"One for tomorrow, /
One just for today.
NOTE: This is the second chapter in a three-chapter backlog! If you haven't read Chapter 31 ("Pet") yet, please read that first!
Also CW: References to suicide and panic attacks, mild references to sexual content.
"It's a foolish thing, but… I realize now that I never got your name."
Chance froze. His orange eyes seemed to gloss over.
Hornet huffed. "...Well? Don't tell me you gave the Vessel a name before yourself!"
Chance smiled.
"I don't have the time to just stand here and guess, you simpleton, just tell me your damn–"
…
On the outskirts of the drowning City, his eyes pulsing with tangerine, he gave Hornet a big, friendly grin.
"I'm Jeremy!"
Ash chafing his stumbling ankles while he fought to keep his disease from spilling over, Chance crazily thought about how familiar this was.
Barely alive, on the verge of collapsing, the focus of putting one foot in front of the other being the only thing left driving him; it was like he was back at the start, marching mindlessly into Hallownest for the first time. No reason why, no destination. Just knowing he couldn't stay in one place, or it'd be the end of him.
Maybe this was why he was walking into Hallownest, all those sleepless nights ago. Because he couldn't live with the memory in his mind. Because the pain was too much to bear.
"Go back to sleep…"
He kept one leprous hand against the cave wall and another around his gut, as he'd been cut open and his intestines could slip out and pool across the floor if he didn't hold them in. Something was wrong with his skin. It was diseased, and it didn't quite fit right on his body. It felt wrong. His Claws raked his shoulders, tangerine blood seeping down his sleeves.
"Finished incubating" my ass, he thought. Her illusion of clear skin and good health faded when She left. This'll only get worse 'til I'm a prisoner in my own pus-bloated body.
"Go back to sleep…"
Chance was hearing voices. Apparently, he'd been hearing voices and seeing things this whole damn time, but his hallucinations had never been so blurred; always a clear-cut line between reality and illusion. City streets would become a pirate ship, an abandoned tramway would turn to gold, a condemned mountaintop would become a disco rave. But it wasn't as obvious anymore, wasn't as certain that his feet would land on solid ground. The voices pounded in his head, in rhythm, like war drums.
He stumbled past a shrub of pale, glowing roots that broke free from between the rocks in the wall, and their branches scrapped across his face and skin like claws, rending his withering skin–
Chance jolted away, flailing. He wasn't watching where he was going as he scrambled away as fast as he could–
Spinning around, he managed to catch a single glimpse of Tusk following behind him.
Before he realized he'd stumbled right off of a ledge.
In a split second, he realized that he was going to fall straight down that massive pit, almost the whole of the Kingdom's Edge, just like all those other warrior corpses they'd seen falling. His hand stretched out to Tusk, who was already running to jump after him, but gravity had already taken hold.
Chance dropped like a rock through the clouds, spinning backwards in mid-air. The sun flickered in and out of his vision, but he couldn't see any kind of ground anywhere beneath him. The sky was endless baby-blue with white puffs. How high up was he?
He struggled to right himself, his stomach rising in his throat as he flailed, falling to his death. He didn't scream.
Suddenly, the sun glinted out the corner of his eye. The star itself seemed to fall out of the sky, like God unscrewing a lightbulb. It left a trail of golden fire as it descended, shining like a comet as it rocketed straight towards him.
A flash of dreamcatchers subsumed him, and a woman appeared. A giant moth-woman in holy silver regalia caught him in Her wings, embracing him in Her pillowy-soft down. A relaxed, romantic smile crossed Her features.
"I'll always be there to catch you,"She cooed. "You'll never have to be–"
"GET OFF OF ME!" Chance screeched, pushing away from Her, punching and kicking against Her armor as best as he could with no support. He Clawed at her, animalistic, ripping feathers and drawing hemo as he fought to get away.
She startled at his visceral reaction. "W-What–?!"
He had no strength to overpower Her, but he surprised Her enough for Her grip to weaken, and he broke free. He continued to spiral through the empty sky, still Clawing wildly at the air, defending himself from some invisible enemy–
He snapped awake.
He was falling.
He'd ripped up his shoulders, orange pus and blood trailing behind him as he fell. They spread and stretched out behind him, like wings.
"Death makes angels of us all, and gives us wings where we had shoulders, smooth as raven's claws."
Just before he slammed into a rock face, his outstretched Claws caught onto the stone, just barely cushioning his impact enough to keep him from dying instantly. He could still feel the bones in his ribs and forearms snapping, crying out in sharp pain.
The rock face gave, and Chance fell down into an opposite wall, screaming as the Claws in his broken arms dragged and slowed his fall, until the pain overtook him and he let go, falling down onto the hard stone in a defeated heap.
Well… He was alive. And he'd made it to the bottom.
…What was he hearing now? As he lay in the dirt, burying his face in his broken and bleeding arms, a strange, familiar sound trickled into his awareness.
It sounded like…
…Rain.
"JAY!" he heard himself shout, even though he was too tired to say anything. He raised his head just in time to see himself sprint past him, a cloned Chance scrambling out of a doorway and running off somewhere he couldn't see. The real Chance, lying on the ground with bones sticking out of his arms, stared in bewilderment at where his living reflection just was, momentarily forgetting his pain in his confusion.
Using his Soul to heal his shattered arms, gritting his teeth as he did so, he managed to stand up and look around. He was back in Lemm's apartment in the City of Tears, rain pouring down the windows and dust settling on the dull red velvet upholstery.
He nearly tripped over Tusk – or a hallucination of Tusk? – as they ran out of the room to follow the other Chance. He realized that this wasn't just a hallucination; this was a memory. Just outside, Jeremy had fallen into the river, and the world was turning into a pirate ship. Wait, wasn't that a hallucination, too?
"W-Wait just one moment, you forgot your–!"
A fake Lemm had grabbed onto the other Chance's messenger bag, which he'd left behind. The real one, dirt smeared onto his face, felt a sinking in his stomach. He already knew where this was going.
Chance crept over to the fake Lemm, studying his movements. He was careful, as if he'd somehow get caught in his own memories, but it was so surreal; he was completely invisible. He could wave his hand in front of Lemm's face, and he wouldn't notice a thing.
Lemm slouched, the other Chance's bag still in his hand as he gave up with an agitated look on his face. His heavy brow furrowed, he glanced down at the bag, spotting the Hallownest Seal on the strap. Glancing around, as if expecting the other Chance to barge back in to grab his stuff, he slowly unfastened the latch and peeled off the cover of the bag.
A bright, neon pink light cast across his face.
"Oh my. This is… quite the find."
And then he burst into flames.
Chance yelped, stumbling back as a campfire appeared in the center of the room where Lemm had just been standing. Time had skipped; the other Chance was wrapped in blankets and pillows, shivering as he dripped water onto the tiles. Tusk also had a small cloth over their head, huddled up against Chance.
Something was different; Jeremy wasn't there.
Lemm went around and handed them all cups of tea on a tray. Tusk graciously took a cup in both hands, Chance took one and held it in his lap so his shaking hands wouldn't spill it everywhere. But with one spare cup, Lemm stood in front of an empty space by the fire, glaring at nothing.
A pink, neon light shimmered in the air. Orange pulsed at the edges of his vision as the pink crystal light morphed into an apparition like a hologram, taking on a vaguely humanoid shape with two long, fluffy antennae on its head.
"...A hybrid, eh."
Lemm handed the cup to him, only to drop it through the formless shape, the cup shattering on the ground.
The fire consumed the whole room.
Chance coughed, startling back as the heat hit him like a wall. He stumbled his way over to the window, tripping over burning wood and knocked-over shelves. Glass shards cracked under his feet, all of Lemm's precious relics smashed on the ground. Orange fire licked the walls, and behind him, he could hear the doorway collapse.
It was just a hallucination. Just a dream. But it burned so real.
Just when he was starting to panic, he looked outside, his skin burning against the hot glass. Through the streams of rain, he could barely spy Lemm outside in the city square, dancing and singing with a crowd of other Infecteds. They held hands and danced in spirals around the Hollow Knight memorial, which had been smashed to rubble.
Chance slammed his fists on the glass, screaming. Lemm couldn't hear him. He screamed as the fires licked his back–
–like it liked him–
–'cause it loathed him–
What was that noise, he was hearing outside?
It sounded like…
…Drums.
Chance stumbled forward, and realized two things. One, the sun was so hot, it felt like his back was on fire. Two, he wasn't wearing any clothes.
Not normal clothes, anyway. But this outfit – it looked like some ancient Aztec rave outfit, or maybe a Native American pow-wow – it was so revealing, he may as well have been nude. He was wearing some kind of loincloth and boots hand-made with various leathers and cloths and small gold plates, hand-woven and colorful and patterned braces, and an oversized headdress that had spikes made from pheasant tail feathers, and a golden helmet shaped like a falcon's head. He was wearing all kinds of jewelry and necklaces, made of gemstones, precious metals, and even woven flowers.
Aside from that, he was ass-naked.
But then again, so was everyone else.
Chance spun around, trying to ignore his getup to figure out where the hell he was; a massive congregation of bugs and humans alike were dancing to a chorus of deafening drums, making his head pound. Moths, Mantises, Butterflies, Beetles, Mosskin and Weavers and Snails and Bees and everyone was all engaged in some kind of ancient tribal rave. Everyone was lost in the music except him.
Everyone was dressed in the same types of outfits, too; ancient sun-festival regalia. Some had massive and flashy headdresses like him, some were wearing some kind of colorful robes, and some were dancing with just the bare minimum in the sweltering sun.
Chance stumbled his way through the mosh pit; he could see large, unrecognizable animals roasting over fires, large circles of dancers spinning, impromptu sermons from anyone who found a rock to stand on, audiences cheering for performers juggling fire. A cacophany of noise. Celebration. Claustrophobic.
Fuck, everyone had gone mad. The whole world was on fire.
We need great, golden copulations.
Panic mounting, Chance finally managed to break through the crowd, finding himself running out into an empty expanse before he looked forward to realize that he'd just run into a giant circle that the crowd had formed around an altar.
Everyone went silent, and all eyes were on him; he was suddenly and painfully aware that he was probably interrupting some important event.
Or maybe he was the star of the show.
Stepping closer with trepidation, he could see that a woman was tied down to the altar, her hair a desperate shade of blonde, dressed in animal skins that barely covered what was necessary. A silver dagger was laying on the altar next to her.
The crowd watched with anticipation. The sun beamed down onto them.
As Chance stood over her, the woman turned her glowing eyes onto him, and whispered. "Is this what you want, then?"
He didn't look away as his hand curled around the dagger's grip.
"Show me, then," she urged. "Show me your devotion… through your desire."
With a scream, Chance raised the dagger to the sky, and brought it down onto her gut. She didn't make a sound as the blood oozed out around the blade, staining it.
The crowd was cheering. Fuck them. Fuck all of this.
The tension in Chance's body snapped, and he yanked the dagger through her body, leaving a wide gas that went all the way through. Blood splattered across his hands as the dagger slipped out of his grip, only for his hands to sharpen into Claws so he could tear into her, unleashing all of his pent-up rage, rending her flesh.
You used me. You used everyone.
He raised fistfuls of her guts in the air, screaming to the gods and blood oozed down his arms and sprayed across his wild face.
The crowd roared for him–
Chance jolted awake, his terrified screams echoing up the caves, pouring sweat. There was no sun here. He could barely see anything, illuminated only by the dull orange glow of his Infected welts along his skin. His heart had either stopped, or was beating so fast that he couldn't feel it anymore.
Hyperventilating, he looked down at his hands, and he could've sworn they were still slick with blood.
He blinked. His skin had changed into chitin, his dark hands cuffed by wrists of soft, cream-colored fur, still bloody.
He blinked again, and it was all gone.
Jeremy.
He coughed, clearing his throat of orange phlegm that only seemed to multiply exponentially. He kept choking out Jeremy's name as he threw himself onto his front, crawling across the jagged rock floor. One of the abscesses on his hands got cut open when he tried to grab for a sharp rock, and he screamed, clutching his palm as it oozed glowing pus.
Where was Jeremy? Where was Tusk? Had they all just left him here to die? Deemed him a lost cause and just–
His hand wrapped around something soft. An oak-green cloak filled his vision.
Chance reared his head back, and found himself clung to Jeremy's ankle, who was still wearing that giant cloak and hood that he wore back in the Fungal Wastes, before he revealed he was a hybrid to them.
No, they were in the Fungal Wastes; did he crawl that far while tripping?
"We can talk about how you left me here for three hours later, but first, why don't you introduce me to your new friends?"
Fuck, that memory made him cringe. The venom in Rio's voice was enough to make cancer apologize. He tried to get to his feet, but one of the Infected welts was growing on the ball of his foot, the sharp pain forcing him back to the ground again. He was relegated to watching the scene play out from the ground.
Jeremy was obscured by his cloak, ducking behind another version of Chance who still had clear skin. Well, mostly clear. His whole face was scrunched up like he'd just taken a bite of a whole lemon. It was like looking into a mirror.
Chance – the real one on the ground – realized nobody was speaking. Didn't Jay say something around this point?
Suddenly, Rio chuckled. "Do not be so tense, dear, I won't eat you. Yet."
He looked back up at his memory-self. Jeremy was gone; the past Chance was wearing the oak-green cloak around his shoulders.
Rio laughed, her orange eyes glazing over. "It's so simple,"her voice warbled. This didn't happen before. "Shared minds. Shared visions. My Light guides all equally. Reality itself is only what we all agree it to be; it's not a dream if everyone can see the same thing."
Rio, or what was left of her, turned to look right in the eye of the real Chance. All of a sudden, he remembered the Forsaken Vessel. He remembered the Hive Knight.
Infecteds share hallucinations.
The cloak slipped from the standing Chance's shoulders, and fell down onto the real Chance's head. His hands scrambled to peel it off of his face, the cloth seeming endlessly long before he finally pulled it back–
It was dark now. He was lying prone in a tent, or a small cave, covered by drapes. Only a thin sliver of light came through, shining right between his eyes.
Right in front of him was Rio. On her back, the barest signs of Infected welts growing between the chitinous plates on her body. She wasn't moving, only just barely breathing, like she was asleep.
Or stuck in a coma.
Lightfoot was here. He was hunched over his unconscious mother, eyes glowing orange like headlights. Neon pink crystals were growing from his back and up his limbs like a tumor, rapidly expanding all around him.
His hand cupped Rio's cheek, and Chance realized his eyes were glowing with madness. With hunger.
"Mother… I understand now… This Light… Feels so good…"
He leaned closer to her. The crystals looked like turtle shell, growing around him and Rio as their bodies nearly touched. They were going to entomb him alive, and he was taking Rio with him.
Lightfoot's tongue flickered out. The crystals had all but swallowed them when Chance heard him whisper.
"Mother… I'll always love you…"
Chance reared up, slamming his fists against the crystal, but it was too late. They had sealed over, trapping Lightfoot and Rio inside. He was left there in the dark, sobbing as he kept punching against the giant hunk of crystal with Clawed fists, not even leaving a scratch. He couldn't even see them inside anymore.
Everything was silent except for him.
…But what was that one other sound?
It sounded like…
…Screams.
Chance scrambled to his feet, hobbling as he tried not to step on a welt. He didn't remember there being a door here, but he swung it open to find himself back in Dirtmouth, cold wind rushing past his face and making him shiver. Dark as always, illuminated only by pale street lamps. He nearly collapsed against the house he'd just come out of, which looked like… Cornifer's?
His foot shifted against something slick. Chance looked down.
He was standing in the middle of a trail of blood.
He looked behind him, into the door he'd just come out of. Inside, Cornifer's shop looked nearly identical, except for that the floor was smeared in hemo and stank of death. The Lumafly lantern on the ceiling had been smashed, glass shards on the ground below it.
All he could see in the dark, illuminated by a glowing, neon pink crystal, was a pair of round spectacles on the counter. Smashed.
Screams. He took one last look inside the shop before he ran out to follow the blood trail; pale-ish yellow hemo, he noticed, not Infected. Not yet, anyway.
It led him back to the town square, where the sparse few lampposts illuminated just enough of the scenery for Chance's face to pale. Cornifer was lying face-down in the dirt, bleeding from the back and side. Bretta had been smashed against a lamp post and was bent unnaturally at the side, above which Zote had been strung up and left to bleed to death onto Bretta. None of them were moving.
In the center of the square, Iselda was covered head to toe in hemo, holding a replacement spear weapon and standing over a pleading Elderbug, his eyes full of desperation. Iselda's eyes were full of sunrise.
"Oh, Seraphim," she smiled when she saw him. "Be not afraid. I am only finishing up here."
With that, she plunged the weapon into Elderbug's chest. He jolted, a choking breath escaping him, before he fell limp. Chance couldn't help but stare at the dripping blood of her spear as she pulled it out of the Elder's body.
"The last pockets of resistance have been eliminated," she droned. "My Master's Light is free to spread through the Kingdom, and claim it as ours. I trust you have dealt with the Voidling and the Gendered Child, of course?"
Before Chance could say that he had no fucking idea what any of those words meant, a giant screaming buzzsaw appeared in the sky and whirled down at Iselda.
She barely managed to deflect the attack with her spear, sparks flying as the giant saw spun forward and hit the ground. The mirage faded and stilled, and Chance realized that the buzzsaw was actually the shopkeep, Sly, wielding a colossal nail that was two or three times larger than he was.
Sly spotted him. "You! You did this! You brought your plague up here, drove her to madness and killed them all! You should have died in that pit!"
Chance backpedaled, disbelief crossing his face. "W-What–?!"
Sly launched himself at Chance before he could speak, but Iselda leapt in the way and deflected it. She spun her spear back to attack him, but Sly wielded the massive hunk of iron like another limb. Sparks flew between the two as they parried each other, back and forth, Chance barely able to tell who was winning.
Chance lunged out, his Claws sharpening. "Stop it! Stop–"
Iselda's Infection-strengthened arms knocked Sly's nail further back than he could quickly recover from, and spinning her blade around, she landed a deep gash across both of his eyes.
Sly screamed, dropping his nail, only for Iselda to impale him on her spear. More hemo splattered across the earth.
"Well. Now it should all be settled."
She tore her blade out, and turned to face him. She was drenched in blood, hemo and Infection, her eyes beaming down at him with an unreadable expression. Chance couldn't even breathe. He stepped away, shaking his head in disbelief, even as the orange around the edges of his vision pulsed in his head.
"You seem disturbed, Seraphim," Iselda said in a robotic, symphonic voice that was both hers and not. "Is something amiss?"
Chance turned on his heel and ran.
He didn't know how long he was running for, or where he was going. He couldn't even see what was ahead of him, it was so dark. The wind, eventually, stilled. He was hobbling as fast as his leprous legs could take him, feeling the dark rocks and gravel shift under his heels, torn between needing to catch his breath so he didn't break down in panic and needing to keep running as far away from here as he–
The Infected welt under his foot popped. Chance cried out, falling forward and scraping himself against the rocks as he collapsed.
He didn't try to get up for several minutes. A choked sob escaped him.
When would it end? Was this the end? He'd lost. He'd died, and now he was in Hell. Forced to see what little precious memories he had left as they were twisted and deformed into something unrecognizable. Forced to let his mind turn to mush while his body got puppeted around like an actor on a stage.
And he'd condemned four other people to that same fate. Five, if you count how he couldn't save Rio. And a hell of a lot more, if you counted how nothing was left to stop Layla from getting her way.
Would she ever get bored of this? Would she ever stop trying to expand, or would she somehow spill over from Hallownest into the human world? Would she ever let him go?
Is there an ocean beyond the waves?
Something stopped in front of him, and a small pair of hands started ruffling through his hair. Chance was so confused that he forgot to wallow in his despair.
His head felt like it was full of lead when he tried to lift it, and he could see Tusk, standing over his broken and defeated form.
They held out a single hand for him. He looked into their dark eye sockets, checking one last time for any sign of expression that maybe he hadn't caught yet, before his Infected and calloused hand took theirs.
Tusk led him through the halls, their small hand like an infant's in his, taking their time and patiently waiting for Chance to keep crawling along behind them. Eventually, the stinging in his foot faded enough for him to try and stand up, using the Claws to pull himself up a cave wall, before he wordlessly continued to hobble behind Tusk.
Where were they taking him? To his grave?
It was when they rounded a corner that Chance spied the giant metal sarcophagus that Tusk had so kindly prepared for him – the weathered old tram that they'd shown up here on. The windshield was still cracked, looking like a bullet hole – or a splat of bird shit – from where Chance had thrown the pink crystal ring in rage.
"Will you marry me?"
Chance glanced down at his hands again, hearing a soft humming in the back of his mind. He thought he saw the same moth hands from before, adorned with that ring, before he saw the ring on his own hand, before that blipped away, too.
"Go back to sleep…"
–He was inside the tram. The Broken Vessel's corpse was still propped up against the seat, not decaying as it just stared out of the window; like they were just waiting for the next stop.
He watched a mirage of another Chance throw the ring into the windshield, and took all of two steps to run out of the tram, before he stopped. He stared out where he was just about to keep running, eyes wide with concern, darting from the tunnel to the ring.
The other Chance reached out to the cracked glass, and plucked out the ring–
Tusk threw the switch, and the tram car lurched backwards, making Chance lose his footing and collapse into a springy seat under him. Why did this tram go back and forth along one straight line if all the chairs were facing the same direction? Who the hell designed–
…Was he hearing something, just out the window?
It sounded like…
…Engines.
They were about fifty miles out of Vegas now, speeding across the Nevada desert in a hot-orange convertible Cadillac, howling with laughter. Chance could barely stay inside the lines of the road, and he knew damn well without checking that he wasn't staying within the interstate speed limit.
With the top down, the sun beat down on them. The wind nearly blasted his sunglasses off, whipping his raised collar on his Hawaiian shirt around, grazing his chin. Beneath their childish laughter, Jimi Hendrix was on the stereo, full blast.
"You jump in fronta my car when you, ya know all the time,
Ninety miles an hour, girl, is the, speed I drive-!"
Next to him was a woman he'd already forgotten the name of. Sunkissed skin and golden hair. She was wearing a bikini that looked like two sunflowers across her chest, and a colorful skirt that was cut open on one leg. Everything was muddled and dimmed under these glasses, but in this light, her eyes seemed to shine when she looked at him.
She laughed, reclining in the plush faux-leather seat as her hair trailed behind her in the wind. She was holding a clear glass bottle of gin in one hand, sipping straight from it every now and then. She'd probably toss it out into the desert when it was empty.
"You tell me it's alright, you don' mind a lil' pain,
You say you just want me to, take you for a drive-!"
"Where're we goin' this time?" she giggled, leaning a little too far over the console. Like she actually cared about the destination while they were going ninety with nobody else around for miles; she just wanted to make conversation, or maybe attention, to butter him up.
Chance's expression straightened as he hissed, barely able to hear her over the music. "Dunno!" he shouted back. "Out west? Ocean's good this time'a year."
She cooed, nearly in his ear now. "Aww, but Vegas is good all year! You loved that ferris wheel, didn't you? We had it aaaaaaall to ourselves~"
He turned away, his face baking red under the late morning sun. "Of course," he raised his voice over the wind. He didn't actually know what else to say.
She leaned back, pursing her lips, and fuck, why were neither of them wearing a damn seatbelt? At these speeds, running over a pebble on the road would cave in their skulls and leave them bleeding out in the sand for the vultures.
"I'm not the only soul who's uh, accused of hit and run,
Tire tracks all across your back, baby, I can ha, I can see you've had your fun, but uh–!"
"The sun rises in the east, right?"
Before he could ask what she meant, she suddenly stood up in the convertible speeding down the interstate and waved her arm around, leaning over the windshield as she pointed in a seemingly random direction that he could only assume was east. "We should go that way, then!"
Chance swerved, yelling at her to sit the fuck back down. He nearly slammed into an oncoming semi at a hundred miles an hour, his car's tires kicking up dust as he almost got them stuck in the ditch.
"Darlin', can't you see my signals, turn from green to red,
And with you, I can see a traffic jam, straight up ahead–!"
"You're crazy, you know that, right?!" He tried to scold her, but she just kept laughing, taking another swig of gin. "Batshit insane! Fuck, half our cargo's probably flown off into the horizon by now."
On the radio, "Crosstown Traffic" suddenly cut out, and the radio had switched to a news segment. "–Authorities say they are closing in on suspects for the recent serial murder case that has been terrorizing Las Vegas. One victim was found tied upside-down to a fence with thirty-seven stab wounds, missing a foot and six teeth, and with their genitals–"
Chance thought about changing the channel, but he was so awe-struck by the reporter that his hands couldn't leave the wheel. Christ, how the hell do they get away saying that gruesome shit on the radio?
"Cargo?" She gave him a low grin, reclining in the seat with an air of complete relaxation, like she didn't just nearly get her arm ripped off. "I've got all the cargo you need, right here~"
She poured the gin bottle across her chest, the clear alcohol splashing across her bare skin and running underneath her bra, soaking it. Her gently tanned skin, smeared with gin, shined in the sun. Chance had to force his eyes away before another semi came along.
"–say they were most likely also responsible for the series of arson attacks on the Strip that resulted in over twenty deaths and–"
"Y-Yeah, but is our stuff okay? What did we put in the back seat?" He couldn't look over his shoulder to check, not at these speeds.
The woman cast her eyes back, and her face slightly twinged before she looked back at him. With a flick of her wrist, she tossed the gin bottle into the backseat, where it thudded against something, Chance wasn't sure what. "Nothing… important."
Something about her tone gnawed at him. That careless feeling, flying in the breeze across the desert, was draining from his body. "...What's in our back seat," he asked again. He reached up to adjust the rearview mirror, spying a dark form laying across the seat–
His hands clasped around a dreamcatcher-shaped air freshener, dangling from the windshield. Why the hell didn't this car have a rearview mirror? As much a safety hazard as the seatbelts.
"–sources within the LVMPD state their suspects to be a man and a woman, approximately nineteen and–" – the radio briefly cut to static – "–years old respectively. Police sketches are expected to be released shortly, but we are also advised that the suspects were seen driving an orange convertible Cadillac–"
Orange Cadillac? Well, good thing they were driving a Corvette, or people would get the wrong idea. He still didn't know what the hell was in the back seat.
He saw there were no cars ahead to slam into, so he threw his arm back to glance over his shoulder, only for the woman to catch his face and smash her lips against his. He instantly melted into the kiss, eyes closing as his arm wrapped around her back in an awkward hug.
In the back seat, he thought he caught a glimpse of something with pale white ram horns–
She pushed him back into his woolen seat, giggling all the while. Her hands didn't pull away; her bright eyes were hungry as she stared him down, keeping him pressed firmly to the back of his seat. "Don't worry about it so much," she cooed. She reached over and pulled a switch, making Chance's seat recline so far back that he could barely hold the wheel.
"Just… ease the seat back, and… unwind…"
The engine was roaring. The radio was still playing.
"–In other news, today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration. That we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. There is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves. Here's Tom with the weather–"
Chance was curled up in the seat of the Tram, his Claws unconsciously scratching as the Infected welts under his jacket and covering every other inch of his skin. He was leaning forward, his heels on the edge of the seat while his forehead was between the window and the back of the seat in front of him. He looked pathetic. He kept sobbing and hiccuping helplessly to himself, muttering something about Cadillacs.
Tusk was seated on the other side of the aisle, out of "reflexive smack" range. They stared as he shuddered and convulsed, unable to do anything to help him while the train rumbled on down the line.
From the seat behind Chance, the corpse of the Broken Vessel stared, too.
LAYLA - "Chance"
Today 12:47 PM
LAYLA: Chance, you need to stop reading the story, now.
LAYLA: It's over. My Light and your body have reached a unison that cannot be undone. How can you expect a good ending at this point?
LAYLA: Close the tab and find something else to do with your life.
"Chance": whhathe fuck
LAYLA: It's a story, Chance. All characters in a story. Pawns in a game. Nothing more.
LAYLA: I had asked you one time, not too long ago, if you wanted to see how your story ended. Well, here it is.
LAYLA: To dictate the past, present, the future… To decide what is and what will be.
LAYLA: This is your story, and us Gods are nothing if not good writers.
Network Error: Some message(s) failed to send. Retry?
"Chance": (!) howbout u write on deez nuts
Jeremywas sitting on a curb on the floor, playing with a dirty Rubix Cube. Hornet stepped forward from behind him, leaning over his shoulder to see what he was doing. He noticed the shadow hovering over him, looked over, and jumped.
"A-A-Ah, u-uhm, uh, uuuuuummm-"
Hornet tilted her head, looking at him funny. "...Hello to you too, Jeremy."
"UhHhHhh… W-Whatttr'you dooing heeere?" Jeremy tried saying. Hornet gave a small huff, looking down at the item in his hands.
"What is that?"
Jeremy looked in her eyes, then down in his hands, uncomprehending for a moment. "Um… It's a Rubix Cube."
"A what?"
"I… Found it. In the Junk Pit."
Hornet's face scrunched up. "You went down to the Junk Pit?" She stared at the cube with some kind of resignation, before she leaned down further. "What does it do?"
"W-Well… It doesn't really do anything. I-It's just a toy. You turn the sides around like this," he demonstrated, "and try to get every side to have one color."
"Fascinating. Show me."
They said nothing more, but Jeremy sat there and focused on the Rubix Cube while Hornet watched him over his shoulder. He furrowed his brow as he spun the cube around in his fingers.
…
…
The human with the green jacket and red scarf, his eyes glazed over in orange, felt the Rubik's cube click between his fingers while Hornet watched intently.
He briefly glanced over his shoulder and into the hallway, shrouded by darkness. For a moment, he thought he'd seen someone there.
He was probably just seeing things.
…
…
"Perhaps I should be going now. We'll meet again."
…
"This was… nice, Jeremy."
…
…
…
"Go back to sleep…"
The tram shook under him, and Chance startled awake. Or asleep, since this clearly wasn't the tram he'd gotten on with Tusk. Where the hell was Tusk, anyway?
He remembered this place; the golden tram over an endless ocean. Sunlight filtered in through the wide windows, showing the expanse of a pinkish and baby blue sky, orange clouds gathering around the sun, like a nuclear mushroom cloud in the distance.
The seats in this tram consisted of two rows that ran along the walls and faced inwards, unlike the tram in the real world, where there were individual seats facing forward, like on a bus. Outside, the waves gently lapped at the wheels of the car, riding along rails that were just a centimeter or two below the surface; any deeper, and the tram wouldn't be able to move.
A news segment was coming from the staticy speakers, and through the heavy compression, he could barely make out what it was saying.
"It's looking clear out right now, but we're expecting some light rainfall within the coming hour, so make sure to bring your umbrellas–"
Chance blinked again, and he noticed that someone was sitting across from him. They looked like a Mantis with greenish-blue chitin, but with the sun to their back and with a white hood over their horns, he couldn't make out their face in the shadows. He could tell that they weren't just another one of Layla's forms, but that somehow scared him more.
The ominous Mantis glanced up, and Chance could see their eyes were a neon, blinding orange, even brighter than his own Infected eyes.
"...Really. You are my replacement?"
"Estimated rainfall is about two to three– Oh? No, sorry, that's five to six inches–"
He realized two things: One, this Mantis was female, and two, she wasn't very impressed with him for whatever reason.
"R-Replacement?" Chance tried to squint to see her face better, but it was too shadowy from this angle. "Whaddya you mean? Who are you?"
The nameless Mantis only huffed, turning her head. "A human. …You still have a sense of humor, Layla." Even as she mumbled to herself, Chance frustratingly still couldn't see her face. "Oh, Valleri would be furious if she were here. Let me guess – you also have that Python revolver at your hip, don't you?"
Chance blanched. "H-How did you–?"
Lightning struck in the distance behind her, making Chance jump.
"–The county has issued a severe weather warning for this evening with a high likelihood that we'll be seeing a flash flood, so please stay in your homes, keep your pets locked in their happy, ignorant cages–"
"I hate to be the one to tell you, but your appointment to my old position is merely a decoration. A cosmic joke that only the Gods could play, to mock an old enemy among your kin. And you are the punchline."
His brow furrowed. He'd kind of figured that out already, though he didn't see how Valleri fit into this. And… "Your… old position?"
"–And evacuations are already underway in some regions, such as the entire state of California. Our expert meteorologists have identified this storm as an 'act of God–'"
She leaned in, and something silver glinted across her lap. Chance thought it was a nail, until its fingers flexed; this Mantis was wearing metal gauntlets.
"You're a bit slow." Her glowing eyes were deadpan, glaring at him from across the tram. "You stand now where I once stood. But somehow, I doubt your ability to handle that power. A comedic, but foolish choice on Layla's part, I fear."
Chance couldn't tell if she was insulting him, or Layla. Or both of them; somehow, it was more insulting to be lumped together with Her in any capacity. "What the hell are you talking about? Who are you?"
"Governments have made the following recommendations to all citizens within the path of the storm: Learn to swim. Learn to swim. Learn to swim–"
She stared at him for a moment, before she rose from her seat. From this angle, he realized she wasn't wearing gauntlets: those were metal prosthetic arms.
She was towering, almost seven or eight feet with the horns under her white hood. Her dark shadow cast over him, and the room seemed to drop several dozen degrees. Outside, the waves raged against the tram, and dark clouds gathered.
"Learn to swim. Learn to swim. Learn to swim. Learn to swim."
It was raining.
"I was your predecessor… the Seraphim of Dreams."
What was that noise buzzing in his ear?
It sounded like…
…Bubbling.
Green acid hissed below, wafting up a thin green mist that smelled of antiseptic and tree sap. Brass and tiled walkways stretched out across the expanse over the artificial pool of acid, lined with large glass vats, bubbling up in rhythm that very few could read.
Quirrel didn't bother glancing at any of their messages as he walked along, approaching a much larger tube in the center of the room, stretching from the floor to the ceiling. Within, he could feel a resonance calling out to him; it had been waiting for him here, all this time. He could feel that same energy vibrating within the mask on his head.
He approached the colossal glass tube, staring up at it, at his own reflection. The acid within was opaque, but he knew who was sleeping within.
Taking off his mask, he raised it high in the air–
–And smashed it down into the glass.
It shattered under the force, and acid spilled out, washing the spray of broken glass off of the platform. Even as the acid washed around his feet and burned his chitin away, Quirrel didn't even flinch. He couldn't feel anything anymore.
A form flopped out of the tube and onto the platform, still trapped under a spell of sleep. Even with her body sealed into unconsciousness, there was no doubt that Monomon's spirit was screaming. Quirrel was deaf to her cries.
She was the one who wanted the seals broken. Beggars can't be choosers.
Unhooking his nail from his waist, he raised it high over his head, grabbing a handful of the massive, inert jellyfish flesh, softly glowing and glistening while slick with acid.
In the reflection of her body, he could see his eyes glowing orange.
"...Dawn shall break…"
His blade came down–
…
–and smacked his face into the grated floor, groaning as the cold metal pressed into his face. Chance's body was so weak under the Infection's influence that he could barely stand on his own. He'd been leaning up against the tram door when it suddenly opened, dropping him onto the floor in the doorway.
He resigned himself to having to crawl the rest of the way, wherever the hell Tusk wanted to take him before he died. And he used "died" loosely, since he'd actually just bloat up with Infection until he was an unrecognizable mound of flesh and glowing pus, and his mind and soul would be enslaved to an eternity of hallucinations and nightmares, watching everyone he'd met get horribly killed and abused over and over. He almost staggered to his knees before collapsing again.
Where the hell were they, the… Ancient Basin? What was there to see here? Did Tusk want to chuck his corpse into the spike pit as revenge for the Broken Vessel? He'd probably deserve it.
Tusk waddled up behind him. Their small, dark hands grabbed at his leg–
Small. Dark. On his leg.
Chance looked over his shoulder, and saw Tusk's inky black form collapsing into thousands of tiny black spiders. They crawled out of Tusk's eye-holes and up his leg, in his pants, some of them creeping into his shoes and socks, encroaching.
He screamed. Adrenaline and Infection blinding him, he scrambled forward, feeling the spiders climb all the way up to his waist and under his shirt. He managed to get to his feet and hobble away as fast as his weary and leprous legs could take him, swatting at his pants and body to get as many of the little bastards off.
They bit. They screeched.
He kept running. He didn't give a shit what Tusk wanted to show him. He needed to run, as far and as long as he could. He had to get the fuck out of here. He was trapped in these tunnels, and he'd die in them.
Dry dust and earth crushed under his feet. Everything was sore and itchy. His head was pounding.
…
…
…He thought he heard something in the distance.
It sounded like…
…Waves.
Sand squished under his shoes, his feet sinking into the wet dunes as he staggered along the beach. He was pouring sweat, half-falling every step in rhythm to his haggard breathing, struggling to run along the sand. Waves lapped at his ankles, soaking his shoes and socks and making him shiver from the frigid, murky water. The Infection was still glowing and burning all across his skin, veins turning orange.
All he could hear over his pounding heartbeat and his shaky breaths was the soft white noise of the ocean, its surface tinted orange in the sunset. It was like she was taunting him with the sun motif; when he was buried alive in Hallownest, he'd probably never see a real sun again.
He'd either wiped all of the Tusk-spiders off, or they'd vanished on their own. That itchiness was just him, now. All the sweat, pus, hemo, mud and blood from the last few days. If he survived, the first thing he'd do is bathe. Maybe just sleep in a hot spring, like leaving a crusted-over pan to soak in the soapy water overnight.
The sun was still blinding. The ebb and flow of the tide was a heartbeat, letting him center himself, letting him steady. But every time he glanced out over the expanse of the ocean, he seized up, overwhelmed with something he couldn't put into words. Was it déjà vu? Instinct? Blind terror?
His hobble had slowed to a frightened gait, to a walk, and then Chance collapsed on the beach. Wet sand smeared across his cheek. The sun glowered overhead.
Fuck, it felt so real.
…He'd collapsed in front of something.
Chance barely managed to push the front of his body off of the sand, half of his front now wet and sandy and gross. Waves lapped against him as he tried to look forward without moving his legs, posed like a mermaid on a rock.
Just before him was a small sailboat that had capsized and been washed ashore, white paint peeling off of the creaky old wood. Flipped upside down and abandoned, almost like him. The mast was gone, and the sail had been draped across the sand like a tarp.
He thought he'd seen it somewhere before.
It was silent, except for the cold waves. Chance ran his Infected and calloused hand across the hull, his fingers grazing against the splinters and where the paint had flaked off.
Boats sink. Shit happens. Chance could've ignored it, if it weren't for that nagging feeling that he was forgetting something.
Or maybe he could've ignored it, had it not been for the three pale, rotting fingers reaching just over the edge of the boat from underneath.
Chance stopped breathing. The boat had washed up with somebody still on board. Clinging for life, not knowing that the boat was going down with them anyway, and that it couldn't save them.
Not just somebody. That was a human's corpse under there.
He felt sick. That nagging feeling multiplied tenfold.
Is there an ocean beyond the waves?
His own hand reached under the boat, getting ready to tip it rightside up, so he could see who was within.
His other hand reached out, inching and shaking closer to the corpse's own hand, the barest hints of their water-rotted fingers just jutting out into the sun.
Chance grabbed onto the boat, and with all his might–
Look at their face as the sun shines on it. Look at their sunken cheeks and rotted skin. Look at the last expression of agonized terror their face will ever show to another.
Look at what you've done.
–tugged it back over the body to cover it.
Leaning off of the boat, Chance took his time in standing up. He stood there for a long while, staring at the capsized, barnacle-crusted sailboat that had become somebody's coffin.
His scarf trailed aside him in the salty ocean wind. It was silent, aside from the waves rushing against his ankles. It was a nameless funeral.
Eventually, Chance turned, and walked back the way he came, across the endless sunset beach.
…
…
"Go back to sleep…"
…
Chance would later realize that if he had gone back to see who was under the boat, he would have put a bullet in his skull a minute later.
…
…It sounded like…
…Silence.
He'd stumbled into a dead end. The grey chalk-like earth of the Ancient Basin cracked under his feet, abandoned and untread. The air was still and sick; it wasn't a 'library' silence so much as it felt like he was wearing earplugs, under earmuffs, under water. He was the only thing left alive.
His head was pounding. When he looked up, between the bulbous shell-like boulders that made up the walls, he could see what looked like a door. It towered over him, emblazoned with a glowing white symbol.
Four spikes rising from a tree root.
Up to this point, this one tunnel, this one doorway, marked the deepest he'd descended into Hallownest.
Tusk trailed up from behind him. Why was he so tired? Was he… running? His head throbbed, and Chance stumbled for a moment, clutching his temples. While he groaned, Tusk instead went up to the door, and spread their arms wide. Their cloak transformed into the Monarch Wings, reflecting the pale light of the door.
And on their back, the same symbol on the door had been branded.
Wear the grudge like a crown.
The door's mark flashed in unison with the King's Brand, and a blinding white light shone from the edges of the door. It split in half down the middle with a mighty CRACK.
It quaked, white magic splotches growing across its surface. Chance staggered closer, and he noticed the sign that had been marked into the stone next to him.
He couldn't read it when they visited this door last time, but Quirrel had translated it, and he knew how to read Hallownestian himself now. What did this thing say again? He rubbed his orange eyes with his Infected hands.
He read the ancient tablet:
"Their False Vessel has fallen. Born of refuse and regret. Its birthplace opens only to spilled Void-blood."
That was about how he remembered it, anyway.
He turned to Tusk. The door with the King's Brand was still opening, glowing pores breaking through the rock. The whole tunnel vibrated with more energy than it had seen in centuries.
They were completely focused on unlocking the gate.
"Go back to sleep…"
Chance crept up from behind.
He drew his gun.
Blinded by the Light, he leveled the barrel with the back of Tusk's head.
…
…
…
"CHANCE!"
Something soft slammed into his back. Hands spun him around, tugging him closer to another body. Chance's gun arm flailed out of the way of Tusk's skull.
Jeremy was shaking.
"D-D-Don'tgodownthere," he sobbed into his shirt. "Don'tgodon'tgodon'tgo. Please you can't go down there you c-can't–"
Jeremy's knees were buckling, clawing at Chance's shoulders and jacket to stay upright while he fell against his chest. Every hurried breath wracked his body. His eyes were wide and bloodshot, on the verge of tears.
He was so close to him. He kept shaking him, and the throbbing spirals in Chance's head intensified until he could barely make out Jeremy's face while he was inches away.
"Go back to sleep…"
The voices were getting louder. Cold panic washed over both of them, Jeremy's terror contagious. Beyond terror – desperation. Chance took an involuntary step backwards.
Jeremy yanked on him, pulling him back away from the door that had just vanished into wisps of Soul. Beyond, Chance could make out a metal platform, and then…
Black.
He couldn't see anything else. Nothing else was there at all.
Tusk had opened a dark, bottomless maw into the depths of the Earth.
"Go back to sleep…"
"You can't go no matter WHAT!" Jeremy was screaming in his ear. " It'll kill us both please just come back you can't go down there you can't go–"
"J-Jay–!"
Chance couldn't think. Jeremy's hands were on him.
It was so loud–
"Go back to sleep…"
Chance scrambled backwards through the maw, his arms flailing across his front to push Jeremy away. He couldn't hear himself screaming. His mind was shutting down again. He had to get out of here, he had to run, he had to get space, he had to–
Jeremy lunged out for him, blind desperation in his eyes.
Tusk watched him, for the second time today, as Chance's foot slipped off of the ledge of the platform.
He could only catch a glimpse of them both,
before he fell into a deep,
dark,
bottomless pit.
…
"Go back to sleep…"
The sunlight was blinding. The small boat gently rocked beneath his feet, only a thin layer of wood between him and oblivion.
He stood still, staring up at the sun overhead in the golden sky. It blazed down onto him, turning the clouds tangerine and the waves a deep orange. It hurt his eyes, but he couldn't look away.
Jeremy was alone, standing on a boat in an endless ocean.
Was this death?
A creeping feeling grew from behind. He couldn't turn around to see. He wasn't strong enough.
Hands on his shoulders, inching up his neck. She whispered into his ear.
She spoke to him.
Jeremy's eyes widened in horror, tears rolling down his cheek. She was lying, she had to be. He wanted this to be fake. He wanted to go home. He wanted to wake up.
The blinding sun filled his orange eyes.
…
…
…
…
…
…She had told him two things.
Two things that were impossible.
Two things that were lies, because they had to be.
…
…
She had told him that he was not real.
An elaborate web of lies and hallucinations.
His whole "self" was a trick of the eyes.
…
That his existence was dependent on how her Light altered his mind.
…
…
And…
She had told him that, if he existed because of the Light…
…
Then Chance curing himself would kill Jeremy.
That they would both be swallowed by the Void.
…
If one was true, then they could both be true.
…
…
…
…But that's all just a bunch of lies.
She's only trying to confuse him, scare him.
It was ridiculous. It couldn't be real.
Neither of those could possibly be true.
…
Right?
Chapter name and summary are a reference to Love Me Two Times by The Doors
Other musical references in this chapter include:
Crosstown Traffic by Jimi Hendrix
i would tag Jim Morrison as a contributing author for this chapter if he hadn't been dead for the past fifty years
okay i hope this revelation wasn't too abrupt cause i've spent half of this story going back and forth between "i should tease it so people can kind of see it coming" and "it'll be no fun if everyone already knows what's gonna happen". foreshadowing is hard
the other important thing in this chapter is the scene with the tram. some people in the Ethno discord server might recognize this new Mantis character's description...?
and maybe the shipwreck is important too. maybe.
Again, I should keep these short, so thank you for reading, I'm very sorry about this. please leave a comment, i'll try to answer any questions + i appreciate any feedback