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The Inbetween is a place that has become so very familiar to Karl.
He's grown to find comfort in its constance. No matter what time he travels to, no matter how gruesome or heart-wrenching the experience, the Inbetween stays the same. Each time he wakes from the blinding pain of death, he's greeted with the welcoming white of the castle’s walls surrounding him.
The first time he'd come, he'd been uneasy. The books he'd found told him things he wasn't sure he fully understood, but he knew for sure that he'd need to start exploring.
The next two trips were uneventful. He searched and searched the halls and rooms of the castle, but all he found was endless white. Every passage was identical, every room awkwardly barren.
But the third trip.
His eyes fly open, chest heaving as he shoots up from where he lies on the polished floor. He touches his legs, his arms, his stomach, one after the other; he's real, that's for sure. He’s in his body, clothed in his white hoodie. In the middle of the room resides the same withered rose, lonely and solemn. The Inbetween.
With a grunt, he heaves himself to his feet, and prepares for what will probably be another ten, twenty minutes of scouting the place fruitlessly. He swears the halls are endless in this godforsaken castle. Endless and empty.
It's aimlessly that he wanders, sneakers tapping methodically against the hard floors and echoing loudly off the walls of the corridors.
He's tired, and his head hurts. He still aches all over from his death in his previous travels, and now his feet are screaming at him to sit down and give up his search.
He's so exhausted that he almost misses it.
He stumbles upon yet another great room, spiral staircase positioned right at the back. He nearly sighs in his frustration, so very tired of the same rooms over and over again.
Then he blinks, and he realizes. Just before it is a pillar with another wither rose, and a book in an item frame, but that's not what matters.
In front of the pillar stands a boy, hand hesitantly hovering over the petals of the flower. Like he wants to touch it, but he knows he can't. A display of self-restraint, but only just barely. It takes only two more moments before it hits Karl.
"Ranboo ?" He asks in disbelief, jaw dropping. Hurriedly, he takes a step back, a little afraid, because how could Ranboo be here? How does he know that’s really him?
Ranboo startles, shoulders straightening as he whips around, eyes wide.
And just as quickly as it was there, it's gone. The world blinks out around him, and in the next moment, he's stirring on the floor of his library. Alone.
He rises, and with shaky hands, he pulls a new book and quill to recount his new adventure. Afterwards, in his diary, he writes of the Inbetween.
Ranboo was there. How? Maybe I was seeing things. No, he was definitely there. Right? Is my memory playing tricks on me?
Am I forgetting already?
When his next adventure comes to a close, he comes to with a gasp in the exact same spot on the floor he always does. A rush of warmth rolls over him, and he relishes in it. The inbetween has always been pleasantly warm, even in its cold wash of stark white.
This time, he doesn't jump straight into exploring. He needs to calm down, and take a few moments for himself. His feet carry him on autopilot to one of the places in the Inbetween that feels most familiar to him, the most safe.
The two swings sway gently, the white leaves of the tree rustling in the faint, nearly non-existent breeze. Briefly, he wonders why there are two of them in the first place. He breathes for what feels like the first time in ages, sinking into the seat gladly.
For just a moment, he closes his eyes. He doesn't worry, he doesn't scramble to remember. He just stops. And God, it's so glorious.
When he opens them, he sees him again. Ranboo, standing across the way, his back to Karl. Around his shoulders is a white cape, embellished with intricate golden markings, billowing down to the floor. His half black hair is a stark contrast to his all white outfit, adorned with his golden crown.
He leaps from the swing, heart pounding in his ears all of a sudden. He's here again. It was real last time. It really happened. "Ranboo! Wait!" He calls, and takes a step.
It's as far as he gets. He blinks, and when his eyes open again he's face to face with familiar dingy walls, lined with posters and books.
He writes again.
Ranboo is there. It's real. How? Why? Why can't I get to him?
He slams the book closed and practically throws it in his chest, the lid shutting with a loud clang. His brows furrow, and he tries not to think about how he'd nearly forgotten his entire travel experience in his haste. He’s starting to forget, and Ranboo just might be the key to all of this.
Karl’s next search isn’t for “the castle’s secrets,” it’s for Ranboo. He’s starting to think the two are one in the same anyway, intertwined so complexly that it’d be impossible to separate them.
He hasn’t been sleeping well, lately. His thoughts are plagued with time travel and memories and Ranboo. Everything he does leads back to one of those three, or sometimes all of them. Sometimes, he wishes it would all go away.
But it can’t, and it won’t. He has to figure all of this out before he loses himself, and he’s starting with Ranboo.
It takes an hour for him to find Ranboo this time. He makes laps around familiar areas of the castle, and explores a few new places too, but Ranboo never appears.
Just when he’s given up and circled back to the main room, the waking room, he sees him. He’s holding a book in his hands, the words etched in the front too small to read. He writes in it frantically, with the same desperation that Karl sometimes writes with when he wakes in his library. His lips are moving, uttering words under his breath too quiet to hear.
Karl wastes no time before he starts sprinting, feet pounding hard against the shiny floors. He’s going to make it, this time. He’s not going to wake up in the real world, he’s going to get to Ranboo and he’s going to figure this out. He has to, because he’s forgetting, and Ranboo is forgetting, and what good will either of them be if they’ve both already forgotten?
But the floor falls out from under him, crumbles away into nothingness, gives in to black. He tries to blink it away, and feels himself collide with a floor, thrown off balance. He groans, and rubs at his ribs; they ache from where he’d hit the floor so hard, protesting as he shifts his body.
He pushes himself to his feet, eyes scanning the purple and green carpet. The library, it’s just the library.
You’re forgetting, he whispers to himself. You’re forgetting, you need to remember, you need to write everything down. He scurries for an empty book and quill, and flips the cover. The tip of the quill hovers over the blank page.
He can’t remember. He can’t remember what he did. All he remembers is Ranboo, writing in his book and being so, so untouchable. Tears prick his eyes as he stares down at the page, and they splatter down onto the paper. He really can’t remember.
He has to find out how Ranboo is connected to all of this, and he has to find out soon.
Karl comes to the Inbetween standing for the first time ever, and he squints against the suddenness of the bright white walls, rubbing at his eyes.
When he moves his hands from his eyes, Ranboo is staring at him. Right into his eyes from in front of the wither rose, with his white button up shirt, vest, and pants, cloak draped heavily around him.
Something about his eyes makes Karl freeze in place, and it takes all his effort to start moving forward, a grimace on his lips. Ranboo stands still, stock still, unmoving even as Karl struggles to move in front of him. Every step leeches his will to take another, but he has to keep moving, he has to get there. There is no other option.
He comes face to face with Ranboo, staring up at him, unable to break eye contact. He could’ve sworn Ranboo hated eye contact.
...Ranboo hates eye contact.
“You’re not real,” Karl breathes, loud in the silence of the Inbetween, and his eyes widen. “You’re… not Ranboo. But you still… mean something.”
And “Ranboo” doesn’t speak. He doesn’t utter a word, not even as Karl reaches for his arm. When Karl’s fingers go to close around Ranboo’s wrist, they phase right through, clenching into a fist.
Then he’s gone. He just disappears into thin air, and Karl takes a deep breath, turning his gaze to his hands. He needs to speak to Ranboo. He needs to speak to Ranboo, immediately.
Don’t forget, he tells himself. You have to go. Don’t forget.
The arctic is freezing, too cold in his hoodie, even with his layered turtleneck underneath. The snow falls heavily, a fresh blanket of it coating the ground. His hair is wet with it at this point, as well as the sleeves of his hoodie. It’s starting to seep through his sneakers, not quite built for a trek through many inches of snow. He’s glad that, at the very least, most of the journey could be made through the nether.
It takes what feels like an eternity for what must be Technoblade’s home to come into view. He huffs, and watches his breath cloud in front of him.
Out back, he tells himself, recalling Tubbo’s words. He lives behind Technoblade.
The shack in Techno’s backyard is sad and small, probably barely even tall enough for Ranboo to stand up straight. There’s no door, only a fence gate where one should’ve been, so he knocks on the wooden wall instead.
“One sec, Techno!” A voice calls, and Karl swears it came from underneath him. He glances down, eyebrows raised.
He jumps a little when the crafting table against the face of the mountain moves, seemingly on its own. Out pops Ranboo’s head, the back of it, to be exact, as he climbs what must be a ladder. Karl stills.
“I’m so sorry for using your villagers, I-”
Abruptly, he stops, words dying in his throat as soon as he turns around. His gaze searches Karl’s face, but never meets his eyes, and he visibly swallows.
Karl clears his throat. “We need to talk.”