Rain World: Feral

by Foreverwing17

Summary:

He looks down at himself. He looked just like the rest of them… but he was different. He knew this now. Their old world was nothing like his, and he was nothing like them.

They had lived in cages, but he was born into a world. His life would never be like theirs.

Chapter 1: New Moon

Dignity watched as his new siblings crawled out of their eggs. They both came out at almost the exact same time. One was a teal feminine with dark purple markings, the other a forest green masculine with red markings. They both had the same crest, a diamond with a hollow circle inside, just as he did.

He looked up at his parents. His father was leaning on his mother’s much taller side, both with their eyes closed. His mother opened her eyes and nodded at him, then glanced between him and his hatchling siblings. An answer to his silent request to hold them.

He bent down, looking at the two newborns. He felt a surge of joy, love for his new family. He reached out and scooped them both up in his arms. He cradled them, taking in their whole, tiny prescences. So soft, so fragile. He drew a careful finger over the teal one’s forehead. So innocent.

He looked up at his mother again, she wanted to hold them too, to feel her new creations. He set them into her arms and stepped back.

“Hello there, little ones,” she said in a soft, loving voice. “Do you know who we are?”

She was answered with the slight opening of eyes and a barely audible chirp from the green one.

“We’re your family,” she whispered. “I’m your mother, Moon, this is your father Sig, and that’s your big brother, Dignity.”

The green one chirped again, seemingly pleased with the sound of his mother’s gentle voice. She held them closer. A moment passed.

A moment too long.

From the trees behind them, a group of scavengers appeared, spears raised. Dignity’s father whipped around, raising himself on his massive, thick tail. A scavenger ran toward him, spear primed to stab him, only to be met with venomous fangs.

“RUN!” He screamed, flinging the scavenger away. “DON’T WAIT FOR ME, GET OUTTA HERE!”

His mother hesitated, but Dignity pulled her along, sprinting away from the scene. He could hear spears hitting flesh and being deflected off near metallic scales as he ran, only looking back to make sure his mother and siblings were still behind him. He slowed just a bit for his mother, who was still carrying the two newborns, both squealing in distress. They only slowed down once they couldn’t hear the sounds of fighting anymore.

And then, all of the sudden, there was a loud, hissing scream.

Dignity looked back at where they had just run from. He couldn’t see his father or the scavengers anymore. He took a step, hesitating, then sprinted back. He returned to a terrifyingly familiar scene.

Everywhere, there was blood, deep red staining the grass and trees and bushes. Four scavenger corpses lay dead on the ground, the survivors seemingly having already left.

On the ground, though, was what scared him. On the ground, laying completely still, was his father, dead. He looked at him for a moment. The scavengers had taken out all their spears, but he could imagine what he looked like by the end of the fight by all the spear-sized holes. His face was relaxed, but it was clear from his widely open mouth that he was mid-hiss when he fell.

Dignity wasn’t entirely sure why he felt how he did about the sight. He’d seen his father die hundreds of times before, but for whatever reason he still felt like he did six major cycles ago every time it happened. He looked into his father’s lifeless eyes and froze. He took a deep, long breath and turned back to where his mother was.

Silently, he made his way back to the rest of the family. He silently nodded to his mother when she looked at him and she nodded to the southeast, then turned that way and started walking. He followed, his mother always knew where she was going.

They made their way further through the woods, then found a small stream. Dignity stared into the stream, watching his reflection distort with the movement of the water. His reflection stared back at him blankly. But the stream kept flowing, no matter what his reflection looked like. Such is the cycle, it just keeps going.

“Dignity,” his mother broke his trance. “Are you okay?”

Dignity nodded, still staring at his own reflected gaze. He felt a moist tail twine around his and finally looked at his mother. Her face was painted with concern. Her antennae pinned back, the tips glowing dimly. He glanced back at his reflection, seeing his own splayed and pointed downward, then met her eyes again and nodded, fixing his antennae back into their upward resting position.

His mother grimaced, looking down at the little bundles in her arms. She looked up at him again. He felt the worry of a mother. They stayed like this for a moment, then his mother broke eye contact.

Dignity sat down and rested his tail in the stream. The water felt cool on his scales. He extended his long, smooth tongue down into the stream and started slowly sipping the water. He looked over at his mother, doing the same while still cradling his two little siblings. It reminded him of a memory from when he was small, the first thing he could remember, in fact.

A warm day in the marshlands, far from any danger. His father had brought them a pile of purple fruit, Dignity’s favorite kind, at the time. The only kind he knew back then. His mother and father sat relaxed, drinking from the water around them. He sat in his mother’s lap, nibbling on a fruit the size of his head. Beside him, leaning into his mother, was…

He didn’t want to recall the rest.

He lay down, closing his eyes. It was only half way through the cycle, but Dignity didn’t want to keep going. His mother nudged him with her tail, but he didn’t mind it. Slowly, he drifted off.

 

Notes:

Yay, first ever fic on Ao3! I honestly don’t know how to do fricking anything so uhhhhhhhhh yeah.

Enjoy the author’s suffering as they try to figure out how this all works

 

Edit 3/31/25: Just figured out how to add images (and just got the motivation to make art for this) so yeah there’s our first look at Dig. This really does seem to be the “author learns how to Ao3” chapter isn’t it.

Chapter 2: Sun

Summary:

A wild SRS blocks your path!
Dignity used: misgendering,
it’s not very effective.

Dignity awoke the next cycle in the shelter they had been in the previous cycle. His mother dragged him here, he assumed. He opened his eyes a little more. He noticed green scales beside him, his father. He looked down at Dignity with a smile, then looked at the two hatchlings, then his mother.

“Moonie,” he tapped her shoulder. “I get that you wanna wait for them, but we’re gonna be here all cycle.”

“Surely it won’t take them that long,” she looked at the shelter door.

“Moon, it’s already mid-cycle.”

“I know, I know, but we can’t just go out alone anymore. None of us can fly, and we both know how dangerous it is, you especially.”

“Yes, but they’re still taking too long.”

“Give them just a bit longer, please.”

“Alright.”

His father slithered to the edge of the shelter and curled his tail around himself twice; his mother kept staring at the door. It had been open for a while now, but they hadn’t left yet. Dignity didn’t know who they were waiting on.

He watched the door, he didn’t know what for; whoever “they” are, he guessed. The door stayed still, he kept his eyes on it, nothing happened. He kept watching, still nothing. Nothing… nothing… nothing… He wondered if there was even something to wait for, or if his parents were going insane.

He had just looked away when there was a flash of yellow on the marking above the door. He tensed, but his parents seemed relieved.

Out of the pipe crawled a large yellow iterator well over his height, a dragon, to be specific. Massive wings clearly capable of flight, a long, powerful tail, — though not nearly as long or powerful as his father’s — sturdy claws, sharp oval pupils, everything. Red markings covered his body in thin lines and he had an orange sun crest with seven dots.

“Hello, Moon, Sig, I apologize for being so late,” the dragon said. “There was a train lizard.”

“It’s fine,” his mother assured.

“Who are they?” The dragon asked, nodding toward Dignity and his siblings.

“Oh, these are our kids,” she said. “The older one is Illuminated Dignity, and these two are still unnamed. Dignity, this is Seven Red Suns, an old friend.”

Suns nodded to him in acknowledgment and he nodded back. He felt something when they locked eyes, almost like fire. He wouldn’t be surprised if he could actually breathe fire from how it felt. 

“I see,” Suns said, turning back to his mother. “I do not know how I did not put two and two together, in hindsight.”

“It’s fine,” she said. “We all get things mixed up sometimes.”

“Mother,” Dignity signed. “You said ‘they’, who else is coming?”

She and Suns looked at each other awkwardly. Was he missing something?

“You remember when I told you not all of us are he and she?” She asked.

He nodded.

“Well, that applies to Suns here.”

“Oh,” he signed, a bit embarrassed. He drew his antennae back.

“It is fine,” Suns said, “It only makes sense that you would assume I am a he.” They flicked an antenna. “I applaud you for it, in fact. I cannot tell the difference.”

“Not to interrupt,” his father interrupted, flicking his tail impatiently. “but the cycle’s moving on and the next shelter is in the dead zone of Wind’s rain circle, and you know she never holds her rains back for anyone.”

“Patience, Sig,” his mother said.

“Actually, he is right,” Suns said. “The cycle is over halfway past and we still have a distance to go, since you cannot fly.”

Dignity internally checked the time. They were right, only a third of the cycle remained. And, while this was his first experience within a can iterator’s grounds, something told him it wasn’t long enough to make it to the next shelter should they have to pause.

“We’ll have to take a river if we go now,” his mother said. “and we don’t know if they can breathe in water.” She nodded to the two little ones still in her arms.

“Actually, If it is okay,” Suns said. “I could take them to the nearest shelter and the rest of you can rendezvous.” They spread their wings slightly, emphasizing their flight capability.

“Sounds good to me,” his father said, hurrying out the shelter door before anyone could object.

His mother handed Suns his siblings and beckoned for Dignity to come out with her. They exited the shelter as quickly as they could and sprinted to the stream they found the previous cycle, no doubt it would lead them to a river deep enough for swimming. 

He paused to look up for a moment as Suns flew overhead, the stripes on their massive wings illuminated by their namesake, even through the thickening clouds. They quickly passed the two of them and Dignity continued following his mother.

They quickly found the stream, and it did indeed lead to a deeper river. They swiftly and gracefully dove in, letting the current take them while they oriented themselves in the water. Dignity took longer than his mother, she having fins and being far more streamlined, but he was still fast enough to not waste time.

They swam through the water as fast as they could, or rather, as fast as Dignity could, now being the slower one. A bend in the river that happened to have some strangely tall rocks caused Dignity to fall behind for a moment, but he caught up as soon as his mother noticed him. They kept swimming until the river gave way to-

Oh… wow. Dignity stared into what seemed like a great void of water. He had never swam in anything larger than a river before. He almost let the sight take him until he remembered they couldn’t stop.

His mother stayed closer to him as they swam through the great reservoir, as she called it. It felt like an entire ocean to him, even though he knew that it wasn’t — his mother had swam in the ocean before, apparently it was even more grand.

They slowed for a moment to look above the water so his mother could do… something. Dignity never understood why his parents did some of the odd things they did. Apparently, other iterators could do this too, him included, but he just didn’t know how yet. The tips of his mothers antennae glowed brightly and they pointed as upward as possible, like a red beacon. He still didn’t know exactly what she was doing, but after a few seconds of waiting, Suns flew down to circle over them.

“Just up that cliff,” they said in response to seemingly nothing, and glided to the south for a moment before circling them again. “On the cliff, actually, but I think there is an inside route. I would not know, I cannot fit inside those tunnels, but Sig made it, somehow.” They looked up at the slowly darkening sky, then gave them a nod and flew away.

His mother started moving again, faster this time, forcing Dignity to use even more stamina to keep up. They made it to the cliff rather quickly, and started climbing. It was only a few leaps to the shelter.

He and his mother stepped in, him behind. Everyone was here, and just in time for the rain. The shelter door closed and the sound of a crushing downpour was muffled into white noise outside. Dignity wondered what would have happened had they not reached the shelter in time. He sat down and thought about it. He would have died. He and his mother would have died. He knew, of course, that they would have just come back the next cycle, but it was still an unsettling thought.

He stopped thinking about that and stared at the wall in front of him, Suns had taken up that spot. He looked to his left, there was his mother, his right, his father and siblings. Suddenly he realized how small this shelter felt with all of them squeezed in. It must normally be a very spacious shelter, but with a serpent and a dragon in it, it felt tiny.

His thoughts were interrupted by a wave of fatigue. He realized how much he had exerted himself swimming here. He also realized how hungry he was. Had they eaten last cycle? He was pretty sure they did. It didn’t feel like it though. Or maybe he was just extra hungry from the extra movement. That and not eating this cycle.

He looked over at his father, who he was sure was even hungrier than him with the size of his tail. His mother was probably fine, she didn’t need as much as the others.

It was probably worst for Suns, assuming they didn’t eat the lizard they mentioned earlier. Dragons are massive, massive wings, massive tails, massive claws, the second largest iterators. They ate five lizards their size every cycle, so not having anything must be terrible for them. Dignity was suddenly grateful he inherited his father’s shortness without his size.

Suns lowered themselves to the ground and curled their tail around themselves, yawning. He saw his mother doing the same, and his father coiled himself in his corner.

He lay down himself, tail only half curled around him. He stretched his proto-wings and yawned, then closed his eyes and drifted into sleep.

Notes:

Hehe Suns doesn’t use contractions.

Anyway, actual notes:
So this chapter is kinda………… ehhh. Idk the entire thing felt kinda rushed and forced, specifically Dig misgendering Suns. I mean, I *could* just say it feels like this because this is how Dig’s mind works but it still feels weird.

Now for the actual good juicy notes for context lovers also oh my gosh why the frick did I do so much worldbuilding for this ANYWAY

If you haven’t noticed (w h i c h y o u h a v e) these bois are very much not normal dudes, in fact they’re so not normal that half of the Google doc I’m writing this entire story in is just worldbuilding. So y’all get the short version bcs the word limit is literally too short for this and we’d be here forever anyway.
So, basic summary: iterators are now (mostly) off the strings and divided into different subspecies (the only ones that are really relevant are the serpents, dragons, aquatics, and raptors). Each subspec is mostly self explanatory by the name, (ex: serpents are lamias (with useless legs), dragons are gargoyles) but some are a bit more complex so I’ll just let the story explain that. I’ll probably explain a bit more in another chapter.

All that aside, concrit and grammar error reports are appreciated, thanks for all the clout- I mean hits so far

Chapter 3: Frenemies

Summary:

Author forgot how to write interesting filler chapters! Y a y !

Dignity woke up before the others, which was surprising, considering he usually woke up after the shelter had opened. He looked at the sleeping forms around him, then noticed Suns shift their wings. They were, apparently, also already awake.

He locked eyes with them for a moment, then looked away. Suns’ breathing was extremely audible in the near silence, a steady, guttural inhale and exhale. He focused on the sound, feeling Suns. They were calm, somehow — Dignity didn’t know what that somehow meant, but he could still understand.

He almost had hyperempathy, or so his mother had said when he told her he could feel others the way he did. He had been surprised to learn that it was actually very, very rare, in contrast to his previous belief that it was normal. She explained to him how the few like him could feel others’ emotions exactly as strongly as they felt them; the almost part was because he didn’t reflect the emotions too. He still was never given an answer as to how or why he could read others’ thoughts when they were loud enough, though.

He continued feeling Suns, reaching into their presence. They were like a rippling pond inside; their worries, pains, and trials all gently tucked away beneath the calm surface of the water. It was rare for Dignity to find someone who even seemed this balanced, it was usually either almost perfectly stable or terribly out of tune. But this was relaxing, a smooth mind to soothe his own crashing waves. He breathed in and out in time with Suns.

The shelter door started opening, interrupting Dignity’s feeling and waking the others. Suns and his father immediately bolted to the door, their hunger radiating from their minds, while Dignity and the others followed casually behind. Suns took flight and circled over the reservoir, searching for something, and the others started scaling the cliff. Dignity grabbed his father’s tail, the contact flooding his mind with his father’s frustration as he tried to find a clawhold in the stone.

“Meet us at the top!” His mother called to Suns, who was still circling the water. They let out a roar of acknowledgment.

Dignity felt an external surge of satisfaction as his father found a place to put his claws and started climbing. His mother grabbed his father’s tail and held his siblings with her wings. His father started climbing faster, having found a lizard-sized trail of clawholds leading to the top of the cliff.

His father climbed for some time, the others holding on tightly, until Suns came down to help. They grabbed Dignity and flew him to the top of the cliff, where three jetfish lay in a pile. Suns told him to wait while they grabbed his siblings, then his mother, but didn’t help his father, for reasons Dignity couldn’t find in their mind.

After a minute of waiting, his father made it to where they waited, clearly exhausted. Dignity and Suns — but mostly Suns — had already eaten two jetfish, and Suns had already eaten half of the third when his father moved in to take the rest of it.

“Could’ve left a bit more for me,” he mumbled between mouthfuls, glaring at Suns. They kept their straight face and stared back at him. After a brief moment, Suns growled and looked away.

Dignity felt into his father and Suns. There was a negativity between the two, instinctual and personal. It was more than dislike, but less than hatred. This tension between them that Dignity couldn’t quite describe. And he couldn't find the reason for it. It would have seemed irrational if it wasn’t so clear to him that there was something between them that he simply didn’t know about.

Dignity released their minds and turned toward his mother, who was facing in what he assumed to be the direction they needed to go. He walked over to her and sat. She was staring upwards, at what, Dignity couldn’t tell. At least, until he looked upward himself.

In the sky, far above them, the surrounding buildings, and even the thick clouds, was a massive structure. So massive that it covered most of the sky from where Dignity sat. It loomed over them, casting a massive shadow to the west. Dignity awed at it, humbled by its sheer scale.

He turned to his mother, forcing himself to look away from the grand structure. She continued staring at it. He felt a longing coming from her and wondered what it was for. She kept looking at the structure. He gently tapped her for attention.

“Mother,” Dignity signed, looking back at the structure. “What is that?”

“That,” she responded. “Is Grey Wind, the iterator we’re going to.”

“That is…” he started, confused. “An iterator?”

“Yes, that’s an iterator.”

“How can that be an iterator, we are living organisms, not massive superstructures?”

“Well, that will take some explaining.”

“What?”

“I’ll tell you another time, if you don’t figure it out on your own by then,” she glanced at him with a slight smile, the one that meant he wasn’t ready for what he wanted to know.

“Let’s go,” his father’s voice called from behind them. “We’ve still got ground to cover before the next shelter.” He slithered toward the industrial jungle in front of them, not waiting for the others.

Dignity followed close behind his father, still mesmerized by the sight above them. None of the others seemed to feel anything toward the massive structure, again, for reasons he did not understand. It was almost as if it wasn’t there for them, even when it was covering a quarter of the sky. He doubted he would ever understand.

He stared up at the structure until it was blocked by a wall in front of them, grounding Dignity again. The group had found some kind of small tower that was apparently necessary to climb, as all other directions were massive unclimbable walls.

“Well this is gonna be very fun,” his father said, sarcastically. “Just what we all need, another big building to climb right before we climb an even bigger building!” His mother nudged him with her wing.

“Actually,” Suns interjected. “I could carry you over it.”

“Yeah, just like you carried all of us up that cliff,” his father retorted.

“Sig, you are a serpent,” they said. “I can only carry you so far before my wings give out under your weight.”

“You just offered to carry us!” He shouted, tail lashing, sails raising.

“Because there are places for me to rest here,” they responded calmly. “I cannot carry you up a sheer cliff with no resting spots.”

“Hey, hey,” his mother interrupted before his father could shout again. “let’s not fight right now, please.” She looked at his father, who looked away angrily. One of Suns’ antennae twitched, but they didn’t say anything. “I would like to take your offer, Suns.”

Suns nodded and jumped off the ground. After a moment of circling, they steadily dove down, grabbed Dignity’s mother in their talons, and flew over the tower. After a few moments of waiting, they returned and did the same for Dignity.

He felt the air rush past him as he was brought up and over the tower. He looked down, seeing everything they would have had to get past on their own, feeling relieved that they wouldn’t have to. Suns drifted down to the other side of the tower and dropped him beside his mother, then flew back to get his father. After returning with a very unhappy serpent, Suns circled above them again.

“Keep moving,” they called from above. “I will be back.” They flew somewhere toward the east. Dignity exchanged glances with his mother and his father stared angrily at the sky where Suns was.

The group moved on, passing through pipes and avoiding a few lizards until they reached the shelter, which was littered with random shiny objects. They climbed into the rather spacious shelter and settled themselves. After a while of waiting, Dignity heard the sounds of the approaching rain and Suns entered the shelter, carrying two dead lantern mice in their teeth, a few blue fruits, and a few more shiny things in their claws.

They set one mouse in front of Dignity’s father, put down the new additions to their steadily increasing shiny object collection so they could hold their own, and gave the fruit to his mother. Dignity felt some strange attractive feeling toward the random things radiating from Suns. He guessed it was just some strange dragon thing. He added this to his list of things he would never understand.

Suns started tearing from their mouse, staring at the items in the ground. Dignity’s father picked up his mouse and swallowed it whole, as he almost always did with his prey. It always unsettled Dignity when he did that. Suns gave Dignity’s father a glance before looking back at their collection. His mother’s face said she felt the exact same way he did about his father’s strange habit.

Suns eventually finished their mouse, letting out a content growl and closing their eyes. His father was already asleep. His mother leaned against the shelter wall and closed her eyes too, the little ones in her arms still nibbling at their tiny pieces of fruit and keeping her awake. Dignity watched her and his tiny siblings until he couldn’t keep his own eyes open and fell asleep.

Notes:

More lore time! (Notes notes after the lore)

Dignity using sign language.
So (and I totally didn’t forget to do this last chapter) Diggy uses sign language (specifically Suns’ and Spearmasters’, which has become the norm by now). No he’s not mute, he’s just not comfortable talking (and this totally isn’t me projecting nope no nope totally not nope). Bro has this extreme monotone (also totally not projecting) that makes him sound f u n k y so he just kinda doesn’t talk.

Suns’ shiny stuff addiction!
So Suns is a dragon (if you couldn’t tell by then being directly called a dragon) so they do dragony things. Such as: shiny object addiction! I’m not sure why I did this, it’s probably not gonna actually become a big thing. Just kinda here because Sunny is dragon = dragons like hoarding shiny things = Suns likes hoarding shiny things. And yes, they do have a massive twenty foot pile of shiny things where they live. May or may not actually write anything about that.

Actual chapter notes time: So I’m a bit happier with this than the last chapter. It’s still not quite what I want it to be, but it’s definitely at least a little better. But I can’t really talk since I’ve only actually been writing fanfics for a year and a half now, Rain World for three months, and cannon characters for literally three weeks. So not the best quality for now. Probably gonna have some actual quality chapters later though.

Anyway, concrit and spelling/grammar mistake stuff accepted, blah blah blah, have a nice day/night yall!

Chapter 4: Restless

Summary:

Filler content(tm) with a tiny pinch of character depth

Dignity felt an intense burning hunger. Strong enough it made his stomach spasm even though the feeling wasn’t his. He curled in on himself, clutching his waist and lashing his tail.

He looked up, trying to find the source of this agony. He met the glowing red eyes of Seven Red Suns. They stared down at him hungrily. He looked to the other sides of the room. Nobody else was there.

Suns stepped towards him. He couldn’t move. They took another step. Dignity continued staring into their eyes, the pain keeping him where he was. Suns kneeled down to his chest. Dignity braced himself.

Suns’ jaws opened. Dignity watched as a scalding drop of saliva fell onto his scales. They met his eyes. Their guilt flooded his mind. They looked away again. They dug their teeth into his chest and-

Dignity and Suns woke from the shared nightmare. Dignity had never shaken so hard in his life. He looked at Suns, who was projecting a mix of every form of guilt he had ever felt. They would never do that, He could feel them think. It wasn’t them, they aren’t a…

He started to rethink his assumption that Suns was stable.

The thoughts grew distant, fading back to a normal strength that Dignity couldn’t hear. He honestly didn’t want to hear them, he never did. Whenever he could hear thoughts they were always horrible. It was almost always fear, pain, guilt, or sadness in the other’s mind. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought those were the only things others felt.

Suns stared at him distantly, still deep within their own thoughts. Dignity pulled his tail closer and whimpered, something he hadn’t done in quite a while. The sound seemed to bring Suns back to reality and they looked away shamefully. Dignity could faintly hear their thoughts again. They aren’t a… they… they’re not… not…

Dignity’s father stirred, projecting his own negative feelings. His mother too, even his little siblings. Oh… He must have been projecting himself. The others surely wouldn’t have the same nightmare as him, or anything like it, but their dreams still wouldn’t be pleasant.

He looked over at Suns again; they were curled around themselves like a scared slugpup, shaking. He wondered what was going on in their mind. They must have done… something to someone to make them feel that way about themselves, but Dignity couldn’t think of what. Had they hurt someone they cared about? Had they killed someone by accident? He would never know, would he. So many things he would never know.

His father stirred again, then woke with a loud, stern hiss, which woke his mother and siblings. He panted, holding his tail. Dignity’s mother shook in her corner, his siblings wriggling uncomfortably in her arms. They stayed like this until the shelter door opened.

They quickly moved out of the shelter, Suns first — in case there was anything waiting for them outside. Suns flew up to scout ahead and the others followed slowly behind. The first half of the cycle went as it usually did, avoiding things, climbing things, and catching the smaller edible things that got too close.

They had just scaled a small when Suns called for them to stop. “Red lizard,” they said as they landed on the wall. Dignity’s father immediately tried to jump off the wall to fight the lizard, but was grabbed by the tail before any distance could be made.

“Really,” he said, looking at Suns. “I can’t do a single thing on my own.” He glared at them, his annoyance clear in Dignity’s mind.

“You,” Suns growled. “can’t fight a blue lizard without dying. I highly doubt you can kill a red one.” They flicked their tail and left to kill the lizard without letting him argue any further.

After a few moments of waiting, Suns returned and told the others it was safe to continue. They stopped for a few minutes to let Dignity, his father, and Suns eat the lizard’s corpse before moving on.

After a few more lizard encounters — each starting another quickly cut off argument between the larger two — the group reached a karma gate that Dignity’s mother said would be the last before they reached the leg. On the other side of the gate was a greatly appreciated, though very small shelter, which the group somehow managed to fit into.

Dignity squeezed between his father and Suns, a decision that was immediately regretted once the doors closed and he found himself trapped between a living furnace and a ticking emotional time bomb. Dignity’s scales scratched uncomfortably against his father’s as they shifted into slightly more comfortable positions within the tiny shelter. Meanwhile, on his other side, Suns radiated amounts of heat Dignity didn’t know a living being could produce. He suddenly wished he could sweat.

Somehow, by some miracle from whatever controlled their world, Dignity fell asleep. An uncomfortable, nightmare filled sleep, but still sleep. It was concerning, though, how many nightmares he had had recently. Every one of them were about Suns and his father fighting while he watched from afar. Some of them ended in one killing the other — usually his father killing Suns. He couldn’t have counted how many times he woke up if he wanted to, though that was mostly because he was tired.

By the time the next cycle had come, Dignity had woken enough times that he might as well have stayed awake half the night. He tried to keep his eyes open as the doors started their loud grinding, but he simply couldn’t keep himself awake. He let his eyes close and felt warm claws pick him up as he let the calm of sleep take him again

Notes:

Delicious filler love it yup so great

A n y w a y
This one is kinda meh. Not the best, but not absolutely terrible. In hindsight though, I think I actually saved myself from having to abruptly start a few things that for now shall go unmentioned.

No lore today (finally), enjoy the short notes while they last.

Concrit, spelling, grammar, blah blah blah all that stuff. Happy super late Halloween I totally didn’t forget about that goodbye-

Chapter 5: Introduksjon til Verdighet

Summary:

verdighet (Bokmål Norwegian)

 

dignity: n.
dignǝdē

the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect;
a sense of pride in oneself; self-respect

nobility; quality; rank

from Latin “dignus” (worthy)

He feels warmth sink through his freshly formed scales and into his whole body. He cannot yet see, but he can sense safety. He moves slightly. The warm liquid around him moves with him.

He feels cramped. Not enough to bother him, but just enough for him to want to move. He moves, wiggles, squirms. He pushes himself against the barriers containing him. He feels then move, he’s making progress. He keeps pushing.

A small crack comes from somewhere, and he feels a different sensation. It feels right. The cracking comes again as he continues pushing, pushing, pushing. He pushes with his head. More cracking, cracking, cracking.

The walls feel unstable now. He keeps going.

He pushes.

And pushes.

And pushes, until-

CRACK!

He falls out of the container. The odd sensation comes again, the feeling of the warmth leaving. He dislikes this feeling.

He opens his eyes, now that he is aware of them. He is flooded with the sensation of color. He does not yet know how to describe what he sees. Something moves close to him, a blur of some light color that looks like the larger color above him. Another color moves, behind the first color. The other color is darker, more like the other colors around it, but unique enough to be seen.

He looks up at the rest of the first color. It looks back at him. It makes him feel good. He can vaguely feel something from it; not a feeling of his, but its. It feels good. It moves something, then turns to the other shape of color, which also moves something.

He continues looking up at it as it picks him up and holds him in a comforting way. He still does not understand, but he enjoys what he feels.

This world is much bigger than what he knew before.

And still is.

Notes:

Okay I literally got impatient to post this (I write two-three chapters ahead of what’s posted - currently on chapter 8) so early chapter y a y

Also Ao3 decided I’m five (I think) hours ahead of where I actually am and I tried to fix it but it said “n o” so I guess we have Back to the Future chapters now

Chapter 6: Encounter

Summary:

Dig and Snus one on one wall time with totally nobody else there nope no one else

Dignity felt a cold breeze rushing past him as he opened his eyes. He almost felt like he was flying. What a dream, flight. If only he could-

He looked down.

Had he been anyone else, he would have screamed, but he didn’t. He squirmed just for a moment before he realized what was happening. He looked up. He was being carried by Suns, as suspected.

He looked down again, calmer now knowing he was within firm talons. The ground was so far away that lizards looked like colorful batflies on the ground. So much smaller than him, simply because he wasn’t close. The towers and smaller ruined buildings on the ground so much smaller than they actually were. So far below now.

His thoughts were cut short by a powerful emotional urge projected by Suns. They dove downward to a tower directly below them and set Dignity down before gracelessly stumbling to the ground. They looked around wildly, then spotted something and sprinted toward it at a speed Dignity wasn’t sure someone so large should be capable of possessing. They stopped at a pile of rubble and started removing rocks and weathered bricks from it, only finally stopping when whatever they were looking for was uncovered.

Dignity stared in confusion as they felt a rewarding feeling from Suns. They calmly turned back to him, holding a small, very shiny golden mask in their mouth like a scavenger that had just found a pretty pearl. They promptly grabbed him again and returned to the air.

Dignity looked up at Suns’ new possession, still confused as to why this seemed so important to them. The same reason they seemed to need to collect all the other random shiny things they seemed so obsessed with, he guessed. Yet another addition to the growing list of things he would never understand.

He kept watching the ground, its greys and muted greens all blending together as Suns flew past. Why was he being carried by Suns anyway? Where were his parents? Was he at least still going in the same direction as before? Yes, he was, fortunately.

In fact, they had been going in the right direction for so long that the massive structure once looming over them was now directly in front of them

Dignity stared in awe and fear at the massive wall before him. Strange extrusions released massive clouds of steam that rose to the wall of clouds above. Lizards climbed everywhere, chasing smaller things and fighting other lizards for seemingly no reason. Two shapes, one off-white, the other navy blue, which Dignity recognized as a slugcat and an iterator respectively, slowly scaled the wall far below them.

Suns tilted their wings and turned to the left. They glided around one of the steaming extrusions and landed on a platform with an entrance to a shelter in the wall. They dropped Dignity, then entered the shelter to set down the golden mask.

Dignity turned to face the edge of the platform, looking up at the thick clouds just above them when Suns came out. He looked back at them.

“Apologies for bringing you here without your knowledge,” they said. “Moon requested I bring you here until she returns from Grey Wind. She also asked that I guard and provide for you until then.” They waved a wing downward, “She and Sig are still scaling the leg below us, so we will likely have to wait a good few cycles.”

Dignity nodded. His mother surely had a reason for him to stay with Suns while she attended whatever matters she needed to with Wind. Speaking of…

He knelt down and put a hand on the gently vibrating ground. His mother had said that this entire structure was an iterator. That was… still quite the thought. Nearly incomprehensible, he dared to think. He rubbed the rough metal, as if soothing the person below. He suddenly felt… very, very small. If his mother spoke the truth, then he was indeed standing on a massive, massive member of his own kind. One so large that the entire population could likely fit on top. He looked past, to the ground below. Everything was so much smaller. It must all seem microscopic to the larger being below him. So, so much larger…

His stomach growled. He looked behind himself. Suns was laying down behind him and looked up when he turned to them. They tilted their head.

“Hungry,” he signed. Suns nodded and got up, stretched, then dove off the platform.

Dignity watched as they dove to a lower part of the wall until they were obscured by one of the extrusions. He doubted they would take long, they were a dragon, after all. He moved his antennae forward, straining to hear anything, but they were too far down to be heard. He would simply have to wait.

He lay down, listening to the humming of the structure. He tried to mentally reach out to the iterator, but found no anchor. He sighed, but felt relieved that he would have some mental silence, for once. The first silence since…

He decided not to think about that.

A batfly drifted down past him, just out of reach. His mouth watered. His eyes followed the batfly as it flew down, then back up again. He moved forward and raised his arms. It flew up toward him again, not knowing he had moved. It rose within his reach and, in a quick motion, was caught in his hands. He swiftly bit off a wing, not bothering to kill it first, then the other, then the rest. It only made him hungrier.

He looked around himself in every direction but down. Nothing edible. There were rocks, but he I wasn’t nearly that desperate. He sighed. Surely Suns wouldn’t take too much longer.

And indeed they didn’t. A lizard cried loudly in pain and Suns returned with its blue-and-black corpse. Dignity fidgeted with his tail until Suns dropped the lizard in front of him. He hungrily tore off a large chunk of the rich flesh. Suns soon joined him.

After a few minutes of eating, Dignity sat back, full. He licked his face up to his eye, quite content. Suns was still eating. Quite viciously, as always; likely another dragon thing. Adding to the never understanding list.

That list had really been growing lately.

Dignity yawned. He’d been sitting here most of the cycle now. Doing basically nothing. Somehow, he felt bored. He looked to his sides, which looked basically the same as any other direction, excepting forward, which was the edge. Walls and pipes and a little slugcat and-

Wait, that slugcat wasn’t there before. Dignity stood up and walked towards the off- white slugcat, which he was sure was the same one he’d seen before. It hadn’t noticed him yet, and was instead looking at a gap in the platform it was on, thinking. He inched closer, listening to its thought process as it tried to figure out how to cross the gap. He inched closer, and closer, and closer-

“Back off serpent!” A stern voice said from his right. He jumped, looking over to the wall that suddenly had a tall, navy blue figure by it. The stranger had six narrow, spike shaped antennae and large fins on his sides, an even larger one on the tip of his tail. Sharp teeth were bared and gills on his neck flared. A shark.

Dignity backed up a step, trying to show he wasn’t a threat. The shark waved his tail aggressively, pointing a spear at him. “Don’t even think about it,” he warned. “That is my slugcat!” His gills flared even more and he took a step forward. Dignity took another step back. The slugcat looked back.

“I do not wish to steal from you,” Dignity signed. “I was observing.”

“Why should I trust you?” The shark growled, holding his spear more firmly. “I know you’re just trying to kill him.”

“I swear, I was not,” Dignity signed, fear rising in him. He took another step back.

The shark took three steps toward him and raised his spear. Dignity prayed.

A roar sounded from behind and large wings beating were heard as Suns flew in to help. They grabbed the shark, causing him to drop his spear, and flew high. They roared again, directly at the shark, then dropped him from a safer height back onto the platform.

They landed in front of him, smoke rising from their nose, height difference making them seem massive. The shark looked up at them, trembling. Suns walked over to Dignity, looked back to the shark, then at Dignity again and walked away.

The slugcat, who has seen the entire thing, grabbed the shark by the tail and dragged him to a lower level. The shark stared blankly forward.

Dignity looked back at them, felt a wave of an all too familiar feeling, and followed behind Suns.

Notes:

And here begins my absolute least favorite part to write!

Why are iterator walls the best part of the game but the worst part to write. If I had to write my wall experience, it would literally just be “there was a lizard, then a dropwig, then a stupid cyan flung itself off the edge of the world”. I cannot express how much I hate writing the wall. Curse the wall.

I realize now I just vented hating a wall.

Anyway I don’t have much commentary this time (that isn’t just screaming at a wall) so uh. Yeah. All that stuff, spelling, grammar, concrit, have a not bad day.

Chapter 7: Spears-Three-Tips

Summary:

Shark man and his pet cat meet Dig and Sunny part 2

Dignity sat in the shelter and thought. Just… thought. About anything, everything. His name, others’ names, reality, the world. Anything that came to mind was welcome. Anything except one specific thought.

This had happened to him before. Every now and then there were cycles where he couldn’t get himself out of the shelter and he would be dragged out. He couldn’t focus. He couldn’t stand. If it weren’t subconscious, he likely wouldn’t be able to breathe.

He looked at the ceiling, trying to rid himself of his terrible thoughts. Terrible memories. The few things he’d rather die than have in his life. The only things he’d rather die than have in his life.

A dark red wing rushes past his face. He looked at the wall. A spear flies by. He looked at the ground. The sound of a scream lingers in his mind. He rolled onto his side.

A name is called. He looked at his hands.

A cry for mercy. He clenched his fists.

Blood spilled everywhere; it got in his scales. He squeezed his eyes shut.

A tiny voice is cut off.

He runs. He doesn’t stop. He dives into the river when he knows he can just barely swim. He doesn’t look back. He runs and runs and runs and runs and runs and-

“Mrrp?”

Dignity jumped. He looked to his sides, eventually finding the pale intruder.

“Mrrp, mrr wawert wawar’t?” The little slugcat said in its little slugcat language. “Warrp’rr, wawa rrptr’orrt wawar.” The slugcat looked at him as if he could understand what it was saying. He vaguely recognized the word “you”, but otherwise did not understand the creature, even its mind was too foreign.

“I am sorry, I do not understand you,” he signed, hoping he hadn’t found himself at a language barrier. “Do you understand iterator sign?”

It looked at him, very much not understanding, and gave a small “mrr?”

Dignity sighed, he hated using his voice, but the only other option was seeing if it could understand vocal language.

“Can you understand me now,” he said in his rarely used near-monotone. The slugcat nodded yes. Dignity sighed in relief.

“Why are you here?” he asked. “Do you want something? Are you looking for Suns?” The slugcat motioned for him to leave the shelter, then exited itself. He followed.

Dignity jumped again, completely unprepared to see the shark from yesterday standing right outside the shelter. The slugcat climbed up the shark’s back and draped itself around his shoulders. Dignity’s eyes widened in fear.

The shark bent down slightly, reaching Dignity’s height, and looked him in the eyes. Dignity almost crawled back into the shelter, but he decided not to. If he was going to be killed, he likely would have been dead already. He stood straight and looked back at the shark.

“Look,” the shark said, then sighed. “Last cycle was a misunderstanding, I would like to offer you and your… friend… something as an apology.” He looked away and shifted his tail. “It’s the least I can do for trying to kill you.”

Dignity paused, considered for a moment, then responded. “I accept, we will wait for my friend to return. I do not know where they are at the moment.” His last signs grew slower as he realized he really didn’t know where Suns was. That… might be a problem. But, for now, he wouldn’t worry about Suns’ whereabouts.

The shark nodded, lowering his antennae in respect.

“By the way,” he said. “I’m Twelve Foreseen Tridents, but you can just call me Tri. You are?”

“Illuminated Dignity. The dragon is Seven Red Suns. We are waiting for the rest of our board to return.”

“Ah,” he sat himself down, moving to the side to let Dignity have space. “Can I assume they’re also climbing Grey Wind?”

“Yes, they are,” Dignity sat and started stroking the sensitive spot on his tail.

“Hmm,” Tridents looked up toward the top of the massive superstructure they were on. “It seems like more and more people are coming to Wind lately. I wonder why…” He tapped the ground with his tail a few times.

The distant sound of wings grew louder, Dignity and Tridents looked up. Suns had returned, carrying yet another strange shiny object. This might become a problem, Dignity realized.

Suns landed and entered the shelter to set down the silver ring they had found, then exited and gave Tridents a glare. He inched back slightly.

“Why are you here again?” Suns interrogated. Tridents stammered for a moment, but Dignity responded for him.

“Do not antagonize him, Suns,” he signed, then flicked his tongue. “He means us no harm. There was a misunderstanding last cycle.” He flicked his tongue again, then glanced between the two larger iterators. “I also highly doubt he would attempt to harm me again knowing you would protect me.”

Suns looked between the two for a moment. They gave Tridents a slightly softer glare, then sat down beside Dignity, still radiating distrust. Dignity flashed one of the small bioluminescent spots on his face.

“Wurrtrerrtrorr’trrt,” the slugcat on Tridents’ shoulders chimed in. “Trerorrt watrurr wawara.” It flicked an ear and gently pressed against his neck.

Tridents looked at the sky. “I guess we do,” he said, apparently understanding the slugspeak. “We need to go now,” he said, turning back to Suns and Dignity. “See you another cycle, maybe. And don’t forget about my offer!” He spun around and sprinted off toward a nearby pole and climbed out of view.

“He left quickly,” Suns said, narrowing their eyes. Their right antenna twitched in the way Dignity had learned meant suspicion.

“They likely needed to hurry,” Dignity signed. “It is already halfway through the cycle.”

“What?” They said, confused.

“You noted that they left in a hurry.”

“I… never said anything.”

“…”

“Are you… telepathic?”

“Am I what?” Dignity signed. “What is ‘telepathic’?”

“A telepath is one who is capable of reading others’ minds,” they explained. “I had not said anything aloud, yet you believed I did. From this I drew the conclusion that you heard my thoughts in that moment, and assumed I had said them.”

Dignity processed that for a moment. A mind reader? He didn’t think of himself as a… mind reader. He would consider himself a mind feeler, not reader. He couldn’t hear others’ thoughts unless they were strong, what Suns described was someone who could actively hear thoughts, not what he felt. Maybe he was… somewhere in between?

“I do not believe that to be an accurate description of myself,” he signed. “I cannot actively read thoughts.”

Are you sure about that, Suns distinctly thought, surprising Dignity with how clear it was in their mind. They tilted their head and opened one eye slightly more than the other. Have you considered this capability could still be maturing? Tell me, not-mind reader, how we have shared so many nightmares recently, or how you know me so well when we have only known each other for five and a half cycles?

Dignity raised his hands to sign, then dropped them. It was strange to grow accustomed to others as fast as he did, he realized. And Suns was right, he wasn’t able to feel others as clearly in his early cycles. Hmm…

“I suppose… that is a possibility,” he signed. “But even so, I would not consider my current self a telepath.”

“But there is still a chance.”

“Only a chance.”

Notes:

Oh boy lore time except it’s really more worldbuilding than lore this time.

So, the weird slugcat language. That’s a thing now.
There’s a lot of weird stuff going on with this and I’m actively trying to figure out how grammar and spelling are gonna work (I might come back to a few chapters and change some stuff) so if some madlad wants to decode this I hope they like redoing everything halfway through.

(If anyone does though…)
A few words to start with

Day/cycle - warrp
Hello = mrrp
Large = brorrt
Leave = trerorrt
Me = wawa
Name = wartro
No = err
Rock = trot
We = wawara
You = wawar
Yes = trr

The chapter title is the direct translation of the slugcat word for tridents — wurrtrerrtrorr’trrt

And yes, this language is heavily based off of actual sounds my cat has actually made (minus the wawa)

Chapter 8: Untold Observance

Summary:

Tw/Cw: moderate blood, gore, child death

Notes:

Quick chapter summary at the end for those who would rather not read the details

Dignity spent the next six cycles sitting in the shelter and looking down at the ground so far below. He wondered how far his parents were, if they were already climbing down again, if they had also met Tridents and his slugcat.

He puffed steam from his nose, a little thing he had taken from Suns. He had picked up a good few habits and smaller actions from them in the time he’d been on the wall with them. He’d also been educated on a few superstructure iterator terms, functions and other general information one would need when scaling such a being. Dignity exhaled more steam, this time trying to imagine how it would feel to one of these  massive iterators.

What an existence they must have, these great beings. What does it feel like to be such a grand structure? Is this something he could experience? Is he even able to comprehend what it would be like?

Why must he have been born as he was instead of created as one of them? What were the chances he would have been one of them, had there been some slight difference in the events leading up to his existence? What would have happened, had he been one? Would he even be the same person? Would he even follow the same-

He shook his head. Questions like this would only lead to spiraling, if his parents’ thoughts said anything, confusing as they were.

He left the shelter, yawning, and stretched. Suns was already tearing into an orange lizard, but paused when they noticed Dignity approaching. He sat across from them and started taking his share.

“The others will be here soon,” they said, licking gore off of their claws. “We will descend once they reach us if we still have time.” Dignity nodded.

The two finished the lizard and waited for the others to return. Surprisingly, they didn’t take very long.

A familiar green figure dropped from a pipe above the platform, followed by a familiar blue figure holding a smaller familiar green figure and a smaller familiar blue figure. Said smaller figures now had their own pairs of tiny antennae.

Dignity felt a new feeling well up inside his chest. A protective feeling, almost like pride. Responsibility? He had no clue what it was. But it only came when he looked at his siblings, for whatever reason. He didn’t know exactly why he felt it, but he assumed it was some kind of… bond. Something telling him he needed to keep his young siblings safe. From what, it didn’t matter.

He noticed after a moment that the others had all gone silent. They were doing that thing that they did with their antennae again. He still didn’t understand it. After a few moments, Suns nods and Dignity’s mother motions for him to follow.

The group began descending from the platform Dignity and Suns had stayed on for the last few cycles. Suns flew around the area they were in and warned them of any visible threats — mainly orange lizards. They waited out whatever was there before continuing down.

All went well until Suns warned of a particular threat ahead. Scavengers. Dignity froze just hearing the word.

“There is a decently sized party of them on the next vent,” Suns said, still watching from the air. They circled closer to the others to be heard more clearly. “They each hold multiple spears. Though there are no elites with them.”

Dignity took a small step backwards, shaking. The others looked at him with concern. He started breathing faster, shaking harder. His eyes lost focus. He felt the concern grow.

The world turned into a blur of mental and physical. He could tell the others were still looking at him, but he didn’t know where they were. He couldn’t feel his body. Then he heard a sound. He thought it was his own voice, but it didn’t sound like it had when he last heard it. Or maybe it had just been so long it had changed. The sound grew louder, now accompanied by the loud thoughts of fear from the others.

He couldn’t make out what it was he was saying, or what the others were thinking, or what was happening in the blur of color around him. He moved, he didn’t know where to, but he didn’t care. His head started feeling light. The voices of the others grew louder, but he couldn’t tell if they were talking or thinking.

Then, in an instant, he could see again. But it wasn’t what he should have seen. He wasn’t on the wall here. He was back in the marsh again. Back with… with… no. He was with his parents, still young, eight. It was a normal day, traveling. There was a scavenger toll in the direction they were headed. An unavoidable one, unfortunately, but his parents were, for whatever reason, unwilling to trade their pearls.

They reached the toll and were greeted by a light grey scavenger. He signed at them in some scavenger language Dignity didn’t understand, but he could easily tell he wanted payment. He saw his mother sign something back to him. He shook his head, signing something else. She signed back, then nodded at him and flicked an antenna. The scavenger still seemed unpleased, signing yet another phrase Dignity didn’t understand. His mother sighed, then said they would need to find some spears to trade. She was clearly still not going to give him her pearls.

Just as they turned around, a spear flew over their heads, hitting the scavenger now behind them. They turned back toward the toll. Every scavenger was looking at them. Dignity took a step back. A scavenger pointed at them, spear raised, then yelled something in their language.

All at once, the scavengers threw their spears at them. They started running. The spears kept coming. They ran faster. A spear landed right in front of Dignity. He froze, panting. He was behind his parents now, but his father turned back to help him.

His father yelled something, but Dignity was panicking and couldn’t hear him. He grabbed his hand, forcing him to move, but he still froze for three seconds.

Three seconds was enough time for a spear to land in his father’s forehead.

Dignity screamed. His father, or his body, fell limp on the ground. Dignity tried to run to his mother. He was just in time to see her reach for him, only to be stabbed too. He looked around, trying to find his one last hope. Further away, running toward him, was his… sibling. He reached for them. They reached for him. He grabbed their hand and they started running together, as fast as they possibly could. He thought they would make it. He was sure they would make it.

But fate had other ideas.

A third spear hit them in the back. Their crimson scales almost hid the blood spilled on them. They looked up at him from the ground. They call his name, they scream it. A scavenger races toward them. He wants to run. He wants to save his sibling. He can’t decide.

The scavenger raises their spear at his grounded sibling. They plead for mercy, to no avail. A fourth spear stabs them in the chest. Their blood is splattered on Dignity’s hands.

He turns. He runs. He doesn’t look back. He wants to, but he doesn’t look back. He keeps running, and running, and running. And then he does look back.

A crimson slugcat leaps toward the scavengers, sending spear after spear at them. He realizes now who threw the first spear. He feels anger, rage. But he can’t do anything. He couldn’t have done anything.

He saw nothing for a moment, then saw reality again. He was still hyperventilating.

He fainted.

Notes:

After a short wait, Moon and Sig return with Dignity’s siblings, who now have antennae. They descend uneventfully until Suns reports a scavenger party in their path. Dignity panics, flashing back to the cycle he lost his entire family to the scavengers; the only one who doesn’t return the next cycle is his first — and at the time, only — sibling. He becomes greatly disoriented by the sudden memory and faints.

 

Part one of the accidental mini saga I have now dubbed: Depressed Dignity because that’s literally all it is

The next few chapters are gonna be a bit heavier on dark topics, mind the tags and warnings

Chapter 9: Darkness

Summary:

Cw: suicidal thoughts

Notes:

Again, summary in the post-chapter notes

Dignity awoke suddenly, gasping. He was facing upward. His left leg hurt. His head felt light. His vision was blurry when he opened his eyes. He couldn’t remember what happened for a moment, until the memory came back.

Tears welled up in his eyes and his breathing became quick and shaky. A distant thought said he needed to calm down, but went nearly unheard. The tears started streaming and he started whimpering. The whimpering soon turned into wailing.

He didn’t know nor care how long it went on, crying, pausing to breathe, then crying even more. Every now and then he took a sharp, staggered breath. It only calmed when he felt a warm claw on his shoulder.

He looked to his side, where Suns was crouched beside him. They radiated their calmness, somehow. Almost like a mental anchor. Dignity’s wailing returned to a whimper.

“Listen,” they said. “I do not know what you are dealing with right now, nor do I believe I can relate,” they took a deep breath. “But you will be okay in the end.” They set their tail around him.

Dignity silently sobbed for an amount of time that he didn’t know. He didn’t care then. The whole cycle could have passed and the rain taken him away, he wouldn’t have cared. Nothing mattered anymore. Not without them. Nothing mattered, nothing, nothing, nothing-

His eyes opened suddenly as he was engulfed in a warm embrace. He felt Suns’ wings wrap around him, holding him tightly, lovingly. He could feel their warm breath on his scales as they held him close. Dignity fought the urge to relax in their hold.

A warm drop of water fell onto Dignity’s head. He looked up slightly. They were crying. Suns buried their face into Dignity’s neck, shaking, and made a few small whimpers of their own before finally releasing him. 

They moved themselves away from Dignity and stood up, regaining their composure. Dignity stared blankly at them.

“I-” they took a deep breath. “I… apologize for that… outburst.” They looked away. “You just-” another deep breath. “You remind me of my own child. I do not want to see you…” Their gaze drifted toward some distant place, their eyes clouding. They sat down again.

Dignity didn’t bother trying to search their mind for whatever they were seeing, instead opting to simply lay there, motionless. He laid there for a while. More time passed without his notice or care. He only moved when Suns told him the cycle was ending, only to let them grab him.

He was soon, once again, being carried by Suns to a nearby shelter. Once they had made it inside, Dignity slumped himself against a wall. Suns put their tail around him; he ignored it. He just wanted to sit here forever, doing nothing, saying nothing, thinking nothing. Just… exist here. Or maybe even just not exist at all.

He wondered what that would be like, not existing. Must be wonderful. Not having to deal with anything, not having to think horrible thoughts, not having to relive terrible memories. Blissful.

He dreamed of nonexistence. Pure void. Nothingness. It was better that way. It was always better that way. He didn’t know it, but he did. It was so, so much better that way. He should just stop existing right now. That would be better. That would be so much better. That would be-

He was taken from the dream by Suns waking him up. He drowsily stood up and limped out of the shelter. Suns said something that he didn’t hear and he was picked up again.

The wind felt oddly cold as he was flown back to where he had been the last cycle. He didn’t mind it. He didn’t mind anything. He didn’t mind being put on Suns’ back when he didn’t stand on his own. He didn’t mind the worried thoughts from his parents as they descended the structure. He didn’t mind.

The entire cycle was a blur. Everything was a blur. Thoughts and feelings and reality seemed to become one mass of everything. He only managed to focus on anything once they were in another shelter and everyone else was asleep.

Dignity looked around at the others’ sleeping forms. The scene would have been better if they were still here. Their maroon twined around his purple, both dedicated to the other until they grew old enough to part. If only…

He looked at his hands. The blood had been washed off for more longer than they had been alive now. He shakily inhaled and exhaled. How come they didn’t come back. Everyone else did, it would only make sense. But life didn’t work that way, did it. It had to take his sibling, and only them, no one else. It wasn’t fair.

He laid on his side, staring at a wall. He wished, more than anything else, that he could die. Not just die and come back, no, die forever. Be done with everything going wrong in his life. Kill himself.

It was a stupid thought, he knew. It wasn’t possible to permanently die, everyone knew that. But he could always wish. He could always wish…

Notes:

Dignity, after falling off the wall, is taken back up by Suns — not before a quick snuggle session to ease the pain, mental and physical. He feels completely apathetic to the world around him and can only focus on the unfairness of the world and what his nonexistence would be like. He reminds himself that such a thing is impossible, with the nature of the cycle and decides to wish instead.

Chapter 10: Øy av Vegger

Summary:

vegg (Bokmål Norwegian)

 

wall: n.
wôl

a side of a building or room, typically forming part of the building’s structure;
any high surface or façade, especially one that is imposing in scale

barrier; separator; panel

from Latin “vallus” (stake; pole)

He is on the back of what he only knows as safety. He feels strange where they are. It is light, in a way. He feels as if, the deeper they go into the strange dark place, the less he is bound to the ground. He doesn’t like it.

The other one, fear-color, he had dubbed it, moves wildly beside him. They clearly don’t like it either, and were showing it more.

The untethered feeling becomes stronger as they enter the darkest part so far. He has a bad feeling, something about this place isn’t right, and yet… he feels something. Within the… walls. The concept is strange in his mind, but it fits what he has seen of these “wall” things so far.

The darkness is suddenly lifted and the strange feeling left. He finds himself and the other moving things he is with within a large, strange space. Above them is another shape that resembles those he was with, but a different color and with longer pointy things coming out of the top. 

Nothing seems to happen, though he can, somehow, tell that there is something going on. He just can’t see it.

Suddenly, he is brought toward the shape in front of him. He feels scared. He doesn’t know what it is doing with him or why. He doesn’t know what it can do to him. He doesn’t even know that it can do anything to him, but he is still scared nonetheless.

His breaths, already fast, become even quicker. A lurching feeling forms within him and he tries to squirm out of whatever is holding him.

He is then put down. Whether it was because he succeeded or because it had put him down on its own terms was beyond him.

The strange invisible thing takes fear-color. They squirm just as he did, and are set back down, just as he was. The two come together and wrap themselves around each other, both still scared from their encounters.

After some time, the bigger, safe shapes take them again and are forced out of the place by the strange invisible thing. He feels relieved. A glowing thing comes out of a wall. He does not know what it is, but doesn’t feel threatened by it, so pays it no mind. Soon, however, he finds himself with a problem.

The safe shapes place him and fear-color with a very large glowing shape made of the moving shapes stuck together. The large shape takes them both and the safe shapes he has been with so long now leave them. He feels betrayed.

The large shape takes them somewhere. It is much like the place with the other shape, but larger and darker. There is also a lack of other moving shapes here. He tries to squirm out of the glowing shape’s grasp, unsuccessfully. He looks at fear-color. They look at him. Neither knows what is happening.

The large glowing thing places them down and leaves. Long, thin strange things coming out of the walls replace it. The thin things grab him and fear-color and place them in a strange place. He begins to feel fear again, breath quickening. He does not have to feel it for long though, as he, for seemingly no reason, grows drowsy and falls asleep.

Chapter 11: Eleven Blades

Summary:

Upon the copper mountain it stands, the Grand Archway. At the peak of this arch is a podium. On this podium lie two testimonies; one of a person, the other machine. Both describe the setting sun over the horizon. The person describes it as an array of colors creating what we perceive as beauty; the machine describes it the same. The single difference, however, is how they are worded.

Notes:

Summaries are probably gonna be a lot less crack from here on just because of the tone of the next bit. Might have a few more crack summaries in some super far off chapters.

Dignity woke up feeling just as bad as he had the cycle before. Well, not exactly as bad, or in the same way. He felt better, yes, but he was tired. He could have sworn he was more tired than when he fell asleep. Maybe thinking like that could do that to someone.

He shifted his leg slightly, wincing at the sudden pain that came from it. Right, he broke it, didn’t he. He shifted his wings, which also ached, though not nearly as much. Despite what he knew were naive hopes, they still hadn’t grown any larger. He vented steam from his nose.

He tried to open one wing and realized he was being held by someone. Suns, if the forced calm said anything. Dignity could just barely see their dream. They and some smaller, pink figure — although “small” meant almost everyone to Suns — beside what Dignity assumed was a lake. They let off a wave of pleased warmth, a grin forming on their face.

The shelter doors started opening with a loud rumbling sound, startling both of them. Suns moved their arm off him and stood up, folding their wings behind their back. Dignity attempted to stand, but couldn’t manage to get on his leg. He was suddenly very jealous of his father’s ability to slither on his tail. He huffed more steam.

He jumped as a cool hand ran over the displaced scales on his leg. He sighed; only his mother. He turned his head to face her.

“I… believe it is broken,” he signed. “I cannot stand, I tried.” She looked at him sternly, concern radiating from her mind. He looked away.

“Oh well isn’t that great,” his father said sarcastically from behind. His mother glared at him. “You know, this wasn’t happening before we picked them up.” He side-eyed Suns, clenching his fists.

“Sig, please-”

“Actually, we were doing perfectly fine before they came.”

“Sig-”

“In fact, this wouldn’t have happened at all if they weren’t here! We wouldn’t be worrying our asses off about Dig if they hadn’t mentioned those Voiddamn scavengers!”

“Sig-”

“We’d really just be better off without them at all! All they’ve been doing is sitting around and letting us do everything while they lay in their high hoard of gold and watch the chaos unfold!”

“No Significant Harassment-”

“IF THEY WOULD JUST-”

Suns roared, a deafening, angered roar, directly at Dignity’s father. A thick cloud of steam and smoke came from their fully opened mouth, the inside of their throat glowing. They flared their wings, arms going limp, pupils slitting, stripes glowing intensely. Dignity nearly passed out from the mental blast, only suffering a sudden, intense headache instead.

They paused for a moment, then whipped around and rushed out of the shelter.

Dignity’s mother turned to follow, but stopped. She slumped, then sighed sharply. She turned back to face Dignity’s father, anger showing in her eyes and hurt in her mind. She opened her mouth to yell at him, but stopped herself, turning to Dignity instead. 

“We-” she took a breath and composed herself. “We need to fix… that.” She gestured to Dignity’s leg. She took another breath, closing her eyes for a moment. “Ideas?” His father looked up and shrugged. She sighed. “…Well then, you’ll just have to carry him.”

“What?” His father gave her a confused, slightly offended look, mentally annoyed. “What do you mean I have to carry him, can’t you carry-” he looked at his other children, whom Dignity had somehow mentally tuned out, still wide eyed and silent from Suns’ outburst. “Right, right, fine, I’ll take him.”

He grabbed Dignity’s hands and pulled him up so he could balance on his good leg, then turned partially. Dignity grabbed his shoulders and hauled himself onto his back, avoiding straining his left leg. It was uncomfortable, he had little space between his father’s sails and his tail dragged behind, but it worked.

His father slithered out of the shelter. Dignity could feel the softened rage within him flaring up from the less-than-productive interaction. He looked around for any sign of Suns, his view partially blocked by his father’s body. He could barely make out what looked like a small scorch mark on the ground to his left. He would have pointed it out had his mother not first.

She ran her tail over the blackened concrete. “Scorch marks,” she said looking in the direction the marks were pointed. She sighed, her mind gently radiating worry. She gave Dignity’s father a glare, then started following the black marks down the wall.

They slid down a pole, still very warm from having been recently used. The marks kept leading down, slowly becoming less intense and smaller. They passed another pole, this one broken, half on the ground. More scorch marks surrounded the area. Dignity thought he felt a distant emotion, though he couldn’t tell exactly what.

They continued descending, following the black marks. They found a few more small scenes, definitely caused by a very strong, iterator sized creature. They passed a broken spear, then jumped as a loud yell filled the air.

They rushed down to where the sound came from, passing any other signs without a glance, already knowing where they were going. Dignity held tightly to his father’s back, trying to keep his bad leg stil. They eventually made their way to a large vent, on the edge of which stood Suns, their wings half flared, looking down at someone. They roared and almost brought their claws down on whoever they were attacking, but paused upon hearing them approach.

They turned around, lowering their stance. The iterator they had pinned quickly scrambled to his feet, but were just as quickly grabbed by Suns. They pulled him back and bit into their shoulder, splattering blood on the other iterator’s copper skin. He screamed, his floating stone mane flaring, locking eyes with Dignity for just long enough for him to feel the pain.

Dignity was suddenly thrown onto the hard ground, his father dashing over to Suns. His head spun for a moment upon impact, his leg throbbing. He looked up to see his father knocking over Suns, who was too busy trying to keep the over iterator in their teeth to react. They landed on their side with an audible thud, nearly bringing the other down with them. His father threw his tail on top of them, knocking the wind out of them and cutting off the start of another roar. The other iterator stumbled away toward Dignity and his mother, holding his shoulder and gritting his teeth, his eyes wide. He nearly collapsed on the wall behind them.

Dignity’s father put part of his tail over Suns’ neck. His face turned to rage and he unhinged his jaw, unfolding his massive fangs, dripping with venom. Suns’ expression suddenly changed to pure terror. He aimed for their neck and attacked, but was blocked by their wing. His fangs sank deep into Suns’ wing; they silently screamed, lacking the air flow to do so.

Suns struggled, lashing out with what they could, to no avail. Their motions became slower and weaker. They eventually stopped struggling entirely. They squinted, then opened their jaws. Their stripes and the spaces under their scales started glowing, slowly at first, then brighter, then brighter. They started going pale. The glowing became even brighter, then suddenly stopped at a peak brightness. They opened their mouth as wide as it would go and closed their eyes.

Dignity’s father stared in confusion for a brief moment, before looking down at where his tail covered Suns’ chest. He stared curiously for a very short moment, then his eyes widened in shock. He looked back at Suns’ face again. Suns opened their eyes slightly, then released a sudden burst of flame at their attacker.

Dignity’s father jumped back. His tail, as heavy, long, and slow as it was, was caught in the flame. He hissed in pain, falling to the ground without the support of his tail. Suns took a moment to regain their strength, then stood up and roared. They jumped on top of Dignity’s father, hooking their claws between his scales. He looked up in anger and shock.

Suns bit into his chest, easily breaking the hard plating scales that covered it. He screamed in pain. Dignity’s father watched in horror as Suns ripped out a chunk of flesh and swallowed it. Suns bit down on his throat, harder this time. He screamed again, trying to push them off of him. The sound gurgled for a short second, then stopped entirely. Suns still didn’t let go. His struggling slowly grew slower, then stopped. He went completely limp, his mind empty, dead.

Dignity looked over to his mother, who was staring in shock and horror, covering his siblings eyes. She was too shocked to interfere, he realized. That or she knew Suns would have killed her. The stranger behind them watched with wide eyes, still holding his shoulder.

Dignity looked back at Suns, who was now hungrily tearing into his father’s chest. They paused, then turned their head toward them. There was a sudden blast of strong emotion, then they spread their wings and, their limbs dragging from the lack of effective lift, ungraciously flew over the side of the vent.

Notes:

Oh boy that was an abrupt ending if I’ve ever read one.

Okay trust me this chapter was gonna be a much more narratively interesting chapter but at some point I guess my brain malfunctioned and started writing an entire scene that boosted it up to literally 2,200 words. I would have waited to finish that but since the other chapters are around 1,000-1,750 words it would probably be a bit awkward to have a random massive chapter soooo-

And if that wasn’t enough on its own, life decided to hit me with a nice fat dose of attraction to a guy who clearly has no interest and I cannot focus oh my gosh. So if I miss a chapter or two (my schedule is one chapter every six days) it’s probably because I literally forgot that this existed for a hot second.

Anyway, have a nice day/night wherever y’all are out there, your kudos and comments have kept me motivated.

Chapter 12: Greater Secrets

Summary:

One account describes the beauty of the sun promptly before moving to complain of how little it means to the speaker, just as the rest in their life. The other account describes the sun in its full glory, every color, every shine, before the speaker begs the universe to let them see it with their own eyes.

The testimonies were placed there, atop the great arch, as a reminder to all who see it of the plight of those whom they walk upon. They were placed as a plea from those who care that someday they too will see the sunset with their own, digital eyes.

- Atop Highest Mountains (to Fill the Endless Stars)

Notes:

Prepare for five years of dialogue (for this fic’s standards)

Dignity stared at his father’s partially shredded body. He… no. No, no, no, no, he wouldn’t let it get to him again he wouldn’t. This isn’t the same it’s not the same stop no, no, NO-

“Are you… okay?” a voice says from behind. Dignity turns to see the copper iterator still there, his mind faintly radiating worry and relief. “You’re… um. You aren’t exactly- you don’t look-” he flattened his mane against his shoulders, flinching slightly. “Y’know.”

Dignity looked down at his arms, which were crossed over his chest. His hands were placed at the base of his neck, fingers wrapped around. His tail curled over his talons. Something told him his face was even worse. He dropped his arms and set his tail behind himself again, flexing his antennae to make sure they were aligned. A small shiver still went down his spine. He nodded.

“Okay…” the stranger said, skeptically. His mane returned to its normal size, each row orbiting in its own unique pattern. It almost felt as if he could see what was happening in his mind through it. His thoughts seemed to be… weakened, in a way, or maybe blocked by something. Maybe if he focused on the movements… hmm…

He shook his head, refocusing on what was happening. Those rings seemed to entrance him. Interesting… but that could be a problem. He would have to find out.

He looked over at his mother, who was still staring at his father. She breathed heavily, somehow keeping her composure. Dignity knew she would be sobbing within the hour. She had always hated how his father kept getting himself killed; now was no different. He looked back over at the copper stranger.

“Could you get her to help me?” he signed. The stranger gave him a confused look. “Can… you read sign?” He gave him an even more confused look.

“I, uh…” he looked around for a moment. “I don’t speak sign language.” He brought his mouth to a line, slightly awkwardly. Dignity sighed. He pointed to his mother, then to himself, then made a “come” motion with his hand. The stranger seemed to understand this. He turned to Dignity’s mother and gently nudged her with his tail, then motioned toward Dignity.

His mother looked at him, took a breath, and took a step toward him. She paused, thinking, then turned to the stranger. “Not to be an inconvenience to you, but,” she looked at Dignity. “He can’t move and I can’t exactly carry him, so, if you wouldn’t mind…”

“Sure,” he said. “You guys did just save me. Well, it was really just him, but you get it.” He came over to Dignity and hauled him over his good shoulder.

He noted the slight weightlessness he felt as he got a hold on the copper iterator. Possibly the same as what kept those tablets floating around his neck. Hmm… adding to the list of things to never understand.

Dignity gave one last glance at the scene before they started moving again, this time back upwards. The copper iterator’s body felt strange beneath Dignity as they moved, but he was… mostly fine with it. It felt harder than it should feel, to him at least. Rough, like there were rocks under the skin. Strange.

They kept going upwards, past the signs they had seen earlier and back up to the shelter. They would have to wait there for his father to come back, so there was no point in making progress. The copper iterator set Dignity down inside the shelter, then leaned against the wall himself. His mother laid his siblings down beside him, then went back out. Not without a glance at him and some strange looks between her and the stranger.

Dignity sat quietly with his back against the wall, glancing over at the stranger every now and then. The copper iterator was examining a few rocks he had picked up along the way, for whatever reason. They met eyes a few times, looking away each time.

“So…”the other said, breaking the awkward silence. “I take it you’re mute, yeah?”He flicked a thin antenna. Dignity shook his head. “So… you’re not mute?” Dignity nodded. The copper iterator blinked a few times. “So you can talk? Can you not talk? Am I missing something here?”

Dignity took a breath, unsure of how to communicate. He was not using his voice, but he couldn’t use sign either. Writing would take up too much space…

“You know what,” the other said. “Here.” He took one of the tablets in his mane and handed it to Dignity, then took out one of his antennae, handing that to him too. “And before you worry, I do this all the time,” he took out the other antenna, then put it back in. “That’s what these are for, I don’t hear with them.” Dignity nodded and started writing on the tablet with the thinner end of the antenna.

“I am not mute,” he wrote. “I simply prefer not to use my voice unless absolutely necessary.”

“O…kay?” the stranger said. “So you just… don’t talk?”

“Yes.”

He gave Dignity a very confused look, then shook his head. “O-okay then,” he said, shaking his head. “Is there some kind of… reason or something?” Dignity cringed, curling his tail over his good leg.

“l would rather not say,” he wrote, his hand shaking ever so slightly.

“Ah, okay,” the other said. He looked to the side in a moment of awkward silence. Dignity looked away with the same awkward feeling. They didn’t meet eyes for a few more moments, then the other spoke up again. “So… what’s your name?”

Dignity looked at him, tilting his head. “What is yours?”

“Twin Stone Tablets,” he said. “Tablets for short; I don’t like Stone.” He looked at Dignity politely expectantly.

“Illuminated Dignity,” he wrote. He flicked his tongue.

“That’s a cool name, Illuminated Dignity…” Tablets’ eyes drifted, then focused on him again. “I had a friend with a name like that once. She… wasn’t the best person, but she was a good friend, most of the time.” He sighed, his face dropping for a second, before quickly returning to a neutral almost-smile. “…A-anyways.”

Tablets looked at the rock he was still holding, studying it like a scavenger. He then casually placed the rock in his mouth, crunched it, and swallowed. Dignity blinked hard. Tablets flicked the antenna he still had and blinked back.

“Ah,” he said. “Sorry, I’m used to everyone knowing about that.” He looked to the side and smiled awkwardly, revealing hard looking, metallic teeth. “I, uh… don’t have a normal diet, to say the least,” he chuckled. “I only eat… err… rocks. Other such things too — rebar, bricks, concrete — but mainly just regular rocks.”

Dignity nodded slowly. Tablets picked up another small rock already on the ground and started eating it. One of the stones in his mane floated over his injured shoulder.

Dignity’s stomach growled; Tablets’ eating had made him realize how hungry he was. He also realized just how long it has been since he’d last eaten. Somehow he’d made it two cycles without realizing why he was so tired. Then again, he was in a… mental state for those cycles, so he had likely been more focused on… other thoughts.

He shook his head; he didn’t need to think about that again. His stomach growled again, quieter. He sighed helplessly. There seemed to be a pattern to when he actually felt hungry and didn’t just know he should be. It always seemed to happen whenever he couldn’t do anything about it. Again adding to the list of the never-to-be-understood.

Dignity sat motionless for a few minutes, still extremely hungry. He didn’t get bored easily, but he almost felt mentally tired from the lack of anything to do again. Normally there was always at least one mind to read, but Tablets’ was, for whatever reason, impossible to see. Or maybe he just wasn’t thinking anything. Very strange, either way. He was tempted to ask, but he didn’t want to reveal his ability to a stranger he couldn’t read.

Eventually, his mother returned, a few batflies in hand. She handed them to Dignity and took a quick, deep breath. She immediately curled herself around his siblings, one wing over them for warmth. Dignity moved his tail so as not to touch her — stress was one of the few feelings that affected him — and quickly scarfed down the batflies.

He sensed the cycle coming to a close just as the shelter door started closing. He closed his eyes, already laying down. He tried to sleep, but it simply wouldn’t come. His mother was still radiating stress and he was still hungry. He tried for a few more minutes, before realizing he either wouldn’t get any sleep this cycle or it would be a bit before he did.

He opened his eyes slightly to see that his mother and siblings were asleep. Tablets, on the other hand, was not. He laid in a fetal position on the ground, shivering, wide-eyed. His mane rested on the ground, making him seem much smaller. What surprised Dignity, though, was that he wasn’t glowing at all. Normally iterators, no matter the type, had at least a few glowing marks on them — his mother’s pink arm and tail stripes were glowing dimly and his own blue, scale-shaped stripes were as well. Tablets didn’t seem to have any of these markings. Even his crest and eyes didn’t have a hint of bioluminescence. That was… concerning.

Dignity quickly decided against asking. Clearly it wasn’t something he would want to talk about, if how he was acting said anything. Tablets looked up at him and froze. His breathing became even faster than it already was. Dignity blinked. Tablets froze again, then shook his head and lightly slapped his face with his tail. He mumbled something; Dignity just barely made out the words “not her… can’t hurt… Secrets…”

Tablets turned toward the wall and Dignity decided to try sleeping again. He closed his eyes and took a long breath, releasing it as steam. He tried not to focus on his leg and, by yet another miracle, managed to fall asleep.

Notes:

Yay that totally didn’t take forever because I straight forgot that I hadn’t finished this chapter yep nope totally.

Y’all have no idea how much I had to restrain myself from just dumping TST’s entire backstory in one chapter oh my gosh. I love this rock eating American penny so much he’s such a bean. A bean with a lot of lore. That I am going to dump at some point. Maybe.

I also totally didn’t forget that Dig needs food for three whole chapters yep totally didn’t happen.

*checks the last posting date* And I totally didn’t forget to post this four days ago yep nope. Y’all are still getting your Christmas Eve post though don’t worry, it might be a bit of a rushed chapter but it’ll be fine.

Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, whatever else y’all might celebrate around this time I can’t keep track for the life of me. Happy holidays!

Chapter 13: Dragonbite Viper

Summary:

A boy excitedly walked outside into the busy streets of Draconis, looking to see the famed seven sunsets the city was known for. Such an event happened once every major cycle and could only be seen from so many angles. It was only a trick of the light, of course, but that did not stop sightseers from pouring into the city to see the sight.

Seven Red Suns could not have cared less, at the moment, about the famed sight that could only be seen atop their own structure, the sight for which they had been named. But, once every major cycle, a particular green friend of theirs would want to see it, so Suns always kept an overseer at the spot, just for that one cycle.

One major cycle, the tradition was broken. Many things were broken that cycle, trust, friendship, lives. And yet, the world kept spinning, and the bright, seven sunsets still returned, every major cycle.

Dignity awoke to, for the first time, hunger. Intense, painful, hunger. His own this time; he was very much awake.

His having not eaten the previous few cycles — with the exception of the few batflies — had finally caught up to him. His stomach ached, not enough to be a serious problem, not yet, but it was still painful. He gritted his teeth and wrapped his arms around himself, eyes tightly shut. He whimpered and opened his eyes just enough to see his mother, revived father, siblings, and Tablets looking at him worriedly, his parents mentally panicking.

He raised a hand to sign, but found he couldn’t focus on what to say. Even if he could, moving his hand felt strange. He took a shaky breath and put his arm back around himself. He tensed as a small pang of hunger came and went.

It did not help that his leg was still throbbing, even two and a half cycles later. He wasn’t sure if he hated that it hurt more or was glad that he had something to ground him. Either way, it only added to the pain.

His pained stomach growled and he barely restrained a yelp. He gave a long, half silent hiss to release at least some emotion. He opened his mouth as wide as he could without unhinging his jaw, unfolding his rarely seen fangs. That was the sign he told his parents he would use if he was ever actually in a situation like this. His father’s face almost immediately turned to rage and he almost stormed out of the shelter, stopped only by seeing Dignity raise his hand again.

“Not… them,” he slowly signed. “Did this… to… myself. Did… not… eat… two cycles. Not… enough… last. Hurt.” He put his hand back down. He suddenly felt moderately nauseous, but managed to keep from an event.

His father quickly rushed out of the shelter, determined not to let Dignity starve. His mother seemed to have frozen, staring blankly at him, past him. Her mind seemed to… fade. Tears started forming in her eyes and a feeling of loss and failure filled her conscience.

Tablets — whom Dignity had forgotten was in the shelter with how quiet his mind was — put his tail around Dignity’s mother. He looked worried, but not for her. Worried in a distant way, as if something like this had happened to someone else he had known before. Someone he had been close to-

He realized he had been feeling Tablets’ emotions only once they had been cut off again. That confirmed that he was, indeed, intentionally blocking him out, somehow. Though that wasn’t his main concern at the moment; he was still in pain.

The next hour felt like years. It was probably the longest hour he’d ever experienced. And yet he somehow mentally survived the wait for his father to return, a large baby centipede in one hand and a tiny, feathered iterator in his mouth. He dropped them both by Dignity.

Dignity quickly ate the centipede, barely bothering to break the shell. The dead iterator, though, he was more reluctant with. He picked it up and studied it for a moment. The idea of eating another iterator — small enough to fit in his mouth or not — didn’t exactly sit well with him, but he was still hungry and this, apparently, was just the way things were. He quickly shoved the iterator down his throat, whole. He knew he would regret that later; his stomach already hurt from eating the centipede. At least the pain was softening.

He looked up to see his father nodding to leave the shelter before picking him up and putting him on his back like he did the previous cycle. He was quickly brought outside, his father seeming to have forgotten about his leg with the speed he was moving at. He tapped his shoulder, which seemed to remind his father.

“Come on,” he said as the others came out. “Let’s get moving, I’d rather not be Suns’ snack again.” He tapped his tail impatiently, then darted downward, Dignity still on his back. He tapped him again once they reached a ledge where he had to pause; his father turned his head to look at him.

“I do not believe this will work,” Dignity signed. “You carrying me, that is. My… less than ideal physical state at the moment is not being helped by your… impatience.” He flicked his tongue.

“Well what do you want me to do then?” His father said, irritability in his voice and mind. “Could always just leave you on the ground here, if you’d prefer that instead-”

“How about we don’t leave anyone behind, disabled or not,” Tablets said, catching up to them. “I will take him, thank you very much.” He then carefully transferred Dignity from one back to another, making sure not to bump his bad leg on anything. Dignity internally sighed.

The group continued downward, pausing every now and then for Dignity to rest. His father caught an eggbug, which was shared between him, Dignity, and his siblings. His mother declined and Tablets opted to eat another rock.

“So…” his father said after a while of silence. “Are you just following us now?” He gave Tablets a subtly disapproving look.

“Well,” he responded. “I don’t have anyone else to follow — everyone I know is a good journey away from here — and you happen to also be coming back down from a visit with Wind. I think that answers your question.”

“Oh,” his father said, slightly annoyed. “Do you plan on parting once we get down?”

“Where are you all going?”

“Don’t know. North, maybe.”

“Well that just so happens to be where I need to go too.”

“…Great.”

Dignity felt a slight directed stab of frustration from his mother’s mind. He didn’t need to search her mind for why, he felt that way too. His father could be a pain, even more so after a death cycle. He also always seemed to feel jealous. Of anyone, really, who he wanted to be jealous of. Dignity didn’t know why and, for all he wished to understand others, didn’t want to know why.

Another while of silent travel passed. The group continued on, now with an air of frustration and worried curiosity that only Dignity could feel.

Suddenly, a loud, guttural scream filled the air, followed by a familiar winged figure falling from above. They struggled to grip the edge of a vent for a moment, then lost the little support they had gained and fell out of sight, another scream following.

They moved down to the vent Suns had fallen from, looking over the edge to see them still falling, then disappear below the clouds. Dignity’s father huffed.

“Deserved,” he hissed. Everyone looked at him in either anger or shock. Dignity felt a wave of hatred from him. He hissed and turned around.

He didn’t have time to do anything, though, before the sound of strong wing beats came from behind. He turned again and his eyes suddenly went wide.

Suns stood over him, growling. Their body seemed to droop, half doubled over; their scales were slightly off-color, the little skin that showed pale. They were smoking from their nose and lashing their tail, their growl flaring into small roars every few seconds. They put a shaky claw on him, leaning part of their weight on him. They put their face up to his, their snout almost touching his. They whispered to him, just loud enough for everyone to hear.

“You…” they took a hoarse breath. “Die an echo, freak…” Their body spasmed and they looked straight forward. Their breath caught and they seemed to choke on nothing, then they suddenly went limp, their body falling on the serpent, lifeless.

Dignity felt a surge of a strange mixture of feelings within his father then. He couldn’t make out most of them with how quickly they were felt and mixed in with the others, but he could, just for a moment, distinguish shock, fear, regret, and a tiny, immediately repressed surge of nostalgia.

His father stood still for a moment, the dragon’s corpse draped over his shoulder. He sat in a pool of unintelligible feelings for a few minutes, then seemed to snap back to life. He took several steps back, then body falling off of him, dashed, faster than Dignity had seen him before, down the structure. Not a second later his mother was sprinting after him, Dignity and Tablets left behind with only each other.

Dignity looked at Tablets, who gave him what he was fairly sure was the exact same confused and somewhat shocked look back. Tablets started in the same direction the others had, not before giving Suns a quick glance. He took a shaky breath and started downward.

They moved down in complete silence the rest of the cycle, stopping only to grab food for either of the two. They eventually reached a shelter which, while not having the other four they were looking for, was still necessary to stay in now that they were below the clouds again.

The two held each other as the rain poured outside. Dignity didn’t know why he held Tablets, but knew, only because of the contact, that Tablets needed to hold him. Something about his… size seemed to calm the stone-skinned iterator. It was a strange factor to calm him, but it did. He laid holding Tablets for a few minutes, before quickly easing into an uneasy sleep.

Notes:

I PROMISE I POSTED THIS ON CHRISTMAS EVE, AO3 JUST THINKS I LIVE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD FOR SOME REASON.

Anyway.

In the case that I never mentioned it, or that y’all didn’t catch on: Sig has venom. "But why would you give NSH venom?" You surely ask. Well you see, *yes*. Why not give Sig venom, it’s fun! It leads to fun things happening, such as: everyone getting traumatized- wait. Hmm… maybe past me didn’t think this whole giving Sig venom thing through completely. Meh, whatever, surely nothing will go wrong in the future because of this, right?

Chapter 14: To, Tre, Sjo

Summary:

Something echos in the distance
I wonder what it could be
Nothing seems to exist anymore
Though I know that is incorrect
What happened, I wonder
How did we become this
Tiny fragments of what we were
Locked away in our prisons

- Forked Rivers (Destiny Bound)

Dignity did not previously think he was capable of lucid dreaming. And yet, here he was, wide awake in a dream. Well, it made more sense knowing it was, once again, not his own dream, but it was still a very strange feeling

He seemed to be inside some strange, dimly lit, square tiled room. He looked up and saw Tablets, wearing a cyan robe, staring blankly forward at him. Dignity moved toward him and, after he didn’t react to him being directly in front of him, determined he couldn’t see him. He turned to see what he was staring at. He froze.

A large, silver iterator hovered in the center, held up by a metal arm of some kind. She wore a light blue cloak and a thin necklace with three blue gems of some kind. She had a slugcat’s tail, paws, and ears where most had antennae, two long, diamond shaped panels floating beside either side of her head. A deep blue scar covered her closed right eye.

She floated down to Tablets, breathing hard. The distant sound of rushing water came from somewhere. The two locked eyes. Tablets took a shaky breath and stepped back. The other pinned back her ears. Some silent moment passed between them, interrupted by a loud series of beeps. Tablets was held in the air by some nonexistent force for a moment, then violently thrown down.

The silver iterator moved upwards in the air, the base of the arm moving over the wall with her. Tablets looked up at her in fear. She glared at him for a moment.

A large purple vine then sprouted from one of the walls, quickly growing. Tablets looked up just in time for it to impale him through the chest. He yelled out in pain. The other iterator detached from the arm and quickly took the form of a slugcat, exactly like her, covered head to tail in large blue diamond spots. She bounded up to him and stood on her hind legs, glaring. She stood over him for only a few seconds before something happened that Dignity didn’t catch and-

The dream, or rather nightmare, ended suddenly. Dignity looked up at Tablets, who had moved away from him overnight, now standing with his back against the wall, panting. He looked down at Dignity, then took a relieved breath and slumped to the ground.

“I-I, uh,” he looked away. “Sorry, I… I didn’t mean to wake you, I just, uh… I…”

“Nightmare? I understand,” Dignity said, sitting up. He nearly recoiled at the sound of his own raspy, pubertal voice.

Tablets briefly perked up. “I thought you didn’t talk,” he said. “Also, how did you know I-”

“I save speaking for special cases and anyone I trust who can’t communicate in any other easy way,” Dignity said. “You happen to be one of those trustworthy people.” he paused for a second. “And even if I didn’t just see your dream, the frantic wall clinging and panting made it obvious.”

“Ah, that… makes sense… Wait, you what?!”

“Yes, I saw that. Normally I wouldn’t tell anyone, but I like you. Also, talking is just easier than having to show you my forsaken handwriting every time I want to say something.”

Dignity curled his tail around himself. “But don’t expect me to always talk to you, especially around anyone else, writing would just be inconvenient now that we’re traveling together.” He slowly ran the tip of the sail on his tail over his bad leg, wincing slightly when he put pressure on it.

Tablets blinked, then shook his head and bent down to Dignity. “…That looks… worse than before.”

“…Infected,” Dignity noted.

Tablets looked closer at it, then backed away. “I think I know someone who could help with that.”

“Hm?”

“Come on,” he grabbed Dignity’s hand and helped him onto his back before leaving the shelter. He ran to the edge off the vent they were on and jumped off, strategically placing his floating stones to angle himself toward a pole. He grabbed the pole just before he would have dropped past it and hopped onto the ledge it was on. Dignity panted from the drop.

“Tri!” Tablets called. “Tri get over here! I know you’re down here!” A long few minutes passed as no one came. Tablets tapped his tail. “…I’ll send Marine after Circuit.”

Suddenly, a navy blue blur, Tridents, came rushing out from a pipe near the base of the ledge, a pale slugcat close behind. He skidded to a stop in front of Tablets, the slugcat jumping onto his shoulder. He pushed the slugcat’s head away from his gills and gave Tablets a slightly humorous look.

“You didn’t say the magic phrase!” he said. “You know what I said about not using the magic phrase!”

“I’m not saying that,” Tablets protested.

“Come on, Tabs, it's not that hard. All you have to do is say ‘Forest is an ugly stupid wyrm.’ Easy as that.”

“She might be a little, you know, absolutely insane, but she’s still your groupmate Tri.”

“Whatever,” he looked at Dignity. “Ah, werorrtrorrrerrtro’orrt morrtarrp’terrt, Dignity. Circuit has been encouraging me to ‘incorporate slugspeak into my causal vocabulary’ lately,” he added after Dignity gave him a slightly confused look. He was only slightly telepathic, after all. “But Void, their greetings can be a mouthful sometimes. Anyway, what do you need me for, Tabs? Also how did we both meet the exact same twitchy kid on our way down?”

“Dig’s got a broken, infected leg,” he turned to show said leg to Tridents.

“Mm, not too bad,” he said, inspecting the damaged leg. “How long has he had this?”

“A few cycles now, I think. I wasn’t with him when it happened.”

“Hmm. Must have a great immune system; it’s not nearly as bad as most I see that have gone only two cycles.” He tapped the slugcat on his shoulder. “You still got that pearl, Circuit?”

“Trr,” the slugcat, Circuit, responded. It proceeded to regurgitate a pale cyan pearl. “Rotrerr… Pearl!” it said proudly, as it handed the pearl to Tridents. “‘Pearl,’ trr?”

“Trr, ‘pearl,’” Tridents said. “Though try not to roll your r’s. I know it’s a bit hard with the nature of your voice, but something tells me the older generations are going to have a hard time figuring out what ‘pærrl’ means.” He flicked two of his right antennae.

Tridents held out the pearl, which started floating as he did so. He brought his hand back down and looked at it for a moment, then grabbed it from the air. “You happen to have any batnip on you?” he asked Tablets, who shook his head in response. “Alright then. Circuit?”

“Wawa rrptr’orrt rra rrent’rr rarraoerrtorr,” it said. “Wawa trre brrotro!” It then leaped off of Tridents and dashed away.

“Well… then…” Tablets said, watching Circuit run up a pole. .So… are you gonna get any or…?”

“Circuit just said they’d get some,” Tridents said.

“Okay… then,” he flicked an antenna. “I worry about your mental stability sometimes.”

“They have a language, trust me.”

“Mhm… Like I said, concern.”

Circuit quickly returned, batnip in hand. It- they — Dignity didn’t want to risk another awkward misgendering — handed the herb to Tridents, who immediately told Tablets to set Dignity down. He bent down to Dignity.

“Okay, I need you to hold still for just a moment, alright?” Dignity nodded. “Good.”

Tridents put the batnip in his mouth, chewed it, and spat it on the wound on Dignity’s leg. Dignity cringed.

“I know it’s a little gross,” Tridents said. “But we gotta get that infection killed before we can fix your leg.” He started rubbing the paste over the wound. “Infected meat doesn’t taste as good, after all!” Dignity froze. “That was a joke, that was a joke. I don’t want to try anything with them on your side. Dragons and their weird honor system sometimes, Void.”

Dignity tried his best to keep from moving, but still flinched every so often. Tridents eventually finished rubbing and stepped back. “And now we let that set.”

“And that will take how long?” Tablets asked.

“I… don’t know.”

“Okay then. My… friend… is… insane… noted.”

“Twin Stone Tablets, you eat rocks. You ate rocks before you even went off the string.”

“Well, what can I say? The whole artificial evolution thing decided I should eat rocks.”

“…Because you already ate rocks, Tabs.”

“I know!”

“You- Okay, you win this time, Twin Stone,” he rolled his eyes. “Anyway, you caught up to me, we might as well move on together.” Tridents moved back to the pipe he was hiding in before, grabbed a three tipped spear — a trident, Dignity realized — and crawled in. Tablets put Dignity on his back again and followed, quickly joined by Circuit.

The new group moved quickly through the pipe, which led to another vent. Because all pipes lead to vents, these cycles, apparently. There were a few tiny, feathered iterators on a horizontal pole sharing three blue fruits, which were big enough for all of them to take part of while still having half a fruit left over. They were the same kind as the tiny iterator he had eaten the previous cycle, he realized with a slight feeling of guilt. Dignity felt Tridents’ tail twitch beside him. He turned to see him staring at them with the same unblinking gaze Suns gave their prey. Right, Tridents was still a shark.

Tablets also seemed to notice his staring just as Tridents took a small step forward. He put a hand on his shoulder, which seemed to snap him out of his trance.

“Thanks,” he said, looking over at Tablets. “I suddenly remember why I was hiding in that pipe in the first place. Those look… really…” he started drooling. Tablets snapped him out of it again. “Ah, sorry, sorry. I’m just- really hungry all of the sudden.” He looked away for a second, then back again. “I, uh,” he cleared his throat. “I’ll only take… a moment…”

Tablets sighed as Tridents stalked over to the flock. Dignity took note of how he kept just out of view. He crouched behind the pole they were on and waited. Only a few moments passed by before he seemed to grow impatient and leaped at the nearest. The area around him briefly turned into a mass of feathers before clearing out to show Tridents with one of the tiny iterators dead in his mouth. He quickly tore into it, eating as much as the tiny body had to offer, then stood and returned to Tablets and Dignity.

Tablets started moving toward the edge of the vent, where another pipe was, before pausing as the flock suddenly returned from above, now flying even faster. They flew right past the vent they stood on in only a few seconds, a few small, frightened sounds coming from them. Dignity was puzzled for only a few seconds before a familiar sound came from where they were flying from. He tensed, already knowing what to expect.

Suns dove past the vent in a loud rush of wind, then rose to it again, sensing, in some way, that there were larger things standing there. They landed with a loud thud and rose to their full height. Dignity had forgotten over the last few cycles how large they were, looming over them with wings that blotted out their namesake, already hidden by the clouds. He suddenly understood how the others had felt, with the massive, bloodthirsty dragon towering over them.

A wave of panic suddenly rose in him, but his body wouldn’t respond, fear holding him in place while telling him to run. Suns let out a breath of smoke, their burning breath distorting the air around their face. They stalked closer, their wings still spread. They growled, sending a shiver up Dignity's spine.

Suns came up to Tablets, opening their mouth slightly, just enough for Dignity to feel the heat from their breath. Their stripes started glowing, dimly at first, then brighter. And brighter. And brighter-

Dignity realized, just in time, what was about to happen. He shoved Tablets’ head just hard enough to move him out of the way as Suns released a stream of flame at them. They closed their mouth and barred their teeth, flames still spilling out from between their teeth.

They quickly jumped on top of Tablets, who quickly threw Dignity off of himself. Dignity caught himself before he could accidentally harm his leg any more than he already had. He looked up just in time to see Suns lunging at him, roaring aggressively.

Suns raised a claw and Dignity closed his eyes, preparing himself for a painful death. A few seconds passed, and Dignity realized he hadn’t been killed. He opened his eyes and looked up.

Suns was looking down at their claws, their tail laying over their talons. They were holding their breath, though they didn't seem to notice they were. They looked up and met Dignity’s eyes for a moment, before suddenly making a muffled coughing sound and going wide eyed. They released their breath in a cloud of thick smoke, thicker than their normal breath. They choked on the black cloud for a moment before fanning it away with their wings. They were caught in a coughing fit for a moment, then suddenly stopped, took a raspy, ineffective breath, and fell over. Dignity, once again, didn’t sense their mind.

Dignity looked at Suns’ body in half shock, half confusion, before realizing Tablets had disappeared. He looked around for him, but still couldn’t find him; Tridents also seemed to be gone. He thought, for just a moment, that they had abandoned them, before being hit on the head with something hard and passing out.

Notes:

I suck at poetry okay.

So I may or may not have accidentally straight up written Tabs and Tri’s relationship as my own relationship with my own bff lol (I’m looking at you Imtired42). That was a fun little realization I had about halfway through writing this chapter.

Oh by the way I think I forgot to mention the big gash on Dignity’s leg. Cause that kind of thing happens when you fall off of a 300ft building.

Anyway, lore time! Lore time? Does this count as lore-

So remember that scug language? Yeah it’s back. And now Tri is getting his degree in it (with some persuasion from his scuggo, of course). Also, for some clarification/writing style stuff, Dignity and Tridents are the only ones (as of this chapter) who hear slugspeak as an actual language instead of a jumble of weird animal sounds. For instance, where Tridents might hear «orrtarr warrp» (good day/good cycle), Tablets would just hear «wawa wawa» or something like that.
Also, some characters can somewhat understand scug, but don’t comprehend it correctly. A not-so-soon-to-be-named character who I will not be naming for spoiler reasons has an understanding like this. Certain slugcat words are combinations of multiple (usually two, but up to four) words and affixes. This leads to a lot of confusion with words like «sun», which is a combination of the words for «fire» and «god». The word for «god» also being a combination between «all» and «peak» (technically «tip», but slugcats aren’t exactly too specific). So you can imagine what happens when you try to say «Seven Red Suns» in their language.

Anyway, lore time over because this is getting pretty long.

Happy New Year!

Chapter 15: Regnbue By

Summary:

Regnbue (Bokmål Norwegian)

 

Rainbow: n.
rān,bōw

any display of the colors of the spectrum (usually in an arch form)

variety; mosaic; medley

From Old English “regnboga” (rain-bow)

He feels strange, he senses strange things. What is this new sense? The new things appearing because of this sense are even stranger. He always senses something now, sometimes strong, sometimes soft, sometimes harsh, sometimes smooth.

The light-colored one, one of the safe ones, makes the most that he senses. A soft sensation comes from it, one he greatly enjoyed. It feels good, this new sensation; calming.

He rubs against light-color as it brings him across whatever they were on, making more of those soft, calming things. If he focuses on the sensations he can sense himself making those strange things.

He looks up as light-color moves to a new space. He looks in awe, seeing a large, endless space the same color as light-color. He looks and saw fear-color looking in the same way as he.

Above them, in the light-color space, he can just barely see a shape of some kind. The shape seems to be made of all the colors he had seen and a few more. He likes it.

He notices that light-color stopped moving. It is also looking at the shape. He looks back at the pretty, colorful thing. Light-color starts moving again.

He takes one last look at the colors, then tucks himself into light-color. He feels fear-color moving beside him for some time, before it also moves into he and light-color.

He feels strange, he senses strange things. What is this new sense? The new things appearing because of this sense are even stranger. He always senses something now, sometimes strong, sometimes soft, sometimes harsh, sometimes smooth.

The light-colored one, one of the safe ones, makes the most that he senses. A soft sensation comes from it, one he greatly enjoyed. It feels good, this new sensation; calming.

He rubs against light-color as it brings him across whatever they were on, making more of those soft, calming things. If he focuses on the sensations he can sense himself making those strange things.

He looks up as light-color moves to a new space. He looks in awe, seeing a large, endless space the same color as light-color. He looks and saw fear-color looking in the same way as he.

Above them, in the light-color space, he can just barely see a shape of some kind. The shape seems to be made of all the colors he had seen and a few more. He likes it.

He notices that light-color stopped moving. It is also looking at the shape. He looks back at the pretty, colorful thing. Light-color starts moving again.

He takes one last look at the colors, then tucks himself into light-color. He feels fear-color moving beside him for some time, before it also moves into he and light-color.

Notes:

Totally didn’t forget to post this yesterday nope totally not at all nope

Chapter 16: Feathers (Part 1)

Summary:

Here I stand, or rather float, amid the pearls strewn about the floor of this pathetic excuse for an iterator. I will never understand how this one even came to be, Nineteen. Maybe it would have been better if this one had never been. No, it would have been better, I know that for sure… So why, no, no… What was going through the mind of the idiot that made this broken machine?

Dignity opened his eyes to yet another of someone else’s dreams. He couldn’t tell exactly where he was this time, though. It felt… very strange, to say the least. He could feel himself, but he couldn’t… feel himself. He tried to move and found it completely impossible. The same thing with inhaling…

He tried to look anywhere, and it suddenly hit him that he wasn’t in his own body this time. His conclusion was then supported by the feeling of some part of him moving without his input. It was, though, clearly the movement of whoever was having this odd dream.

A few moments of little action pass before he senses something… within him. It felt wrong to him, yet, somehow, perfectly normal, if not expected, to the dreamer. After a few moments of tracking this strange sensation, he is finally allowed to see where he, or rather the dreamer, is.

A strange, tiled wall appeared in his vision, not unlike the walls of the space from Tablets’ nightmare. The only visible difference was that this wall had a slight blue tint to it. He thought he was noticing a pattern.

Suddenly, he moves and looks upward. There is another moment of the feeling of something navigating through him, before he saw the large — though it seemed small to him, despite being at least twice his size, from what he could see — red shape of a dragon appear from an entrance above.

It looked at him silently for a moment, then handed him a small, round object and retreated back into the entrance, the strange crawling feeling coming with it. He looked at what the dreamer recognized as a pearl for a moment, before doing… something with it that summoned another strange something in front of him. A few moments of more strange actions that he couldn’t entirely comprehend passed before he released the pearl into an orbit of similar pearls around him.

A brief, for whatever reason tense moment passed as he felt around himself. There was an aching feeling at the bottom of his… what he could most closely describe as legs, and a few similar aching feelings around the rest of this strange, extended body he now seemed to have. He took a breath, or at least, what he assumed was one based on how it felt, and did another strange, incomprehensible thing, then waited.

At some point, something happened, he didn’t know what. He had entirely lost what was happening by then, too confused by whatever was going on to even try to understand it. At some point, after whatever strange thing had been done, there was the feeling of falling, burning, and the sound of something crashing in the distance, then darkness.

A silent moment passed, and Dignity realized he felt his body normally again. He slowly opened his eyes, almost believing he would see the strange room again. He was greatly surprised when he was instead met with a small, nearly black space. He felt movement on either side of him, which he discovered was Tablets and Tridents on his right and left respectively.

Dignity turned his head toward Tridents and realized after trying to move that he was being held. Tridents noticed his movements and turned his head to him for a moment, quickly making a “shush” sign and pointing to his antennae, signaling him to listen.

He held still, quietly listening as told. He heard a shuffling sound from somewhere, then a very high voice say something he couldn’t make out. A moment later, the voice became frantic, a small feeling of fear coming off strongly enough for Dignity to feel it through whatever was between them. The voice became even faster as a hiss sounded, quickly becoming a scream. The hiss suddenly stopped. The voice came again, softer, scared. Another, airier voice came, followed by the small voice again, then silence.

Dignity waited, tense. He glanced at Tablets, who gave him a concerned look in return. He held his breath.

Not long after, a tiny, pink iterator, covered in feathers, floated (floated?) toward them through some small entrance in front of them. Dignity watched the smaller one slowly drift toward them, wide eyed.

A few moments after, another form enters the space, blocking the little light from that end. A few glowing, diamond-shaped purple patterns just barely illuminating the shape. A pair of purple eyes open, quickly focusing on Dignity and- Oh.

His father was here too, somehow. This entire situation was becoming more confusing by the second. He blinked a few times to orient himself.

Dignity looked to his left, feeling a wave of urgency come from Tridents. His dark green-blue patterns dimmed and glowed impatiently in the dark. Dignity’s own blue stripes glowed brighter with his, he noticed.

“Come on, we still have Circuit to find,” Tridents hissed, ever impatient.

“And Moon,” his father added. Dignity gave him a look, though he doubted he could see it in the dark, even with everyone’s bioluminescence. “…And Suns,” he reluctantly added.

Tridents flinched at the mention of the dragon. “Or we could not find them. You don’t have to be in your structure to know they got us into this mess.” Tablets cringed when he realized who they were talking about.

“I know, I know, but…” his father looked to the side. “None of us may like them right now, but…” he trailed off. “Nevermind.”

“C-could we, uh, get moving, please?” the tiny iterator, now clinging to the top of the space, said. Said iterator was then grabbed by Tridents.

“You still have a lot to explain.”

“I’m not with them I swear-”

“You’re still one of them.”

“I’M NOT I SWEAR PLEASE-”

Dignity preemptively stopped the torment with a loud hiss. He could feel the two predators’ rage, the terror from the smaller iterator, and Tablets’ tenseness turning to a concoction of emotion of his own. His own panting was the only sound in the sudden silence.

Tablets started squeezing himself backwards through the tight area, easing the tension. Dignity followed, the other three soon after.

The moment he fully left the small space, Dignity was hit with an overwhelming amount of mental input. He barely registered the slightly golden walls or the fact that he was floating. His mind was filled, overflowing with thoughts and processes beyond his comprehension. He just barely managed to somewhat anchor himself on a foreign inner monologue, though he couldn’t understand it with everything else clogging his thoughts.

He held his head and curled in on himself, the headache too much for him to bear. Somehow he stayed conscious enough to see a blurred version of what was happening around him. The others’ minds seemed to have disappeared within the sea of the new, larger one he found himself trapped within. He closed his eyes in an attempt to reduce as much input as possible.

A minute or so went by as he was unable to even move, only trembling in place. He only realized he couldn’t think when the larger conscience seemed to focus on a smaller point in itself, letting Dignity collect his own mind for a moment.

A few moments were given before a much more focused voice speaks.

“Hello there, little one. I see you are a bit overwhelmed there,” the voice says, softly. A distant feeling of something comes from the disembodied conscience.

Dignity thought for a moment before responding. “Yes, I… what are you..?”

The voice becomes subtly softer with its next words. “Ah, you do not recognize me, do you? But I should have expected this, it has been a while.”

“What do you mean by that? Have we met before?”

“Yes, we have, though seeing as we can communicate now, you have likely matured since… Ah, as I thought.” It paused for a second. “Let me explain a few things, if you do not mind.

“I am Grey Wind, the iterator of this land. I am well aware of who you are, Illuminated Dignity. When you were very young, you were taken to me for a number of reasons that I will let Moon explain. Speaking of, I have been close with her for a long time, longer than you could imagine, so you have no need to fear me. Unless something were to collapse my structure, of course, though I doubt that will happen for a few ten thousand cycles at least.”

Dignity processed the information for a moment. It wasn’t everyday that one met someone like… this. This person had known him since… before he could remember. That was a thought he didn’t think he would ever have. And the wording of everything seemed… he wasn’t sure.

“Are you still there? I did not shock you too extremely, did I?” Wind worried.

“I am… thinking about this,” Dignity thought to the… iterator.

“I understand,” Wind assured. “I will attempt to reduce my neural activity in the areas you traverse through; I can tell your strange ability and my intellect create quite the problem for your mind.”

Dignity opened his eyes, feeling the larger mind mostly leave him. He let his arms rest to his sides again and looked up at the grey-blue face looking at him with worry. He blinked slowly in response, still recovering from the mental overload.

“Oh, Void you’re alive!” The shark sighed in relief. He let his antennae droop for a moment.

“Can we go now?” the hissing voice of Dignity’s father complained. Dignity didn’t have to look at him to sense his impatience.

“Give him a moment, snake,” Tridents snapped at him, lashing his tail. “Do you really- Nevermind.”

Tridents gently put an arm around Dignity and guided him as he pushed himself off of the wall they had just been by. Tridents pushed them off of another wall, skillfully angling himself to float past a few strange extrusions and into another room, Dignity’s father trailing behind.

A few more wall pushes and the three were in a darker room, lit only by the soft glow of their patterns. Tablets and the smaller iterator were holding onto the opposite wall of the room, seemingly waiting on them. Tablets looked up upon noticing their glow.

“Oh Void, he’s alright,” Tablets sighed, his mane drifting away from him slightly.

“Not entirely sure what happened,” Tridents said, letting go of Dignity, who simply floated in place, still a bit confused. “Not that it’s our biggest problem right now though. We have other things to do.” He turned to the tiny pink iterator and grabbed her, a small scream cut off as he covered her mouth with his finger. He gave Tablets a glance, then twisted himself in the air until he reached an exit to the room and left, tiny iterator still in hand.

Dignity stared awkwardly at Tablets, who looked over at his father, who looked away. Tablets looked over at Dignity for a moment, then looked down. Dignity flashed a few stripes on his tail to get Tablets’ attention again.

“What is happening?”

Notes:

Hey, guess what. I’m still alive!

Sorry for not posting for so long, it’s been a *really* rough month for me; lotta mental crap happened, you know, the Ao3 writer’s curse. But I’m back! Well, maybe. I’m still updating this, yes, but there might be a bit more time between chapter uploads while I recover from this, but I’ll try to get back on schedule by maybe mid-late March.

Also, as of a few days ago Feral reached 1k hits, which is *way* more than I thought this would ever get, so massive thank you to everyone who’s been reading this, that was a really big writing motivator and a little bit of light in this dark point for me. Once again, huge thanks to all of y’all.

Anyway, with all that said, have a nice day/night wherever you are, however you are, and thanks for reading this far.

Chapter 17: Feathers (Part 2)

Summary:

I wonder how many she disappointed, Nineteen. Hundreds, thousands… millions? How many iterators did she let down when this happened? Or were they all too busy betting on when she would die to notice. Maybe they still think she’s here, or maybe not. I will never understand them.

Dignity tensed as Tablets guided him through the exit to the room that Tridents left through. He was much more anxious now, having been informed of their situation.

Apparently, he had been out for the last two cycles, knocked out by a member of the scavenger-iterator tribe that lived here. The small feathered iterators — songbirds, they were called — had joined the scavenger tribe and were working with them for whatever reason.

They were also inside the massive iterator, though Dignity had already figured that part out from his conversation with Wind. Said iterator was also apparently fine with the tribe living on and around her.

As to why they were here, for whatever reason, the tribe was very aggressive to anyone who so much as scratched one of their people. They had assumed that Tridents, having killed one of their members, was with Suns, a dragon on the rage. The others just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

They had all been knocked out, kidnapped, and placed in some strange place, which they escaped from, somehow. Tridents came up with the plan, so Tablets didn’t know how he did it. Dignity had awoken just after they had escaped.

And that brought them to where they were now. Taking some random songbird with them as a hostage to get back the others who were still being held. Dignity didn’t know exactly how well that plan would work, if the pink songbird’s feelings said anything, but he didn’t exactly have much of a say in this.

Tablets cautiously passed by a corner, blocking Dignity with his mane. He paused, then let Dignity see.

Before them, were his mother and Suns, their limbs bound by a thick rope of some kind; Dignity assumed it was something the scavengers had made. Suns growled in frustration through a stone mask that had been put over their face. This tribe is smart.

His father was trying to cut through the rope binding his mother with his fangs, unsuccessfully. He hissed in frustration as he failed to sever the thick fibers holding it together.

“Dignity… Hey,” Dignity felt someone projecting to him. He turned to Suns, assuming they were still the only one who knew how. “You… still hear me?” Dignity nodded. “Cannot project well… here… Too much… Wind’s neurons… sensitive. Sorry for… that. Favor… please?” Dignity nodded again.

“Slightly… unorthodox. Take this.” Suns spat something out. Dignity pushed past Tablets, who froze seeing Dignity approach Suns. Suns moved their head upward, letting the object float out of the mask. Dignity grabbed it, then looked at Suns in confusion and concern.

“Like… said, unorthodox. Grow back… few cycles,” Suns’ eyes moved to the rope. “Use fang… cut rope.”

Dignity did as Suns said, testing the fang on the rope holding their arms together. He easily sawed off the rope with it, letting Suns move their arms freely again. He quickly did the same for the rope on their wings. They immediately started stretching, then nodded to Dignity and motioned to his mother.

He did the same for her as he did for Suns, who cut off the rope binding their legs and tore off the mask. Once his mother was free, his father looked at him in disbelief.

He looked between him, the fang, and Suns a few times, before almost yelling, “Oh how come their fangs can cut the rope?!”

“…Because I am a dragon? Have you really not noticed?”

“Noticed what exactly?”

“Ahem,” Tablets joined. “Dragon teeth and claws can, in a few rare cases, cut through solid rock. I would know. From experience.”

Dignity’s father groaned, narrowing his eyes. He turned around toward where they had entered the room from and pushed himself out of the room. Tridents followed him, then, after a few moments, returned with him.

“We aren’t leaving,” Tridents said firmly, “Until we find Circuit.” He glared at the serpent, who glared back at him. “…Did you even know where you were going?” He received no response.

“Tri,” Tablets questioned, “Where did the bird go?”

“I sent her to find Circuit.”

“And how exactly do you know she’ll come back?”

“…Because we have a dragon. A fire dragon. And I have a master’s in making those things mad.”

Suns snarled at the comment. Tridents ignored them.

“And even if we didn’t have a dragon, I’d figure something out for her myself.”

“Void, it’s just a slugcat…”

Tridents looked down, then looked back up at Tablets. “They’re not just a slugcat,” he snapped. Dignity sensed a deep hurt in his voice. “I thought you of all iterators would get that, isn’t your-”

“Void, okay, sorry. No need to mention… that.”

There was a tense silence.

Said silence was soon interrupted by a tiny voice. “I-I found them. S-s-see! Th-th-they- They’re right h-here.”

The songbird floated down from a pipe above them, Circuit trailing behind. The pale slugcat pushed themselves toward Tridents the moment they saw each other. Tridents held them in a tight hug, whispering to them in slugspeak

Tridents looked up at the others, much calmer than before. “Let’s find a way out of here.” He turned toward the entrance, Circuit on his shoulder, the others following behind.

“W-w-wait! Wait!” The songbird pleaded. “W-what about me? I can’t go back! Th-they all hate me, I can’t stay here!” She waved her wings for emphasis.

Dignity looked back at her, Suns also lagging behind with him. They approached the tiny iterator, who looked up at them, hope and anxiety fighting in her mind. Suns grabbed her and brought her to their eye level. She looked at them anxiously. Suns paused for a few seconds in thought, then shoved her into their mouth and swallowed.

Dignity stared at them in shock as they turned back toward him. They flicked their tongue at him. He nodded slowly.

A while of following Tridents later, they found what seemed to be some kind of exit. There was an opening that seemed to lead to the outside of the wall, beneath the clouds. Tridents motioned for the others to stay put and slowly stepped out.

He jumped and immediately retracted his step, looking back at the others, pupils slit, panting. He looked over to Tablets, who only gave him a confused look back. Tridents looked down, prompting Circuit to take over for him.

The slugcat stared everyone in the eyes like another iterator and, for the first time ever, Dignity sensed some kind of higher intelligence in them when they locked eyes. He looked at Tablets last, and he also, for the first time ever, seemed to respect the now serious slugcat. Circuit spoke.

“Scavengers, many.”

Notes:

Chapter is just a little rushed uhhhhh.

I looked at the date and was like “hmm I should probably write another chapter now that it’s been over a week hmmmm maybe”

 

A tiny little bitty thing that I do and don’t like about this specific section of Part 1 (there are three parts to this fic, it’s gonna be looooong), this was completely unscripted. 100%. Uncalled for, not supposed to happen, whatever other way of describing it one can think of. And yet somehow this little section that I did not plan at all has had some of the most important set-ups so far. Crazy right?

 

Aaaanyway, good news! I *think* I’m going to be getting back to regular updates now (yay) after five hundred years. More Dig (in)action after three lifetimes of nothing!

 

And with that said, have a nice day/night y’all, wherever you are, however you are. Keep going strong when things get hard in life!

Chapter 18: Feathers (Part 3)

Summary:

But, alas, that is simply the nature of being above them all, isn’t it? Never understanding, for they are too far below myself. Like a scavenger trying to understand a snail; it is simply too intelligent in comparison.

But I still simply cannot help but wonder, even with my own greater mind, why they let this happen.

Dignity froze. It was happening again. No. This- no. He started breathing faster. He started shaking. He lost focus again. It didn’t help that there were more minds this time. He tried to focus on something but found it impossible. His breathing became even faster.

He felt himself getting lightheaded, the world turning into a blur of visible minds and implied colors. He heard a voice say something, many voices, more than there should be. Who were the voices? What were they saying? What was happening? Why can’t he feel his hands-

A sound cuts through everything else. A sound and a feeling, but not from any of the minds. He stares at the spinning rings, orbiting something. They glow. He feels calmer. He feels nothing. The world fades to black.

 

…

 

Tablets held the rings in place for a few more seconds, just to make sure it worked, then relaxed them back into his mane. He’d only done this once before for… reasons he would rather not recall, so he couldn’t be entirely sure about anything.

He gently held the purple hybrid in his arms, turning back to the others. A short, relieved sigh escaped him. “Crisis averted, if I do say so myself.”

The others looked at him wide-eyed, Tridents especially. Tablets shrugged like he hadn’t worked what must have seemed to be magic to them. Tridents grabbed his shoulders, gills flaring.

“What was that?!” He whisper yelled. “You never told me you can do that!”

“Well, I never thought I’d need to do it so-”

“I still want to know what it was!”

“Really, it’s nothing too important to know, especially right now,” Tablets motioned toward the allegedly scavenger-filled exit. “All it did was put him to sleep for a bit, nothing else. Now let’s figure out how to get past those guys.”

Tridents reluctantly backed away, turning to face the rest of the group. “…Any ideas?” He looked down at his slugcat, who made a few “wawa” sounds, which Tridents somehow seemed to understand. “Circuit says we should throw the dragon out to fight ‘em off so we don’t have to deal with them, any objections?”

The serpent and aqua looked at each other silently, Tablets and Tridents doing the same. Tridents opened his mouth to speak again when the dragon, Suns, spoke up.

“I do not approve of this, respectfully, of course,” they stated firmly. Tridents sighed.

“You tried to kill us not three cycles ago, beast,” Tridents said. Suns gasped. “And even so, I don’t listen to scaly winged freaks like you.” His voice became darker, his eyes narrowing. Suns froze in shock.

“Ahem,” Tridents looked to see the aqua glaring at him. “Perhaps we should end this before another attempted murder happens.” She flicked her translucent tail toward the opening in the wall. “I say we should all go out at once, with Suns and Sig taking the lead while, um, the copper one and I stay in the back.” She turned toward Tablets. “What is your name? What are both of your names, actually.”

“Twin Stone Tablets, but I just go by Tablets,” Tablets said. He caught himself from bowing to her. “And he’s Twelve Foreseen Tridents. Goes by Tridents.” Tabs and Tri were nicknames reserved only for them, nobody else. She didn’t need to know about them, even if he felt the need to tell her everything about himself that could ever possibly be important.

“Well I suppose we should introduce ourselves too, since we didn’t get to before we were separated again. My name is Looks to the Moon, and that’s No Significant Harassment,” Moon ruffled her small wings. “I was told you already knew Dignity.”

“Speaking of introductions, what are the names of- Wait, where are your other two-”

“Are we leaving or not,” Sig interrupted. He impatiently tapped the wall, the faint glow on his scales flickering. He glanced at everyone once, then made a soft hiss and pushed himself through the exit, a half shocked Suns following quickly behind.

Tridents rolled his eyes and followed behind them, leaving Tablets, Moon, and an unconscious Dignity alone in the weightless area. Tablets could have sworn he saw Moon flicker silver for a moment. He quickly pushed back that thought. Moon darted out after a few tense moments. Tablets let go of Dignity before following behind her.

They stepped out into an already violent scene: Scavengers and songbirds clawing at Tridents and Sig, the serpent catching a few between us fangs and flinging them off the wall.

Circuit sprinted around and between the scavengers, stealing their spears straight off their backs and quickly stabbing them before doing the same to another. They stabbed an elite in the chest just before it could hit Tridents with an electric spear.

Suns was nowhere in sight. They must have abandoned them, Tablets assumed. Just like a dragon to leave them all to die.

Tablets would have kept analyzing the scene if he hadn't felt the impact of a spear on his skin. He turned to his side to see a scavenger’s eyes boggling at his rock-hard shell. Wouldn’t be stabbing him with that spear any time soon. Tablets whipped his tail at the scavenger, giving it a fresh gash across its chest. It stumbled backward into another scavenger, sending them both falling off the edge of the wall.

Tablets half gracefully moved between the furry and feathery attackers toward Tridents, who looked at him in relief before dodging a spear. Tablets took Tridents’ back, blocking with his body alone, and covered Tridents’ front with a portion of his mane, giving them a floating semi-shield while they moved through the scavengers.

He started moving faster as they were assaulted by quick, tiny claws. He was fine when they scraped him, but Tridents had started to look more red than blue. Tablets stayed slightly closer to Tridents, though he wasn’t sure if it would make a difference.

Tablets could feel his friend start shaking; more so than he normally shook, which was rare on its own. He felt his own breath come faster when a drop of Tridents’ blood ran down his back.

Tablets turned around and moved in front of Tridents, his arms spread and tail in a wide circle around Tridents’ legs. He moved his mane to form a much tighter shield behind him.

“What are you doing?” Tridents managed to ask between heaving breaths. He tried to move past Tablets, but he wouldn’t budge.

“I’m keeping you from getting killed, is what I’m doing.”

“They’ll kill you!”

“They can’t, my skin is too tough,” he tapped his arm for emphasis. “And even if they could, I can move faster down the wall. I’m sure you would like to take your sweet time to get back down.”

“Whatever.”

Tablets almost jumped as the pale shape of Circuit darted through the attacking scavengers, climbing on the back of the one closest to him and stabbing its neck with a stolen spear. The slugcat dodged a dive bombing songbird and jumped onto Tridents’ shoulder, carefully so as not to hurt him more than he already had been. The two exchanged a few “wawa” sounds and Tridents’ eyes went wide.

Tridents grabbed Tablets and, limping, dragged him as close to the wall as they could get, Circuit jumping off of Tridents and following closely. Tridents forced Tablets to get down and laid himself on the ground. A few scavengers came toward them, expecting an easy kill if Tablets had to guess, but Tridents was smart, even if he didn’t seem it at times, so he didn’t question what they were doing.

Only a few moments later, a loud roar sounded — the exact roar that they had started to get familiar with for all the wrong reasons. The scavengers turned around. Tablets looked up to see Suns gliding down and landing in the mass of scavengers, completely unfazed as a horde of scavengers came toward them.

Tridents pulled Tablets closer while still watching Suns, then whispered, “You might want to make us a shield.” Tablets did so, making yet another shield out of his mane.

A scavenger charged at Suns with a spear, which was easily taken out of its hands and thrown to the side. The scavenger backed back into the small crowd that had formed around Suns.

A moment passed. Nothing seemed to happen. Nothing until Tablets saw Sig wrap himself around Moon and move as far from the scavengers as possible. A moment later, a massive burst of flame engulfed most of the scavengers, causing the others to flee to some other part of the wall, as well as the songbirds overhead. At least twenty charred scavengers laid on the ground once the flames stopped.

A few seconds passed as the tribe retreated in the face of a fire-breathing opponent. Suns waited for all of them to leave before flapping upwards again. They returned a moment later holding the other two hybrid children in their arms and Tridents’ trident in their talons. They set the trident down and delivered the newborns to their mother, then looked around for …something. Maybe it was just a dragon thing, Tablets didn’t know.

Suns went back into the wall, then returned with Dignity in their arms, who seemed to be slowly waking up. They looked upward as the feathered, pink form of their hostage/guide songbird came down. Her feathers seemed much lighter pink in the light, Tablets noted. She landed right in front of Suns, looking up to meet their eyes.

“You are aware that you may leave us now, yes?” Suns asked her. She shook her head and said something Tablets couldn’t hear — her voice was just too small to carry that far. “Well… I will not stop you from following us, though I do not speak for the others.” Suns looked around. Nobody objected, at least, not verbally. Sun looked back down and nodded at her. She beamed at them, then flapped up onto their shoulder.

“Actually,” Tridents growled, both he and Tablets moving toward Suns; Tridents with now with a noticeable limp. He stamped his trident on the ground, briefly spooking Circuit away from him. “I, object. How do we know she won’t just go back to her tribe every cycle so they can ambush us later?”

“Because she was exiled,” Suns responded. “I was told while you were fighting. She was caught helping Silent Sound of Day, the air dragon, climb up the wall while he was injured. Sound had apparently killed one of their scavengers at some point, but she was unaware of this. She was punished immediately after being caught.”

Tridents narrowed his eyes, but nodded anyway. He was right to be skeptical of what a dragon said, but he had to trust them anyway, otherwise he risked being killed. Suns sighed, venting smoke, and turned to Moon and Sig. They looked like they were about to say something when Dignity stirred in their arms. Suns set him down.

Dignity, for the first time in cycles, stood on his own, his leg seeming to have mostly healed over the last few cycles. He put his hand to his forehead, then opened his eyes and looked around at everyone. He signed something, which Tablets didn’t understand at all. Suns nodded. Dignity let out a breath of steam.

“He asked if the scavengers are gone,” Tridents translated. Tablets nodded.

“Well, if everyone’s back and ready then I say we should leave now,” Sig said, his sails twitching. “But, if no one else is gonna come then I guess I’ll just leave on my own since nobody seems to care about actually getting places-”

“We get it,” a hoarse voice said. Dignity’s voice. Sig turned to him in shock. Tablets couldn’t tell if it was because he had been talked back to or because Dignity had spoken at all. Judging by how Moon was also looking at him, it was probably because he had spoken at all.

Sig slowly turned back around and slithered into a pipe, Moon following close behind. Suns looked down at Dignity, who took a quick, deep breath, then looked back up at them. They motioned toward the pipe that Moon and Sig had gone through and slowly moved toward it. Dignity followed close to their side.

Tablets looked at Tridents, who looked at him back with likely the exact same expression. Circuit hopped onto Tridents’ shoulder, looking at both of them with the closest expression a slugcat could make, then chirped and flicked an ear at the pipe. Tridents limped over to it, looked back at Tablets, then slipped through. Tablets followed after him.

Notes:

Oh hey look I’m back.

And I totally didn’t forget this existed for almost all of March.

So anyway.

I may have, uh, misclicked and posted this chapter while I was reformatting it for Ao3 so uh, um. That happened. *It’s fixed though now,* praise. I don’t think I’ve ever revised a chapter that fast before.

*Also* I added art to chapter 1! And this mayor may not be my way out of making elaborate character descriptions (especially for my OCs, who obviously don’t have public references (as of posting this chapter)). So that’s cool.

And lastly for today (or tonight here in the US), I might not post on schedule for a week or two (because I can totally be talking about posting on schedule) because I have five million competitions coming up, plus three band concerts to get ready for in the next two months, so I don’t have as much time as usual to dedicate to this. This doesn’t mean I won’t be working on it during that time though, just, again, not nearly as much as I usually do.

ALSO AND I PROMISE THIS IS THE ACTUAL LAST THING HERE, the Watcher just dropped on Friday, and thats kinda really cool. I won’t spoil it for anyone, but it is absolutely amazing to play it please. And with the Watcher comes a crap ton more lore, meaning a crap ton more stuff for me to cram into the already hyper dense worldbuilding for this tiny little AU. I can’t say if the lil black bean will be appearing in this (since I kinda didn’t plan for that), but I’ll see what I can do. If they do appear, it will likely be in the last section of this. That will probably come out mid-late 2025 if not 2026, so that’s plenty of time to play t DLC or catch up with it in the case that there are spoilers for some reason.

Chapter 19: Lock

Summary:

Hmm… This one is quite… strange. They keep laughing at something. They’re so… childish. I wonder… when did they leave? What were they, a monk, a peasant… a child?
…
I…
…
It doesn’t matter, no. It…
Maybe I’m not the only one.

He was starting to feel uneasy. He was starting to feel very uneasy.

He didn’t know why, but he simply… felt that way.

Maybe it was his father. He had been acting more and more irritable lately. More so than usual. He was normally just bad enough to be an annoyance, but now he seemed to be getting mad at someone, if not everyone, every second of the cycle.

It scared him.

He didn’t know why, but it did. Maybe it was a premonition? It felt like one.

Dignity sighed. He had been thinking about this too much lately, hadn’t he? They were at the bottom of the leg now; surely everything would go back to normal in a few cycles.

Or at least somewhat normal. Tablets, Tridents, and the songbird — Twenty Diamonds — were still following them. They had formed something of a board, since they were all going in the same direction anyway. Tablets and Tridents were going to some place up north to meet someone, and the others didn’t have anywhere better to go — excepting Suns, who had territory back down south. Dignity’s family had always been nomadic anyway.

Diamonds flew up to the small platform they waited on and landed on Suns’ shoulder. “There’s a pack of yellows down there,” she said in her usual high-pitched voice. “At least seven of them.” She cringed back a bit as Tridents readied his trident. Circuit gently batted at his neck.

Suns softly growled and dove off the platform, Diamonds flapping off their shoulder and landing on the edge of the platform. She looked back at the others — specifically Tridents — and shivered. Dignity thought he heard a scream from her mind.

Tridents lowered his trident and huffed, then nearly jumped into Tablets’ side as Suns roared below. Tablets somehow stayed still enough not to accidentally push the others off the tiny space.

Dignity felt a small sense of amusement from Diamonds, who apparently found it humorous that Tridents was as jumpy as he was — which was actually a new discovery for Dignity. Tridents set his trident vertically into the platform and leaned on it, mumbling or thinking something angrily.

A minute later, Suns flew back up to the platform and motioned for them to come down. Dignity quickly leaped from the tiny platform to the metal floor below. Said floor had eight bloody lizard bodies scattered across it. One lizard was notably missing most of the flesh and organs in its abdomen.

Suns landed by the mutilated lizard and took a quick bite out of it while Diamonds landed in the space between their shoulder blade and wing. The others quickly followed them before heading into a pipe.

Dignity crawled out of the pipe last, finding everyone standing just outside a karma gate. He internally breathed a sigh of relief. He, personally, was tired of that place. He quickly joined the others in the gate.

After a few short moments, the slightly less than familiar feeling of water pouring over his head hit Dignity. He closed his eyes and drew back his antennae in slight annoyance, shared by a few of the others. The water stopped, replaced by the loud buzzing and clanking of the gate opening and closing on either side, letting them walk through. Dignity looked back as the gate closed again before following through the pipe leading outside.

Stepping out, Dignity found he was now on a small extrusion of land surrounded by… water. Lots, and lots of water, stretching beyond the horizon. He froze in awe.

To his left, his mother stood, wings and arms outstretched. She seemed- she felt… he didn’t know quite how to describe it, but that may have been because he had never felt it before.

Behind him, he felt a similar feeling from Tridents, but less… whatever his mother was feeling. It was more of some kind of relief rather than… that. Tridents moved up beside her, and something was felt between them. Maybe it was an aquatic thing? …List of things to never understand.

The two finned iterators looked at each other, something passing between them again, then Tridents dove into the water. He quickly resurfaced, looking and feeling much more positive than he had for the last few cycles.

Tridents gave Tablets an inviting look, from which Tablets slowly backed away. Dignity still might not have been able to read him, but he could tell he didn’t like the water, or at least it seemed that way. Tridents rolled his eyes and  dove under, Cuircit somehow staying mostly on his back as he did so, then leaped up to grab Tablets, who he then dragged into the water.

As it suddenly turned out, Tablets could not swim. For some strange reason it took Dignity a moment to realize that was why he was so afraid of the water. Tridents started laughing at Tablets attempts as he held him above the surface.

Dignity felt a hand on his shoulder and looked over to his mother standing beside him. She looked down at him, then gestured toward the blue expanse around them.

“This, Dignity, is the ocean,” she said. “The vast expanse of water off the mainland.” Dignity simply stared out at the water.

“I came from the ocean, did you know?” She said, “Not in the way that you would assume, but in a different way. I’ll tell you when you are older, Dig,” she said when he looked at her.

“I know it’s kinda Hara’s job to say this,” Tridents said from the water, still holding a frightened Tablets, “but shouldn’t we get moving?”

“Says the one who just wasted time swimming,” said the serpent in question.

“Well at least I-” Tridents started, but was quickly cut off by Suns grabbing a now screaming Tablets from his arms and flying off. “…Absolutely not,” Tridents said, sprinting after them.

Dignity looked at his parents, who were now the only other ones here. They looked at each other, then at him, then back again

His father huffed, then dove into the water. His mother followed after, himself trailing behind.

The water was, surprisingly, very cold. Dignity had never swam in the ocean before, but he had thought it would be much warmer. Ahead of him, his mother darted gracefully through the water, his father struggling to propel himself with his tail, but managing to keep up.

Dignity swam just a bit deeper, trying to see further down. He couldn’t make out much, as he was still trying to follow his parents, but managed to catch a few glimpses of colorful things. He would have reached down to touch one, had he not needed to stay close to the others.

He resurfaced for a moment to look up at the cloudy sky. The sun was still covered by the cloud layer here, but it was still bright enough to see where it was. He dove down again, sprinting to catch up with his mother as she rolled in the water. Dignity attempted to copy her maneuver, but found he was less suited for swimming in such a way, to say the least.

Not far ahead of them, Dignity could make out Tridents’ and Cuircit’s shared silhouette still sprinting to catch up to Suns, who was nowhere in sight themselves. He seemed to be swimming slowly, possibly because of his energetic outburst, Dignity thought. They quickly caught up to Tridents, who reluctantly swam faster to keep up with them.

After a few minutes of swimming, Dignity began feeling slightly fatigued himself. He hadn't exactly swam for that long before — he usually only went for a minute or two in a river. Not too far ahead of them, to his relief, Dignity could barely make out what seemed to be land. Tridents, also seeing this, pointed it out to them. Dignity swam a little bit faster.

What felt like only a moment later, they had reached the shore. Dignity pulled himself out of the water a moment after his mother, followed by his father and Tridents. The four of them immediately laid down to catch their breath.

After having given himself a moment to recover, Dignity stood up to the feeling of someone approaching. He stared inland, into a very dense looking forest of some kind of strange tree he hadn’t ever seen before. The feeling of someone’s mind only became stronger the longer he stared.

He suddenly felt something… strange from whatever mind he was sensing. Something that sent a shiver down his spine. He took a step back. A moment passed.

…And nothing seemed to happen. He must have just been overthinking, surely. He was sure that there was someone there, but whoever it was didn’t seem to be bothering them, so whatever that feeling was, it must have not meant anything… right?

He turned back toward the others, who were now all standing up and stretching or looking back at the ocean. He took a step toward them, then felt that strange feeling again. He thought nothing of it that time. Another step forward, then he froze. There was something- someone on his back.

He tried to turn to see what it was, but found he was being held too firmly and couldn’t move. He tried to struggle against whoever was holding him, unsuccessfully. He hissed, alerting the others to his assault. Tridents immediately held out his trident, sprinting at Dignity’s attacker, who moved out of the way.

Dignity hissed again as he felt his feet leave the ground. He tried to struggle again, gaining the same results as before. Whoever this was was strong, and they could fly. Dignity tried to shift his position, for once succeeding. He opened his mouth as wide as possible without unhinging it and took a gasping breath, then unfolded his fangs and bit into whatever part of his attacker he could reach.

There was a small hiss of pain from just above him as he was suddenly released. He let out his own small cry as he fell a fortunately small distance. Scrambling to his feet again, he looked up at the aggressive iterator, who had landed just in front of him. She was silver, with strange floating antennae and similar wing-like things by her back. Her tail was thicker than normal, and she had… slugcat ears-

Dignity wasn’t given much time to process the sight, as he was again grabbed. Just before he was brought into the air again, though, another pair of hands had also grabbed him. Before the attacker could try to pry them off, she was tackled by Dignity’s mother, who pinned her down in the sand for a moment, only to be pushed off and pinned herself. A silver, clawed hand was raised, then moved as if to strike, but froze. The silver iterator slowly lowered her hand, then took a slow step back, fear on her face, shame and embarrassment flooding her mind.

“L…Looks to the Moon…” She muttered, then looked up at the other three. “No Si… Tridents…?” She took a few more steps back. Her tail brushed the sand anxiously. She locked eyes with Dignity for what felt like a lifetime.

Neither blinked. They simply stared at each other — he wasn’t sure for how long — until Dignity crumbled to the ground, gasping and holding his right eye. He tried to look up again, only to find the light was too blinding.

His eye burned, like no other pain he had had before. He curled his tail around himself in a fetal position, kicking at nothing, breathing erratically. He squeezed his eyes shut, the pain in one only getting worse. He thought he could hear shouts from somewhere, but they were distant and muted. He barely had the mental strength to think between the others’ internal screaming before he blacked out.

Notes:

Oh my gosh, look who’s actually writing again. Crazy, right?

Sorry for not updating this for so long, I actually kinda forgot it existed for a while, then I went through some stuff and lost my motivation to do literally anything at all, but one long talk with a friend later and I’m actually back!

On a lighter note, I’d recommend paying attention to the language the chapter title is in… for no particular reason, of course, totally. Nothing going on there at all, trust~

Chapter 20: Watashi wa Ame

Summary:

雨 (Hiragana: あめ - Romaji: Ame) (Japanese)

 

rain: n. v.
rān

n. moisture condensed in the atmosphere than falls visibly in separate drops
v. rain falls

precipitation; drizzle; sprinkle

from Old English “regn”

Black tendrils blocked her view. She didn’t dare look up. If she did… well…

She slashed at the living biohazard holding her down. She just barely managed to make a mark — one that was now oozing a strange blue substance. The tendrils retracted.

She immediately righted herself, quickly sweeping her tail under the pink menace’s feet, tripping him. She took no time pinning him down herself.

She raised her claw to gouge out his eyes, but missed by an arm’s length as she was picked up by the tendrils again and thrown to the side. She landed hard on the ground, her head spinning. She took a moment to breathe while she couldn’t move her body. She barely managed to look up.

The rotten iterator had stood up again, and was himself panting just as hard as she was. He wiped a stream of blue, viscous blood from his face with one of his tendrils, his eyes stabbing into her own. She gave him her best enraged stare back.

She gritted her teeth, pushing herself back up with shaky arms. She managed to rise to her full height, spreading in wings and raising her tail and a vain attempt at intimidation. As if she had anything in the rot monster.

He leaped at her, arms outstretched to push her to the ground again. She easily moved out of the way, raking her claws down his back while he recovered, tearing his orange-red robe. He gasped in pain, then looked up at her again. He moved as if to attack, then stopped and looked past her with a manic grin. She turned to see what he was looking at at the perfectly wrong moment.

Just as she had turned, a spear flew directly at her head. The tip was red — it was an explosive. She froze for less than a second, which was exactly how long it took for a black and gold blur to go past and block the spear. She registered a distorted cry of pain just as her right eye was hit by part of the explosion.

She fell to the ground, screaming in agony. She could, just barely, make out light blue stains on the ground before her. She could just barely register the searing pain in her eye as she held it. She could just barely tell that, some amount of time later, someone picked her up and took her somewhere. She wasn’t aware enough to tell who or what before she lost consciousness.

Notes:

Yeah, that’s right. I did just make an Inabakumori reference. And yes, I am a proud weeb.

 

Alsooooo, in celebration of Deltarune chapters 3 and 4 coming out (bet you didn’t see Deltarune influencing this at any point eh?) I’m posting *two* chapters this time! And, even better news, I finally have a backlog again so I can actually post somewhat constantly again now, so y’all can expect actually somewhat kinda consistent updates again.

Chapter 21: Reason Becomes the Blame

Dignity blinked the blurriness out of his vision, slowly bringing his mind back into reality. He suddenly gasped for air, realizing he didn’t have any. He choked on something for a moment — probably his own saliva — while he pushed himself into a sitting position. He took a moment to breathe, then jumped when he looked up.

The same strange iterator from earlier was crouched beside him, looking completely defeated. He would have stepped away from her, had he the energy, though he could sense she didn’t have it in her to do anything to him. Not anymore… whatever that meant.

“I give up,” she sighed, standing. “I give up now, I’m done, I’m tired, I am completely sick of this.” She turned to rake her claws down a tree. “The one thing I manage to catch is still alive, just my luck.” She slammed her tail into the tree, visibly realizing how bad of an idea it was just a moment after. Honestly, Dignity felt worse for the tree.

She looked over at him, turning her head slightly to the right of him. It took Dignity a moment to realize that it was because she couldn’t see with her right eye. That would explain the strange dark blue mark over it, and why it was closed.

“Well?” She sighed. “Those others you were with are just to the southeast. I won't stop you from going back. Void, I’ll take you if you want at this point.” Dignity only stared at her. She deflated, then rose again and stepped over to him. “…Well?”

Dignity continued to stare at her. Her strange antennae and wings, both light blue, shined from a closer point of view. She had a star crest, separated into three sections, top and sides. It was also blue. Her eye was also a slightly lighter shade of that same blue. She had a lot of blue-

“Hello? Did you even hear anything I said?” She waved her hand to the side, all four antennae drooping in annoyance. She glared at him for a moment, then her eye widened and she grinned. “…Do you… want to be eaten? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?” Dignity stood up and stepped back. “…I’ll take that as a hard ‘no’ then.” She sighed again.

“…So are you going back, or are you just gonna stay here and annoy me? One option lets you live and the other gets you eaten, so I’d choose wisely if I were you.” She stepped away, flicking her tail dismissively. She stood silently for a few seconds, arms crossed, before something in her mind betrayed her and she turned back toward Dignity.

Dignity shivered when she looked at him that time. The strange feeling he had earlier was radiating off of her in waves. Dignity had no idea what it was, but it seemed desperate, and it made him want to run for his life. Something told him, though, that running was the worst option right now.

“…Well since you don’t seem to be going anywhere…” She slowly stepped toward him, the strange feeling now overwhelming. Dignity started shaking. She circled him, sizing him up, it seemed. Dignity realized he couldn’t run anymore if he wanted to.

Now was the worst time to run.

She stood in front of him for a moment, then grabbed his arm and bit into it. Dignity screamed.

At nearly the same moment, a bronze trident flew just past them, grazing the silver iterator’s back. She let go to look back. Her eye widened in fear.

Tridents stood just feet away, pure rage in his eyes. The other iterator stepped back — a terrible mistake. Tridents ran to pick up his trident while Circuit came out of nowhere to tackle the stranger’s face. Tridents quickly joined them, pinning the other to the ground, hovering his trident just over her head. Circuit quickly jumped onto his shoulders, watching closely.

“So… You got out, eh? Took the messenger with you as well. Smart.” She said in a mocking tone. She was cut off by a small movement of the trident just before she could say any more.

“Save your breath,” Tridents spat. “Nobody cares.”

“Typical Tridents-”

“I’m. Not. Done.”

“…”

Tridents took a deep breath. “Just stay away from us and we won’t have a problem. Not hard. Very simple. We get to not have you on us, and you get to not die. I’d say it’s a pretty good deal.”

“And I think you should burn.”

“Funny, that’s exactly what Forest said before she burned down my structure. Also funny how your little boyfriend was the one that got me out just before you told him that you helped with that.”

“What?!”

“Fuck do you mean, ‘what’?!”

“I never said that!”

“Tablets would say otherwise.”

“Tablets eats rocks.”

“Good to know we’re both talking about the same person, but I’m pretty sure you still don’t get it.”

“Wha-”

She was cut off by a trident stabbing into her neck. She froze in horror for a moment, then choked for another before she stopped moving entirely. Tridents slowly pulled out his now silver stained trident. Dignity could feel the weight on his mind.

Tridents slowly stood up. Circuit chirped at him, they were given no response. They looked over to Dignity, who looked back at them blankly. They gently batted at Tridents’ shoulder. Still no response. Tridents’ antennae twitched every few seconds. Nothing more.

Dignity looked up. He could sense Suns approaching before he heard their wings. They slowed and floated to the ground, setting a frightened Tablets down in front of them. They looked at Dignity, asking him what had happened. Dignity looked at Tridents, then back at Suns. They nodded.

“Tridents-” Tablets started. He paused suddenly, as if sensing his friend’s emotions. “…Tridents?” He walked toward him. “Tridents, what happened-”

“Don’t look,” Tridents said firmly. “You don’t want to know.”

“…Tridents…”

“DON’T.”

Tablets recoiled at Tridents’ raised voice. Tridents himself felt like a bomb, just waiting for someone to set him off.

“…At least let me see-”

“No.”

“Then tell me what happened-”

“No.”

“…”

“…”

“Tridents…

“Your trident is stained silver…”

“…”

“There’s only one person in this world who has silver blood.”

“…”

Tridents started shaking.

“…

“You killed her, didn’t you?”

Tridents hung his head.

Tablets stepped toward him.

Tridents ran away.

Notes:

Oh boy, here comes the relational angst arc. May or may not have been inspired by a few different fandoms I’m in.

I would have made this chapter a bit longer, but it felt just a bit better to leave it here. And I may or may not love leaving cliffhangers, teehee~

Chapter 22: Windchimes

“…”

Tablets stood silently for a moment.

“You’d better run, traitor.”

His breath became sharp and shaky.

“She never did anything to you…”

He bent down beside the silver iterator’s body, every limb falling limp. His mane coated the ground around him. Softly, he whimpered.

Dignity felt a warm hand on his shoulder and looked up at Suns. They looked down at him.

“We have no place in this,” they said. “We… should leave him.”

“Leave him?” Dignity signed.

Suns took a steady breath. “Yes,” they signed back. “If he is to go north, he would have to go across the same island chain as we are. It is the only way north.” They paused for a moment to look at Tablets — who was now audibly sobbing — again. “She will come back the next cycle. Assuming they will move together without Tridents, she will carry him between islands.”

“Are you sure?”

“I cannot answer that.”

Dignity raised his hands to sign back, but found himself at a loss for words. He set his hands to his sides and nodded solemnly. Suns did the same.

Suns put their arms around Dignity and took off. They flew not far to the other side of the island, where Dignity could see the others had gathered to wait for them. Suns hovered for a moment just a foot above the ground, scattering sand into the air, before landing with a heavy thud and setting Dignity down. They took a long breath, which was exhaled in a large cloud of steam.

Dignity walked past his mother as she turned to him. He stepped into the cold water, shivering as it seeped between his scales. The cold didn’t stop him from moving further out, far enough that the water reached his waist. He took a minute to breathe.

He felt his mother’s cool, moist hand on his shoulder. He wanted, for some unexplainable reason, to push it off and run away. He wanted to scream at her and his father, and he didn’t know why. The feeling was strong enough that he couldn’t hear anyone else’s mind over his own for the first time in his life. He shivered again — not because of the cold.

“…Dignity?” He heard his mother’s voice say. “…What’s on your mind?”

“Nothing.” A lie.

“…Dig… Please…”

Dignity stared toward the horizon without responding. He distantly heard his father scoff. He heard small parts of a conversation Suns and Diamonds were having. Something about how his antennae had stopped twitching. He had no idea what they were talking about. He felt the hand leave his shoulder as he waded further into the water.

He brought his hands up to his face. Something told him to rake his claws down his eyes. He didn’t. He still knew better than to listen to ghost minds over his shoulder…

Or maybe he hadn't heard anyone. Maybe it was just him. He… didn’t think he would think to do something like that, but… maybe. He moved further. The water now reached his chest.

“Dignity?”

He jumped at the sound of Suns calling his name. He turned around to see them looking at him. He waded back towards them. He fell into their arms.

Suns carried him while moving inland towards somewhere. Dignity hadn’t been paying attention to where. He only noticed the change in lighting as Suns moved under something into some cooler place and laid him down. The ground was hard and cold.

 

…

 

Dignity woke up some amount of time later. He didn’t know when he had fallen asleep. He looked up to find Suns, his parents, and his siblings sleeping in various places in the space they were in, which Dignity assumed was under a large rock of some kind.

Giving his eyes a few seconds to finish adjusting to the dim light, Dignity slowly stood up. Only half thinking, he stepped outside of the space and into the forest. It was just barely lighter outside, only the faint glow of the moon and stars mostly hidden by the clouds to provide any light. Dignity only then realized he shouldn’t be out at this time. He strayed further anyway.

He vaguely remembered where he last saw Tablets and Tridents in relation to where he and the others were. He walked in that general direction. It was hard to tell exactly where he was going in the dark.

After a while of walking, he felt, somehow, that the trees were more familiar. He ran his hand down the trunk of each one until he found one that felt like it had been shredded. He was indeed back where he was before.

Dignity oriented himself based on where the tree was. He had last seen Tablets just to the right of the tree… Suns was standing there… and he was… here. It was all coming back now.

And now that he was here… what would he do? He had found his way back… now what. Should he just turn back around…? He didn’t know.

Then there was a flash of black.

He wasn’t sure how, but there was. A black flash in an already dark night. Great. Now he was freaking out.

Another flash. Something shiny was with it too this time.

Dignity looked around, trying to see what it could be. He started breathing faster.

Another flash. Now he was completely panicking. He stepped back-

There was something behind him. It was cold- No, it was freezing. Dignity slowly turned around to see what it was, then looked up to see it fully. He took a step back.

Something- someone was staring down at him from at least four times his height. They were blacker than the surrounding darkness, yet shining in some way at the same time. They had eight glowing, golden eyes, positioned to look like two eyes with X’s through them. Somehow, even in the dark, Dignity could tell they were grinning at him. It was a wide, wicked grin.

Dignity started shaking. Harder than he’d ever before. Something about this person- everything about this person made him want to run and scream and hide. Yet, at the same time, something made him want to stay. Made him want to come closer. Dignity couldn’t move.

They moved closer to Dignity, kneeling and bending over to be closer to his height. There was a soft jingling sound from somewhere. It was eerily musical. Dignity heard a small growl under their breath as they looked at him, suddenly seeming very confused.

They continued looking him over long enough for Dignity to do the same. The jingle had come from what he was pretty sure were shards of some crystal like things on what appeared to be wings. They had an overly long tail that was slowly forming a circle around them, more crystals on its tip. They also had six horns of this same crystal that moved like a slugcat’s ears with their expression. He couldn’t see any of their limbs from his position, but he assumed they also had this crystal-like thing on them.

After another few moments of observation, they growled again, this time more audibly. Their expression changed to one of annoyance, save for their eyes, which hadn’t changed at all the entire time.

“…There’s something wrong with this one…” They mumbled to themselves, flicking their horns back. Their voice was rough and low. “It’s too… Hmm… Not sure, but there’s something wrong with it. No fun in the broken ones.” They rose to their full height again, the jingling sound returning as they moved their wings.

Dignity tensed as they grabbed him with their tail. They brought him up to their face, then dropped him and caught him with a clawed hand, still level with their eyes. They tilted their head in thought, occasionally opening their mouth as if to say something, then staying silent.

“Why are you here?” They finally said, bluntly. Dignity felt like he was about to start hyperventilating. They waited for a moment, then growled when he didn’t respond. Dignity managed to free his left arm to point down. They seemed to understand and set him on the ground again, kneeling back down themselves.

“I don’t know,” Dignity signed, hoping it would understand him.

They hummed, then spoke again. “I suppose we have the same reason, then. You came to see her and so did I, yet she is no longer here. No thanks to the cycle, of course.”

“…I… Didn’t come here for her,” Dignity signed, trying to emphasize confusion.

“Hmm, yes you did. You just don’t know it. I do. I know all there is to know about you with a single look and a few… let’s call them ‘visits’ to a few others.” Dignity tensed at that last part. “Oh, no, no, I didn’t do anything to them… not that I wouldn’t like to… I only observe. It’s the only thing I can really do, other than the other things that I can do, of course.”

This person was very confusing.

“What are you saying?”

“Mmm… nothing. Nothing really. In fact I really should be on my way. Not that I’m going anywhere, but does it really matter? We’re all just numbers on a die anyway; pieces in a game of chess. Some win, some lose, some… some of us die. Some of us die and yet stay and yet are reborn at the same time — I would know about that one. I’m sure you could talk to Nineteen about it if you really want to know more, but I can tell you’re getting tired of me… And I’ve been rambling for long enough now.”

They looked at the sky, which was just barely becoming lighter. They sighed. “You should go as well. They’ll be wondering where you are.” They rose again, still looking down at him. “But then, they’ll be wondering for a very, very long time soon enough.”

Dignity almost asked what that meant, but they had already flown off before he could move.

Dignity slowly walked back to the others, still confused about what had just happened. He wanted to think it was a dream, but he was clearly very much awake. But some of the things said… they brought him a sense of dread in a way he didn’t understand. Again, things one would think would be in a nightmare.

It was easier to find his way back than he had expected, but it made sense, considering he had found where to go in near complete darkness earlier. Fortunately for him, nobody was fully awake by the time he had returned. Only Suns was getting up at all. Surely no one had noticed he was gone.

Dignity stayed outside, leaning against the rock. His mind was still with the strange… thing he had spoken with. Or rather, listened to. It was a very one-sided conversation, if it could even be called one at all. Dignity inhaled deeply, then let it out through his mouth as steam. He shifted his wings uncomfortably. He suddenly really wished he didn’t have them.

“Dignity,” Suns’ voice said from beside him. He turned to look at them. “Are you well? You are never awake this early.” They settled their wings over their shoulders.

“I’m fine,” Dignity lied. He had lied twice now.

“You are not acting as if you are… Dignity…” Suns gently grabbed his arm. Dignity looked down at it. He hadn’t realized he was squeezing his arm at all. It hurt now that he realized it.

He dropped his other hand back to his side. He looked up again. Suns was looking at him with worry. Dignity stared back blankly. Suns’ gaze intensified. Dignity realized they were trying to tell him something. He then realized he couldn’t feel their mind at all. Suns gave up. They looked down with a steamy sigh.

Dignity looked away. He could distantly feel something scratching against his arm. He paid it no mind. Eventually Suns went back inside. Dignity didn’t mind their absence. He didn’t mind anything anymore. Not after the encounter with whoever that was.

Not after another death had broken someone.

 

Notes:

Man I wonder who this funky autism creature who may or may not be the most developed character who unfortunately is not the main character and thus will not seem like a developed character is. Wouldn’t it be really strange if it turned out this little dude had appeared multiple times before without any explanation at all?

I’m very good at being discreet about my characters, I know. Very much a thing that I am totally very good at.

This chapter didn't come out nearly how I wanted it too so it's definitely gonna get a rewrite at some point (I'll mention it when I do), but I'm going to leave it like this for now since I want to move on to the next section of Dig angst.

 

So you know that whole section from earlier in the story with all that depression? Yeah, the next few bits are going to be that but doubled, so I'm just going to say it now so I don't have to later. This isn't a vent fic (I don't really have much to vent about anyway other than just being generally depressed) but sometimes I accidentally make it one.

Chapter 23: A Change

Summary:

…That was interesting.

I wonder what he plans to do now. Well, I don’t wonder, I know. But wouldn’t it be nice to pretend I didn’t know for once…? Maybe, maybe.

Did I tell him too much? No, I don’t think I did. I don’t suppose it matters though, I can’t change the future once I know it. That’s how prophecy works, is it not? Or, well, I guess it’s how I work, but it’s all the same anyway, it doesn’t really matter.

…Why does something tell me I should visit him again soon?

Notes:

Overly long dialogue section written by an autistic person warning.

Dignity was still staring at nothing when Suns came back. They stood just left of where he was staring. He looked toward Suns. He looked past them.

They sighed. “Dignity…”

Blue eyes looked up to meet red.

They took a slightly shaky breath. “Why…”

“What?”

“What happened?”

“Nothing happened… except for last cycle.”

“I know it is not just that, Dignity.”

“How?”

“…Looks to the Moon… and No Significant Harassment.”

“…What?”

“They… They are not themselves either. They have not been since we met again… They are… too different for it to have only been time.”

“W-what…” Dignity cleared his throat. “What do you mean?”

“…They…

“Is this really the only version of them that you know?”

“…They were different before?”

They looked down. A moment passed. They gently picked up Dignity and flew above the boulder they had been under. They put Dignity down.

“Are you entirely sure, Dignity?”

“Yes.”

“…

“Look south. At Grey Wind.”

Dignity looked. The structure looked the same as before. The only difference being that Dignity could see where its legs touched the ground from here. Other than that… it was just Wind.

“I am… not sure if you have been told this before, but-” Suns paused. “Maybe this is not the best time to explain this, actually.” They looked at Dignity. “Do you… Do you feel as if you could handle something… something… important right now?”

Dignity nodded. Anything to get the last cycle off his mind. Anything.

Suns breathed for a moment, then continued. “Not long ago, at least for those of us that this applies to, all iterators were like Wind.

“…What?”

“We were all… I really prefer not to phrase it this way, but… we were all… trapped, in a way. Trapped within ourselves. Like Grey Wind, like Gazing Stars, like Forked Rivers, and all the others who chose to stay that way. How it happened, I do not think is something that should be told for now. Not with you in your current state, anyway. But what matters is that we all were that way.”

Dignity processed that for a minute. He didn’t know how to respond. He wasn’t expecting that, but he also wasn’t shocked by it. It almost felt… hmm.

Dignity looked at Suns. “What does that have to do with us?”

“…Back then, Moon and Sig, your parents, they were… very different. I was not part of their local group, so I do not know exactly what it was like with them, but I was told that Moon was much more vocal than she is now. Seeing her as quiet as she is now is… I do not know how to describe the feeling.” They looked down.

They took a few weighted breaths, then continued, “Sig was nothing like he is now. He was a troublemaker, yes, but he was happy with himself. A jester, one could have called him,” Suns chuckled slightly, “I can still remember the sound of his laughter after I told him my messenger had accidentally exploded one of his strange birds. I personally saw no humor in it, but I know it made him smile…

“Sometimes I… I wonder what happened to that iterator.”

Dignity had been looking at the clouds while Suns was talking. He felt something in Suns drop — the first thing he had felt in someone since last cycle — as he spoke of his father’s past self. He could understand why.

He could remember now, just barely, a time when they had been somewhat like that. Back when he was little. Back when-

Suns sighed again, looking up at Wind’s structure in the distance.

“Sometimes I wonder… if that will happen to us all. It almost seems like it already has at times. Even I am not the same person I was then.” They took a shaky breath. “I was… flawed then. Some of the things I did were,” their breath hitched, “…unforgivable.

“Some of the things I have done now… are even more so.”

There was a silence. Dignity stared at nothing specifically. Suns stood silently. Dignity could feel them thinking. He felt just a bit better, being able to feel their mind again. He focused more on the fact that he could feel them at all than what they were thinking about. He didn’t want to think about what they were thinking about.

The silence was broken when Suns started crying. Dignity looked up at them. It was barely audible, but he could hear their breath shaking. Small tears rolled down their face, looking completely out of place on their normally strong yet soft facade.

Dignity stared into them. He listened to them. Their eyes darted somewhere else with every unwanted thought. Dignity almost felt bad for them. He shouldn’t, really. They almost killed him, after all. They killed his father, they almost killed Tablets, they almost killed Tridents. They didn’t deserve his sympathy. They didn’t deserve anyone’s sympathy.

They were a freak. They were a disgrace. They almost killed Pebbles and then they drove away their only friend. They drove away their child. They drove away everyone they knew. They hurt them. They hurt them all. They only hurt them. They could only hurt.

They could only hurt.

Only hurt.

Hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt-

Suns snapped out of their thoughts. They were breathing fast. Dignity realized he was as well. They held eye contact for a solid minute.

“I-I-” Suns stammered, “I apologize, tha-that, that was- I-I really-” They looked down. “…You should not have had to hear that… I should not be thinking-” They took a deep breath. “I… I-”

“Suns! Oh, and Dignity too!”

They both looked back. Diamonds was flapping over to them. She landed a few feet from them, fluttering her tiny wings.

“W-we should- uh, um, w-we- you- Sig- I-” She shook her head and took a small, steadying breath. “Sorry, sorry, my tongue got a bit twisted, ugh. Ahem. Sig is staring up and being pouty waiting for you two to come down so we can get moving.”

Ah. Right. They were still traveling.

“…We will come down in… just a moment,” Suns said, their voice still shaking slightly.

“I, u-uhm, I didn’t interrupt anything, did I?” Diamonds asked nervously, taking a step back.

“N-no, no. We were only- we were only talking.”

“Okay then,” she waved at them, turning back around. “Don’t take too long, will you?” She smiled anxiously and frantically flew back down.

Dignity looked up at Suns again. They breathed shakily, slowly closing their eyes. Dignity reached his hand out toward them. They recoiled when he touched their wing. They slowly relaxed.

Suns slowly, reluctantly, carried Dignity back down. Sig was, indeed, at the base of the rock waiting for them. He huffed as Suns landed.

“Took you long enough,” he snarled. He slithered up to Suns, raising himself on his tail to be slightly taller than them. “Don’t pull this shit again.”

Suns growled. Dignity could feel that they were too drained for a confrontation. The two glared at each other for a tense moment. Suns turned away first.

Suns walked up to a tree and ran their claws down the bark. They let their hand fall to their side after a second of hesitation. Dignity took a step toward them, but felt a cold hand on his shoulder. He looked back at his father, who was staring at Suns, his eyes slit in disdain.

Dignity looked back at Suns. They were breathing faster again. They were shaking. They turned back to Dignity and his father.

“…You want me gone, do you not?” They asked. They looked tired.

Sig hissed in response.

“…Have it your way then,” Suns said, their voice low and defeated.

Suns turned away again and spread their wings. Dignity immediately ran toward them, ignoring his father’s yell for him to stop. He reached out to Suns just as they took off. He stumbled forward to where they were standing, staring up at them as they flew off. Dignity’s eyes started watering.

He stood for a moment, staring at the sky where Suns had been, then slowly turned his head to look at his father behind him.

He looked more serpentine than ever.

Dignity suddenly became aware of his breathing. He felt his face change in some way. He didn’t know what he looked like, and something told him he didn’t want to know.

Blinded by whatever he was feeling, Dignity whipped around and ran. He only ran. He could hear his father screaming behind him, chasing him. He was faster than Dignity, but Dignity was smaller. He ran between the tight spaces, the ones he knew his father couldn’t follow him through.

Eventually he couldn’t hear anything behind him anymore, only himself. He kept running. At some point he reached the shore — he started swimming. He wasn’t sure exactly where he was going. But none of them knew where they were going, only what direction to go.

He knew what direction to go. He knew where Suns was going, they had said it enough times by now that he knew where all of them were going.

North.

Go North.

Notes:

This may just be the worst chapter yet. I’m not sure if it’s been made clear by now by simply how I write it but I *suck* at character interactions and this chapter happens to be one that really needs someone who doesn’t suck at that to be a good chapter. Fortunately, because I managed (somehow) to finish writing this chapter without going insane, the next few shouldn’t have that much socialization (MY FELLOW INTROVERTS, RISE!!!), so they should be much better than this one.

Chapter 24: Assignment

Summary:

Why am I here again…? This place is an abandoned grave, not my home. Not that I need one.

Why do I feel wrong here? It isn’t like I should, I don’t think. Is it this specific spot here? But…

No, I can’t be that. That was too long ago. Actually, I shouldn’t be thinking about that at all. No one should. No one can. Forest made sure of that before it even happened.

So… why do I still hold that grudge?

As it turned out, “north” was a rather vague destination.

Dignity had been swimming for so long his entire body was beginning to hurt. Adrenaline could apparently only carry him so long before his muscles started to give out. He switched between undulating and using his arms regularly enough to last longer than he normally could, but it still couldn’t take him far enough.

He slowed to a stop, completely drained of energy, both physical and mental. He took a deep breath of air and floated on his back. The sky was less cloudy here than it was when he started swimming. He must have made more progress than he thought…

That or he had strayed so far from the island chain he would never find it again.

He released his breath and took another one, flicking his tail slightly. He drifted forward a bit.

So… what was there to do? He had run away from his family, he had no idea where Suns was at this point, and he didn’t even know if he was still going where he needed to to find them. Great.

Well, he was at least alone with his thoughts for once, if there wasn’t any other positive to his situation. He replenished his air again.

Maybe he would just float here forever. That sounded fine. He had just thrown his life away anyway, not like he could do much else. If he stayed here long enough, he might be killed by some strange sea monster… His mother had told him about those “leviathans” that used to surround her, maybe one of those would find him.

Actually, now that he thinks about it, would he rather be crushed by a leviathan or… actually, no. Leviathan seemed like the best option no matter what the other was.

…

Hmm…

…

…

…

He took another breath.

…

…

…“Mrrp?”

Dignity jumped, losing his breath. He flailed in the waiter for a moment before regaining control of himself and resurfacing. He looked around quickly to see what had made the sound, his eyes eventually landing on a small blue shape beside him.

Dignity froze, then quickly dove under the water, swimming straight down, then looked up to see if it was following. It was.

He snapped in whatever direction his mind decided in the moment and swam as fast as he could, his exhaustion replaced once again by a rush of adrenaline. He didn’t look back this time, more focused on not being killed.

Something grabbed onto his tail.

He panicked, trying to scream only to not have any air to scream with. He lashed his tail, uncaring of how it forced him into strange positions in the water. At some point the thing had released him. He looked around.

It was on his back this time.

He struggled to get the thing off, flashing his scales brightly in contrast to the dark water. It seemed to have worked, as it was off of him once again. He looked back to see what it was. He braced himself. He saw-

A…

A slugcat.

He had panicked over a slugcat.

Dignity drifted slowly toward it, partly to inspect it and partly because his gills couldn't filter the water if he wasn’t moving. It looked like any average slugcat, except it had what looked like frills on its face, a translucent pink skin around its tail. It was clearly adapted for water.

The rodent rubbed its tiny eyes, blinking slowly to see him again. It looked up at him as its eyes adjusted to non-blinding light again, then its face suddenly lit up, as much as slugcat faces could. It pointed up, then darted to the surface. Dignity followed it.

The two resurfaced again, both taking large gasps of air, tired from the sudden chase. Dignity looked at the aquatic slugcat. It looked back at him exitedly.

“Wawa-” It paused suddenly, thinking. It then facepalmed, then shook its head, scattering small drops of water around it. Dignity found it just a bit cute.

It pointed past Dignity to his left, waving its arm and making a swimming motion. Dignity didn’t need to read its mind to understand it wanted him to go that way. He nodded.

The slugcat made a happy sound, then darted off in that direction. Dignity began swimming after it, seeing nothing better to do.

A while later, he found himself exhausted again. The slugcat was nowhere in sight, so he didn’t dare stop, lest he lose his way again. He slowed, moving himself with small, slow tail motions. His limbs felt heavy.

Only minutes later, the small blue face reappeared in front of him, motioning toward itself again. Dignity tried to follow along with what it was trying to say, but found it a bit harder. His mind was simply too drained, and he never could make sense of slugcat thoughts anyway.

It motioned toward itself, then pointed down, then toward itself again. Dignity nodded slowly, pretending he understood. He would just follow it again. The slugcat nodded enthusiastically and dove down. Dignity trailed behind it, swimming far more slowly.

They swam down until it became too dark to see. Dignity absently let his scales glow. They kept swimming.

Somewhere in the dark, Dignity saw a small green light. A bit deeper, and there was a blue one. Then a purple, then an orange and a red and eventually there were too many colours to keep track.

Dignity looked around wide-eyed as the lights eventually became bright enough to light up some of the surrounding area, though they didn’t contribute as much as whatever was producing the light that it seemed the slugcat was leading him to. Said slugcat turned around to look at him with a joyful face before turning back around.

The slugcat led him around some large structure covered in strange plants. It looked ancient. A curious glowing face looked at them from beside it. Another swam around, also looking at them.

The slugcat swam under a large arching structure toward a brightly lit area. Dignity could now clearly see that he was correct in his subconscious assumption that these were iterators — aquatic, specifically. Patterned, glowing bodies moved around the area, ducking in and out of the surrounding structures. Some carried things, others didn’t. There were a few groups as well as others on their own. Dignity watched in partial awe as they all carried out seemingly regular activities.

The slugcat slowed as it approached a small structure. It seemed to be made of repurposed parts of some other structure, one long since taken down, seeing as its parts were already being reused. It entered through a roughly iterator-sized opening and motioned for Dignity to follow.

Inside, the space looked just as strange as on the outside, though it didn’t feel nearly as strange as it looked. A pattern of lanterns lit the space from the ceiling, casting a warm orange light on the inside. The lanterns lead through a wide tunnel to a larger space below, within which a shorter, black iterator in a flowing green robe rested.

The slugcat swam up to the iterator, tapping at their shoulder for attention. They turned to face it, and their tired face quickly turned to one of mild surprise and interest upon seeing Dignity. They waved upward, then pushed themselves upward through the water into an air pocket above them, which Dignity followed them into.

They- correction, she (why couldn’t he sense her mind before?) rested herself on a shelf coming out of the wall, placed in the water so one could sit on it and still hold their body mostly within the air pocket. Dignity took a place on a similar shelf on the opposing side, assuming he had no other real option. The slugcat joined the other iterator, curling up beside her. The orange lanterns floating around them created a calm atmosphere.

“What brings a feral like you to a place like this?” The other finally spoke. She scanned Dignity for a moment. He suddenly couldn’t sense her mind anymore.

“The slugcat led me here,” Dignity signed, praying she would understand him.

“Excuse me, but I know little of the shared sign language.” No, she did not understand him.

Dignity cleared his throat, preparing himself to once again hear his own, now less unused voice. “The slugcat led me here,” he said, cringing as his voice cracked. “I do not know why,” he added as she gave him a skeptical look.

“Hmm…” she glared at him for a moment, before turning to the slugcat in question. “Rivulet, is this true?” The slugcat — Rivulet — nodded in response. The iterator sighed.

“In that case,” she rose from her spot and began… floating just above the water. “My name is Unbound Shackles, the resident superstructure iterator of this domain. I do not know why one of our ambassadors has brought you here, but that will not change the fact that I expect you to regard me with respect.”

The room was suddenly flooded with bright green light, which cast ominously upon Shackles’ face, her glare suddenly more intimidating, though that could also be from the sudden revelation she had just dropped on Dignity.

In the light, he could also now see that she was not, in fact, floating, but was being held up by some kind metal arm. He could also now properly see her actually floating antennae, shaped like four-pointed stars, the top and bottom points extending to make their length. She had the same four-pointed star as her crest, along with three stripes, one in the middle stretching to the point between her eyes, and two beside it reaching halfway to that point. The markings were the same neon green as her eyes.

“Come down,” she said, lowering herself into the water. Dignity dove into the water as well.

There was a gentle-yet-strong current flowing through the space now, letting Dignity breathe. Shackles floated perfectly in the center of the space, still glaring at Dignity, though it softened when he positioned himself to be lower than her in the space. The light pulsated, bringing to Dignity’s attention the square tiles on the walls. They looked oddly like those in Tablets’ and whoever else’s nightmares-

“I take it you haven’t been to a proper iterator chamber before,” Shackles said, slowly moving in a circle, letting her arms fall downward as the rest of her body moved upside-down. Her voice somehow came from all directions at once, penetrating the barrier of water between them. Dignity nodded. “I’m not surprised,” she stated, moving further away from him.

“So, is there anything you desperately want to know?” Shackles asked. “Anything special you simply cannot live without knowing? Any answers as to why something specific is happening?” Dignity simply waited. “You might as well ask. It’s the only thing anyone comes to us for these days, and I’m going to send you off in a moment here anyway.” Dignity thought.

There was a short moment, then Shackles started looking impatient. “Well then, if you have nothing to say, I’ll give you ten seconds to leave on your own before I push you out.”

“A-actually-” Dignity started, then remembered she couldn’t understand him-

“I can translate your sign, I just didn’t know if I could trust you before. Not that I do any more now, for your information,” Shackles informed, now drifting around the room.

“Where are… we?” Dignity asked.

“Of all- Ah, nevermind,” Shackles said. An image suddenly appeared on one of the walls. “This is a map of our local area. This right here,” she pointed to a spot in a blue area — which Dignity assumed meant the ocean — just outside of the green area taking up the left side, “is where we are.”

She looked back at Dignity, then pointed to a spot below where they were labeled Chasing Wind. “Assuming you’re looking for another proper iterator, Wind is to the south of here.”

She pointed to a few other spots labeled Frosted Inferno, A Blue Flamed Candle, and Keeper of Great Secrets/Twin Stone Tablets. “If you’re looking for something interesting to do with your life, you could always visit Flame. I will warn you though, nobody’s heard from her since the ‘incident’ happened.”

Dignity nodded as she finished. None of the places she had mentioned seemed like they would get him anywhere in his search, but he didn’t have anywhere better to go. Flame did seem to be directly north of where they were, and not too far away as well…

“Anything else?” Shackles asked, the map disappearing. She had returned to drifting randomly around the space.

“Just one thing,” Dignity signed. “Has a shark iterator passed by here by any chance? He carries a trident, and he is usually followed by a pale slugcat.” It probably wouldn’t help much to know where Tridents is, but for all he knows Suns might have followed him.

Shackles moved to be directly in front of Dignity, staring at him intently. “Did you say a trident?” She asked, suddenly taking on a new seriousness. Dignity nodded.

Shackles moved away from him. “Do you know for sure if he was going this way? From what direction if so?” She asked in a calm yet frantic manner.

“I last saw him on the island chain south of here. He said he was going northward to see someone.”

She paused, then she looked panicked, though still with that odd calm. “Fuck…” She moved around as if pacing. “This is not good, this is bad, this- OF ALL THE TIMES I NEED ONE OF THEM TO LISTEN TO ME-” She paused. Dignity thought he heard rushing water from somewhere.

“You, you’re following him, are you not?” She asked him.

“…Yes? I am following someone who I think might be following him, but I am also following him to follow them…?” Dignity confused himself with his own answer, somehow.

“I need a straight answer, yes or no.”

“Yes.”

She moved in front of him again. “Listen to me, please,” she said. Dignity realized he could feel her around him again. She was scared. “I need you to find him and do anything you can to keep him from doing whatever it is this time. I don’t know how to explain all of this, but I can’t lose Flame again- I can’t lose another. Please…”

Dignity absorbed what she said. He came to the conclusion that he had no idea what was going on. Of course, he didn’t have to think to know that. He didn’t want to get himself into anything serious, but… Even if he couldn’t feel Shackles’ anxiety from every direction begging him, he technically had already gotten himself into whatever mess this was by knowing Tridents, so, morally, he didn’t have much of a choice.

Shackles still stared at him. He nodded. She backed away. Dignity turned to leave.

“Before you go…” Shackles started. Dignity looked back at her. She moved up to him and handed him a black-green pearl. “Bring this to Flame.” She looked down, then back up at him. “I… apologize for dragging you into our drama. This really should have ended a long time ago. Anyway, you may be on your way now.” Dignity nodded and left.

Notes:

So I didn’t mean for this part to happen in this chapter, but it just kinda did, and it just kinda worked so I’m not gonna complain about it. Also… Ruffles jumpscare! Slowly but surely the scugs join the story…

The main plot is finally set in motion! Technically it already was, but Dig was unfortunately unaware of how everything worked before and that would have made things a tad little bit hard to work with. But now that that part’s over we can get into the more interesting stuff! I have had this OC lore stuck in my brain for so long now, IT MUST BE RELEASED!

Speaking of that lore, I’m gonna try to explain most of it at some point, but it might end up being its own thing at some point. The beef between these goobers is real.

Chapter 25: Dead Pothos

Summary:

Pothos n.
päthōs/pōthōs

a southeastern Asian climbing plant of the arum family

 

Pathos n.
pāthäs/pāthōs

an emotion of sympathetic pity

Here he was. Again.

Why was he here? Why did that feel less like a question after all the times he had asked himself?

He floated over the grey wreckage. He could name the purpose and state of every piece of metal. He could recite every protein in every strand of DNA in every cell of every wilted vine in order. He could navigate the place as if it were still standing.

He had lived here once.

When his name was still Key to the Greatest Secrets.

Now… he was just Keys. The gold-plated freak.

He drifted over a single piece of rusted metal for at least a minute. Somehow, it was still stained red. That wouldn’t have been surprising if it were on the east side. But this was on the west side. The southwest side. He tilted down to move it-

His hand stayed just above it. The same mysterious field around every other inanimate object keeping him from disturbing it. He sighed.

He raised his claws to his eyes. He raked his claws through his eyes. The pain was unbearable. His vision failed. He was blind again. This was how he remembered he still existed.

Exactly one minute later, his eyes were as if nothing had happened. His vision was blurred by his own golden “blood”, but there was otherwise no difference. He wiped the blood off his eyes. He longed for the time when he had eyelids.

…

He looked over the wreckage from its highest point. There was no point in being here. There was nothing here for him. Only reminders of a better time. He would let the world burn if it meant getting that life back.

Burn. Why? Why did he have to make himself think about that now? That wasn’t even him. He was only associated with that at all because it caused a chain reaction which his own death happened to be a part of. He’d never even seen a fire before… This wasn’t his to think about. This wasn’t his to think about.

This wasn’t his to think about.

This wasn’t his to think about.

This isn’t his to think about.

He paused his thoughts. It was the closest thing he could do to taking a breath.

He needed to maul something. He would maul the next living thing he saw. He needed to let off some steam.

No, he wouldn’t maul anything. Too much physical effort. He would just… do something… He would figure it out when he found a victim.

…

…He was a little hungry.

…

…He didn’t have any other ideas in mind. And something had told him to go visit that odd purple feral again…

Notes:

Fun fact for this chapter specifically: I actually have a Pothos in my room — its name is Jeremy and it’s a Silver Satin Pothos (it also inspired the chapter name). Cool thing about Silver Satin Pothos is that they aren’t actually Pothos at all. I don’t remember exactly everything about it, but at some point someone realized they had classified it as part of the Epipremnum genus when it actually belonged to the Scindapsus genus. I didn’t actually know about this until after I got the Pothos, but I know now and I think it’s pretty cool.

 

Sooooo I changed the fic summary because the old one was made with the mindset that this would somehow end up being an Sig centered fic, which it didn’t, obviously. So now there’s a much better, much more accurate summary that may or may not be implemented somewhere in the future.

Chapter 26: Rolling

Dignity takes a moment to look around now that he wasn’t being dragged anywhere. Aquatics were still moving about the area — notably, more iterators than Dignity had ever seen in one place before. They all acted as if they knew each other, or at least the ones that Dignity saw interact.

He noticed, for some reason, that there were few younger iterators. Most of them seemed to be adults, or at least close enough to one to basically count. Yet he had only counted six adolescents and two younger children so far. Interesting…

Dignity was suddenly pulled out of his thoughts by a small hand touching his back. He turned to see the- Rivulet looking up at him happily.

“Apologies for not talking so well earlier, I didn’t know you read sign!” It signed, rather quickly. “But it will definitely make talking easier while I follow you!”

Dignity mentally buffered for a moment, surprised that this slugcat could understand sign. Circuit didn’t, so he had assumed all slugcats didn’t understand. Though, maybe it was a bit stupid of him to assume that about all slugcats from only one experience. Then again, he was stupid-

“You are following me?” He signed to the blue ball of energy staring at him, his signs a bit rough as he was still holding Shackles’ pearl. Rivulet nodded enthusiastically.

“Fell-Machine Unbound instructed I follow you,” the slugcat signed. “She also said the pearl must reach All-Machine Blue quickly. So we must leave fast, fast!” Rivulet emphasized her point by swimming in quick circles around herself, then grabbed Dignity’s free hand and tried to drag him forward. Dignity willingly moved with her.

Rivulet swam slower than Dignity had seen her before. He assumed it was to ensure he could keep up. She was still a very fast swimmer though, so Dignity still struggled to keep up. That could have been his exhaustion though.

Speaking of, was he really still exhausted from the chase? It hasn’t been long, but, even while swimming he should have recovered his stamina by now. Odd… Wait. Oh, of course, he was an idiot.

He hadn’t eaten since the previous cycle. He hadn’t noticed because he hadn’t felt hungry. That… didn’t really make sense though, he would notice if he was hungry, right? That's the whole point of the feeling, to remember to eat. It’s kind of an important part of life, after all.

Dignity lightly tugged on Rivulet’s hand. She slowed and looked back at him.

“What is it?”

“Could we eat before we go?” Dignity asked. “I have not eaten since last cycle, and I can feel it affecting my strength.” Rivulet nodded positively and started leading him in a different direction.

They had barely gotten very far by the time Dignity had tired himself out again. He tried to keep up with Rivulet, who had slowed even more for him, though it was becoming even harder to do so. Moving at all eventually became painful. Rivulet looked back at him.

“Are you okay?” She asked him. Concern didn’t seem right on her usually positive face.

“I…” The water resistance seemed so much stronger than usual. “I am fine. Only tired.”

“I could go ahead,” Rivulet offered. “You seem exhausted.”

“I-I… I can…” Dignity didn’t finish his sentence. As much as he wanted to lie, it simply wouldn’t be worth it. He couldn’t keep going, not for a while anyway.

“I will bring something for you, just stay here!” Rivulet managed to smile before darting off, much faster than they had been swimming before.

Dignity managed to swim to the surface to breathe. He floated on his back again, staring at the sky, again. Floating wasn’t as tiring as treading water. The sky was only lightly cloudy here. The sun was getting low, and the sky was painted pink and orange. They would need to find somewhere to rest soon.

It was suddenly harder to breathe, or maybe his lungs felt heavier. He took shallower breaths. It felt like the world stopped existing for a moment. At the same time it was overwhelming. Everything, every little sound, every gentle lap of the water, was overwhelming, and simultaneously nonexistent. Dignity was stuck floating in between.

If he closed his eyes, it would stop. But then the nagging thoughts would resurface, telling him things he did but didn’t want to hear. He opened his eyes. The overwhelming nothingness was preferable.

He shouldn’t be alone. It made him think. He thought too much when he was alone. The thoughts were too much when he was alone. The thoughts were all he could think about-

“And then he died!”

Dignity recognized that distorted voice.

He righted himself so he could look at him. It was easier to see him in the light, even if it was dim.

“Oh, did I get it wrong?” he asked, rotating in the air to be upside-down, almost eye level with Dignity. “Mm, I suppose that I did, since you’re clearly still alive right now.” The pupils in his eyes disappeared, but Dignity could feel his eyes on him still.

“So, how’s it going, running away? Happy, depressing, freeing, frightening…?” He turned upright and floated just above the water, just barely recoiling when a stray drop of water would touch his crystal… shell. Dignity still wasn’t sure what it was.

“You know, it would be very nice if you would actually talk sometime,” he deadpanned, two right pupils returning. “I don’t exactly have much to do with my existence, so if you would at least bring me a little entertainment it would be greatly appreciated. Ahh… You were so much more interesting when you were scared of me.” He pinned his ear-crystals, then jumped as a small wave splashed him. Dignity continued to stare at him.

A moment passed.

“Well, if you really don’t care about me now,” he put on the manic grin he had the previous night. “Then I’ll just give you a reason to be afraid of me.” He brought his head down to Dignity’s level and, as best they could, they locked eyes. They stared at each other for a moment.

Without warning, he lunged forward and grabbed Dignity in his mouth, then almost immediately dropped him. Dignity took a few seconds to recover from falling back into the water, then resurfaced and watched him. He shook and scratched at his head violently, roaring (though it sounded more like a scream). He lashed his tail, splashing himself as he did so, which only worsened his episode.

Dignity ducked under the water, looking up at him, or at least, where he should be. He could only see some parts of him, the rest was just… not there. His screaming, on the other hand, was very clear, even through the water. He was curious as to why, but he didn’t want to take any chances with him. Not after… that.

Dignity watched the rest of his struggle from below the surface. The rest of his body eventually reappeared. He resurfaced for a quick second, just to flick him with water, then rested underwater again. He waited for him to leave before resurfacing again.

He noticed two small objects floating beside him. He couldn’t see them well in the dark, but he could tell they were round and shiny… Oh, right, he was carrying a pearl. He must have dropped it when-

He grabbed both pearls, unsure of which was his since he couldn’t see the colors. He had no idea where the other one came from, but if it was something too important, he guessed, it wouldn’t have been left here. He wondered if it was his pearl. He didn’t know how he would have any pearls, but considering he was capable of quite a few things nobody should be able to do, his existence included, he surely had some way of carrying pearls.

Rivulet came back a few minutes later, holding two glowing plants of some kind. She let them float in front of Dignity so she could sign.

“It is not much, but it should help you feel a little better,” she smiled and gestured to the plants. Dignity nodded in thanks.

He put both pearls in one hand so he could hold one plant with the other. It was, unsurprisingly, mostly water when he bit into it, but it was still something, he supposed. Both plants were quickly eaten.

“There is a cave not too far ahead,” she signed. “We can rest there. You need it.” She dove under. Dignity put a pearl in his free hand again and followed her.

Dignity couldn’t tell what direction they were swimming in, though he assumed it was the correct one, whichever that is now. The water felt colder than earlier, but that made sense since the sun was down.

The cave they were staying in didn’t take long to reach. It was below a patch of land too small to be called an island, with an opening just far enough above water that it wouldn’t flood and just low enough that they could both easily enter and exit.

Dignity climbed inside, then collapsed as soon as he was within the chamber, dropping the pearls somewhere on the ground around him. Rivulet rushed over to him, kneading his shoulder frantically. Dignity made a low, exhausted sound. Rivulet continued to prod at him, but he ignored it. Within minutes, he had fallen asleep.

Notes:

If I had a nickel for every time I accidentally deleted a chapter and posted the one after it before posting said chapter, I would have one nickel, which isn’t a lot, but it’s strange that it happened at all. Hopefully this will never happen again!

Chapter 27: Magenta Flames

Notes:

(Small note: I accidentally posted this chapter before the previous one (which is why I posted early this week), so go read that one p l e a s e. Sorry for any confusion!)

Dignity slowly opened his eyes. His vision seemed slightly blurrier than usual.

He sat up and yawned. He was still in the cave. Rivulet was curled around herself still, but perked up when she heard Dignity moving. She raced over to him and quickly signed “We move on now?” Dignity weakly nodded, collecting the pearls and slowly standing up.

Rivulet sprinted out of the cave and into the water. She waited for Dignity, who moved far more slowly.

Dignity fell into the water, took a moment to recover, then resurfaced beside Rivulet. The slugcat gave him a concerned look for a moment, then forced a smile and began leading them again.

Dignity felt more energized than before, but only slightly. They were moving faster, but still slowly. Dignity couldn’t help but feel it was his fault. Well, it was. He was the tired one who was slowing them down. He was the one worrying everyone. He was-

Shut up.

He kept his eyes firmly on Rivulet. He would keep up this time, even if he completely exhausted himself trying. He just had to keep going. Just… keep swimming. They were heading toward land, so he just had to keep pushing until they got there.

It was… hard though, to not keep listening to himself. They weren’t exactly in the most interesting place. Nothing interesting had happened other than- Nothing, nothing had happened. Keeping his mind in check while doing basically nothing was proving challenging.

Almost too challenging.

They kept swimming. Nothing worth noting happened. Or maybe something did. He was having a hard time telling. Wouldn’t he know if something happened though? Yes, he would. But nothing else- nothing happened. Nothing…

He slowed as Rivulet paused in front of him. She swam to the

“That sound. Did you not hear it?” She looked at him with a confused expression. Had he missed something?

“I-” He paused as a loud rumble came from the distance. 

“That was the sound,” she signed. “It was hard to hear it in the water. I think it came from that way.” She pointed slightly to the right of the direction they had been heading in. Dignity could just barely make out the shape of an island not too terribly far from where they were.

Before he could suggest they investigate, Rivulet had already set off toward the island. He followed her, as always.

They swam faster toward the island than they had been just before. Dignity was nearly exhausted by the time they arrived. Rivulet must have been eager to see what the sound was. He couldn’t blame her, he was curious as well.

They took a moment to rest before looking around. There were a few trees, but not like the forest on the last island. They were currently at the base of a hill, which blocked the view of the other side of the island.

A loud boom came from the other side of the hill, loud enough that Dignity could only hear a constant ringing for a few moments afterward. Dignity could just barely hear yelling coming from the same direction as the sound. It became louder as the ringing in his antennae cleared, then quickly died down.

Rivulet, seemingly still struggling with her own ringing crisis, slowly started climbing the hill. She paused, shook her head, then started sprinting as usual again. She paused at the top.

Dignity joined her atop the hill. Looking down on the other side, he could now see a pink iterator and a crimson slugcat of around the same size — rather short for an iterator, very large for a slugcat — beside a pile of cherrybomb seeds. It was hard to hear from the distance, but he could faintly hear the iterator complaining to the slugcat.

Rivulet sprinted down to them, apparently unconcerned about the fact that they were in possession of make-you-and-everyone-around-you-go-deaf plants. Dignity stumbled down after her.

Rivulet nearly ran into the slugcat, who looked quite annoyed at her presence, saying something in their language repeatedly. The crimson slugcat growled, making Rivulet jump and take a few steps back. The iterator looked at Rivulet with a similar annoyed expression.

Rivulet started saying something to the slugcat, who then, in a very deep, gruff voice, said something back. Dignity couldn’t at all tell what they were saying — it was especially unhelpful that Rivulet seemed to be immune to fear, based on how she approached them. To Dignity’s great surprise, the iterator joined the conversation, sounding almost exactly like a slugcat. Rivulet also seemed surprised, and continued talking.

Whatever she said made the other two look up at Dignity. He froze under their gaze. Now that he was closer, he could see that the slugcat only had one eye, or at least, only one eye open. The other had a large burn scar, as well as a normal scar, over it.

The iterator, on the other hand, did not have any apparent scars, though still looked just as intimidating aside from his height. Four yellow lines, the outer ones longer than the inner, formed his crest. His antennae were very long, almost like a bug’s, being mostly thin and coming to a thicker point at the tips. He wore a yellow-orange cloak, concealing any other details.

“And you are?” The iterator asked. His voice was high, though not quite squeaky — a great contrast to his slugcat partner’s. His yellow eyes narrowed, as if glaring at Dignity’s very soul.

“I-I…” Dignity’s hands were shaking. He cleared his throat. “I- um…” He took a step back. Something felt wrong about this iterator. Dignity didn’t want to be near this mind.

“Eh?” His leer softened into a more casual expression. “Oh don’t tell me someone’s ‘warned’ you about us or something. We aren’t malicious murderers or anything of the sort.”

Dignity felt less anxious without the harsh look, though still kept his distance. “I-I’m… Dignity,” he managed to say. “Illuminated… Dignity.”

The iterator looked him over for a second, before saying, “Five Pebbles. And the slugcat is Artificer.” Artificer grunted.

Dignity almost made an excuse to leave, but he paused. He thought… he had heard of a “Pebbles” somewhere before… and this iterator did look familiar… Had Suns mentioned… Oh… Oh, oh!

“U-um…” Dignity took a cautious step toward Pebbles. “You, uh…” He realized only after starting that this may be a bad idea. “You wouldn’t happen to know a…” He looked away. “Suns? Seven Red Suns…?”

Pebbles now looked annoyed. “Yes, and?” He looked expectantly at Dignity, then slowly said, “Wait… Do you know them?” Dignity nodded.

“I am actually looking for them,” he said. “Well, kind of. We were traveling with a few others… then something happened and they flew off.” He looked down. “T-they mentioned you. B-but it was by accident, I think.”

Pebbles’ expression slowly changed to one of anger as Dignity explained. He flipped his antennae back further than Dignity had seen anyone before (was he even capable of moving his own that far back?) and looked away, then looked back, suppressing some violent urge.

“Well I don’t want anything to do with them, so even if I had seen them I wouldn’t tell you.” He pointed his head upward defiantly, then lowered his face and looked at Dignity again. “Who else were you with?”

“W-why do you need to know?” Dignity asked, stepping back again.

“Just tell me.”

“I-I was with, um…” He took a second to remember who all he was with. “T-Twin Stone Tablets, but we lost him, um… Twelve Forseen Tridents, but he went off on his own as well as his slugcat, Circuit.” He paused for a second, pushing away the memory of that event. “Twenty Diamonds, and my parents, No Significant Harassment and Looks to the Moon.”

The last two names seemed to shock Pebbles. He stared at Dignity for a moment. “Did you say they are your… parents?” He said, still shocked. Dignity hesitantly nodded.

Pebbles locked up. Dignity almost locked up because he locked up.

He needed to leave. He really needed to leave. Something was wrong and it wasn’t just Pebbles’ reaction, that was clearly normal. He wasn’t safe. None of them were, not with t-that in his mind.

Deep blue started seeping into Pebbles’ eyes. That was it. He was done. He was absolutely not staying for whatever was about to come.

Dignity took a shaky step back, then started quickly backing up. Something black and blue and wrong moved behind a now fully mentally disabled Five Pebbles. Dignity turned and started running as fast as he could.

He realized, only after running far enough away that he couldn’t sense the wrongness, that he hadn’t actually been followed — except by Rivulet, who had also ran. He came to a stop and looked back. He nearly backed into Rivulet in terror.

Pebbles, who hadn't moved from where he was, was now standing on three strange… tendrils coming from his back. A third waved aimlessly in front of his distant blue eyes.

Dignity jumped when he felt a small claw tap him on the arm. He looked to his side to see it was only Artificer, who now seemed far less intimidating compared to her iterator partner.

“He does this all the time,” she said amazingly clearly, though still with a thick accent. Dignity thought his view of slugcats could not possibly become any more confusing after this. “Give him a few seconds.”

Sure enough, Pebbles eventually came back down, the tendrils retracting. He looked exactly like he did before, except the blue eyes. Artificer casually walked back to him. Dignity and Rivulet followed more slowly, Rivulet yelling something excitedly to Artificer.

Dignity slowed to a cautious pace once he was closer to Pebbles again. The strange wrongness was still there, but it was fainter now. Pebbles glared at him.

“You never saw that,” Pebbled deadpanned. He turned around. “Leave us. You’ll only bring us trouble if you stay.” He flicked an antenna dismissively.

Dignity quickly turned and prepared to run as far away from them as possible when a rough “wait” came from behind him. He turned back around to see Artificer glaring at Pebbles, who felt very annoyed.

Artificer said something in slugcat to Pebbles, who said something agitated back. Artificer said something else, to which Pebbles drooped slightly in annoyance. He turned back to Dignity, one yellow eye twitching.

“…Apparently,” Pebbles forced himself to say. “We need you to stay because we can’t leave this place on our own.” He drooped even further. “According to her, not me,” he quickly added, as if it weren’t obvious.

“W-we actually,” Dignity coughed. He was getting tired of hearing his own voice so often. “Have places to be. In a short amount of time.” Void, why was he so bad at talking on his own.

Pebbles looked at Artificer, who looked at him the exact same way. He huffed and walked away from the group, staying within hearing range. Artificer seemed to take great offense.

Before anything else could be said, Rivulet tapped Dignity for his attention, signing, “Artificer tells me that they cannot leave the island without help, since she’ll explode if she touches water too long.”

She… what?

Did Rivulet actually believe that? There was no way. He had never seen or hear of an exploding slugcat and he wasn’t inclined to believe such a thing existed. It was simply too absurd.

…But he had just had two- an encounter with some strange… thing, so…

But- a slugcat? That was just insane. He was more likely to actually find Sun than to see a slugcat explode. There just wasn’t any way he could think of that one even could-

Rivulet tapped him, snapping him out of his thoughts. She said something in slugcat, to Artificer, Dignity assumed. Said crimson slugcat paused her quiet argument with Pebbles to come to them.

She looked Dignity in the eyes and walked a few steps away from any of them. She turned toward Dignity and, still looking him firmly in the eyes-

Exploded.

Or rather, launched herself into the air via some explosive force. She landed on the ground again with practiced ease.

“And that would be a fatal explosion if it were in water,” she said, then walked back over to Pebbles. Dignity stared, completely dumbfounded. His world had now been shattered thrice in three cycles.

He turned to Rivulet again, who looked at him with a victorious smile. He wished he could read slugcat minds.

“I don’t know how we would help them, since touching water would be bad,” Rivulet signed. “But I think one of us should try, since they’re stuck here. I could bring the pearl to Flame and you could catch up after helping them!” Dignity nodded slowly. He did not want to be stuck with those two, and they clearly didn’t want to be stuck with him either, but Rivulet was clearly significantly faster than him, so it would make sense for her to go on. He couldn’t argue with logic.

“Great! I’ll get the pearl you dropped and be going then, bye!” She darted off before Dignity could respond. He had dropped the pearl? Well, it wasn’t in his hand anymore, and that explosion had shocked him, so it made sense.

Wait. He has a problem now. A very, very large problem. He’s stuck on this island with some mentally something iterator and an explosive slugcat. And he can’t leave until he helps them because he literally doesn’t have the energy to go on without help. Great…

He looked over at the arguing pair. This was his life now… yay.

Notes:

Ladies, gentlemen, and everyone out or in between, I give to you… the moment you’ve all been waiting for…! Five Pebbles!!! He's here! Finally! The character tags no longer lie! Now the only question(s) left are: Will I be able to write Dig’s mental mess properly, how many more characters will be introduced before my brain is fried by all the relationships, and when will I every learn to keep a chapter tonally consistent.

 

Oh my gosh I did not ever expect this to hit 2k hits. Thank you to everyone who actually reads this for giving a crap about my poorly written fic that may or may not ever end. It’s nice to know that someone out there likes what you’ve made when your closest friends couldn’t care less about literally anything you do or feel. Thank you all so much!!!