Tag: q

souridealist:

red-kimchi:

i’m in a major mood for some sadstuck fanfiction that involves derse dreamers maybe wondering why they had to be on the planet the ‘bad guys’ come from and what qualifies them as derse dreamers in the first place.. like is there some inherent ‘bad’ or broken quality to them? or it’s just random placement? and it has a happy ending.

lol i don’t know i’m no storyteller i just do the arts herpa derpa have a derse dave

this is random as hell, OP, and I’m afraid it drifted a bit, but hopefully it’s close enough to be interesting! also, um. Hi?

It’s all a blur – the agent, the terror building in her throat as she ducked and dodged and longed for her needles, Dave bright and quick and closer to graceful than she’d ever imagined he could be, the sick green glare building closer and closer and Dave clutching at her arm, twisting, shoving –

“No,” she gasps, and Dave flinches, fingers agonizingly tight around her wrist as she twists in the air, struggles towards him, and

“Sorry,” he whispers, lips bumping against her cheek – sticky, hot – and his other hand collides with her stomach, a hard sharp punch that knocks her back, breathless and choking as she spins into space, helplessly trying to twist herself upright just in time to catch – a flash, a flicker, and as she blinks the spots from her eyes she finds space dark again. There’s no sound.

She hovers there.

“Fuck.” It hisses its way between her lips. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, you stupid, impossible…”

She isn’t sure how long it is before the shadows shift, a patch of gray sliding into shape, dull white eyes and glinting teeth, hair swirling through the Outer Rim’s half-space-half-not and coiling around bright orange points. Rose simply watches, doesn’t move.

“Hey,” the shadow says, shrugging – undulating, really, shoulders and hair and all. “Are you Rose?”

She nods, automatic and slow, holding the rest of herself still. The shadow smiles, nervous, unreal. “I’m Feferi. It’s – I mean, I’m sorry about your. Friend? Your human moirail? I’m not sure…”

“My brother.” The words echo strangely on her ears, tinny, distant, as she stares at where the Green Sun used to be. “My… he was my brother. David.”

“I’m sorry,” Feferi repeats, twisting her hands behind her back. “I… brothers are important?”

“Yes. He was.” Rose clears her throat, closes her eyes, opens them again. “Feferi. Why him?”

“It’s…” She shrugs, gaze skittering away. “I don’t know. It just happens.”

“Why?” Rose steps forward, feet steady on the half-nothingness beneath her. “I want an explanation. I want to know why this happened to him. He shouldn’t have been involved in any of this.” The words come as easily as reciting a passage in school, as destroying a classmate trying to argue without having read the book assigned. “He shouldn’t even have been on Derse. He never cared about any of this – this -” She gestures, sharp, fingers stabbing at the shapeless shapes around her. “He didn’t care. More than that, he hated it. He – he even warned me away. The horrorterrors, the Furthest Ring, he had nothing to do with them. Not until me.”

“Rose -” Feferi’s hair is limp around her, flat; it makes her look oddly like Jade. Rose barely notices, focuses more on forming the words, not thinking them until she hears them:

“He deserved better. He wouldn’t even have played the game if I hadn’t asked him, never mind gotten twisted up in this. He wasn’t frightening. He wasn’t uncaring. He wasn’t – he wasn’t grimdark. He should have been on Prospit, he should have been somewhere safer.” Rose swallows, hard – her throat feels tight, but it seems as meaningless, nothing more than a sign of infection. “Why did they choose him for this? He did nothing to gain their attention, nothing whatsoever. Was it just because he was my family?”

“I don’t know!” Feferi wails, stomping her foot; her hair uncoils. “I don’t know either! Some of ours – I mean, I had Golly, but Equius, Nepeta, there was no reason! I guess it’s – I guess it’s just because we can, that’s the only -”

“I don’t know if you noticed this,” Rose snaps, feet slapping against emptiness with every step, “but he died. That would seem to blow a few holes in your theory, wouldn’t it?”

“Maybe he was -”

“If you say one. more. word –” Rose starts, fist shining slate-silver in the dimness as she steps in just a little closer, and –

“Christ, are you actually beating up a dead ghost?”

“Dave?” She’s turned before she can think to move, staring – yes, a thin shock of purple in the dark, unhurt, unbloody, shades unbroken. “David. How did you – ”

“Uh.” He shrugs, drifting closer – distance is warped and hard to measure, and suddenly he’s close enough that his hair shifts with her breath. He’s not looking at her, head tilted towards the ground and weight shifted from foot to dangling foot, and she reaches for him, thoughts caught in her throat. Her fingers close around the arms of his shades, pull down. His eyes gleam, dull and white.

“Yeah. I didn’t.”

She swallows hard. Her hands are shaking, the glasses trembling against the air, she slaps them closed, swallowing hard, once, twice.

Then she punches him, full to the jaw. His head jerks; there’s no sound, no mark, nothing.

“You miserable bastard.”

“What the hell was I supposed to do?” he snaps, shoulders hunched against the shadows. “Let you die?”

“Yes!”

“How about fuck no?” He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, wincing a little. “No. No, no, no way. You’re – no.”

“So you decided to abandon me instead?” She crosses her arms, tucking her fists against her chest, spits the words out through her teeth. “Yes, isn’t that noble and clever. Save the girl who’s been preparing for this kind of thing for years, slated for it, who’s already given in to their machinations once, it was clearly meant to be me -”

“Okay, seriously, what.” He stares, wrist still pressed into his cheek. “What. No. You’re gonna be – you’ve got John, you’ve got Jade.”

“Yes. Dear friends both.” Her lips are shaking; she can’t speak. “David. It shouldn’t – it should have been me.”

“Yeah, I heard you.” He sets his jaw, blank eyes closing; his hand knocks gently against hers, their knuckles brushing. “It’s still bullshit, and anyway, it’s too late now.”

“Don’t -” She chokes. “Dave. Dave, I’m so sorry.”

Their hands twist together. His is cold.