake your head, and sparks crisscross your sight as you do. "I didn't, I, I only just noticed it."
"You even gave me a similar talk to the one you just said, which was very helpful, even—"
"But," you mumble, and shake your head again, and you think your pulse is back to fluttering at your ears. You don't exactly know why this is such a big deal to you but it just is, and the hollow bubble swirling in your head isn't helping you make sense of why this is making you lose track of up and down.
Tavros grabs one of your arms like a vice, and you clutch right back.
"Karkat," he says, his voice muffled as if you were back underwater, "you can sit on my lap, if you need it."
"What? No!" you squeak, and slap his arm away in surprise. The vertigo passes, the confusion retreats. You're still groggy, but the shock has startled your brain back in gear, and you feel slightly less dumb.
"Okay," you restart, putting a hand on your chest where the nausea is rearing up again, "so you're telling me that I figured this shit out on the operating table, and then figured it out all over again here."
"I'm not sure if that was the case," he says mildly, "since, honestly, you didn't seem the least bit surprised, and it didn't seem like news to you at all."
"Well, that makes fuckall sense," you shoot back, and limp a little when you turn in order to properly gesticulate at the wall. "Look at this asshole, his symbol for the movement's purposes is a ball with stylized wings on top. I only just noticed it was your symbol modified because you were sitting right by it!"
"There's probably a perfectly sensible explanation for this," he says, "which is possibly that you figured this out while lying on my legs on the way here, since you had a good long look at my symbol during that time, what with being swooned on my chest, but you lost so much blood that it didn't stick in your mind afterwards."
"That's the dumbest thing I ever heard," you say, even though it makes perfect sense. You remember bits and pieces of the journey here, but it's all awfully muzzy. Who even knows what you were thinking.
"Okay, then," he dismisses your dismissal with a shrug, and you move back into awkward silence.
Movement in the room seems to be intensifying, even though it's not on the way to anywhere important and all the furniture has been collected already. The reason is obvious to you: Everyone wants to witness the interaction between two revolutionary legends, or at least between their hapless descendants. They'll just mill around until you deliver, and brooding together in companionable silence will only work for so long.
"Urgh," you accidentally say out loud, and when Tavros glances questioningly at you you fish around for another topic. "Uh, find anything interesting in the Hive, though? It's like. So old. Super old. Old as balls."
"Aaah— oh!" Tavros visibly fishes around as hard as you just did, but unlike you he seems to find something worth reeling in. "I saw the place where they grow food underground!"
"The Hive of Greenery?" you blurt out. Of all the actually cool things in the Dark Hive which you constantly take for granted that's admittedly one of the biggest deals, and every now and then it does hit you with renewed wonder.
"Yes, that one!" he grins. "It's really incredible that they grow plants inside a glass block, which mimics the weather on the surface, using heat from the magma under the ground and stuff, which's... actually really scary?" He looks momentarily haunted. "Even though the whole thing seems very controlled, I suppose, and hopefully won't erupt, I guess. They also had all those lamps, which were thankfully turned off, to simulate the sun, and it's kind of sad to think that they'll have to leave all that stuff behind, it seems. You know, I never used to see actual growing food, or taste it, as opposed to food you buy from places, or get in ration packs, and it's all kind of weird, though also exciting in a way, and... some fruits have a weird texture in your mouth when you bite on them," he confides, "which somehow isn't conveyed through bottled juice and ice-cream."
"Yeah, it's different from artificial flavoring," you concur, though in your case you actually got to taste the original fruits first, and sometimes like the artificial flavors better anyway.
"Yes, but nevertheless it was extremely cool to visit," he says, settling back with a smile. "Like visiting in a miniature jungle, which somehow was organized in rows, but still very green and leafy, and which I could even imagine Nepeta running around in while roleplaying as a meowbeast."
"I see," you don't, not really, but at this point you're just letting his voice wash over you as your thinkpan slowly sags back in tiredness.
"I also saw the block with all the lakes, and the cool iron bridge," he continues, "and this marker which is holy for some reason, and I saw the paint makers crushing seeds and flowers until the colors bled out, which was really cool and explains all these paintings a lot better. And I also visited the Recreational Block for Pupas, which is a very comfortable and fluffy place and full of really interesting games, and blocks of all sizes colored in pleasing pastels, and I also visited this wall that had a depiction of you chastising an adult over another cowering adult—"
"Oh god," you mutter, vague memories of calling some elder a big stupid asshole bully at some point or another floating up unbidden through your hazy mind. The memory is making sparks bounce around in your head for some reason. Who was the Elder involved again?
"—and also the place where they make delicate jewelry, though sadly they were dismantling it already when I got there. Are you really sure you're actually okay?"
"Has it been half an hour?" you mumble to yourself, and sway almost experimentally. Okay, no, you're not collapsing yet, you can adjust your equilibrium, your back is still made of silicon. But you're starting to think you passed the peak of this ride not too long ago, and are perhaps gearing up for a lovely featherbeast dive.
"I don't know about the time," he says, "but maybe you should sit down somewhere."
"Not on you I won't."
"No," he agrees. "But somewhere."
"Hn," you're not entirely sure you're even capable of bending right now, and if you do you probably won't be able to get back to your feet. "Maybe... maybe I should go back to my block—"
You're interrupted by the arrival of a massive group of elders, heralded by their usual bickering as they cut through the crowd of curious hanger-ons. The Grand Elder stands smack-dab in their middle, his face so rigidly displeased he looks like a disapproving granite idol with shades. Meanwhile the entourage shifts and stumbles around him in a constant ebb and flow; it's as if the Grand Elder were a displeased gas planet orbited by dozens of Elder Satellites, half of which are competing to be the ones striding purposefully in front while the other half shake their heads.
When they finally reach you the one in front happens to be Weirdly Over-Emotional Elder Cries-A-Lot, who predictably takes one look at you and bursts into tears, and his colleagues charitably shuffle him further back into the group. Three others agglutinate into his previous spot, shoulders stooped and capes shuffling as if trying to look extra servile; you glower at them with all the dignified annoyance a convalescing mystical figure can convey, and they immediately shuffle the Grand Elder to the front. Or rather, they shuffle behind the Grand Elder's statuesque frame, and he humors them by taking the front.
He kneels down, like he usually does when he wants to talk from eye-level. You feel a bit of unease, but you can tell it's unfounded; when you fuck something up, the Grand Elder always tells you about it in private, over a plate of dry fruit and a teapot, and at inconspicuous hours. He understands better than all the other elders how precarious your position actually is. Some other fuckery is afoot.
"How long can you stand?" he asks, his deep murmur concealed by the general bustle of cultists sticking around where they needn't be.
You grimace a little and sort of mumble back. "Ugh, I don't really know, I mean... to be honest I'm feeling kinda shitty, but it's like, faraway shitty or summat— anyway, dude told me his thing would last a time, but that was sometime ago—" you palm your face in frustration. "I'm not even making sense to myself!"
The Elder's face relaxes minutely. "You seem to be in good enough spirits," he rumbles, and offers his palm; sweeps of habit have you rest your hand on it, and their juxtaposition makes yours look almost as small as it did in your earliest memory of him. " We are about to empty the Hive, however..." He presses his lips into a thin line. "The Council believes it would improve general morale if you were present and visible as final instructions are given out in the Gathering Block."
"Uh, sure," you say. The Gathering Block is the widest in the Dark Hive, and it has both a dais (for you) and a stage (for everyone else). It's certainly the place to go for both gathering and visibility purposes. You don't like the way your thoughts are turning progressively sillier, though.
The Grand Elder nods gravely, and when he lowers his arm down to your hip you clutch your shawl and lean your weight on the offered seat without conscious thought or decision or so much as remembering that Tavros is right over there, oh god— but by then the Elder is already rising to his feet like a mighty golem, and an attempt to climb down in embarrassified sputterment would not only be ridiculous and childish, but also incredibly painful.
So, instead of jumping down and clarifying your muddled aromantic relationship with the Elder (while nursing freshly broken legs), you settle back and allow your mind to drift while murals and patches of previously tapestry-hidden rough rock whoosh by.
It feels like no time has passed at all before you're being lowered, and your unsteady feet touch the floor of the Readiness Block. It is, in the tradition of all backstages, dusty and unfinished; the walls are raw cave rock, the floor is uneven and rough, and non-holy debris of Accords and Testimonials past, usually lined on wobbly shelves waiting for the next occasion, are being dumped into bags and captchalogued.
You watch it all happen from a place of weird underwater mufflery. Everything is kind of floaty and swimmy. Looks like that featherbeast is diving! Why were you thinking about featherbeasts again?
Okay, no. Get a grip, Karkat. On this biggass floating bear paw, if you must.
"Karkat." The deep rumbling voice tugs you a little closer to reality, and you manage to focus on the Grand Elder somehow. "Are you sure you're up to this?"
You nod minimally. The hand you have laid on his palm is covered by another humongous, heavy hand— a gesture you're not familiar with coming from him, and which you can't quite interpret in your state. But he just nods once, very gravely.
"The Council wishes to dress you in a newly designed Ceremonial Robe," he says, and you nod again. Robe. Yes. Makes sense. You need to be wearing red. Red means you're in business. "It is a joint creative project by the Weavers, the Jewelerers, the Seamstrices, the Embroiderers and the Paint Makers." He says it very carefully, like this should mean something specific to you, but sifting through layers of meaning right now is too tiresome; you just give another stiff tiny nod, and he lets go of your hand.
Then the Grand Elder stands up and melts into the shapeless gray wall up ahead, abandoning you in some bizarre half-dream. Your ceremonial blankie is tugged off your arms; you barely get to vocalize your dismay before it's muffled by jingling cloth, and when you see the world again it's with a heavy, clacking weight settled on your shoulders. Everything is momentarily louder and noisier.
"Where the fuck is Silk Weaver!?"
"He locked himself in the hygiene block, says he made a mistake on the gloves—"
"Somebody dig ‘im out!"
"He keeps sobbing and asking for an honorable cull—"
"Somebody remind ‘im we don't do that, and then dig ‘im out!"
Several people seem to be kneeling around you, for once neither in prayer nor in patient wisdom; instead they tug your new robe here, tuck it there, and the sudden sting of a pin makes you twitch from your neck down. A belt is tied around your waist, and sewn in place instead of buckled in.
"But what about the gloves—"
"The beading snapped!"
"The new leggings aren't—"
"Leave it to me, where's the velvet—"
You feel the weight of a collar as it's fastened around the base of your neck, and when your hand wanders up in curiosity it brushes several tinkling coins. Other fingers tangle with yours, holding beads to hang around your shoulders; someone tugs at your sleeve, and you feel as it misaligns something by your waist. There's a lot of frustrated hissing around your ears, but you can barely make sense of it.
"Shit!" someone says at your back. "The Green Moon fell!"
What? No. That can't be right. It was there when you arrived, it was this whole thing you had to deal with—
There's a crunch somewhere out there, and the murmur diminishes enough that you can hear a very small "fuck" before it picks back up twice as agitated.
"Somebody bring in a semi-flat size-five jade!"
"Glass will do! We don't have time to—"
Your arm is guided into soft cloth. You raise it and blink at the luxurious red loosely wrapped around your wrist; the assistant doesn't try to pull your arm back down, but neither does she stop what she's doing, expertly sewing part of the cloth around a ring and sliding it onto your finger. Somebody stumbles up with a beaded string, which she drapes around your impromptu glove. It's warm; you notice how cold you've been all over again.
As if weighed down by the awareness of the cold, you finally dive.
For a terrifying moment, you lose track of up, down and the location of your limbs. You plunge into a deep white dream and then come out; somehow, instead of finding yourself flat on your back, you're sitting on the shoulder of whoever's kneeling behind you. His horn digs into your waist. He's wrapped the long tail of your robe around your legs and is dutifully embroidering a cluster of jewels on its train despite the awkward position; someone offers a green gem and he yanks it out of their hand without taking his eyes off his work.
Another velvet tube is being tugged up your other arm. You almost want to ask the assistant if she noticed that you just fainted, and how they kept you up, and how they kept the Grand Elder from noticing—
You blink and stare at the bustling hoods beyond your immediate circle of last-minute adjustments. It still feels like you're surrounded by a very mild hallucination — you can't quite focus on anyone's faces or their actions — but at least you can tell that the unmistakable, massive figure of the Grand Elder is not around.
But you do spot a patch of brown, and your mind clears enough that you understand what you're looking at. It's Tavros; they draped his chair and legs with different shades of bronze, and much like you he's being subjected to a final bout of embroidery. It looks like he's in the process of firmly objecting to the string of fine sparkly chains draped over his horn.
Someone touches your foot, and your improvised seat dutifully holds you steady as you're subjected to velvet leg warmers and even more beads. Meanwhile a shadow covers your sight, and your face is assailed by daubing fingers, and prickly brushes insistently rub over your eyelids, cheeks and lips. Everything clacks and clinks around you at the slightest movement, and it's not helping you fight back the floaty feeling of surreality you're struggling with.
Finally, you're gently pushed back onto your feet, your ceremonial thingy is draped back over your arms, your elbows are adjusted so they'll hold it in place, and then there's more tugging, more clinking, more curses, more rapid-fire sewing. Elder Charter strides up with a horrid hat-shaped... thing under an arm, trailing a pointless veil and yet more beads; he solemnly sets it on your head and steps back, only to twist a corner of his lip in sneering disapproval.
"I guess it'll have to do," he mumbles, turning and sighing in affected tiredness, and it's just such a... thing that it makes you want to walk up and kick his shins, wave a finger at his face and tell him some veritable stuff. Stuff, yes, because your words are fucking off little by little and you can't think of anything more descriptive than that— undeniable proof that you're going to walk out there and immediately dismantle like a hive of cards.
When everyone finally steps away from you, it feels like the stiff cloth is the only thing holding you up.
You drag a sandal forward in a tentative step. Everything around you rattles like an entire percussion orchestra, but you manage to stay on your feet despite your lightheadedness.
The Grand Elder strides in, horns, head and shoulders above his colleagues, his cape flaring wider and farther than you've ever seen it go. He almost looks hurried.
"The equipment is in place," he tells Elder Charter. "The Messenger is waiting."
The room plunges in surprised silence. You suddenly feel suffocated, as if the collective intake of air sucked out everything there was to breathe. Charter doesn't seem to care, though— he just nods and turns to the rest of the room, clapping his hands for attention and initiating a series of complicated gesturing and pointing. Slowly, hesitantly, the assistants leave the block. Elders start taking position ahead of you, and are sometimes dragged by Elder Charter into a different spot. Somebody wheels Tavros to your side, and intense shuffling takes place at your back.
Without you moving an inch, a two-person-wide entourage has formed around you.
"Move at your own pace," says Elder Charter, who's suddenly right by your ear. "I'll make sure everyone follows your steps."
You can't turn your head to look at him, so you do another tiny nod and hope he sees it. Charter steps back.
"Tavros," you mumble, "if I clutch your device out of nowhere it's because of friendship. And symbolism."
"Got it," he mumbles back, and you finally move.
Slowly, ponderously, the entourage starts to file onstage, ruthlessly directed by Charter running up and down the line with hisses and gestures. You clear the backstage entrance without tripping or sagging once, and somehow manage to keep up the streak until you reach the center of the half-circle of capes.
You vaguely remember the half-circle being standard for Minor Accords— usually welcoming cultists who just moved in from whichever place, bringing whichever skill, a clap of hands for our new brosis. It seems fitting for a farewell, though. You stand in place, and let your head float gently as Elder Charter steps forward and gives some sort of speech.
The Gathering Block has become completely alien. The rivulets around the walls are dry; your dais, standing opposite from you for the first time in your memory, is bare of pillows and blankets, and the ceremonial bowls and fancy lamps and scrolls and tapestries are gone. The gathered cultists are sitting on bare rock, their hooded and shaded faces eerie under the half-light from the portable sources hanging over the stage. You can't tell if their orange-ish edges are an artifact of your delirious sight; even though you feel cold, everything looks as hot as if a fire was starting nearby.
"The Followers marked with the triple-braided Iron-and-Gold wristband are to move to the Hive of Red Clay," says Charter, scrolling through his ubiquitous tablet. "Don't try to make the trek all at once; the Waypoint Hive and the Hive of Sandy Breeze have offered space for a day's rest and rations. The tunnels that point in their direction have been walked by hostile wanderers, so it's advisable to stagger your exits and move in groups of two or three. Double-check your daylight capes and skin-protecting-pomade in case you need to move under cover of daylight. The followers marked with the Scarlet and Jade band—"
Your eyes travel over the shadowed, solemn faces and the dark reflective mask of their glasses, their stiff backs and tense shoulders mirrorring yours; your eyes cross in vertigo, and under the weak light they blur together into an indistinct gray mass of bumps and points, a single amorphous blob, anonymous and identity-less.
You're suddenly aware of how little you actually know about them, about all these needy assholes you've interacted with so often for so long. Here and there you recognize a pair of horns, spot a familiar nose, find a set of lips teetering on the edge of recall— but you know nothing about them, only what they do and how they act in your presence. Who are they? Who were they? What was it they were truly after when they threw away their old lives and burrowed underground, sewing you a jewel-studded robe while living in monastic poverty?
More than ever before you feel like a sham, a fake, a con-troll taking advantage of these people's desperate yearning for innocence. You want to tell them that you can't help. You want to explain why they should expect nothing from you. You feel like you should be curling in shame, but instead there's only a dark, empty hole eating at your chest, drafty and cold.
"...remember that the pupas of Dapplehorn Hive have known horror. Employ your Common Sense and do not put them under undue stress," Elder Charter says, tucking the tablet under his arm. "With this, our instructions are finished. Raise a hand if you have anything to say before departure."
Nobody stirs. The air is still and heavy, devoid of the ever-present trickle of water and hum of air recyclers, and without the murmur of cloth and the swish of capes the atmosphere is more solemn than it ever was in any previous ceremony, almost suffocatingly so. Sour anxiety crawls up your throat. Even now, all you do is stand somewhere like a religious adornment so that the fact of your mere existence will bring reassurance to these people whom you barely bothered to—
The solemn silence is utterly shattered when you step forward, swaying like the noisiest and most awkward quackbeast, and weakly raise a hand. Your beads swing and jangle even after you've firmed yourself on your feet.
Their collective attention focuses on you with the strength of a hammer's blow. You had thought it impossible for the Elders around you to emanate any more stiffness, but are proven wrong by the simultaneous surprised flinch that carries through the very air over the stage.
Your previous decisiveness crumples under the weight of their surprise; your back prickles in warning as your shoulders hunch unconsciously.
"I..."
Your voice is tiny and weak and pathetic; it falls muffled out of your lips and straight to the floor like a stunt that failed before it started. No dramatic echo, no booming reverberation for you, only the mundane flatness befitting someone who— you stomp mercilessly on this train of thought, and force your words out through numb lips:
"...I want to see your eyes."
Nothing happens, nobody says a word. Somehow you expected protest, but now you wonder— how could anyone challenge a direct request from you, in such a public location and delicate moment? Even the Elders who've tried to undermine what little influence you have could never do it so brazenly without serious repercussions, and the average follower would not dare, no matter how justified they were. Yet revealing your blood color is anathema, displaying your eyes is forbidden, and there are perfectly justifiable reasons for them to be so.
You've never regretted opening your mouth so deeply.
Cloth shuffles behind you, and you feel more than see the Grand Elder's looming figure step forward. You expect him to stoop down with a kind hand on your back, to cover your view with his cape, to softly tell you how and why you're being unreasonable, and you keep expecting it until he steps to the edge of the stage and reaches up to one of the portable illumination devices, lowering the cover on the furthermost facet and dimming the light that fell on the audience.
He dimms each device one by one, moving to one corner and then backtracking to the other. Some of the Elders seem to realize his intentions and step forward to help; soon the audience is as dark a mass as the sea on a moonless night. The elders step down onto the narrow, respectful space set between the followers and the platform, some gracefully, some awkwardly, and kneel down, their faces turned to Tavros and you.
And then the Grand Elder takes off his glasses and raises them where its silhouette will be clear to those on the back. His eyes glitter from the shadows under his hood, refracting like a meowbeast's under the dim light; seeing their color makes you want to laugh — in surprise or hysteria — as a hundred hints coalesce in your mind into a sudden bubble of understanding.
The other Elders raise their glasses as well, not to be outdone, and as you glance at each of them in turn you can't help thinking I would have never pegged you as olive, I could swear you didn't have fins, you're the mildest purple ever, holy shit, you're brown!, another blueblood?, how are you still alive if you're rust, you being jade explains a lot, you're the opposite of sollux, and so are you, why is there another fucking violet what do violets stand to gain—
Your train of thought is derailed as the darkness behind the Elders wavers, dances, and starts to fill with multicolored stars.
You stare dumbly at the blinking spectacle in front of you; perhaps because of the fading drugs, or maybe because of the severity of your wound, you forget the stone under your feet and for a moment are utterly convinced that you are floating, waiting half-asleep on the edge of infinity, and the shivering lights of the universe are laid down at your feet, a billion thousand wigglers for you to defend and nurture.
Then you slip back into the cave, and ahead of you is not a magnificent cluster of stars but merely a gathering of very scared, very brave people, some staring stiffly ahead, others turning their heads shyly to their neighbors. Yet the intense joy you carried from that vision doesn't diminish in the least; instead, it overflows and runs down your cheek in an embarrassing display.
You crack a shivery smile. You'd thought the warmblooded stars would vastly outnumber the coldblooded ones. You were wrong.
Tavros wheels up to your side with a wide, surprised grin. You grin back weakly, grasp the back of his device and sag over the handles, and the spell seems to break; the Elders climb back onstage, their glasses firmly back in place, and cluster around you while Elder Charter shouts out instructions. Once again you lean on Tavros' device, this time under the guise of pushing him backstage, and as soon as you're out of view you're picked up and sat on one of your own.
They tug the ceremonial headgear off your head, and since you're clutching your shawl for dear life they gather its loose length onto your lap instead of taking it away. You keep slipping in and out of your starry hallucination, carrying from the edge of infinity this weird, fond amusement directed at the moons, the caves, the blustering Elders around you. There's a "tlink" sound, and your device runs over a bump on the floor with a crunch; someone behind you says "Not the green moon again!", and you find yourself snickering inexplicably.
They push you through darkened halls and paths towards the floating platform, and descend to the Grand Elder's lab in a cluster of gray capes. Most of the machinery in the block that isn't bolted down seems to have been put away, and the embedded lights are all on. The Grand Elder strides ahead towards a small platform that was always there but which you never paid particular attention to; it's the first time you see its display turned on, but none of the imagery on the screen feels new to you.
You let your head loll a bit to the side, and spot the drawer in which the Grand Elder used to keep a small portable computer for you. You suddenly, burningly need to talk to the others. Is it still there? Has Tavros contacted any of them during his stay? The Hive's connection is heavily protected and outside communications are for emergency reasons alone, but you were allowed to browse in a broken down and simplified system and troll around so long as you didn't accept any files. At some point you suspected your connection was monitored, but that just encouraged you to be particularly vicious and ridiculous in your convos.
You grasp the handles on your wheels like you've seen Tavros do, but a warning burn traces the edges of your wound as soon as you try to push. You relax back onto your seat. Oh well. You tug the nearest cape.
"C'n you push me over there?" you mumble, and— oh god, this is Elder Cries-a-Lot. You're so not up to his over-emotional bullshit right now.
But he looks down at you from so far away, you wonder if he's not hallucinating the same starry spectacle you did. His glasses are still off. A single tear runs down his cheek.
He pushes your chair to the intended drawer, tucks your knees neatly under the desk it's attached to, steps away and stands there, swaying gently with his face to the wall. You ignore him and pull out the small portable device, still waiting for you. You haven't used it in a long time, and it's smaller and lighter than you remember it being. It's still charged somehow; you boot it up to the very barebones interface, and open Trollian.
Terezi is the only one online.
— carcinogeneticist [CG] began trolling gallowsCalibrator [GC] —
CG: tetrezi
CG: *TETREZI
CG: *TEREZI FUCK.
GC: QU1CK T3LL M3 SOM3TH1NG ONLY K4RK4T WOULD KNOW
CG: I WORWE THE DRAGON CAP EYOU FORGOT IN MY HIVR.
GC: OH
GC: WOW
CG: IC AN TYPE.
CG: ..
GC: OK4Y 1 H4V3 NO 1D34 WH4T TO TH1NK 4BOUT TH3 TH1NG YOU JUST S41D
GC: SO 1M GONN4 4CC3PT TH4T ONLY K4RK4T WOULD KNOW 1 FORGOT MY C4P3 4ND H4D TO GO B4CK 4NG R3COV3R IT 1N TH3 F1RST PL4C3
GC: 4ND 1LL FORG3T 4BOUT TH3 R3ST UNT1L TH3 N3XT T1M3 1 N33D 4 F4VOR
CG: SORRY, IT WAS A CREWPY THING TO DO AND I FELT BAD AFTERWARSD BUT ITWAS WARM ANDI WAS HAPPY AND SAD AN DLONELY BECAUSE OF EVERYONE1S VISITING
CG: AND ITWAS A NIC ECHALK SMELLING HUG.
CG: I MEAN *LIKE8.
GC: K4RK4T
CG: *LIEK* A NICE CHALK SMELLING HUG.
GC: SHH JUST STOP
GC: 4R3 YOU ON SOPOR1F1CS OR SOM3TH1NG?
GC: DO TH3 GR3Y CULT1STS R3GUL4RLY PUT YOU UND3R SUBST4NC3S?
CG: NO, NO.
CG: I MEAN YES BUT NO, IM' ON ATHONG RIGHT NOW YWS BUT I'M NOT ALWALS ON SOMETHING NO.
CG: FUCK.
GC: >:?
CG: OKAY TRYING AGIN.
CG: I A NASTY CUT AND MEDICINE BUT DIVE SO MY DEXERTITTY ISSHOT TO FYCK.
GC: K4RK4T WTF
CG: ALSO I'M DIZZY AND CNR' ON MY FWWT.
CG: SO I'M ON LIKE ON TAVORS ON DVI
GC: OH MY GOD
CG: CE.
CG: ON A DEVICE.
CG: LIKE TAVROS.
CG: SORRY.
GC: OK4Y L3T M3 S33 1F 1 GOT TH1S
GC: YOU GOT 4 N4STY CUT 4ND TH3Y G4V3 YOU M3D1C1N3 TH4T M4K3S YOU LOOPY 4ND D1ZZY SO YOUR3 ON T4VROS WH33L3D D3V1C3
CG: NO, I WAS'NT LOOPY ON THE MEDICINE, IT'S BECAUSE HT EMEDECINE AWAY THAT I CRASHED!
CG: AND I'M NOT ON TAVROS HAS A NEW DEVICE!!!!
GC: OK4Y SO YOUR3 OUT OF M3D1C1N3 4ND CR4SH3ED T4VROS' D3V1C3 B3C4US3 YOU W3R3 LOOPY W1TH P41N SO H3 GOT 4 N3W ON3?
GC: TH4TS N1C3 FOR H1M 4T L34ST
CG: OKAY KINDA, WHATEVERM,
CG: HOWIS EVERYONE/
GC: OH YOU KNOW TH3 USU4L
GC: 3V3RYON3 4CCOUNT3D FOR
GC: WORR13D 4BOUT YOU 4ND 4LL
GC: 4ND CUR1OUS 4BOUT HOW YOU'R3 DO1NG 1N TH3 PL4C3 W1TH TH3 GR4Y P3OPL3 W3 S1MPLY DON'T KNOW 4NYTH1NG 4BOUT
CG: WELL I'M OKAY, OTHER THNAN THE THING WHITH THE WHAT THE THINGN WITH THE AND ALL I'M OKAY.
CG: IT'S LIKE SILICON.
GC: OF COURS3
CG: BUT THEYERVACUATING THE DARK HIVE AND CANT' TAKE ME ALONG BECAUSE I FELL LIKE A OF SHIT AN I'M NO CONDIDTONS TO RUN AROUND BEING SLINKNING IN SHADOWS LIKE I DONE ASSWHOLE FLARPIGN PUNGENT LITTLE PIECE OF FRAGNANT SHIT WHAT BEGNG SLICED OPEN A FUCKIGN HAM WITH POISON AND SHIT. THAT'S STEALTHJ WORK
GC: D1D YOU JUST S4Y TH3Y WONT T4K3 YOU 4LONG B3C4US3 YOU SL1C3D 4 PO1SON3D H4M OP3N 4ND F3LL ON SH1T WH1L3 FL4RP1NG 4 N1NJ4
CG: YES.
CG: YES THAT IS THE THING I DID WHICH I SAID.
CG: LOOK JUST FUCK YOU WHYES EVERYONE OFLINE:
GC: OH TH3YR3 JUST 4SL33P 1TS PR3TTY L4T3 1N TH3 MORN1NG
GC: GU3SS YOU WOULDNT KNOW WH4T W1TH B31NG UND3RGROUND
CG: ..HOW DOYOU NKNOW I'M UNDERGROND?
GC: S1111GH OK4Y YOU W1N MR TOO SH4RP TO L3T 4 S1NGL3 SL1P SL1D3 P4ST M3 V4NT4S
GC: W3 4SK3D G4MZ33
GC: H3 W4S 3V4S1V3 4T F1RST BUT OUR 1NT3RROG4RROT1NG COM1TT33 WOR3 H1M DOWN 3V3NTU4LLY 4ND H3 SP1LL3D SOM3 M4JOR B34NS!
GC: 4BOUT HOW YOUR3 P4RT OF TH3 GR4Y CULT1STS 4ND HOW YOU COULD H1D3 1N TH31R TUNN3LS
GC: 4ND
GC: W3LL
GC: SOM3 MOR3 4CTU4LLY
GC: BUT 1 WONT W34R YOU DOWN T3LL1NG YOU SH1T YOU 4LR34DY KNOW
GC: SUFF1C3 TO S4Y W3 DON'T M1ND!
GC: 3V3N 3QU1US D1DNT M1ND H3 S41D 1T W4S 4 BLOW 4G41NST S34DW3LL3R SUPR3M4CY OR SOM3TH1NG 3QU4LLY T3RR1BL3
CG: OH
CG: HEHE OF COURSE
CG: HOWIS GAMZEE
GC: WORR13D 4BOUT YOU L1K3 1 S41D
GC: BUT R3M4RK4BLY CONF1D3NT TH4T YOUD B3 S4F3 4MONG YOUR GR4Y BROS
CG: OKAY
CG: IF YOU TALK TO HIM TELL HIM
CG: I LOVE HIM
GC: WHO4 TH3R3!
CG: AND I LOVE YUO
GC: OH
GC: 1
GC: UH
CG: AND I GUESS I LOVE SOLLUX TOO, AND KANAYA AND EVERYONE ESLE
CG: THOUG SOME NOT THAT MUCH REALLY
CG: I GUESS I JUST RELALY LIKE THEM A LOT
CG: THEYER ALL VERY PRECIOUS AND DUMB
CG: AND ‘IM GOING TO MISS EVERYONE SO MUCH
GC: W41T WH4T!!
GC: K4RK4T 1 SW34R TO GOD 1F YOU DONT CL4R1FY TH4T L4ST S3NT3NC3
GC: 1M GO1NG TO DO SOM3TH1NG TH4T YOU W1LL R3GR3T
CG: OKAY DAMN, SHIT THAT THERE WAS MAUBE TOO DRAMATAC, IT CAME OUT IN SUHC A DUMB WAY.
GC: BUT 1 WONT 1N TH3 L34ST!!
GC: >:[ ST1LL SUSP1C1OUS!
CG: BUT THEYR'E SENDING ME OMEWHERE FOR TREATING MY BACK BECAUSE IM' TOO WEAK TO EVAUCUATE WITH EVERYONE ELSE
GC: OK4Y TH4T SOUNDS MOR3 4CC3PT4BL3
CG: GOT THE TRANSPORTATIZWR PRIMED UP AND ALL.
GC: YOU M4D3 1T SOUND L1K3 YOU W3R3 JUST GO1NG 4W4Y FOR3V3R 4ND 1LL H4V3 YOU KNOW TH4T WOULD B3 UN4CC3PT4BL3!
CG: WELL I DO'NT KNOW THE DETAULS ,I JUST KNOW THAT ITS GOT SOMETHING TO DO WIHT THE MESSENGER AND EVERYTHIGN THATS HAS TO DO WITH HIM IS A GODDANM SWIWLRING MALELSTROM OF DRAMAPUKE.
CG: SPEAKING OF, IT LOOKS LIKE THE TRAPSPORTALIEZER IS DONE REDADY,.
CG: CREIS A LOT IS GONNA TAKE ME AYWAY NOW.... )B:
GC: >:[ 4WWWW GOSH DONT CRY
GC: CONT4CT US 4G41N 4S SOON 4S YOU C4N!
CG: WULL DP
CG: BUEW!
You drop the portable device back into its drawer and allow Cries-a-Lot to tug your wheeled device away from the table and towards the gathering of gray shrouds. He parks your device right by Tavros', then wanders vaguely towards the other Elders. They look kind of upset.
"What do you mean insufficient fuel!?" someone squeaks.
"We have been using this same lump of uranium for a while," says the Grand Elder, not looking particularly flapped. He's sitting at a small desk, typing on his reinforced computer. The interface looks different from the usual one; it seems to be written entirely in the weird angular Cult Code. Maybe it's a new internal operational system in development.
He hits a last key with a certain air of finality, then rises to his feet. "Step away from the platform," he says. "The Messenger is coming with extra uranium for the machine."
The Elders give the thingy a wide berth. The transpor...tizer? Transportemizer? For some reason you were pretty sure of the term for this apparatus while talking to Terezi, but now you're not sure you ever knew what it was called. In any case, you have a pretty clear line of sight to the sudden crack of light that snaps onto the platform, and to the bizarrely dressed alien that replaces it.
It's wearing brown. Not Tavros brown, but a boring, faded grayish brown in strange shapes. Kanaya would probably have something snide to say about the cut of its garb. But it's certainly broad-shouldered and thick around the torso in a way that could be very menacing in different circumstances.
It steps down from the platform and towards the Grand Elder with confident strides, exposing a row of square teeth and lifting a corner of its weirdly furred upper lip with a roguish smile.
"Horuss, my old friend!" it says in perfect Alternian, extending a brownish, papery hand. "It's been a while!"
The Grand Elder steps forward and holds the offered hand, shaking it once.
"Jake," he says.
The alien suddenly turns to you, its eyes crinkling behind transparent glasses.
"And we finally get to meet again, lil' chap!" he says cheerfully, leaning down over you, and you just... sort of narrow your eyes at him, because hell if you know how to respond to that. At your side, Tavros makes a small aborted sound.
His skin is as papery and saggy as the oldest elders' — though not quite to Elder Plucker's level — but its color is a freaky pinkish brown. The sclera in his eyes — what little you can see of them under saggy, bushy eyebrows — is white, and the pupils are a weird, bright olive. It's like looking at a pair of fried eggs.
He raises his eyebrows at the two of you inquisitively, and then turns back around to drop a chunk of green rock on the Grand Elder's palm.
"Well, here it is! Should last you a little longer than the previous one. I daresay the traffic is going to intensify in the foreseeable future!" He rubs his palms together. "Now gather ‘round, children, it's time to go on a grand adventure!"
"Where!?" asks Tavros, his voice high and tense.
"Oh," the alien draws back, his expansiveness reigned in. His attention focuses on the space at your side Tavros' wheelchair is probably occupying. "Well, my hive, pretty much. Or one of them, I should say, I happen to have several at hand—"
"I don't wanna go!" he says, his voice going squeaky at the end. The air moves, and your side feels suddenly empty. You assume Tavros wheeled his device backwards. Behind the Messenger, elders mutter and gesticulate at each other.
"But Summoner—" one of them says, stepping forward and raising his hands in a pacifying manner; a silky brown cloth flutters by you and lands harmlessly on the floor, and the elder steps back.
"It's Tavros!"
"Tavros," says the Grand Elder, his voice as deep and serious as when he's breaking down a squabble; as usual when he brings out that tone of voice, the bustle immediately dies down. "The Messenger is a trusted ally with access to medical equipment and techniques in a location unknown to the Empire. His people don't practice culling, and can heal wounds and diseases our culture never bothered to develop treatment for. He can easily heal Karkat, and he can probably heal your legs."
An involuntary twitch runs down the whole length of your body.
"Hold your horses," says the Messenger, laying his hand somewhere on the vicinity of the Grand Elder's elbow and tugging him back. "Young man, such promises are not to be made lightly! I can guarantee Karkat's laceration, which is why he's off to get our five-star treatment. But my staff will need a set of X-rays and an MRI before any such claims can be made about Mr. Nitram's set of walkers. Even then," he turns to Tavros, "on the best case, it'll be a whole sweep before we put you back on your feet, young man, and that's the truth of it." The look on his face is incredibly serious, severe even. "Healing takes time. It absolutely must not be hurried."
You turn your neck until you feel tugging at your back, desperate to see the look on Tavros' face, but all you see is the tip of a horn before little black puffs start encroaching into your sight. Goddammit.
The silence stretches uncomfortably. There's a small shuffle of cloth before Tavros speaks again.
"My friends don't even know if we're alive," he says, his voice weak and pained, and guilt and worry grasp at your chest before you finally remember that, no, you just talked to Terezi, and you probably mentioned Tavros to her, didn't you? You open your mouth to tell him, but your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth and you can't seem to be able to pull it down. "Maybe— maybe this is my one chance, but—"
"Nonsense!" says the Messenger, his voice as deep and reverberating as the Grand Elder's. His shoulders are set, chest thrown out, chin raised, eyes bright. "Absolutely not! Never your last chance, my dear. Your have options, you most definitely have choices."
And then he deflates, and approaches the two of you; he kneels on the floor with some effort and muttering, leaning on your chair and turning it around in the same movement so you can see both Tavros' confused, tear-streaked face, and his own twinkly-eyed little grin.
"This is not a farewell, okay? It's just a vacation. And if you don't feel ready to go, don't go. Readying yourself is also a part of healing, so take your time!" He slaps Tavros' knee. "When they reopen the Dark Hive, the transportalizer is going to be sitting right there waiting for you anyway. And even if it takes some time, it's not like you'll have to just sit and wait— where's Lizzie? Lizzie, my dear," he looks around himself, and the youngest elder waves happily from the Elder crowd, her hood slipping over the sawed stump of her horns. "There you are! Remember those strength building exercises?" A nod. "There you have it," he turns back to Tavros, whose face is starting to take on that look of disbelief cultists get when you try to strike a conversation with them. "You get a headstart on that, talk to your friends, breathe easy for a while. When you're ready, just send out the word and we'll be there. No stress, no worries, no pressure. Take. Your. Time."
He wiggles his lip fur in a vaguely humorous manner, and Tavros cracks a small smile. Then, after a nod and a last knee-pat, he stands up with a grunt and turns to you.
"And as for you, young man... why, but you seem to be gone half past the riverbend already! Off we go, there's a good lad. Don't worry, Tavros, I'll make sure he's in good hands and in good company until our get-together is in full motion!"
He lifts you from the wheelchair — what's with all these deceptively strong old people — and walks back to the transportalizer, chattering all the while.
"Alright, I'll upload daily reports for the first two weeks, then shift to weekly when he's back to grumping around as usual. In return, Lizzie, I'll want reports too, you know where to send them, and Horuss, do tell when the rest of the twelve have gathered, I'm sure they're mobilizing right as we speak. Chauss, you have the symbols, right? Good. This is it then, until the connection is back up. See you all soonish!"
The air snaps and sparks white around you; before the spots in your eye are halfway faded you already feel hands tugging away your shawl, picking at the threading holding your belt in place.
You're set back on your feet, but several pairs of hands hold you steady as you struggle with your vertigo. You finally focus, sort of, on your surroundings; the air smells like the cult's infirmary, only sharper and colder, and the walls are green. It seems to be a wide block, and you think those are doors, and there's a sign on the wall with a logo in Cult Code, but the writing is gibberish. You do recognize the blinking numbers on it, but you have no idea what they mean.
Your robe clacks merrily as it's lifted over your head, blocking your sight and brutally diminishing the amount of reality holding you down; you're horizontal when you can see again, and the ceiling over your head is clattering past in a blur with a sound like many hurried voices.