Author's Note: Hahahah remember me? I HOPE YOU DO CAUSE I SURE DON'T HAHAH! But anyway no I haven't forgotten about this fic and I hope you all haven't either! I still love EriSol I still love this fic and I wish I could just write it all day! Anyways, I am back! With another little tidbit for you and PERHAPS a bit more of a shippy sort of chapter? IDEK but I hope you enjoy my brain vomit anyway! PLEASE DO AND ENJOY AND LEAVE ME SOME THOUGHTS IF YOU DO ; w ;!
Chapter 12
Uneasy Lies the Head that Wears a Crown
With Mindfang's vicious distractions and tantalizing curves to occupy Dualscar, Eridan was able to spend the next few days immersed in magical bliss unmolested. He and Sollux leveled up their characters side by side amidst the occasional in game prank and constant teasing, and for the first time the seadweller experienced a taste of a world where he could simply be without the oppressive weight of a crown upon his brow. He forgot all about the pirate ship he was to one day take over. Gone were any thoughts of his master's disapproving scowl on his scarred face and his harsh, rigorous punishments. He lived his free time in indulgent sloth and relished every moment of it. Even when he returned to his mundane usual duties, he began to think perhaps Dualscar wouldn't even mind his transgressions because it helped him focus and gave him something to look forward to when the long day of apprenticeship was over. Not that Eridan truly cared after the initial guilt wore off. He was certain his beloved Captain had his fair share of secrets even his heir was not privy to, and now he had one of his own. Every good Captain had to have a secret, and Eridan was content to let a budding proclivity for gaming become his. He was Prince of Neptune's Gambit, and he had every right to enjoy all the privileges that entailed.
Along with a new mental escape came also the renewed hope that in spending so much time talking to their Helmsman, he might finally find a way to win him over, and craft him into the perfect navigator and servant Dualscar never could. He renewed his resolution to study his every move and word, psychoanalyze and categorize his every quirk and idiosyncrasy in hopes of unlocking his spirit. However, the Psionic proved just as cryptic and enigmatic as ever. He deflected any serious question with sarcasm and nastiness. He was dispassionate about everything except being a fiercely oppositional, royal nuisance. Worst of all, Eridan discovered he was also prone to dramatic mood swings, and almost as frequently as he was a complete arrogant ass he could be morose, taciturn, and infuriatingly self-deprecating.
Ordering him to snap out of it as his future captain never worked, and was even less effective when Sollux was in a mood, so Eridan resorted to clandestinely allowing him to choose the game they played and losing even more spectacularly than usual. Soundly defeating him at least would bring back a glimmer of the usual Sollux he much preferred to the gloomy one. Yet all the same he still enjoyed the transformed feeling of a slate wiped clean between the two of them with a new wash of something akin to trust, or perhaps just simple comfort. The seadweller remained uncertain if the Psionic truly trusted him, or if he simply trusted that he would not do anything deliberate to hurt him again. Or at least fail miserably at it. Either way, both seemed content to have someone to insult and play games with, and Eridan in particularly was happy, at least for a while, to cast off the shackles of responsibilities and quadrants.
He was dismayed to find one cycle they all returned with a vengeance.
He and Sollux were in the midst of a particularly intense sudden death match of a game where the object was to tame wild creatures and train them to battle when a message from Dualscar instructing him to meet him on the bridge popped up on his screen. He stared at it in surprise long enough to give Sollux the edge he needed to drop his fierce seahorse creature to the ground with a vicious bee-like beast. With a less than delicate oath he brought up Sollux's chat window where he knew the textual barbs would already be flying.
TA: you lo2e agaiin fii2hbreath!
TA: but ii have two giive accolade2 where they are due.
TA: ii diidnt thiink iit was statii2tiically po22iible two be thii2 terriible at a game but you have set a new and lofty standard for mediiocriity.
TA: congratulatiion2.
CA: ram it sidewways up your artificially regulated wwaste chute
CA: dualscars buggin me
CA: thats way more important than kickin your pathetic mustard blooded ass at this shitty game
TA: what really?
TA: what2 that old cru2tacean want?
TA: 2iittiing on the load gaper and need2 hii2 liittle loyal errand boy two come wiipe hiim?
CA: oh thanks a lot for that mental image you dirtsuckin hunk of hardwware
TA: you are mo2t welcome.
Eridan scowled, but all the same hesitated in his computer chair. If Dualscar was summoning him personally it was bound to be some unpleasant task involving either Vriska or Mindfang, and he would be quite content at that moment if he never saw either cerulean-blooded temptress again. He chewed his lip, drummed his fingers, debated pretending as if he never saw the message, but ultimately decided it would be best to just heed the call.
TA: well?
TA: what2 he want?
CA: he didnt fuckin say i gotta meet him on the bridge
CA: its probably a really important mission he wwants to brief me on so dont wwait up for me
TA: and here ii wa2 lookiing forward to siighiing and watchiing my trolliian wiindow longiingly all cycle.
TA: piiniing for the moment you returned to me and whii2periing your name iintwo the lonely darkne22.
CA: shut up ill be back wwhenevver
Eridan changed his status to away and rose from his computer to sweep his cape over his shoulders and jam his feet into his shoes. He walked out briskly as he set his face into his usual haughty sneer and made his way to the bridge where his master awaited.
Much to his relief, he found the Captain of Neptune's Gambit very much alone at the controls with only a few of his technical crew scattered about the grand chamber at the forefront of the ship. He stood by the yawning concave window overlooking the prow, a printed report of some kind in his hands and his brow furrowed in annoyed concentration. Eridan approached him with militaristic decorum and stood by his side awaiting orders. The shrewd yellow eyes never strayed from the words they focused so intently upon. Eridan glanced uncomfortably around the bridge, unsure if Dualscar had really not noticed him or if he was simply finishing what he was doing before addressing him. Eventually, he decided to clear his throat and move one step closer to get his attention.
"Dualscar…? Sir? You uh… Wanted to see me?" he interjected, trying his best to keep annoyance out of his tone.
Dualscar's brow shot up in genuine surprise, and he whipped around to regard his heir, wide-eyed.
"Oh, Eridan!" he announced, realization percolating into his expression, "Indeed I did, my boy! Thank you for comin' so quick."
Eridan shrugged.
"Just followin' orders. What is it you wanted?" he asked, bizarrely devoid of emotion.
Noting the lack of his usual vicious enthusiasm and preemptive assumptions, Dualscar focused intently and set the report aside for the moment to face him.
"Oh, a few things," he began, frowning, "But I wanted to talk to you first…"
"Oh?"
Dualscar sighed and arranged himself as if he had scripted the encounter long ago in his mind and wanted it just so.
"Yes. You see you've been scarce, lad. Aloof. I ain't seen hide nor hair of you in ages. You miss meals, you hole up in your block, and now you come under direct orders from me an' just stand here gapin' like a guppy and not batterin' my ears with this, that, and the other about doomsday devices and treasure maps and who knows what else!" he elaborated, flourishing a frustrated hand, "You haven't been… Well YOU. In what seems like weeks! I'm just a little concerned, is all."
Eridan couldn't help but roll his eyes a little. Not only had Dualscar always dismissed his ideas in the most insulting of ways, yet suddenly missed them, as he passed he noticed a fresh, painful looking bite mark on his collar bone just visible beneath the neckline of his cape. He knew exactly where it had come from and doubted very sincerely his master had been fretting over him, let alone even thinking about him.
"I'm sure it's just because you've been busy," he answered, crossing his arms petulantly across his chest, "I'm fine."
The captain stared at him, eyes narrowed suspiciously, shaking his head as he paced away.
"Ahhh now see here's the thing! Even when I'm busy you're always haranguing me. In fact I think when I get busy you get even more insistent, like I'll get soft and give in to your daft little schemes all the easier cause I ain't payin' attention," he mused, fins quivering in thought, "Somethin's… Different. This time."
The cold grip of fear coiled its unforgiving fingers around Eridan's heart. The way his master cut his cold golden eyes at him, it was as if he were scanning his very soul for the lies he had woven there because he already knew what they were. He tried his best to hide whatever resulting expression on his face and raised his brows as if merely curious.
"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked acerbically.
Dualscar shrugged frostily.
"I ain't got the foggiest. You tell me…" he began, pacing back toward his heir, "What's goin' on, Eridan?"
A brief flash of fear betrayed Eridan's innermost thoughts on his face, but he tried valiantly to hide it behind a callous sneer.
"Nothin'."
"Don't give me NOTHIN' you little brinesniffin' liar…" Dualscar spat.
Luckily the epithet caused a very real scowl of annoyance behind which Eridan could continue his fabrication.
"I said it was nothin'!" he growled defensively, "And I meant it! You're just gettin' paranoid."
"Oh here we go. Fuckin' HELL, boy! PARANOIA? You really expect me to believe that after all these sweeps? After I RAISED you? AFTER I MADE YOU WHO YOU ARE? I know every goddamned thing about you!" Dualscar bellowed, his fins flaring.
Eridan shrank against the rising tide of Dualscar's infamous tempestuous rage, but held his ground.
"I…! Well! I-! OK fine it's not nothin' but it's not a big deal!" he stammered, his own fins flattened against his head.
"Not a big DEAL? Really? You think I don't know you? You think you can fool me? ME? You think you can HIDE things from me? On MY ship? I know EVERYTHING that happens here!" Dualscar railed on, pointing a ringed finger into his charge's face, "And I know EXACTLY what you've been doin'. I know why you've been holed up in your room, avoidin' the rest of us like a barnacle on a whale's BACKSIDE. I KNOW…"
All the color drained from the young prince's stupefied countenance. He could hear a dull whine in his ears as the periphery of his vision went white with abject terror and his limbs went rubbery and numb. Dualscar knew. He knew everything, and he was about to suffer the worst consequences he had ever suffered in all his short eight sweeps of existence. The magnitude of his suffering would linger in the very energy of the universe for millennia to come, yet all he could manage to do was splutter a panicked string of meaningless fragments.
"I-I-! It wasn't-! It's only-! I just-! We were only-!"
"Don't even bother, Eridan… Save yourself the humiliation. And you should have known you couldn't hide it from me forever," the captain cut in viciously.
Eridan withered, the strength and will sapped from his body. Disgrace washed over him in a dark wave, extinguishing all hope of ever atoning for his sins of cavorting with the enemy. It had been wrong all along, and worst of all, he knew it full well and had indulged himself anyway.
"I'm… I'm… Sorry… I'm sorry, Dualscar. I failed you," he breathed subserviently, falling to one knee with his head bowed and his eyes pinched shut, "I failed you…"
Never had he intended for things to go so far. Never would he have imagined his entanglement with the Helmsman would deepen instead of drift apart to casual enmity as expected of their vastly different blood castes, that he would become an escape and a comfort rather than an object of disgust, and he was wholly ashamed. Dualscar would be right to destroy him for besmirching the infamous name of their ship and his legend. He waited for the holy retribution to fall upon his head, for his world as he knew it to be obliterated around him as he watched, but nothing came. Moments passed, and all he heard was a mournful sigh from his mentor as he sagged in frustration.
"I knew it… So it is Vriska… Isn't it? I should have known you'd louse that one up, too…" Dualscar sibilated bitterly.
As he turned to put his disappointment of an heir to his back, Eridan's head snapped up in shock, eyes wide and jaw plummeting. The light seemed to return to the bridge and flood over him in a radiant torrent of relief. He had been spared.
"Wh-Vris…?" he gaped, but quickly recovered, practically leaping to his feet once he realized he had no need to grovel, "Oh, I mean… Yeah, that was… Tough. I really… Tried. I tried so hard with her, sir. But we're just not… It's just not there. Hate or love."
Dualscar turned back, and the sympathetic quirk of his lips calmed Eridan's frayed nerves even further.
"You could have just told me it didn't work out, lad," he chided in a gentler tone.
"I know… I should have. I was just afraid you'd be… Well… Furious with me. I know how much it meant to you for me to try and partner up with her," the younger seadweller replied.
"Angry? No, no, I'm not angry. Disappointed perhaps, but not angry. Well, angry you felt you had to hide it from me is all. These things happen, and it's best we all just move on. There'll be others, and you'll find someone right for you, someone WORTHY to stand at your side and shed blood under the mighty Orphaner's colors!"
"A'course," Eridan piped enthusiastically, eager to move on, "Well, now that that whole boondoggle is all cleared up and put to rest… Was there anythin' else?"
His mentor paused, a curious flicker in his golden eyes.
"Actually there was. I was thinkin' about that conversation we had after that cycle down in the engine room, after our… Disagreement," he elaborated.
Eridan winced. It was the last time they had really spoken before the Serket scourge had plagued their vessel and it had been less than pleasant. Revisiting it would be even more unpleasant.
"Oh… That? What about it…?" he inquired.
"I was thinkin'… Perhaps the reason you've been strugglin' lately really is my fault. I been leadin' you down dead-ends an' I ain't been vigilant enough, too lax. I need to trust you with more, push you farther, really test what you can do so you can grow all the more! So I decided have a mission for you. A real one," Dualscar answered.
Eridan's heart soared. In only a few moments he had gone from being convinced he was about to become a smoking crater in the metal floor to being entrusted once more with something direly important. He had been granted a precious chance to prove himself after everything he had done, after everything had gone so wrong, and redeem himself both in his master's eyes and his own. All he had ever wanted was to be like Dualscar, to make him proud, and he stood before him, willing to hand over his precious faith once more.
"Anythin'! Anythin' at all, sir! Just give the word and it's done!" he gushed.
"That's my boy!" Dualscar chortled, clapping a hand on his shoulders, "Now don't get all up and hot and bothered, it ain't the most excitin' of tasks but like I said, it's fuckin' important. See we're runnin' dangerously low on fuel."
Humble ship maintenance was certainly low on the list of responses Eridan had expected.
"Huh…?" he blurted, "Fuel? But don't we have that jumped up technofreak in the engine room to handle that? I mean isn't that sorta the fuckin' point of keepin' him around and not cullin' him like he deserves?"
"Well partially. The Helmsman takes care of pilotin' and runnin' all the programmin' and things. But we don't wanna sap any a' that energy for stupid little trivialities like keepin' the lights on and makin' sure we don't freeze in space when we need it for outmaneuverin' and outgunnin' chumps, right?" Dualscar quipped with a smug grin.
Eridan's cheeks heated up.
"Oh. Right."
"So I need you to do a little diggin' around with the scanners and anythin' else you need to find us a source of energy, then assemble an expedition and lead them out to harvest it. Think you can handle it?"
It was far from the glamorous and deadly pursuits he had been used to endeavoring in, but any chance to redeem himself to Dualscar was priceless. Vriska mattered nothing, Sollux meant nothing, it was Dualscar who had saved him, nurtured him, and taught him everything he knew, and for Dualscar he would do anything with pride and gusto.
"Yes, sir! Of course, sir! I'll find the best fuckin' batteries in the universe!" he replied brightly.
"Excellent! Get started, and I'll see you for dinner later, right?"
"Absolutely."
Eridan smiled, and for the first time in what seemed like sweeps, Dualscar returned it. He cherished the rare gesture as he bowed and swept out of the room, and made his way swiftly down to the engine room to make use of the energy scanners and hash out a course of travel with Sollux. Dualscar's eyes stayed on his back and violet cape as he went. Stoic and silent, their pitch-black pupils flashing, they narrowed shrewdly in thought for a brief moment, then turned back to the report on the ship's collective computer usage he had been scrutinizing. He stared at Eridan's station number, which had risen to the forefront of the list, but folded it up and tossed it into a nearby bin before he returned to more pressing matters and allowed his charge to complete his task.
The Prince of Neptune's Gambit flew down the decks as if his very shoes had wings and bore him to the engine room door on the winds of glory. He didn't even mind pushing into the dank, stale air and fording through the dark and foreboding labyrinth to Sollux's control hub where he knew the energy scanners were located, or the fact that he had never actually used them before and had no idea how. Nor did he mind witnessing the technological horror that was their Helmsman for the first time since the incident with Vriska. Eridan breezed in with a haughty grin on his face and his nose in the air and granted the lowblood only the most nonchalant of glances as he marched over to the controls to search for the particular machinery he needed. Behind him, the Psionic raised his brows at the rebuff and smirked a little to himself.
"Long time no see, Prince Fishface! To what do I owe the honor of this rare in person visitation?" Sollux lisped teasingly.
"Business!" Eridan spouted triumphantly without turning to look at him, "Important business! A simpleton like you wouldn't understand or care! So just go back to rearrangin' your dust carrot creatures into tableaus or doin' whatever it is you do all night down here."
"Oh, careful. Some of those dust scenes are a little erotic, I wouldn't want to upset your delicate highblooded sensibilities," Sollux replied with a click of his tongue.
Eridan shuddered at the thought.
"Ugh, as if I would debase myself to look upon your revoltin' little provincial perversions, keep your bulge to yourself thank you very much!" he sniffed.
"That was sarcasm, shit for brains."
"I knew that! The point still stands! Now stuff up that lispy fuckin' noise tube and let me concentrate!"
"On what…? Listening to figure out where the hot air is leaking out of your grotesquely swollen ego? I'll give you a hint, it's where all the rest of the shit you call logic comes o-"
"I told you it's none of your business!" Eridan cut him off before he could complete his vulgar thought.
Sollux chose to chuckle and not press the issue further in favor of casually observing the seadweller's clumsy attempts at decoding the complicated technology with which Neptune's Gambit had been equipped. His ringed fingers tentatively touched levers and experimentally flipped switches, only to frantically reverse the action when warning lights would flash on or distant ominous rumblings resounded from elsewhere on the ship. Quiet, frustrated curses in colorful and eloquent incarnations filled the dank air with amusing ire, and Sollux allowed the comedy of errors to continue for several minutes before he finally chimed in.
"You 100%, absolutely, positively, beyond a shadow of a doubt sure you don't need help?"
Eridan stopped, shoulders hunching and fingers curling into claws.
"If I needed advice from an impertinent slave with a tube rammed in every leaky orifice I would have asked for it! Now you can shut up or I can shut you up for-"
Eridan stopped himself mid-sentence, and pursed his lips and thumbed his chin in thought as he turned around.
"Actually never mind. I do need you to perform a simple task for me!" he added with a grin, "You see I have been granted the immense and glorious mission of sniffin' out some fuel to make your miserable existence a little bit easier, so you might as well aide in the amelioration of your persistent state of agony since I'll be indirectly doin' you a fuckin' favor!"
Sollux quirked an eyebrow.
"Fuel…? Like the plutonium reactors in the- Oh! You're looking for the energy scanners! You are way cold if that's what you're groping around the more delicate parts of my machinery for."
"Well obviously!" Eridan snapped, back stiffening, "I needed to check a few things beforehand! But now we can get started so I'll just…"
Trailing off as he turned back to the controls, Eridan squinted behind his thick spectacles at the miniscule writing and abbreviations on the various knobs and screens. He shifted to another one, raised his hand to turn on the monitor, but Sollux's grating voice chirped merrily from behind him.
"Cold!"
The seadweller grimaced and ground his teeth.
"I know! I was just moving!" he hissed, shuffling over to his right.
"Colder!"
"Cram it you insufferable, plebian little dirtsucker!"
Even despite the venom in his words, Eridan had no option but to follow his direction and moved left instead.
"Lukewarm now!" Sollux informed him with a snicker.
Eridan ignored the jest, but continued, letting his hands hover just above the controls as the Helmsman tauntingly guided him to the unfamiliar device he had never once utilized. All the while, however, he stole furtive glances back at the smug Psionic to ensure he was headed in the right direction.
"Warmer, getting warmer!" he sang, "Warmer waaarmer. Hot, getting really hot! Oh nope colder! Warmer again, a little warmer. Hot, very hot! Burning, sizzling! Red hot!"
Unable to endure a second more, Eridan finally exploded.
"I KNOW! I KNOW GOD DAMN IT!" he bellowed, chest heaving, "I don't need your fuckin' help! This is MY mission, Dualscar's countin' on me and I'm NOT gonna fuck this one up on account of a pissant overhyped BATTERY."
Eyes wide, teeth gnashing, and lower lid twitching, Eridan whirled back on the control panel and flipped on the first switch he could find.
"Colder."
The animalistic screech that tore from Eridan's throat infinitely pleased his tormentor. Sollux grinned a Cheshire grin unseen behind him and laughed to his heart's content while his seadwelling companion flattened his fins against his skull and scowled at his work. Eventually, Eridan found the screen surrounded by knobs and gauges that all had something to do with scanning, energy readings, and ion signatures and switched it on.
"It's about time," the Psionic chimed in.
"Shows how much you know," Eridan hissed back, "I am royalty, and royalty always does everythin' precisely when he means to! Now stand back, or rather just continue to hang there like the catch of the night, and watch the magic happen!"
The device was actually fairly simple, Eridan discovered as he fumbled his way through the settings and the calibration. It required nothing more than a search parameter, which he made sure to set out into the furthest reaches of space, and a set criterion of energy signatures which he gleefully set to 'all'. The machine flickered and whirred and a holographic map of galaxies upon galaxies materialized in the air above the search screen. Pinpoints of light color-coded to the type of radiation the source of energy emitted began to blink on, but all of them were tragically mundane. Plutonium, uranium, radium; plenty of nuclear material that Neptune's Gambit's reactor could easily convert to energy to keep it sailing the cosmic seas, so Eridan searched further. He knew in the pit of his soul that he could do better. He could find something unique, something far more powerful, something even his esteemed captain had never seen before and win the respect he craved.
Sollux watched him, curious and for once, silent, as he shifted the hologram further and further away from the current location of the ship, examining in meticulous detail every last energy reading he came across. He searched exhaustively, patiently, and from all angles with a stalwart determination even the Helmsman had to admit being impressed by, until after what seemed like an eternity flying through miniature galaxies and star clusters he chanced upon a tiny planetoid in the middle of a dangerous asteroid belt. It nearly flew by unnoticed, but as Eridan scrolled past it the surface illuminated in a deep royal purple color that had not appeared yet. He wheeled the simulation back with a gasp and quickly looked up the new hue in the guide, which read, 'Unknown Element'. Both Trolls stared in stupefied silence.
"Unknown…? Wow, even I've never seen that happen before," Sollux noted with genuine surprise.
"Really?" Eridan asked, eyes lighting up as he turned around, "That isn't a normal reading?"
Sollux smirked in return.
"You're the illustrious highblood who doesn't need any help, you tell me," he retorted.
"Of course I knew that already! I just… Needed a second opinion, doesn't hurt to gather data when you're dealing with something potentially lethally powerful!" Eridan puffed in response, lifting his nose in the air.
He turned excitedly back to his new finding, zooming in to inspect it closer. Not only was the element unknown, but the tiny planetoid also orbited a largely unmapped and rarely explored distant solar system and remained thusly unnamed. All the computer system had stored in its data was a catalog number: (222) 2II2 PN. A quick search of the internet on Sollux's browser revealed absolutely nothing about the location. Nothing in Dualscar's extensive logs, nor anything in any of his old databases had anything to say about it and as the mystery grew, so too did Eridan's euphoria. Another treasure hunt had unfolded itself tantalizingly in front of his very eyes.
"There's nothin' about this shitty little rock, NOTHIN'," he whispered in awe, "Do you know what this means, Sol?"
"Uh, we should rewind the program and find the nearest source of uranium so we can get this stupid chore over and done with as soon as fucking possible?" his companion quipped amusedly.
"No, you simpleton! An unknown energy signature on an unexplored planet? It means we have no idea what the actual fuck it is!" Eridan replied gleefully.
Forgetting his station, forgetting the difference in their blood castes, forgetting a life of piracy and blood, he turned around, the radiant light of adventure and intrigue in his yellow eyes, and a wide, giddy smile on his face. Sollux had never seen the normally pinched and uptight seadweller with the narrowed eyes, the clenched fists, and the tense jawline glow with such pure joy. He stared, lips parted with one of his many witty turns of phrase already prepared upon them, but could not muster the strength to fire one off.
"So…?" he muttered with a bemused smirk once he found his words, "I think that fact was made pretty transparent by oh I don't know, the lack of any info in the computer."
"But that's just it! I wouldn't expect someone like you to understand but! It could be anythin'! Anythin' at all! It could be some sort of new energy source! Or better yet it could be some kinda weapon with the power of a thousand slaughtered suns packed right in! Or even a new type of ship! A ship faster than light that weaves between the very atoms of the universe unseen! Or a portal to another dimension! There's no tellin' what we'll find! And who knows what the planet or even the journey'll be like! Maybe it's guarded by some ancient race of aliens sworn to defend their secret for all time! Or maybe even we'll have to solve some sort of puzzles left behind by geniuses so radiant the universe itself saw fit to snuff them out! It'll be amazin'!" Eridan continued, his chest swelling and bubbling with effervescent delight as the path of glory once again seemed to open itself before him.
And into the dank air of the prison of hardware and wire, a peal of laughter, like a long unplayed melody, rang from Eridan's lips and resonated so violently through his stony façade as to open the tiniest chink in his long reinforced armor to the stolen child lost sweeps before. Sollux bore witness to the most ephemeral of glimpses into something tangible, something tender and true, something still alive and golden at his core as he morphed for a split moment into that boy so full of awe still curled deep inside his soul and still stubbornly clinging to hope that something wondrous existed beyond the veil of bloodshed he had been born into.
"Don't you see, Sol? This could be it! Finally! The treasure I've been searchin' for my whole life since I was a wiggler! The key to everythin'! To rulin' the whole universe and bein' the pirate I always wanted to be! It could even- It could really even be somethin' mag-!"
Eridan caught himself before he said the word, the word that had been beaten out of him, sullied, and destroyed until it hurt to even think of it, and in so doing caught the Helmsman watching him with a captivated half-smile. The Prince quickly corrected his aberrant behavior by crossing his arms over his chest and scoffing. He extinguished that light shining through the fleeting crack in his righteous fury, and squared his shoulders to fit himself back into the silhouette of command.
"At any rate! It's sure to be somethin' so devastatingly amazin' Dualscar'll drop dead on the spot from shock!" he finished pompously, raising a finger into the air, "Helmsman! Set course for Planetoid 2II2 PN! That is an order!"
The grin on Sollux's lips felt refreshingly true, as well as the chuckle that followed his marching orders.
"Aye aye, Future Captain Fishface," he laughed, and pulled the coordinates from the energy scanners into his navigation system.
"Well I suppose Future Captain is better than Prince, but you will address me by my name from now on," Eridan reminded him testily.
"Fishface isn't doing it for you anymore eh? Yeah you know I guess I have worn it out a bit. Alright, how about Future Captain Saltybritches?" Sollux inquired merrily as the engines roared to life and the ship heaved onto its new path.
"Augh, what are you, two?" Eridan snarled, "At least be creative."
"Heh, really? I kinda liked that one. Okay okay, I got it. Future Captain Nautical Nookwhiffer?"
"Oh, alliterative now, charmin'."
"I thought so! Oh, how about Future Captain Barnacle Butt? Future Captain Kelp Commando! Future Captain Shiver me Shameglobes! Future Captain-"
"Enough enough! Just get us there as soon as possible! Dualscar's waitin' for my report," the seadweller finally interrupted, his arrogant gaze softening just slightly, "But… I'll be back online in a bit for a rematch on that stupid game. I'll destroy you this time, mark my words!"
He flashed a bright grin of challenge at Sollux, who returned it without malice and without resentment, only the playful promise of utter pixelated domination. With that, they parted ways once more, Eridan to the upper decks of cruelty and conquest, Sollux to the belly of the beast where he always remained, both amused and disgusted that the only ray of light into his eternal gloom seemed to be Eridan's infrequent, but always momentous visits. Only he no longer had to be so repulsed by admitting he actually looked forward to seeing him, because that night he had shown him exactly why. There was still something uncorrupted inside, an innocent ember of exploration and innovation as yet not smothered by the darkness Dualscar had poured into him, a desperate yearning for camaraderie and friendship and for someone to look at him with anything other than disappointment and coldness. Beneath all of it, perhaps, Sollux thought, something beautiful lay, something chained and bound, blind with the heavy burden of a golden jeweled crown too big for his brow around his eyes, waiting for someone to lift it so he might see the light once more.