Here we go again, more fucking horror terrors.
This time, instead of Terezi being hung on that single post in a scorched field, it's everyone he knows on the island on multiple posts, and the field is still ablaze. He's tugged on his arm, and he looks down to see himself there. He yanks away, but the other him is too strong. On his other side, another him tugs, and has a rope. He turns to run, but it's like he's running in slime. The two smaller Karkats grab him, get the rope around his neck, and start dragging him. He's holding onto it for dear life, while simultaneously trying to not get burned by falling fireballs. They hook the rope over the top and pull him up, up, up… It's only a matter of time now. The smell of the field burns his nostrils as he struggles to breathe.
Someone's calling him. But how? All of his friends are dead.
"Karkat! Fuck!"
Karkat jolts awake, breathing hard like he just ran a fucking marathon around a bonfire. And speaking of fire…
"Karkat, get out of here!" Sollux yells. The room Karkat borrowed is filled with smoke. Is the hotel on fire? "The hotel ith on fire and I can't find Aradia!"
Karkat scrambles to his feet, running about to grab everything of value, which wasn't much; only some shoes and his cape thing, which may or may not have Kanaya's picture from that one time in it. "She probably did the smart thing and ran outside!"
"She went to get the guests out!"
"Don't they have alarms?"
"She went to check for morons, like you!" As soon as he said that, the alarm in the room went off.
Karkat and Sollux run out just in time for a gas pipe to explode in the room they were just in. Their boss is going to be pissed. The extended stay hotel they manage after hours isn't very popular, but they still have loyal customers. They've been working here, helping run the place for a few months now, and "summer" has hit hard. Whatever nookstain had lit a fire in their room for warmth must be regretting it now. Probably some shithead who wanted toasted marshmallows but was too high to realize they need to be outside for that. He facepalms at the theory.
Karkat smells smoke again, but in close proximity, so he looks down to see his cape had been singed. Great, now he looks like a vagabond. He pats it down with disgust, then looks around for Sollux. And he's gone. Probably to go look for Aradia. As he stated before, she probably went to a safe place.
He decides to carefully make his way to the front of the now-burning building, where there are flashing lights and blaze-control units are trying to extinguish the fires. The boss, a human male with a strong disposition and a kind heart stands, staring at the unfortunate circumstance in front of him. He looked like he had been crying, and rightly so. This business was his only livelihood, burned to the ground by some idiot who had no regard for others' safety. Karkat wonders if that weird kid who left suddenly last night, who also broke the television in his room, had anything to do with it. Karkat's still angry about that. He didn't even pay. Sure, he left some bills behind, but he left everything else, too. Karkat gets a migraine just thinking about it.
Karkat also sees the few guests they were looking after standing around, searching their things for spare change, and also looking around for a phone. He's like them now, homeless without a thing to their names. Some of them were like that guy, by themselves, but others were entire families, living in two rooms, sharing a bathroom, and they just lost everything, small appliances included. Karkat turned a blind eye to them, knowing that said appliances weren't allowed on the premises, and it's highly unlikely one of them started the fire.
"I can't find her!" Sollux shouts over the noise. No.
"Who?" the boss asks.
"Aradia! Where did she go?"
"She wasn't stuck in this, was she?"
"Some of the alarms were working properly, tho she went to go fix them, then I thaw the thmoke…" Sollux chokes up. He never does that. He starts breathing hard. "ARADIA!" he calls at the top of his lungs. "ARADIAAAA!"
The building responds by collapsing, sending burning ashes into the sky. The blaze-control units are shouting for people to get back, telling them it's impossible to save the building now. If everyone isn't outside by now, they're gone. No one could survive that.
Sollux bolts forth. Karkat springs into action, grabbing his middle and making them hit the ground hard.
"You stupid asshole!" he yells. "You'll die!"
"Maybe she'th sthill alive! Let me go!"
"Get ahold of yourself! No one can survive that!"
"You don't know that!"
"She's dead, Sollux! Stop struggling and let me save you!" Karkat pants.
"No! Fuck!" Sollux squirms, but Karkat's grip only tightens. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, FUUUCK!" He screams more unintelligible things that sound like Aradia's name, then he descends into silence. Their boss comes over with some paramedics, and they come take Sollux away, leaving Karkat alone to stare at the flames.
He never should have left the island.
"How are you holding up, Kanaya?" Feferi asks, leaning over her bed. She's been like this since Karkat, Sollux, and Aradia left. Every day, after she's finished with her duties and the grub-children are put to sleep, she goes straight to her own and does not emerge for hours. Vriska is thoroughly annoyed at her newfound job of taking over care of the grub-children at night. Sometimes Feferi does it when Vriska "takes off" with her boat.
"I am fine, don't worry about me," Kanaya finally answers, not moving.
Feferi sighs. She straightens herself and leaves the block, giving up for the evening. Right outside the door, Porrim sits on the ground, knees drawn close to her chest and hands fiddling with some loose threads on her dress.
"Is she okay?" she asks, looking up at Feferi. Her horns are getting taller, so they almost hit the wall behind her.
"Kanaya is fin! Fine!" she replies cheerily. When Porrim gives a small smile in return, Feferi takes her hand and pulls her up. "Do you know how to sew?"
"Yes!"
"Can you teach me?"
"Okay!"
Porrim leads her to the girls' shared block, where only two other trolls were sleeping, the others trying to get each other to sleep by whispering harshly. Whale, until Feferi walked in, then they silenced themselves immediately.
"I'm just getting my sewing stuff," Porrim whispers into the darkness. Nobody responds, so she carefully makes her way back to Feferi. "Come on." She leads Feferi to a doorless block, one that they haven't finished renovating yet, and starts digging around in a large chest. "I found these things of fabric." She pulls out some beautiful fuchsia-colored fabric, enough to wrap them both several times. "Isn't this your blood color?"
"Close," Feferi says, stepping forth to touch it. "It's a little darker, but it's still reely pretty."
"It's not your color."
"What?" Feferi is blubbergasted. "I've worn it all my life! And it's my blood color! How is it 'not my color'?"
"I don't think it fits your personality." She pauses. "I like bright colors on you! Like blue and green and yellow and gold!"
Now she gets it. "Are you useang me for dress-up?" she scolds lightly, putting hands on her hips.
"Yep!"
Feferi can't help but laugh. It's the first reel one she's had in a long time. She laughs so much that she begins to tear up.
"Did I do something wrong?" Porrim asks, worried. Feferi opens her eyes and sees the fabric on the dirty floor, the small troll putting a hand on her arm in concern.
"No, you're good! I just didn't expect it." She kneels down and puts her hands on Porrim's shoulders. "Just hang on to that eeling."
"Eeling?"
"Feeling. It's a good one. When you all are older and leave the island to work, you can be waterever you want to be." She gives an encouraging smile.
"Can I make people clothes?" she asks, smile growing wide.
"Do you want to make clothes?" Feferi raises an eyebrow, wiggling it.
"I want to make sad people pretty. Because maybe if I can make them pretty, they won't be sad."
Feferi didn't expect that, either. She hunchbacks her shoulders, but quickly raises them again. "Whale, who do you think is sad? Me? Kanaya?" Had Feferi been that obvious? She knew Kanaya was a steel box when it came to her personal life, but…
"Yeah. I can always tell. I can feel the air get weird and I can always tell who's making it weird."
"Have you tried making Kanaya prettier?"
She just shakes her head.
"Does she make you nervous?"
She nods her head.
"Don't be!" Porrim tilts her head slightly, confused. "Kanaya is the nicest troll I know. Nicer than me sometimes! Glub!" Feferi brought her fists up to her own cheeks when she said that.
Porrim giggles. "Thanks, Feferi." She turns to the fabric on the ground and folds it up neatly, putting it back in the chest. She rifles through it some more and takes out some more fabric, but it's not bright or neon colored; it's a dull red with swirling designs on it.
"What are you making?"
"A dress."
"Who for?"
"It's a secret," she whispers. She immediately gets to work, grabbing a piece of charcoal and doodling on the floor. Feferi could tell that the charcoal was from the fireplace downstairs. She feels sorry for Porrim, she doesn't have anything to work with besides whatever she can find in her environment.
Feferi silently decides to leave. She needs to talk to Vriska.
"You want me to get what?" Vriska asks incredulously. "At this hour?"
"Think of it as another iron!" Feferi says with a pleading tone. Vriska loves it when people beg, but coming from Feferi just makes feels her feel like a terrible person.
"Do you have any idea what that word even means?"
"No, but they're not for me, so…"
Vriska scoffs lightly. "So you're willingly giving me permission to manipulate a young troll by fulfilling a request?"
"I know it sounds bad, but it's something you would do, right?"
"Damn! You know me too well. And am I seeing a royal highblood turning into a ruffian like myself?"
"Glub!"
"Okay, okay! You don't need to glub at me. But seriously, no matter who this is coming from, it's still manipulation, and it still involves you." When Feferi doesn't respond, Vriska resists all of the urges to slap her own forehead and elaborates: "I fulfill this request as yours, and you're in my debt and are subject to manipulation by me. I fulfill this request as hers, she's in my debt and is subject to manipulation by me. Either way, how is this different than literally every other request I've gotten over the past year?"
Feferi looks at the ground sheepishly and doesn't reply for a long time. "Because it's her dream. It's special. You might have to work harder to get them." She suddenly looks up, making Vriska twitch involuntarily. "What if we go with you?"
"You want to subject yourselves to this madness?" Vriska yells, pointing to her own horns. "It's not pleasant! I refused to let Aradia do it because she's so fucking anemic! She found a way around it. Somehow. I may work them hard, but I don't like hurting them like that!" Speaking of which, she has to do it again soon, because her horns are becoming more and more obvious. She can't hide behind her hat for much longer.
"I can do it." Feferi pauses. "They'll grow back."
"That's not the point—"
"And look what I can do with my fins! I've been practicing!" Before Vriska can refuse, the naïve seadweller flattens her fins so completely, they look like stray hairs attached to her face. That's… impressive, actually.
Vriska sighs. "Fine. We'll go in the morning. Get some sleep."
A thump comes from upstairs. Damn boys, they can never keep quiet at night. The girls are much better behaved. At least they go right to sleep. The boys are much more ornery. But she can control them better than Kanaya at the moment. They split up the work after Karkat left, and that meant Vriska couldn't get to the mainland as often as they needed. Most of the time, Vriska had to do both money-making and money-spending, and that meant she earned less money each time so she would have time to get the supplies they needed before the stores closed.
"Just go, I have work to do."
"Thank you! Glub, glub!" Feferi squeals and hugs Vriska's middle.
"Okay, okay! Get off! I said I have work to do!" And troll boys to throttle. "You're welcome!" She shoves the seadweller away and heads inside. Her face is burning. She slaps herself on both cheeks to give herself the excuse.
Silently, she climbs the stairs, careful not to give her position. They don't know it, but she can see every single troll-child hiding behind various furniture in the hallway, waiting for her to pass by.
She takes out her gun, locked and loaded. She eyes the first mistake: Mituna's horns sticking out from the top of a broken-beyond-repair set of drawers. The second: A leather jacket arm that can only be worn by Cronus. The third: Kurloz's hair in the fake greenery that doesn't really count, but she'll work around it. The fourth: Rufioh's horn in the doorway of an unsafe block. The fifth: Horuss's heavy breathing in the ceiling, which she had to admit was clever, and which was probably the thumping she heard earlier. She stops at the sixth and seventh: Kankri barking soft orders, and his bright red sweater reflecting off the white moonlight and onto the floor at the end of the hallway. Where the hell did he get that thing, anyway?
She shoots the foam bullets rapid fire at Mituna's horn, Cronus's arm, Kurloz's general face area, Rufioh's horn, and the wall behind Kankri. By the time he gets up to tell her she missed, it bounces back and hits the back of his head. Out of the ones she had hit, they all groan.
"Forgettin' somethin'?" Cronus sneers.
"Nope," she sneers back. She takes Cronus by his arm and the back of his stupid jacket, also wondering where he got that repulsive outfit, and throws him up at the paneling, hitting Horuss and making them both fall right into Vriska's waiting arms. "Nice try, but you have a long way to go before you all beat me at my own training techniques." She then mutters, "Bunch of twots," and lets them go.