fleetlogs | THE EDITED PHERES LOG (third times a charm)

The kid is starting to whine, but you do not give a single fuck what sort of raucous noise they want to rattle up: it's not like they can do shit. The sun is up, the air is hot, and your apartment is a thirty minute fucking walk, so fuck anyone that thinks you're about to start dawdling.

You change your mind when the kid starts yowling about drones. The first high pitch noise goes straight into one audiosponge and deep into your the fleshiest part of your pan, and you hiss, your ears immediately pinning back defensively. You'd cover them up, but your hand is currently occupied by the thrashing bag of cloth and bones you're holding up.

Not for long. The kid is fucking hitting you, little paws clenched into fists that're pummelling away at your side and your arm and anything in reach, and the first time one strikes a port and sends shockwaves of sparks crawling up your arm, you're fucking through. You shake them, hard, and then drop them on the ground for good measure.

The only warning you get is the way that Hinnom tenses, head tilting like ze's listening to someone talk, and then goes still. Combat training is what makes you duck, and you're grateful for it when the booted foot goes over your head and straight into Pheres's instead.

Grateful, and appalled.

"Hinnom!" you hiss, flushing. "Pheres - are you alright?"

You only realise you've fallen asleep again when Hinnom starts yowling. Your head snaps up from where it was resting on Marduk's shoulder and thank heavens you're still wearing the glasses, because it feels like the day has only gotten brighter over the past hour. Even through the tinted shades, your vision is crowded with white spots.

And then, seconds later, more appear when a booted foot kicks you directly in the horn. The momentum is too weak for it to really hurt, but the impact of the metal sole is enough to set your horn to ringing, and suddenly you're not tired at all.

You have no idea what's going on. But you do know -

"Drones?" Your mouth feels like it's full of cotton, but you're holding a water bottle for some reason, and you rip off the keratin lid with a claw and take a grateful gulp. The rest of the water, you dump on your head: the suncloak you're wearing is sunproof but not waterproof, and the liquid soaks rapidly through the cloth and onto your skin. It doesn't get rid of the way your head feels like it's full of cotton, but it helps, and besides, it is hot as hell out here.

"What - why are there drones?"

Riccin drops you, and you hit the ground with a bounce that leaves you staggering. But that's okay, because you're on your feet and already spinning, trying to find the best route to escape.

Where did you leave the sewer grate?

The others are talking, but right now, you don't care. Castor's circling your little posse, peering at each in turn, and the information he's rattling off is what you've got to pay attention to. The drones are still a few blocks over, clearing out the last of the communal hivestems. The neighborhood back there is completely locked down, and you've probably only got a minute or two before the groundsmen start moving over here to start rounding up the kids in the street.

Kids like you.

"These two will be fine." He's been looking over Marduk and Riccin, and yeah, you weren't worried about Mardie: she's like, working for the fishheads, so the drones'll probably just pat her on the horns and call her honeygrub. And Riccin's practically the size of a drone by themselves, so they can't be worried.

But Castor's looking at Pheres now, leaning in close enough that the bighorn shifts. Flatscans can't see ghosts as much than specks, but sometimes they can feel their auras. "But this one's cullbait," Castor announces. "Bring him along."

You puff out their cheeks, but there's no time to protest, and while Pheres might look old as fuck, he isn't big: anywhere you can squeeze, he should be able to fit, too, so you dart over and grab his free hand.

"They're doing a culling sweep," you say, and give his arm a yank. If only you were bigger, then you could just scruff him and haul Riccin did. "Come on come on come on! We've gotta go!"

And how the fuck does the kid know that?

But the daytime is quiet. A little too quiet, maybe, and you frown, looking around. Sure enough, there's kids at the windows of a lot of the nearby hivestem, their curtains open and outlines blurred behind the tinted glass. They're not looking down at them, though.

Their faces are angled up, towards the next block over.

"Hold it," you say, irritable. The kid is acting like this is a fucking emergency, but none of you are really cullbait: the kid and Pheres aren't about to be culled just for looking skinny as fuck, you've got the Shepherd's symbol emblazoned bold on the back of your cloak, and Marduk seems like the sort of dumbass that could rattle off her imperial signature in her sleep. "It's a culling sweep. So what?"

Oh. A culling sweep.

You've been through those before, both times on those rare occasions when you slept off-grounds for a night. Drones came into the hivestem and collected all the residents straight in a line, and did a health inspection for blood abnormalities, any incurable communicative diseases.. anything that might warrant a culling so their apartment block could be freed for a new, healthier child.

At the time, it was terrifying. The air had been thick with fear pheromones, and the sound of children weeping: you had watched one child culled right in the middle of the line, and then cried when her moirail demanded the same.

(The drone had done it, under code five hundred and eighty two. You had looked it up, afterwards, and all of the rest of the culling qualifications, just in case, and you hadn't slept for the rest of the day.)

But now...

You're all healthy. No blood aberrations, no disease: you might wonder about Hinnom's health with the way that ze live in the sewer, but ze spends too much time with you. You'd have noticed if ze was sick, or sported any unusual mutations.

"Culling sweeps are a perfectly normal and routine part of the day," you say now, trying to sound soothing. Ze's practically vibrating with anxiety, and the way fear pheromones that are coming off of zim in waves is making your horns ache. "I've been in several, and come out fine. There's nothing to be worried about."

It's a culling sweep.

Well, fuck.

Adrenaline is cutting through the fog of your brain like a knife through a page: one minute, you're still groggy, and the next, your thoughts feel keen enough that they're ripping holes into your pan. Your bloodpusher feels like it's going to climb out of your throat, and you abandon Marduk's arm in favor of following Hinnom.

You're still swaying, but fear is keeping you steady enough that you're not falling over.

The air stinks of fear pheromones, and part of it's coming from you. You've never been in a culling sweep before, but you've heard the stories, and you know how it goes. There's always too many maroons in the population, more redbloods than they can fit into house allotments, more then can be fit into the hivestems, and they're always looking for reasons to thin the herd.

You and Sipara have worked too hard to keep the two of you alive for you to get culled by a bloody drone, of all things: lobotomised soldiers, barely sentient, barely trolls. Better to have been culled by a person than to die like that, because you were too daft and drunk to just stay indoors.

Marduk is shooting off some lovely nonsense about safety, but she's green, and you don't even have to hear what she's saying to know it doesn't apply.

"You two can participate, then," you snaps. "I'm not. Goodbye!"

Oh hell no.

After you just went through all this bullshit to fetch him, you're not about to let Pheres take off with some kid with a drone phobia.

You stalk forward until you're close enough to grab him, and then you do, one hand wrapping around the top of a rostal horn. Thank fuck for gloves, because you can feel the heat of the cuff even through the leather.

"Stop being such a wicked cluckbeast," you order. "You fucking dumbass. The fuck you think they're going to do, they see your candy-ass trying to hide out a sweep?"

He's not a blood mutant: his cheeks are ruddy enough that it's clear he's maroon, and you saw his clothes under the sun cloak. Boy is hiding exactly jack shit under that thin-ass get-up, so obviously, he's got nothing to fucking worry about.

The yellowblood is another story, but you really do not give a fuck about the pipsqueak. They're the jade's problem.

Hinnom started moving as soon as you pulled free, and so you're hurrying after the wriggler when your world goes abruptly off-balance. There's a hand on your horn!

Normally, you wouldn't care. Normally, though, you aren't staggering without your psionics, and with your balance already shot from alcohol that refuses to just fucking process. Their grip isn't firm, but the way their fingers are curling into the velvet of your horn is leaving you dizzy.

You hiss at Riccin, showing all of your teeth, and you jerk your head hard to try and wrench it free. "Get off of me," you demand, and then again: "Right now!"

You don't have the weight to out and out wrest free. But you do have one thing on your side, and that's agitation. Drowsing had reduced the sparks to essentially glitter on the base of your horns, shiny but harmless, but you can feel them cracking as your anger grows. Your body wants you to jump, but you can't jump with someone grabbing you, and so the energy you're pumping into your psionics has nowhere to go.

Nowhere to go but out. The air is getting bright with the aborted sparkle and crack of your psionics as the thwarted energy forces its way into the air. You can't jump, not with a hand on your horn, but maybe you can burn the hell out of their hand, if nothing else.

Pheres pulls his arm free from you and is stepping after Hinnom before you can even react. "Goodbye!" he calls over his shoulder, waspish, like he thinks you and Riccin are the ones being foolish.

"You can't outrun a culling sweep," you yelp, and the fear is rubbing off. You feels sick to your stomach, and the flash of gratitude when Riccin moves to intercept them doesn't do much to help: they're going to get themselves culled trying to escape. That's how people die. "You'll be fine! You'll both be fine, just --"

The world goes bright, bleaching out, and you think lightning must've struck, because the air feels heavy with something. Then the colour comes inching back, and you realises it's just Pheres, sparking like when you first saw him.

It's worse now, though, and the sparks are bright enough that it hurts to look at them. The first flare was the worst, and it's already dying down, like he can't quite sustain.. whatever it is that he's trying to do. "Please stop," you whine, glancing towards the distance. You can hear something buzzing. If the drones arrive and find them all fighting...

You're not sure what'll happen. But it'll probably be bad.

He'd snapped at you a few times online, but you had figured Pheres was all talk: after all, it's easy to play tough when you don't have to back it up. But no, he's bearing his teeth at you and hissing like he's actually going to bite.

Big fucking whoop. His teeth are nubby, with none of the care or polish that he's obviously put into his horns, and those fuckers wouldn't even break flesh. The whole thing is pathetic as hell, and you have to marvel at the display. He's as threatening as a wet baby meowbeast. Are you supposed to be scared?

He jerks his head to try and get free, and you tighten your grip on his horn in response. "Get off of me," he demands, his voice frantic, and the only reason you're not growling is because his pan's still marinating in alcohol. He doesn't know what the fuck he's saying, and -- goddamnit, you're here to prove a fucking point about you and Sipara's quadrants. Maiming him won't help.

Even if you are sorely fucking tempted.

"Quit the noise, brother." It's a good thing you're wearing gloves, or your claws would be digging into his skin. "I'm helping your chump ass." But that only makes him jolt his head away again, making your grip slip onto the cuff proper, and later, you'll reflect that's what saved you from your hand getting completely fucking scorched.

The build-up of psionic aura is abrupt: Pheres has been sparking away steadily this entire time, a tiny-ass blip on the radar of your attention, and you barely notice when it starts to amp up. But then it keeps going until the air is suddenly thick with the glowing sparks, the initial surge bright enough that it's hard to see.

The honey's still in his system. They're directionless: whatever his ability is, because by now you're fucking sure it isn't standard telekinesis, he's not using it. He's just pumping energy into his aura and putting on a lightshow, because although the sparks are rippling across his horns and snapping like bands off into the air, they're not going anywhere.

Except onto you.

They might be dissolving before they can get farther than your hands, but the few that hit you fucking sting, even through the thick leather. The initial surge hits the metal and bounces, but you can still feel the brittle heat of them if it'd hit your skin, you might've actually gotten burned. The sparks after that are too weak to do more than sting, brief taps of heat that die off just as the feeling registers, and you tighten your grip as he loses energy.

Incredulity keeps you quiet through all of this, and when the air clears of light, no one's talking at all: the only sound is the buzzing in the distance, the harsh rasp of Pheres's breath, and the snarl reverberating all the way from your thoracic cavity.

He tried to fucking zap you. That fucking bastard.

"You done yet?" you snap. "Because if you're going to keep that shit up, you're not going to have to worry about the goddamned drones."

Your telekinesis only works at a distance, but Pheres is tiny as fuck: you don't need powers to beat some sense into him, if it comes to that.

Once, when you were young and translating a book of old myths, you'd read about one of the very old creation myths, written back before the tyrians gained their stranglehold on the throne and the Empire, back long before the first Dysseu had crawled out of the brooding caverns and marveled at the colour of the sky.

It had been written by jadebloods, back in the days when each caste lived separate in vast, communal hives, and it had said that when the first eggs were sculpted, out of clay and grass and smoke, all trolls had been hatched with black eyes, the better to see in the gloom of the night.

It was only when a greenblood had cut her hand while sculpting and blood had mixed into the clay that the first jadeblood had hatched: a jadeblood, with jade eyes as pale as her blood, eyes that made her strain at night, but made her the first troll to be able to see, and walk in the light of the day.

(You don't remember the rest, much to your regret: it was one of the first books you'd ever done, staying up all day with a dictionary and a pen because you didn't have the caegars to pay for a proper translation, and you hadn't known yet to make yourself a copy of everything you fixed.)

As a wriggler, you'd thought it was an excellent tale.

As an adult, all you can think is that it was complete hoofbeastshit. Your eyes are as pale as they get, and the light of your psionics feels like a punch to the snout, even behind the tinted gloom of the glasses.

You're not blinded, but your eyes are watering as the sparks die down. You can't keep it up, even if you wanted to: your horns ring like you struck them against a wall, and Riccin's hand is still curled tight around one.

As you blink the ruddy tears out of your eyes, they have the audacity to ask you if you're done yet.

"You're going to get me killed," you say, your voice thin and reedy. There's a buzzing in the distance, and you feel the approach of the drones like a hoke on your shoulders.

Pheres looks like you've hit him, his eyes big and wounded, and the kid behind him looks ready to bawl. You feel like when they were bumping horns: like they're living in some crazy-ass world that you can't see or hear, and you're just stuck dealing.

(You might as well have hatched indigo, for all the sense these two are making.)

"What the fuck is your problem?" you demand, and you let go of the horn, because it's starting to feel weird, just standing here and holding it like that. You clamp a hand on his shoulder, instead, grip firm so he doesn't take off. If you have to keep an arm on him in front of the drones to keep him from doing something stupid, well -

Myrrha is going to owe you so fucking bad.

Pheres is looking at you like you've signed and stamped his own Imperial death notice, like you've done him some great wrong and he can't even muster up the energy to be distraught over it. Plenty of kids in the cullpits have looked at you like that, right before your hammer cracks them in the back of the pan, but coming from Pheres, it's unsettling as fuck.

"The hell do you two have against drones? They're not out here for population control." You're losing the thread of your anger: it's still there, boiling away like an unwatched pot, but it's hard to keep hold of it when there's bile rising at the back of your throat. (It's all these fuckers freaking out that's getting to you - the air's so thick with fear, you might as well be hearing chucklevoodoos.) It's a fucking health-check."

Hinnom looks like ze's going to burst into tears: there's already yellow pinpricks at the corner of zir eyes, and you feel like you've been called on in the middle of lecture, because you don't know what to do.

You're certain you're not pale for Hinnom, or any other colour; your friendship is the platonic camaraderie of lonely near age-mates in a city hostile to your respective castes. But you'd do anything to stop the way they look right now.

"It's okay," you say, and oh, no, now you're starting to sound distraught. If Hinnom starts crying, you're going to cry, and then where will you all be? Hinnom and Pheres won't have to worry about the drones: judging by the alarmed looks Riccin is giving the two of them over Pheres's head, the psionic might save the drones the effort and cull them both just to escape the tears. "It's okay!" you say again, urgent, as much to calm them as to soothe Riccin. "They're just going to run our symbols and IDs and make sure no one is dying."

Hinnom's lusus is climbing out of zir shirt and wrapping around zir neck, the oversized mandibles clicking with what might be distress. You want to pat zir shoulder, or maybe hug zim, but the mandibles and each set of legs are coloured with bright, poisonous red, so you bunch your hands on the side of your tunic instead, worrying the fabric with your claws.

It's already ruined from the sewers, anyway.

Edited 2015-03-31 01:11 (UTC)

You hate Marduk, and you hate Riccin, and you hate Pheres, because if you weren't with them, you wouldn't be about to die.

And right now, Mardie is at the top of the list, because she's keep trying to talk to you, her bottom lip trembling like she's got any right to be upset when all of this is all her fault. You're never going to do a favor for her ever again. You're never going to do a favor for anyone ever, ever again, even if you don't die, but you are, and...

"You're so dumb," you accuse Marduk, petting your lusus. She's bumping her antennae against you, mandibles pinching gently at your skin as she tries to figure out what has you so upset. Your throat is too tight for the chirps and hums that you use to communicate with her, though, and so you just pet her instead, trying to draw comfort from the smooth press of her exoskeleton against your skin. "You're SO dumb."

(Lowbloods never leave lasting ghosts: there's too many, and they've got no resistance to the other psychic imprints. They start off strong, brighter and realer than all the rest, but all they do is rub and rub and rub on each other, until a perigee or three passes and there's nothing left but an imprint with no memories and a dozen names. You tried keeping lowbloods leashed, when you were little and hopeful, and all that happened is that they rubbed off on you instead, piece by piece, until fading away entirely.)

(When you die, there'll be no one to leash you and try to keep you real. You'll just be one of those blobs in the sewers, with no name and no face and no -)

"They can't run my symbol 'cause I don't have a symbol," you warble, spitting out the words, and now you're crying, gross, ugly sobs that you don't bother to try and keep in. You're going to die and it's going to be forever. "I don't have a symbol or an ID or anything else and they're going to cull me and it's all your fault!"

"Oh," you breath. Hinnom is sobbing behind you, a wretched, wet noise that is unhappily familiar, and Riccin is still holding onto you. They've moved their grip from your horn to your shoulder, and there's an idea fermenting in the back of your pan. You just needs a few seconds to think...

You tear the glasses from your face and fling them onto the ground. They're cheap: they hit the pavement and the thin glass lenses crack with an audible snap that's almost satisfying.

(You can't remember where Riccin got them, but you hope they belonged to them.)

"Look at my eyes," you demand, sharp with contempt. Your brain is foggy, but your words are coming out crisp with outrage, so only the ends are slurring. Mentally, you can't help but echo the little maroonblood's words: these two are so completely stupid. "Do these look like they're fucking regulation? Do you think a drone can tell the difference between - between psionics and daywalkers? Because I don't think they care!"

"They're going to take one gander at my stupid bulbs and then they're going to cull me, because I'm burgundy, and then-" Your voice hitches, but you force it out: "And then Sipara's going to cull you."

It's not a threat! It's a promise. You may not be the best diamond - if you were, you wouldn't be in this situation right now - but you know your moirail, better than you know yourself.

You know her well enough that she'd regret it, and that sour conviction is what pushes you to action. (It's easy to give up on yourself, but never on Sipara.) Your teeth are dull and flat, but you keep your claws filed and polished. Riccin is tall, but you already know that you can reach their face, so you pull your hand back and slap them hard across the face, claws angled to catch the skin and rip.

One moment, Pheres is all but growling, snapping out each word with a disdain that feels personal. His reasons are all hoofbeastshit - there's no way the drones are going to look at his warm skin and flushed face and think undead cullbait, fluorescent eyes or not - but that's not stopping him from spelling it out in his sharp-ass tone, like he's personally schoolfeeding you on life.

The next moment, he slaps you, a solid thwack that sends you stepping back with surprise, and he wrenches free of your grasp. When you reach up to touch your smarting face, your fingers come back damp with vivid gold blood, and all you can do is stare.

He hit you. He fucking hit you.

You should be furious. You should be irate: your meteor hammer is literally a twitch of your fingers away, locked away in your signing modus. There's no reason not to bring it out. You've culled people for less, and as Sipara's made it viciously clear, he's not even your fucking enclade. Pheres is functionally a stranger.

Fuck this shit. You've culled friends for less.

But you don't pull out your hammer. You just stand there and stare, feeling something curdling in your gut you can't quite identify.

(He's terrified, and it's not so much pathetic anymore as it is worrying.)

Edited 2015-03-31 01:23 (UTC)

Ze doesn't have a symbol, and ze doesn't have an ID, and -

You've heard about feral trolls. They escape from the brooding caverns right after pupation, before a lusus can pick them, and they live in the woods: no schoolfeeds and no allowances means no education, and no hive means no socialisation. They're animals. They cull other trolls for fun, and dine on their meat, and culling them is a gift to society.

They do not live in cities, running post for caegars and wearing hand-me-downs and making ghost puns about how they never aspectral your visits, but it sure does lift their spirits, boo.

They don't make friends.

Hinnom's not feral. Ze can't be.

"How do you not have an ID?" you demand. Hinnom is crying and you shouldn't be yelling at zim, but that's what you're doing: your voice is going higher and higher, because ze's crying and suddenly, you're scared. "Everyone has an ID!"

Hinnom is sobbing, Marduk is yelling, and Riccin is staring, and you are still entirely too drunk to try and decipher the look they're giving you.

Your clawtips are gold, brighter than the yellowed keratin of the nail proper, and you'll feel bad about the scratches running across Riccin's face later: right now, you've got to make sure that you and Hinnom don't die.

Fear keeps you steady as you dart over to the little yellowblood. You're moving as fast as you can, one stub in front of the other, but it feels like you're going entirely too slow. You're not sure if the rushing sound in your soundsacks is the buzz of drones approaching, or just the sound of the blood racing in your veins.

Maybe it's both.

"Shh, sh, it's alright," you croon, dropping hard to your knees in front of the little maroonblood - no, yellow, because the tears streaking down their face are as sallow as the blood on your claws. Hinnom's lusus is twining around their neck, and.. you doesn't know anything about insects, so you can only hope the way it's looking at you is friendly. "I've got it, it's okay, shh. You're psychic, aren't you? Can you think of a place in the city?"

"Somewhere that's - haah - safe?"

Castor is talking to himself, his lips moving silently as he holds onto the symbol. You keen at him, demanding attention, but he doesn't notice.

You hate him the most.

Marduk is yelling at you, and you hunch your shoulders and wrap your arms around yourself. This isn't fair. This isn't --

Pheres is kneeling in front of you, and his voice is just the right pitch that it manages to catch your attention. It's soft and nice and sympathetic, and maybe it catches Castor's attention, too, because he actually looks up from his pendant.

"Yes," you say, hesitantly, peeking over at Castor to see if he understands the question. He's staring at Pheres like he might actually have a plan, but.. even if you get into the sewers, the drones are too close to escape. "My - my hive. But it's too far to run."

"That's okay!"

The tears streaking through Hinnom's make-up are yellow as the blood on your hands, but habit is hard to break, and it's hard not to look at his distress and feel your pumpbiscuit contract. (He's the same age you and Sipara were, when everything was terrible, and he's a lowblood: that's all that should matter, isn't it?) It's not really being pale to soothe him, you're sure, so you keep your pitch low and warm, the words almost hummed. "We're not running," you say. "My psionics will handle it. Just, ahh.. think of it, okay? Think it at me very hard."

The words make your skin crawl. You don't know the slightest thing about psychics, other than that they're terrifying and you hate them: if it weren't for the definite whine of drones in the air, you'd never risk this. The last time a psychic got in your pan, you nearly died.

But at least if someone is going to be rooting through your pan, it's a wriggler, and Hinnom wants to get out of here just as much as you do.

You take hold of Hinnom's hand, and now this is all getting very uncomfortably pale, but you ignore the way your stomach is twisting and force a smile. "Tell me when you're ready?"

Edited 2015-03-31 01:28 (UTC)

Pheres's voice is shaking, and his hand is clammy. His face looks wet this close up, and you feel a little better about crying, because his eyes are a rheumy, bloodshot red.

"Make eye contact," Castor says, finally speaking. He's clutching his pendant, and he doesn't let go when you look at him, just jerks a hand dismissively. "Not with me," he snaps, "with him! That might help."

Talking with ghosts is one thing, but you've never tried it with proper people. But it's the same thing, isn't it? Just one's got meat on their bones and the other doesn't.

You really, really hopes it's the same thing.

Pheres is kneeling, right at eye-level. You take in a deep breath and lean forward, until your forehead is pressed against his, and you can count the veins in his eyes.

And then you think of home.

The air is heady with the sound of drone wings, and above that, you can hear the heavy stomp of grounded movement. They must be at the next street over, for all that they haven't heard any culling screams. Any minute, they'll be pressing into this street.

That thought stirs you out of your stupor. The little hoofbeast corrall show that Pheres and this kid have been putting on is a fucking absurdity, and you're wildly resentful that you've had to play audience to it. If you thought hitting them would make them stop crying, you would in a heartbeat.

"This is a fucking awful idea," you snap, stepping forward, directing your words at Pheres. If the kid is feral, then they're going to get culled, but there's no point in him throwing his lot in with them, no matter his stupid delusions about his Messiah damned eyes. "They've got battery sensors - if they catch you trying to bail, they'll gut you like a goddamned fish."

No one's listening. Your voice falters, then cracks, and you clamp a hand over your mouth to cover the way your breath is hitching.

Riccin isn't even looking at Hinnom. As far as they're concerned, ze's already dead, and that's what makes you realise ze wasn't joking.

Hinnom's feral. Ferals are culled. Ze's going to get culled, and it's all your fault: ze told you, and oh.

Oh, Empress, what are you going to do?

Hinnom is too close, close enough that you can smell the cluckbeast they ate for breakfast, and you are entirely unhappy with the way their forehead is pressed against yours. The only thing that keeps you from recoiling is the fact their eyes are baby gray and harmless, and the fact that this contact might be the difference between living and dying.

It's still terrible, though.

"Don't listen to her," you hiss at Hinnom. If you weren't holding their hand, you'd clamp your fronds over their sponges, just in case. It's got to work, and if Riccin fucks this up, you'll bash in their stupid head before the drones take off yours.

You don't feel any difference yet, but maybe Hinnom isn't thinking hard enough - or maybe that's how psychics work. You didn't have a warning with Rmeros, either, and with that thoroughly unsettling thought in mind, you start pushing on your psionics.

You don't know the city, and your spatial awareness is entirely fucked, for all that it's gotten better: you can feel Riccin stepping forward behind you, and the empty space of the sewers below, but the buildings might as well be pencil thin for all the impression they're leaving. If you jump now, you're likely to end up in the river, or in front of a cart, or vivisected by an unexpected wall, but even that would be better than just waiting to die.

THE EDITED PHERES LOG (third times a charm)

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[pheres subscribes by the idea drones are trolls] [is he right? WHO KNOWS] [he runs off rumour]

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[friendly reminder that marduk is sixteen]

[riccin is eighteen AND TERRIBLE]

[pheres is nineteen and the most passive character ever]

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[and hinnom is like twelve] [fourteen?] [sAME DIFFERENCE]

[so the hysteria is like when cops bust underage drinking] [except in this case]

[the cops SHOOT YOU] [also: pheres is 110% more likely to fight for other people than himself] [:C]

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[all of these kids are dumb] [so dumb]

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[WORST GHOST LUSUS]

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[and the most passive child award goes TO]

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[mardie may be passive] [but she has NERVES OF STEEL] [/paps]

[much like pheres] [and the mun] [riccin has NO IDEA what drones are in reality]

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