Heh. I do not even... I'm not sure why I wrote this, don't know why it only took an hour, and don't even know if it's a one-shot or a prieview right now (which is why it says not completed or whatever). But enjoy this derpy-ness. The song that is playing is Images Pour Orchestre by Debussy (look him up. He's cool.), hence the title.
Also, not EquiusxNepeta, if you were thinking that...I just didn't want to spoil it~ lol
"Oh Equius~!"
The muted sound of footsteps on carpet follows the green-blooded young teen across the living room and down the hallway of her moirail's house. The thunder of too-loud symphonic music fills the house. Nepeta could never figure out why her friend liked this horrible noise. It was coming through the vents as if they were loud speakers in a way that left her almost no way of knowing where the sound was coming from. She decided to try to find the muscular young man as quickly as possible.
"You're not in the kitchen like you said you would be...!", she shouts cheerfully from said room, as if this reminder would suddenly make him appear. On the phone yesterday he sounded normal (or as normal as one could expect him to be at least), but she has the sudden feeling that something is wrong now. From the looks of it, he had been in the kitchen sometime in the recent past. There are dirty dishes in the sink, flour and cookies all over the counter, and a puddle of honey on the floor in front of the sink. Geez... What was he making...?
As she walks down the hallway to Equius' bedroom, she steps in something sticky (cookie dough, it would seem) and realizes that the mess has been tracked almost all the way down the hall. If I just follow this, surely I'll find him~ As she puts her keen senses to work following the scent of unbaked cookies however, she notices something odd. Equius' house doesn't quite smell like Equius. But...his body spray and natural scent are so strong that it's masking almost everything else is the house.
Oh, it goes into the bathroom... She gingerly opens the door only to realize...that the trail leads away from the bathroom, too. But the huntress decides to look inside for clues anyway (because this is becoming quite an exciting mystery to her).
Woooow... This room is a mess. A complete mess. Everything is broken; the bathtub, the sink, even the toilet, which was still leaking it's blue water onto the floor. And there's cookie dough, flour, and honey smeared all over the floor and the sink, almost as if someone had been rolling around in it. Nepeta knows that her moirail is odd...but this is a little too weird, even for him. Ah well, on with the hunt~
She now follows the tracks and smell down the hallway, and then down the basement stairs into the roughly-cut caverns that are Equius' basement. This is where the music is coming from; it is coming to a crescendo, swelling bass and fluttering soprano rushing together to form an outright wall to her sensitive sense of hearing. This is giving me a headache... 3= Nepeta paused and tilted her head trying to focus. Ugh, is that an oboe? No wonder I can't hear anything...I've got to get him to turn this off!
She opens the door to his robot workshop, hoping he'll be inside. He has been kinda stressed lately... But no. It was empty, save for some broken robot parts. What about the library? Hoofbeast art gallery? Subatomic particle reactor and conversion lab? No, no, and no! Now the frustrated young woman is starting to panic, she runs down the long hallway, flinging open doors, but to no avail. Where is that horrible music coming from?! His ventilation system is way too good at carrying this...
Of course. She was mad at herself for not thinking of this sooner. His private study. The one your could only get to by tilting the second hoofbeast painting from the right. She smiled to herself and hurried back to the art gallery. He had mentioned this place to her only once, only saying that it was the place he went to be alone and think. That must be where he is now.
She followed out the instructions she had remembered, reluctantly touching the painting to move it. At once, the room started shaking and a statue which had previously been sitting in the far corner disappeared from sight. Napeta went over to investigate, cautiously peeking into the newly-exposed hole in the floor. Beneath her now was another passage, smaller and dimmer than the one she was in now; it led off in it's twisting path toward the left. Her curiosity further led her to hop down, landing with a soft -thud- on the loose-dirt floor beneath her.
Her eyes pricked up (or they would have if she had any) and she looked around. Something about the sound was different now... She slowly realized that she could actually hear the music clearly now, not just some echo of it coming to her through the ducts in the walls and ceiling. She heard each note clearly and loudly...not that it mattered of course, because she still hated this music. However, she was glad to hear it now because it meant that she was getting closer.
She followed the tunnel until she came to an opening where the path flared and the ceiling soared. Now there was no dirt. This place looked even more modern than the first floor of his house.
He has a secret underground lair, just like Catman~!
Nepeta reached over a paw and flipped on a light switch, and one by one, the lights brightened the place. It was all so shiny and big that for a moment, she failed to see her friend.
"Equius~ I looked all over for you! Why are you down here? It's so dark and gloomy, even I can hardly see..."
"Oh, I... " Nepeta noticed that Equius looked quite nervous. He was sitting at a desk, sweating a lot more that he even normally does; his hair was tied back, his glasses were off, and he just did not look himself. She tilted her head and frowned as she realized that he wasn't wearing a shirt as well.
"Equius, what have you been doing? It better not have been doing what I'm thinking you have been doing. I thought we both agreed that you hurt your self and break too much when you do that. And you don't smell right..." She frowned and started to walk toward him. "What is going on?!"
"No. I must command that you stay right there. This is my personal business and I would respect if you would not fool around in it." He bit his lip and swore, looking very distracted. "...Please. Just this once, Nepeta"
"Weeeeell...It must be really important if you said please. But you know you can tell me anything, right~?" The muscular teen nodded curtly, his lips pursed tightly. "Okay then...well I'll come back later...th...en..." Just as she was turning to go, she recognized the scent, put the pieces together. That's why he smelled so weird...that why he was acting so different... That wasn't honey...it was blood! Sollux' blood!
Her face held at once shock, mortification, and glee. "Sollux...?! Are you here?"
Equius nodded, moved back a bit, and after a few moments, a pair of mismatched eyes looked at her from just over the edge of the desk.
"...Hi Nep."