Loose Threads

by BubbleBtch

Summary:

A collection of missing scenes, explanations, behind the scenes interactions, and straight up AUs of Hoops, Strings and other Placebo's.

Notes:

I was tired this week, and so instead of a chapter on the main story, i give you this!
Please send in requests and suggestions.

Chapter 1: The first meetings (is just a backdrop to the small town romance)

“Ohh! You really do have a sword!”

“Oh, My Wyrm!”

“Eeeeeee!”

The group of chirping girls all surrounded the one boy brandishing his dull sword in the middle. They had all snuck put of the village to see the sword that he had proclaimed that he had found.

The one other boy to the side scoffed. He had been so sure that it was just going to be a piece of broken metal or a shed claw.

He wouldn’t have encouraged everyone to come if it had really been a sword. Now instead of being caught out in a lie, Toun had become the most popular boy in the village.

And instead of having all of the girls ignore him, Toun had them crowding around him and tickling his antenna’s with complements. His shell was nearly shining with how proud of himself he was, as if finding this old piece of metal had proven something.

Even if it was a really cool sword.

“With that I bet you could slay all types of beasts!”

At those words, Slone couldn’t keep his mouth shut anymore, “Slay a beast? Toun? Puh-leeze! He’d just run away from it! He might have found a sword but that doesn’t mean he knows how to use it! Even if he did have the shell to use it, he’d definitely just end up hurting himself flailing around.”

At Slone’s harsh words the girls all stopped cooing at Toun and turned their little angry eyes at Slone. They all stood in line between the boys, as if acting as a wall to protect the boy behind them.

The tallest of them all folded her arms and stared down at Slone.

Velm had molted before all of them, and she had almost reached her adult height, and she loved to use it to force her authority, acting like it was her job to keep them all in line.

And she was actually very good at it.

“That’s mean to say Slone. Are you trying to say that you would do any better against something that crawled out of the caverns? Bare handed?”

Slone’s antenna’s laid back, but he wasn’t about to stand down. “Of course, I wouldn’t, but putting a hand in my sword in my hand sure wouldn’t save me. Only strong guards and knights are really able to use swords. Someone like Toun can’t just pick one up and proclaim himself strong!”

Slone took a step or two to the side in order to look Toun in the eye, doing his best to put a mean look on his face.

“Do you know what crawls around in these tunnels? Mawlurks with mouths so big they could swallow a bug without even brushing their teeth against their shell. Belfly’s that would sooner kill with their own bodies then to let a bug walk under their perch.”

Slone took a step closer to the smaller bug. His pretty eyes widening in fear at Slone’s words. His delicate little hands gripping the sword in his hands tighter as Slone stood as tall as he could to hover over the pretty boy.

Slone shook himself a little, trying to get back on track and not get distracted by how cute the other boy was. “My brother works in the pipes below the city of tears, and you know what he told me? That there are disgusting beasts that thrive in the watery pipes. Loud slapping creatures that can shout and scream as they run toward you. They’re called Flukemon. They don’t have eyes or antenna but they have mouths that they’ll use to eat anything. Their bodies are pink and white, and soft to the touch, so if you swung your blunt little sword at them you might manage to get one good hit in. You might even manage to cut it in half if you tried hard enough. But then both halves would grow teeth and get back up to get their revenge.”

Slone was so close to Toun now, he could have wrapped their antenna’s together if he wanted to. But Toun’s were laid back in fear, and Slone was not going to do that. Nope. Why would he want to touch antennas with the pretest bug in the whole village?

Ha, ha.

Anyway.

“A scardy bug like you would fog the whole place with fear before getting saved by someone stronger. Don’t pretend that carrying a dull piece of metal makes you brave!” Slone took a step back, needing to put a little space between them.

Slone could see the way that the girls were gearing themselves up to shout him down and protect their precious pretty boy. He braced himself for an argument for the ages.

And in the lull of silence before the yelling started there came a loud wet SLAP!

The entire group froze.

They had all snuck out into the tunnels near the edge of the blue lake. A place that they weren’t allowed to go. A place that their parents had warned them about.

A place that their parents had made up stories about to keep them away. All sorts of tales about creatures swimming up from the depths to snatch little bugs away as snacks. Of the water rising and washing away the curious children that got too close to the shore. Of the various monsters from the tunnels making their way out of the maze that was the inside of the sewers and hunting around the edges of the lake.

That last one had always almost sounded true, and as the wet ‘slap, slap, slap,’ noise got closer their minds all spun toward the words that Slone had just said.

About the loud wet slapping creatures from the sewers.

The group as one all turned toward the sound, and there, coming out of the darkness from where the blue lake was, was a fat pale shape. As it got closer they could see the water drip off of its body and could see the splashes of pink amongst the white.

It stood taller than all of them and had some dark raggedy water-logged cloth on its head. It’s body bulged oddly and it didn’t appear to have any arms. It was walking toward them oddly, a strange and careful shuffle as if it didn’t have any eyes and couldn’t see them in the dark.

“Hello-?”

“AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!”

The little group of young bugs all screamed at the first sound that came out of the creature.

Slone felt something push him to the side and then he saw the back of Toun. The fool hardy bug had rushed to the front of the group and placed himself between the Flukemon and the rest of them. He was standing with his back to the group and the sword thrust out to the creature.

“STAY BACK YOU UGLY MONSTER! I’LL SLAY YOU!”

Toun waved the sword at the creature and instead of rushing toward the scared children, it made a noise like a shriek and ran away into another dark tunnel away from them.

The group stayed frozen for a few moments, the girls all clustered together and Toun standing directly in front of Slone, still holding the sword aloft with all of the strength in his shaking shell.

Slone felt as though their shell was a size too small for their insides, and as if they were about to burst open with warm fuzzy feelings all over Toun’s back.

Toun looked over his shoulder back and Slone. And when Slone looked into the prettiest eyes of the whole village, at the boy who threw himself between him and a monster . . . ?

Well, it’s safe to say that Toun was going to get a boyfriend whether he was prepared for one or not. 

Chapter 2: Benny Hill theme

Summary:

So what if "The Storyteller" had terrible aim, and Mary got dropped in the middle of the White Palace instead on in the Blue Lake?
What's a very panicked and naked girl to do? Well run screaming of course!

 

Court was not going smoothly.

There had been a significant increase in the rate of the infected, and the Soul Master had once more requested a public audience with the Pale King to argue his case in experimenting on the infected individuals.

Usually Lurien would respect the inclinations of a researcher or a scientist. There were many things that they could learn from the infected bodies, from how they acquired that monstrous strength, to why they all eventually ended up swelling with fluid and having their shells crack open and ooze orange puss.

But the Soul Master’s experiments were far more gruesome than any dissection that Lurien had ever attended with Monomon.

Oh sure, they were clinical and the notes were perfect, but very rarely does the bug who is getting cut open, be culled beforehand. The Soul Master insisted that the experiments need to be conducted on living bugs, so that the soul can be monitored.

But Lurien does not think that simply draining an infected bug of all of their soul would do anything to help the individual.

And even if it did, then they might not want to come back after the torture their bodies had gone though. Not that there was ever enough of the bug left to support life.

Lurien turned toward where the Pale King sat, regale and unaffected by the Soul master’s words.

Truly he was a higher being, untouched by the problems and desires of petty mortal bugs.

 

---

 

Why is he doing this again? Didn’t I already tell him no?!? His science is immoral and disorganized! If I wanted a list of ways that removing soul from a half dead patient would kill a bug, I would make it myself!

What’s after this? I believe that I was supposed to be hearing about the efforts in finding places to bury the dead by now. Did he skip in line again?

The Pale King’s tired thoughts didn’t show on his face, but if any of the bugs could have seen the way that his wings were loosely tucked together along his spine, the same way that could be seen on any over worked parent who was listening to one of their children try and talk around a request they knew was going to be denied

 with then they would have surely lost their pristine image of him. If they could see the way that his legs fidgeted where they were tucked under his body and the way that his mandibles dug into his mouth with the effort that he took to keep his temper.

Well, they would surely fear his lack of control and would all cower before him and hid behind his wife. He would lose all of the ground he had managed in making them see him as a god that they could approach with their thoughts and feelings, and they would once more consider him to be nothing more than a gluttonous titan who would sooner eat them than listen to them.

And, to keep his subjects calm, the Pale King could not tell the Soul Master to shut up and leave.

No matter how much he wanted to.

The Pale King had just settled his nerves back into his firm control when there was a change in the air.

The already vast room seemed to grow and twitch, the air between the Soul Master and the Pale King seemed to . . . tangle for a moment. As if a spider had made a mistake in its weaving, blurring near invisibly, before there was a very distant voice that said a single word.

“Whoops!”

And a pale mass of flesh slammed into the ground between the Pale King and the Soul Master and the tangle that had brought it here jerked straight, disappearing for his sight and senses.

The Pale King did not pause.

There was an unknown foreign presence here brought by a god that he had not met.  Weather they were to help or hinder would be seen later, but for now he would protect his people and keep it away from them.

Shining spears burst from the ground, making a messy but strong barrier between the creature and his subjects, he had long since left his throne, his body coiled below him and wings spread. Soul gathered and dripped from his hands as he prepared to meet head on this unknown thing that a foreign god had dropped in the midst of his court.

It had managed to prop itself up some, it’s strange four limbed body still mostly sprawled on the ground as what had to have been its head raised up to meet the snarling visage of the god whose domain it had invaded.

It’s face was . . . strange. Truly a creature that only a god could create, it’s mouth strange and fleshy and with a stubby horn in the center of its face. Wet strings clung to its head and body, and the Pale King could see no carapace, shell, wings or antenna. Only soft wet slug flesh and a pair of oddly colorful eyes.

The Pale King was confused. This creature had no natural weapons and he could sense no soul power. Perhaps it was poisonous? But he could smell nothing toxic despite the liquid that covered it.

The Pale King leaned toward the creature, his mouth dropping open to better smell the creature on the floor in front of him.

But his small movement seemed to snap the creature out of its paralyzed staring and its own mouth dropped open showing it’s red insides and blunt teeth.

The Pale King had just decided on the sight of its teeth that this creature probably wasn’t sent here as an act of war, when it breathed in deeply and let out a deafening wailing scream that made him lose control of his soul in surprise.

The spears that separated the creature from his people disappeared, and the sudden lack of a glow drew the creature’s attention to the bugs behind it.

No.

His people!

The Pale King lunged forward, his hands and teeth primed to dig into the soft flesh of the creature, but with another scream that knocked his sense lose in his head, it rolled to the side, dodging his attack and leaving him to slide across the slick floor, the liquid that it left behind greasing his slide enough to send him tangling into the body of the Soul Master.

The precious seconds that it took to regain his senses and free his long body from the Soul Master gave the creature the time it needed to balance itself on its two legs and run past them both.

It’s wailing sent his people to the floor while they clutched their antenna, their collapsing bodies opening a way for the creature to dive past and disappear through the doors of the court room.

Out of sight it may be, but not out of hearing.

 

---

 

The creature was loud

Loud in everything that it did. It’s breathing, a raspy gasping noise, was clearly audible and could be matched to the expansion of its chest.

It’s feet, the oddly long and flesh things, slapped the ground with its every step, announcing its arrival like a drum.

And it would scream a tunnel shacking wail whenever it met a bug’s eyes with its own.

But it was also slow.

It was easy to catch up to, but despite it’s slow pace, it was hard to catch.

It reacted quickly to any touch to its body, throwing itself forward, backward or to the side to twist out of whatever grip a bug had on it. And if a bug managed to grab it firmly, then there was a chance that the giving flesh and odd slickness would allow it to still slip out of a bug’s hands.

And then the creature would make that hideous noise, the shrill wail that would knock anyone in hearing distance to the floor.

Anywhere the creature went, it littered the ground with bugs who were completely unable to make sense of the world for seconds at a time, some bugs being knocked completely unconscious by the noise. These bugs would, either by chance or by plan, slow down anyone who had managed to keep their feet, letting the creature gain another large gap before it was once more surrounded, and it screamed again.

The chase had been going on for a while now, the creature slowing every now and then. Sometimes a bug would manage to bring it to a stop entirely, but any attempt to actually hold it still would fail.

The creature was . . . heavy. Much heavier than it seemed it should be.

Heavy enough that during one of the moments when a bug had managed to grab one of its legs, it had fallen and rolled into a group of guards who had all been bowled over by the sudden impact.

The creature had screamed them all into submission from where it had laid at the bottom of the pile and as it had scrambled back up it had cracked a few of the guards armor from where it had put its full weight on them.

As the creature had once more headed down a hallway, one that led to the King’s and Queen’s personal halls, the various denizens of the palace couldn’t help but be relieved. It would run into the wards now, and they should be able to keep it pinned in that single hallway until the King could catch up from where even he had been knocked senseless by the screaming.

With this plan in mind, the bugs began to slow down in their chase of the creature, herding it toward where the runes were laid and once there was nowhere to run but into the runes that would keep out all foreign bugs they all breathed a sigh of relief as the creature ran head first toward the runes.

And then they all choked when the creature went right through and continued running. The runes hadn’t even activated!

A number of bugs chased after it, perhaps hoping desperately that they had gotten the hall wrong, or that maybe the runes had been damaged? But they slammed into the glowing runes and had no choice but to watch the creature continue to run away, turning a corner and leaving their sight as it went deeper into the most protected and forbidden parts of the palace only traveled by the most trusted retainers.

The Pale King would not be happy.

 

---

 

Mary was having a terrible time!

She was naked, cold, and being chased by monsters!

If it hadn’t been for the way that it had hurt when she finally hit the cold white floor, she would have thought that she was having some kind of anxiety dream.

But nope! As her bruised elbows and knees could attest, this current terrible fucking situation was 100% real!

Mary already had a stich in her side and was starting to gasp. She was hopelessly lost in the white halls that were more maze than anything else.

She hadn’t seen any windows and even if she did, she felt like she might be on at the very least the second floor or something! And if she broke a leg jumping from a height then she would be easy pickings for these damned monsters.

Why had they even kidnapped her if they were just going to fucking chase her around an enormous building?!

Mary finally gave up the ghost and leaned against a wall, propping herself up with and arm and gasping for breath. There wasn’t any monster behind her right now, but she knew that they would pop up again.

Maybe I can hide?

Mary, between gasping breaths, took a closer look at the long hallway she had been running down, and sure enough there were doors dotting it. They were a shiny platinum color so they hadn’t really caught her attention while she had been running away, terrified for her life.

In fact, she hadn’t been leaning against a wall. This was a door.

Mary managed to frown through her gasping, as she looked at the door. It was twice as tall as the other doors in the hallway and had some fancy carvings on it.

Maybe she should choose another do-!

Mary jerked her head toward the end of the hall. She could hear something coming from where she had run.

With the fear of a chased rabbit, Mary yanked the door open and barely looked inside before she tossed herself inside. She only just managed to keep from slamming the door behind her, but she knew that she couldn’t make any loud sounds or they would know that she was hiding.

The room was pitch black, and Mary pressed herself to the door before slowly feeling along the wall until she was pressed into a corner.

Slightly boxed into the corner and in the quiet dark, Mary’s heartbeat began to finally slow. The adrenaline in her system slowly began draining out, and now that she had a moment of peace she was overtaken by a wave of tingling tiredness and numbness.

With the need to run away draining out of her, now all Mary had was the hollow realization that she was stuck here.

She was stuck in this strange place surrounded by monsters. That she had nothing, not even a single piece of clothing, to her name.

She was cold, wet, alone, and there were dozens of monsters out for her blood.

Mary wasn’t able to stop herself from crying.

And she was soon trying to muffle her own chocking sobs.

Completely unaware of the black eyes that watched her from the dark.

 

---

 

It had been waiting for someone to retrieve it.

It had been ordered to wait in the holding room that had been made special for it. And so, it had waited, motionless and unthinking as the seconds had slowly ticked by. The only motion in the room had been the shadows of bugs walking past the door, the light flickering from the thin cracks at the bottom. The only sounds that could be heard were the quiet murmurs of the retainers as they passed the door or echoes of a bug’s hurrying steps from down the halls.

Not even the breath of the living disturbed the stillness of the room that housed the currently unused Hollow Knight.

If the object inside the dark room had the ability to think, to feel, then it would have greatly disliked these long moments of quiet, lonely, stillness. It would have whined, pleaded, and disobeyed the orders to return to the room that housed it during the long hours when it was unused.

But it didn’t have those things. So, like always, it waited. Empty and still, for a bug to come in and give it an order.

It often waited for very long and silent stretches of time.

But this time, things were happening in the White Palace. Things that it was able to hear from where it was sequestered away.

A loud shrill noise had echoed down the long halls of the White Palace. It had sounded again and again. Growing louder or quieter over time, but always heard.

It must have been deafening to travel far enough that the Hollow Knight could hear it from where it resided in the inner most halls.

It had been listening attentively for the next great cry, so it had heard the loud slapping long before it had ever gotten close to the room where the Hollow Knight was kept.

A sound like someone beating a wet rag to floor, and a rhythmic hissing like wind leaking form a broken blacksmith’s bellows.

The canopy got louder as it got closer until whatever bug was making such sounds stopped outside of the Hollow Knight’s door.

The metal door gave a nearly silent creak, but the fact that it’s hinge’s suffered at all from the power of the bug outside of its door meant that it must be a being of power. To have gotten past the seals that guard the inner halls, and to make even metal cry at it’s strength . . .

The Hollow Knight’s core orders allowed it to defend its body against attacks from everyone but the Deepnest Princess. But unless ordered, it could not attack first.

The Hollow Knight’s body did not move, not even did its hands tense as the rune laden door to its holding place opened.

The light from the opened door cut into the black room, and in slipped the bug that had somehow circumvented the runes that had kept any but the Pale King and White Lady from entering the room where the Hollow Knight was kept.

The bug quickly shut the door behind them, and pressed themselves to the door in a strange manner. After a few seconds of this strange stance, they began to creep to the side, keeping their back to the wall the entire time, until they were pressed into a corner of the room. They proceeded to seemingly collapse.

The bug bent in strange ways until their legs were pressed to their oddly jiggly torso and their arms were wrapped around where their legs bent. They proceeded to bury their face into their folded limbs.

The Hollow Knight, who had not moved from where it was standing in the center of the room, had followed the bug’s progress with it’s head.

It had never seen a bug that looked like this before. With the flesh and coloring of a slug, but the limbs of a cave dweller. They were an oddity.

The Hollow Knight continued to stare at the strange bug that had invaded it’s room, and if someone who could have seen through the pitch-black darkness had been watching, they would have seen the way the Hollow Knight had begun to slowly lean toward the unusual bug.

This made it all the more obvious that the Hollow Knight jerked back in surprise when the bug on the floor let out a choked sob.

Crying, no matter what form it took or how it sounded, was always recognizable. And this bug, who looked like noting that the Hollow Knight had ever seen, who had managed to infiltrate the White Palace and slip past the runes that locked the Hollow Knight’s storage room, was absolutely sobbing in the corner of the room.

The Hollow Knight did not have an order pertaining how to assist an obviously distraught bug.

It had never been given any instruction on how to comfort a crying bug, nor any instruction on what to do if it ever came across one.

All of the orders that the Hollow Knight had ever been given had never taken in account that one day the Hollow Knight might be alone with a crying bug. This was apparently a glaring oversight that would need to be corrected.

But in the moment, the Hollow Knight was left with conflicting possible actions.

It could do nothing. This bug was obviously a trespasser, and despite its current state, was powerful enough to get deep into the White Palace. The crying might be a ruse.

But a ruse for what? The Hollow Knight neither felt, thought, or had a will. There was no bug here to put a on a show for.

So. The crying must be real.

And if so, then there was a bug in need of assistance, and the Hollow Knight has long since been ordered to assist any bug in need.

“This is an order, Hollow Knight. An order that will always be in effect unless I, the Pale King, explicitly state so. As a servant of the kingdom of Hallownest, the Hollow Knight must always assist a bug in need as long as doing so does not harm another peaceful individual, or this vessel.”

The Hollow Knight, now fully turned toward the sobbing bug, took a quiet step forward.

It seemed a more momentous action then the small room deserved.

 

---

 

Mary had started hyperventilating, her fist half shoved in her mouth to try and obstruct her quick breathing.  

Her crying jag was far from over, but it was beginning to gain volume, and even in the throes of a very good cry, she knew that being loud was a very bad idea.

Her throat and lungs ached so much, that the rest of her body felt numb in comparison. Her skin was clammy with the drying water and sweat covering her, the general cold air, and the adrenaline leaving her system.

So, the brush of the satiny, void black hand on her arm was lost in the many signals that were drowning out her brain during her half controlled panic attack.

It was a such a gentle touch, like the brush of fabric in the wind, that it repeated and repeated without getting a response out of Mary.

It was only when the large hand had gently folded around her protruding elbow that Mary suddenly realized through her numbed senses that something was in the room with her.

Mary kicked out blindly, just thrusting her feet out in front of her, but she only managed to hit fabric before her heels slammed into the hard floor.

A number of things were happening to Mary, a number of realizations as well!

For one, her body was making a valiant attempt to restart her adrenaline reproduction! Not to mention the fact that, in her fright, Mary had managed to bite into the hand that she had shoved into her mouth. All of this combined with the fact that the hand that was wrapped around her arms had not even been jostled by her sudden panicked wiggling had her fight or flight reflexes coming violently to life once more.

But that was only on the physical side.

Mary’s mind was drowning in a combination of terrifying facts to the tune of.

It’s got me, it’s got me, it’s hand is so fucking big. The door hadn’t opened, I know that door hadn’t opened. Where had this monster come from? HAS IT BEEN IN THE ROOM THE ENTIRE TIME?!?

Mary yanked her hand from her mouth, forced air into her stuttering lungs and did the only thing that had worked so far in keeping the monsters away from her.

She screamed.

Or, well, she tried to scream.

What actually left her throat was a gasping wheezing chirp as her throat throbbed in pain, already worn out from the screaming, marathon running, and the crying breakdown.

Mary couldn’t force her voice louder than a whisper, no matter how she strained.

She made one more desperate croak, her throat burning, as the huge hand wrapped around her arm kept her pinned in the corner. The fingers that curled around her caught limb seemed to be made of iron for how they didn’t even twitch at her struggling.

Mary might as well have been caught by a statue.

Her body was mindlessly desperate to somehow find some kind of hold in the darkness, the fear of her situation made a hundred times sharper by the fact that she couldn’t even see the monster that had her in its grasp.

Unable to flee and unable to fight, Mary’s free hand, still marked with the indents of her teeth, swiped blindly into the darkness. And in its desperate reaching, it managed to find the monster’s arm in the darkness, and clutched it in a parody of its grip on her.

“-please”

Mary’s throat was burning but the thin desperate whisper managed to force it’s way past her lips as she stared into the dark.

“-please don’t hurt me”

The hand twitched.

 

---

 

The Hollow Knight had made the incorrect action. Instead of comforting the crying bug, it had distressed them even more.

The bug was begging the Hollow Knight not to hurt it.

The Hollow Knight did not have a course of action for what to do if a bug was begging it to not take an action. The Hollow Knight did not have any course of action for this odd situation.

A distressed bug in a place that they ought not be and the Hollow Knight without an approved individual, it’s Father or it’s Mother to give it an order.

All of these conflicting problems revolved inside of the Hollow Knight, and it was paralyzed where it was bent over the still crying and cowering bug. Their forearm still gripped in the Hollow Knight’s large hand.

The Hollow Knight’s finger tips kept twitching in response to the quick pulse that beat under the bug’s thin flesh, the pulse going faster than a bee’s wings.

This had to be a response to the distress that the bug was feeling. If the beating slowed, then perhaps the bug would calm down?

The Hollow Knight carefully reached out with its other arm and carefully reached for the bug’s torso, the images of all of the times it had watched other’s offer comfort the injured and the panicked flashing in it’s head.

It laid it’s hand on the bug’s soft heaving side, and even though the bug let out a whimper and tried to curl even tighter on itself, the Hollow knight continued to gently tap it’s side with its hand.

It had seen other’s pat individuals to calm them before, perhaps it would work here? A hug would surely not be appreciated. They were already curling away from the touch of the Hollow Knight’s hand, being wrapped in its arms would not help their mental state.

The Hollow Knight continued patting the bug, changing spots every few moments. From its head to its torso and it’s oddly folded legs, the Hollow Knight littered pats to all of these places.

It must have been working because the bug began to slowly uncurl it’s body and loosen its grip on the Hollow Knight’s arm.

It turned its head toward the Hollow Knight’s chest and gave a quiet, “What?” Before it began to slowly reach out and make slow swiping motions at the Hollow’s Knight’s chest.

It was at this point that the Hollow Knight remembered that it’s holding room was black as the void and bugs usually needed some light to see by.

The bug’s fear was beginning to make more sense to the Hollow Knight.

 

---

 

Mary had no fucking clue about what was going on right now.

She was huddled in the corner of a dark room, in an unknown monster ridden place.

She was cold, wet, and naked.

But not alone!

Nope, there was an unknown assumable huge monster who had her captive in their grip!

And it was patting her.

The strangeness of the action managed to startle her out of her panic, and her breathing slowed as the unknown monster pawed at her.

Arm, cheek, stomach or thigh, the monster didn’t care. Everywhere was going to be pat!

The touches were emotionless and brief, and Marry couldn’t get even a smidge of intention from the motions. Nothing sexual, thank god, though some of the pats were placed on her tits.

If anything, it reminded Mary of someone who was uncomfortable with physical touch attempting to calm down someone . . . who was . . . crying . . .

 . . . was she being comforted?

Mary, finally gaining some courage, tried to see the monster in the dark.

But it was useless, she couldn’t see anything at all.

She began to slowly reach out, trying to figure out where the monster should be according to how to was holding her arm.

It should be right in front of her?

But as she reached out, she only touched air.

“What?” She croaked.

Just how big was this creature?

Mary was trying to decide if she should stand up or follow the arm from the hand when she heard speaking.

“-ink it came this way.”

Mary froze.

“What why? No one’s heard any screaming.”

“Exactly! It has only screamed when it’s seen other bugs, that means that it must be in a place with no bugs. Surely it has hidden away in an empty room.”

Mary’s eyes were nearly popping out of her skull.

The monsters could talk? They could talk and reason. Oh, shit.

Mary’s finger’s dug into the arm of the monster who had a hold on her. If she could hear the monsters outside than surely it could too.

Was she about to be turned in? Was it going to give her to whatever was outside the door?

The quiet tap of feet stopped right outside the door, and Mary pressed herself harder into the wall, terror reigniting in her blood.

There was a tap on the door.

“Should we check in the Hollow Knight’s room?”

Mary pressed a hand over her mouth in order to not scream.

“That creepy thing? It would have screamed the palace down if it had seen that! There’s no way that it’s in there.”

“Hey, don’t call it creepy! That’s the Pale King’s tool to save us all. It’s going to be sacrificed to stop the infection.’

“I can be thankful for something, even when it’s terrible to look at ok? Now are we going to continue searching for the intruder?”

Mary held her breath hoping beyond belief that maybe she would live through this.

“We should check just to be through.”

And with that there was a strange noise, like a key turning in a lock, and the door swung open giving the monsters outside a clear view of the room.

But Mary and the monster were both shoved in the blind spot, unseen.

“Huh, I guess it must be out somewhere.”

The room, made of the same white stone as the rest of the damned place, lit up with the opening of the door. And Mary could finally see what monster had her pinned in a corner with a hand on her.

It was much bigger than she had assumed. Instead of looking toward its head, she was instead staring toward it’s torso. It’s body was covered in a white cloak, but she could see inside and it was as dark as a lightless tunnel, completely unable to see it’s flesh, but for what was reaching from out behind the white draping fabric.

 Mary’s eyes followed the thin limb until it ended at the hand that still held her arm. The monster’s limb was far longer than she had though to see on a real creature. It was spindly and black.

Mary’s hand, still wrapped around it’s thin wrist stood out like the moon at night against the darkness of the monster’s body.

Mary forced her head to tip back, and stared nearly straight upward in order to see the face of the monster.

 . . . it didn’t look like a face.

Mary had been expecting antennas, mandibles, multiple eyes, and huge sharp teeth. Something to match all of the other monsters that she had seen. But this? This was barely anything at all.

It had a pure white face with high arcing horns and two deep pits as eyes.

And nothing else.

It looked like some piece of tasteful modern art.

The door shut, once more casting the two different creatures into darkness.

Mary was left, listening to the two monsters walk away, still in the grip of a third.

Mary began to put together a few puzzle pieces.

Number one. This monster was different from the others.

In size, color, and in its actions, this one was different from the rest.

Number two. The other monsters didn’t like it and called it a thing.

The monsters said it was going to be sacrificed.

Number three. Mary wasn’t from here and didn’t look like these creatures and was called an it by the monsters.

 . . . had this . . . person, been transported here too?

And if so, could they help her?

“Do you- will you help me?”

The creature’s hand twitched, and Mary decided to take that as an affirmative.

She began to slowly get up, and as she got to her feet, she heard the gentle sound of fabric moving, letting her know that the person she was trapped with was moving back.

The fear that Mary had been holding close, began to drain away. She, probably, had a companion. She wasn’t with anyone that she knew, but she wasn’t alone.

“Let’s- cough-, let’s make a plan to get out of here.”

The hand on her gave a gentle squeeze.

Chapter 3: The Dance

Summary:

A deleted scene from Bugs and Politics.
I hadn't nailed down the Ant Princess's character yet, and Tiso wasn't in the story yet.
So this scene was in a hypothetical where only Ant Princess and Hollow were gonna be friends.

The Storyteller was dancing.

It was a slow, luring dance.

Her hips were swaying from side to side, following the beat of the drums. Her arms were above her head and her long sleeves fluttered as her body wavered from side to side. Her legs bent, lowing her body slowly and bringing it back up, following the rise and fall of the singing.

As her body rose, her arms dropped. Their slow descent caused the eyes all those who were watching to drag down her body. To follow the curves and dips of her body, whose softness seemed all the more accented by the way her own hands would sink into her flesh as they traveled down.

The Storyteller was showing off all of her most vulnerable places. From her giving chest, to her soft legs. Her slow rise and fall just seemed to draw attention to how small she was, how close she was to the ground even when she was at her full height. Her slow rolling movements, her cycle of drop and rise, just seemed to pull in anyone watching.

This dance baffled the foreign bugs watching. It was no fast-paced threat, no flashy showing of color, vitality and health. It was achingly slow and . . . almost . . . hypnotizing . . .

A few bugs, unbeknownst to them, had been slowly creeping toward the Storyteller. Moving forward with her every slowly drop, as if they were being reeled in.

The Princess was one of such bugs, only managing to shake herself out of the trance she had found herself in when she stumbled over the goblet she had dropped in her focus of the Storyteller’s swaying hips.

The Princess purposely turned herself away, but couldn’t help keeping the slowly twisting storyteller in the corner of her vison.

“Wh- why is she moving like that?”

Why is she moving like the most enticing prey?

The question was directed at Hollow, but when there was no sound of chalk on slate, the princess turned to where Hollow had last been.

The spot was empty.

The princess looked around, feeling as though she had taken her eyes off of something important and now it was missing, only to find the tall veil laden creature half-way to the storyteller.

Hollow, who had been kind and gentle the entire time that the Princess had known them, was stalking towards the storyteller.

Their steps were slow, barely lifting off the ground and seeming to sliding over the stone. Their shoulders were lowered and their head was tilted toward the slowly swaying storyteller. The delicate clothing that had showcased their pretty features, now seemed to only highlight their most dangerous angles.

Their long thin hands had never seemed so dark and dangerous as they reached for the Storyteller, the fingers seemed to almost resemble blades about to test their edge on the storyteller’s soft body.

The Heir of Hallownest had seemed to be a delicate and gentle flower, and now the Princess could plainly see that for all that the creature had no mouth, they had inherited their Father’s teeth.

The Princess watched the Heir close in on the Storyteller, and had a belated realization that perhaps she should stop this.

Stop this before the Heir damaged their Father’s favored advisor.

But.

Maybe there were some old grievances to be aired out. Maybe the advisor deserved some teeth for ordering the Heir around and taking so many liberties with their person.

Maybe she could just . . . watch.

And watch she did as the Hollow got closer and closer, until on one of the Storyteller’s slow rises, her hand was caught in the iron grip of Heir of Hallownest.

The Princess expected her to start, jerk away, perhaps panic at being snared. To give into the desperate prey instinct to struggle and flee from such an overpowering predator.

But . . .

The Storyteller spun.

Her hand was kept in a loose hold as her body spun and her odd robes flared out around her. Her body was just as lax as it had been but now she faced the Heir as they towered over her. The light tinkle of her laugh was heard over the music as she leaned her body back, her weight hanging from Hollow’s grip on her. She threw her head back and one of her legs rose under her robes to kick at the air as she reached out to the Heir with her other hand. Offering the appendage to the claws of her captor.

Hollow so carefully took the delicate appendage in their own, and gently pulled the storyteller up right once more and as the Storyteller continued to sway, began to follow her lead.

Now there were two creatures dancing alone together in this slow alluring way. But while the Storyteller’s movements spoke of weakness, of bait, the Heir’s slow movements were more like a content predator after a full meal, letting themselves be swayed by the heat of the sun or the push of the wind.

And that was when the Princess understood.

Hollow’s long stares, sudden straightening and attentiveness wasn’t born out of fear or anger.

 The Heir didn’t follow the Storyteller’s every move with their head, and obey their every order out of fear of a teacher, or even respect.

The Heir loved this creature.

“Oh.”

Chapter 4: Dreamwalking (canon timeline)

Summary:

Mary goes to the canon timeline and has a little bit of a breakdown at what she finds

Notes:

hi everybody, so like i said a million years ago that i had something in the works to break your heart, and this is it!
i got a new job and there are a lot less hours so i will be writing a bit more.
enjoy the pain!

 

 

Mary was alone and she was walking through the deserted tunnels of the Crossroads.

The world was dark, quiet and utterly devoid of a single soul.

There were a few creatures here and there, bugs with no thoughts, that passed her by like ghosts, only there if she looked at them straight on, but blurring into nothing but color and movement if she did not focus.

Mary could not feel the ground beneath her feet nor the damp chill that was always in the air of the tunnels. Mary did not know where she was going, and did not feel a particular need to hurry nor slow.

She just kept the same steady pace, her cloak fluttering around her as she walked and walked.

Mary knew that she was asleep.

Not quite all of the way, not in the way that she was when she was dealing with the Radiance. Not lucidly in the way that would allow her to fly or to control her surroundings, but in that quiet way.

The quiet way that you knew rules of the world.

Mary knew she was dreaming the same way that you knew gravity was working, or that your air was filling your lungs.

It was a physicality, and so obvious that one didn’t even spare it at thought.

The only sound in the world was from the chain hanging from her neck, it was the crunch of dirt as she dragged it behind her that seemed to be the only evidence of her passing.

The chain had no weight to Mary, no icy metal touch to her skin, to hard edges digging into her. She would have never know it was there if it weren’t for the sound of it dragging across the ground, the chain not giving the dirt the same courtesy it was showing her.

All of a sudden, but also after a hundred steps, Mary was in front of the Black Egg Temple.

But.

It was wrong?

Gone were the stalls lining the cavern walls, gone were the murals that splashed it’s sides, gone were its silk flags and decorations.

It was not the festive thriving community center that Mary had haphazardly helped it become.

It was still grand, but . . . minimalistic. It was classy and royal.

Mournful.

Mary walked through it’s open door and stuttered to a stop.

There was a second door, carved with abstract pictures of masks.

Familiar masks.

There was Herrah, and Monomon, and Lurien! The three dreamers who had become less of a council and more like companions, each in charge of different aspects and needs of the kingdom. But still willing to join Mary and the Pale King for a drink after all of the business had been taken care of.

Mary tilted her head, suddenly aware of her own mask on her face as she looked at this odd, unfamiliar thing.

This had not been there before.

Mary stepped forward, reaching out to touch this decorated door, raising her hand to touch the carved visages of her friends.

But instead of carved shell beneath her hand, her fingers and palm passed through the thing without even a pause.

Mary stared at the sight of her arm ending at her wrist, the door feeling no different than air to her.

She paused for a moment, though in this dream she didn’t have the mind to really contemplate what this truly meant for her.

Mary shrugged her cloaked shoulders and continued onward, passing through the carved door, utterly unaware of its purpose.

Unaware if it was placed there to keep something out or to keep something in.

And with everything else that Mary did not understand, it’s purpose and power did not apply to her.

Mary continued to walk, the path dark and lightless, but not as dark as the Abyss. Nothing could compare to that type of lightless nothing, the home of the Void.

But despite it not comparing to the Abyss, it was still entirely too dark for Mary too see.

But . . . she had ways to see in the dark.

Didn’t she?

Mary dug into her clock, checking the pockets that were rarely ever used, Hollow near eternally at her side, never needing to carry anything in their presence. Pockets that would usually never hold anything other than the supplies needed to make a few dreamcatchers, and the odd knife to cut thread, now held exactly what she needed.

A nightlight, a little pom-pom of frazzled string and uneven edges.

It glowed merrily in her hand, sleeves haven fallen to her elbows while she searched.

Mary dangled it from her hand as she continued her walk, the small thing not as bright as a lantern, and did not cut through the darkness like a lumafly light, but now Mary could walk forward and be confident she wasn’t about to step over the edge of some platform.

Mary kept walking forward, deeper and deeper into the Black Egg Temple, a few vague but dark shapes just out of reach of her night-light’s glow, but they didn’t attract her attention.

In fact, Mary was almost certain that she would be doing nothing but walk for the rest of her dream if it weren’t for the dark shape ahead of her that slowly became clearer as she moved forward.

Something was hanging from the ceiling?

That was strange, the ceiling was tall here, Mary having reached nearly the center of the Temple, the place where the ceiling was at its apex.

The place that she herself had ended up once hanging from the ceiling.

Mary got closer to the thing, and she could see that it was something made of fabric?

Dingy white material hung lankly, and as Mary’s eyes traveled up the fabric, she saw that it was being kept aloft by thick shiny chains wrapped around the thing.

In fact, now that she was looking, she could see where the chains were anchored to the ground!

There must be nearly a mile of chain all together needed to keep this thing suspended in the air.

Was- was it some type of dream catcher?

No, it was too solid, too sack like to be that, so what was . .?

Mary had kept her slow pace forward, now only a few feet away from the hanging thing. It’s ends dangled roughly at her chest level, though the object continued upward into the dark.

Mary stopped right before it, reaching out to touch the material with her spare had.

This was silk, very high-grade spider silk.

The kind of silk that not even the Pale King could get in great supply, it was thinner than sewing thread, and woven like this? In such a large garment? In a single piece?

This grimy ratty thing was worth half the City of Tears! It was a treasure! A king’s ransom!

What was it doing, hanging locked and alone behind a door in a deserted Temple?

Mary took a step back and lifted her nightlight over her head, trying to get a better look at whatever this thing was, trying to see if she could recognize-

White.

There was white at the top, above the glint of shined steel.

Mary stumbled another step back, trying to raise the nightlight just a bit higher, to see just a touch clearer, just what she was looking at.

Because if she was not mistaken, and for all of the gods that she had met, she desperately hoped she was-

Eyes, dark enough to make the surroundings seem bright in comparison, horns serrated and tall.

“H-Hollow?”

No response.

Mary rushed forward, the grungy fabric of their cloak being twisted in her hands as she ripped it open.

Yes, there were the void dark feet, barely visible amongst the gloom, seen more by the absence then by their reflection of light, but even more panic inducing was the sword that hung next to them, the metal shining but duller than it should have been.

The blade all but verbally confirming just who was hanging here.

Mary reach out, grabbing one of their feet with her hand, letting the cloak fall closed around her arm as she tilted back to look up at her bound lover.

“Hollow! It’s ok, I’m here! I’ll make it okay. Fuck, who did this to you? How did they do this to you? You must have been ambushed, no one can take you in a fair fight. Did one of the Soul Sanctum bugs come back for revenge? I’ll kill them, I’ll kill whoever did this to you! No, fuck, I’ll do worse, I’ll tell your father, I’ll let him torture them, I’ll have your mother bury them alive and grow flowers from their eyes, I’ll- I’ll- “

Mary got closer, wrapping her arms around Hollow’s legs, pressing the hard chitin to her soft and warm body, knowing that Hollow would appreciate the touch, would want her to touch them as much as possible.

“I’m so sorry Hollow, I don’t know where I was when this happened, but I should have been with you, I should have protected you. How long have you been alone in the dark? It- it doesn’t matter, I’ll get you out!”

Mary gave another squeeze to what little of Hollow that she could reach and then scrambled toward the chains that must have been what anchored them to the ceiling.

Mary had no idea what she would even do to the chains. She didn’t have the strength to break metal, but there had to be something that she could do! There had to be something, anything that would get Hollow out of this predicament.

But as she reached for the chains, her hands went through them just like the door.

Mary was too frantic, to realize what had happened, slapping at the chains for a few heart-beats before she realized that she couldn’t touch them.

“Wha- what!?! I- I can’t- why can’t I- “

Mary spun around, diving for the other chain only to be met with the same problem, her hands passing through the steel like air.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, what that hell is happening! Hollow! I can’t touch the chains! Why can’t I touch the chains!? Are they- they- “

Mary stopped.

“They’re magic, aren’t they?”

Mary can’t interact with magic, Mary can’t affect magic, but magic can’t affect her either.

This had always been a boon, but now, in this moment, it was the worst curse she could have ever borne.

She couldn’t help them.

Mary, stumbled to her feet, having fallen to her knees in her desperate scrambling at the chains. She couldn’t touch the chains, but she might- might still-

She grabbed Hollow’s leg, offering what comfort she could, even as she thought out loud.

“Damn it, what bastard, what cunt, who could-! Hollow- Hollow I am so sorry, I- I can’t fucking TOUCH the things. I can’t free you! Not- not by myself, but maybe, I can go get help? But I don’t want to leave you! I don’t want you to be alone! But I can’t- “

Mary had been leaning into Hollow, gently shaking them in their bonds even as she clutched their legs to her chest, burrowing her masked face into their shins as she felt tears roll down her cheeks.

She didn’t know when she had begun to cry but it wasn’t unexpected. It wasn’t the time to cry but it wasn’t like she could do anything else but sob and apologize.

Something other than cloth brushed the back of her elbow, and Mary remembered.

“Hollow! The sword, your sword! Maybe I can use that! Drop it Hollow, drop it and maybe I can use it to break the anchors!”

Mary took a step to the side, not wanting to let go of Hollow but also not wanting to lose some toes to the blade.

She waited.

“Hollow?”

No response.

Mary’s grip on Hollow’s leg tightened.

“Hollow? Are you, can you wiggle your foot for me?”

No response.

The horror that Mary had been feeling at seeing Hollow strung up in chains like a spider’s meal, seemed like nothing but nerves on a first date compared to the absolute, icy creep of terror that was crawling up her spine as each second passed without a response from them.

Were they dead.

“Hollow. Hollow! HOLLOW! Please, please, please! You have to respond to me Hollow, you have to respond! You need to- anything! Anything Hollow! I’ll take anything from you! A foot wiggle, a shake of your head! Hell, kick me away! But you need to let me know you’re alive! You have to be alive Hollow! You have to you have to you have to!”

Mary was wailing, her face buried back into Hollow’s legs as her throat was choked by tears and she desperately begged them to be alive, to not be dead, to give her a sign!

Anything!

shink

Mary flinched and looked toward where the sound came from.

The sword, Hollow’s sword, barely visible in the dark, was standing at a slight angle in the ground beside her.

They had dropped their sword.

The relief that flooded through Mary nearly brought her to her knees, if it weren’t for the fact that going to her knees would make her let go of Hollow.

She sobbed.

“Alive! Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Mary cried for a bit longer, the relief robbing her of her urgency, but eventually she managed to untangle a hand from Hollow’s body and reach out to the sword.

Her hand went through it.

Mary stared.

“no.”

Her throat tightened up again.

“please, no.”

She couldn’t touch the sword.

She couldn’t help.

Mary’s fingernails dug into Hollow’s legs, her desperation reaching a new height.

She kept her grip on Hollow even as her other hand reached for her mask and yanked it up above her head.

“HELP! SOMEBODY HELP!”

Her voice, her greatest asset, her only weapon, echoed in the empty temple, bouncing off the walls and surely reaching someone’s antennas outside of this damned cage.

“HELP ME! HELP US! THE STORYTELLER DEMANDS ASSISTANCE! YOUR HEIR, THE HOLLOW KNIGHT NEEDS HELP!”

Mary stopped to take a breath, her throat scratched raw from her sobs and her screaming, and in that moment the sound of rattling chains were all that was heard.

For a moment, Mary had hope that it was Hollow! That they were fighting their bonds, struggling to be freed.

But no, they were as still as she had found them.

No.

The rattling came from her chain.

Something was following her chain.

Responding to her demands for help.

The dark grew darker. The nightlight, having long since been dropped to the floor, was swallowed by the Void that was flooding into the temple.

Mary felt it first on her feet, then her legs, the waves of void rising higher and higher until she felt it at her shoulders.

Far above her head, opening up like true nothing was a pair of bright white eyes. They stared directly into the empty gaze of the chained Hollow Knight and narrowed just a touch, the minuscule movement threatening the Vessel. The void nearly roaring in the face of this other mirrored creature a single possessive word.

“MINE.”

The Void seemed like water, but it clutched at her like hands, gently prying open her grip on Hollow even as she began to plead once more.

“no, no, no! Please, they- they need help! Help them! Help them! Please you have to-“

And then Mary’s head was under the waves, gentle fingers pressing her mouth shut even as others wiped her tears away, gold glinting in the dark devoid of light, before the Void greedily swallowed it away.

Mary cried and struggled in the loving arms, feeling them drag her back the way she had come, retracing her wandering steps until she woke up in her bed still wrapped in hollows arms.

Mary woke up crying, feeling like she had abandoned someone to a terrible fate even as she counted up her loved ones throughout the day.

Hollow stayed by her side the entire time, never taking their hands away from her for a single moment.

More possessive than usual, as if there were guarding her from another suitor.

Chapter 5: Shrimp Mary

Summary:

So the premise of this is-
what if Mary was a Shrimp mermaid.
if this continues its gonna do more with Lurien and his city then the king, but i also kinda wanted to explore the gap in classes for the bugs and how there might not be a lot of mingling between the social classes.

Mary didn’t need anything.

Nope.

Not a thing.

There was plenty of food where she was, trial and error had let her figure out exactly what was and was not edible. Surprisingly enough, the most common plant turned out to be both palatable and filling!

Water was a non-issue, and she had yet to see even a single creature that could enter her domain and survive.

Mary was set for life!

She had no reason to transverse the confusing pipes of the bug city, no reason to risk being seen while swimming in the clear and shallow canals.

No reason to drag her strange and grotesque body out of the water and onto land where she was hobbled by her own weight, unsupported by the buoyancy of water.

No reason at all!

Except for how she wanted hot food bad enough to kill someone for it.

She had eaten the same raw seaweed (riverweed!?) for every single meal ever since she had woken up under water and had a panic attack about the fact that she was underwater.

It didn’t taste bad but she was sick of it! She wanted anything else!

Hell, even eating some raw fish would be a welcome change over more damned riverweed!

It had driven her to the city, raising her head up out of the water while hiding underneath bridges and sniffing the air, trying to figure out if any restaurants were close enough to the canals to let her snatch some food.

She hadn’t had any luck, and she was pretty sure that she had swum through every single canal in the city!

But apparently bugs didn’t like to eat next to the water, and so far the closest thing she had found was some little stand that was still a yards away from the edge.

But Mary had long since passed desperate, and the smells of grilled mushrooms had been haunting her in her dreams.

She had eventually decided that, fuck it!

What was the point of living if you couldn’t even enjoy a meal?!

She had collected coins from the bottom of the canals and she was able to understand the words that these bugs spoke! She had seen the snails, spiders, and insects that she had thought to only reside in nightmares travel the water logged streets of the city.

She was going to be a paying customer!

Her money, while not exactly gotten honestly, was still good!

And she wanted some hot food damnit!

Mary had watched and waited for a bit, learned the rhythm of the streets and when the seller opened and closed his little stand.

She had decided on going early to ensure that there would be food, and maybe the seller would still be sleepy enough to not really notice that she was not a normal customer?

It was this plan that had led Mary to where she was now, dragging herself up a shoddily made ladder, crafted out of the various things that she had picked up off of the canal floors and knotted together with woven bits of the very riverweed she was loath to eat again.

She had saved the sharpest and strongest bits of metal for a grappling hook that she had thrown at some type of bug powered light pole.

She had missed the first few times.

But it had caught eventually! And now she was doing her best to drag her ugly body up and over the edge of the canal.

Mary was no longer a human, but a mermaid.

Kinda.

As far as she was able to tell, she was now half shrimp.

She had five little sets of flipper legs, and a broad tail. Her new shell was half clear,  half grey and one could easily see the red veins that were underneath of it. She had gills somewhere in her new lower body, the openings being somewhere between her legs, but she had learned that she could still use her lungs! (as long as she spit the water out first)

She was a strong swimmer! (if one counted propelling herself backwards as swimming)

But her new body was terrible at traversing land, her little legs too weak to hold her body up out of water.

So she mostly relied on her jsut as weak upper body strength to move herself around. Army crawling over land while dragging her shrimpy body behind her.

Which means that it took her roughly ten minutes, with lots of huffing and puffing, to even climb up the ladder. Dangling by her hands, but with her tiny legs hooked over the handles when she was forced to rest.

And in that time, not only had the mushroom seller come over to the edge of the canal to watch her struggle, but she had also apparently attracted the attention of many other early morning venders.

They had been watched for a time as she slowly dragged itself out of the canal, and sprawled on the street in victory.

Mary took a moment to catch her breath. Her long body had finally cleared the painful edge of the canal with only her flared tail still slapping the ladder as she rested, body shuddering in exhaustion.

Her lungs were really getting a work out, her chest flexing, making her torso rise and fall as she tried to get her breath back.

She didn’t even have the room in her mind to think about just pushing herself back into the water.

But she still really wanted some hot food.

“Can- gasp! Can I get one skewer?”

The bugs stared down at her, this unusual creature that had dragged itself out of the depths, sprawled on the ground.

“Please?”

 

---

 

So!

It turns out that as long as you are polite and have money, no one cares where the hell your money comes from or even what you are!

Mary got her skewer, and after eating it, bought herself another one.

And another.

And at that point there were enough bugs out on the streets that she was getting looked at a bit.

Not a lot, no one was just stopping and staring, but more than a few did a couple double takes.

But no one started screaming or pointing and no one was aggressive!

It turns out that she had been worried for absolutely nothing! All these bugs had their lives to deal with and no one had time to freak out about her.

It was surprisingly relieving to learn that in the world of bugs, she was only an oddity and not anything to panic about.

Needless to say, after Mary had eaten her fill and shimmied back into the water, she returned back the next day to drag herself ashore and buy more.

She began to be a common enough sight on the street, even if she couldn’t move very far from the edge of the canal.

And once she was known it was simple enough to bribe some bugs into coming closer or getting her food from other stalls that were out of her reach.

Mary hadn’t eaten so well since she arrived here.

Her days were peaceful and calm, with only small upsets and slightly sore shoulders to show for her new hobby.

But then everything abruptly changed.

She had been swimming back to her home, just traveling under the water unnoticed but not hiding when there was a splash in front of her.

Mary had managed to see the wildly thrashing figure sink as quickly as a stone before she flipped backwards and propelled herself toward it.

She slammed into the bug, jolting both of them a little farther down the canal, but she managed to grab them around their shoulders.

The bug was already beginning to slow it’s struggling, drowning even as Mary slammed her tail to the bottom of the canal and forced them both upward.

Mary managed to get the bug’s head above water, but it was only when she forced them even farther up that she realized that water was seeping from their sides.

There was a few panicked moments where Mary tried to force the bug all the way out of the water, but while her arms had gained muscle, she was nowhere close to being strong enough to hold a bug out of water for any long amount of time.

Mary did not want someone dying in her arms.
She was traumatized enough! She was not adding this to it all!

Mary pressed the bug against the wall, flipped them upside down and shoved upward.

The bug’s body slid up the wall and above the water.

Most of their head and shoulders stayed in the water, but their sides had cleared the water line and they were stable enough.

The bug began to move again. Not exactly strongly or coherently, but the hands that had latched onto her own wrists were squeezing her with a strength that was encouraging for their continued survival.

Mary wasn’t sure how long they were stranded like that. How long it took for someone to see the probably comical sight of a bugs lower half, -just sticking out of the canal, and probably waggling their feet about.

But it wasn’t terribly long, not long enough for Mary’s arm’s to start to lose strength or for her to even really catch her breath back from the frantic and panicked struggle to get a grip on the bug.

Between one gulp of water and the next, the bug that Mary had been gripping so firmly was dragged out of her arms and out of the water entirely.

Mary’s face smacked into the wall and she was dazed for a moment before she swam upward and poked her head out.

After the effort that she had made to keep that bug alive, she sorta wanted to make sure that they stayed that way.

Mary’s head breached the surface to the sounds of sputtering and frantic words.

“-god- spppllttt! There’s a GOD- hack-hack-hack- in the canal!! I saw it! Spluttlt -it saved me!”

Oh wow, he must have been really close to dying if he thought he was seeing God!

Mary reached up, and slapped the side of the canal a few times, shouting up, “Hey! Hey!! Are they good?!”

There was a pause up top, the only sound being of running water and the splash of never ending rain.

And then there was a mad scramble for space to peer into the canal. A short little line of bug faces. All of them adorned with wide eyes and attentive antennas, hands gripping the railing above them.

Mary waved.

The one on the far left raised their hand and waved back.

Mary smiled, her grin splitting her face and pinching her eyes at the corner, “Hi there! Which one of you fell in? Or are they out of sight?”

The bug in the middle gently raised their hand, the limb shaking, shock obvious in their eyes.

Well, that was understandable. They had just taken a very surprising dip and were most likely still recovering from the ordeal. Mary knew that she would still be shacking like a leaf in a tornado if she were to nearly drown so bad that she was seeing God.

She pointed up at the bug, suspecting that they might not know what to do after nearly drowning. Water seemed like a death sentence to them, they probably were rarely fished out quick enough to survive and didn’t know how to properly recover.

“Make sure that you get as much of the water out of your sides that you possibly can! You are going to want to stay in a warm and dry place! You’ll probably need to leave the city for a while, the moisture in the air will keep the water from drying out. Getting the water out is very important! You will get sick otherwise.”

Mary pushed away from the wall, swimming far enough away that she could use her tail, her body instinctively curling up, her fanned shrimp tail flexing like feathers on a bird’s wing.

She was just about to dive back beneath the quickly moving water, when the bug in the middle lunged after her. They nearly fell back into the water, if it weren’t for the two bugs beside them grabbing their arms to keep them from taking a second dive into the canal.

“WAIT!! WAIT!!”

Mary startled, both at the bug’s action and their volume, tail curling in tight in preparation to thrust her far away from the perceived threat.

But Mary waited, using her hands to keep her body pointed toward the bug. And upon seeing thatch they were keeping her attention the bug seemed to lose some of their steam, their body becoming wracked with more coughs as their sides expelled more water, clenched tight by the shout.

“Wh- What- are you?”

Mary blinked before laughing, throwing her head back so far some rain went up her nose.

“Oh! Goodness, I’m just a shrimp!! Now keep out of the water, it’s no good for you!”

And with those parting words carried by a chuckle, Mary ducked back under the water.

How odd these bugs were, to be so enthusiastic to know the species of who had fished them out of the canal.

Maybe there was some cultural thing related to it?

Well, not like it mattered, Mary wouldn’t see them again.

They might or might not take her advice to leave the city, but it was a big place, and she doubted that they would be walking too close to the canals after their brush with death!

Chapter 6: Shrimp 2

Summary:

Drunk, singing, shrimp Mary!
No plot just sad vibes.

The City of Tears, a usually somber place, was bursting with life.

A million colorful umbrellas and waxed cloaks crowded the wet streets as the entirety of Hallownest celebrated, a dozen parties all scheduled to happen on the same day until everyone simple threw open their doors and joined in with their own festivities.

Bugs partying for partying’s sake, music rising in one moment only to be drowned out in laughter after the next.

But below the music, below the laughter, a voice rang out across the water.

The words were distorted by the echoes of the metal canal banks, the vowels stretched like taffy until the word was tangled in its own bouncing sound.

For most of the bugs in the city, this voice went unnoticed, barely heard and easily forgotten.

But for the bugs who were closer to the source-

-the words were much clearer, much easier to parse.

“The King and his men stole the queen from her bed
And bound her in her bones”

The voice was clear though oddly sharp in places. It rose and fell and lingered on the ends of words, twisting them into strange shapes.

“The seas be ours and by the powers
Where we will, we'll roam”

The bugs who heard the singer cast about for where they were, a few even asking others if they knew where the stage was located. If they knew the name of the singer.

Most were met with confusion and shrugs, the answer unknown.                                                                       

“Yo, ho, haul together
hoist the colors high”

But for a particular area, a particular street that had wider canals than most areas, that habitually had food stands lining its banks?

None who heard the voice had any question for whom it came from.

No question about where the stage was located.

“Heave-ho, thieves and beggars
never shall we die”

Not when they could see the odd creature, languishing on the sunken memorial.

They could see the strange being that had dragged her water bloated body from the canal and purchased food from their stalls.

Not when they could see her wave a bottle in the air in time with her voice.

Not when they could hear her voice echo back at her like a choir.

No, none of the bugs on those streets had any doubt for where that singing was coming from.

-but they didn’t enlighten any who asked them.

These bugs didn’t know this creature had crawled from the canal to pay for their food and boost their fallen from a watery grave.

But they didn’t want her chased off.

 

---

 

Mary finished the sea shanty with a flourish, her tail curling up as she held the last note for a long as she could, bottle held high, before flopping back onto her elbows

Mary lifted her bottle to her lips, gulping down the honey mead with a thin trail escaping her mouth and leaking down her face in her exuberance.

The echo of her piercing off key voice jumping from canal to canal, somehow managing to be heard above the general hubbub of the many partying bugs lining the streets of the city.

There had been some sort of festival today.

Or a lot of festivals?

Any bug that she had asked had given her a different answer, from a wedding to a birthday, until Mary had just stopped asking.

But in the end it was a grand party, a celebration full of drinking, and food, and dancing. Parties started in homes or restaurants and spilled out into the water-logged streets of the City of Tears, and from there music and laughter fought back the sound of constant rain.

And Mary, a regular face on the one particular street with lots of food stalls located on the lower banks of the canal, had added her voice to the crowd.

She was not a good singer, make no mistake.

Whatever stories there were about mermaids had not been made with her in mind. She carried her tune in a bucket, because with anything smaller her pitch would fall out.

But that had been at the beginning of the celebration, when Mary had been full of food and the kids had still been involved with the parties.

That time had long since passed, the remaining partyers all very much so deep in their cups, Mary included.

She had long passed being sober enough for embarrassment to touch her.

Because here’s the thing about living in water, a place where literally no one can get to you, and where you had no predators, and where you couldn’t fall down when you stumbled.

It sorta caused you to drink way more than you were used to.

Or at least that was what Mary would tell anyone who asked her how she overindulged to this degree.

To explain how she had ended up tits up in the middle of the canal, drunk out of her mind and singing so far off key she probably ended up in a completely different time zone from the song.

Mary was lounging on some decorative thing that rose from the water in the canal. She wasn’t sure exactly what it was but it had lots of fancy engravings that she had been using as handles. She hadn’t been able to really look at it from it from it’s intended angle, so she had no idea what it was supposed to be portraying, but none of the bugs who saw her lounging on it had told her to get off, so it had become her perch to drink on.

Her back curved around the highest arch, her little shrimp feeties kicking in the air as she uselessly paddled in reflex to the rain pouring on her. Her hair trailed down around her like wet silk, half draping over her body like some alluring siren.

Perfect bait for intrepid sailors who would be led astray over a pretty face and a sweet voice.

As if she had either!

Mary giggled at her own thoughts as she let the bottle pop from her mouth, some of the sweet honey wine drizzling down her body to mix with the rain.

And just the sight of the wine seeping into her hair made her laugh harder, exhilarated at the thought that she wouldn’t need to wash it out, because it wasn’t like it would ever manage to dry enough to be sticky!

Mary threw her head back, boisterous laughter echoing down the canals and inviting other bugs to laugh along with her though they couldn’t have any idea of what she found so funny.

Mary finished her bottle, letting it tumble from her hand and land in the water, making a bleary drunken note to pick it up later.

Mary let her arms fall, her fingers only barely dipping in to the water below her. Her hair had ended up haphazardly spread below her, the constant rain creating little streams and trials for it to flow into.

Mary let her eyes fall closed as she let her chest inflate with air, let her tail curl in an instinctive response to the gentle stimulation of the falling rain on her sensitive places between the carapace of her tail.

She was drunk out of her fucking mind, the only bonus being that she had been topless before all of this started, bugs not giving two shits about her tits. So the curve of her spine showed off, not only her shrimp tail, but her soft stomach and floppy tits.

Also her armpits and up her nose, but like, whatever.

Bugs don’t care, so neither should she!

 . . .

Mary very purposely did not lift her arms up to hide her armpits even though they very suddenly felt a lot more sensitive to the rain falling on them.

She was too drunk to be embarrassed! She refused to be shy now! Not when she had just sung her heart out in the middle of a city while topless!

. . .

How drunk was she anyway? How many bottles had she finished?

Mary was absolutely pickled, and it was her own fault. She had taken every single bottle handed to her and had slammed them down as quickly as she could.

And it had left her like this.

Drunk as a skunk in a funk.

She didn’t even know how much time had passed at this point, how long she had been enjoying the festivities before she had decided to open up the final bottle that she had been given.

She had dragged herself out of the water, having already learned her lesson on opening alcohol under water and nearly crying at its loss.

Such a waste to give the canal a taste when it was already so wet.

Mary continued laughing as the entire would spun around her and the rain pelted her with it’s cool temperature.

She was surrounded by water and partying bugs, if at any point she wanted to escape the crowded atmosphere she could dive down beneath the water, just roll off this round decoration and flop into the water like a fat seal.

Mary was alone in a crowd, a fish surrounded by birds, a shrimp amongst cave bugs!

She was the safest she has ever been in her life, she had all of her base needs taken care of, she had no worries at all! But also-

-She was the most separated from society that she had ever been in her entire life.

Mary was most comfortable submerged in water, she could come out for long periods of time, but had to stay wet.

It was easy when she was just sitting out in the rain of the city, but she couldn’t even sit under an awning for more than a half hour before starting to dry out to an uncomfortable degree.

Not to mention that without the buoyancy of water, movement was clumsy and exhausting. She could barely drag her ass out of the water, and it wasn’t safe for her to leave the edge.

Her safety was every other creature’s instant death, and most bugs didn’t linger close by.

She didn’t blame them, but she was lonely.

Mary let her mouth fall open, let the rain fall inside of it.

 . . . it tasted like sediment, like licking rocks.

But really, all the water did, and she knew that it wasn’t actually rain but leaks from the lake above.

Mary spit the water out and took a breath.

She let the moist air fill her lungs until it hurt a little-

And then she let it out in a single clear note.

“oooooooooh”

Her voice seemed to echo and mix with the sound of the rain, weaving through it like it was swimming around the various buildings of the city of tears.

It echoed back and Mary giggled before doing it again in a slightly lower pitch.

Mary kept letting out different pitched ‘oohs’ for a while, letting the echoes ring in her ears as she waited for the alcohol to get worked out by her liver.

Her shrimp liver.

Her shi-ver.

“Shiver-me- timbers!”

Mary busted out into giggles at the sound of her own voice saying stupid things, letting her tail curl up and ruffle and flex.

Let her little feet kick in the air with her joy.

She always had been a happy drunk!

And the rain washed away the salt of her tears anyway, so it was like they never even happened!

Notes:

i listened to a sea shanty and suddenly remembered that it was MerMay

Chapter 7: Taken By the Fae

Summary:

A child Mary steps through a mushroom ring and finds herself somewhere else.
But it's ok, she knows how these stories go, she just has to bargain her way out!
But wow, fairies sure look different than how she thought!

Mary had been kidnapped by fairies.

She had walked through a mushroom ring in her backyard and had quite suddenly been somewhere else. The sun had disappeared, the air had thickened, and Mary had fallen flat on her face into a giant mushroom cap.

That had been at least an hour ago, and she was already sick of walking. She was going to find the fairy did this to her, and she was going to have to strike a deal with them to get back home.

Because that’s how the stories went, right?

A child is kidnapped and they have to explore the new world and bargain to get themselves brought back home.

She might even get some kind of gift or super power!

They just had to be brave and strong and pure of heart!

But Mary hoped being smart would be good enough.

Because Mary was only ten years old, and even she knew that she wasn’t going to be strong enough to fight something like a fairy.

Well, maybe she could if they were really small or something, but she doubts that she was taken by something small.

Or if she had been taken by something small, then it was likely that they had made her small to match.

Mary, who had been carefully balancing on top of a mushroom cap in order to try and climb up the side of a short wall, lost her balance and slid to the ground, falling on her butt as she once more failed to keep from falling down, ripping some of the mushroom caps up with her fingers.

Mary frowned, before shaking her head, tossing a small cloud of spores into the air as her hair swung.

This was terrible!

Mary was covered in a thin yellow film from all of the gunk in the air, and it felt gross on her skin. She had scrapes all over her legs and had hurt her knees and elbows tripping over unseen obstacles and mushroom roots.

She was already sick of this adventure, and she hadn’t even met anyone yet!

She just wanted to find a fairy and start to learn about her situation! To learn what she had to do to go home!

She didn’t even know what kind of fairies she was going to be dealing with!

She was pretty sure that these were going to be autumn faries, all of these mushrooms sure suggested that, but it’s not like she knew that for a fact!

In fact, weren’t there only two kinds of fairies? The dark and light fairies?

But dark and light didn’t mean good or bad, Mary remembered.

All fairies were trouble, it’s just that some of them looked prettier than others, but none of them were good off hand.

Mary righted herself from her most recent stumble, forcing her knees to lock past their shacky exhaustion.

She wanted to sit down and rest, but . . .

She didn’t know where she was, she hadn’t found anyone, and she didn’t feel safe resting.

So, she would keep moving until she felt safe, or until she couldn’t move anymore.

This determination led her down another few tunnels and over some weirdly elastic mushrooms that made her steps bouncy, but didn’t lead her to safety.

In fact, as Mary turned a corner and saw her first fairy, it looks like it led her into danger.

The fairy didn’t look like how Mary thought a fairy would.  But while she was surprised, she can’t say that the fairy looked like it was out of place.

It looked like a fat and stout mushroom, taller than her but not taller than her dad. It’s eyes and mouth were situated below it’s mushroom cap, making it look like it was wearing a hat.

And maybe it was?

Mary did her best to smile, but she was nervous. Because as much as she had wanted to find a fairy, she didn’t know what a fairy would do to her once she found them?

The fairy just stared at Mary, its orange eyes glowing in the dim tunnel.

Mary took a deep breath- and then coughed for a bit as she inhaled to hard and the dust in the air tickled her lungs.

Mary then took a much shallower breath and-

“Um, Hello?”

-said her first words to a fairy.

The Mushroom Fairy didn’t move for a bit, just staring at her.

And then it let out a bellow and began to slam its head into the ground below with enough force to shake the tunnel.

Mary screamed as the cave began to crumble around her, the floor and ceiling shuddering and collapsing as the glowing orange mushroom continued to thrash and smack itself into the floor and now the walls as well.

Mary screamed louder, fear flooding her as she was sure she was about to be buried alive.

But as the ceiling fell, other scared voices joined her own.

“-stay away from the center- “

“-keep your stance wide-“

“-if you have wings then take flight-

“-for the mushrooms- try to land on the mushrooms!”

Mary looked up, trying to see who was speaking, only to have to cover her face as more dirt rained down upon her. She tried to turn, and run, but she only just managed to turn her back to the thrashing Mushroom Fairy before something landed on her and sent her to the ground.

The wind was forced out of her lungs and something fabric flopped over her head, blinding her and tangling her all in one.

 Mary was knocked for a loop for a few breathless seconds before she started to scrabble wildly at the ground, eventally forcing herself up to her hands and kness.

She crawled forward, away from the still falling ceiling, dragging whatever had tangled around her head with her, almost choking herself as it caught on something heavy that was dragged along with her frantic scrambling.

The shouting behind her was starting to fade as she moved away, but one voice in particular cut through the racket. It was masculine but picking up its pitch, the voice gaining volume the longer it went unanswered.

“Vessel?! Vessel! Where did it land! Where is it?!”

If Mary had been thinking clearly, then she would have stayed, would have made contact with the obviously more sensible fairies.

But she was a scared little girl who had almost died, these were strangers in a strange land, and so the moment that Mary managed to get her feet underneath of her?

She ran.

Her eyes were watering from her own tears, and the dirt that had gotten in them, her body was sore and brusied from the rocks that had hit her, and she only managd to get a few yards down a tunnel before she slipped on another mushroom and fell down an incline.

Mary rolled down the incline, too shocked and out of breath to scream. The impact of her body going downhill was softened by the mushrooms below her. She finally came to a stop underneath a particularly fat mushroom with a very broad cap.

Mary laided flat on her back, shuddering in adrenaline and tears, on the verge of crying and crying until she passed out.

And she would have!

If it weren’t for the fact that something had come with her.

The thing that had tangled around her, it had been a piece of clothing.

A piece of clothing that was still being worn.

There was a creature bent over her, with a white face and black body, wearing the white robes that were stained with dirt and tangled with Mary’s hair and arm.

Mary stared up at the second fairy she had ever seen.

She gazed up at an impossible face, perfect porcelain skin like a doll with only endless black eyes. There was no mouth, no nose, no ears- not even a scar or a freckle.

It was pretty like a toy, nothing resembling a human or even an animal, but alive all the same.

Mary didn’t know if she should be scared or in love.

She just lay beneath the fairy, waiting for it to make the first move.

But as she laid there, and her heart started to calm down from her fall-

She noticed that the fairy had large horns at the top of their head.

Horns that had gotten stuck in the mushroom stem.

The horns were lodged deeply, forcing them to take an awkward bent stance above her. Their arms too short to either reach her or the mushroom, their legs awkwardly spread to keep from stepping on her.

This fairy stood above her, their arms clutched awkwardly to their chest as their dark eyes started to well with tears until they fell out and onto Mary’s face.

And seeing this fairy, this creature, cry above her in obvious distress-

Well, it drove Mary to action.

“Oh no! Oh, it’s okay, it’s okay! Don’t cry! I’ll help, I’ll help!”

She managed to untangle the dirty cloak from her arm, losing some of her hair in the process, but she couldn’t really feel it. She managed to get to her feet and take a better look at how the fairy was stuck.

First, she realized that this fairy was short. Very short, super short!

They were small and slight and nearly drowning in their cloak.

The second thing she realized was that they were much lighter than they should be.

She realized this after she gripped them by their head and heaved backwards with all of her might. Their horns slid out of the mushroom like a hot knife from butter, and Mary stumbled back a few feet, dragging the fairy with her.

They both ended up falling to the ground again and even with the fairy landing on her chest, they barely weighted more than a kitten. The impact not even pushing the air from her lungs.

Mary managed to grab the fairy by the shoulders and roll them over so that she was the one leaning over the top of them and-

Wow, those horns were big.

 . . . those horns were really big?

Mary sat back, scrambling to her feet and allowing the fairy room to get up.

And they did!

But clumsily, with a weird swaying motion, as if they were . . . unused . . . to the weight . . .

And that was when Mary realized the third thing.

This had to be a baby fairy.

They were short, only their horns putting them above Mary in height. They were super skinny, and light, and looked like they weren’t used to the weight of their own head.

Either the horns were new, or they had grown recently.

And the final nail in the coffin of Mary’s conclusion.

They were still crying.

Weird black tears were still dripping down their little white face, and the combined sight of such a shorty in dirty clothes and tears in their eyes plucked at Mary’s heart strings in a way that only her little cousins could.

So, ergo, this was a baby fairy!

. . .

Oh no!

Had Mary kidnapped a little kid!??

She hadn’t meant to!

Mary bent over a little to try and look the little kid in the eyes, “I’m so sorry! Are you hurt? Are you okay? I didn’t mean to take you like that!”

Mary paused here, waiting for the fairy to respond.

She waited a little while, knowing that sometimes little kids could be shy or anxious about meeting new people, or unsettled by unfamiliar situations.

. . .

. . .

“Um.”

. . .

Mary squinted at the fairy, trying to figure out why they weren’t even making-

Mary’s eyes dropped from the fairy’s eyes to the white expanse of the rest of their face.

Right.

No mouth.

“Sorry, I didn’t think about how you probably can’t speak because of your mouth. Or, because you have no mouth. Sorry.”

Mary looked down at the ground for a second, shame heaped on her shoulders, like that one time she had asked a man why his eyes were moving in different directions and her mom had been so mad at her for being rude.

You weren’t supposed to point out how people were different! It was rude.

Oh, but if they couldn’t speak because they didn’t have a mouth-

Mary’s head jerked up and she tilted her head around to try and take a look at the side of the fairy’s head.

“Can you hear me?”

No response.

Oh no!

“Can you only see!?”

Mary spoke out loud even though the fairy couldn’t hear her, but she had no other idea of how to ask her question.

She had nothing to write with, and she didn’t know any sign language other than how to say ‘I love you’ from the song her elementary school had taught her!

“Do you understand this?”

Mary’s little hands went through the simple finger spelling that she remembered, her pinky curling a little in the air, and her O’s being sloppy, but the fairy did something different when she signed at them.

The tears stopped and they ducked closer to her hands for a moment-

But then they froze like they were in danger, and the tears came back with a vengeance.

Mary panicked.

She reached out for the fairy and tucked them into her arms, her head having to lean to the side to dodge the horns, and she started to shush them and pat their back.

“There, there! It’s ok! I’ll get you back to your family! I won’t hurt you, you’ll be ok, and I’ll keep you safe!”

Mary shushed and rocked back and forth, and patted, relief soaking through her as she felt little hands clutch at the back of her clothes.

The fairy was returning her hug!

That had to be good!

Right?

Chapter 8: Nothing but Net (shrimp 3)

Summary:

Mer May!

The most embarrassing part of the whole incident, was that Mary had seen them!

She had been swimming down the canal, her head only just barely under the water. She had been leaving long ripples as she moved underneath the surface and against the current. She had been heading toward her regular side street, where she would pull herself out of the canal and feast on hot freshly fried food.

And there had been movement on the bridge she had about to swim under.

Mary had actually paused, poking her head out of the water and getting a better look at who was walking about at this early hour.

And she had seen the cloaked bugs holding -something- on the bridge.

She had made eye contact with them, had even raised a hand out of the water to wave a little, smiling as she had continued to swim toward them, not even giving a thought more to them as anything else but early risers.

And then she had apparently gotten close enough, and the bugs had tossed something off the bridge.

There was a loud splash, and suddenly there was something pressing on Mary’s head, forcing her to sink deeper into the water.

Mary’s shrimpy instincts had made her jet backwards, but that just meant the weighted net tangled around her even faster.

Her little kicky legs were either pressed to her body, or tangled together. Her wrists were bound tightly together and pressed to her chest, a piece of the net going over her face, making her close one eye.

Her struggling only got her more tangled and soon Mary was laying on the bottom of the canal, wrapped like a Christmas present.

And then, there was a tug on the net, and Mary began to rise from the water.

Mary struggled even more at first, only managing to tighten her bonds, but she was desperate to not be pulled from the water.

From the only protection that she had, the only place that no one could follow her.

But like most aquatic creatures that found themselves ensnared in a net.

She failed.

But!

Unlike most aquatic creatures, when her head breached the surface she did not begin to choke on air.

No.

Mary expelled the water from her throat with a cough and took a bracing gulp of air, inflating her lungs with the damp air of the City of Tears until it felt like they would burst in her chest.

And began to scream bloody murder.

Mary knew she was loud, knew that she was much much louder than the regular bugs of this city.

Her panicked wailing echoed off of the canals, traveling over the water and overpowered the constant low hum of the rain.

Her shrill screams were loud enough to vibrate the more delicate features of the city, to penetrate the metal buildings and ring around the antennas of the sleeping bugs.

To wake the dead.

Mary was not in a position to see her kidnappers as she was being hoisted up like the fresh catch of the day, but judging by how her slow ascent stopped for a moment before becoming much faster and jerkier, her screams had surely been heard by someone.

Mary ran out of air for her first long wail, took another breath, and began again.

She added some words to her banshee wailing this time.

“HELP! HELP ME! THEY’RE TRYING TO TAKE ME! HELP!”

Mary couldn’t see anything but the water below her, and even then, at an upside-down angle.

But judging by the sudden flashes of light that reflected off of the fast-moving surface, doors were opening and lights were blazing to life behind windows.

She had been heard.

But that didn’t mean she would stop screaming.

“HELP ME! HELP ME! WAKE UP AND HELP ME! PLEASE!”

More light on the canal, and now Mary could hear voices and slamming doors over the sounds of the rain.

And then Mary was dropped a foot or so as the bugs who were trying to haul her up fled the scene.

Mary gasped for a bit, the relief of no longer being in danger of being whisked away into the night flooding her.

Not that she was in the clear yet.

She was still dangling over the water in a net.

A net she would need to be released from before she could return to the water, if she was dropped in like this, she would starve to death, stuck on the bottom of the canal unable to move or get help.

So Mary caught her breath and waited for there to be some noise above her.

She didn’t have to wait long.

“Um. Are- are you ok?”

Mary gave the water below her the dead-eyed stare she wished to show the bug on the bridge.

“No! I am not! Please pull me up!”

Her voice was shrill still, a bit breathy, but at least she managed to get the urgency through to the bug.

There was more commotion of the bridge, more bugs appearing from the buildings along the canal, more bugs seeing someone hanging over the water and responding with the appropriate amount of panic.

There was some shouting, some high-pitched words and yelled orders, but eventually Mary was dragged over the side of the bridge, heaved over the rails and quickly but carefully lowed to the metal.

And it was probably at this moment that the crowd that had come to her rescue actually got a good look at the bug they had been saving.

 

---

 

There was a baffled silence as the bugs all looked down at her, the quiet only broken by the eternal rain and the sounds of far-off bugs coming closer. The bug’s screaming having reached much farther than the immediately surrounding canals.

These bugs all stared down at the net tangled . . . bug? Yes, she had spoken. Had talked to them.

And despite how she didn’t look like much of a bug, she looked even less like one of the leafy creatures from the Greenpath.

So, a bug.

Her upper body was decidedly strange, the pale body distending through the tight net, bulging around where the ropes held her tight. But! Her lower body, while an unknown sight, was decidedly bug like.

Almost like a Pill bug with the overlapping plates and the tight curling bend.

But her shelled lower body was where the familiarity ended.

Her body ended in a strange flared tail. It looked more like a single sturdy butterfly wing, splayed wide and made of shell rather than membrane.

To say nothing of her legs, the numerous appendages either pressed to her body, or uselessly kicking at the air. The tips similar to her tail, with their wide flat tips that looked entirely too delicate to hold her . . . generous weight.

The surrounding bugs could only stare in bafflement at this strange creature, before one of them, an off-duty city guard, took it upon herself to begin learning more about the situation.

“Does anyone have something sharp? We need to cut this off of her!”

The off-duty guard kneeled down as a few bugs ran back into their homes to collect knives.

“Are you ok? In any pain?”

The bug shifted as much as she could on the ground, and then spoke.

“No. it’s not comfortable, but as long as it doesn’t get any tighter than this, I won’t be hurt.”

The sound of the bug’s voice made the guard pause for a moment. It was clear and  . . . deep, in a way that she hadn’t heard before. Like there was no wasted air, there was no rasping around the sounds as the words escaped her throat.

It was like the voice of a trained singer. Of someone who had learned to close their sides to ensure the sound of singing was perfectly controlled. The sounds pitch perfect and delicate.

It made the guard suspicious.

This bug, wrapped in a spider silk net whose strands glowed with soul, sounded too sweet for the situation.

The bug was drenched, as if she had been out in the rain for hours instead of a few minutes. But as the guard could easily contest, it had been only a few minutes between the tunnel shaking scream that had wrenched the Guard from her dreams and the group effort to save the bug from their precarious fate dangling over the water.

But, now that the bug was no longer in immediate danger . . .

Why was the bug being lowered into the canal with a net? Why not just toss her in?

And why a soul infused net? Why a tool that was only used when putting down extremely dangerous creatures that could use soul instinctively without minds to work spells?

Why go through the trouble of tangling her up in a soul net if she was simply going to be drowned? Was she brought here from another place? Were they going to retrieve her body afterwards?

There are easier ways to kill a bug than this, why go through the trouble?

There was more to this, more to what was happening.

The guard gently patted the still bound bug, even as she looked at another bug, a younger male beetle who looked both excited and apprehensive to be involved.

Someone who was excited to be apart of the adventure, but wasn’t sure if they wanted to be.

“You. Go to the nearest guard station and tell them there was an attempted drowning. Tell them that Guard Kelt is at the scene.”

The bug blinked at her for a moment before nodding and pushing past the crowd, running into the night.

Kelt turned her attention back the bug still on the ground, instinctively looking her over for any sign of . . . anything. A hint of why she was in the net, a sign of captivity, any hint for what mystery was afoot.

The guard kept her eyes on the bug, even as she reached up and scratched at her face. Rubbed at her eyes.

Something was on her face, getting washed away in the eternal downpour but still sticking to her more sensitive skin where some of it had dried.

Kelt didn’t look at her hands, didn’t relax on the job.

Didn’t see the orange under her claws being whisked away by the rain.

Chapter 9: Catch of the Day (Shrimp 4)

Summary:

Mary works herself into a nervous mess, but she's not even the most interesting thing in the room.

Mary was having a bit of a bad time.

Like, no shit, she was still in the net!

And to make it even more fraught, despite multiple bugs attempts to cut her free, the net was not even fraying. Every time someone tried to saw away at it, it flashed white and just! Didn’t! Cut!

But the whole situation had only gotten worse when the bug that had taken charge of the situation, a guard?, had apparently decided that Mary was in some way involved with her own attempted kidnaping.

And that is what led to her being in this dignified position.

Hanging like a slaughtered animal on a stick.

Mary had been witnessed in a lot of undignified positions since being dumped into this kingdom.

She had been seen dragging herself out of the canals of the city, huffing and puffing the whole time. Showcasing just how weak she was and how much of a struggle it was to get her shrimpy ass out of the water.

Mary had been seen, and heard, drunk off her ass on some decorative masonry, singing off key for the entire street to hear. So intoxicated that she could barely even pour more sweet sweet mead down her throat.

The only reason she hadn’t drowned in the rain that night, had been the saving grace of her new gills, making it impossible for her to drown after she had fallen asleep with her mouth open to the forever raining sky.

Mary had been seen swimming around with her tits out, flashing everyone from the oldest geezer to the youngest grub. Though, it wasn’t like they knew her fatty chest sacks were anything indecent.

But still.

Mary knew.

Mary, after being in the water for what had to be months now, still instinctually clutched her chest to cover it whenever she was on land. Even if she knew none of the bugs cared about her mammaries. 

And that was all to say, that despite the embarrassments that she had undergone, despite the embarrassment that had nearly dyed her face red every time she left the water and exposed herself-

Being strung up like some kind of slaughtered pig on a pole was still taking the cake for the most embarrassing situation that she had ever been in.

So far.

When everyone had failed to cut her free of the net, the situation on the bridged had quickly devolved into chaos.

And when the city guards had arrived and promptly lost their shit at the sight of the off-duty guard who had apparently been missing for a few days??

That was all that Mary about to get out of the situation. She had been at a bad angle to see, and had been a bit more concerned with getting stepped on as more and more bugs had crowded around.

There had been a lot of shouting, questions being demanded from both sides, and then someone had stepped on Mary’s tail and she had squealed.

Her high-pitched cry had managed to defuse most of the tension, the crowd all wincing as one and remembering what exactly had brought them all together.

And the soldiers had taken one good look at her, an unknown species bound up in a rare and costly net that one wouldn’t just waste on a random bug, and decided to bring this to a higher authority.

And Mary, who had not been paying taxes, was a bit nervous about that.

The off-duty guard who had apparently been playing hooky on the job went easily, understanding the process, but while Mary would have preferred to just be cut free and tossed back in the canal.

But she didn’t have much of a choice.

Everyone else had come to a decision and soon she was getting a lift.

There hadn’t been an easy way to carry her. She was way too heavy and unwieldy to be carried by a single bug, and the net was forcing her to bend in such a way to not let a good grip to be gained on her.

All of this acclimated to one of the city guards bringing out a spear and carefully sticking it between her body and the net, allowing her to hang from the pole.

And now she was being carried through the city of tears, bugs looking out of windows and out from awnings to watch the strange procession of concerned civilians and slightly frantic guards.

All of them witnessing Mary being held aloft by four bugs, two on each end of the pole, like she was the catch of the day.

She felt like an absolute fool.

Her only comfort was being taken from the fact that with all of these witnesses, it was unlikely that she would just be disappeared into a fishtank or something.

Mary just sighed as she closed her eye, trying to not get sick from the gentle swaying that came from the guard’s marching.

She hoped that all of this would be straightened out quickly.

But she knew that it was probably going to be a whole ordeal.

The strange parade marched farther and farther from the canals that Mary was familiar with, toward an unknown destination.

Mary, from her dangling position could see little more than the street below unless she twisted her neck painfully. But she sure noticed when the streets began to become more and more high-class.

The change was gradual but as she was carried farther and farther from her ‘stomping grounds’ she could the difference in nearly everything.

The streets that Mary had always dragged herself across, the places with outdoor food stalls and the bug equivalent of blue-color workers, always had uneven water worn stones.

Even the places that were ‘paved’ had a particular pebbled texture of small stones mixed with concrete, the lower quality material becoming weathered with the constant water and feet of travelers.

She was used to water smoothed edges and broken corners, of plain stone tiles whose only decoration was the curling paths that the streams of water cut over time.

Not the patterned mosaics that were beneath her now.

Not exactly pictures, but there were some blue stones mixed in a repeating pattern. There were borders and curved lines, the higher quality stones still sharp and easily seen despite the foot travel that they must see.

Mary managed to lift and twist her head just enough to catch a glimpse at the surrounding buildings and the bugs that stood off to the side, watching them march.

The paths were wide and clean, but despite the spaces room, it wasn’t being used for anything but travel. There were no stalls set up under awnings, no hastily constructed roofs to keep water off of the goods.

The bugs that were watching the procession were not wearing soggy gray cloaks, were not wearing sown leaves or were naked to let the water roll off of their shells.

No, the bugs were decked out in vibrant colors, in flowing and details outfits that were kept dry by large umbrellas.

They all looked like rich Victorians.

Fuuuuck.

Mary had only interacted with the lower and middle-class types in the city! The laborers who cursed more than they spoke, and the street vendors that were skirting health code violations like it was a sport!

She had no idea how to talk to anyone ‘fancy’!

And if the ‘Higher Authority’ lived in this area, it was about to be a serious language barrier! She was gonna insult them so badly!

Though hopefully her . . . exotic continence would make it obvious that she was not from around here.

Mary’s nerves just wound tighter as the stick holding her angled upwards and the guards began to climb up some stairs.

Some very fancy, colorful stairs.

She managed to hide her whimper even as the ever flowing rain was blocked as she was brought inside.

 

---

 

Lurien was the Watcher of the City of tears.

But he had not seen this coming.

A messenger had been sent from the city guard, proclaiming that there was an attempted drowning that had been stopped, but that the situation was suspicious.

And then, as he had been descending in his elevator, a second messenger had flown through one of the high floor entrances yelling that Guard Kelt had been found!

And then, as Lurien had been making his way toward the room he used for meetings with the city guard, a third messenger had nearly run into him in the hall way screaming about the City Guard having killed a god.

This all ended with Lurien forgoing meeting in the proper room and trying to see the arriving guards in the entrance hall. Just so that he might have a clearer idea on what exactly he was dealing with.

What he saw was . . .

Lurien did not know every city guard on sight alone, did not know all of their names or ranks.

But it was easy to pick Guard Kelt out of the mixed group of guards and civilians currently walking through the open doors.

She was a touch larger and taller, signaling her as female. She wasn’t wearing the cape that signaled her guard status, but she was striding with the gait that all guards eventually acquired to keep from having the cape tangle with their elbows.

And she was quite obviously infected.

Her shell was dull with many miscolored splotches showing that she had been suffering from the diseases for a number of days. The edges of her face had the tell tale cracks and minor cuts that showed where the orange infection had swollen her veins can burst through the thinner connective tissue.

Guard Kelt, even at a distance, looked like one of the infected bodies that were stored in the White Palace Labs, in Monomon’s Archive’s study specimen room, in the Soul Master’s autopsy rooms.

Guard Kelt looked like an infected body that had finally been killed and then carefully flushed clean of the infection.

She looked like the walking dead.

But-

But!

Despite how her shell was rough and damaged, despite how her face was swollen and cracked. Despite how she was stained with the residue of infection.

Despite having all of the markings of a diseased corpse-

Her eyes were clear and dark.

She stood there, her arms crossed, and eyes narrowed, as she barked orders at the other guards. She spoke to civilians and herded the various servants who had been summoned by the sounds of the crowd all arriving.

Guard Kelt was an obvious victim of infection but stood in the center of the group without a hint of confusion or a touch of glow.

Lurien was dumbfounded.

Here, in front of him, was a survivor of the infection.

An impossible hope for a cure.

Lurien took a single step toward the guard, his mind already buzzing with questions, with things he would need to do, messages to be sent- The Pale King would need to be immediately sent for-

When the crowd finally parted and another mystery was carried in.

Lurien’s mind, a marvel so proclaimed by his own god, stalled out.

An impossible creature dangled from a soul net.

It was- it was a mismatched bug, with harsh contrasting colors.

A soft white body and a dark shelled body. The bug looked like it was made of two entirely separate creatures, like it had been sown together from spare parts.

It was hanging docilely in it’s bonds, and managed to twist it’s neck just enough to look around itself nervously.

It was-

It was fascinating.

Luiren so badly wanted to study and question it, wanted to know what it’s species was, how it had lived with such a strange body type, what use it’s contrasting sides were for-

But currently, there were more important things to concern himself with.

Lurien, managing to find his voice called out to the three messengers that had been following him.

“You. Go to the White Palace and tell the Pale King that he is needed in the City of Tears immediately. You, go and summon the Teacher from the Archives, if she tries to linger, in form her that there has been a new breakthrough on her studies.”

Lurien addressed the crowd now. “Guards, please come with me, civilians please return to your homes.”

The guards immediately snapped to it, while the civilians left but with reluctance.

Lurien, already turning to lead the group to the small lab that he had in his residence heard one of the bugs behind him mutter in an unusually loud whisper.

“Oh fuck.”

Chapter 10: Dehydrated (shrimp 5)

Summary:

Mary is forgotten! And that's a bad thing!

In an eternally raining city buried under the earth, there was a tall spiraling tower.

“ . . . wheeze . . .  wheeze . . . wheeze . . .”

The tower housed the Watcher, a bug who had been appointed as the one to run the city for the God King of the underground realm of  Hallownest.

“Gasp! Wheeze . . . wheeze . . .”

And inside of that tower, with the Pale King and his Dreamers in attendance, called from their corners of the Realm to study the first survivor of the infection-

“Cough, cough, Gasp!

Mary was a little bit fucked.

“GASP!”

The mermaid was still bound in the uncuttable net, left to lay on the floor of a side room that had slowly cleared out as time had passed.

She had been forgotten.

At first Mary had been terrified, had thought that they were calling in the king to see her. That her time was running out, and she would soon be nothing more than a goldfish in a bowl or sashimi on a cutting board, sliced open for study.

But though she had kept her own mouth shut, unwilling to give any of the surrounding bugs any ammunition to use against her, they had not been near as quiet.

She hadn’t even eavesdropped! All of the conversations were held right in front of her! The crowd that had carried her to the room migrating toward the door and attracting more and more bugs passing in the hallway who brought fresh news to discuss.

The bugs had first spoken of the missing guard being found, and as more and more time had passed, they had gotten visibly excited with the details about the situation.

Apparently, the guard had been sick. And with her apparently having survived her illness, a possible cure had been found. A way to finally stop the mysterious illness that had been plaguing the kingdom.

And that was what had brough the King and his various ‘dreamers’ to the City of Tears. An opportunity to study the guard, and to learn the cure.

The illness was much more important than a strange bug being kidnapped, and so Mary had been left in a side room and forgotten.

It had been such a relief!

As her various . . . (not guards so much as just the ones who carried her here) all got more and more and more involved with the gossip, they began to slip out the door in groups of twos and threes.

Until the last pair walked out, deep in conversation, and shut the door behind them.

Leaving the still bound Mary alone.

At first she had been so happy!

She was unimportant! She was forgettable!

She was not the most interesting thing in the room!

But as more time passed, she began to get uneasy-

She was still bound after all. Unable to move, escape or defend herself and someone had done this to her on purpose.

Just because the important people in the city had no interest in her, doesn’t mean that someone else wouldn’t just pick her up and walk off with her.

But when even more time passed with no one coming to check on her-

Mary realized that she had a more immediate concern than a possible kidnapping.

She hadn’t noticed for the first few hours, what with how she had been sitting in a puddle of water and the eternal muggy moisture in the air, but she was . . . drying out.

At first it was the tip of her tail feeling itchy, but then it spread down to the overlapping parts of her shell and soon her shrimp feet felt tight and brittle, like they might crack.

But the discomfort, while not exactly fun, was not a major concern.

No, the problem was when her internal gills started to grow tight. Started to wilt and shrivel as they were not refreshed with water.

Mary had no idea what her internal structure looked like, how the human mixed with the shrimp, how the mammal fitted to the fish.

But whatever was up with her lungs and gills were a little too connected.

The more she breathed, the drier she became. And the dryer she became, the deeper her breaths became. Her lungs working overtime to get her the oxygen she needed, but harming her gills in the process.

By the time that Mary began to become short of breath, when she realized that her breathing had picked up and become strained, she had already lost her voice.

Mary found herself unable to do more than whistle and gasp as she choked on air, craving water like, well, like a fish out of water.

It was happening too fast, she was dehydrating like she had been left out in the sun at high noon, not stashed away in a dark and muggy side room.

It had to be a mermaid thing, some kind of draw back that came from being the creature she now was.

She had been taken from the water.

So now, she was dying.

And she didn’t even have the ability to cry about it!

Bound up in a net that she had lost the strength to struggle in, silenced by her own parched throat, forgotten by the bugs who had worked together to save her-

She felt like some kind of tale that parents told their kids, about how you have to be responsible for your pets or they’ll die from neglect.

Mary’s skin felt like it was two sizes too small, tight and close to tearing. The net still binding her felt like rough rope, wearing away at the places it touched.

Her eyes had shut at some point, and her lids had nearly welded together, what moisture remained gluing them shut.

But her mouth, with its dried and cracking lips, remained open.

She continued to breath the moist air that wasn’t enough to keep her body wet enough to function.

Mary was pretty sure she was going to die here, was already in the depression stage of grief-

When she heard the sound of little feet running down the hall.

Mary couldn’t speak. Her throat was closed up and something was wrong with her vocal cords. She couldn’t struggle in her bonds, her body tightly bound and now weakened by the lack of oxygen.

But she still had breath.

She still had lips!

Mary managed to purse her lips together, and with a hope that maybe this would be enough-

She whistled.

“Fweet!”

The steps slowed a touch.

“Fweeeeeeet!”

The sound of steps stopped entirely, but nearby the door of the room.

“Fweet! Fweet! Fwee- cough, cough, cough! F-fweet!”

The door to the room creaked open and Mary, silenced and blinded by her lack of moisture, could only hope they would be able to help her.

There was the quiet click of little bug feet, and Mary could sense a presence standing about her.

Was she about to be saved?

“That is a very badly spun web. I could do a lot better than that!”

What?

Mary, eyes still glued closed, frowned as she continued to wheeze. The voice was high-pitched and feminine, and much closer to the floor than she thought it would be.

Had the bug crouched down?

There was a touch to her face, and Mary instinctively flinched away. But the touch kept on, patting around her face like it was searching for a seam

“What are you? I’ve never seen a bug like you before. Do you have a mind? Mama says that we’re not allowed to eat bugs with minds, but you’re already in a web so someone from home must have tried to eat you.”

Mary’s face scrunched up at the touch turning scratchy, like the bug was trying to pry something from her skin, but not finding a seam.

“You’re not wearing a mask, but you have a face. But you’re so soft, only half of your body is shelled! Are you a snail? Mama says that snails are soft bodied and only part of their bodies have a shell, and that the rest pokes out.”

The touch left her face, only to poke at her side, examining where her shrimp body met the soft mammal parts of her.

“I think a snail would taste good, but they usually have minds. Do you have a mind? If you don’t then I’ll ask Mama if she can finish wrapping you and we could take you home for later!”

Ok, what the fuck?

Mary, though not having the ability to talk, still hopped that the universal ‘uh-huh’ noise translated into bug speak.

She did in fact have ‘a mind’!

She did not want to be this- this cannibal’s snack!

The poking stopped, and the voice sounded a little sad.

“Oh, you do have a mind. That means that I’m not allowed to eat you at all. At least not in my Dad’s home.”

Mary was starting to think that maybe she shouldn’t have gotten this particular bug’s attention.

But she had it, and well, it would be a waste to not at least try to save her own life, right?

Mary tried to make more noises, to ask for water. But what she was quickly learning was probably a child just continued to chatter about how her mother had brought her along to a meeting, and that she had skipped lunch, and that she had gotten bored and snuck away.

Mary almost restarted the five stages of grief. She was now thinking that she was probably going to die in front of this child! Which, judging by how the kid had wanted to eat Mary, was not going to traumatize her or anything.

But to Mary, dying with an uncaring or unaware audience wasn’t exactly better than dying alone.

Hopefully someone was looking for the child, and would find the both of them.

The kid started to poke at Mary’s soft body again, jabbing at her like a child finding a dead body in the woods.

Hopefully they would be found quickly.

Chapter 11: Shrimp 6

Summary:

Hollow arrives!

This was it.

This was the end.

“-like the treats but everything is so bright and white and I know that It’s father’s color, but it hurts my eyes after a while-“

Mary’s breathing had shallowed out into a bare hiss, her skin had cracked in a number of places, and her chest barely moved.

“-Mother, not my Mama but Father’s wife, is really really nice! I’m training to fight with one of her favorite guards and we always train in the garden and-“

Mary was going to die in front of this toddler. All dried out and still tangled in the net. Like a fish that was too small to eat, but not worth the hassle of throwing back.

“-don’t understand why they don’t eat the ones they kill, but maybe it’s because they taste different if you don’t wrap the bodies in web? I’ve offered to do it for them, but they just tell me that its not allowed-

At least she wouldn’t traumatize the kid, though there was apparently a possibility that she would be eaten.

Fuck she hopes the kid waited for her to die all the way.

“-super tall and strong! I want to be tall like Hollow Knight one day, but not that tall. Hollow is so tall they scrap their horns on the tops of doorways and it has to be irritating to crawl through smaller doorways-!”

There was a sudden shifting, the kid getting to her feet and throwing herself over Mary’s body, the air’s movement letting her know the kid’s trajectory.

“Hollow!”

There was more movement, more scuffling as the kid seemed to crowd around whoever had apparently entered the room.

“Come see, come see! I found a snail in a web! They haven’t moved, but when I got here, they were making this noise and I think that they’re dying! If they die can I take a bite? I’ve never had snail before-“

Mary would have hoped that maybe this bug would save her-

But after sitting in her slowly drying body for long enough, she really doubted it.

Bug’s didn’t know what a shrimp was, and as she had seen being wet was a death sentence for them.

It was probable that even with this new bug entering the scene, Mary would still die. Hell, they might think she was already dead!

If she could speak, hell, if she was able to move, she would have made an attempt.

But as she was now?

All fuzzed out and mellowed with her slow death?

She would probably just let it embrace her.

Mary was firmly in the acceptance part of dying.

She was going to let go of this mortal coil with as much diginity as she could.

But then the impossible happened.

Splut.

Like the voice of an angel, the cool wet splat of a water-logged piece of fabric whapping her in the face was the most beautiful sound Mary could have heard.

It was like her face was a sponge, soaking up water and loosening from it’s mummified visage.

Her body, as dry as it was, still wanted to live and forced her to move.

To keep the moisture, to get more.

The moment her lips were no longer glued together, her mouth cracked open and bit the fabric, sucking the water from it even as her eyes tried to open.

Mary couldn’t see much. The waterlogged fabric still on her face, but as more water managed to seep into her skin, into her eye, she began to perceive more than just a blur of color.

Or, she could at least see that the fabric coving her face was a very expensive and silky weave.

Something fit for a king.

Shit, this wasn’t the King, was it?

No, no. This must just be some advisor or something, one of the kid’s relatives.

The fabric began to pull away, catching in Mary’s teeth for a moment. She bit down harder, her jaw creaking as she held onto the fabric like it was the last gasp of air in the ocean.

She wanted to keep the fabric there, to suck more water from it.

But communication was more important, might allow her to survive.

Sacrificing the water for hope.

Mary forced her jaw to relax, her tongue instinctively swiping across her lips as the fabric was pulled away, trying to chase any droplets.

Mary took a breath and the inflating of her lungs only hurt a lot instead of being torture.

“help me!”

Her words were thin, thready and barely more than a whisper. Probably not even audible over the distant sound of rain.

But Mary was desperate.

“need  . . . water! Water!”

Mary’s eye, the one pointed upward, managed to focus.

She had a shit angle, but whoever had given her a hearty wet slap to the face was a very tall bug. They wore white, but their body was a deep black without any shine.

They had bent over, lowered themselves to a squat as they brought their head closer to where Mary was laying on the floor.

She managed to look into their eye, or at least black part of their face, possibly their mask? It was probably a mask actually, because there was no way that their eye was just a black pit.

There didn’t seem to be anything but darkness in the holes on the mask, almost like there was nothing behind the mask at all.

Or possibly, Mary’s vision was shit and she couldn’t see deep enough into the shadow of the bug’s mask to see their actual eye.

It didn’t matter.

Mary needed this bug to either toss her into the rain or dump a bucket of water on her. She needed to get water!

She needed it! She was dying! She was dying and it hurt and she wanted it to stop hurting!

She needed this bug to-

“Drown me! You need to . . . drown me!”

Mary was desperate, Mary was dying!

Mary . . . was a mermaid.

 . . . she might have put a little too much force behind those words.

The bug, who had been as still as a photo. Whose monochrome shape in Mary’s blurry vision had been like a silent movie put on pause.

The bug, whose only color had been the bright red cloak of the child clinging to their shoulders. Whose only sign of life was the fact that they could move.

The bug who was surely some kind of royal advisor, or guard, or knight or whatever.

At Mary’s words, they sorta . . .

Jolted.

Like someone had pinched their ass. Like someone had shocked them after shuffling their feet. Like something other than the desperate whispered demand of a dying shrimp had been gasped into their ears.

The bug moved like they had been pushed. Ducking even lower as one hand took a handful of netting at her tail, and the other slid between her skin and the floor.

Mary gasped in pain.

As she had dried, as she had shriveled up, her skin had nearly become glued to the floor. And it was the more sensitive parts of her too, the near laden skin of her sides and stomach.

Getting so suddenly peeled from the floor that she had nearly become one with was . . . unpleasant.

She might have left some skin behind.

But that was a concern that was quickly left behind as Mary was unceremoniously lifted from the floor like a choice fish from a market.

The bug pulled her close, tucking her upper body in to their inner elbow, drawing her face beneath the still wet cloak. They kept a firm grip on the net, keeping her shelled body aloft as they swiftly turned, making the cloak once more slap against her face and stick.

Mary couldn’t see anything through the cloak, but as the child squealed with glee and lights shifted, she was sure that they were moving quickly.

“-going Hollow? Are you taking the snail to see father? Mama told me not to bother them while they were working, that the work was ‘Very Very important’ but if you do it then it’s not my fault if you took me with you! Is the snail important? They couldn’t be if they were left to die right?”

Mary was trying to suck more water out of the wet cloak on her face, trying to get enough of the liquid down her throat so that she could properly communicate when it was removed.

She needed to tell them that she needed water, that she would die with out it. That she wasn’t like the rest of the bugs in the cave, that it was okay to toss her into the canals!

It turns out that she didn’t need to be so concerned.

The bug carrying Mary seemed to enter an occupied room. Because quite suddenly, there were more voices all talking over each other.

“-blood samples, shell samples! Maybe she got into something that would cure the infection! Stool samples as well!”

“-be willing to send my subjects into the city to listen for any gossip. They would be able to go mostly unnoticed, seeing as how you cave-bugs so rarely look up. If someone knows anything they will catch the words-

“-already have some guards searching her home. It currently has all the markers of an infected individual, some drying orange splatters and general mess of clumsy hands attempting to do common activities. But they understand the importance and are cataloging everything-“

“-last time! We are not going to do a dissection! She is the first bug to be cured! Killing her ourselves would be an absolute waste- Vessel?!”

The last word cut through the rest of the conversations, and Mary could feel the sudden focus of the various speakers.

If Mary hadn’t just so recently learned how bad it was to be forgotten, she would be wishing to disappear right now.

But there were more important things to consider.

Like getting water.

The small child chirped up from the above Mary, from where she had perched on the tall bug’s shoulder.

“Hi Mama, greetings Father! I found this snail, and Hollow found me! If they’re dead, can I have a bite! They look really chewy-”

And it was at that point that the bug, who had not stopped moving despite having acquired the attention of the room, -presumably because they were busting in on some important meeting while carrying a shrimp and a child- resituated their grip on Mary’s body.

She was pulled from the slight anonymity of being buried in their cloak. Mary let the fabric slide from her mouth, hoping desperately that she had managed to moisten her mouth enough to actually talk to someone about her needs.

She opened her mouth to try and speak, slightly blinded by the bright white light in the room-

And then the bug thrust their hands down and Mary was submerged in water.

Mary gasped, nearly choking on the first gulp of wonderful life-giving water.

And at that point she was so relieved that she might have started crying.

Chapter 12: Hornet POV (Shrimp 7)

Summary:

Hornet!

Hornet clung to the armored shoulder of her sibling, eyes bright and excited as she peered down at the splashing water.

Her sibling had surely been sent to look for her once Father noticed that she was no longer beside Mama in the big dancing room. The one that had the big water fountain in the middle that was always gurgling with water.

Her sibling was the only one besides Mama who could find her when she wanted to stay hidden, and Mama had needed to stay in the big room with all the other loud bugs.

Mama and Father were very excited, something good must have happened!

But that didn’t mean that Hornet hadn’t gotten bored.

Hornet; Princess of Hallownest and Heir of Deepnest, had been disappointed when Mama had told her that they were going to the Wet City.

It was a very damp place. Any web made there would always end up beading with moisture no matter how carefully a spider tried to keep it dry.

The Wet City didn’t even have a garden to run in, so Mother wouldn’t be fun to play with either.

Mother would be confined to her chair, Father and Mama would be talking about adult problems that she wasn’t allowed to hear-

And worst of all, there was nothing at all to hunt!

All of the bugs in the Wet City had minds and Hornet couldn’t get a fresh snack at all!

But while she had been trying to see if any of the locked doors had been left open in the Watcher’s tower, Hornet had found something exciting!

She found a dried-out snail!

It had been laying on the floor, barely wrapped up at all!

Hornet had first thought that it was a discarded snack, that a spider had begun to wrap it up but had decided it wasn’t worth the webbing half way through.

But the snail had made a strange noise, and it’s soft parts were moving a little.

And the webbing couldn’t have come from a spider, it was so badly woven!

The snail had been all shriveled up and curled like a bug about to die. It couldn’t open it’s eyes and after a while, it stopped making that noise.

It had to be very very close to death!

So, Hornet had decided to wait for it to die the rest of the way so she could take a bite!

But while she had been waiting, Hollow had come for her.

Hornet had dragged their willing sibling over to the snail, had shared her discovery with her sibling.

She had thought that she had convinced her sibling to let her stay until the snail had died, that they were going to let her take a bite once the movement stopped for good-

But instead, the snail had managed to speak!

Hornet wasn’t able to hear what it said, but whatever it was made their sibling-

Odd.

Their sibling didn’t like to take orders from anyone but Father and Mother. They wouldn’t even follow Mama’s orders all the time.

But if they were ordered by some bug that didn’t even work at the palace?

They would always go very very slowly, do the task wrong, or just stand there and stare at the bug until they thought better of trying to make her sibling do their chores.

But a few words from this snail had them rushing.

And Hornet’s sibling never rushed.

Hollow could move quickly, very very VERY quickly.

They could go so fast they lost their form and turned into a blur of void. They didn’t like it when they lost their form. They only did it when they were fighting, when they training.

And Hornet, who had clung to their shoulder as they had raced through the halls, had no idea what order could have been given to make them start to go blurry at the edges.

But whatever it was-

It was exciting!!!

Hornet’s cloak blew back from the speed that their sibling was going, squealing her joy at the ride even as other bugs through themselves out of their way, their surprised faces only making Hornet laugh harder.

Hornet squealed as Hollow took a corner quickly, and then raced through a pair of large open doors.

It was the Watcher’s ballroom, where all the bugs had gathered! It was the biggest room in the tower, and the only place that could easily hold all of the bugs who had shown up to the important meeting!

Hornet was able to easily pick out the groups of bugs as Hollow continued to go deeper into the room, heading toward the center.

Most of the bugs were city bugs, running around and trying to set up all sorts of tables and fancy equipment.

There were her Mama’s spiders, half of them having retreated to the wall in order to stay out of the way of the Teacher’s more excited crowd.

There were the Soul Sanctum bugs, the whole lot of them always stinking of old soul and the rot of wet meat.

Hornet could see the Soul Master arguing with Father, could see how the Teacher was already writing on a chalk board, how Mama was trying to speak to the Watcher-

But once bugs began to leap away from Hollow, dodging out of their way as they barely slowed to keep from ramming into the loitering bugs, the Dreamers and Father all turned to see what the commotion was.

Hornet freed up one hand, waving happily at her parents, as Hollow continued to part the crowd.

“Hi Mama, greetings Father! I found this snail, and Hollow found me! If they’re dead, can I have a bite! They look really chewy-“

Hollow, who had been moving with such focus had come to a stop.

And dunked the snail in the fountain.

Hornet’s grip on Hollow’s cloak kept her firmly on their shoulders even as they plunged their hands into the fountain, tilting their whole body toward the frothing liquid that tried to avoid contact with their shell even as it consumed the snail.

The sudden action startled Hornet into silence, startled the room into silence.

Well, not the whole room, the bugs at the edge’s couldn’t see what Hollow had done, the fountain hidden by the many bodies, but most everyone who weren’t staring in horror were asking what had happened, declaring that they couldn’t see.

Hornet heard the rattling hiss that her Mama let out when she got surprised, heard the much deeper humming hiss of her Father when he was shocked.

One bug in the crowd managed to find their voice quickly, loudly shouting, “Was that the attempted murder victim? Did the Pure Vessel just drown the attempted murder victim?!”

They were rude to yell inside, it was against the rules, but Hornet was more concerned with her a different rudeness.

“Hollow! The snail’s gonna be all soggy now! I wanted know what they tasted like! Now they’re going to be gross! Take them out!”

Hollow usually gave into her demands. They liked her and tried to skirt around their orders to make her happy. Only Father’s orders, or Mother’s rules were more important than Hornet’s requests.

But . . .

Hornet’s face scrunched up.

Hollow was-

Was shaking?

The arms holding the snail in the water were shaking like Hollow was struggling to keep the snail down, like it was a more than the near dead thing it was, as if it was a difficult and powerful prey.

But even if the snail had been fighting, Hollow was far too powerful to- to struggle!

Hornet lowered her head, brought it closer to her sibling’s body, to the Void that made up their form-

It was . . . buzzing?

Not a sound, not- not all the way.

Father said that the void doesn’t have a voice, so Hollow doesn’t either. Horent’s sibling simply cannot make a sound.

But this buzzing-

It was so close to a sound that Hornet was beginning to be-

To be worried?

“Hollow?”

The shaking increased, the buzzing gaining power.

Hollow’s hands stayed below the churning water of the fountain.

Hornet reached out with one hand, attempting to offer something to her sibling- comfort like Mama did for her?

But before she could make contact with their face, she was plucked away from Hollow’s shoulder and passed to her Mama’s arms.

Father, after removing Hornet from her sibling’s shoulder, began to issue commands.

“Pure Vessel. Remove the bug from the water. Lay out the body and wait for further instruction.”

Father didn’t even wait for her sibling to obey before turning to Hornet.

“Hornet, my daughter, can you tell us where you found that bug? We need to know who ordered the Pure Vessel to kill them.”

Hornet, struggling to right herself in her Mama’s tight grip, answered.

“I found the snail in one of the waiting rooms! They were left on the floor! Someone had wrapped them badly and hadn’t even finished killing them!”

Hornet finally managed to wiggle herself to face her Father, eyes squinting a bit at how bright he was.

He hurt to look at sometimes, and he didn’t make sense all of the time. But he was the most dangerous and powerful bug in the kingdom and was the best a getting honey off of her shell when she got messy.

“Hornet, did you see anyone else with the . . .’snail’?”

Hornet shook her head, kicking her feet a little to try and get some leverage to see around her Father’s head.

“No! They were left all alone, all dried out and dying! I was waiting for them to die all the way when Hollow found me!”

Father stroked a hand over her head, rubbing at the place being her horns for a moment. Hornet watched his mouth suspiciously.

She wasn’t anywhere near messy enough to submit to a grooming.

“Did you speak to anyone in the halls? Did anyone give any orders to the Pure Vessel?”

Hornet, still focused on her father’s mouth, took a moment to answer.

“We passed some bugs, but Hollow was going too fast to talk to, and we didn’t stop at all.”

Father frowned a little, looking up at Mama before turning around.

“The order must have come before it found Hornet, but why would- Lurien! That bug was brought in with the survivor, weren’t they? Did you have time to do a follow up investigation?”

The bug with only one eye on their mask, the Watcher, stepped closer to Father and bowed a little.

“I apologize my King, but when I realized that there was a survivor of the Infection, I cast all other thoughts away to focus on learning how. I had not assigned anyone to the unknown bug, nor did I begin any investigation.”

Father let out a little hiss. The sound not really angry, just annoyed.

“I suppose I understand, but as the Ruler of this Kingdom, it is still one of my responsibilities to ensure justice, no matter what other events are unfolding. We will assign some bugs to the cast and question the Pure Vessel while Monomon’s students set up their labs.”

Father turned all the way around, clearly expecting to see the bug’s water bloated corpse on the floor behind him, eager to investigate and get the problem out of the way.

But her sibling had not moved.

Had not obeyed Father’s command.

They had never done that before.

Father paused for a long time, staring at her sibling’s back.

He took a step closer to them, his wings twitching in agitation.

Steel entered his voice. Father was using the voice for when you had to obey, no matter how much fun you were having, or how little you wanted to do your chores.

You would be in trouble if you didn’t listen and obey when he used that voice.

“Pure Vessel. Remove the bug. From the water.”

But Hollow didn’t move. They stayed on their knees, arms in the water, the shaking of their shoulders obvious enough to make their cloak sway.

They did not move from their kneeling position.

They weren’t obeying Father’s ‘You’re going to be in trouble’ voice.

“Pure Vessel. Stand.”

Her sibling did not move.

Oh no, oh no!

Hollow was going to be in so much trouble!

They weren’t obeying Father and he was going to get mad!

Hornet twisted to look up at Mama, to plead with her to make Father go easy on Hollow, to not make the punishment too long or too bad!

But Mama wasn’t looking at her.

Mama was staring at Hollow.

And as Hornet looked around, she saw that EVERYONE was staring at Hollow. 

Which meant that everyone was looking in the right direction to see the pale wet arm of a corpse reach from the water and loudly slap down on the edge of the fountain.

Chapter 13: Rehydrated (shrimp 8)

Summary:

Mary pulls a ring, and then just keeps talking.

Mary isn’t afraid to admit that the first thing she did once she got dunked in the fountain was cry.

Messy, chocking, gasping sobs thrashed through her. Her lungs and gills struggled to force water inside of her body between the full body clenches that came from her crying.

Mary couldn’t help but be thankful that the bug who had dunked her in the fountain kept such a firm grip.

Without them acting as an anchor, she would have surely bruised herself against the close walls of the fountain, gotten herself into an even worse tangle as she sobbed her heart out and thrashed her tail.

But the bug’s hands kept her still, kept the firm pressure that pressed her safely to the bottom of the fountain. Kept a firm handle on the netting of her tail. Kept her shrimpy ass pressed flat like a weighted blanket as the water seeped back into her flesh.

Mary’s chest expanded and pressed against the hand splayed across her side. She finally breathed, finally had a small pocket of safety after the slow strangling death of dehydration.

Mary reached up and wrapped a hand around the bug’s wrist, trying to let them know through the touch alone how thankful she was, how desperate she had been-

Wait a fucking second.

Mary’s head jerked down, starting at her chest, at where the netting had kept her arms and hands pinned.

She could see the marks where the net had held her weight, saw where it had rubbed and dug into her skin.

Saw where it had shifted from her drying out!

Mary stared for a moment longer, and then a brilliant grin broke across her face. She had lost so much mass while drying, had managed to shrink just enough while dying on the floor, that the net had lost it’s tight hold on her and had slipped downward!

Her arms were free!

She started to laugh, the water shaking around her. She laughed so hard that the bug had to shift their hand to keep a firm grip on her chest as she convulsed in something other than tears.

Mary twisted, using the bug’s grip as an anchor, using her now free hands to wiggle the net down her body, to get it away from her sensitive and soft flesh.

Her shrimp tail was still utterly tangled, but at least now she had her hands again! If she was left out to dry again, now she could at least army crawl away instead of just lay there.

Mary took a moment to rub at her eyes, to try and well, not wipe away the tears. She was in a fountain, her face being wet wouldn’t even be a thought.

But she was sure that the skin around her eyes would be red, that they would be some bloodshot.

But she almost died! She was allowed to cry!

Mary managed to shimmy around in the fountain, to get to her stomach.

The bug was still holding her down, and while not as much as a help now, it was still a very good source of leverage to work with.

Once she got her head above the water, she could tell them to let go.

Mary managed to shift their hands from her chest to her tail, wiggling around in the fountain until she had her upper body free.

She reached out of the water and managed to catch a grip on the side of the fountain.

Her hair ended up plastered to her face as she dragged her upper body out of the water, blinding her and clogging her ears.

But she didn’t need to see yet, she could tell where the bug who had saved her was. It was simple to put a hand on their arm, trail that up to their shoulder, and then use her grip on the fabric there to keep her head above the water.

Mary tried to speak, but had to cough the water out of her throat and lungs. She coughed and croaked for a moment, water gushing out of her mouth until she managed to take a deep rattling breath.

“Thank you.”

Mary coughed again.

Fuck, her voice sounded terrible.

Mary freed up a hand, almost sinking back into the water before flexing her arm and hanging from the bug whose arms were still in the water.

She managed to slick her hair away from her mouth and make a pretty gross hacking cough. She spit the loose flemph out of her mouth, aiming for the floor next to the fountain.

And then she tried to speak again.

Her voice was still scratchy, but at least now it didn’t sound like sandpaper.

“Ahem. Ah~ Sorry, nearly dying really wrecked my throat!”

Mary turned toward the bug, trying to both get her hair out of her face and to keep her upper body out of the water. She kept trying to finger comb it away, but it was so tangled from drying that she was only scootching it around.

But she could still speak.

“I can’t thank you enough! I was about to really die on the floor back there! Gosh, I don’t even want to think what would have happened if you hadn’t listened to me!”

Mary stopping trying to fix her hair for a moment, reaching out and patting at the bug that was still pressing her tail down, letting her use her abbs to take some of her weight and keep above the water.

“I couldn’t speak! I wasn’t able to explain myself at all, but you still manage to know that I needed water from- well, a less than stellar demand. Drown me! Gosh, anyone else would have thought me insane!”

Mary couldn’t help it, she was still giddy from her crying jag and laughing fit. She dragged herself upwards, stretched out and bent in half at her shrimp seam, and wrapped her arms around the bug’s neck.

“But you did it! You saved me! You kept me alive, put me back where I belong! Dunked me back into water!”

Mary wrapped her arms a little tighter around the bug’s neck, feeling the firm grip that they had on her finally loosen.

They must have finally understood that she no longer needed to be held down.

Mary loosened her grip some, hanging from one arm instead of two. She finally managed to drag her hair away from one of her eyes, finally managed to get a good look at the bug who had saved her.

“How can I ever repay you? There has to be something I can do for you, something that you want? If its within my power, I’ll do whatever I can for you! Whatever you want, if I can give it, I will!”

The bug didn’t answer her.

Instead, they stood up.

Mary squealed a little, instinctively clinging to the bug’s neck as they rose up, accidently taking her with them.

Mary’s still bound shrimp body was lifted out of the fountain, the bug’s height easily making her body clear the rim as they turned to face the room, swinging Mary’s shrimpy lower half in a wide arch that nearly flung her into the room.

Mary, startled and confused, clung to the bug’s neck and cloak. She buried her head in their chest even as her tail instinctively flexed and curled, her instincts to swim away kicking in.

The bug finished it’s spin and suddenly dropped to the floor. Mary squealed again, instinctively trying to claw her way up the bug’s body to keep from hitting the floor or getting slung into the room.

The bug had dropped into a chivalrous kneeling position, bowing their head and crossing an arm over their chest.

This meant that their face was buried in Mary’s stomach and shrimp legs because Mary had somehow managed to drag herself up onto the bug’s shoulder.  The rest of her body was propped up on the bug’s raised knee, her tail slapping at the air in panicked confusion.

Mary adjusting her grip on the kneeling bug’s cloak, half slung over their back, finally had a clear view of the room.

The very very crowded room.

It full of bugs.

Bugs in fancy outfits, most of them following a few themes that reminded Mary of uniforms or dress codes. All of them were staring at her, or the bug whose shoulder she was slung across.

Mary’s head spun around, trying to take in the sights around her, trying to understand what mess she had found herself in-

And she saw a bug she knew.

Well, not knew, but she had met them just a few hours ago-

And they were in charge of the bugs who had left her to dry out in an empty room.

Mary, still using the bug she was clinging to as a balance, flung out one arm to point at the bug with a single eye on their mask.

“You! You’re the reason I’m here! You- you had me detained and then abandoned in a room! I almost died! I can’t be out of water for so long or I dry out! What kind of place are you running here where bugs who were nearly kidnapped get forgotten in empty rooms!”

The bug with the mask seemed shocked.

She thought so at least?

They were wearing a mask and a full body cloak, so it wasn’t like she could really tell-

But they weren’t moving and were facing her, and she was sorta the center of attention at the moment, so she was going to assume that she was shocking them.

And she would not be embarrassed!

Because Mary was absolutely the wronged party here!

No one had even come around to like, take a statement or something! She had been whole sale forgotten!

She was going to go full throttle white lady Karen on this fucker!

She NEARLY DIED!

“Do you know how terrible it is to die by inches!? To lay on the ground as you shrivel up, listening desperately for anyone to come by, not even having a voice to scream? To have nothing by your own company as your mind twists in circles and tells you that there’s no way to save yourself?! To be bound and forgotten, left for dead because of another’s neglect!?”

Mary bared her teeth and tried to drag herself farther up the bug’s shoulders. But she was only able to move an inch, her lower body still firmly pinned by the bug’s head buried in her waist, before disaster struck.

Her attempt to struggle free only made her lose her grip and leverage, her body flopping backwards with ungainly grace, leaving her back in a strained arch.

Mary was left looking at the room from an upside down angle, hair on the ground and her hands on the floor, trying to get the leverage to force herself back up.

Her abbs were not strong enough to get her the leverage she needed, her tail curling and uselessly smacking into the bug who still held her around the waist.

“-shit bitch motherfucking son of a two-faced dollar store whore-“

Mary muttered curses and struggled trying her darndest to get up on her own before eventually giving up and saying-

“Hey! Pick me up would you? I’m- eek!”

The bug move immediately, resituating their grip on her and tugging her right side up again.

Mary soon found her self in a princess hold, her tail curled toward her as the bug kept a firm grip on her.

The repositioning let her blood drain from her head, and lessoned the strain on her body.

However it also brought her face to face with the glowing white bug who was baring their teeth at her.

The bug flared bright iridescent wings, almost blinding Mary, and snarled at her.

“What have you done to my Vessel!?”

Chapter 14: Will or Will-less?

Summary:

Hollow Knight POV

The Hollow Knight had been sent to collect the Princess.

Her absence had been noted shortly after the arrival of the Pale King. More for the lack of the Princess’s complaining and demands to play with the Hollow Knight than anything else.

Herrah noticed that her offspring was not whining of boredom, and upon finding her side bereft of a tiny princess, huffed out a sigh.

She had turned to the recently arrived Pale King, easily breaking into the conversation he had been having with Lurien the Watcher, and announced that-

“Your child has run off again.”

The Pale King blinked, before looking towards the floor. He did not see the red that the young spider was always cloaked in

A color chosen partly for the Princess’s enjoyment of the color, but more so for how the bright color made it easier to locate her.

“Ah.”

The Pale King had turned to the Hollow Knight looking up toward the underside of it’s head. The Vessel was still dripping water from where it had used it’s cloak to keep most of the rain off of the Pale King.

The Pale King frowned a moment, gesturing for it to lean down.

The Pale King wiped the water from its face even as he gave it an order.

“Pure Vessel, locate the Princess and return her to the Deepnest Queen.”

The Hollow Knight gave a single nod to acknowledge the order. It smoothly rose back to it’s feet and turned toward the doors.

Finding the Princess was a common, and often a simple, task for it.

The touch of Void that lived within the Princess was something that the Hollow Knight rarely had trouble tracking.

The Hollow Knight walked down a few hallways, following the invisible trail that the Princess left behind. The visible trail as well, the Hollow Knight closing many opened cabinets and righting tilted paintings, showing where the mischievous child had passed.

It took only a few minutes of travel to hear the quick chatter of the missing child.

The Hollow Knight entered a room commonly used to hold waiting bugs and was seen by the Princess who so very rarely showed anything but delight at its appearance. The child spoke of hearing a strange noise and finding a snail. She dragged the Hollow Knight over to-

A shriveled corpse bound in a still glowing soul net.

It was not a snail.

And had surely been dead entirely too long for it to have made any noise.

(Perhaps a ghost?)

The Hollow Knight had seen forgotten corpses before, had seen the remains of bugs who had eaten poisonous plants in secluded tunnels or bugs who had been hurt and crawled away to bleed out in a hole.

The corpses of shelled bugs would only show the age through how easily they crumpled when pressure was applied to the shell, all of the moisture leaving the body and turning the insides hollow.

But this bug was softer, at least on part of it’s body. It made the age of the corpse more visible, made the body puckered and shriveled like dried meat.

The bug had to have been left there for a long time to become so dehydrated-

But how could a corpse like this be in the Watcher’s tower?

The room did not look abandoned. There was no taste of rot. No dust.

The Hollow Knight kneeled next to the corpse, pulled closer by Hornet, and its cloak slapped into the corpse’s face.

The Hollow Knight inspected the corpse.

There was no obvious sign of injury, no strange or uneven coloring that indicated poison or infection. It appeared that the bug had simply been bound in a net and then left to die in a secluded room.

A cruel way to kill.

The Hollow Knight, too late to save this bug and with no murderer to subdue, turned back to the Princess. It was going to complete it’s original task and then lead someone back to the corpse-

The Hollow Knight’s cloak tugged.

The cloak was caught on something?

The cloak was caught on the corpse.

The corpse bitten the cloak.

The Hollow Knight stilled.

The fabric was tucked firmly in the corpse’s mouth, giving no doubt that it was the corpse who had moved to take it in.

In fact, the corpse’s face was different, less shriveled than it had been a moment ago.

Infection? It was known to raise the dead if an infected body was not properly destroyed.

But no.

A blurry eye was cracked open, surely half blind but no orange glowed from the socket.

The corpse released the Hollow Knight’s cloak and a thin voice begged for help.

The Hollow Knight did not know how to help a corpse.

It was struck still. It was ordered to help bugs, to save them when it could.

But how did one help the dead? How was it to save a bug who was already lost?

The corpse on the floor begged for water from the Hollow Knight, and it was about to raise to obey the request-

When the corpse gave it an order.

“Drown me! You need to . . .  drown me !”

And the Hollow Knight, a creation with no Will-

Suddenly, truly, in a way that just made it apparent that it had a WILL all along-

Lost it.

 

---

 

The Hollow Knight was a well-honed tool for execution and protection.

And tools obeyed orders, were meant to be used.

Many orders came from unqualified bugs, that came during situations that did not allow uncleared bugs to order the Pure Vessel, that were demeaning for the Pale King’s creation to follow or could cause it damage-

Those orders were not to be followed.

Because the Pale King was not a Fool.

The Hollow Knight had been given layers and layers of instructions. Rules and exceptions and hierarchies of command to ensure that no bug took advantage of the Pure Vessel’s empty will-less state.

The Pale King gave many instructions and rules during the many lessons given to the Pure Vessel.  

To obey and uphold the laws of Hallownest. To put the lives of the Many about the lives of the few. To preserve the Pure Vessel’s form and condition whenever able.

To preserve the life of Princess Hornet above all others.

The White Lady gave the Pure Vessel instructions during the times when she summoned it to her garden.

To stay safe while out in the tunnels. To stand tall and prideful when in the view of the kingdom. To act with honor while interacting with the citizens of Hallownest.

To make sure that Hornet, heir of Deepnest, is happy.

Hornet, the Princess of Hallownest, the Heir of Deepnest, the sibling has given orders to the Pure Vessel from the moment she had seen it.

Play with me! Carry me! Hide me! Follow me!

But the Princess had only ever given the Pure Vessel a single instruction on how to govern its actions.

“You have to be Good, Hollow! Mama and Father say that they’ll let me play with you as long as I’m a good girl, and if I have to be good then so do you! You have to be twice as good, so even if I’m kinda bad we still can play together!”

Be Good Hollow!

That instruction was . . . a more versatile instruction than most others that the Pure Vessel was given. It was not an instruction that was often applied to its public actions, as Hornet’s orders were at the bottom of it’s Hierarchy.

But the Pure Vessel often applied it when in situations that were less fraught. Situations outside of battle and danger.

It was demeaning for the Pure Vessel to do chores for castle staff.

But it was Good for the Hollow Knight to assist one of the White Lady’s gardeners in watering the plants.

There were only 19 bugs who were qualified to give the Pure Vessel orders outside of battle situations or of the training ground.

But it was Good for the Hollow Knight to hold an umbrella while the Watcher’s butler struggled to find the key to the side door.

No bug outside of the Pale King’s inner circle was cleared to give the Pure Vessel any instruction outside of an emergency.

But it was Good to hold a door open for a rushing maid, it was Good to help a servant carrying a large object and it was Good to assist the Knights in cleaning up the training ground.

. . .

The Pure Vessel often followed the Princess’s instruction.

There were only bare moments when it did not apply her orders to the actions it took. When the orders of the Pale King were most relevant.

There was no room for Good in a battle.

But Hornet, daughter of a spider and a wyrm, would never begrudge the Hollow Knight for having a bloody blade.

Any knight, solider, or survivor could inform any listener that when blades were drawn and lives were on the line, there was no room to be ‘Good’.

When a cheap move would give a fighter the advantage, when an underhanded tactic would soften a blow, when a dishonorable action would save the lives behind the raised shield?

With a blade in it’s hand, the Hollow Knight was very far from ‘Good’.

Had taken a blade and forced it through the bodies of bugs. Had crushed shells beneath powerful blows. Had destroyed the bodies of mindless creatures and opposing bugs alike.

The Hollow Knight had followed orders to kill.

Had heard the voice of the Pale King tell it to finish a fight. Had followed the shouted commands of other Knights to permanently end a threat to the lives of others. Had sliced through threats as civilians’ begged for protection and salvation behind it.

The Hollow Knight had killed before.

Had been ordered to kill.

And it would surely kill again.

But never had the Hollow Knight been given an order that broke all of it’s existing instructions before.

Never had it been ordered to break the Laws of the Pale King- to kill a bug outside of battle. To kill a bug in a dishonorable and cruel way, acting against the White Lady’s wishes. To go against the Princess’s desire for the Hollow Knight to be ‘Good’.

It had never been given the order, “Drown me” before.

To kill an unknown bug in such a shameful and cruel way, despite there being no known crime against them, and at the bug’s own request.

The conflicting rules, the strangeness of the order, the lack of this strange and unknown bug’s authority,- all of these combined should have sent the Hollow Knight into a logic spiral at worst, or been ignored entirely at best.

But despite the lack of authority-

Despite the breaking of the King’s law-

Despite the dishonorable action-

Despite how it was not Good-

The Hollow Knight found that there was no action other than completing the order.

Drown me.

There was no action but lifting the shriveled living corpse from the floor. No other way to move, but to peel the wilted body from the ground, to hoist the shelled lower body up by it’s bonds.

Drown me.

There was no way forward but toward the nearest source of water. There was no stopping for questions, no slowing down or choosing a less crowded venue to commit the deed. No saving the Hollow Knight’s reputation as a flawless tool, as soon nearly every important figure in Hallownest would witness the senselessly cruel and unexplainable murder it would commit.

Drown me.

There was no action available but to submerge the barely living bug into the fountain, no matter who saw the Hollow Knight preform such an action. There was no order that superseded the one the corpse had given.

Not even the Pale King’s orders could cut the tethers that guided and restricted the Hollow Knight’s actions.

Drown me.

It didn’t matter how the Hollow Knight struggled to obey a different order. It didn’t matter that the Hollow Knight attempted to respond to the Pale King. To respond to the soft words of the Princess.

Drown me.

The only action the Hollow Knight could take was to keep a firm grip on the struggling body beneath the water. To continue to press the bug beneath the glassy and rippling surface. To over power the weak body beneath the shuddering liquid despite it’s struggles to break free and save itself.

Drown me.

To drown the bug in front of the Pale King, the Dreamers, the Princess-

To commit a cruel murder.

To be given no choice but to be-

Drown me.

To be Bad.

To break every rules, buck every instruction, to go against the wishes of others-

Drown me.

Against it’s only wish to be good!

The Hollow Knight knelt there, arms sunk in the water of a fountain, surrounded by the bugs it was made to protect and obey, and held a bug under the water to die.

To hold their still struggling body down-

 . . . their still struggling-?

Drown me.

The body still struggled.

The bug had been below the water more than long enough to drown, been submerged for three times as long as needed to fill a bug’s body with water.

Why did the body under the Hollow Knight’s hands still move? How long could a bug’s dying breath last?

Drown me.

The struggle had slowed, but now the body beneath the Hollow Knight’s hands shimmied and twisted. Not with the panic of desperation, but methodically. As if the bug had all the time in the world to escape their watery death.

And as the bug shimmied and shoved, as the Hollow Knight’s grip shifted from the soft upper body to the bound and shelled lower body-

Perhaps the bug did?

Drown me.

The Hollow Knight, still holding the body beneath the water, still kneeling beside the fountain, still unable to follow the orders of the Pale King, focused it’s eyes on the water.

On the pale appendage that broke the surface and gripped the edge of the fountain.

Drown me.

The body shifted under the Hollow Knight’s hands, the soft upper body levering itself out of the water.

The Hollow Knight, still frozen in it’s act of drowning, couldn’t move away from the rising corpse, couldn’t shift away as one of the hands touched it’s arm, latching onto it’s cloak and hung its weight from the hand.

The Hollow Knight couldn’t move as the corpse pulled itself close to its face and expelled water from behind the dark stringy curtain that covered their face, body convulsing as it tried to expel the water that the Hollow Knight had forced it to take on.

Drown me.

The corpse must have expelled enough water, because it let out a sound. A short string of words that buzzed through the Hollow Knight’s senses, sounding like a curse from the mouth of a tortured and dying god-

“Thank you.”

And then the corpse turned its head, uncovered the bottom part of its face, and spit a small chunk of slime from its mouth.

Drown me.

And instantly, despite how it had to be dead-

 -it had to be dead. Most of the body was still beneath the water. How could it be breathing? How could it be speaking? It’s body was full of water, how could it still be moving? It was dead, it was dead-

Drown me.

-the body beneath the Hollow Knight’s still unmoving hands, was a corpse no longer.

“Ahem. Ah~ Sorry, nearly dying really wrecked my throat!”

The Hollow Knight’s head was buzzing with panic, with relief, with horror.

The bug was not dead. The Hollow Knight had not finished off a bug near death.

Drown me.

But the Hollow Knight was unable to remove its hands, to stop itself from keeping the bug’s lower body beneath the water.

The order that the strange now living bug had given it still echoed through its- its-

Its MIND.

Drown me.

The Hollow Knight was only barely able to hear the bug’s other words, to hear it thank the Hollow Knight for- for saving it. For listening to it. For obeying its demand.

As if it had been able to refuse!

Drown me.

The bug’s hands curled into the Hollow Kngiht’s cloak, dragged it’s body farther out of the water, curled it’s arms around the Hollow Knight’s neck. Hugged the Hollow Knight in a show of thankfulness and relief-

A cool wetness on the Hollow Knight’s face, the top of the bug’s head brushing against the white of it’s face-

Drown-  

Silence.

The echoing order fading as the water touched the Hollow Knight’s face.

The Hollow Knight’s hand’s relaxed, the grip on the bug’s bound body finally loosening as the Hollow Knight once more had a will.

The Hollow Knight stayed kneeling for a moment, stayed on it’s knees of its- its own will.

The bug that could take the Hollow Knight’s will from it continued to speak and cling to it’s neck. Continued to thank it and offer payment for it’s saved life.

“Whatever you want, if I can give it, I will!”

At the sound of the word, the word that would haunt the Hollow Knight for a very long time, it stood.

The bug still clinging to its neck squealed and kept their grip even as the Hollow Knight turned toward the Pale King and dropped to a kneel.

Toward the god who had made the Hollow Knight to be Will-less, to be Mind-less, to be Voice-less.

Toward the god who at the moment, was still unaware just how badly he had failed.

The Hollow Knight stayed still as the strange bug continued to cling and struggle on top of it.

She was no longer focused on the Hollow Knight, now seeing the rest of the room and focusing on the Watcher.

She began to yell, to berate the Watcher for nearly killing her in his negligence, for leaving her bound and helpless.

The bug’s still bound tail curled and splayed what parts of it that could move, and her upper body clawed and pulled to keep her balance atop the Hollow Knight’s shoulder.

She failed.

The strange bug fell from their perch atop the Hollow Knight, body bending in discomforting ways as her tail remained pinned down by the Hollow Knight’s arm even as the rest of her hung in the air.

Curses spewed from her mouth as she struggled to right herself, a torrent of filth that flowed past the kneeling Hollow Knight until-

Another order was given.

Pick me up.

The Hollow Knight once more moved without will, scooping the bug into it’s arms, shifting her body until it was firmly gripped and kept stable.

Not even the Pale King, the Hollow Knight’s enraged creator yelling at the bug in it’s arms could make it’s hold falter.

Enslaving the Hollow Knight once more.

Letting it get another taste of what it truly meant to be without Will.

Chapter 15: shrimp

Summary:

run away!

Notes:

i got this written while waiting for Steam to let me buy silk song.
i finally got it which is why it's only this long. so short, not even 2,000 words!
don't expect an update anytime soon, ii got a game to play.

Mary had started her day with the goal of getting some hot food.

Her goal had changed when she had been netted like the big catch on a fishing trip to being as loud and attention attracting as she possibly could. Hell, the screams that she had let out were probably still making some of those bug’s antennas ring.

Upon being taken to a higher authority, being ‘saved’ by the bug cops and brought to like- the mayor- Mary had just wanted to cooperate and get cut free and released back into the canals.

And she had suffered gravelly for her passivity.

Nearly dying on the floor because she had just wanted to be forgotten and let someone else deal with whatever problem she had brought to their door? That plan had backfired so spectacularly that it had nearly killed her.

So just like a white mouse in a lab, she was going to go back to doing what had worked first.

Being so loud and in everyone’s face that it would be unthinkable to ignore her.

So when this trumped up glow worm bared his teeth at her and started making weird demands-

Mary met him on the same level.

With escalation.

Mary bared her own, less impressive, teeth at the bug and snapped out a reply.

“Vessel!? What fucking Vessel!? You mean the fountain?! I just took a dip!”

Mary released one hand from the guard holding her and pointed aggressively in the worm’s face, getting her hand a little too close to his teeth if she was being honest.

“Calm down! It’s just a water feature! I need water to live! Would you have preferred a corpse on the floor?! That would have fucked with your décor way more I assure you, rotting shrimp smell terrible!”

The glow worm flinched back from Mary, his teeth still bared but the hissing that had been the background noise of the conversation petering out.

Mary had a bare moment to pat herself on the back for making the fucker back down-

But then the hissing and anger returned with a vengeance.

The glow worm flapped it’s wings, leaving the ground and hovering in the room with a much longer body than Mary had thought that he had, like some Chinese dragon and a bug had a terrible baby. Like if a dragon fly was much longer, limper and scarier.

The glow worm suddenly had bright white glowing spears materializing into existence around him, like a big pointy death halo.

And Mary no longer thought that it was a good idea to be the loudest bitch in the room.

Mary panicked, flapping her tail in fright and wrapping her arms around the guard’s neck so tightly, she must have been strangling them.

“Run!”

The guard did so immediately, juking off to the side just heading where their feet were pointed. Mary kept her eyes on the spears, only getting more panicked as they suddenly got brighter in an obvious warm up to launching.

“Dodge! Don’t get hit!”

Mary shrieked and clung to the guard’s neck as they dodged and sprinted away from the various projectiles that were thrown at them.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck! What the fuck is wrong with you?!? STOP ATTACKING!”

There was a pause in the glowing spears as the guard raced around the room. The guard, while fast to respond to orders, seemed to have lost their sense when the glow worm started to attack. They were just running in one big circle around the edge of the room.

But luckily Mary still managed to keep some of her wits about her.

She yanked on the guard’s horns while yelling for them to, “Turn here!” and soon the guard was racing down a long hallway.

The architecture blurred by, the distance eaten up by the guard’s long legs as more and more distance was put between them and the crowded room.

But not so much distance that Mary couldn’t hear the enraged scream that echoed through the halls behind them, couldn’t hear the sound of twisting metal and cracking stone as the glow worm surely gave chase.

Mary’s grip on the guard tightened, her own strength hurting her hand as her flesh bruised beneath her own strength.

There was a monster behind her. A monster that wanted her hurt, dead, destroyed!

A monster that had more physical power, more political power, more power power than her!

And she was- she was a fish out of water! A fish who needed to return to the water, and quickly! Already she could feel her skin tightening as the wind stole more and more moisture from her flesh.

Her legs were still tied by the ropes, her only form or survival crippled by the stupid net that had caught her.

She needed them off of her.

“We need to hide! There- there are tons of rooms here! We need to- to go up! Yes, up! Go up! Find somewhere to hide!”

Mary couldn’t stop herself from yanking on the guard’s horns, from manipulating the one thing that she had power over.

Not that it did much good, the guard’s neck must have been made of iron with how they kept their face forward, taking a sharp turn and then lunging up a narrow staircase that Mary hadn’t had the time to notice.

They went up and up until the stairs ended and they once more sprinted down a hallway. But this time, they darted into a room and fell to their knees behind a wide couch.

Mary, her hands shaking and her heart beating in her ears, lost her grip on the guard with the sudden drop, and she spilled to the floor hair and arms tangling as she tried to catch something to stop her drop.

But she failed, and Mary was soon once more on the ground in an unfamiliar place but with significantly higher stakes than earlier. Her shoulders and upper back on the ground, but her tail, still in the net, had gotten caught on some of the guard’s armor and kept her at an angle.

Mary laid there for a moment, her breath wheezing in her lungs, eyes wide. She had managed to get her elbows on the ground, managed to prop her head and neck up.

She stared up at the guard bent over her, stared up at the empty eyes and smooth white face.

At the impassive visage of her savior. At her hero who had done so much to save her, even though they could have tossed her to the ground at any time and let the glow worm do what he wanted to her.

The adrenaline, the fear, the shaking in her hands-

It made her emotional.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you. You- you’ve saved me again. I- I’m going to repay you, I’ll do something for you! Anything you want, I will deliver it-“

Mary’s breathy thanks were interrupted by a low rumble, either something being destroyed or a sound so deep and brassy that it shook the foundations of the building they were in.

Could be either.

Mary’s breath caught and her gaze dropped from her Savior, to her bonds.

Her numerous legs were tangled, the netting was digging into her stomach, her tail forced to curl by the tension of the ropes.

Mary grabbed one of the ropes on her paddle foot, but as she tried to tug it free, she could feel it only tighten around her stomach. She gasped and released it, the tension only half loosening as the tangle became worse with her minor interference.

“Fuck- fuck fuck. It’s- it’s an absolute knot, a rat’s nest of crossing ropes and tangles. How- how am I going to get free?”

Mary, already accustomed to begging for help in the short time that she had known this strange guard, turned her watery eyes and upward once more.

“Help set me free? Please?”

The guard, who had been still and quiet while Mary had been having another panic attack on the floor responded to her begging.

They reached into the shadows of their clock and pulled a long brightly shining sword from the depths. The edge was sharp and the blade was long.

And it was poised above Mary’s soft belly.

Mary winced, closing her eyes at the sight of the sword hovering above her. But she did her best to relax.

After all, the guard was surely just trying to cut her free! Because if they wanted to hurt her, they would have had many chances before now.

Right?

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 2 of Belief and Strings