A/N: This is not as much as my other chapters but I just wanted to get another chapter up already. I am very glad of all the support you guys have been giving me and I would like to thank everyone that encourage me and left me nice messages. The next chapter will be us moving along with the plot and I hope to really keep you guys entertained. My writing may slow down due to the fact that I have been doing a really long roleplay with someone and it is extremely long. I am tempted to take a lot of the elements from it and apply into another fanfiction, because the prompt was something that I have been wanting to write about for a long time but never had the motivation to do it. However, now that it is being played out, I feel like I can now be able to write it. So with that being said, expect another Homestuck fanfiction to be posted up after a few more chapters of this story!
(MUTINY)
Chapter 4: Ingeminate
Terezi gets caught off guard by the trolls comment. Does this mean that Vriska was no longer within the hive? Did her friend manage to escape? If that is the case then Terezi knows that she is in deep trouble. They would surely be trying to now be searching for Vriska and Terezi was in the center of this evil operation. She let's a huff. Now Terezi wishes that she could time travel and prevent herself from ever leaving the ship. Yet, now she is stuck in a dark closet and Terezi is ready to pound her head on against the wall within the closet. Before she could continue on with the self hatred, the door slams open and the hallway light is brighter than how Terezi last remembered.
"Looky here! It's that teal blood from earlier." A strong hand grabs the hood of Terezi's cape and the tug is so rough that it almost makes her choke. "Stop!" Terezi is more confused than scared but when she is dragged outside of the closet, she realizes how much trouble she is in. She can not even get to her feet due to the constant tugging and pulling. She hears several laughs from two trolls, and the one holding her purposely keeps pulling on her hood.
"Damn. She is a shade lower than the last one. That's going to cost us." Terezi is disoriented due to the constant pulling of her hood, which is already making her dizzy as she tries to get to her feet. Yet, she is still able to tell that there is only two trolls there. She can only assume that they were the ones from outside. "Yeah, she is a little short and skinny too. Not a lot of trolls will want to buy this wiggler. At least the last one look handy." Terezi forces herself to get to her feet and she starts to dig her nails into the troll's arm. He laughs at her attempt of trying to escape. "Well, since the blue blood is gone let's just sell this one. We will at least get some profit out of her."
The other troll gives out his suggestion. "Exactly what I was thinking! Let's go. They will be taking off soon." Terezi starts to get dragged and that is when her fear spikes up again. She keeps trying to pull away but the second troll is behind her, pushing her forward. "Get moving!" Terezi unwillingly follows and stumbles outside of the hive. She is already too tired and hungry to struggle any longer. After all, she has been running around all night with little to no food in her system. It also did not help that food was always rationed on the ship and that means that she automatically does not eat a lot. Her chest is starting to hurt and Terezi is confident that they are not going to catch a ride. Once they continue to walk right into the forest, Terezi knows that she will not be able to psychically keep going. They do not go far before Terezi stumbles to the ground and refused to get up. "Get up!" Yet, Terezi can not make herself move and just stays there. The other troll gets annoyed and unnecessarily kicks her in the chin.
The impact makes her cry out in pain. She clutches her face and wants to start crying. Her tongue moves over the area where her teeth had been impacted. All of her teeth are amazingly in place still but there is a bit of blood coming from the inside of her mouth. Yet before she could move, they once again start dragging her by her hood and she is unable to get to her feet. The pulling of the cape chokes her and every pull makes her light headed and unforchantly for her, she slowly starts to close her eyes due to the lack of oxygen. Even though rocks and branches scratch her, it does not stop her from losing consciousness.
(MUTINY)
"So tell me Vriska, what brings you out here all alone?" The Signless questions her as he watches her drinking her third cup of water. By now all the adults have already surrounded her. They sit far enough as to not hover over her and the trolls her age were sent off into their tents as to 'not scare her', as the older trolls claimed. Yet, Vriska does not feel that these trolls are a threat and might be her ticket out of here.
"Some trolls tried to sell me to the slaver's market," Vriska states casually as if it was something that she was used to. The troll that called himself the Signless frowns. The yellow blood showed signs of anger while the olive blood gasps and brings her hands to cover her mouth. Finally, the Jade blood shakes her head in disappointment. Vriska can feel the negative vibe in the air and soon the Signless speaks up again. "I am sorry to hear that. You must have been scared...but why would they go after you? According to what you are wearing, you are a Cobalt blood. You are not really low on the hemospectrum." He points to her sign and Vriska shrugs it off. "Yeah, well. They couldn't handle me. They only tried to get me because I tried stealing." By now, the water she was drinking was gone and Vriska places it on the floor. "Why did you steal," the Jade blood asked.
"Because I wanted to." Vriska replies bluntly and gains a few disapproving looks. "You shouldn't take what's not yours." The Signless comments and it reminds Vriska of the conversation that Mindfang and her had. Vriska is starting to think that she would probably start listening more often….but that would not be fun. Yet being the troll that she is, Vriska learned to just go along with things. "It won't happen again." She lies through her teeth. Next time she just won't get caught. "Well, that's good to hear. Would you like something to eat? We don't have much but we have enough to spare." Vriska eagerly nods her head. "Yeah. I'm starving. I have not eaten all night." The Signless turned to the olive blood. "Could you fetch her something to eat?" She smiled with the response, "Of course, love! I think we should all eat actually." She gets up and makes her way to one of the tents. "I think formal introductions are needed." The Signless stands up. "You already know that I am the Signless."
He then points to the jade blood. "This is my mother. She goes by Dolorosa." She gives Vriska a friendly smile and Vriska just gives her a quick nod. "This is my good friend, the Psiioniic." The yellow blood does a quick wave and that is when the olive blood arrives back with food in her hands. "And this is lovely lady is my matesprit, the Disciple." He helps remove the food from her hands as she responded with a, "Hello there, little one!" Vriska noticed that they are carrying a lot of food, and of different varieties. There are a lot of grubloaves and a few meats that Vriska has never seen before. Then there are a few berries along with other nature grown food. "I thought that we should all eat it. Sun will be up in a couple of hours." The Signless nods his head. "I will call the young ones. I am sure they are curious of our new guest." With that, he gets up and heads to the tents. All the other older trolls get up and start preparing the food as Vriska watches.
(MUTINY)
When Terezi wakes up, she realized how terrible she feels. Her face hurts and she is already starting to experience hunger pain. Yet she is confused as to why her wrists are hurting and once her looks down her noticed that they are chained together. Panic sets in and Terezi tries to pull them apart, even though it is impossible. Terezi looks up and that is when she realized that she is back near the docks but this time she chained to a large pole and there are other trolls that happen to be in the same position as her. There are three more trolls connected the same pole as her and the other poles are only about three three feet away each other, scattered in a rough circle. Yet, Terezi is not the youngest there. There some that can barely walk and are still chained up. She was the only one properly clothed and everyone else looks to be in rags. A few of the adults glance her way once they noticed that she had awaken. Yet, no one says anything. There is an odd silence among the trolls and Terezi is confused as what is happening. "What's going on?"
One of the trolls attached to the same pole as her gives her a sad look. His face shows age and Terezi can tell by looking at his eyes that he is a brown blood. "They plan on throwing us on a ship and take us to some other land where they will sell us. This is the slave market." He voice is rough and dried out, and Terezi is sure that the troll probably had not had anything to drink in a long time. His words start to sink in and she starts looking around for any sign of hope. She does her best to keep calm but once she sees a few trolls standing close by with whips and swords, Terezi starts to think that hope is lost.
"I don't belong here," She mumbles to herself. Another troll next to her gives out a huff. "Yeah. None of us do." Terezi takes in with what he says. She had always seen slaves before, mostly on Mindfang's ship. They always looked miserable and sick. Yet Mindfang had told them that some trolls are hatched to serve and other are hatched to lead. She explained that very few trolls can break that rule and when they do, they tend to accomplish amazing things. So, Terezi never really thought about the hardships that slaves had to go through and now that she is on the brink of being sold as one, it scared her. For the first time, she finally understood the seriousness of slavery and nothing has yet to even happen to her. Yet, Terezi has seen how they have been treated and dreads the thought of the abuse happening to her.
She knows that there is nothing she can do though. The chains are too tight and the guards are constantly walking around them, watching every move that they make. A few trolls walk by. They have smiles on their face and laugh at their own jokes, ignoring the group of trolls that are doomed to servitude. Terezi found it ironic considering the fact that she had down the same thing plenty of times before. "Please! Help!" She cried out to anyone who could hear her. The other captured trolls don't say anything and many of them just stared at the ground. The passing trolls just glance her way but continued to walk, not caring of about her predicament. The only attention she got was from one of the slavers. One walks straight to her with a whip in hand and Terezi realized that she should have just stayed quiet. The troll does not say anything to her right away but instead, raised the whip high.
It came down fast on her, hitting her across the left side of her face. "Ah!" She cried out and tucks her head behind her arms. Yet, the hits still come. Terezi curls into a ball in a desperate attempt to block the blows. The whip cuts through her dragon cape and she starts to cry. The troll does not hold back on each hit and soon Terezi can feel her blood starting to spill on the ground. "Stop! Please! Stop!" Terezi tried to move away but is stuck because of the chains. Luckily after the tenth hit, he stopped whipping her but still hovered over her with the whip still raised.
"Don't talk!" He yells to her. Terezi cowers before him but out of the corner of her eyes she can see someone. About five meters away, stands Mindfang, watching. Terezi sees that she is standing by herself and there is a grin on the pirate's face. "Mindfang!" Terezi cried out to her but Mindfang continued to stare at her.
The troll raised the whip again and Terezi quickly gains the fear of getting hit again. She held her breath and the whip came down again. Yet, Terezi continued to call for her Captain but Mindfang simply took her time strolling up to them. The pain was unbearable for Terezi as her tears started mixing in with her blood. Her skin starts to tear in different areas especially in her arms and back. Mindfang stands near the male troll. Her hand loosely holding to her sword but she makes no move to stop the assault. "Well, what is going on here?"
The male troll looked to Mindfang, not knowing who she was. "This wiggler does not know how to listen but we will get her behaving before someone buys this little shit." Terezi was still crying and Mindfang pointed to her. "That little shit belongs to me." Mindfang shows off her sword, meaning that she was not playing around. "Give her back to me or we are going to have a problem." He scoffs. "You have no proof." As soon as he said that, Mindfang drew her sword. The blade is held close to the man's neck. "I own her. So give her back." Her words come out venomously and she gives him a stare down. He is unable to do anything and just slowly nods her head. "Ok...Ok...take her. Just take her then." He reaches into his pocket and pulled out a key. "You unlock her." Mindfang gives the command as she holds onto the sword as the male troll quickly unshackled her. Terezi can feel everyone watching her. The other soon to be slaves watch the scene unfold, probably wishing to be released as well.
Terezi starts shaking as the chains fall off. She is doing her best to stand up. "Let's go Terezi." Mindfang sheaths her blade and walks away. Terezi clings to Mindfang before the Captain shoves her away as they get away from them. "I told you to stay on the ship." Mindfang scolds and Terezi follows her closely in fear.
"Sorry, Captain." Mindfang walks Terezi back to the ship and a few crew members give them a worryful glance. "Saw what happened back there? If I was not closed by, you would have gotten sold off to some sea dweller as a fuck toy. And that whipping...ha! He was an amiture. I would have beat you twice as hard and longer. So if you think that hurt, you have not seen nothing yet." Terezi avoids eye contact. "Sorry Captain." Terezi had already learned to just go along with Mindfang and to not argue with her. It is best to always just agree and save herself from anymore pain. "You should be. I wasted time looking for Vriska to bail you out of trouble. I should have just left you there."
Terezi does not say anything as Mindfang guides her to the shared block between her and Vriska. "Stay in here this time. When I get back back you are really going to get hit!" Mindfang shoves Terezi into the block and slams the door shut before her. Terezi some how only stumbled and prevented herself from falling over completely. She slowly removes her cape, which was covered in her blood, and tosses it to the ground. There is blood all over her. Cuts and bruises scatter all over body and Terezi wants to cry but that seems to be what always gets her hurt. So she walks to the pile of dirt clothes and throws herself on top of it. She feels miserable and wants nothing more than for the night to end.
(MUTINY)
Vriska was enjoying herself. The food that was served tasted amazing and was better than the same food she was always eating on the ship. She has never had a large of food offered to her at once and was really excited. The adult trolls allowed the younger trolls to sit around the fire as well as everyone started eating. To Vriska, it was odd to have so many trolls eat together in such a peaceful manner. The adults talked among themselves and the trolls around her age hesitate with talking with her. After a little encouragement from the older trolls, the younger ones tried to converse with Vriska once the Signless introduced his own descendant. She did not mind meeting them but was more interested in eating. "Vriska, this is my descendent, Karkat." Vriska takes a bite out of her food hardly giving the other troll a glance. He looks tired and looks like her does not really care about her presence. "Hey." He replied quickly, not even glancing her way. Vriska looks up and catches a disapproval look from the Signless but does not say anything about it. The troll called the Disciple turned to her own descendant. "Introduce yourself, kitten." The younger olive blood turns to Vriska and gives her a genuine smile."Hi! I am Nepeta. It's nice to meet you." It was simple but at the same time was a nice gesture." Vriska gave a simple, "Hey." Vriska's mouth is full of food so the response came messily. The younger yellow blood was not paying attention and suddenly realized that it was his turn to introduce himself. He was in the middle of eating but placed his food down long enough to acknowledge her. "Sup. I'm Sollux." He gave a quick wave and went back to eating his food. Vriska squints her eyes slightly. His voice sounded...weird to her and she could not pinpoint what it was. She figured she might have just misheard him. Next to him is a jade blood. In the back of her mind Vriska questioned why there are two jade bloods out of the cavern but does not bring up the subject. Instead Vriska looked at her long enough just for the young jaded troll to introduce herself. "Hello. My name is Kanaya. Nice to meet you." There is a friendly smile on her face but Vriska ignores it and continued eating.
She was too hungry and tired to really care about the other trolls. There was small chatter among them but Vriska stayed out of all the talk. She did not want to participate in the conversation because by then she was already getting a headache from everything she has been through. So she eats quietly and whenever she was asked a question she usually answered it with a simple response. "So Vriska," it was the Dolorosa this time. "Where do you live?" Vriska already knows what to say. Mindfang trained them since they could talk in what to say. Yet, knowing that they were more to walk her back to the dock, Vriska only half lies. "I live on a ship. We transport food." Vriska takes another bite from her food and she is really impressed with how it tastes. "Oh! That sound adventurous. Where do you travel to?" Vriska is trying not to get annoyed with the sudden questions but at the same time she told herself that she should have seen this coming. "We go everywhere." They somehow accept the answer and don't push the questioning.
After eating, Vriska feels so much better. They started cleaning up the food and putting out the fire. The trolls around Vriska's age were talking among themselves with a glance at her every once in a while. She knows that they are talking about her but she knows that they probably don't come in contact with a lot of other trolls. After all, they are in a forest off the edge of the town. "Vriska." Vriska looked up and it was the Signless troll calling her. She walks up to him. "We have a couple of hours til sunrise. It should be enough time to get you to your ship." He states. "You are going to take me?" Vriska questions even though she knows the answer. Of course sthey are going to walk her back.
They are the only ones who know how to get back to the town. Vriska did not expect them to just point in a random direction and let her go on her way, though she really would not mind. Mindfang always warned them about leading the wrong trolls to the ship. Vriska knows that everything that they do is not completely legal. In fact, everything that they do is illegal. The last thing wants is for her ancestor to get mad at her for giving their position away. "Of course, we are. We can't leave you alone. You said it yourself that slavers were after you." Vriska knows that she can not argue. With a nod of her head, the signless gives her a smile. "Alright then. If you don't mind, Dolorosa and my Disciple will be going with you to make sure you find your ancestor." Vriska gives a simple "Okay", then noticing that the other two trolls were already to take off. They both have backpacks that Vriska supposed that were holding items needed in case of an accident or of an emergency. "Ready to go," the Dolorosa questioned. Vriska walks up to them and gave a simple, "yeah."
They travel for maybe an hour and Vriska can tell that the sun will be rising soon. This makes her worry mostly because she does have any form of protection against the sun. Right when she was about to complain about it, the Disciple spoke. "We are almost there! Soon you will be back with your own ancestor." In the back of Vriska's mind, she hoped that the olive blood is right. the last thing she wants to be out in the burning sun. Mindfang warned them many times of the dangers of the sun and even threaten to throw the two young trolls outside during daylight if they did not behave. Vriska believed in those words and never did anything to the extent of being sent outside in the light. Yes, she threatened many times with it but always talked her way out of it. Now, Vriska does not know how Mindfang will be when she returns. Will she be happy to see that she is fine? Is she going to get punished? Maybe they will just forget that the whole thing ever happened. If anything, Vriska is sure that she could try her best at being sorry and hope that it is enough to bail her out of trouble.
However, Vriska figures that she has plenty of time to figure something out. So, they walk through the forest and Vriska is curious as to how they know where they are going. They do not walk on a path and it almost brings doubt to Vriska that they are taking her back to the town she was suppose to go to. The two female trolls carefully guide her through the nature, watching every step that Vriska makes, as if she was a weak wiggler who could not defend herself. Vriska knows that she can not really complain. She just only found it weird on how much they were watching out for her and they did not even know her. It was a nice gesture that Vriska secretly appreciated. Not many trolls went out of their way to make sure that she was fine. Yet here they were, going out of there way to make sure that Vriska was fed and going back to her ship safely. So they travel through the forest and soon the thickness of the trees started to die down. Then the grass was not as high. Next thing Vriska can see is buildings off in the distance.
A smile forms on her face as she can recognize some of the structures. "Why are you guys in the wild?" Vriska bluntly questioned. It did not make sense to her that they were so close to a town but were not living there, even if it was just sleep there during the day. The two female trolls give a each other a look, wondering how they were going to answer, until the olive blood responded. "It's nice to get away from the city." She gives Vriska a smile and the young scorpio accepts the answer. "I suppose we should start heading to the docks then." The Dolorosa gives Vriska a light tap in the right direction. They move through the outer parts of the town and Vriska is relief when she can see her ship in the distance.
"That's it!" Vriska points to it with joy, knowing that she would be safe once she gets on board. "I can walk the rest of the way." Vriska quickly offered, knowing that Mindfang would be mad at her if she found out that anyone knew that it was used for criminal activity. The two green bloods are caught off guard by the comment. "Are you sure," the Dolorosa asks. "Yeah. I'm fine." They hesitate but do not stop Vriska. "Ok. If you are so sure. We will let you be on your way. Just be more careful next." Vriska nods her head and started walking off in the direction of the ship. She looked back quickly and could see that they are starting to make their way back to which they came from. They were weird trolls. Were all trolls on land this strange?
If that's the case then, Vriska knows that she prefers to stay on the vast seas. She does not even get to walk a couple of feet before a crew member spots her and runs to her. "Found you! The Captain is mad! Come. Lets get you back to her." Vriska feels safe knowing that no one can hurt her and as she was guarded going back to the ship. However on the way back, Vriska catches a look at a group of trolls being forced onto another ship. Immediately, she can tell that they are slaves just by what they are wearing and the shackles clinging to their skin. Some of them are crying silently as others held their head low, but Vriska did not care. It was not her problem.
(MUTINY)
The moment that Vriska step foot on the ship, she felt like the Empress herself. Every available troll rushed to her, asking if she was ok. They glance over her to make sure she did not have any kind of injury. Some rush off to find the Captain as others tried to spread the word to stop searching for her. Right now, Vriska feels pretty important. She guess that is how you are treated if you are related to someone very important, and in this case it was the Captain of the fleet.
They offer her food and water but Vriska refused and before more attention can be even to her, she can see Mindfang walking up to her from the distance. She let out a nervous breath of air. She knows that she is in trouble and Vriska was already preparing herself from some form of punishment. The rest of the surrounding members can feel the negative vibe and started at slowly move away from Vriska. Giving her and Mindfang alone time. Once Mindfang reaches her, she simply stands over her. Vriska looks up at her ancestor but regretted it quickly. A harsh glare is given to her but nothing is said at first. Vriska knows that Mindfang is thinking long and hard, but of what, she does not know. Vriska tried to break the eye contact but Mindfang roughly grabs Vriska's chin.
"You have ten seconds to explain yourself." Vriska can feel her throat tighten and her mind goes blank. She fumbles to start but a story comes out of her eventually. "Slavers tried to get us! I-I got Terezi away from them. They got me but I got away." Vriska let the words fumble out. Mindfang stared at her for a while trying to see any lie in her. "You realize that you could be dead by now right or sold off to some rich sea dweller. Trust me, you don't want to be in that position. Go to your block. We will talk more tomorrow. I can't deal with you right now because if I look at you any longer I think i might beat you into the next sweep." Mindfang let go of Vriska's face but let her nails drag against her skin.
Vriska does not think twice before running off into her shared block. She quickly closed the door behind and rubbed her eyes, tired of everything that happened that night. Vriska only takes two steps before seeing Terezi curled up in a ball on the pile of dirty clothes. That is when Vriska can see little droplets of blood that no doubt belong to the teal blood. "Terezi?" Vriska slowly makes her way to her friend. "You okay?" She moves closer to her and she can see a lot of dried blood covering her. There are lacerations covering her body and and some of the wounds look almost infected.
Terezi sits up slowly and Vriska does know if she should help her up. There are dried tears on her face and her puffy eyes indicate that she has been crying. "What happen?" Vriska asked but Terezi shoves Vriska. The force makes Vriska land to the wooden floor. "Leave me alone! You always get me in trouble!" She shouts at Vriska. Terezi goes back into laying in her pile, not giving Vriska a second glance. Vriska stays on the floor for a while, staring at Terezi even though her friend is not looking back at her. She quietly picks herself off the floor and sits by Terezi even though she is sure that she want her no where no her. Vriska pulls her head to her knees knowing that once again this was all her fault.
(MUTINY)
A/N: Well that was fun to write. I feel really bad now for what I made these two went through( read: terezi). Still hopefully the next chapter will be a lot more uplifting as to lighten the mood of the story. This story can't be sad all the time! So stick around and see what trouble these two will get into next time!