A/N: Thanks to Shadow Wasserson for editing help.

Disclaimer: I do not own Homestuck.


Rose awakened to the pain of an enormous stone slab crushing her arm. Memories of the battle slowly came back to her. They fought the Batterwitch's forces in the bowls of the crypt. She remembered the flaring lights of the explosions and sounds of massive structural damage as the ceiling collapsed upon them. Her seer's insight allowed Rose to find a small alcove sheltered from most of the debris, rushing to safety just in time to avoid being crushed. Unfortunately, she was now trapped there.

Rose called to her friends, but no response was forthcoming. She tried to struggle out, only to find herself entombed in rubble, barely able to move. Her seer's senses probed for her wand only to find its splinters lying behind several feet of rubble. Her strife specibus was empty, so there was little hope of blasting her way out. A rumbling noise filled her ears as the rocks above her began to settle. A must smell filled her nostrils as ancient air released by the collapse began to filter down to her. Rose's breathing became more labored as the air around her began to grow stale. Great gasping breaths obtained less and less oxygen. Her lungs began to burn within her chest. She struggled to escape. She wanted to scream, but her gasping breaths didn't afford that luxury. Her strength began to fail her. She was dizzy and weak. The world began to fade around her, and then she died.

And she came back. The pain returned. Rose struggled and gasped for breath, but there was nothing she could do. Rose struggled desperately against the rocks and the toxic vapors, but they refused to budge. And so she died, and she returned. Her chest burned. Her arm ached. Instinct had her struggle in vain. Pain. Struggle. Death. Again. Pain. Struggle. Death. Pain. Death. Pain. Death.

After innumerable rounds through the cycle, the screams of primal terror ringing through Rose's brain dulled enough to offer her a lucid moment. Her powers searched the paths of fortune for some hope of rescue. She searched for her friends, but could only tell that some unseen catastrophe had befallen them. Rose wept at the loss, adding another anguish on top of her already considerable suffering. Soon another wave of pain swept through her, nearly overwhelming her ability to maintain coherent thought. Rose was struck by a new terror, that she would be trapped here forever. Eternally fighting for air, and eternally failing. Dying again and again, ceaselessly and without end. The seer reached out with her mind, searching desperately for an escape, any way out of this torment. A solution came to her almost immediately, and she laughed at its simplicity.

So as the pain in Rose's chest redoubled, threatening to end her once more, she reached deep inside herself, fighting with the last of her strength, digging deep into her psyche, where the whispers of the horrorterros still dwelled. She found the place where the voices still babbled in the forgotten tongues, and grasped it like a lifeline, giving herself freely to the bloodeldritch throes. The pain and the darkness struggled for control of Rose's mind. She screamed, overtaken by the dark agony. Her limbs burned for lack of air and her mind screamed the chants of the dark gods filled her with their malice, but it was not for long. For soon death overtook her, and this time, it was Just.