I do not own TrollHunters. Tunafishprincess was very helpful in beta reading. :)

Translated Goblin speech is represented by italics. Avery's guide to goblins was referenced.

The smell of sweat had gone cold, clinging to the walls and equipment, competing with the mild perfume of cleaners. The soft billowing of fabric disturbed the dark silence, followed by muted fumbling of leather straps and metal clasps. Jim glanced over his shoulder, calculating the shadows that disrupted the crack of light from the closed door. His mask was stowed in the satchel he pulled over his shoulder then. He adjusted it over the leather armor he donned, a two piece that protected his torso and shoulders, and attached to it was a holster for a pair of daggers and a pack of three throwing knives. Strapped to his calf was the spare blade he confiscated from the goblins, which looked like a stray from Stricklander's cape.

Otherwise he disguised his intentions with only a casual demeanor. He couldn't hide himself, everyone knew that hooded cloak, and without it everyone would recognize his set of horns, tapered and curved back like Stricklander's but charcoal in color. In his satchel he packed little more than his Looking Glass, the petrified wood piece Toby gave him, and the page where he transcribed the play into the Trollish alphabet. In the far side of the dark, empty training room was the locker room, where the showers drained into a single larger grate. He used a dagger under the edge to pull it up and out, slipped in, and pulled the grate over after him.

And just like that he'd left the Order.

He was confident he could squeeze through the drainage to the main sewers. On a map the officers examined in the offices was a layout of the underground access, an escape route if anything happened to compromise the travel agency that made the primary entrance. When he thought he'd covered enough ground and was in unclaimed territory, he took out the Looking Glass to scout ahead. Though he was armed this time, he really, really, really didn't want to face a troll. He fared well enough when sparring with the changelings, but he didn't know if they were going easy on him. Apparently, Stricklander had some sway over just about everybody.

Jim had nearly caught up to where he left Scout when the faintest sound made him slow his pace. He turned back slowly. There was no one behind him, but he couldn't help but feel like he was being-

A weight dropped onto his shoulders. It maneuvered across his back, then under his arm, pulling at the straps of his armor and satchel. Jim felt a yank at each of his ears, and glowing yellow eyes bored into his own.

"Waka chaka!"

"Batty! What in the world are you doing here?"

"Waka!" It called cheerfully into his face, holding itself in place by Jim's long pointed ears with its hands and his shoulders with its feet.

Jim's face cringed at its response. "Ugh! Are they not taking care of you? When's the last time you had your teeth brushed?" He reached into the satchel for the spare toothbrush he kept back in the museum days and scrubbed away at Batty's teeth. A toothless goblin is a dead goblin, he recited in its tongue. Batty cooed and melted unto the floor where Jim continued to brush. Softly he heard other voices calling out in recognition. "Man, I actually missed you guys. C'mon, let's get out of here." He carried on his journey with the posse of creepers. A troll with a lick of sense wouldn't approach a party of goblins. He conversed with them in English so more words were available to him, but understood their responses spoken in their babble. "Did I miss anything? What happened after the break in at the museum?"

Pink danger noodle hunt Light Clad One.

"How'd that go?"

Blue fight.

"Light Clad One is blue?"

Yes, affirmed a goblin.

"News to me, I don't know any true trolls, except Bular. Have you guys seen Stricklander? Is he still around?"

Green-fruit leader same.

"Why am I not surprised." He scoffed. Of course Stricklander would carry on with work and teaching and probably dating just the same. Why would any of that change.

A goblin chattered excitedly, riling up the others.

"Who's party monster? Shape shifter?" They roared over his mispronunciation. He understood his error when they turned the insult back at him and he corrected himself with emphasis.

Yes. Big parties Lightless Place.

"Really? Well I guess someone has to be in such a dreary place." He sighed. Another baby taken from their loving family that wouldn't be missed. He didn't understand the magic of the Changeling Nursery, but merely existing in solitude was not what humans were meant to do. Half humans, maybe. "C'mon, let's get as far away from here as possible." He moved ahead, unsure of the direction he was going. He should have paid attention the only time he arrived at the Janus Order. He managed to navigate using the size of the passages as confirmation that he was heading towards town where he could get his bearings. "Hey, I think we're under Delancey street. Let's get some fresh air." He looked up and around.

From the surface, a manhole cover trembled and grated sideways across the newly laid asphalt. A set of glowing yellow eyes topped with green fur and dwarfed by leathery ears scanned the street level. "Waka, chaka," it announced. It crawled out, ears scanning where its eyes couldn't. Human fingers gripped the edge of the hole, and a not human head poked out, grunting. It was like gym class all over again, except rope would have been a good thing. He pulled himself onto his elbows and side stepped into the shadows where the construction vehicles were parked. There didn't seem to be anyone out anymore. They snuck into a neighboring alleyway, Jim clearing his nose of the underground stench with deep breaths.

"Are we missing someone?" He looked around at the otherwise empty alley, furnished with trash cans and dumpsters belonging to the corresponding stores and restaurants.

"Cha! Mean-da!"

A goblin poked his head out of one of the cans belonging to a Mexican cuisine restaurant and bar. It proudly brandished a chicken rib cage in its yellow stained hands, the skeleton already stripped of its meat for enchiladas or some other dish.

As if attempting to calm a wild beast, Jim put his hands out cautiously and approached slept. "Chicken Legs, don't do this-"

Salivating heavily, it nearly unhinged its jaw and used both yellow paws to shove the entire thing into its maw. "Spit it out! You can't eat chicken bones, remember last time?!" Forgetting they could use their mouths to shred through metal, Jim desperately reached his fingers around the fowls corpse and tried to withdraw it from the goblin. Chicken Legs allowed itself to come with it and wiggled its limbs limply while Jim struggled. "I said spit it out!" He pinned the dangling creature by pressing his foot over its toes and yanked.

"Mami, where are you going?"

"I hear a kid back there."

"You're not their mother…"

His stomach dropped like a rock with dread. He kept his grip on the goblin and hid behind a dumpster, looking back in remorse at the manhole that was out of reach. He saw the lengthened shadow of the woman who was approaching. He remembered her voice from the fundraiser at the hospital. Councilwoman Nuñez. Of all people, he didn't want to be discovered by the councilwoman of Arcadia, and Claire's mother. It didn't help that Chicken Legs was choking on its foolish decisions. It pointed pleadingly at the back of its throat at the few bones that broke off the carcass and went down the hatch. Jim glared in response and put a finger to his lips. A human could go four minutes without oxygen before the brain started to die, he learned in health ed. Surely a goblin would be fine for one, because the alternative was goblins and a half- breed that worked for a secret order that had its roots across the globe being publicized by the councilwoman of Arcadia. She might even be able to maneuver to a position in the federal government with a discovery like that, head the new branch in troll intelligence. The Order would silence him before anything was revealed. Councilwoman Nuñez turning right and taking a few more steps meant Jim would die a second time, and from assassination of an entity that didn't exist. A permanent death this time.

A phone rang. Her steps stopped. His breath hitched in his throat. "Hello?... is that so? Thank you, I'm on my way."

Her companion, Jim assumed Mr. Nuñez, had caught up to her. "What is it?"

"Apparently, we have our own child to worry about."

Jim waited for the sound of footsteps to die off. He turned to Chicken Legs and gave it a hard smack on its back, bones shooting across the alley from the cannon of its throat. "Let's get out of here," he pointed to the manhole cover.

They wandered back through the sewers, and Jim lead the goblins by his ears. "I hear something. It's familiar. C'mon, let's check it out." They scurried along the pipes and by his feet, stopping occasionally like roaches to sniff at the air. "Wait, I recognize this song. It's on the tip of my tongue. That's the song they play on the radio- Papa Skull! I didn't know they had a concert in Arcadia! We gotta check it out." He began to sprint to the source, ducking through the more narrow passages, goblins chattering about bones and parents as they went. He got as close as he could to the sound from within the underground channels, the singer's voice faint to him but the rhythm of the bass beating through him. "I'm at a concert," he cheered. He looked back at the goblins, which were involuntarily bouncing to the beat.

Insides corrode alarm question.

"You're fine! It's called music. You guys seriously lack in culture."

Some of them looked terrified, thoroughly believing they would fall apart at the intensity of the sound. Greg looked unphased, bouncing its head with the beat, nametag clipped to his ear flapping with the intensity. The rest of Greg below the neck was relaxed and unmoved. Perhaps it understood head banging. Jim dropped the hood to soak in the sound. Finally, he felt free, even if he was hiding from society, and from a secret society, crouched in a tunnel of rejected substances. This may be the most human he'd felt in weeks, savoring the music with the crowd of fans nearby. He forgot for a moment about the textbooks in Trollish, about his training in combat, about the changelings secret agenda, about what would happen when Stricklander realized he'd left, about trolls in general and about being dead to his friends and mom. For a moment he was just in a stinky underground pipe listening to metal.

The music died, and the crowd dispersed. He exhaled contentedly. "Alright, I'm almost hungry enough to eat trash like you guys. Let's fix this."

It was tricky navigating these rigid paths to optimal places to slip into the surface world undetected. He found a manhole near a pizza place and snuck with the goblins to the dumpster. Like a maestro, he conducted the organization of his subordinates with his words and occasional gestures. "Open that box, what's in it. Jalapeños? Nah. Not that one. Pineapple? Well, better than jalapeños, but I get why it's untouched. Bring it here. Close it first!"

They slipped back into the manhole, and Jim opened the box with a brandish. "Cold pizza. The best pizza! Who wants some?" He reserved two slices for himself, tossing the crust to the always ravenous creepers, and reserved the box itself for Mutton Chops. "An eventful night, I'd say. Where have you guys been staying?"

They chattered. He picked up a word that he thought meant palace. They seemed to lead to the outskirts, where the group clambered out another manhole in a quieter side of town. Dogs announced the presence of the party, which was of no consequence. A few more turns through back routes and they arrived at a junkyard. Jim was relieved, it was the perfect place for garbage- eaters to dwell without being problematic to humans. The mounds of waste rose upward like turrets, obscuring the view outside the plot. Jim found a car at the edge of a centralized pile that had the passenger side door missing. The drivers side had debris that cascaded in through the busted window. He sniffed at the decayed foam of the car seat. The weather had been too dry for mold to completely take over, and it looked relatively okay for an abandoned preowned. "I call dibs on the throne," he called to the others. They ignored him, getting comfortable in tires and old appliances. Toby would have gotten his joke. The recliner for the car seat was broken, set permanently as far back as debris behind it could allow. Ironically it was softer than his bed in the Order, although it was no more comfortable. He propped his feet up on the dashboard and pulled the hood over his face. He felt proud of himself. If it weren't for the close call, he'd consider himself to be doing well, having acquired food and a place to sleep on his first day out on his own.

But what would tomorrow bring? When he saw on the map a means to escape without detection, it almost felt like a test to see if he could get away with it. It was the changeling way to hide things in plain sight, for the hardest thing to be too easy to be true. Now that he'd proven to himself he wasn't stuck, he couldn't bring himself to want to go back. Day to day life was redundant and didn't seem to lead up to anything meaningful. He recalled the ticking that dominated his dreams back in school. It was returning. It was the soft ticking off a wristwatch now, but just as before, it would build to a grandfather clock in the silence between the pages of the books and the smacks and slaps in gym.

He was back at square one.

•••

The ticking became irregular and discordant. His eyes flew open at the slam of a washer. He looked around, confused by his surroundings. Now that the sky was getting light he could see the faded colors of the rubbish, and he could somewhat make sense of the general shapes of things, enough that he could walk faster without fear of snagging his clothing or skin on things. There were voices, probably from the business workers. A refrigerator opened and a goblin crawled out on all fours like a spider, and Jim noticed the similar scurrying of the other goblins heading in the same general direction through decomposed mattresses, mangled shopping carts, twisted bikes, unrecognizable fabrics, rolls of rotting carpet, and similar waste. He followed. He climbed up a couch that leaned vertically on a turret of garbage to leap over the fence. Down into the storm drain he gathered with the goblins, listing their names to make sure there was no one missing.

•••

The trees released their scent in the warmth of the sun. The hum of cicadas and far away highways kept the air alive with ambient static. There would be visitors to the park, sure, but humans were typically lazy and habitual and weren't likely to wander off the pavement into the thicket. Jim practiced his coordination with the spare blade, twirling it between his fingers, while he chatted aloud to the large green ears that surrounded him.

"Just an idea. What would it take for me to get to Vermont? I can't afford bus tickets. I can't exactly hitch hike." The blade fell. He picked it up and began slowly again, steadily picking up speed as he twirled the blade once more. "Maybe we can break into the library at night and print out a map. But I don't know where in Vermont I would go. Maybe he's hiding like a recluse, too. Maybe the girlfriend part was a lie. Or she's a is stupid. Forget I even brought it up." He threw the blade at the tree trunk in front of him. Dumb idea- the curvature of the target made it ricochet into the weeds. He sighed at the hopelessness of his bad ideas. "He's my dad. He'd have some compassion knowing we share the same curse, right? Maybe he could teach me how to shape shift?" He accepted the blade that was brought to him by Eyebrows. "But if Stricklander won't even try to teach me how, maybe it's because it can't be done. Or he doesn't care." He examined the blade. "Stricklander. What a weird name." He sighed. His life in Arcadia was over, and he didn't want to go back to the Order. If he did try to go back to the life he had, he knew the agents would be waiting to ambush him. It wouldn't be safe for anyone he cared about for him to trigger that trap. The only thing that remained of James Lake Jr that the Janus Order couldn't remove was James Lake Sr., since they couldn't exactly take away a part of his life that wasn't actually a part of his life.

Jim imagined a plain colored, common car pull up the driveway to a cookie cutter house. An older version of himself emerged. Blue eyes were weighed down with weariness from work or lack of sleep, slightly obscured by the glare of the neighbor's porch light reflecting off his rectangular glasses. His hair was disheveled from a full day at a standard nine to five job. He probably scratched at the back of his head the way Jim did. He walked up the small yard, perfectly manicured, to the pristine, plain house. He stopped at the door to pick up a newspaper or mail or something, and a boy wearing a hood leaned carefully out from beside the porch.

What would he call him to know if he found the right person? Mr. Lake, Sr? James Lake? How would he react to being called dad?

Before he could get a word out, the light on the porch came on and a woman opened the door. Behind her was the sound of children laughing.

He gripped the blade hard. Ten years. Jim and his mom could have easily been replaced in ten years. He never allowed himself to even consider what would have happened to his father in all this time. Allowing himself to speculate this one time triggered an emotional response he didn't understand, didn't want to understand, didn't have the energy or courage to begin to try to comprehend.

"So when does the circus come around, anyone know? I bet I could make a killer. Who wants to help me learn how to juggle knives? No one's laughing? I thought it was a great joke. Half joke. I might not be joking, it's the best idea I've got."

•••

The setting sun invited the crew back into town for odd meals of conveniently accessible, questionably old portions. Desert turned out to be a bulk package of still frozen miniature cheesecakes. Freezer Burn held up the mother load proudly to Jim's dismay.

"Where did you get this? I don't even know what restaurant serves these! No you can't put it back, they have food laws against that! It's a very important rule you can't break. Not something you can actually break, it's- look, what's done is done. Just stay out of freezers. You should know better, of all goblins." He referred to the tip of its left ear that broke off from frostbite, a scar it acquired before falling under Jim's care. At some point, somehow, it was locked into a freezer for an undetermined amount of time by mistake. It must be difficult being a parent. Freezer Burn didn't so much as shrug, it just ignored him and went off to do its own thing. Hopefully that did not include stealing more food.

The goblins were repulsed by the mere appearance of the pastries, and so Jim resorted to stocking up on calories. The cakes were good, but he couldn't quite enjoy his second dinner out in the world on his own. He was miserable from a full day in the sun with little to do, and hiding under ground lowered his self esteem. He was literally lower than homeless, on the run with nowhere to run. The cheesecakes lost their appeal three slices in; the thickness in his throat made him thirsty. He rubbed the sticky dairy off his hands on his pants. He was repulsed by his own hygiene. Perhaps if he woke up early enough he could rinse off in someone's sprinklers.

They took shelter at the edge of town towards the woods, into a small section underground that branched under the sidewalk, in case a troll passed by overnight. "Wake me if we have company, got it?" The goblins piled in the corner of the alcove opposite him, secreting their mucus. He avoided glancing back at their slimy mess and wished he could plug his ears from the sounds of gathering snot. He lay back with the satchel under his head and his hood over his face, the cloak folded over himself to keep warm. Tonight his thoughts lingered on how he was going to take shelter when the rain came and his passageways became rivers. He could hide up in the trees in the forest so lightning could find him and put him out of his misery.