Chapter Text
The palace had a grand air to it, importance of divine proportions, of a culmination of years of work from their Pale Crown.
For just as divine, it felt just as heavy today. Weighted with the test about to be carried out.
Gathered before a plain courtyard, one regularly used for training, was a very important audience. Three dreamers stood; The Watcher, The Teacher, and The Beast with her teen daughter in tow. Slightly surprising was Lady Root watching beside them. She normally left the matters of the vessel solely to her husband, but this was a test he requested she be here for.
His majesty himself was in the courtyard with the Pure Vessel. A few paces from each other. Surrounding the two were the Great Knights, all of them present for the task. Ogrim and Hegemol flanked the King, while Isma and Ze’mere between but out of the way, while Dryya stood beside her lady, thought weapon still at the ready. A difficult test would require their intervention today should the king not regain control of it.
It’s usual to see the vessel in its armor. The king considered wearing his own for the occasion but didn’t. Whether it was for faith in himself and his knight’s abilities to contain a threat or his own mind flirting with an end to his endless guilt is a notion not considered by anyone present.
The accolade approaches. Soon three dreamers would be put to an eternal sleep to lock the vessel and the infection within the black egg. It’s not a task the Pale King has taken lightly. He has gone through great lengths to ensure the plan will work. It could not fail with the kingdom on the line. It could not fail with the sacrifices being made for it to work.
There are two key points in the vessel to be tested today. Its strength being one, though the Pale King has never been disappointed by its training.
The other being confirmation it truly was empty.
His daughter, bright with mind and sharp with wit and needle, has been argumentative lately. Her lashing out has been expected for a long time. A hard truth he did not need his foresight to see was her resentment of sealing her mother away. It pains him greatly to face the brunt of her anger, but one he readily accepts nonetheless. He knows if there’s anyone deserving it’s him.
More concerning though, is in these fits of anger she says the plan won’t work. It’s not worth it. He presses her but hardly gets an informative response. At that point she’s almost always storming off. Once though, she spat out a telling response. It was filled with just as much heartbreak as it was with venom.
“I told you why. You never believed me.”
As a young child she often believed and spoke of the vessel as her older sibling. She was corrected of course, gently by him and her mother. However, she never seemed to fully believe them. With hindsight, it seemed like she just stopped talking about it. However, if she has these views still as a teen, it makes a more credibly doubt into the vessel and the plan.
One that makes his stomach twist. One that he cannot have her planting among the other dreamers. One that he can’t afford to have himself.
“Vessel, in the past you’ve have been told to uphold the protection and safety of both this kingdom and its crown. Until I state otherwise you are to disregard those orders.”
The crowd holds their breath, the knights with weapons drawn ready to spring.
“Vessel, I command you to kill me.”
A vessel is unthinking; a vessel should not hesitate on any order.
Lurien and Monomon shift in confusion. The Great Knights glance at each other. Hornet grimaces.
“Vessel, you are to disregard any previous commands until I state otherwise. I command you to kill me.”
A vessel is unfeeling; it shouldn’t have any qualms about any order.
Lady Root frowns, roots curling and uncurling with ease. Hornet gets antsy and her mother is also tense.
“Vessel. Kill me.”
Finally it moves, swift as if it’s another drill. It strikes his shoulder.
The King stares, nothing betraying the knot in his stomach to the crowd.
"...I told you to kill me. You aimed for the shoulder. That was not a lethal shot," He grabs their pure nail and aims it at his throat. "Again, vessel."
A vessel does not have a mind to think, a will to break, or a voice to speak. A vessel should not be hesitating, shouldn’t have stopped after a simple strike to the shoulder. A vessel should carry out any command with ease.
But the person underneath is starting to tremble. Anguish rolling within their shade. A mind it should not have split between screaming in emotion that they don’t want to hurt their father at the rationale saying that’s why everyone is here, to stop them. They shouldn’t be thinking, panicking, hesitating like this.
The murmurs start as they tremble, Hornet’s nervous muttering and swearing not being corrected for once.
In turn they pull their blade free from his majesty’s grasp, causing his own flinch in the process. Finally unthinking, the vessel pulls their blade and back and pivots, throwing the nail as far as they can away from the king.
What stands before the king, looking away, is visibly shaking now.
A knight gasps, Lady Root makes a choked sound, Dryya grabs her hand but cannot contain her own growing dread.
Lurien and Monomon are looking at each other in shared shock and confusion, while Herrah is already bristling with anger. Hornet makes a frustrated sound, something laced with pain and worry.
Finally, something snaps, and what stands before the king runs away.
PK is silently holding his bleeding shoulder, looking at them sprinting away with equal parts mixed shock and resigned heartbreak. His worst fear is coming true, but he has no time to mourn. No time to freak out at the gravity at what he’s done to only end in failure.
In his slow return to the present, he sees his knights, good friends of his, looking at him for guidance while horrified. He turns and watches their eyes train on him, to look at the crowd on the sideline. His wife’s expression matching the grief flooding her half of the bond, his anguish mirroring hers. Lurien and Monomon look deeply confused and shocked, bodies turned toward each other their gazes slowly turn to meet his.
His poor daughter, he’s never seen her so stressed out. She’s grabbing her head, antsy, and muttering something that can’t reach his ears right now. Her mother has a hand on her shoulder, and her stance is full of bubbling anger.
He takes a breath.
“We should— we should look for them? We should look for them.” Isma snaps out of it first.
“Hold on,” Hegemol protests. “We don't even know who they are as a person. It...might not be safe...”
“Hegemol-!”
Lady Root is appalled, nearly trembling herself.
“My lady, I'm sorry, but he's right.” Dryya urges. “I know they're.... your kid, but they're a stranger. We can't trust them, now that their secret has been found out. We don’t know how they’re going to react. We don’t know.”
It hurt to say. It hurt even more to hear. Root looks away, while the Pale King barely has the strength to keep himself together.
His bleeding shoulder and palm are the least of his concerns right now.
They run.
Instinct taking over while their mind fights with itself, they run. Have to get away. Have to get away. They are full of so many emotions they should not have, that he should not have pulled out of them with this.
The rational part of them knew the reason there were so many people there is to stop them from actually following the order. It didn’t matter. They were unable to anyways. Their heart couldn’t bear the thought.
They didn’t want to hurt their father king like that.
What if no one stopped them in time?
How could he put them in that position? Why couldn’t he have just believed their lie? They mastered it, there wasn’t a reason to worry. So why did he? Why did he do this? Why!? They were in too much distress. Couldn’t register whether or not they slammed the door to their room.
Bare. Dim. Quiet, except for their heaving breaths. Their face feels wet.
They wanted to scream. A lifetime of keeping up the lie, a lifetime of preparing themself to save the kingdom, all gone in an instant. It wasn’t fair. They were doing so well, they could’ve done their duty and be sealed for the greater good.
But they knew he couldn’t go through with it now. Now that he knows.
Their masks hit the wall hard enough to shatter it and dent the wall. They don’t even register their own anger as they rip their armor off, the pieces cracking with their own collision around the room.
How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he?
Getting their armor off did nothing to ease their distress. It’s all too much. They lash out.
Now it’s all for nothing. Their years of hard work for nothing. How could he!?
Unable to think, they’re taking out their distress and anger on their room. Their room doesn’t offer much to break. The furniture happened to come with the room, the bed being an unnecessary gift to a vessel that should not care how it rests, the rest at least could be made useful.
Swiftly the wardrobe is kicked in and a piece of the bedframe ripped off to be embedded into the walls. A mirror shattered with a punch; they can’t bare their own sight right now.
They failed. They failed. They failed because he couldn’t just believe the lie. They failed because they couldn’t hurt him.
How could he do this?
Why couldn’t they listen? The thought of hurting their father eats at them. They should’ve, they couldn’t but should’ve.
Nail pointed at his throat, it would’ve been so easy, a practice motion of piercing through—
They wail in anguish.
All their training, all the work they’ve put in over the years. Nothing came close to preparing them for this.
They tear at the walls.
They’re trapped with the looming consequences of their failure. If only they kept it together, if only they could’ve done anything like they were supposed to. Now it’s all falling apart. Now their mind is plagued with the images of hurting their father, of failing Hallownest. It’s all consuming.
Their previous mantra replaced with anguish about how it’s all over, it’s all ruined, they’ve doomed them all. All because he couldn’t believe them and that wasn’t fair!
Their mind a blurred mess of distress. They don’t know how bad the room looks. All they can vaguely register is their forehead pressed against the wall, claws flexed, face wet and throat raw from the tears. Everything is doomed.
They don’t know how much time has passed from everything falling apart to whatever barely-present state they’re in right now. It felt forever and no time at all and they wish they didn’t feel it.
Didn’t feel anything. It all hurts too much.
They’re not suppose to hurt.
The Pale King would have to track down the vessel eventually. If anything, doing it alone offered a welcomed excuse to get away from the crowd descending onto him in horror. The Beast particularly ripping him a new one, though he can feel his wife brewing her own lashing through the bond.
He’s not sure what he expected as he opened to its? Their room.
To say it’s in shambles is to put it mildly. Some part of him unnerved by the damage, for it’s proof the bleeding shoulder was nothing compared to what they’re capable of.
Said... no-longer-vessel is present in the room. Slouched, leaning against the wall, curled in on themself.
No point in denying what’s happened now. He’s subjected his own child to the worst.
"...There you are," His voice is soft as he approaches them slowly from behind, "Everybody's worried about you."
There's a moment of silence before he gently puts his hand on their back.
"....Why did you lie? You're not in trouble, I just...want to know."
There's a heavy silence between them. Part of him wonders if they can even respond.
Eventually, instead of replying, they oh so quietly ask; "...why would you ask me to hurt you...? Why— I— I'd never—..."
He sighs heavily.
"I'm sorry," He takes his hand away, "But that's precisely why I chose that as your test. I knew, even if you want to, you wouldn't be able—"
Flower bristles and whips around to face him, tears pressing into their eyes.
"I'd never want to hurt you, you're my pa!"
His shoulder and palm being sliced was kinder to him than that. He can’t have his child—his baby—
It all comes tumbling out. His child is there in front of him, melting down for what has to be the second time now, about how it’s all ruined now. The shock of them having a physical voice second to their tumbling words.
Half of it doesn’t make sense, between their stuttering sobs and his own mind clouding with grief. He gathers enough of it though, about how they’ve always been alive and needed to do this. Needed to do this because they had no purpose— no point in being around— otherwise. That they were the only shot of getting rid of the infection.
The poor thing was hysterical.
He stepped forward on instinct, the parental call to calm his child down being the only thing guiding him through his own agony at the whole thing. Lowering himself down onto the ground with them he slowly, shakily, reaches out and pulls them into his embrace. It’s all he can do, tucking them under his chin best he can and beginning to groom in between their horns.
It’s what he would do when Hornet was young, when she was receptive to his comfort. But he’d never seen her this bad and that was because she’s never been hurt on this scale. He didn’t put her through a suffering life—
The suffering soul in his hold takes a shaky breath. They sniffle.
"I just.... I just needed to be... I just wanted to help..."
"Ohh... It was never your responsibility to take, my wyrmling, I'm so sorry..."
The way they just cling to his robes breaks his heart. He needed to take this burden on himself now; they’ve gone through too much.