We Begin With A Necessary Flashback
"Kanaya, what are you planning?" Gamzee had been in the brig for a full day, and Vriska heard nary a sound from there. It made her think he was planning something. Like her moirail was planning something now. Vriska finally cornered Kanaya in her quarters.
"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, without looking up from her sewing. Rufioh ruined another shirt trying to fit it over his stupid dumbass horns that were getting too large for his body. Someone should teach him how to dress, instead of Kanaya making him new clothes every time his growing horns fucks something up. It gave Kanaya a good excuse to avoid Vriska. But not today.
"You're hiding something from me in my own treasure room."
"I thought it was ours." She paused, looking up with her eyes. "And you did promise me a single stash of treasure for my own." She looked back down and continues her work.
"It is ours! That's why you need to share information with your own captain!" Vriska didn't want to play the moirail card, but she didn't have a choice besides mind control. No one makes plans without Captain Vriska Mindfang Spinneret knowing about it, especially her own first mate! In a calm voice, she asked, "What's in the chest, Kanaya? I'm your moirail, I need to know."
Kanaya paused again, lowering her sewing and sighing. She stared in front of her for a long time before answering, "An egg."
"An egg?" Really? What's so great about an egg? "What's so great about an egg?"
She bit her upper lip and chewed it slightly. "It's from my lusus. My mother grub. I cut it out of her with my chainsaw before I escaped my hive for the last time, killing her in the process."
"A Mother… What the fuck?!" Vriska suddenly stood up, then bent down to shake Kanaya's shoulders. "That's treason! There are only four left in existence! Well three now, but… Our entire crew will be slaughtered if they find it here!"
"Stop telling me things I already know." How did she remain so calm?! "I have a very good reason for doing the things I do."
Vriska failed to resist slapping her in the face. "How dare you risk my life for whatever you're planning! Without me! No one makes plans around here without my consent!"
"You need to meddle more than I do, am I right?" Kanaya laughed softly. "We truly are meant to be palemates." Was she talking to herself?
"Tell me."
"Alright." She got up and put away her supplies, lightly pushing Vriska out of the way. It took way too long. What a stupid hobby. It has too many pieces and takes way too long to clean. Not that she's very neat herself, but that's not the point. Kanaya gestured to her pile of fabric and sat on it. "Ready when you are."
Vriska plopped down front of the pile in a huff, crossing her arms. Kanaya just shrugs in response.
"I did it because I am sick of this planet's… shenanigans," she said like she was getting it off her chest. "I know our ancestors had some history, and not much besides that is known about my own outside of the original Mindfang's journal. What I do know is that she was a part of something bigger than ourselves, and I think I believe that I want to change it, too. By any means necessary."
"I didn't know you had it in you, Kanayaaaaaaaa." Vriska felt her smirk get bigger than she intended. Kanaya had balls, that's for sure. "But let's say that we join forces, which you have already taken the liberty of doing without my knowledge but I'm allowing it to slide because apparently we're so similar." She shrugs. "I've read my ancestor's journal too, so I know that her reputation was only heightened when it came to her beliefs. And now that I have become such a successful pirate," she flips her hair over her shoulder, "I think this will do the same for me."
Kanaya snorts uncharacteristically.
Vriska squints her eyes.
"I apologize. Go on."
"So the egg thingy, how does it work?"
"I have to incubate it in a few months, but after the new mother grub hatches, all we need are buckets to—"
"Skip the details."
"Right. Of course, the higher the blood caste, the longer it takes for those grubs to hatch. And since you're the highest adult troll aboard, it shouldn't take more than… eight sweeps for a new ceruleanblood to come around?"
"Perfection."
"Indeed. It also all depends on the environment. Mother grubs used to thrive in the caves because they were perfect for being private, damp, and still." She glanced around her quarters. "This ship is anything but. Well, the brig is damp enough, however that's only because putting the new mother grub in there is the sole reason I suggested it be able to withstand lusii in the first place." It all made sense now.
"So what other planet did you have in mind?"
Kanaya sighed again. "That's where my plan falls short. Clearly, I did not think this through before jumping on top of it." Vriska only raised an eyebrow. "The internet raves about a fantastical place called 'Beforus,' but as soon as I started studying your star maps, I realized it was a ridiculous and made-up farce."
"It sure is," Vriska scoffed. "I didn't even know it was a thing on the internet. It's a stupid idea and it's fake and doesn't exist."
"I only chose it because it was the planet that older trolls had forcibly immigrated to. I figured it was a good place to start over. But lately, the age limit seems to rise. It's almost like a conspiracy now. I have no faith in Alternia now."
"You are so depressing."
"I'm not sure what you mean. I can't have faith in a world that has no good things anymore. However, I do have one thing I have faith in."
"And what is that?"
"The future. If I can do something about it, then I can have faith in it."
"They have a name for that. It's called being a control freak."
"It takes one to know one," Kanaya said, shrugging.
Karkat and Eridan prematurely react. The same way, no less.
"What do you mean Beforus isn't real?!" they shout simultaneously.
"I drew the small planet with a colored wax stick, you moron," Vriska says, chastising Karkat's dumbassery. "You should have at least picked up on that."
"The real morons are you two!" he accuses, pointing at Vriska, then Kanaya. All Vriska can do is laugh.
"To continue my story," Kanaya says loudly, raising her hand to motion the angry one to sit down. He does. "I'm afraid we had less time than I anticipated. For the last few weeks we were on Alternia, we were going to wait an additional four weeks before departing, so we could safely make it to another planet that we're quite sure is abandoned."
"And what planet is that?" he asks gruffly.
"It's the same planet that our beloved empress had visited so many sweeps ago. Official reports say it's uninhabited, even though the conditions observed are quite temperate and apparently teeming with wildlife. What little information we've gathered so far about its sun has confirmed that the light it emanates is not as harmful in extended exposure."
"There's one small problem," Eridan says. "The freakish subliminal imagery Gam talked about earlier with us said that she disappeared on that planet." Vriska shoots him a look. More information she should have known about. "What?"
Looking back at Kanaya, Vriska sees that she is looking down at her hands. "I have reason to believe that when one's connection with the Gl'bgolyb is lost, it means they're gone. I have no definitive proof, though." Vriska remembers talking to Tavros about the lusus-troll connections. With some castes, like fuchsia, teal, and brown, it is entirely possible to have connections with a lusus through minds. It's not quite mind control per se, but she can't remember the rest. It was all nonsense to her. Now she wishes she would have listened when he babbled on and on about that stuff in bed.
"If I may contribute," Feferi pipes up. "At this distance, I can still hear my lusus' thoughts. She's worried that I'll never return to the ocean, but she's very patient!" She smiles a smile that makes Vriska want to gag. It's too happy. No wonder Tavros fell for that. "I told her that I will return home soon, so there's no need to worry about her letting out a vast glub!"
"Thank you, Feferi. You have clammed my fears." Ugh!
"Was that a fish pun, Kanaya?" Feferi asked.
"Was it good?"
"Idiots!" Karkat intervenes. "We can't go back now!" Everyone turns to him. He looks about to explode. Vriska imagines Karkat getting so angry that he combusts spontaneously, and it's a hilarious sight. "Literally everything that we've worked for to change Alternia is now in the fucking sewers!" He turns to Feferi. "What happened to all that bravado you had, huh?! Where is it!" To Eridan, "I'm pretty sure you never wanted to change anything!" And to Nepeta, "And I hate to fucking say it, but you're the only asshole on this damn ship who even thinks about these things anymore!" She blinks, but is cut off by more yelling. He turned to the rest of the group. "Everyone is so wrapped up in their own problems, pitying themselves for no reason! I've gotten over it! Nepeta has gotten over it, you two never gave a shit about Alternia in the first place," he points to Kanaya and Vriska, which she agrees with now that he pointed it out. "And now that I have your attention, Feferi what the fuck?! You took my ancestor's journal, went all gung-ho about his shit visions, and now you're… you're…" He viciously wipes away tears.
"Karkat, I—"
"TEREZI DIED BECAUSE OF YOU!" he shouts at the top of his lungs. At that, he storms off to the door like a spoiled wiggler. He stops and turns to Vriska. He looks about to say something, but doesn't, slamming the door open against the adjacent wall. That was cold, even for Karkat.
As Vriska saw all this unfold, she can't help but agree with him.
"It's all my fault," Feferi manages to say. Everything was. Karkat was right. She got the journal from Terezi, who had taken it to blackmail him so that they would become matesprits eventually, but it ended up not working out that way. She gave it to Feferi to help hide it, and what better place than under the sea? But then she started reading it for fun, and the rest was history. She got Eridan to help, then she hired Karkat to help her, and both were reluctant. She should have known betta than to force them into something as dangerous as politics. If she hadn't even cracked it open, had that stupid curiosity get the better of her, her friends would still be alive.
"Fef, don't cry," Eridan says. She looks to her side, where Eridan is offering his own cape to wipe away her tears. She didn't even realize her eyes were leaking. She accepts it, wiping the water away. "Come on," he whispers with open arms. Sniffling, she scoots closer and he wraps his arms around her.
"I hate to interrupt, but I do have one more point to say about the planet we're headed to," Kanaya says.
"Go ahead, I'm fine now," Feferi says, giving a weak smile and resting her hands on Eridan's forearms. She really is, she promises herself.
"It may be entirely possible to make it a new Alternia. Repopulate, so to speak." Feferi felt Eridan shifting his position. "If this works, we can make the rules: no more empresses, no more violence, and the only loss we will suffer is after a long and happy life."
Feferi never would have thought of that, making a new place for trolls to live! She hasn't told her lusus yet, but instead of trying to change a place so well established in tradition and corruption and tyranny, so conservative that it rips itself apart, she can make a new one instead. She lets her imagination run wild at what kind of place she could create.
"At the moment, I feel that I have explained everything, so we will adjourn."
"Kanaya, please." Vriska puts a hand in front of Kanaya's face. "I'm captain, so I end the meetings." She pauses. "Go away!"
They all do so, save Kanaya, who shakes her head at Vriska's retreating figure, and Feferi and Eridan.
"Kanaya, can I ask you something?" Feferi says shyly.
"Yes?"
"Can we, Eridan and I, can we borrow your pile of fabric? I need a feelings jam." She decides that now is a good time and place to finally have one. It seatainly has been a while.
"Of course," Kanaya answers with a gentle smile. "Take all the time you need. We still have eight more months before we get there."
"Thank you, Kanaya! Eridan?" She takes his hand.
"Yeah!" he replies a little too loudly. He flushes violet and looks away. He's so cute.
"Karkat, I need to speak with you for a moment." Kanaya has been hounding him for months. If she wants to apologize, then she can lick his bone-bugle until she's blue in the face. Oh wait, she doesn't have blue blood, so that'll never happen! He's been burying himself in star maps, away from everyone except Vriska sometimes.
"No," he replies.
"Please hear me out."
"No."
"I need to know something that you know."
"No!"
"Please Karkat, it's important!"
"No, no, no, no, no, no, no! I don't care!"
"It's about our ances—"
"I don't fucking care!" He used to give a shit about Kanaya because she was the only sane one on this bleeding asshole ship. But clearly, she never gave a shit about their home planet, politically or not, so she basically betrayed him.
"I need to know!"
"Shut the fuck up! I don't care, I don't care, I don't care!"
He feels a hand on his shoulder stopping him. Before he can rip himself away, he's forced to turn backwards where he sees Kanaya holding a chainsaw and about to rev it.
"Shit!"
"Please…" Her face is definitely pleading, her lips lightly pursed and her eyes an unmistakable sheen and bloodshot. It doesn't match her pirate garb.
Karkat breathes in, letting his deprived lungs get some air. "Okay," he sighs, defeated. "Do you want to sit here in the hallway or…" They're just outside the consumption room, which should be locked when no one is eating in there.
"Here," she answers, putting the chainsaw away after turning it back into a tube of lipstick. She takes out a ring of keys and unlocks the room, both of them entering alone and locking the door behind again.
Karkat picks a table nailed to the floor and sits in a bench that is also nailed to the floor. Not much room, but it's better than the top deck. "Ask."
"A few months ago, when you were yelling at Feferi, you mentioned something about you ancestor's journal."
"Yeah?"
"And if my assumptions are correct, you have bright red blood, am I correct?"
"Get to the point."
"We may have, well not us, our ancestors may have known each other intimately."
Karkat rests his chin in his hand, highly concerned.
"I don't know much about her, but I think that we might be connected through it." She struggles with her words. He guesses he would struggle too if he was trying to make a connection between ancestries.
Wait a minute. "I, uh…"
"Karkat, what does his journal say about someone named…" She swallows carefully. "The Dolorosa?"
That's it! He knows now! Kanaya's been so familiar to him, but he's never seen her before in his life. He has that fucking journal memorized, and he remembers a drawn sketch of a female troll with horns similar to Kanaya's with short hair and billowing clothes. It was colored, but it was a faded brownish-green color. It really did look like Kanaya in a dress. The picture was titled "The Dolorosa" on the bottom of the page. "She raised me and supported me. I would not have lived if it were not for her."
"The look on your face means yes?" she asks.
"More than yes," he answers, half laughing. "She rescued my ancestor from death! I wouldn't be fucking alive if it weren't for her!" There were a lot of pages about her in it. More maybe than even his ancestor's matesprit.
"Do you have it? Can I read it?" she asks excitedly.
"No, it's long gone."
Kanaya's dejected face breaks Karkat's heart.
"But I know it by memory!" he assures her, trying a bit too hard there.
"Can you tell me about her?" She looks at him eagerly, happily even. At first, he thought she didn't have many emotions to spare, but now… What is this feeling suddenly developing?
Before Karkat can answer, they are jolted out of their seats and strewn across the room. The door becomes unhinged and hangs open by the deadbolt. That infernal bell is heard from just outside the door.
"Everyone, evasive maneuvers!" Vriska. "We're headed into an asteroid field! All hands on deck!"
