#kat original

[xkat-holstaur]

[thirdlastdoublelife]

cleo and scott head to spawn, the call of their soulmates leading their journey.

what will they say when they get there? will they be apologetic? have they just missed each other when exploring? (no, of course they haven’t. they want the deep dark and the nether, of all places. they want to some of the most dangerous places in the world, without even a passing thought to the person on the other end. did they know it wasn’t just their own life they were endangering, did they know that there were people on the other end who felt it all?)

scott and cleo go meet their soulmates whom they’ve already decided aren’t worth it. why? to satisfy curiosity, maybe. they’ve seen all the other soulmates. they all found each other many moons ago. they’re all happy (well, most of them anyway) and building lives together. for the first half of the session, it’s all anyone was doing, searching for their soulmate. and they found them. but theirs? they weren’t even looking. even the call to spawn happened right as the session was ending. the whole session, they were searching, feeling the pain of the dangers they were in, eating as an act of self-preservation instead of care, they tried! they tried to care and where were they?!

and when they get there, they finally meet their soulmates who, all session, have done everything but meet them. and they... want to do a gameshow?

cleo and scott want to laugh at their naivete. they really don’t know. or they don’t care. martyn wants to make a fun gameshow, pair someone up with pearl (but everyone else paired up ages ago, and the only ones left waiting are the two currently sitting in silent fury.)

scott decides to humour them a little. cleo follows his example, though she wants nothing more than to throw the other two off the hill they stand upon. scott gets hit by a goat, and exclaims, and pearl immediately realises that theres no point to the gameshow anymore. she’s found her soulmate! and... and he doesn’t want her. he only looks at her with a bitterness in his eyes, having searched and waited for her and for what? if she was so excited, why didn’t she come find him? why didn’t she even try?

cleo stares hard at martyn, trying his best to find pearl’s soulbonded. but him? he doesn’t even care about finding his own soulmate. so as scott gets hit and pearl winces in pain, and cleo stares at martyn, the only one left who has no clue (maybe even after you-know-who). a fresh surge of anger rises through cleo’s chest. she was searching and waiting the entire time, and he doesn’t. even. care.

scott and cleo leave hand-in-hand, chosing each other when their own soulmates couldn’t be bothered to chose them.

[xkat-holstaur]

[xkat-holstaur]

[thirdlastdoublelife]

i STILL have more thoughts about the divorce quartet, specifically martyn.

like he gets rejected. and then he just brushes it off, and also leaves pearl as well, and so he is alone by his own choosing, and he pretends that its all fine. he can work with this. but... he’s still sad about it. hes literally going through the 5 stages of grief

denial - the “theyll come back to us“ mindset

anger - blaming pearl and leaving her alone

so next week we might get bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

[thirdlastdoublelife]

Pearl stares at the item in her hands. It sits there, its gilded surface reflecting golden sunlight across her face. 

“You should do it, Pearl. You know you want to.“ Martyn sits across from her.

Pearl raises her eyes to meet the ones staring intently back at her. “How about you do it? Since you and Cleo hate each other so much, this could end all your troubles. At least Scott and I aren’t out to get each other.“ She reaches a hand out to him, the forbidden fruit sitting in her palm, now within Martyn’s reach.

He pushes her hand back. “No, no, this wouldn’t end our anger. It’d just fuel it. Give us the ability to actually do real harm to each other with no consequence. At least this way, we...“ His voice trails off. This way, we won’t actually kill each other. But that makes no sense, they want to kill each other. Right?

“Trust me, it’d be better for you.“ He settles on that. “But you don’t have to do it. I mean, it’s your choice, I guess. I’ll just... leave you to it.” He wanders off.

Pearl continues to sit in silence. She can feel a prescence that’s not her own, beyond the thin veil of her current reality, every so often wincing as pain comes through the bond. She hates it.

“Wait, is that a golden apple?“ Scar’s voice breaks the silence. Grian follows quietly behind, mouthing a “sorry” to Pearl.

“Yeah, we found it in a dungeon.“ We. She almost winces at the memory, her and Martyn, before everything went downhill.

“Are you... planning on eating it?“

The silence speaks for itself. Grian begins to panic a little. “Pearl, look, if things aren’t going well for you and Martyn-“

“My soulmate isn’t Martyn. And even if it was, Martyn doesn’t like me anyway, so-“

“Or whoever it is, you don’t have to go this route. It doesn’t have to be like this- Pearl, if you eat that, it’s irreversible, you’ll never have a soulmate again.“

Pearl stares up at the genuinely fearful face staring back at her.

Scar chips in. “Right! Having a soulmate is so much fun, Pearl, they do all kinds of things for you, like they feed you, they give you clothes, you know, like soulmates should! I think as long as you talk to your soulmate, you’ll get over whatever rough patch you’re in!“

“Scar, I’m pretty sure those are a you thing, not a soulmate thing.“ Pearl tries to smile through the pain. It ends up more like a grimace.

“Still, Scar’s right- you don’t need to do anything drastic right now, just talk to them. They’re your soulmate, they can’t just keep you out of their lives forever, you know?“

“...Right.“ He can, she thinks.

-

It’s dark and raining by the time she reaches the canyon where Cleo and Scott call home. She knocks on the wooden door, praying he isn’t home so she can delay it a little longer. But this world does not have kind gods, and the door opens.

“Hello? Oh, Pearl. It’s you. Thought you were in a cave somewhere, seeing how you were getting hurt so much. You’re welcome, by the way, for you know. Keeping us alive.”

Pearl can’t deny getting here was an ordeal, with constant zombies, skeletons, and creepers roaming around in the dark. Scott was still saving her, no matter how much he hated her. It makes her wish she could turn back time, back before this world, back to girlbossing and gaslighting and gatekeeping, back to where they were ride-or-die, back to when they were more like soulmates than whatever this is.

“I’m sorry.“ she half-sobs. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I should have found you, I should have tried harder to look for you, I shouldn’t have-“

“Do you even have any food? Here.“ Scott promptly ignores it all and hands her some cooked steaks, practically shoving them into her hands.

 “I-I do, I just didn’t have any time to eat on my way here, is all...“

Scott’s eyebrows raise. “Then what are you here for?“

“I can- I can fix this. Fix us.“ Pearl practically begs, taking Scott’s hands and dropping onto her knees. “I can be a good soulmate. Give me a chance, Scott, please.“

Scott’s eyes only harden. “I told you this before, Pearl. I. Don’t. Need. A. Soulmate.“

Pearl’s desperation only heightens at hearing Cleo’s voice in the distance, calling out for Scott for something or the other. “I can do that too!“

Scott’s expression turns to confusion as she says that.

“Scott? Are you home?“ Cleo only grows closer with every step, each one only a reminder of everything Pearl has lost. (Or, perhaps, never had.)

Pearl takes out the golden apple, still shining brightly like a beacon in the dark night.

“Pearl, wait-”

Freedom has never tasted so bittersweet.

[blar-glas-blou]

if you up the ante enough, you'll eventually get anthill, because hills are tall

[thirdlastdoublelife]

@ tumblr show my posts in tags. pls.