Preparations for each hive were going well, both Kanaya and Vriska report to everyone a week later. Every adult troll had their own room if they wanted, and the kitchen is officially open for business. Kanaya had chosen the basement with the matriorb, setting up a hammock under the stairs. The children were all in one room at the moment, but that might change soon. Vriska assigned herself to be the keeper of the loot and announces that they finally raised enough human money to purchase a boat.

"Nobody cares about that except you!" Karkat remarks over the tight crowd in the living space just inside the entryway. It's vast enough to hold all twenty-one of them, and the perfect meeting area. The children erupt in a fit of giggles, but the laughter dies when Vriska glares at them.

"Which brings me to my next point!" she continues. "From this moment onward, and I have spoken to both of them about this, I hereby officially transfer my leadership over to two adult trolls that aren't me. I am demoting myself to second-in-command. But believe me, I am more pained about this than you are." She blinks slowly to shift her gaze to Karkat. "And from now on, you won't be reporting to me about your problems, but to your co-leaders: Karkat Vantas and Kanaya Maryam."

"Oh, it's official now?" he says with an annoyed tone and arms perpetually crossed. "They pretty much bother me about everything already. You didn't need a bark-and-tiny-hoofbeast show to tell everyone."

She ignores his comment and moves on. "Now before we move on, since the floor is still mine, and I have decided that I am the keeper of the loot, I should be the first to pollute the troll image by performing a blasphemous act only—"

"Get to the point!" Karkat again.

"—only known as the removal of my horns." It took a lot of thinking, but since Vriska is the most adaptable out of everyone here, she knows that it was only a matter of time. She moves on as the gasps and concerned chatter dies down. "It was only a matter of time, really, and everyone who leaves the island from now on has to have theirs removed as well. Save Karkat and Nepeta and Sollux, respectively. They could just wear a hat."

"Awesome."

"I don't really want to leave anyway," Nepeta remarks quietly. "I have memories here now…" Vriska notes the bewildered stare that Karkat is giving the green-eyed girl.

Vriska clears her throat, gaining attention again. "And also, whoever wants to watch has my permission. I have nothing to lose and nothing to hide, plus it'll be a good learrrrrrrrning experience." The only thing she does have to hide is the fact that she hasn't gotten her powers back yet. Sollux has been complaining about controlling his and Aradia's descendants every chance he gets, but he'll just have to deal with them himself. "Come, Kanaya. To the bathroom!" She gestures to the circular stairs to the second floor. "Oh, and meeting adjourned. Go wreak havoc or something."

Kanaya follows her to the bathroom, and so do about six others, including Aradia, Gamzee, Feferi, Latula, Aranea, and Rufioh. Vriska admits only to herself that she's nervous about the whole thing to begin with. But it'll all be over soon and she'll just have to deal with it.

She sheds her coat and removes her boots and sits on the edge of the plastic tub. Kanaya stands to her right and turns on the water, which is cold, which is fine with Vriska. She nods to her moirail, who has positioned herself. One of her legs are propped on the edge, and she is bending over Vriska, one hand on her head, one on her horn.

"Just know that I've never done this before and it might be painful," she repeats.

"Just do it." Vriska closes her eyes.

"On three," Kanaya says in a commanding tone. "One."

SNAP! Vriska didn't expect to cry out. The younger trolls gasp when she did. One horn clatters into the tub.

"Two."

CRACK! Then the second horn.

"Fuuuuuuuuck!" Vriska cries out again. She finally opens her eyes and sees some worried younger children. She gives them her signature smug smirk and fights every temptation to reach up and feel the damage. "See? I'm fine." She looks to Rufioh, who is about ready to upchuck their fish breakfast.

"I need to file them down next," Kanaya informs. "I'm not very good at this yet."

"I want to see." She stands up.

"Not yet you're not. You're still bleeding," Kanaya says, shoving her back down. "We just cleaned up."

Vriska glares at her. Really? She's in an unholy amount of pain at her horns being broken off, and Kanaya's concerned about keeping the bathroom clean?! They're practically bones, how does she think—

"Besides, it'll scare everyone else if we let you trail blood everywhere." Damn, why is she so right all the time? "I'm next anyway, so I hope you were paying attention."

Vriska scoffs. "Well, I wasn't, but I know you can do it to yourself. You're strong. You can handle it. Just go rainbow drinker if you get scared."

Kanaya pales. "I don't—"

"Yes you can. Now bandage me up, I'm 'bout to pass out." No sooner after she said that, her vision clouded and she fell forward onto the vinyl floor.

"Nepeta, where the fuck are we going?" Karkat asks.

Nepeta felt the need to ask Karkat to accompany her after the meeting ended. She saw him staring at her after she confessed she had new memories here. They were there for each other when they suffered the most traumatic experiences of their lives, so why not help him move on, too?

"As you may or may not have heard, I am your official leader now, so I command you tell me where we're going." They were nearing the tree line, so his voice was very concerned indeed.

"I'm helping you move on," she finally says. She stops at the border and turns to him. "This will only work if you're ready."

"I don't know what that even means." Lie. His face flickered with remorse as soon as she said "move on" and she didn't believe for a second that he didn't know what she was talking about.

"Trust me." She turns to follow her game trail. After taking a few steps, she turns to see that he had already left. "Karkitty…" she sighs. She continues on her way down the trail, down the hill. She won't pressure him. He'll come when he's ready.

Months pass. The weather was now almost unbearably hot, and Kanaya was starting to worry if the matriorb was ever going to hatch at all.

"Anything?" Vriska asks, opening the basement door. Light spills in from the kitchen, and also the smells of fish frying. Eridan must be cooking, because the last time Feferi was let into the kitchen, she nearly set the hive on fire.

"Nothing yet," she answers honestly. "There was a wiggle yesterday, but nothing since." She remains in her crouching position above the egg in its leafy nest and gently picks off a millipede that had crawled on it, and tosses it aside. "How about you? Any progress on getting your powers back?" Vriska finally told her in confidence after she had bandaged her broken horns that first day and everyone left. She must had been holding it back for weeks before that. It had certainly explained the increasing complaints about unruly descendants.

"Unfortunately not." She pauses for a long time. "But I might have a lead."

Interesting. Kanaya looks away from the egg. "Oh?"

"It might work on the humans."

"That's quite a theory. How did you figure it out?"

"When I was buying the boat a few months ago. Originally, I found the price to be unreasonable for its condition. It had no awning, which was fine with me, but it was about two-thousand more than what it was worth, not to mention how much we had. I told him that if he didn't lower the price by three-thousand, then I would take my business elsewhere. He laughed, so I simply imagined him punching himself in the face."

Kanaya laughed lightly. "Did he do it?"

"No, but when he said something about how cheap I was, I got so mad that I turned around and told the prick to jump off the dock."

"Did he do that?"

Vriska smiles evilly. "You'd better believe it. He came back up, sputtering that I could just take the damn thing, and then muttered something about spiders as he swam away pitifully. I dropped the money in the boat and left then and there."

"That's more than a lead, Vriska."

"I know right? I'm thinking of getting back into gambling. Humans are so easy to manipulate."

Kanaya widens her eyes, mortified. "Vriska!" Had she forgotten all of those nights that they spent arguing about the well-being of others in their younger days? Had she forgotten that she nearly lost Tavros to a gang of highbloods when she screwed over the wrong people when they were only seven sweeps old? Had she forgotten all those nights they spent starving because she had spent the last of their savings on a game of roulette?

"It's only an idea!"

"Let's keep it that way," Kanaya glowers. "I don't want to fight with you today."

"Alright, fine. I just wanted to let you know it was on the table. We're going to run out of antiques eventually, and until one of us besides me gets over the fear of horn removal and gets a respectable job, it's the only option we have. Think about it." Vriska turns back to the door and climbs the stairs. Kanaya watches as she closes the door, leaving her in the dark again.

Kanaya sighs, turning back to the matriorb. Another millipede had crawled on it, so she removes that one, too. She's right, though. So far, Vriska was the only one willing to remove her horns, Karkat refused to leave his block except on special meetings, and Nepeta was the only hunter besides the seadwellers, they have no other source of income besides the relics, which the kids all began to hoard for themselves because they had gotten attached. Kanaya just didn't want to be at such a low point in her life again.

Then, a crack. Kanaya snaps back into reality. The matriorb was shaking.

She lets out a short gasp and scoots closer on her hands and knees. A small spider-web shaped crack had formed on the very top. She blinks and squints, to make sure it wasn't her imagination. Then, the crack gets bigger and a small talon breaks through. She smiles and laughs with relief.

"Yes! Come, little grub!" She remembers that she needs to prepare absorbency cloths and dashes to the top of the stairs excitedly. She flings the door open and shouts, "Towels! Quickly!"

Eridan nearly throws the spatula into the air and proceeds to yell at her for interrupting his work. Aradia had heard her and came running with some mostly-clean blankets.

"Thank you Aradia. Follow me. I also need some warm water to soak them in."

"Now that I can do," Eridan mutters, bending down to a lower cabinet to retrieve a pot. Kanaya can't afford to spend time to be surprised at his help so she just turns back to her new responsibility.

She's going to be a mother.

Karkat can't sleep. He never does, usually. And now he really can't because there's a commotion downstairs. He surprisingly doesn't give a shit about it, and proceeds to leave the mansion-hive, avoiding the kitchen and basement altogether.

He thinks about what Nepeta said all those months ago. The long bouts of not being able to sleep are beginning to take its toll on him, and he knows exactly why. The reason Nepeta's words were still with him. The reason he doesn't have to really live anymore.

How long has it been since she was murdered? He recounts the days nearly every day. It's been fifteen months, a week, and six days. It's been nearly a perigee now and it's still fresh in his mind like it happened yesterday. The discovery devastated him. Made him angrier. He hated everyone for it, especially himself. If it weren't for his bleeding bloodpusher for Feferi's cause, then she'd still be alive.

Fuck, he can't even say her name anymore.

He finds himself walking down Nepeta's trail, the sun lowering on the horizon. What time is it, anyway?

"The cat-troll spies her prey and asks if he has finally decided to take her up on her offur."

"Jegus!" Karkat exclaims, extremely startled. Was that a cat pun? And did she seriously refer to herself as "the cat-troll"? He looks around and sees no one.

"She leaps down from the trees above and tries not to startle him more." The branches above him shake and drop some long green needles. He can see that she's moving very fast, and seems to have mastered the trees around here well. At least someone's adjusting well. She lands in front of him about ten feet away.

"I'm not taking you up on your offer, I just want to see what it is," he corrects her. She seems dejected, but gestures to follow her anyway.

"The first stage is denial," she states. "Then anger. Then bargaining. Then depression. Then acceptance." She pauses to clear some brush that had fallen on the path. "And Nepeta noticed that you have already gone through the first three and have been on the fourth fur quite some time."

"I'm not depressed!" he yells. And what the shit-scraping fuck is she talking about?

"Sure."

They continue to walk in silence. They pass a small pond, then go along a creek for a while. She expertly navigates them down a hill, and at the bottom, he sees three large rocks, two with Alternian scribbled on them in what looks like animal blood.

"We're here." She stops in front of one of them and sits on her ankles. He peers over her shoulder to read it. "It's a hunter's tradition, but it works for friends, too."

"Equius Zahhak
"Age: 10 sweeps
"Occupation: Butler
"Blood Caste: Indigo
"Legacy: Nepeta's one and only Meowrail"

Is this a memorial plot? He looks to the other one with Alternian scribbled on it, and notices that it doesn't match the handwriting on the other stone.

"Tavros Nitram
"Age: 8 sweeps
"Occupation: Revolutionary
"Blood Caste: Brown
"Legacy: Lousy Godda Good-For-Nothi Beloved Martyr"

So Vriska has been here. Karkat scoffs shortly. A leader never shows their weaknesses, he guesses.

"Karkat," Nepeta says. He turns towards her. She's offering a container of animal blood. "It's time to move on. We're here now, and we all need you."

"I can't."

"You have to."

"No!"

"Yes!"

"Fuck you!"

"Anytime, fucker! Eep!" She flushes a deep olive and shakes her head violently. He's never heard her curse before. He swallows uncomfortably and blushes a bit himself.

"I'm sorry, I just can't, Nepeta. I can't let her go just yet."

She sighs and puts the bowl down. Some of it had spilled on her arm in the argument. "Okay. I'll leave this here, then."

And at that, she left.

An hour passes before Karkat drops to his knees and stares at the blank rock in front of him. He slowly takes the bowl and carefully dips his index finger in.

"Disgusting," he mumbles. At least there are no clots in it. When he finishes, he takes the nearly-empty container with him. The sun had nearly set, and it'll take a while for him to get back home.

"Terezi Pyrope
"Age: 9 sweeps
"Occupation: Imperial Legislacerator
"Blood Caste: Teal
"Legacy: Innocent"

Finally, it has happened. The mother grub was born, and it'll only be a matter of weeks before she can start repopulating the troll populous on this distant planet.

Feferi Peixes knew that the time had come. She couldn't count on Meenah to do it, because she wasn't of age yet. She was the highest of highbloods, so naturally she felt that her duty was to rule over all the other trolls. Her nature went against her nurture, her entire being conflicting every day.

On one hand, she could just let it be the way it is now, Karkat and Kanaya being in charge of the younger ones and co-leading everyone else.

On the other, Feferi could take over. She certainly had the skill set.

For every day that she resisted this temptation, she fought it back with the ideals of democracy. She seemed to win most days. Others, though…

She nearly killed one of the younger grubs for it. Kankri, to be exact. Like herself, he had found a book about a revolutionary leader in the crypts below. There were only pictures to go on, but he established that he was exactly like Karkat's ancestor and went straight to her to talk about it. When he babbled on and on about how that revolutionary leader never offended anyone in their entire lifetime and became martyr, he immediately connected it to himself. Like he had written the Signless's journal himself!

She got angry.

So angry.

She didn't want to, but she had to do it.

She had to leave. And soon.