Rewind and Repeat

I raised an eyebrow at my screen. They talked pretty consistently, which was normal considering they were matesprits, so her not replying to him would be unusual. I had just seen her this evening, but she was acting weird. She was emotionless instead of enthusiastic, and she had been blank faced instead of smiling. Was something wrong?

CG: FIRST OF ALL, SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU KNOW I HAVE OTHER SHIT TO DO BESIDES SIT ON TROLLIAN ALL NIGHT.

CG: AS FOR ARADIA, I SAW HER THIS EVENING IN THE PRINCIPIUM MARKETPLACE.

CG: SHE WAS ACTING KIND OF WEIRD, BUT SHE WAS THERE.

CG: I DON’T KNOW WHERE SHE WENT THOUGH.

TA: 2he wa2 actiing weiird?

TA: how wa2 2he actiing weiird?

CG: SHE WASN’T ALL CHEERY AND SHIT.

CG: SHE HAD A COMPLETELY BLANK FACIAL EXPRESSION AND BARELY ACKNOWLEDGED MY EXISTENCE.

CG: I WALKED RIGHT INTO HER SO I HAVE NO IDEA HOW SHE COULDN’T HAVE KNOWN I WAS THERE RIGHT AWAY.

CG: SHE DIDN’T EVEN NOTICE UNTIL I TRIED TO WALK AROUND HER.

CG: SHE WAS ACTING WEIRD AS FUCK, BUT I DON’T KNOW WHY.

TA: 2he wa2 actiing kiind of weiird when ii la2t heard from her two.

TA: 2ayiing all thii2 2trange 2hiit before 2uddenly loggiing off.

TA: ii've had a miigraiine 2iince ii la2t heard from her, ii thiink 2omethiing happened ii ju2t don't know what.

CG: SHE’S PROBABLY FOUND SOME STRANGE RUIN ON ONE OF HER DIGS OR SOME SHIT.

CG: YOU KNOW SHE SPENDS MORE TIME DIGGING THAN ANYTHING ELSE.

TA: ii 2tiill thiink 2omethiing happened, and ii'm goiing two fiind out what.

—twinArmageddons ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist—

I’m pretty sure everything that was happening lately was strange and it was getting aggravating.

I ran both my hands down my face and stared at the ceiling for a few moments before looking back down to my husktop. I was just going to have to deal with the weirdness because my friends are lunatics anyway, they’re probably just trying to fuck with me or something.

As for finding Aradia, I wondered if Tavros would know anything. They were pretty close, so even though Aradia may not have been talking to Sollux for some reason, maybe she had been talking to Tavros.

—carcinoGeneticist began trolling adiosToreador—

CG: TAVROS, HAVE YOU HEARD FROM ARADIA AT ALL?

CG: SOLLUX IS LOSING HIS SHIT ALL OVER THE METAPHORICAL PLACE TRYING TO FIND HER.

CG: IF ANYONE ELSE HAD HEARD FROM HER I WOULD THINK IT WOULD BE YOU.

CG: ARE YOU EVEN ONLINE RIGHT NOW?

CG: FOR FUCK’S SAKE, I’LL COME BACK LATER.

—carcinoGeneticist ceased trolling adiosToreador—

There goes that idea.

I got up and paced around my respiteblock, it was likely that Aradia had gone to do some digging in the middle of nowhere and hadn’t gotten back to Sollux, but there wasn’t much over here ruin-wise and I last saw her here.

I looked around my block and realized that it was a mess, so I started picking laundry off the floor and throwing it into the laundry basket, re-organizing my books and putting them on the shelved reading platform instead of them being all over the floor and my desk, and changing out the sopor in my recouperacoon. All of this took an hour, but it did nothing to clear my thinkpan.

Maybe fresh air would help, who knows.

I walked downstairs, rubbing my head, and grabbed my cloak off the hook without even looking. Putting it on was a pain seeing as I was distracted, but I managed and walked out the front door, pulling the hood up.

It was later in the night, so there weren’t many trolls out. Dawn was still a ways off though, so I had plenty of time to walk around. The temperature wasn’t extremely cold, but it wasn’t exactly warm either. That alone was pretty good at clearing my head.

Why was this even bothering me?

I half wondered if Terezi and Aradia had decided to team up, fuck with me, and then vanish. Though, Aradia probably would have had Sollux in on it for no other reason than that she’d think it was funny.

My friends were insane, this was a long standing proven fact. They used to partake in extremely dangerous FLARP campaigns, and everyone is pretty certain that Vriska would have seriously injured, if not killed, any one of our friends if it wasn’t for Terezi.

This doesn’t include the trolls that she killed to feed her lusus, she had already been doing that before her, Terezi, Aradia, Tavros, and Eridan all started FLARPing.

I didn’t partake for obvious reasons, Equius wouldn’t let Nepeta for her own safety and himself thought it was foolish, Feferi had more important things to worry about, and Kanaya and Sollux didn’t care enough to play.

Vriska’s actions toward Tavros were becoming hostile enough that I wouldn’t have been surprised if she had either killed him or worse if Terezi hadn’t stepped in and became her moirail. They’ve been moirails for at least four sweeps now, and it’s been enough to keep her at least somewhat civil. She still kills trolls for her lusus, but that’s more out of necessity than anything else.

It was around the time that all of their lusii were going to take on new charges, give it a few more perigees and all of the ones remaining with our group would be gone. That is, if Tavros lets go of his finally.

I walked past my hivecluster and into the more wooded area to the south. Most of this part of Alternia had a lot of trees and forests between settlements and hiveclusters, with rivers cutting through them and the occasional mountain. There was a mountain close enough to see on the horizon, but I’ve never been to it. Way too far away for me to walk to in a single night, and I didn’t want to be caught outside during the day. I wasn’t stupid enough to risk being completely fried.

There were various trails in this patch of forest, but I walked on the one that I was most familiar with. It went straight through the forest with a few turns here and there, but it was mostly level so I didn’t run the risk and slipping and ending up even slightly injured.

I kicked at the dust on the trail as I walked, watching it cover the rocks in the ground. I kicked up some grass a few times, chewing on my lip for a moment before internally kicking myself for doing that. I can’t injure myself.

I walked up to a fork in the path and stopped. Normally I took the left trail, which looped back around to the beginning again. My head was still buzzing so I figured that I would do better to take a new trail and see where it leads, maybe focusing on the new terrain would clear my head. I turned to the right and started down that trail.

It had to have been at least a two hours since I left. The sky was darker now, indicating that the moons were on their way down. It would start getting light in an hour or two.

However, the moons were still high enough in the sky to was a clearing up ahead with their light. I walked until I was a few feet from the end of the trees and froze.

There was a tall pillar on the other end of the clearing that appeared to be made with of solid stone. There were faded splatters of red that I could see from over fifty feet away, and the grass around the base was dead.

What caught my eye next was the troll crouched toward the middle of the clearing, not far from the pillar itself. They appeared to be inspecting something if their bowed head and moving left arm said anything. It looked like they were brushing dirt off something, but I couldn’t see what it was. This troll must be feral if the tattered clothes had anything to say about it. Their hair was long, and their horns curved tall with hooks at the end of them both. Based on how tall they were, this troll was probably very old and had cold blood running through their veins.

It was time to get out before the feral troll saw me.

I took a step back, and then another, and on the third step I stepped on a branch and broke it. Figures.

The troll’s head looked up and tensed before turning enough to see where I was standing. Their eyes were a deep cerulean, and they looked at me for a second before relaxing. I, however, was starting to panic. I made a point to avoid the attention of highbloods when I can avoid it, and this one had their attention on me. I was probably starting to look panicked, which was the last thing I would have wanted in this sort of situation.

The troll rose to a standing position and finished turning around. They looked like they hadn’t eaten right in weeks, their features guant and skin too pale for trolls. A fond smile formed on his lips and a clearly male voice spoke, “They always said that he would come to finish his ancestor’s work, and they were right.”

He pointed at the grey symbol on my shirt I crossed my arms over it and I growled, “What are you talking about? Ancestors are a myth.”

His smile grew as he shook his head, turned, and began walking toward the other side of the clearing. He stepped over what he was inspecting, walked around the pillar, and disappeared into the trees. I stared after him, not bothering to pursue him. Instead, I walked to the hunk of metal that was sticking out of the ground where the troll had been a few minutes prior.

I crouched in front of it and took my turn at inspecting it. I froze when I realized that the metal was shaped exactly like the symbol on my shirt. A pair of metal cuffs that were connected by curves coming off each cuff. My head immediately shot up to stare at the pillar, where a rusted chain was now visible hanging from the pillar. I looked back down to the cuffs to see where they had been connected, looked back up, and scrambled to my feet. I needed to get away from here, and I needed to get away now.

I turned and bolted back the way I came, leaping over the rocks in the paths all the way out of the forest. I didn’t stop running until I got to my hive for the second time this week.

I dropped my keys at least three times before managing to unlock my door, rip it open, and throw myself inside.