A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews! They really motivate and inspire me. Thank you for reading so far.
Of the multiple makeshift buildings in the rebel camp was a sort of workshop: secluded, dinky, and made of mostly wood with mismatched rugs across the floor with metal plates closing the once gaping hole in the ceiling. It was cluttered and messy; papers and tools were scattered about the room. The only ones who ever spent time in this building were those with an experimental way of thinking, especially one person in particular.
"You really shouldn't stay up so long," the cyclops ghoul advised, watching him from the doorway.
The other waved her off. "It's not a big deal, Iris."
Iris inhaled through her nostrils, vexed at his behavior. "Jackson, you didn't sleep after the party last night—"
He groaned in frustration. "I did sleep, Iris. Until four in the afternoon, actually."
The cyclops ghoul blinked, her sole eye reflecting the embarrassment at her mistake. "So you've been here since?"
Jackson walked over to the makeshift desk and sat in the wooden chair beside it. He responded to the ghoul by pointing at a plate covered in crumbs and then swiftly turned to the papers on the desk.
He heard Iris sigh when he turned his back on her. "Eating in the workshop isn't new, but sleeping in? You're always up for breakfast."
"You can blame Holt for that," he grunted.
A low groan joined Iris, and Jackson quickly recognized it as Zombie. "Strange, now that you're two different people."
Jackson groaned inwardly and swiveled to face the zombie, Slo-Mo. "We were always like that," he said bitterly. "This is his fault." Jackson hated to admit it, but a part of him felt like blaming Holt was the most comfortable thing to do.
The zombie let out a grunt and shrugged beside the small ghoul in the doorway.
Jackson quickly turned back to the desk. "Why did you come here, Iris?" he asked the cyclops without facing her.
It took a moment for her to respond. "I came to check on the plans."
The plans. They were everything Jackson and scientific ghouls like Iris had been developing over time. Simply little ideas they'd come up with for improving the functionality of the camp. "When I saw you I assumed you were here all day," the cyclops told him.
Jackson nodded to himself, and then raised a hand to the ghoul dismissively. "I've already worked ahead on them, so don't worry about it."
It was silent for a moment, yet he felt a nagging presence behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see Slo-Mo and Iris still at the doorway.
"Um," he began slowly, not wanting to sound rude, "I'd like to be alone so if you don't mind..."
"You don't plan on eating dinner?" Slo-Mo asked in Zombie.
He shrugged. "Get someone to bring me a plate of... What is it?"
"Freezer screechza," Iris replied.
Jackson cringed at the monster term. Couldn't they have some normal food for dinner? He sighed, desperately missing mac and cheese. "Yeah, get someone to bring me a slice, please."
The two shared a glance, and then turned back to Jackson and nodded. When they left, Jackson was glad to be alone. Unfortunately, his serenity was short-lived. He heard the hiss of werecats by the open door.
"Come on, ghouls," he heard Toralei mewl from outside.
"But we were together at the party all last night," a werecat—Meowlody—said.
"Why can't we fang out with you?" her twin, Purrsephone, whined.
He heard a sigh as Toralei explained that, though she was glad to see her friends from high school, she needed her space now. Jackson heard reluctant meows come from the twins as their voices faded away.
A sudden shuffling noise sounded within the walls of the shabby workshop, and Jackson exhaled when he realized why.
"Inside today?" he asked her.
"Mm for today, yes," Toralei responded from behind him.
Jackson sighed and gave a quick a nod, still facing away from the werecat. The workshop was the most secluded building in the entire encampment, so Toralei liked to take naps either on the squat building's roof or simply inside it. Jackson didn't mind. They, like everyone else in the camp, had grown comfortable with one another. Of course, it had been rougher when Rocco, Toralei's gargoyle boyfriend, had abandoned her and fled overseas to Scaris. She had been strangely quiet soon after, spending a lot of time sleeping, like she was trying to escape the world. Now she limited herself to one or two naps a day, most spent at the workshop.
"You're not going to eat dinner, Toralei?" Jackson asked while he looked through the papers on the desk.
"It's screechza, right?" she asked him.
"Yeah."
There was a pause before she replied, "I'll eat some of yours." Toralei, like most everyone at the camp, knew that Jackson spent most of his time in the workshop, including dinnertime.
Jackson sighed. "I only asked for one slice."
Toralei yawned behind him. "I'll eat the toppings then."
Jackson smiled to himself, thankful that he wasn't going to be eating some crazy monster world topping like eyeballs.
Toralei's purr-like snore soon filled the silence of the workshop, and Jackson turned back to see her curled up on a rug in the corner. She looked so cat-like and inhuman. It both fascinated and frightened him. Oftentimes, Jackson had to remind himself that she was a monster. He'd been exposed to monsters his whole life yet he had never realized how much the human part of the world meant to him. Now it was gone to him. Thankfully, Jackson wasn't taking it too hard, even though a part of him felt more so an outcast now that he lived in a world of monsters... But he preferred to ignore that.
As he flipped through the papers on the desk, skimming over plans and ideas, Jackson began to wonder if any of this planning was worth it. The rebels planned on exposing the Queen, not living at this abandoned summer camp forever. On the other hand, Jackson couldn't begin to wonder what would happen once they did leave.
What good is a normie in a world of monsters?
A sudden knock sounded behind him, and he jumped in his chair. He glanced over his shoulder.
"Yo," Holt said, holding up a plate of screechza, "gotcha your food."
Jackson exhaled, relieved yet annoyed that it was Holt standing in the doorway. "Thanks," he replied. Of course, they would send him. It was strange to see him. He never visited the workshop. That and physically seeing his former alter ego was still jarring to him.
Holt placed the plastic plate of food on the floor by the door and raised an eyebrow at the sleeping Toralei. Jackson gave Holt a quick glare as he got up from his chair and went across the room to grab the plate.
"What're all these?"
As he knelt down and lifted the plate off the floor, Jackson looked back to see Holt at the desk, rummaging through the papers.
"Holt!" Jackson rushed over to him, hurriedly setting down the plate on the desk and frantically snatching the papers out of Holt's hands. "Don't touch these. I've organized them."
The monster scoffed. "Organized?" Holt looked around the room, pointedly glancing at the discarded papers littered about the floor.
Jackson sighed. "Those are old plans."
"Then why're you keeping them?" Holt headed toward a clump of papers on the floor.
"We could need them," he explained. "If we decide to improve on something it would be useful to look back at the original design."
"Ohh..."
Jackson set the plans back onto the table's wooden surface, and then glanced back at Holt, who was holding up a group of papers and staring at them intently.
He sighed. "Just put those back, Holt, please. Everything has its place."
Holt didn't respond, his amber irises continuing to scan the sheets.
Jackson groaned and began walking towards him. He couldn't imagine why he was so interested in—Jackson caught himself, freezing in his footsteps. He recognized what Holt was holding. He swallowed. "Uh, Holt..."
He looked at him, eyes blazing. "The hell is this?" Holt's hands had already begun melting the edges of the sheet.
Jackson was taken aback at his reaction. He didn't expect Holt to be so angry about it. "Calm down. Those are just—"
"Something you forgot to tell me?" Holt took a step toward him, crushing the paper in his hand.
"I-it was my body, Holt. I did what was right—"
"Our body," Holt said through clenched teeth. He simmered with anger.
Jackson frowned, ignoring his correction. "It's not like you care anyway!" he nearly yelled. "You got the better half of the deal!"
Holt shook his head. "I had no part of this. You kept me away for a year." He looked down at the crumpled piece of paper in his hand and grimaced. "This," he tossed the paper at Jackson, who caught it in both hands, "is insane."
"I still don't understand why you would care—"
"You could've told me," Holt seethed, already taking steps out of the building.
Jackson stood where he was, trying to come up with an explanation to soothe monster's anger.
Holt sighed and pointed upwards. "S'why I never came in here."
Jackson looked up at the scraps of metal covering the once-gaping hole in the ceiling. The workshop was the same room Holt woke up in after a year of being kept back. Jackson looked back at where Holt was and stuttered when coming up with an excuse to calm him down but, by the time he looked back, he was gone.
"Oh, good the food's here."
Jackson whipped his gaze over to Toralei, who was up and walking over to the desk behind him.
He turned to face her. "Uh, Toralei..."
She peeled off the screechza's toppings. "Yeah?"
"You..." Jackson started off timidly. "You heard all that?"
The werecat looked back at him blankly for a moment and licked grease off her fingers. "Nope," she finally said.
He narrowed his eyes at the werecat, then grabbed the slice of screechza once she had done away with the toppings, dropping the crumpled paper in his hand to the floor.
Toralei sat on the chair by the desk. "So what'd you do to piss off your brother?"
Jackson coughed as he swallowed a bit. "Brother?"
She shrugged, swaying her tail casually. "Same parents, right?"
"Y-yeah..." He never thought of it that way. Technically, Holt was family. But brother? Jackson wasn't so sure. He was a part of him. Then a different thought occurred to him, and he looked at Toralei suspiciously. "I thought you didn't hear anything."
A smirk grabbed at the upper part of her lip. "I didn't," she responded, flicking her tail.
Jackson sighed. "It's a long story."
"Spill."
He avoided looking at her when he explained. "I haven't told anyone this but... When Holt and I were separated..." Jackson glanced back at Toralei, her expectant green eyes signaling for him to continue. He looked down. "Only one of us could stay in the body... And that was Holt."
He looked back at the werecat, her expression surprisingly unfazed. "So you shouldn't be here, then."
"No... You know the drugs I used. I also used potions. That, the math, Scarah's telepathy, and the electricity led toward us being split—and we are, clearly—but that only separated our minds."
Toralei furrowed her brows. "So the body just kicked someone out?"
"Exactly. I didn't know which one of us would be but, since I decided to let Holt out before it happened, it would only be logical that I'd be the mind outside the body."
The werecat got up from the seat and narrowed her eyes at Jackson. Then she reached out a finger and jabbed at his side.
"Ow!" he exclaimed, jumping back. "W-what was that for?"
She snickered. "Just checking. You seem pretty real to me."
"Yes, of course I do. M-my mind worked like it would if I had a body—as if I never lost it."
"So you don't have a body?"
"Not then. The potions made sure my mind developed one over time. About a year after Holt and I were separated, I finally had my own body."
Toralei scoffed. "Magic... Never thought it'd actually be capable of that."
"The paper Holt found today showed my notes about the experiment."
The werecat nodded slowly. "So how was it like? Not having a body?"
"Just like actually having one. Like... like a projection with all five senses."
"So not your brain but, like, your spirit? Your soul?"
Jackson looked at her skeptically. "Sure..."
Toralei grinned. "Killer."
A silence passed between them, and Jackson couldn't help but feel awkward.
"So..." he drawled, "should I apologize to him?"
Toralei rolled her eyes. "I'm not your conscience. I don't give a crap whether you apologize or not. But," she sat on the wooden chair and leaned back, "he's probably the last monster you want to keep mad around here."
-.-.-.-
After searching the sunset-lit encampment for Holt, he finally found his former alter ego outside the walls of the kitchen attached to the dining pavilion. Jackson steadily approached him but stopped abruptly when he saw that Holt wasn't alone. A lilac-skinned ghoul stood next to him, holding a cobweb-designed guitar in her arms. Her southern twang reached to where Jackson stood.
"Sure you'll be careful?" Operetta asked Holt, her eyes suspicious slits.
Holt chuckled, but his tone sounded impatient. "It'll be fine. Trust me, just lemme play."
She looked at him for a moment before letting out an exasperated sigh and reluctantly handing him the guitar. "Don't make me regret this, Holt Hyde."
"No worries, Op. I'll get it back to you when I'm done." Holt held the guitar like one would hold a newborn baby as if it was precious and new to him. He leaned back on the wall and slid down it onto the dry grass, staring at the instrument with a sort of wonderment and awe in his eyes.
Operetta raised an eyebrow. "You still know how to play... right?"
Holt didn't say anything, and Operetta sighed.
"Holler when you're done," she said, waving a hand as she turned away from him and made her way to the dining pavilion.
Jackson didn't move, watching as Holt stared at the guitar for a moment longer. After some time, his cobalt fingers reached out to pluck at the strings, but he pulled back, an unsure look flashing across his face.
Jackson cleared his throat and Holt looked up suddenly, his expression turning cold once he made eye contact with Jackson. "Came here to say sorry?"
"Yes, actually," Jackson replied, quieter than he meant to. He inhaled deeply before he spoke again. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
Holt glared at him and Jackson glared back as if challenging him. Then Holt shrugged and looked back down at the guitar. "Okay."
"'Okay'? That's it?"
"Yeah."
Jackson was bewildered. He was so angry earlier. "B-but what about before? You looked like you were about to combust."
He shrugged again. "It's cool." Holt laughed at his stunned silence. "Look, J, I get it. You did what you had to do."
Jackson sighed. "So my apology was for nothing?"
"No..." he glared back up at him, "'cause you should've told me."
He looked away and sat down on the grass next to the monster, casting a shadow over the left side of his face when he did. "I know," he replied. "It was our body, after all."
"Never thought I'd be the one keepin' it, though."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm just sayin'... You were the one using it most of the time... I didn't get to use it much when the trigger got changed."
Day and night, Jackson thought wistfully. Back when he thought he was only blacking out by sunset. Back when the idea of another person in his body never crossed his mind. Would they have found out about each other if it hadn't changed to music? Maybe... "I know," he said sheepishly. "Sorry."
Holt shook his head. "Doesn't matter now."
The two avoided one another's gaze, and it was quiet for a long while.
"Weren't you born first?" Holt asked, breaking the silence.
Jackson nodded, turning his head toward him. "Yeah, I was."
"Then why'd you wanna get rid of your body?"
"Our... Our body, Holt. Doesn't matter which one of us... appeared first. Mom dealt with a whole other baby at night. We were both in there."
He sighed. "Guess you're right."
"So," Jackson said, "we're okay now?"
Holt grinned. "Yeah. We're okay."
Jackson's lip twitched in response, and then he rose up from the ground. He glanced down at the guitar in Holt's arms. "Have fun playing, I guess."
Holt didn't look at him. "Thanks."
Jackson walked away, heading back toward the workshop as the sky darkened. Stars began to illuminate the sky and, as he treaded through the soft, dry grass, Jackson could hear the faint acoustics of a guitar in the distance.
He couldn't help but feel relieved as he closed the workshop door behind him, which, now that he thought about it, was something he didn't regret forgetting earlier.
"They know."
Jackson almost yelped when he heard the voice in the quietness of the building. He glanced about the room. Toralei was gone. Then who, or what, was that?
A figure suddenly formed from the darkness in the corner, and Jackson felt chills creep up his spine. Then a ghoul leaped out of the shadows and, even though he hardly recognized her from the teenager she once was, Jackson knew of only one ghoul who could utilize the darkness as she did.
"Twyla," he breathed, relieved yet puzzled. She wasn't supposed to be here.
"Jackson," she replied, expressionless. "You cut your hair."
He hastily brought his hand to his head, his fingers brushing at his shortened yellow and black locks. "Yes, and you..." Jackson looked her over, not knowing what to tell her without sounding inappropriate. "Are... you." He shook his head at his faltering words. "Why are you here?"
"Did you not hear me?" she asked, taking a couple of steps across the room toward him. "They know."
Jackson brought his hand down and scowled at the younger ghoul. "Why are you here?"
Twyla sighed. "Howleen told me how to get here."
"But Lagoona and Rochelle would only ever give directions to Bloodgood's house near the city," Jackson said, "and Howleen hasn't left the camp."
The Boogeyman's daughter nodded. "She told me where the house was and then I followed the trail she left for me. Don't worry, I covered it up. She asked me before she left."
Jackson felt more at ease now that she had explained herself. He pushed up his glasses and took a step toward the ghoul. "Have you seen Howleen at all?"
Twyla shook her head. "Not yet. But I've talked to Lagoona. I told her what I told you."
"Why are you in here then?"
The ghoul shrugged. "There's hardly any light in here," she glanced over at the one wall candle above the desk, "so there are a lot of nice shadows. Plus, this building's pretty isolated from all the rest."
"So what was that earlier?" Jackson asked
"What?" Twyla looked confused now that the subject had changed. "Oh, 'they know'. I remembered that when you walked in. Sorry for freaking you out."
Jackson ignored her apology, suddenly curious as to what she meant by her previous statement. "Who?" he asked. "Who knows what?"
Twyla became rigid, taking a deep breath before she said, "The Queen's monsters," she said gravely. "They know where the house is. Soon, they'll find out about the rest of us, too."
