Chapter Text
Your name is Rose Lalonde, and you are most likely in shock.
You’ve grown up in this town, and perhaps one of your more annoying habits is that you pay attention to people. It’s a bad habit more than anything else, but ever since you were young, you’ve found it to almost be relaxing. You wouldn’t engage, but you’d watch people everywhere you went, and try and glean what you could about them from the snapshots of their life that they unknowingly presented to you. Cafes, libraries, bus rides – everything gave you a chance to learn more about people and how they were so different, yet so similar. You could tell when a smiling family was genuine, or a recently divorced couple trying to make things easier for their child. You’d watch first dates crash and burn. You’d hear a woman prattle on about how her children aren’t doing anything right, and how they’re raising their children wrong, and now she was desperately trying to assure herself that she was right, and being right was worth whatever argument they’d had. If you didn’t so much as smile, the world would open up like a flower and show you everyone’s secrets.
School was a good place for it as well. There weren’t many people you didn’t know about, and even for a small school yours was full of strange people. You’d paid attention to all of them when you were younger, and you were good at remembering faces, and still are.
“Eridan Ampora,” you say, as you sit down, slowly. Dirk looks as though he’s been carved out of stone, Dave looks guilty, and Roxy looks as though she’s trying extremely hard to stay cheerful.
“Well, yes,” she says, while Eridan stares at you.
“Did one of you tranquillise him? And why is he even here?” You look between your siblings. “Is something going on I should have been aware of sooner?”
“You have been very busy lately, Rosie,” Roxy says, gently. “We really did want to tell you, but it’s a bit...well, Dirk should tell you.”
“Oh, thanks for that, Roxy. Really.” Dirk looks a little sour, but he sighs after a moment. “Rose, I’m just going to come out and say that this is going to sound like a lie. So I want to say that I’m not going to be offended if you don’t believe me, but Eridan turned up in our bathtub, and I don’t think he’s entirely human.”
“He’s human.” You narrow your eyes at your two older siblings. You can deal with Dave later. “In fact, I went to school with him for a number of years. I can’t believe you wouldn’t have remembered.”
“You went to school with him?” Dave asks, notes of horror in his voice.
“He was significantly more annoying and less...whatever this is, but yes.” Your brain catches up with your ears. “The bath? He turned up in our bath? Did he break in or something?”
“No.” Dirk shakes his head. “Look, Rose, you’re the one who reads all the Lovecraftian shit. Something is going on, and I know it sounds insane, but will you at least trust me when I say he turned up unconscious and I didn’t kidnap him?”
You do, unfortunately, trust your older brother. Mostly because he wouldn’t go out of his way to deal with another human being if he didn’t have to, so you doubt he would ever go out of his way to resort to kidnapping your old classmate.
“If you went to school with him, then…” Dave looks sick. “Then you know him, too.”
“Yes, that is rather implied.” You shoot him a sharp look. “I still can’t believe you wouldn’t tell me about this. Or that you’d wait until we had to have a family meeting. Besides, you never answered my question about whether or not he’s been tranquillised.”
“He’s just kind of like that, honest.” Roxy holds up her hand. “And I don’t think any of us would spend money on that sort of stuff. We’ve got hobbies to waste money on.”
Unfortunately, this is again true. You want to swear, but you hold it in, forcing yourself to smile politely at Eridan.
“I’m sorry, this must be a bit of a shock for you. I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m Rose. We used to despise each other at school.”
He tilts his head, looking at you, as though he’s trying hard, but shakes his head after a moment. He looks a little out of it, and you look between your siblings.
“There’s...a bit more to it, actually,” Dirk says, slowly, as though he’s trying not to scare you off. You raise an eyebrow.
“Well, then, you’d better get started.”
It takes a while to get through everything, and when you’ve been thoroughly caught up, you feel a strange sense of danger and excitement.
“It’s certainly a tangle,” you say, carefully. “In my opinion, though, we need to find out more before we take any steps forward.”
“Steps forward?” Dave echoes.
“Well, you can’t expect us to keep him here forever, or to let his family continue to believe he’s missing, if they indeed do, but a little while longer won’t hurt either. And I’m not saying that from a place of malice, but from a place of concern. You said that there’s been some strange goings on since he got here, correct?”
“Yes, but--”
You hold a hand up, and you can feel your siblings looking at you.
“There’s always been strange theories for the unexplained and the supernatural, and I think we need to call a spade a spade. This, right here? This is supernatural bullshit. Luckily, with most things, you can use most older stories as a sort of…reference sheet for a diagnosis.”
Dirk raises his eyebrows as he looks at you. “You’re taking this remarkably well.”
“Oh, I’m saving the breakdown for later,” you say, casually. “Right now, I need to catch you up to speed, but I’ll need to do some research first. I’m not sure where this falls on the supernatural scale, but it is something I’ll need to look into. For now, we need to monitor him.”
“What do I tell Karkat?” Dave asks.
“For now, nothing.” You hesitate. “He and Kanaya were close when he went to our school, but...I remember he left, just before you came. We were all quite young, so I could try asking her more about it and see if she remembers anything, but I won’t tell her anything either. I don’t think it would be wise.”
“What are you thinking?” Dirk asks you, looking at you as though he’s liable to take a screwdriver to your head to see what’s going on in there. You compose yourself, giving him an arch look.
“I’m thinking that this could be something quite bad.”
“Rose.”
“Yes?” you respond, before you all turn to see Eridan staring at you, a flicker of annoyance on his face. It’s an emotion you’ve seen there before.
“Rose,” he repeats, looking at you.
“Oh, shit,” Dave says, half impressed, as you and Eridan look at each other, both of you falling silent.