I would like to dedicate this fic to the inimitable GwenWritesFanfiction, who told me last night that, quote, "This world needs more Vee content." Happy to oblige, Gwen :3
Enjoy!
It was probably for the better that Camila took the car keys with her on her journey to the demon realm. Vee did not know how to drive. Neither did she know the significance of the slip of paper on the windshield of their adoptive mother's car that read "PARKING CITATION". So she decided to ask Masha, the one person here whom she knew, for a ride.
"Where's the rest of your squad?" they asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh, uh," Vee stammered, "they're uh, I'm just tired and want to go home early. They'll come after."
Masha shrugged. "I'll ask Roger. Oy, Roger!" they yelled, hailing over a tall guy with a patchy beard and a fake knife in his back. "Can you give this kid-"
"Vee."
"-Vee a ride to-" They turned to Vee. "What are your pronouns?"
"Uh, she/they."
"-to their house?"
Vee waved nervously.
"Sure thing." Roger escorted Vee to his car. "What's your address?"
Vee told him. She snuck a glance at Masha out of the corner of their eye and could have sworn they were watching her intently. Or maybe they were just staring into space. Who knew. She definitely wasn't reading into it way too much.
Adulting is hard.
Such was Vee thinking as she hyped herself up to call the veterinary clinic at which Camila worked. She didn't want to have to do this, she would have liked to just stay at home alone and relax, but no, life demanded things of them and they had no choice but to comply. Did all grown-ups feel that way? If so, that made for a sad, sad world.
During the ride home, Vee had planned her cover story. Camila had ostensibly left town because of her abuela's failing health. She would be out of work for two weeks. (Hopefully that would be enough time for them to return.) Luz (well, Vee-as-Luz) would continue to attend school because Vee needed some semblance of normalcy so as not to go stir-crazy. Vee would also pray to the Titan that nobody would think to cross-reference her stories.
The other four kids - Hunter, Gus, Willow, and Amity - would not make any appearances because they did not legally exist in the human realm. Which was a strange thing to think about, and even stranger once Vee remembered that she didn't legally exist either. Neither did she legally exist in the Boiling Isles, which, fair, greater basilisks were supposedly extinct. Except... no, they were not going to think about her pre-Vee existence. Not now. Not ever.
Instead, Vee focused on a different, more productive source of anxiety. Vee hated phone calls. She couldn't see the person on the other side so she had no idea how they were reacting they might be making fun of her in silence they might not even be listening at all and she hated talking to people in general she didn't like the way her normal voice sounded she was bad at deciphering the things that other people were saying to her she hated it she hated it she HATED IT.
Needless to say, Vee spent a solid fifteen minutes hyping themself up for the call. She shapeshifted into Camila and scrunched up her eyes tight while she punched in the number.
"New Haven County Veterinary Clinic, how may I help you?"
"Uh, hi, this is, uh, this is Camila Noceda."
"Oh, hey Camila! Why'd you call the front desk?"
Vee mentally slapped herself.
"I just, I wanted to let you know, uh, I'm not gonna be, uh... family emergency. There's been. Uh."
"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry!" said the secretary. Was she supposed to know his name? She felt like she was. "Forgive me for asking, but is it your grandmother? You've said she's not been well."
Vee pounced on the cover story. "Yes! It's her. She's, uh, it's the illness." She wracked their brain for any names Camila had mentioned regarding her job. "... Pete?"
"This is Simon," said the secretary. "And I'm so, so sorry to hear that. I'm sure you must be all a-kerfuffle over her right now."
"Yes! Definitely! I am very kerfuffly right now." Vee chuckled nervously. "Two weeks off?"
"You need two weeks paid leave? Got it."
"Thank you!"
Vee allowed herself to faze out while Simon the secretary rattled off some legal-sounding info. Success! They were being successful! She'd placed a phone call, Simon the secretary had bought into her cover story despite (because of?) her kerfuffle-ness, and all was going well! Now all she had to do was be Luz for the next several days, which should be a cinch.
Being Luz was terrible. Did all human teens have it this bad?
Vee was swamped in homework, much of which she didn't understand. While Luz was in the demon realm, Vee had at least had Camila to help her with her schoolwork. But it was a year later, Vee had not been to school at all since then, and Camila was not around to lend a hand. She didn't have the slightest notion what quadratic functions were, or what a Punnett square was, or how to "analyze the themes present in Lord of the Flies".
Fortunately, Luz had something of a reputation in Gravesfield High (Go Bats!) because of her - how to put this nicely - peculiarities. Vee-as-Luz suddenly not knowing how to multiply out polynomials wasn't the strangest thing Luz had ever done in school. Didn't mean her teachers were happy, though.
Vee was walking to the cafeteria, lamenting over the D they had just gotten on her health exam (who knew humans didn't have magic bile sacs attached to their heart?), when she stumbled across Masha and their friends hanging out in the atrium.
"Yo, Luz!" called Norville, a lanky boy with a shaggy mop of hair. He was sent to camp because he couldn't focus on any one thing for longer than two minutes.
Vee returned the wave and beelined for the group. "Long time no see!"
"We see you all the time," returned Sharon, a stocky redheaded girl. She was sent to camp because she took everything way too literally.
"No, I mean, like, with these eyes." Vee tried to point at their eyes and accidentally poked herself. "Ow!" She hoped the other kids didn't notice her nictitating membranes snap shut.
Masha laughed, and suddenly, the eye pain was worthwhile.
"What's new with you?" they asked. They were sent to camp because, like Luz, they couldn't stop living in a fantasy world of their own design.
"Not much," Vee responded. "Got a D on the health exam. Hey, speaking of, don't you find it odd how this school has an atrium but no ventricles?"
The kids all laughed. "Woah, weird!" Norville said. "I never thought of that before!"
"It is not weird because this school is not a heart," said Sharon.
Masha replied, "How would you know?"
They all shared a laugh.
"So, what brings you over?" they asked Vee. "Thought you were getting too high and mighty to hang out with your old camp friends anymore."
"Yeah," said Sharon, "most of the time you are too busy associating with your out-of-town friends to hang out with us."
"Well," Vee hedged, rubbing the back of their neck, "I was..."
A thought came to her.
"I was wondering if you could help me with my classes? I haven't been doing very well lately."
"Sure thing!" replied Norville. "I'm happy to help!"
"As am I!" Sharon said.
"Agreed..." Masha began, "on one condition." They steepled their fingers and grinned wickedly.
"What's that?" Vee asked.
"I give you another card reading."
"Oh, that doesn't sound so bad."
Masha just laughed and gestured for Vee to sit with them. "We shall see."
Vee sat cross-legged on the floor of the atrium. It was chilly and uncomfortable, and she was nervous about the reading because of how expertly the cards had called them out last time, but it was a small price to pay for homework help (and to spend more time with Masha).
Masha shuffled the deck with practiced ease. Vee sensed the traces of magic left in the cards. Her stomach grumbled. She hadn't consumed any magic in two days.
"Take my hand," Masha commanded. "It will allow the cards to read your aura more clearly."
Vee, blushing, did as they asked. Was she just imagining it, or did she spot a hint of a smile form on Masha's face?
Masha shuffled the deck again and drew three cards, placing them face-up. On the left was a crowned skull holding a cup. On the right was a demon leashed by a man. And in the middle was a pair of linked triangles.
"Interesting... very interesting," mused Masha as they examined the cards.
"What?" asked Vee. "What is it?"
"You continue to grapple with your past," they said. "It haunts your every waking moment. You feel abandoned and alone, and you struggle to live up to expectations, but you will find strength in your friends. Even, maybe..." Masha looked up to meet Vee's eyes. "A special someone."
"Ooh!" said Norville and Sharon in unison.
Vee quickly let go of Masha's hand and stood. "Okay I've gotta go, uh, get lunch thanks see you bye!"
She sped off before anyone could react.
Norville looked at Sharon. "Is it just me or is Luz acting even weirder than usual?"
Sharon shrugged. "Luz continues to defy the limitations of human bizarreity."
Two uneventful weeks passed. "Luz" met with Masha and company every weekday afternoon for a study session. She started to improve in their classes, although the quantity of work still overwhelmed her. Camila remained absent from work, but as the leave drew to a close, Vee fretted over how she would handle being in two places at once. She was already worn thin from the lack of magic; some days she would consume the odd object that Amity or Willow or Gus had cast a spell on, but those weren't filling, and they were few and far between. Eventually she wouldn't be able to transform at all, and they didn't know what she'd do then.
It was a Sunday. After Mass (she'd picked up the habit from Camila), Vee headed to the Gravesfield Historical Society (Under New New Management!) to see if they happened to have anything else magical there. Reasons completely unrelated to seeing Masha.
They walked in the front door and found nobody at the desk. So she ushered herself through the exhibits, sniffing for magic all the while. Nothing over there... nothing over there... there!
Vee beelined for a woodcutting hung up next to a door that read "STAFF ONLY". It was an unflattering depiction of a gang of witch hunters, bumbling about like the foolish lackeys of the bad guy in Disney movies. They were trying to catch a witch who mocked them with a very rude gesture. Traces of magic lingered in the charred edges of the wood block. She sucked them out. It wasn't enough. Vee hung her head, miserable.
Just then, the staff door opened and Masha emerged, fiddling with a set of linked rings. "Oh, hey!" they said on seeing her. "Vee, right?"
Vee nodded, still miserable but slightly less so.
"What's got you down in the dumps?" asked Masha, propping themself against the doorjamb.
Vee sighed. She couldn't tell them the real reason for her melancholy, so she settled on a half-truth. "It's... it's just that I'm feeling lonely."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."
Now that the valve was open, Vee couldn't stop the words from pouring out of them. "I'm lonely because all my friends have left me to go somewhere else for a little while, and I don't have anybody at home to take care of me, I've been taking care of myself for so long and then I stopped and now I have to do it again, and it's hard. Adulting is so hard. Did you know that going shopping for groceries takes me an hour and a half that I'd rather spend doing literally anything else? Did you know that the government will impound your car if you leave it in an illegal parking area for too long?
"And I feel awful all the time because I've been lying to everybody about what's going on, who I am, all that, and I! Hate! Lying to people! It makes me feel sick to my stomach all the time, and it doesn't help that- well, it doesn't help me! But, but I can't tell people the truth because..." She started to shudder with sobs. "Because if they knew, they, they'd hate me! They'd be scared of me! Like with Jacob..."
Masha was not trained to handle museumgoers breaking into tears in front of them. They awkwardly patted Vee on the back as she cried. "Uh... there, there?"
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."
"Here, um, let's go sit down for a little while." Masha led Vee into the back room, where they both sat on the floor.
Vee hiccupped. "I'm, I'm s-sorry about dumping all this on you wi-without any warning."
Masha tried to smile comfortingly. "It's okay. Just try to relax."
The back room had been redecorated since Jacob's eviction. The instruments of torture, bulletin board, and computer still remained, but Masha had installed a few personal touches. A model of the solar system hung from the ceiling, and a constellation map was tacked to the wall. Several fantasy books related to witches and the like sat on the desk. Two posters, both for musicals, adorned the door. Vee was still unsettled by the room, having been imprisoned in it before, but the personal effects were a comfort.
They sat shoulder-to-shoulder until Vee's tears dried up at last. Then Masha suggested, "Why don't we go to Snoozing Titan State Park? Whenever I have a rough day, I like to go there. The aura of the place never fails to lift my spirits."
"Don't you have work?"
"Eh, it's always quiet on Sundays. Let me call my mom for a ride." Masha grimaced.
"Why, is there something wrong with your mom?"
"She - ugh - she's just... so... nice!" Masha scrunched their eyes closed and gritted their teeth.
Vee was confused. "Nice?"
"Yes! She's always so nice to me! It's like, I do something wrong, she makes me hug it out, we're fine. Like, punish me for once! You're the parent of a rowdy teen; act like it! And she's so accepting of me, too! It makes me sick!"
Vee couldn't help but laugh. Masha cracked a grin in response. "Yeah, look at me complaining about having it too good. Look at me griping after you've just had a meltdown in front of me."
"It's no big deal," Vee consoled. "You needed it, I needed it. We're even."
Masha nodded and dialed their mom.
A few minutes later, Masha's mom dropped them off in a small parking lot at Snoozing Titan State Park. It was wooded with deciduous trees, dropping their red-and-gold leaves onto the forest floor. Several hiking trails branched off from the parking lot, snaking through the woods and up the hill.
"Bye, sweetie!" called Masha's mom. "Have a good time with your friend!"
Masha groaned. "Bye, Mom or whatever."
"So," said Vee as the car drove away, "what do we do now?"
"Do you want to hike to the top of the mountain?"
"Sure!"
The two followed a white-blazed trail that took them slowly but steadily upward.
"Why is it called Snoozing Titan?" asked Vee, reminded of the Boiling Isles.
"Because when you look at it from a distance," Masha replied, "it looks like an enormous man is asleep."
After some minutes, they reached the top. A stone tower stood at the peak. They climbed up it and took in the view of the surrounding countryside, from the mountain ridge in the north all the way to the distant shore. The sun hung high in the sky, shaded by clouds.
Vee could smell magic in the air. Acting on instinct, they breathed it in, letting it flow into her bile sac and permeate her body with its power. Then she realized that Masha was watching.
"Holy carp."
Vee stopped absorbing magic and turned to face them. Her lower lip quivered. Was Masha going to freak out? They looked like they might; their eyes were all wide and their skin had gone pale.
"That was..."
Vee whimpered.
"AWESOME!" Masha started to pump their fists through the air. "Holy cow, how did you DO that? What were you even doing? Was that magic? I knew it was real! I knew there was something odd about you! I knew it I knew it I knew it!"
Vee smiled sheepishly. "Yeah so, uh... I guess the secret's out?"
"Okay, okay." Masha took several deep breaths to calm themself down. "Sorry about freaking out on you like that."
"No, I'm actually-" Vee blushed. "I'm happy you were so excited."
Masha blushed too. "Yeah, I just thought it was pretty cool. So, tell me- actually, wait. Are you okay with telling me more about what you just did?"
"Sure!"
They sat on the ledge and let their feet dangle. It was scary, Vee thought, being so unprotected, but it was freeing. For once she could be true to herself.
"I'm a greater basilisk," she began, "a type of demon. I'm from another world called the Boiling Isles, where witches and demons live. The Isles are rich in magic, but the human realm isn't. I need magic to power certain abilities I have."
"What abilities are those?" asked Masha.
"For one, I can suck the magic out of another being or thing. That's what you just saw me do. For another, I can shapeshift."
"So you don't really look like that?"
"Well, no," Vee hedged. "But this is the form I like to use when I'm out among humans. It saps my magic to maintain, though, which is why I needed to absorb the magic here at this mountain."
"What does your true form look like?"
Vee hesitated before responding. "I, uh, it's kind of scary and weird. I don't know if you'd enjoy seeing it."
"Of course I would!" said Masha. "I like weird!"
Vee took a deep breath, then shapeshifted into her basilisk form.
Masha stared at her for a solid minute.
"Yeah," said Vee, rubbing the back of their neck, "it's a lot to take in. I'm sorry, I'll transform back-"
"No no no!" Masha waved their hands in the air, dispelling the sentiment. "You're- oh my gosh, you're adorable!"
Vee gasped. "I am?"
"Yes! I mean, look at you! Your tail piercing, your ears - you're so dang cute!" Masha kicked their legs back and forth, squealing.
Vee flushed and inched away. Cute? She never would have thought that descriptor could be applied to her at all, let alone to their basilisk form. It warmed her to hear. Her face felt hot, but the heat was a comfortable one.
She wasn't sure how to respond. "Th-thanks?"
Masha grinned their gleaming-bright grin that made Vee's heart soar to see. "So, tell me how you ended up on our world?"
"Before I tell you that, I, there's something else I think you need to know." Vee folded her arms over her chest. Masha looked down at the ground and started kicking their feet.
Vee shapeshifted into Luz.
"I'm the Luz that you met at camp."
Masha stared at them, eyes wide. "Oh."
Vee explained everything: how she wound up in the Human Realm, impersonating Luz, attending camp, being discovered by the real Luz, Luz and her friends arriving in the human realm, the fight with Belos, Luz and Camila and the others going back to the Boiling Isles and Vee staying behind to keep house.
Masha remained lost in thought for a long while.
"So I was never really friends with Luz," they finally said.
"No," Vee replied, resuming her human form, "but you were friends with me."
Masha smiled. "I guess you're right."
They sat in a companionable silence. The sun continued its slow trek across the sky.
"What is the real Luz like?" asked Masha.
"She's like a sister to me. She's wonderful. She's likeable, friendly, talented, brave... everything I'm not." Vee sighed.
"I think you're all those things."
"You do?"
Masha studied Vee closely. "I do. You're likeable and friendly, which is why I befriended you in the first place. You're talented at shapeshifting. And you're brave in sharing your true self with me. You could very well have continued to hide it, but you decided to do the hard thing and tell the truth. You mentioned earlier that you don't like to lie, but you felt stuck in your lies. And you broke that spiral just now. That's real bravery."
Vee fidgeted in their seat, feeling indescribably happy. "Thank you!"
Another moment of silence.
"So what am I going to do now?" asked Vee.
"What do you mean?"
"What do I do now that Camila's still gone, and I have to go to work disguised as her but also attend school disguised as Luz?"
"Well..." Masha wrung their hands, thinking. "I guess we could figure that out. Together."
Vee perked up. "Together?"
"Yeah, together." They blushed.
"Do you mean, like... together-together?"
"I-I guess so?" Masha giggled. "If that's okay with you."
Vee smiled. "It's okay with me."
She proffered her hand. Masha took it. They looked at their linked hands with trepidation, but the feeling vanished when she realized she didn't have to be alone anymore.
Snoozing Titan State Park is based off of the real Sleeping Giant State Park, located in Hamden, Connecticut, USA, which also happens to be the city where Dana Terrace grew up. I believe it was the inspiration for the Boiling Isles. Dana Terrace, if you're reading this, I know your secret :3