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wrencatte · 2 months

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mini-fic 3! Cere POV. linguist!Cal, Mantis Crew as Family, Merrin & Cal bonding 1.2k words

“This one?”

Cal squints at it for half a second, says “yes,” then looks back down.

“What about this one?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t even look!”

“Greez, that’s the third time you’ve shown me that one.”

“No, it – oh, wait, haha, yeah it is. Okay. Let me see….”

Cere watches in fond amusement as Greez goes back to the shelves. Merrin comes over with a tome from deeper within the city library and angles it in a way Cal can look at it without straining his neck. His expression brightens and he takes it, running his fingers over the edges and corners.

There’s a slight twist in the Force that Cere’s beginning to learn means he found an echo. She has to focus pretty hard to feel it so she only pays it enough attention to be sure Cal’s not about to fall into anything nasty – not that she can do anything about it if he does, but she likes to be prepared – and tunes back into the softly murmured conversation between Merrin and Cal.

The Nightsister looks absolutely delighted at having found something in a language Cal doesn’t recognize, all quiet pride and subtle preening. Cere hides a smile behind her hand. Adorable. Cal flips the tome open and the two of them duck heads, Cal underlining a few words with his finger and saying something that Merrin repeats. He shakes his head and says it again. Her face twists in thought as she sounds it out before giving it voice and he nods rapidly, grinning. She smiles back, one of those small soft ones that pops up whenever it’s just her and Cal.

Cere is just about to go back to her own readings when Greez arrives, BD-1 whirling on his shoulder, a book held over his head in triumph.

“Ha! Try this on for size!”

Cal takes the book carefully. “I know this one,” he tells Greez, who groans in disappointment. “But, oh wow.” He flips through a few pages, lips moving as he reads the text silently to himself. “I can’t believe they have a book written in pre-Reformation Gwyrdd’tafodi. Do you know how rare that is? When they switched over, they deliberately destroyed all they could! An archivist hid this away for a hundred years in order to get it safely off the planet. It kept getting passed down the family line until one of them got passage on a ship.”

Greez crosses one set of arms, his free hands on his hips. He watches Cal fondly as the young Jedi’s excitement grows with every page flip. “You know, I would’ve never pegged you as such a gigantic nerd.”

“Jedi were scholars and peacekeepers before they were soldiers,” Cere says quietly. A hush falls on the group. Cal ducks down, shoulders hunching, eyes kept resolutely on the page though it’s obvious he’s not reading a single word. She smiles and adds lightly, “We’re all nerds.”

Cal laughs first, tinged with grief and legitimate delight. He tucks the book Greez brought under the one Merrin showed him, which makes Merrin throw Greez a smirk and for the latero to throw his crossed arms up in the air in a huff. Cere rolls her eyes fondly and catches Cal’s gaze. He grins, unrepentant, enjoying whatever contest is going on between their friends. It gets Cal more books without him getting up, so he’s not going to stop them.

Greez’s frustration is amusing to watch, especially when he snatches BD from scanning the book Cal has open so he can co-opt the droid’s database to help find a language Cal doesn’t know. It’s not helping. BD-1’s database might be filled with years and years of history and culture but knowing the intimate details of a language instead of just a simple dictionary is completely different.

Merrin listens to Cal read out loud for a few minutes, humming at all the right moments, but obviously thinking hard about something. Cere gives up on reading her book and focuses on the two of them, curious as to what’s going to happen next.

“How many languages do you know?”

Cal’s teeth click he stops talking so fast. “I don’t know,” he admits with a shrug. “Sometimes I don’t even realize I know a language until I see or hear it again. Sometimes not even then! It doesn’t always register it as a different language. It’s just…words I understand.”

She tilts her head, expression intense. “Could you learn Dathomiri?”

He grins and quips something in the smokey, gritty sounding language of Dathomir. Merrin’s eyes widen, and then, suddenly, they glimmer with a wetness both Cere and Cal pretend they don’t see.

Knuckles pressed to her lips, she breathes a very quiet, “oh,” before clearing her throat and adding roughly, “Your accent is terrible.”

“Is it though?” Cal asks smugly.

Merrin scowls. “I will teach you more…if you want to learn.”

Cal’s expression softens. “I would love to. Thank you for sharing it with me.” He adds something in Dathomiri at the end that has Merrin abruptly turning back to their shared book, expression pained and grieving.

Cere nudges the Nightsister with a tendril of the Force and gets a small smile in response. They don’t share the same bond as Jedi do, but theirs is enough for Cere to believe her. She settles back in her chair, musing on what her life has become, sharing a bond with a Nightsister, before she shrugs it off and fully intends on finally going back to her reading with Merrin and Cal’s back-and-forth as a background noise.

Except Greez comes back again, the book he carries is much thinner than any of the ones stacked around Cal like a barrier. BD-1 clicks excitedly and Greez is grinning smugly as he waves the book in the air.

“Did you know this place has an unknown language section? Guess who found it!” he all but brags. Merrin frowns, nose wrinkling while Cal laughs brightly and holds out a hand for the book.

Greez slaps it in his hand, earning a scandalized look from one of the librarians. Merrin and Cere laugh as he hunches down with quick apologies. Cal inspects the book carefully. If there are any echoes, they’re soft and quick. He grins.

“Congratulations, Greez, I don’t know this one.”

The latero cheers silently, all four arms thrown up in victory.

Merrin rolls her eyes. “You still lost. I found one first.”

Cal hums. “Best two out of three? This place is open for another five hours.”

The two of them exchange looks for a full second before Merrin jumps out of her chair and rushes into the depths of the library. Greez yelps and follows her as fast as he can without running. Cere hides her face, as though that will keep people from realizing they’re with her. Cal laughs, covering his mouth with his book. His eyes peek over, glittering in mirth. He pulls the book away, and holds it to his cheek, leaning in like he has a secret. Cere can’t help but lean in to hear it.

“I already know the language,” he admits.

Cere blinks at him then laughs loudly – nearly getting them kicked out of the library.

#cal kestis #cere junda #nightsister merrin #greez dritus #sw jfo #jfo fic #mantis crew #my writing #there's an alt version of this that's more bittersweet and 200 words more #it brings in the Order of the Dai Bendu and the Dai Bendu language #I just couldn't decide which version I liked more and went with the funny one instead #if anyone wants me to post the other version lemme know #that's if someone reads this far into the tags lol #i need to figure out how to get these onto ao3 #i don't want individual stories but i haven't posted a drabble/ficlet fic in a long long time #and even then the last one i did were full 5k+ oneshot chapters #oh well #imma stop talking now

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mishapen-dear · 2 years

Text

There’s a little green something in the cracks of the road. Grian stares at it, and then he looks at Scar, who is humming cheerfully while he rummages in his bag, and then Grian looks back to the little plant.

Grian looks at Scar again. He takes a step closer to the plant. Scar, blissfully, does not notice.

Something fungal bubbles at the back of Grian’s throat.

He crouches, inconspicuous, next to the plant. He knows it isn’t grass, that it’s probably a weed, but he doesn’t know anything more. He doesn’t care to know anything more, really, and it won’t matter in a moment anyway. He reaches and-

A dull pain pings bright on his arm. He startles upright, wings flaring out, and Scar shoots him several more times with the Nerf gun. The little foam darts bounce harmlessly off of Grian’s chest.

“Bad Grian!” Scar scolds him cheerfully. “No plant killing! Bad!”

“But it’s a small one!” Grian protests immediately, startled and indignant at the embarrassment of being caught. Another foam dart hits him.

“Nuh-uh!”

“Ow- Scar, come on, it’s itsy bitsy,” Grian tries, wheedling now. “It won’t hurt anything.”

“Well, you know that’s not true. It’ll hurt the plant,” Scar answers reasonably. He waves his toy gun threateningly at Grian. “You know the deal, G. No pestulating in the Hoe-ly Spaces.” He uses his dramatic voice to say Hoe-ly Spaces. He always uses the dramatic voice to say Hoe-ly Spaces. Grian wants to punt Hoe-ly Spaces and all associated dramatisms into the sun.

“That’s not a word, Scar,” Grian says petulantly. He ruffles his wings and sits on the larger half of a broken concrete barrier. The vines that had been wrapped around the barrier writhe away from the spores that fall from his wings, so Grian vindictively shakes his wings more. This, at least, Scar does not scold him for.

“What? Sure it is.” Scar has gone back to rifling through his bag again. He keeps pulling out strangely shaped bottles of bright colours with baffling smells. Grian would be more alarmed, but he knows Scar has a weird thing with taking labels off of bottles. How the man ever remembers what goes where, though, he has no idea.

(He has some idea. Scar’s tongue is too many different colours, always, and he’s been almost poisoned thrice. By Grian’s count, the man should be dead.)

“Pestulate is not a word,” Grian says, doubling down.

“Then what is it?” Scar asks innocently. He pulls out a jug of blood and lugs it into the centre of the clearing.

“A nonsense.” Grian shakes his wings again. There’s now a full circle of empty asphalt and concrete around him, free of plant matter. His spores won’t root without living tissue, but he feels a little vindicated by every twitch of the green things moving away from him. “Are you done yet?”

“Grian, Grian, Grian, you can’t rush a good blood ritual” Scar exclaims. “Do you know what happened to the last guy to rush a blood ritual?”

“He di-”

“He died!” Scar presses a hand against his heart. “The plants swooped up and ate him! I found his bones, Grian! His bones!”

“We could just leave,” Grian suggests. “This is- what, the fifth blood ritual? We’re fine without them, Scar. I bet the Kingmaker doesn’t even notice.”

“Oh, pish-posh.” Scar holds out the jug and pours the blood straight down over the smallest unbloomed flower in the clearing. The jug makes awful noises as the blood chugs and glugs out of it, because Scar doesn’t care for any silly thing like fluid dynamics. The jug convulses like its gasping for air and it makes sounds that Grian thinks Scar would make if he were ever simultaneously choked and drowned. The red blood splashes across the green, seeps through the cracks in the asphalt, and gets all over Scar’s shoes. Grian draws his own feet up in distaste, but he’s far enough that no blood touches him. “You know that’s not his name.”

“He doesn’t get a name,” Grian says. “I’m mad at him.”

“Careful, Grian!” Scar says cheerfully. “That almost sounds like rebellion.”

Grian scoffs, loud, but he doesn’t say anything. Scar continues with his stupid blood ritual. Which is to say that Scar goes back to his bag, grabs a canteen, and returns to the plant. Without ceremony, Scar upends that jug over the plant too.

“Scar!” Grian squawks, scrabbling to his feet. “Scar, that’s all our water! Scar!”

“Oops!” Scar says cheerful.

“You only used a few drops for the other rituals!” Grian wails. “We just got that!”

“Oops!” Scar says again. He has no remorse. Grian snatches the nerf gun from where Scar had left it on the ground and shoots him with it. “Ow!”

“You’re the worst,” Grian says.

“Love you, too, G,” Scar says. He shakes the canteen to get the last few drops of water out. Grian watches them fall with despair. The water washes away the blood, dilutes it across the asphalt and towards the ring of vines and green things that surround them. Scar gives the little twice-baptised bloom a loving pat, and it opens in his palm. The petals are a different colour in each Hoe-ly Space, and the same holds true for here. These petals are unnaturally white, unsettlingly perfect, and-

“Is there another flower in there?” Grian demands.

Scar doesn’t lift his gaze. “Yeah,” he says. He touches a scarred hand gently to the second bloom, which shivers at the contact but doesn’t open. “Huh.”

“...Huh?” Grian echoes. “Scar?”

“It’s okay, G,” Scar says too fast. “Let’s just go shopping, yeah? All done here.” He steps back from the plant. He sees the look Grian is giving him and tries to give a bright smile in return. “Seriously, Grian, it’s fine.”

Grian has always had a knack for knowing when Scar is lying.

“...If you say so.” Grian watches Scar pack up his bag, holster the nerf gun, and throw the plant a two-fingered salute. He’s too quick. They haven’t been here for even twenty minutes, maybe, and normally Scar stretches the ritual to last an hour. Grian guesses that he’s not surprised that the blood-jug and the water are the only necessary components. The steps for the other rituals had been sporadically changed each time. “Ready to go?”

“Can we get ice cream on the way?” Scar asks, even though he knows that all the ice cream in the world has already melted.

“Sure,” Grian says, even though he knows that the corpses of the ice cream shop workers are ripe in their rot.

Scar steps up onto the concrete barrier, almost loses his balance then helps Grian up and almost sends them both toppling over. Grian doesn’t comment on it. Scar keeps casting glances to the weird plants, but stops when Grian opens his arms. Scar grabs onto him, tightly, and Grian holds tight in return. Grain’s wings start to flap (Scar sneezes at the spraying spores) and they step off the concrete barrier together. Soon, they’re in the air.

(Scar has cracked a Superman joke at least once every time Grian has flown him somewhere. This time he’s nothing but silent, and he keeps trying to peek back at the plant-filled bridge they’d left behind. Grian flies a little faster.)

—---

Scar lets Grian kill whatever he wants, most days. He doesn’t like mushrooms, or fungus, or mycelia-filled goo, but he doesn’t complain too much. It’s a good deal for both of them, Grian figures. Scar helps Grian with his whole ending-an-apocalypse-by-causing-a-different-apocalypse deal, and he’s good company in a world full of decomposing things that used to be people, and he lets Grian know when he’s getting too close to the rebellion line. The plants destroy anything that oppose them, and the last thing Grian wants is to openly oppose them.

Mushrooms are better. They’re kinder. Almost plant, almost animal, and there’s so much for them to eat. Much better than the violence of true plants.

Honestly? Grian shouldn’t even be alive. It’s pure luck that he found the mycelia before the plants could burrow into him, it’s luck that it Chose him, and it’s luck that it wants the world to end again.

(Sometimes, late at night, he wonders if he’d be happier if he’d been the first harbinger of end-times rather than the second. But, then again, mushrooms are components of decay. Scavengers rather than hunters- it makes sense, maybe, that the fungal spread occurs after the flora’s feast.)

Grian thinks he’s almost done. He used to be human, but now mushrooms sprout around him when he sleeps, and spores spread on the wind from his wings. He leaves large fields of fungus in his wake. Soon enough, he’ll have to actively hunt for the green and force it to recede. Soon enough, the old apocalypse will be ended, and the new ending can truly begin. That’s why Grian doesn’t mind carting Scar around to the last green places so much- Scar gets a free travelling companion, and Grian gets lead right to the green sources that Scar doesn’t want him to hurt. Grian doesn’t hurt them because then Scar will stop showing him where they are, and Grian is smart enough to bide his time. One day, maybe, Scar will die, and Grian will be free to kill as many green spaces as he wants.

(Grian shouldn’t have to kill him. The plants should have killed him. The fungus should have rotted him. Grian sometimes wonders what it means that he’s still alive. He licks poison and blood and shiny things that should give him tetanus, but he’s still alive.)

(Grian thinks about leaving, sometimes, but he never does. He’s always been too curious for his own good.)

“What’s that for?” Grian asks.

Scar freezes like a statue, weedkiller clutched tight in his hands. Slowly, as if Grian is a predator with poor eyesight, he hides it behind his back. Grian tries, unsuccessfully, to stifle his laughter.

“Scar. You know I can see you, don’t you?”

Scar deflates, shoulders slumping forwards as he pulls the weedkiller out again. “Okay, okay, you caught me, G,” he says. “I’m just… looking for a drink.”

“That’s weedkiller.”

“So?”

“...Okay, you’re not even trying now,” Grian says. “What’s with the weedkiller, Scar?”

Scar shuffles his feet and bites his lip, then huffs out a breath. “Are we alone?”

Grian, still smiling, raises his brows and looks around the store. Most of the shelves have been raided, several of them knocked over, and the only people in the vicinity haven’t been people in a long time.

“The plants, G,” Scar says impatiently.

“Oh, no, those are gone,” Grian says. “The mycelium works fast, you know that.”

“Right,” Scar says, and he goes quiet.

Grian eyes him, then gestures to a currently-indoor outdoor furniture set that doesn’t even have any blood on it. “Do you want to sit down?” he offers.

Scar makes a beeline for the furniture set, weedkiller still clutched tight in his grasp. Grian has barely figured out how to sit without crushing his wings when Scar blurts out, “The King’s called a meeting.”

Grian almost falls out of his seat. “What?”

“Yeah,” Scar says. “And I have to go, or, you know.” He jerks his head towards the nearest corpse. There are vines wrapped around its neck. “I was hoping you could give me a ride?”

Grian gapes at him. He feels his mental gears spinning frantically, completely tractionless. “Okay- wait.” He runs his hand through his hair and ignores the mushrooms that brush against his hand. “The King called a meeting- why? He hasn’t done that before- do you think he knows you’re working with me? This is probably a trap, Scar. You know this is probably a trap.”

Scar looks at the weedkiller on his lap. “Yeah.”

Grian stares. “Oh.”

Scar grimace-smiles. “I figured- you’ve been a good friend, Grian. I have… loyalty, to the crown, but I won’t let them kill you.”

“Oh.”

Scar shrugs a little self-consciously. “It’s the least I can do, you know?”

Grian doesn’t want to say it. He likes Scar, though, and he would feel guilty if he didn’t point out, “What’s stopping me from killing them, then? You know what my goals are.”

“Rebellion, Grian,” Scar says automatically. Grian winces and raises his hands in apology, and Scar continues. “I figured- well, maybe you won’t if I ask you really nicely?”

“That can’t be it.”

Scar shrugs. “You haven’t touched the spaces,” he explains. “And all I did there is ask you nicely.”

“That’s different.”

“How?”

Grian fumbles for a second. “That’s- it’s- like- chopping off a head will kill a body?” he tries. “Like- the spaces are the hands, and the King is the head, so that’s- yeah.”

“Are you going to chop his head off?”

Grian is quiet.

“Please, Grian, don’t kill him,” Scar says. He holds the weedkiller carefully, and his fingers keep nervously tapping at its sides. “Neither of them. None of them. Just- keep being your mushroomy, birdy self, okay? You don’t even have to talk to them if you don’t want to.”

Grian is silent.

“Please?”

Grian caves. Mournfully, he thinks of the Hoe-ly Spaces, and he thinks of the quiet rule he has to kill those whenever Scar dies. It feels wrong to delegate something like killing the King to that same rule, but- Scar is right. Beheading the King sounds like it comes too close to rebelling, anyway. “Okay.”

Scar lets out a breath, then gives Grian a winning smile. “Okay!” he says. “Okay, perfect! Hey, I think I saw some chocolate earlier, maybe it won’t be expired.”

“It’s definitely expired,” Grian says, but he stands and offers Scar a hand to help him up.

Scar takes the hand and pulls himself up to his feet. “It’s always good to have hope, G,” he says brightly, and they continue to ravage the store.

—---

The place Scar takes him to isn’t green at all. It’s white and red and brown, like old and new blood on white petals. Well, Grian shouldn’t be thinking in similes here- there is literally old and new blood staining old petals almost everywhere he looks.

The border of the Tree’s territory is made of wood, or whatever it is that roots are made of. They drip red onto the white flowers that make up the groundcover. It had been relatively easy to get past the border- it opened up when Scar approached, peacefully allowing him through. The roots shuddered furiously when Grian approached, but they didn’t kill him when he tucked his wings in and pretended to be demure, so he thinks that means he’s basically Scar’s unwelcomely welcomed plus one. He’s not sure if court people even get to have plus ones, but he’s not skewered by evil plant matter so he thinks that he gets to count as a plus one.

He’s maybe a little nervous.

The interior of the Tree’s territory doesn’t make him feel any more at ease, either. This, too, is a place that is blindingly white. The Tree itself sits in the very centre, painfully pale and looming. The King’s Spire sits to its right, a building of previously-white colours that has now been overgrown with green. Moss and vines, Grian thinks, but he can’t distinguish anything else. Beneath the Tree are several small figures that cause something fungal to gurgle in his throat when he looks at them too hard. Grian stays close to Scar and tries to turn his eyes to the ground.

It’s hard not to acknowledge the Tree, though. They approach it together, slowly engulfed by the leaf cover overhead and hidden from the sun. It’s almost dark. Grian feels very small. The last time he’d felt so small was when his human self had accepted the blessings of the mycelium. He’d been welcome, then, but there is no welcome for him here.

Scar, of course, seems unaffected.

“You’re late.” Grian chances a glance upwards to see a woman with dead eyes and red flowers sprouting from her hair. The fungal thing tries to crawl out of his mouth. He swallows hard and ducks his head. He’s suddenly questioning the might of Scar’s weedkiller against all of this. He understands a little, maybe, the might that would have been needed to bring the first apocalypse.

“I’m right on time,” Scar disagrees. “You’re just early.”

“Everyone else has gone.” The woman sounds unimpressed. “And who do you have with you? You know he wants these audiences to be one-on-one.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Scar dismisses. “Sym- synergy. We’re really synergetic. I couldn’t have gotten here at all without Grian.”

“Your funeral.”

“Ha,” Scar says. “As if.”

Grian is startled enough by this statement to look up at Scar, but Scar grabs him by the arm and ushers him towards the trunk of the Tree. “Hey, wait- what do you mean?” Grian hisses. It occurs to him for the first time that this could be a trap for him.

“Not now, G,” Scar mumbles to him. “Ask me later.”

Grian, ruffled, unruffles a little bit at that. After all, there wouldn’t be a “later” if Scar was going to kill him now, right? Grian is beginning to realize that Scar is wrapped up tighter in whatever- whatever this is a lot more than Grian had first assumed, and he does not like it. Not one bit. He hates this, actually, and he hates it more when Scar knocks on the trunk and the wood creaks as it twists and bends out of their way.

A voice from within calls, “Welcome, Goodtimes, to my most private of areas.” And Grian hates that most of all.

They enter the Tree. The Tree creaks and groans and it closes behind them. Trapping them inside. And Grian hates this so much.

He finds even more to hate as they delve deeper into the almost-room that’s waiting for them. The King sits on a throne in the centre, drooping like a wilted flower. He’s dead. Grian can tell that immediately- he wants to spread his wings and spread the spores, but Scar asked him not to, and-

Wait. What?

Grian looks again. The King continues to be dead. The crown sits golden on his head, shining and perfect. The King is undecayed, unblemished, but his eyes are flat, and he isn’t breathing, and Grian can almost hear the creaking as he scowls.

“What have you brought me?”

“Presents,” Scar promises. “Just as you’ve asked. They’re for you, too, Bdubs.”

Grian again begins to wonder if this is a trap. Before he can continue that train of thought, however, there’s more creaking as the Tree shudders around them. The walls shiver, and lichen sloughs downwards until there’s just a human-shaped lump of green left against the wall. The human lump turns around and looks right at Grian with its impossibly large eyes.

Grian almost bares his teeth. He knows that look. This is competition.

(Competiton for what? There’s so much to fight over, probably, if he really thinks hard about it.)

“Why is the bed made of dirt?” Grian asks.

Scar balks, the King pauses, and the lichen-man stares.

“I mean, not to ruffle any feathers,” Grian rushes, valiantly not ruffling any of his. “I guess I was just expecting…”

“What?” The dead King asks.

“More?” Grian says. “Pillows? Blankets? Uh. More gold, I guess, but I know people don’t really carry that around these days. Didn’t.”

“The crown is gold,” the lichen man says.

“Aye, but tis a tiny crown,” the King concedes.

“And the bed is made of dirt,” Grian says.

“It’s a plant apocalypse,” the lichen-man -Bdubs- says. “Of course the bed is made of dirt. It’s not like he actually needs any sleep.”

“I like to nap,” the dead King protests. “Royal naps are very important, Bdubs.”

“Of course, your highness, of course,” Bdubs says quickly. “But the dirt is fine, right?”

“I mean,” the King says. “A dirt nap is mighty thematic, all considering, but… You there, Goodtimes! Have you brought your king a pillow?”

“Uh- no, no.” Scar laughs a little, startled. “No, I didn’t.”

“Shame,” the King says. The Tree rumbles. “Then you have failed me. Goodbye, Goodtimes. You served me well.”

“Whuh-” Grian starts.

“Woahwoahwoa-” Scar babbles.

“WAIT!” Bdubs shouts.

The Tree stops rumbling.

“Yes?” the King asks.

Bdubs looks at the King, then he looks at Scar, then he looks to Grian, then he looks back to the King. “Scar - Goodtimes has displeased you mightily, my liege,” he hazards. The dead King nods wisely. “Right-right- but he has displayed his loyalty quite mightily, too! The blood sacrifices are always pleasing, aren’t they?”

“You would have me grant mercy?” The King sounds displeased. Grian shuffles. He wonders if it’s even possible to kill a dead guy. He wonders if his mushrooms can kill. He hasn’t had much practice spreading them on purpose, but maybe if he can get them in the eyes?

“No, no, no, no mercy,” Bdubs amends hastily. “Just- inconvenience.” He leans in and whispers loudly. “My lord, he has a friend with him. The oncoming rot? I’m just saying- two birds with one stone here.”

“Oh?” The King looks closer at Grian. Grian lifts his wings a little in a threat display. The King nods slowly. “I see, I see… Goodtimes, I offer you a choice.”

“I don’t want to make a choice,” Scar says, more weakly than Grian has ever heard him.

“Nonetheless you have it!” the King booms. “Goodtimes- you may spare your own life, or the life of the oncoming rot. You have-”

“To give you your gifts first,” Scar says loudly.

The King pauses. “You interrupt me?”

“For presents,” Scar says quickly. He pulls of his bag and rifles through it quickly. Bdubs shuffles over and Scar hands over several unlabelled bottles. Salvation. Hope rises within Grian until, alarmingly, he realizes that none of the jugs are the weedkiller.

“Scar,” Grian says quietly.

“It’s okay, G,” Scar replies quickly.

Bdubs opens each jug and sniffs it in turn, then brings them to the King and pours them at the base of the throne. With each bottle the King’s body twitches, making noises like an ancient rocking chair, and- it takes Grian a moment to notice, but each bottle emptied at his feet brings life back to the King’s features. He grins, wide and sharp-toothed, and Grian wonders if he’s lost his chance to escape.

“Now, the choice,” the King begins.

“No,” Grian says, and he lets loose.

He’s on the ground three seconds later.

Lichen fills his mouth, vines around his wrist and wings, bark already growing quickly over his legs to trap him in place. Bdubs wipes a stray mushroom off of his sleeve in disgust, and Scar stares with wide, despairing eyes.

Do something! Grian tries to yell back with his own eyes. Scar doesn’t do anything except let out a breath, and then start to smile.

Scar says, “Phew! That took you forever, Bdubs.”

“Huh?” Bdubs says.

“I started thinking you weren’t going to stop him at all,” Scar remarks, and Grian’s heart drops into his stomach.

“OH,” Bdubs says loudly. His eyes sparkle. “Oh, so this- oh, phew! You got me worried there, Scar! Really worried! ‘Why is he hanging out with the oncoming rot,’ I said.”

“I said that,” the King argues.

“Of course, of course,” Bdubs says quickly. “Anyway, I said ‘wow, I wonder why Scar is hanging out with the oncoming rot!’ But you just needed a bit of help with this one, didn’t you?”

Scar smiles widely. He rummages through his bag again. “Right on, Bdubs,” he says. “Can’t kill a fungus surrounded by fungus, right? It’ll just grow right back!” The two of them chortle together and Scar brings another jug out of his backpack.

In fragile hope, Grian’s heart begins to beat again because he recognizes that jug. It’s the weedkiller. Label torn off. Scar opens it, takes a sip, and doesn’t flinch.

Grian feels several emotions all at once.

Scar hands the weedkiller over to Bdubs just as the King says, “What are you waiting for, Goodtimes?”

“You still have my bow, King,” Scar says.

“I thought we gave that back…?” The King looks questioningly to Bdubs.

“You took it away again after Scar failed to provide appropriate subservience, my lord.”

“Oh, well have it back, then, Goodtimes.” The King waves his hand and more of the tree creaks and moans. A real and true bow and quiver are revealed when the floor pulls back. Grian wriggles frantically, fear spiking again. Scar still hasn’t wavered. Grian is starting to doubt the contents of the weedkiller jug. He tries to flap his wings but the bark has grown over the edges. He tries to let the fungus out but his throat is clogged by lichen. The wood around him dies and tries to rot but it’s just grown over and living again in less than a second.

Scar strides over, playing with the quiver. He kneels next to Grian, then pulls out an arrow. Grian stares up at him, making his eyes as wide and pleading as he can. Scar doesn’t look at him. “Long live the King,” Scar says, raising his arrow. Bdubs raises the jug to him, but doesn’t drink.

Consternation flashes over Scar’s face, and Grian feels another rush of emotion he doesn’t know how to parse. Then Scar’s expression hardens and he brings the arrow down.

It hurts. Grian yells against the lichen in his mouth. There isn’t any blood- Grian isn’t human anymore. Of course there isn’t blood. There is an arrow in him and there isn’t any blood and Scar raises his fist with a cheer, and the King raises both arms with a cheer, and Bdubs drinks the weedkiller.

The Tree shudders.

The King collapses like a puppet with its strings cut.

Bdubs shrieks. The weedkiller drops. It sprays over the floor. The Tree screams. Grian thinks he’s also screaming. Scar isn’t screaming. Scar is frozen, false smile plastered across his face, and Grian realizes with dizzying clarity that he has no fucking clue when Scar is or isn’t lying. That’s a weird thing to realize in the worst moment of Grian’s after-apocalypse life and it’s so silly he just starts to laugh. He stops laughing when a branch spears through Scar’s chest.

“Traitor!” Bdubs yells. Three more branches strike Scar through. He gasps at each one, but he doesn’t struggle. He doesn’t try to get away. He doesn’t stop smiling. He doesn’t start bleeding. “The King trusted you!”

“The King is dead, Bdubs,” Scar says. “And your apocalypse has been ending. The oncoming rot hasn’t been oncoming for a long time- it’s been here-” he gestures wildly to Grian, who has yet another flurry of unregistered emotions “-the whole time, and you’ve let it!”

“The plants-”

“Kill those who oppose,” Scar says. “But your court has been opposing you since the moment you raised them. You failed your own apocalypse.”

Grian feels dizzy. He isn’t bleeding, but he is dying.

Why isn’t Scar bleeding?

“...What are you?” Bdubs asks. He’s breathing heavily. Grian’s vision is swimming, but he thinks Bdubs has sunk down to the floor. “Why-“ another branch spears Scar through “- aren’t-” another “-you-” another “-dead?”

“I’unno,” Scar says. “It never sticks.” The Tree rumbles overhead. Grain can feel it through the floor. “How about you? Are you dead yet, Bdubs?”

There’s silence. “Bdubs?”

The Tree stops rumbling.

“I don’t think poision is supposed to work like that,” Scar says. Or he says something like it. Grian isn’t sure. He’s really tired.

There’s something warm pressed against his face. “I didn’t lie to you,” Scar says quietly. Grian makes a little noise. “I didn’t. I said I wouldn’t let them kill you. I didn’t say anything about me. Doesn’t that mean something, G?” Grian doesn’t answer. “Yeah, yeah…”

Grian breathes out, slow, through his nose.

“You’d hate it the other way around,” Scar promises quietly. “But you did it, Grian. Bdubs wouldn’t have drank that without you. That was you, alright? You did it, you won. New apocalypse, new you. That’s the way it goes. The King died, and now it’s you, and- and it won’t be like this. It’ll be better. I don’t like mushrooms, but I’ll learn to like them when they’re you, okay?”

Grian can’t reply.

“I’ll see you soon, Grian,” Scar mumbles, and he sounds so far away.

And Grian goes to sleep.

And Mother Spore wakes up.

---

written for the @pinchhitsfromthevoid event and for the @ghastspidergwen person! this got. wildly out of hand basically the second i started to write it. unfortunately i suffer from "cannot write a normal apocalypse au" disease but eyyy that just means its a two-apocalypse package deal, which was really fun to write. hopefully it's just as fun to read!

(also on ao3)

#i wrote this in like four or five hours and posted On the deadline #this is almost pure stream of consciousness babeyyyyy #mishapen words #grian #goodtimeswithscar #hermitcraft fic #<- lemme know if i need to add any more trigger tags #hello tag readers. i want you all to know how genuinely little i planned this fic going into it #i do not understand how there's several moments of foreshadowing #i cannot comprehend the fact that the consistencies outnumber the inconsistencies #this fic wrote itself and i was merely its possessed vessel for four-five-however-many-hours #anyway spoilers in the next few tags you have been Warned #look away now #have you looked away #it's okay i read ahead when i shouldn't too #these are the trigger tags for filtering purposes theyve got to be spoilery sorry about that #death tw #blood tw #body horror tw #<- im not sure the body horror really Applies but there you have it anyway #lemme know if i missed any

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