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There’s a hollow, empty ache in the dead center of your brain.
You’re not sure what brought you back to Nepeta’s cave, in all honesty. You’d hung around with Sollux for quite a while after Kanaya’s place, talking about how cool his psiionics were and very much definitely NOT thinking about your other yellow blooded friends. He told you about the girl he’d mentioned, Feferi, and called your teleporting powers ‘fucking bullshit’ and you promised to show them to him next time you hung out. He actually looked pretty excited by the prospect.
You are not at Sollux’s hive.
You’d zapped over to Kanaya’s afterwards to let her know you’d dropped off her parcels as requested and to ask her if she wouldn’t mind fixing a hole that you hadn’t realized had been torn in the right sleeve of Mallek’s hoodie. Her eyes linger on the cerulean sign, full of curiosity that she doesn’t voice, and you sit and talk with Kanaya for hours after the quick repair is finished.
You are not at Kanaya’s hive.
Pounce is purring like a motor boat in your lap and you’re still not entirely sure what brought you back to Nepeta’s cave.
You scritch the lusus behind the ears and relish in the relative peace and quiet. Your open hand gently scrolls through your contacts and you do your best not to linger too long on the unread messages: the “hey where are you”s and the “are you mad at me”s and the “hope you’re doing well”s. All of your apps are horribly out of date. Chittr doesn’t even exist anymore and you’re too intimidated to try and work out Trollian today. You think about opening Grubtube but you think of Cirava, which makes you think of Sollux’s future, and ultimately you put your phone away with a sigh.
“*Ac notices that her new furriend seems sad about something, but she doesn’t know how to ask them how they’re doing* “
You’re not sure what brought you back to Nepeta’s cave.
But you smile at her, try and shove the ache in your head to the side, and ask her to tell you about the drawings on the wall ahead of you instead.
She ponders you for a full thirty-three seconds, and asks, “I was actually kinda curious about mew?”
Mew? Oh, you? Little ol’ you? There’s really nothing interesting to talk about, you’re a pretty open book!
“I asked efurrybody about you, you know. After you took me home from Equius’s,” she says slowly. “They all said the same thing: you’re friendly, you’re weird, your pusher is in the right place… and no one knows anything else!”
But what more is there to say than what’s been said? Her friends are right on the dot. You like your friends, you like making friends, and you like making your friends happy. What else is there to know?
Nepeta sits down next you, gently moving Pounce so that the large cat creature sits snugly across both your laps. Pounce blinks blearily up at both of you, yawns wide and fangy, and settles back into her new position with sleepy gusto. It’s adorable. She reminds you a little of Bec, and an pawful lot of Lady. Awful lot. You mean an awful lot.
“They’re shipping charts” Nepeta says. You raise an eyebrow at her. “My drawings on the walls. It’s all the possible quadrant combinations in our friend circle. I want my friends to be happy, too.”
Nepeta gives you a Very Pointed Look.
You try not to sweat and tell her you didn’t take her for a romantic.
Nepeta rolls her eyes, “What, did you think I’ve been a master huntress since I pupated?”
You are very suddenly no longer in Nepeta’s cave. You’re thrust, shoved mentally through a tiny hole in your brain and into a small, run down movie theater in the midst of a mad trollhunt. There’s a shitty romcom playing on the big screen and Polypa is next to you, hand in yours.
The ache in your heads grows and grows until you feel it in your heart. Pounce gives a warning hiss in your lap.
You snap back and carefully unfurl your tense fingers, smoothing out the fur you’ve been unconsciously tugging on. Nepeta’s staring at you, wide eyed and confused, and you suddenly feel like the biggest clod in the world for crashing her cave when you’re clearly in no shape for friendship today. What are you even doing here?
You feel the world twist and the multitude of choices laid on your shoulders. You need to leave. You need to stay. You need to do something.
You tell Nepeta you don’t fit in here.
A jolt of guilt passes over her and you can read it plain as day in her face, how clearly she regrets ever having pointed out the obvious. Her mouth opens, apologies and denials ready on her tongue, and you hold up a hand and shake your head. Nepeta puffs up like a cat in annoyance.
You motion her closer and she scoots to meet you, shoulder to shoulder, guilt giving way to curiosity. You pull your phone out of your pocket and she leans over your shoulder in earnest as you close your messaging app and bring up your photo gallery.
You tell her about the kids from Earth: you’d been in the neighborhood after fucking shit up with Aradia and had joined in on a Minecraft game night after zapping to Jade’s to borrow a computer. She has SO many computers, you tell Nepeta. You tell her all about Jade, about John and Rose and Dave and her eyes light up.
“From my dreams!” she says excitedly, and the smile on her face helps you pretend like you didn’t horrifically fuck up her reality and chances at friendship. You offer to take her to earth sometime and she squeals.
The pictures after that are from your recent Alternian jaunts: ice cream with Sollux, hanging out with Tavros and Kanaya, a selfie you’d snapped with Vriska after successfully throwing her lusus into a volcano. You scroll and scroll and tell Nepeta about your tiny, local adventures, until-
“Who’s that?” It’s a valid question. After all, it’s a troll Nepeta’s never seen before. Your heart lurches and you have to take a minute to compose yourself before you get stuck in memory lane. All the while, Nepeta watches you: curious, patient, and sharp.
The picture itself is a bit of a mess: selfies are hard when you’re in heels and every troll you meet is STILL taller than you and has to bend to be in frame. It’s also a mess in the sense that you’re pretty sure you pulled whatever you’re wearing in this photo out of a dumpster, but you’re not telling Nepeta that. Instead you start to tell her about the troll you’re with: Lynera, one of your jadeblodded friends.
Nepeta makes a face when you’re done, “I can smell the relationship issues from here.”
You laugh, honest and short, and keep scrolling.
The two of you sit like that for quite awhile. You never get to talk this long and it’s refreshing, finally, to be able to not only remember your friends, but to be able to TELL someone about them. Nepeta is enraptured by your story telling abilities; she laughs and awws at all the appropriate moments, ribs you for being the socially incompetent idiot you were and still are, and is so full of questions you’re not sure where to start.
“Is he your matesprit?” she asks about a photo of Mallek. “Is THAT your matesprit?” she asks with a hint of disgust when you show her a selfie of you and Marvus.
“Is she your meowrail?” she asks about a picture of you and Polypa. “Is THAT your meowrail?” she asks, again, when you scroll past a cute picture of a sleeping Tyzias, a fashionable Chixie, a serene selfie of you and Boldir, and really just about every single one of your friends.
You blush and shrug at each of her inquiries.
“Your quadrants are a mess,” Nepeta tells you bluntly when you pause to tell her about the time you helped calm Charun down after one of their art projects went south.
Your everything is a mess, you tell her. You are the mess. It is you. You’ve reached the end of your photo roll and, for a moment, stare at the first picture you took when you were gifted this phone. It’s of you and Cirava, naturally. You look at the veins under their eye patch, think of Sollux, and hit the home button on your phone.
There’s a long, quiet moment where you bask in the weightlessness of having gotten something you didn’t realize was there off your chest before Nepeta, dear, sweet Nepeta, says-
“You look a lot happier in those pictures.”
And ow, wow, she’s really going straight for the kill, isn’t she? She flashes you a sharp toothed smile.
“*AC explains that any blow that isn’t a killing blow is just part of the game, and that this doesn’t seem like a time for playing*” The mood lifts with her switch in perspective and you smile, relaxed, and lean back into the sofa.
You were happier, if you’re being honest. It was so much easier back then. Easier to make friends, easier to live from adventure to adventure with no worry about what you were or what you were doing. And it isn’t that you don’t love your new friends! You hurriedly explain that you’re so happy you’ve gotten to meet everyone so far and Nepeta giggles at the speed in which you back peddle.
It’s just… you miss your old friends, is all.
You miss being a part of their story, and not just an interloper in this one.
You miss fitting in.
“Why don’t you visit them?” Nepeta asks, leaning into your side comfortingly. “You can do that, can’t you?”
You think about it-
A series of misfires.
The never ending void.
Your heart torn to pieces.
A compassionate horror terror.
An apologetic Aradia.
-You shake your head. You have something to do, here, before you can go find your friends. Something like a mission, kinda like a mystery to solve. You have to solve it before you can see them.
Nepeta frowns at you, a little lost, but nods in understanding anyways. “Will you still visit? After you have your old friends back?”
There’s no way for you to know the answer to that. You could get zapblocked again, you could lose your memories AGAIN, you could die again, you could be forced to deal with Doc Scratch again.
You look at Nepeta and see the concern on her face, the fear that one day she may never get to see you again.
You tell her earnestly that nothing will stop you from visiting her again after your quest has ended. You’re friends, after all.
Nepeta’s glomping you and Pounce is grumpily running across the cave before you know what hit you and your chest feels warm, comfortable. It radiates until you feel it filling your brain with happy fuzzies and tears spring in your eyes, and you hug Nepeta back.
You know exactly what brought you to Nepeta’s cave. Olivebloods really were just the best at knowing just what to say, weren’t they?
Teasingly, through the snuggles you’re being smothered in and the crack in your voice, you ask how you’re going to explain this to Equius.
Nepeta screeches, scandalized, and jumps about five feet sideways off of you with a blush that covers her whole entire face.
You start laughing uncontrollably and Nepeta insists “It’s not funny!!!” and maybe, sure, you don’t fit in around here.
But you feel like you belong.