Knight of Blaze

by Yoruko Rhapsodos

Kagome Higurashi was reincarnated as Kagome Strider, Dave Strider's twin and only daughter of the Strider family. Like her brother, she plays Sburb with John, Rose, and Jade. How will the adventure go, and how will the trolls react to a human that isn't surprised by the fact that they're aliens? The strilonde family just gets crazier and crazier. pale Kagome/Sollux, Kagome/Kurloz

5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I still don't own Inuyasha or Homestuck.

Chapter Five

Kagome wasn't entirely sure where she was. But there was debris floating everywhere. Strangely enough, there were thirteen or fourteen areas where the destruction was concentrated. She was floating just above a purple place that might be Derse. By the look of things soon the right phrasing was going to be 'might have been'. There was a black blur, green fire everywhere, and a few times Kagome saw what might have been some kind of red energy attack. Kagome drew a kunai from her strife deck when she realized she could hear screaming. But before she could do anything Derse was rubble too. There was a black figure with wings, a katana sticking through it, and a dog-shaped head floating amongst the wreckage. Behind it Kagome saw a pillar of light similar to the one that accompanied her ascension to godtier. Then, it clicked.

'The dead crow I prototyped Dave's kernelsprite with still had the katana Dave accidentally killed it with... And Sollux said-' Kagome recalled, eyes hardening as she came to a decision, 'If I'm right and someone is reaching godtier now then I should probably buy some time. That might be part of why Kaminari transported me.'

Kagome threw the kunai, and then drew her Diamond Blaze scythe. She knew that the katana through his torso wasn't quite the same as the katana it was copied from. Bro had purposely gotten Dave and her katanas that are so cheap a normal child could crack them as a lazy, subtle attempt to make sure they didn't get hurt. But the copy that the (probably former) archagent had was obviously different if it had survived a death match with Bro intact. She flew forward at a steady pace, and the dog person the archagent had become met her halfway with his katana already in hand.

"Do you actually have a reason for all of this or are you just throwing a temper tantrum of monumental proportions?" Kagome quipped as she blocked a blow aimed for her neck.

"None a your damn business, kid!" he growled.

Then the smoke cleared, revealing that the pillar of light had died down. A girl with gray skin, black hair, candy corn colored ram-like horns, and beautiful red fairy-like wings could be seen. Kagome couldn't see her eyes well enough to see what color the irises were but her sclera were yellow rather than the white that humans had. Her godtier outfit was varying shades of red, even the gear symbol; the pants were a little baggier and her hooded shirt almost resembled a tunic. Even from a distance Kagome could see a big grin on her face. The archagent moved to attack her instead but she just held her hands out as if something was shooting out of them and he froze. Then she grabbed Kagome's hand and pulled her through a green portal that had formed in the archagent's body. All Kagome could see was a gigantic green sun.

Kagome blinked. "... Would this be the Green Sun Rose wants to destroy?"

"Exactly! Only her mission was never meant to do what she intends." the fairy girl chirped, "You're Kagome right? I'm Aradia Megido, and it's really nice to meet you."

Kagome shook her hand. "Yeah... Kagome Strider. Would I be right again in guessing that you're one of the trolls?"

"Yup! I've been deal for almost two sweeps though, so having emotions again and not being an apathetic ghost or a violent robot is really nice." Aradia confirmed.

"So... What next?" Kagome asked.

"At this point we're waiting for Rose and Dave to get here, the Tumor is what creates the sun in the first place." Aradia explained, "Would you care to explore the dream bubbles with me in the meantime?"

Kagome blinked. "Dream bubbles? What are those?"

Aradia's expression didn't falter. "They're just like they sound, of course! Feferi was asleep while your session's Jack was destroying our session's Derse, and afterwards she talked to the horrorterrors and convinced them to glub up the dream bubbles as a replacement for waking up in your dream self's body on Prospit or Derse and a safe haven for the various dead versions of everyone."

Behind the safety of her shades Kagome's eyes grew glossy with tears she wouldn't let herself shed. "Ev- even... Bro? And John's dad and Rose's mom?"

Aradia's smile dimmed as a sympathetic expression dawned on her face. "I'm sorry, Kagome, but any version of them you came across would only be a memory. The only ghosts are dead players, their dead dream selves, and versions of players who died in doomed timelines."

Kagome tried not to think about the implication that whatever decided how a session was supposed to go was very specific and possible even more sadistic in regards to how things were supposed to progress. "You're saying it wouldn't really be him but I could encounter a memory of him? How does that work?"

"Well the scenery and contents of the dream bubbles comes from memories. If you don't know you're dreaming or dead you relive a memory until you realize something is strange, and sometimes even if you do remember you can watch a memory play out or interact with the illusionary version of someone who was part of the memory." Aradia elaborated.

Kagome grinned. "That sounds interesting... let's go!"

The first bubble had the Dave who had been tricked by a troll trying to prove a point about godtier. Aradia explained some things once he realized something was up and remembered everything, then Kagome gave him a big hug. When the memory reverted to Dave's room after Aradia showed them what the outside of her home- hive, as Aradia had called it- a dead troll Aradia told her was called Tavros showed up. Kagome couldn't tell if he wanted to befriend Dave or get under his skin but Kagome found it really funny. After a few minutes she realized he was the one that had blocked Dave after he freaked him out badly via pretending he was coming onto him. (Or maybe despite Dave having been joking he might turn out to really be interested in Tavros, Kagome had no idea.) The next one was the memory of a doomed robotic version of Aradia, who explained that she'd been a ghost for a while, made herself her own sprite in the trolls' session, and then possessed a robotic version of herself a friend had made until the events that led to her going godtier. The memory was of discovering a hat, a wallet, and...

"Holy crap, that's Lil' Cal! So the bastard that killed Bro stole him?!" Kagome exclaimed, "Not that it's any loss, the thing is off somehow and it's no real loss."

Aradia put a hand on Kagome's shoulder. "Yes, it is. But we'll learn more later, now hush."

That was when Aradia cut into the Aradiabot's conversation with Sollux to help them figure out what was going on. As it turned out Sollux had gone blind. He also lost a few teeth, which apparently had been responsible for the lisp. Without his sight, Sollux had apparently lost an aspect of his powers that had given him a lot of grief. Right as he was deciding he liked the changes there was a noise. It turned out to be Jade, and Sollux had to be scolded by the godtier Aradia for being rude to her.

"Sollux, don't be rude to our guests!" Aradia complained.

"Plural? Someone else is here?" Sollux asked.

"Yeah... I'm Kagome. Thanks for all your help and giving me somebody to talk to, Sollux." Kagome greeted.

"Wha- Kagome?! Yay, I'm so happy to meet you!" Jade squealed and hugged her.

Kagome grinned, "Jade, I'm so happy to finally see you face to face even if you're dreaming!"

"What are you doing here? Are you asleep too?" Jade asked.

"Long story short I'm here in person." Kagome corrected.

Jade revealed that Feferi, another troll, had set the bubbles up. She also revealed that she'd met a future version of the godtier Aradia in another dream bubble. Aradia explained a little about how the dream bubbles work. And then it shifted to a different memory as Aradia explained that she'd known from the start that that first bubble would be essential for learning essential things about their existence and their adventure in the strange multi-realm of the game. After making sure everyone was ready Aradia explained that the next memory would belong to a troll called Kanaya and prompted them to hide until Kanaya realized that the memory had happened before.

Kanaya realized right away that it was a memory, and when she asked Aradia said that she was unconscious and would awake as a 'new self'. Apparently the Virgo troll had been prepared for some sort of transformation since she was young, just as Aradia had been groomed for something. Apparently after the discovery Aradia had Sollux deliver the pieces of Lil' Cal to Kanaya because she knew Kanaya would be able to fix him. That was when everyone was allowed to reveal themselves and Kanaya started glowing, her skin looking white instead of gray. Sollux also seemed like he would wake up soon and Kagome and Jade got to introduce themselves to Kanaya. When they got back to the point Kanaya mentioned that she had fixed Lil' Cal and changed his clothes to a green suit. Then Tavros was back, and it was revealed that the trolls who used to flarp until disaster struck wrote parts of a code. Aradia and Tavros wrote one pair that made up a word, and Terezi and Vriska had written the other half. Roboaradia then revealed that there had been one more fragment consisting of eight symbols written when one of the trolls not present went crazy in a doomed timeline. Apparently her timeline was doomed because a text containing the code was supposed to be destroyed by an explosion which didn't happen in the doomed timeline. It turned out agents of Derse had gathered not only that text but the four others containing the pieces of the code. In the veil the code was combined with other objects to create Alternia's guardian Doc Scratch.

Kagome stared at the scene of the troll session's black queen creating something using the code, some kind of orb, and Lil' Cal incredulously. "I think this is proof that I was right about there being some sort of big bad..."

Not long after Aradia and Kagome left the bubbles. When Kagome asked Aradia explained that it wouldn't be long before the reason that they had gone to the Green Sun had come to pass. Sollux followed them. Aradia though not surprised hadn't been sure that it was even possible for Sollux to do that. Aradia realized that Sollux was half dead, and mentioned that they were waiting for two humans and the surviving trolls. Suddenly they figured out that while his vision was only 2D Sollux had his sight back, said realization meaning one of the eyes was pale instead of blackened to signify he was half ghost. (Like Danny Phantom, though Kagome didn't know yet if revealing that would be a good idea.)

Kagome grinned. "So on top of my twin and my sort-of sister the other trolls are coming, or what's left of them rather? I can't wait."

"So... how did you physically get here?" Sollux asked.

Kagome shrugged. "One moment I'm agreeing to a deal with my denizen Kaminari the next thing I know I'm watching your session's version of Derse get destroyed. That damn dog bird was in the process of starting a fight when Aradia here revived, froze him with time powers, and took me here."

Sollux snorted. "First that fish fucker blinds me when FF and I tried to stop him from causing everyone's deaths, then I half die overusing my psionics, and then you're saying you wound up all the way in our session? You create a whole new level of crazy just by being around."

Kagome gave him a pointed look. "Sollux... we're trapped in a possibly magical game that makes a bunch of children who haven't necessarily ever actually met face to face before go through a deadly fantasy and sci-fi combo adventure meant to create universes on top of simultaneously destroy the planet they came from and save them from said planet's destruction. I'm relatively certain that remembering a past life that involved time travel and things I would wager even aliens with advanced technology would be hard put to believe exist a moot point."

"Touché." Sollux conceded, "So I didn't think I'd get to meet you in person, this is really great."

"Yeah, this is really awesome." Kagome agreed, "You'll play videogames with me when we're on the meteor, right? I've wanted someone besides Dave or Bro to play with for a long time."

Sollux smirked. "You're on! Is one of your human games like Troll Mario Kart?"

Kagome giggled, finding the fact that the word 'troll' was at the beginning of the title silly and amusement in the fact that the cultures were so similar they even had (presumably) the same game. "It's only called 'Mario Kart' but yeah, we do."

The rest of the time consisted of Aradia and Sollux catching up as Kagome got to know the two. He had his flaws just like everything and everyone else in every universe but Sollux turned out to be a great guy, if a little apathetic. And Kagome was convinced that Aradia would become one of her best friends given the chance, she was so cheerful, nice, and quirky. It wasn't too long before Dave and Rose came along. An explosion destroyed the moon of Derse they were on, and created the Green Sun to begin with. As a result of the shenanigans both ascended to godtier similarly to how Aradia had.

Kagome immediately pulled both into a hug, using the fact that if you went by ectobiology Rose was her sister as an excuse. "Dave, Rose! You're finally here. Rose, this is so great I've wanted to meet you for so long. It just bites that I haven't met John and that I only saw Jade in a dream bubble."

Rose patted her back, and then pulled away. "Yes, this is quite lovely and I look forward to seeing how you're different in real life from how you come across online. But I do believe that the meteor the remaining living trolls are on is approaching."

Kagome kept the hood of her godtier outfit down, in her opinion it was ridiculous. But nonetheless the quintet still made for quite the impressive sight. And, as it would later turn out, quite the relieving one. Karkat, Terezi, and Gamzee had no idea that Aradia and Sollux weren't dead; they also hadn't had any clue what had become of the three humans. While three of the four who had arrived on the meteor took the information in stride and were just happy to see them Karkat was staring in shock, nearly slack jawed. He appeared to have been crying over what turned out to be Sollux's corpse. Kagome could also see the body of the troll girl she'd learned from Aradia was Vriska. According to her count there were three trolls unaccounted for, from a few things the others had said they had probably died like Vriska had.

Aradia nudged Sollux. "I told you they'd have your body."

Sollux visibly suppressed a shudder. "Yeah, I already believed you and I can see that. Ugh, can we please get rid of that thing?"

Aradia immediately grew excited. "Oh, let's do it!"

Sollux stared at her blankly. "What do you mean?"

"Sollux, let's throw a corpse party!" Aradia proclaimed, "There won't be a better time and we have so many bodies to work with. If everyone's okay with that we can have a big corpse party and incinerate the remains in the sun, it'll be glorious."

Rose voiced her confusion. That prompted to Aradia to have her tell the other trolls about human funerals. Only it was clearly a biased personal experience, and nobody understood. Even Dave thought Rose made little sense or was messing with them. Aradia found it too specific, saying that she'd had something more multicultural in mind.

Aradia turned to Kagome. "Can you make it any clearer?"

"Let's see... a funeral is a ceremony where people, generally loved ones such as friends and family, gather to lay the dead person's body to rest. There are various methods of taking care of the body, and other things that change depending on religion or lack thereof, the region it's happening in, etc." Kagome elaborated, "If the person or whoever set up the funeral is religious there will typically be something ritualistic meant to help their spirit move on. But the one thing that's constant is that from the perspective of the living it's a time to either mourn your loss or celebrate the life of the person you lost."

Aradia tried to get them to brainstorm ideas, but Sollux nipped her plans in the bud. He pointed out that the other four were just meeting the humans and reuniting with them on top of having just gone through some really heavy stuff. The Aries troll explained that she thought they could bond over it. Sollux pointed out not everyone was so into death.

"It's nice to see you so excited over something but for the others it's pretty fucking morbid." he explained.

Aradia's smile fell. "Am I really that bad?"

"Yes." Terezi confirmed, frowning.

"Oh... I'm sorry." Aradia apologized, "I've been here so long I just don't see death as terrible like the living tend to. I honestly see it as a reason to celebrate."

"Aradia, when I said that some humans celebrate the lives of the dearly departed I meant that they literally throw a party in the normal sense instead of a somber event where people mourn. It's okay to think that way." Kagome reassured.

"She's right Aradia, nobody is blaming you. I actually find your death fangirl thing funny and kind of charming." Terezi agreed.

With that Terezi dubbed Aradia 'Death's Handmaid' in the middle of elaborating what she meant when Aradia voiced confusion. It was also revealed that humans and trolls both had a personification of death who was a skeletal figure. Kagome found all the similarities both species had very intriguing.

Terezi was outright gleeful at the concept. "So you're telling me Dave that we both have Death and cotton candy? We might as well be the same damn species."

Karkat, not so much. He brought everyone's attention back to important things, fussing over how the Green Sun was still standing. In response Dave mentioned that they'd been tricked and Aradia confirmed that it wouldn't ever be destroyed, Karkat and the others had been misinformed. When the Cancer troll expressed concern Rose claimed they'd just regroup and defeat Jack in person. In response Karkat started to freak out, but Gamzee managed to calm him. When part of Karkat's metaphors mentioned ventriloquism Kagome remembered Lil' Cal. Frowning and eyes narrowed in concentration, it didn't take her long to find the puppet not far from where everyone was standing. She approached it- and a chill went down her spine as her spiritual senses reawakened. She could sense an aura, possibly more than one aura. Lil' Cal was so strange- creepy in Dave's secret opinion- because he was cursed and possessed. Kagome took a deep breath and closed her eyes as she took hold of her spirit energy.

'Using spirit energy is all about intent.' Kagome reminded herself.

The nearly forgotten energy rose to the surface as she focused on breaking the curse and any hold the puppet had on anyone. She could try to heal any lasting damage later. In the background she could hear Karkat start to fuss over how bright the green sun was instead, but she didn't acknowledge anything else going on. When she could feel the energy coating her hands Kagome gripped Lil' Cal and pushed the energy into it- or rather, him. There was a flash as the eyes went blank. A sensation tugged on Kagome's senses like something or someone screaming in rage and pain. Gamzee's head immediately turned towards her, and he flashstepped in front of her.

"What are you up and doing, chica?" Gamzee asked.

"This... thing... Bro loved the thing as much as he secretly loved Dave and me. But something always seemed... off... about it." Kagome explained, "A deal with my denizen reawakened the potential I had in my last life, and I immediately realized exactly is wrong with it- him. Lil' Cal is cursed and possessed. So I got rid of whatever was tied to him."

"Damn, that might up and be why my thinkpan is suddenly empty and motherfucking clear." Gamzee mused, "I think I owe you some thanks, Kagsis. That lil' motherfucker fucked up my thinkpan something fierce, pretended to be a friend too. But I'm not so sure it's safe to motherfucking keep around."

Kagome sighed, she knew he was right but wanted something to remember Bro by. "To think this thing was by Bro's side constantly my entire life... maybe even his entire life... Fuck, this explains so much..."

Gamzee put a hand on her shoulder as she focused on keeping her composure. "You all right, motherfucker?"

"Yeah..." turning her head slightly to look at the others Kagome shouted, "Aradia, Sollux! I need your help with something."

"Yes?"

"What do you need?"

Kagome held up Lil' Cal. "We need to destroy this. Will the green sun do it or should we pick a different method?"

"But didn't thith freaky thing belong to your Bro?" Sollux asked.

Kagome's eyes hardened. "This thing... something never seemed right about it, and just now I could tell suddenly that it was cursed and possessed. So, I got rid of whatever was wrong with it. But I won't let this thing stick around, not when it sounds like it had a hand in whatever Gamzee had to do with whatever happened here."

"You're saying GZ went on a rampage... because he was controlled by an evil puppet?" Sollux confirmed, his eyes narrowing.

Kagome nodded, "I've seen stuff like that before. Gamzee already seems different from when the five of us got to the meteor."

Sollux turned to Aradia. "What do you say, AA?"

"It's already been involved in a lot of damage, I'd say the Green Sun is just what the doctor ordered." Aradia agreed.

With that Sollux used his psionics to blast Lil' Cal into the green sun. Karkat was the first one to investigate. The others also looked towards them, though.

"What the fuck are you four up to?" Karkat demanded.

"Gamzee's 'new pal' was a cursed and possessed puppet that was controlling him. I got rid of what made Lil' Cal more than a puppet, and Sollux here helped me get rid if it for good." Kagome explained.

Karkat was clearly incredulous and furious. "Wait, what? That shit fest wasn't just a natural result of Gamzee going sober and flipping the fuck out? God fucking damn it, Gamzee, I've said before not to keep important shit you can't handle on your own from me."

Gamzee frowned. "I'm sorry, best friend. I was confused, and you were motherfucking busy. 'Sides, I was already freaking you out with the shit I was pulling."

Karkat sighed. "No, no... It's fine as long as you're okay now. This just means I don't have to worry about you as much as I thought I would."

With that taken care of, the topic was once again brought around to trying to be productive. When Karkat tried asking about a leader of the group, Aradia said that nobody else cared and probably never had, and then revealed that the humans were the ones they should defer to on the subject of what to do. More specifically Rose and how as a Seer of Light she was particularly adept at picking out a tactic. Rose pointed out a direction, and after a tangent revealed that if they left at the right moment they would be able to head directly to the humans' new session. The news that it would take three years distressed Karkat after he was told how long a year was, and Aradia retorted that it would be a great adventure.

"If I wasn't having so much fun with my death fangirl thing I'd be jealous." Aradia added.

"You're not going?" Kanaya asked.

"I still have work to do here." Aradia admitted, "But that doesn't mean that we won't meet again in the bubbles during you journey!"

"I hope so." Terezi said, disappointed that they would be parted.

"I don't know guys, I might stay here too." Sollux admitted.

Karkat hated the idea, and all but begged Sollux to go with them on the meteor. Sollux explained that he wasn't sure he belonged with the living anymore. When Karkat pointed out that he was only half ghost, he explained that he was tired of the adventures and wanted to spend time with Aradia while catching up with their dead friends.

Kagome frowned. "I'll miss the chance to get to know you, Sollux. We still haven't even played videogames."

In the background Kanaya said she might stay too so she could enjoy the sunlight since she supposedly wouldn't be of any use. Aradia disagreed and encouraged Kanaya to keep up hope that there was still a chance to ensure their species survived. Rose also encouraged Kanaya to stay, and Kagome swore there was flirting going on... she saw Terezi giggling over something as Dave smirked in amusement, too.

"Oh my god, everyone is hitting on each other." Karkat realized in mortification, "Sollux please don't leave me alone, I can't take this shit."

Sollux just snickered in amusement at Karkat's distress. Kagome's eyes darted to Gamzee. She couldn't be sure yet if she'd gotten all of the information on quadrants she needed from her talk with Karkat, he'd clearly implied that there was something between him and Gamzee.

Knowing how likely it was that she was right, she looked at Karkat pointedly. "At least you seem to have a... did you say the word for the person in your pale quadrant is moirail? If Sollux does stay behind, I'll be the only single one among the bunch of us."

Sollux smirked. "Are you implying thomething KG?"

"No, I'm not. If I were it would be that having a friend who won't be distracted by a crush or significant other would be nice." Kagome refuted.

"Wait fuck Sollux please tell me you haven't been flirting with Strider's hatchmate!" Karkat complained, dragging Sollux into one of their mostly playful arguments.

When their backs were turned and Kagome seemed to have been mostly forgotten, her eyes darted to the two dead bodies. Seeing all of the gore that resulted from Inuyasha's and Sesshomaru's methods of fighting had been bad enough. But this was the most time Kagome had ever spent around dead bodies without a fight or tense situation going on to distract her. She stepped backwards slightly to get some distance from them. Gamzee, who had just been watching Karkat, noticed.

"What's wrong, my righteous sister? Them corpses up and motherfucking bothering you?" Gamzee asked.

Kagome nodded. "It's a little off putting and awkward... Grieving when I found Bro's body was one thing especially considering I couldn't move his body to lay him to rest. But just standing around talking with two bodies just laying there is sort of eerie..."

"Would you like this motherfucker to up and take care of them for you?" Gamzee offered.

"That's nice of you... but I can always help, you know." Kagome countered.

"Nah, it's not a motherfucking problem. I've got it just fine." Gamzee refuted, "'Sides, them voices I up and motherfucking kept hearing before you performed that miracle let on that all of the bodies need to be preserved 'cause they'll be needed for something later."

Gamzee was long gone by the time Karkat realized the bodies were missing, and then noticed that he was gone too. Karkat freaked out over it just like almost everything else had bothered him. Apparently Gamzee had stuffed other bodies in jars for preservation after cutting off their heads. Kanaya accused Gamzee of kissing the heads. Dave went from asking about what had happened to figuring out with Rose that the dead horse Bro had made bibs for him and Kagome from when they were babies was the same one Rose's mom had given to her for her birthday.

"Could you two please give Gamzee a break?" Kagome asked Kanaya and Karkat, "He moved these two bodies because they were making me uncomfortable. Besides, whatever was in Lil' Cal and using mind control or hypnosis told Gamzee that the bodies will be needed later for some reason."

"Why the fuck would we need a bunch of corpses for?" Karkat asked.

"Yes, surely they will be nothing but a nuisance which gives off an unpleasant odor. We're lucky that we didn't have to deal with that because we all prototyped our lusus as our sprites." Kanaya added.

"Wait, the sprites...! Even mine proved though other options are possible they all seemed to prefer things that were alive or used to be alive. What if we get to the session only to have to deal with prototyping kernelsprites all over again?" Kagome realized, "If there are other players and they didn't do anything with their sprites what Gamzee did could really come in handy."

Karkat felt Kagome had a point. "Well, fuck. I guess I was being harsh if it was like that. I forgot that death seems to be a bigger deal for humans. And even if the players in the new session prove to be competent it's still smart to plan ahead, so good thinking."

Kagome shrugged. "Look, I get keeping an eye on him after whatever happened here is important, but whatever you do just don't forget that Gamzee seems to genuinely care about you. Don't let drama with the others or one mistake interfere with that or even worse things could happen down the road."

Karkat looked at her speculatively. "Well, you don't seem as much of a self absorbed dumbass as your brother I'll give you that. Why do you care so much?"

Kagome looked Karkat in the eye. "Because I've seen how much worse drama can make an already dangerous or tense situation."

Kanaya barely bothered listening to Kagome's initial explanation before she started to leave herself. When Karkat asked about it she said she was going clown hunting, implying she meant to kill Gamzee. Before they could find out if Kanaya would heed Karkat's pleads to leave Gamzee alone everyone present got distracted. With a green flash a portal that resembled a rip in reality formed. A moment later a bucket flew threw and bounced off of Karkat's head. After a moment of freaking out he investigated and discovered that John had written a note on the back of one of his posters... and that Davesprite had used sprite powers to draw on the front of said poster. The note gushed over how all five humans had gone godtier, made some comments about interspecies makeouts, then thanked Vriska and gave well wishes from Jade and Davesprite. Other than that it was relatively short. Kagome didn't see how it was a big deal when everyone found out what it said later. But at the moment, Karkat stared at Rose, Kanaya, Dave, and Terezi in horror before dropping the poster like it had caught fire and proceeded to freak out all over again.

Before anyone could ask Karkat if he was all right or look at the note, other portal formed. A dead carapacian that seemed to be from Derse wearing a sash made from cable with a label that said 'Mayor' on it was dropped amongst them. Kagome immediately rushed to his aide, but he turned out to be dead or too close to dead for her to do any good. Rose revealed that he was the extra traveling companion she had mentioned.

"Is he dead?" Dave asked, noticing that Kagome was only trying to clean the blood off.

"If we leave immediately we can get him help." Rose reassured, "Luckily for him we have little choice, Jack is on his way."

Karkat asked about rockets, but Rose said that one good push was the only thing needed for the journey to begin. More like a chase, in Kagome's opinion, since Rose mentioned that it would be a literal race to maximize how long it would be until they had to face Jack again. Aradia offered to take care of that with her telekinesis Kagome hadn't known before then that she had.

"Can you help me with that Sollux? They'll need the biggest push we can give them." Aradia asked.

"Uh yeah, sure. Not as much as I could if I were staying behind, though." Sollux agreed.

"Well that's not good, but I still think we can make this work." Aradia noted.

Kagome perked up, remembering a miscellaneous item she'd made with the glitchy snow cone machine she'd assumed would be useless or just very difficult to make useful. Accessing her fetch modus, she retrieved a piece of orange candy that resembled a gumdrop.

"I can't believe this thing is actually coming in handy, but I believe that you'll need this." Kagome told her, "I still don't know how this thing even exists, but eat it and it's supposed to triple your power for fifteen minutes."

Aradia smiled. "Thanks, Kagome. This will really come in handy. Anyway, I'll slow Jack down. It won't last long but it's the best I can do."

"Thank you Aradia, that will come in handy."

"Anyway are you ready Sollux?" Aradia asked.

"Yeah, sure." he answered.

Aradia held her palm out towards the meteor. Sollux put his index and middle fingers to each side of his forehead. Aradia glowed yellow, and a glow that flashed between yellow, white, and black engulfed Sollux. And with that, they were off. Kagome was sure it would be either the longest or the shortest three years of either life.

End of Chapter