Act 4, Chapter 3- Rated R for Strong Conciliatory Content
Act 4, Chapter 2- [Insert Transition Chapter Here]
Words: 3,930
Tags: AU, Meteorstuck, moirallegiance,
[Ao3]
[Previous Chapter]
[Act Masterpost]
February 19th, Year 1 of Sweep 2
You are Terezi Pyrope, and you are about to engage in the next step of your very important plan. Which is not to say that you are not feeling a little anxious or that you are not genuinely feeling a little pale for Rose, but… that is not the point.
This is for her. This is for them. Even Karkat.
“...and I suppose that addressing that issue and setting up ground rules will be important to do at some point in the near future, this is perhaps not the most romantic of subjects.”
“No. That’s alright,” you assure her. “Just follow me.”
You grin and open up the door to your respiteblock. “What comes to mind first?” you ask. You have about as much experience, to be honest, as Karkat does. Maybe less. You haven’t even watched many films. But you have a general, intellectual idea of what is supposed to happen here.
Rose stops for a moment after she steps inside, evidently examining your room. “Well first I would like to preemptively apologize. Human romantic interactions tend to actually be somewhere between that of flushed and pale interactions and thus I may end up behaving with some slight quadrant confusion in that manner. This has already proved somewhat of an issue with Kanaya, though I suspect that--”
You laugh. Of course. Rose isn’t even a troll. It isn’t like she’ll have expectations. It’ll be fine, no matter how bad your pale fumblings may be.
“Right. Kanaya.” You grin. “I will get used to it.”
This shouldn’t be too hard after all. But enough about you, this whole thing really is about fixing Rose after all.
===> TEREZI: Be Rose
You are Rose now, and now in addition to feeling apprehensive about your first decidedly pale encounter (for which you have little reliable information on what to expect), you find yourself having already made a fool of yourself. Of course Terezi would know about humans. She has been dating Dave after all.
“I suppose you would have the opportunity to understand it,” you reply. “That will likely make things somewhat easier, if infinitely more awkward. I’m not sure what implications being quadrant corners with one’s sibling is supposed to have.”
“I’m not sure either,” she says. “Since that isn’t something that comes up for us. At all. Maybe there don’t have to be implications?”
“Yes,” you confirm. “I suppose we therefore have the capacity to determine what protocol should be in such situations.” Fine. Enough pleasantries. You take a deep breath before continuing. “In any case, it is my understanding that activities in this quadrant tend to consistent largely of the sharing of feelings, and related psychological counseling as well as varying degrees of non-sexual physical closeness. Is this interpretation approximately correct?”
“Yes. I can put together a pile now actually.”
“Right. I’ve always been curious about that aspect of it. I suppose it never needed to be explained in detail to a troll audience.”
Terezi scurries around the room getting out blankets and pillows and the odd shirt and whatever assorted soft items she comes across. Slowly these items manage to assemble themselves into a rough mound with several plushies figuring prominently near the apex.
“...That does seem to be aptly described by the word ‘pile’,” you note. “It looks comfortable. Also, very you.”
Two blankets in hand, Terezi flops forward onto your pile, then flips over onto her back. “You can add some things next time if you’d like,” she offers
You pad carefully over to the assemblage, and sit down carefully. “I will have to see what old knitting projects I can dig up.”
Terezi nods, and reaches to pull you in closer. You allow her hands to guide you as you try to make yourself comfortable.
“You’re worried,” she begins. “Don’t try to make it soft. Just let it out, as soon as it occurs to you.”
“I suppose that this will necessitate the end of my amateur psychology business?”
Terezi shrugs, you can feel her shoulders move against you. “I want Dave to be understanding of troll things. I have to do the same, right? That is, when I have a kismesis, Dave might feel like I have two matesprits. So if he has to be understanding of that and how it’s not the same then so do I.”
You breath an internal sigh of relief. However much you have wanted to try this, you would be loathe to give up your practice. “Well I suppose that I will then just need to be extra careful” you say “to make sure that I keep my amateur interactions strictly professional. Though this does make me wonder if the need for greater understanding was not part of your reason for initiating this relationship.”
Terezi somewhat awkwardly pats you on the shoulders. Your current horizontal positions make this gesture less than natural.
“We will figure it out” she says. “You don’t worry about it. I will let you know if something bothers me, and then we will figure it out from there. Like moirails do.”
You nod. “Thank you for being understanding.”
“What else?” Terezi asks. “All of your worries. All of them. Sink into the pile and let your worries out.”
You take a deep breath. “Very well, I am getting there,” you say, tension building in your stomach once again. “You may have noticed that I do not open up about my troubles easily. It may be overly-cliche, but I think it is likely due to the nature of the relationship I had with my mother. She would treat any complaints I had in such an exaggerated manner as to bespeak mockery. Thus, I suppose I have learned to keep my worries unvoiced.” Oh God. Now you appear to be psychoanalyzing yourself rather than giving her a chance. Nice going Rose.
Terezi doesn’t seem to mind though. “My lusus wasn’t very good for that either,” she says. “But she was an egg.” Another beat before she turns her head back towards you. “You know that you’ve been doing your best, right?”
And there the two of you finally arrive at the meat of the issue. “No. Actually I do not know that,” you reply. “In fact, I might go so far as to say that I have been somewhat far from my best these last weeks. Remiss in my duties even.”
Terezi takes one of your hands and guides it over her cane-shawl. You flinch back at the contact with the abominable symbol, but Terezi holds your hand firmly. “This was a good cane, but I broke it.” She runs your hand over the splintered wood as she continues. “That wasn’t the cane’s fault. It just couldn’t deal with the force. So it broke.” She releases your hand, and moves to cup your cheek. “You are not a cane,” she says. “But you can still break. Like you did. The difference is that you can come back from it, while this cane, if I tried to put it back, would never be as strong as it was the first day. It’s not your fault if you break. If anything it’s my fault because i didn’t help you sooner. You did your best. You were pushed too far. You broke. You did your best. Say it.”
You feel her sightless gaze fixed on you, as her words dredge up the fear and pain and selfishness that has left you hiding from your gifts these past weeks. You hear your voice wavering as you begin to speak “I-I broke.”
Terezi holds your arms. “It’s not my fault that I broke. Say it.”
You try to obey, you really do. But the words catch in your mouth. In their place you find all the fear and pain that you thought you had sealed away tightly over these past years coming loose and springing to the surface. You reach out, and your hands find Terezi’s shirt. You pull her close as you cry an age of tears into her shoulder.
===> ROSE: Be the other girl
It is some time before Rose’s sobs settle down into softer crying, and then to silence, and finally speech again. “Wow. I really am a mess, aren’t I?”
“When a wound is left open it festers,” you reply. “You have to apply an ointment to heal it, and the ointment burns. Sometimes more than the original pain.”
“Yes. That was not one of my more pleasant experiences. But I feel much relieved having been through it. Thank you.”
“That’s what moirails are for. We are strong for each other. You lean on me, and depend on me to keep you from breaking, and you don’t have to worry.”
Rose tightens her hold on you.
“Do you trust me Rose?”
She doesn’t say anything for a few seconds. “I don’t know if I do. I want to. But the reality is of course more complicated.”
“Keep going.” You are trying to sound soothing, layering your voice with a little chirping purr. Whether human-soothing is the same as troll-soothing, you aren’t sure. You were never Dave’s moirail.
“Well, on the one hand, despite having lived in close quarters for over a sweep, we have never till now been close. And so it is hard to know.” Rose pauses for a bit, rearranging the position of her head against the pile. “And then there are other things. Although our species have much in common, I am reminded from time to time that there are significant and often unnerving differences.” She glances away almost guiltily before continuing. “And well, for example, when seen from a human perspective what is being done with Karkat seems to be unreasonably terrible.”
You growl. You realize, halfway through, far too late, that this is not a Good Idea, and Rose starts and pulls back before you stop yourself. You squeeze her, pulling her in close, trying to make up for the growl. “I just want you to live,” you say miserably. “All of you. You and Dave and Karkat and Kanaya and the Mayor. And Karkat doesn’t understand. I have to do this.”
Rose squirms between your arms, but you don’t let go. “You have to understand, Rose. I’m trying to save you. Especially Karkat. He has the clown in his room right now. What if the clown breaks out? The first person to get hurt is going to be Karkat. That idiot! And then who’s next. We can’t take him on one on one. And… Oh Rooooseeee…” You bury your face against her shoulder. “I don’t like this. But I have to make sure that everyone listens. Especially Karkat. Or we’re going to die. And. And… That’s why you have to be strong, Rose. Because I don’t think I’m going to be able to be here for long.”
A distant part of you notices Rose shift, notices her relax against you as you continue. “The clown is going to kill someone. And I… can’t let it be anyone else. That’s my responsibility. Keeping all of you safe.” You breathe in deeply, taking in her scent, trying to get a fix on her, hoping that you haven’t destroyed everything. “Please tell me you understand.”
“I understand.” Rose squeezes you briefly. “But I don’t see why protecting Karkat necessitates turning him into a pariah. If anything it seems to me that this is more likely to drive him to irrational consideration of Gamzee’s safety over the rest of ours. And even were it necessary,” she presses her forehead against yours. “I’m not sure how long I could stand to see him treated this way.”
“It’s… That’s… This is how it’s done. I don’t want to hurt him,” you insist. “N-Not too badly, anyway. Not permanently. I want him to keep living. But he has to be made to understand. He can’t act like this anymore. So I’m being careful. Gamzee won’t hurt any of you, but Karkat has to understand, and… And this is how you’re supposed to do it. I never practiced for this. But I’m trying to do what I’m supposed to.”
“But why must it be done this way?”
“Because. Because it keeps order in the ranks.”
“The ranks? There are six of us here. Seven if you want to count the Mayor.”
“I don’t know. I thought that I might have to do it, when I was younger,” you hold her to you. You need her to understand. “Most promotions come because your superior made a grievous mistake. I played it out like my court cases so that I would be ready when I was older, and I would know exactly what to say, and just the right tone of voice, and everything else. And I never thought I wouldn’t kill them. Some say there are benefits to leaving them at the bottom for everyone to pick on, but that goes wrong sometimes. I was going to be smart,” you say, and you smile a little. “But I couldn’t kill Karkat. That wasn’t the point.”
Despite yourself, you begin to cry into her shirt a little. “And I have to know exactly what to do. I have to keep you alive. Even that red-blooded fool.” Rose tightens her hold on you, begins to rub one of your shoulders. “So he has to know how stupid he was so centuries from now he won’t do it again. Do you get it? It has to burn and it has to scar so that he won’t do it again.”
“Yes, I understand. But this can’t be only way.”
“W-What else am I supposed to do?”
You hate yourself. How weak you are, with your sniveling tone and your faltering strength. What sort of moirail are you? How did you let her maneuver you into this position without even trying? How are you supposed to fix her when you are falling apart?
You are killing them, you piece of hoofbeast droppings.
“Karkat is smart despite the metaphorical garbage that usually issues from his mouth. Talk to him.”
“About what? Don’t you get it?” You want to scream at her. You want to hold her by the shoulders, shove your face in front of hers and scream, yell, rant, until your voice is gone, why is she so blind? “I’m killing the clown,” you explain. “M-Maybe not very soon, but I have to do it. Even if somebody else does it, the responsibility is mine. I told Karkat that I would keep anyone from dying. That’s what I was going to do that he couldn’t. But I knew, I knew, before I said it, that I was going to break my promise. Because Gamzee has to die. I’m going to fail no matter what, but that’s why I’m doing it. So it’s my fault.” You bury yourself further in her shirt. “And then I’ll have to be punished. I can’t let it be any of you. Especially you. Y-You have to take over after me. After I’m… gone. You can’t have that on your hands.”
Rose pushes you back a bit to meet you forehead to forehead. “Terezi, no. You are not going to have to kill Gamzee. That is not an alternative. We will find another way.” She pauses for emphasis. “If it means shutting him in a metal box and throwing away the key, we will find another way. Even if this weren’t Karkat’s friend we were walking about. Even if he was going to threaten our safety again. We are not going to kill Gamzee. Or you.”
“W-Why? Rose, d-don’t you care--”
“Something happens,” she says, her voice straining to remain in control. “Something terrible happens if we let him die. Terezi, this is important. Do you understand me?”
You nod as best as you can under the circumstances, with your head between her hands. “Then what else can I do?”
“I don’t know. I guess we’ll just have to figure something out together.”
“I… I can’t be weak,” you say. “But I can be weak here. Rose…” You choke. “I-I think I’m broken.”
“Well that just means that we have an opportunity to rebuild you better than you were before,” Rose smiles back at you. “I’m told that when a bone is not set properly it can heal wrong, and that the only way to fix it is to break it again and reset it. So Terezi, what shape do you want to heal into?”
“A… better one? I don’t know. I stopped thinking about that. I’m trying to go for long enough that you’re fixed. And then I’m done, and you can do it. I’m just the… transitional head.”
“I’m flattered,” she replies. “But I don’t think that it works that way. My impression was that the moirallegiance deal was that everyone got healed. So, Terezi, think about it. Who do you want to be?”
“I was going to be R-Redglare.” Your voice is muffled. You’re pressed against her shirt again. “I don’t know anymore. There isn’t a place for Redglare. Or legislacerators. We won’t be going to the new session. I don’t know what I’m supposed to be! But I felt better, in a way. I knew what I was supposed to do today. I had responsibilities and they mattered. And I knew exactly what I had to do. It was like when my lusus taught me how to smell, and suddenly being blind didn’t matter.”
Rose holds you closer. You are held.
“It’s not easy finding a new path,” she says softly. “But you can do it.”
“But I don’t, I don’t have anything else.” You try to curl up more tightly against her. “I’m lost.”
“I’m here for you.” She begins to rub your back. “We’ll find a way out together.”
“This wasn’t supposed to be about me…”
You sound disgusting. You disgust yourself.
“Are you so disappointed to learn that I have something to offer you here as well?”
“I… don’t know. I don’t think so?”
“Are you sad that I’m not going to let you go through with your plans to valiantly sacrifice yourself?”
You make a noise that is almost, but not quite, a growl. “Maybe…” you say quietly.
“No.” Rose says it emphatically. “No. If you die, Dave loses a matesprit, I lose a moirail, and everyone loses a friend. You are already too much a part of this group for us to lose you. Is something the matter that this seemed like a favorable alternative to you?”
“No. No. I just… This is just the only thing that I know how to do. Don’t you get it?”
You try to pull away from Rose, but she only lets you go a little.
“You tell me what I’m going to do. You can’t just… leave me without any options.”
“I cannot decide that for you,” she insists. “but I can help. There are far too few of us left to mete out justice at the end of a noose, but surely you cared for more than just the hangings.”
“I’m trying to do what’s best for you. Kanaya isn’t fighting this. Even karkat isn’t fighting it. He knows that he fucked up. Even if he’s angry he still knows. Y-You can’t treat us like humans.”
“I appreciate that,” she nods. “But as I understand it, it is my role here to do what is best for you. You cannot simply sacrifice yourself, even if you do not know what to do with yourself. And maybe you are correct. Perhaps I will just need to stuff my discomfort about Karkat’s situation. Chalk it up to cross-cultural dissonance. But I think that there has to be a better way. If he understands, why do we need to treat him like this?”
“I’m… I’m not doing anything to him you know,” you find yourself searching for reasons to backpedal. “I didn’t tell him to leave. He did that on his own. I have talked with him. I have extended aid. When he can deal with it he will come back.” You think back to what happened in the commonsblock. “He knew enough to know when to leave. He has enough judgment for that. I think he has enough judgment to know when to come back. I wasn’t sure before, but I have talked with him since lunch. I believe that he is taking this to heart.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear that.”
You smile a little.
A time passes until Roes finally breaks the silence. “This is not at all what I was anticipating. The books always made it so dramatic. And yet seemed to miss out on the sheer intensity of it.”
“You’re pretty good for this being your first time.” You rest your head against her. You take a moment to stretch, your arms going out wide. None-too-subtly, one wraps around Rose more properly than it had been before.
Rose grins. “Well, perhaps there is some merit to spending lonely afternoons attempting to psychoanalyze one’s housepets.” She relaxes into the new configuration, pressing slightly closer. “though at some point we are going to need to have an interspecies discussion of body language norms.”
“Just do what I do. We do it better. I mean you don’t even have moirails.”
She laughs. “I suppose. But the, uh…” She paps you tentatively. “That. It seems a bit unusual from a human perspective.”
“Oh.” You pap her in return. “You mean that?” You pap her again, a little higher, on the forehead. “Or were you meaning that?” You smile. You pap her on the shoulders.
“Yes. That. Were those first two intended to be notably distinct in some way?”
“No.” You pap her on the shoulders again. “I just like doing it. You made a funny expression.”
“Ah, yes. You were messing with me. I am glad that my reactions have proved a source of great amusement.”
“Oh.” You should, um, you should probably bring up something else while you’re at it. Another intercultural miscommunication. “And Kanaya would never mention it, and we all knew that you didn’t know, but you’ve been flirting pale with Kanaya.”
Rose curls up a bit. “Yeah, I know. How bad was it?”
“Do you remember when I found you a few hours ago? With Kanaya?”
“Oh. Oh Terezi, I’m really sorry.”
You snort. “The court forgives you. And anyway,” you add, whispering. “It’s actually been pretty funny, in a sick kind of way. Mostly at Kanaya’s expense…”
It is now Rose’s turn to hide her face in her moirail’s shoulder. “Apparently I am not as adept as I had thought at this quadrant thing.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
Rose relaxes some, and smirks a little. “Well, I guess I’ll just need to find a way to make it up to her.”
“There are plenty of ways for a matesprit to do that. I’m sure that you’ll think of something.”
Rose smirks harder.
You pap her on the head, and adjust some hairs. “Do you feel better now?”
“Yes. Considerably so, thanks to you.”
“That’s what moirails are for. Now go make up with your matesprit.”
“That sounds like a very good idea. And I suppose that you must have business of your own to attend to.”
You yawn. “Yes. Lots and lots of business.”
“Ah. I see.” She hugs you one more time. “Very well, I shall take my leave.”
Rose carefully disentangles herself as you yawn again.
You drift off as she tucks the blankets in against you.