Chapter Text
It was late when Anne had asked Hop Pop if she could go out, Hop Pop decided that since she had stayed in all day (At least that's what he thought.) she could do with some fresh air but told her to go no further than the post marking the entrance to the farm. she had been out there for around fifteen minutes now looking at the sky.
She never noticed it before but the stars were a lot brighter here than in LA, (she would have probably noticed a lot earlier, but considering she was running for her life from all of the various different monsters that lurked in this hellhole she could be forgiven for focusing on less romantic things.)
Of course, Marcy had once told her that this was because of light pollution, Which Anne just thought was weird because how can light pollute anything, Marcy always was smarter than her, If she was here they would have probably figured out a way to get home already.
Hell Sasha would have probably gotten them halfway home and probably wouldn't have endangered anyone.
Anne on the other hand... She had messed everything up in one day.
Just yesterday Sprig had found her and after fighting a giant red mantis she was brought back here, The farm of course wasn't as comfy as her room back home, it was an improvement over what she had.
Today, She had almost gotten her new friend killed just because she wanted to swim. She was such an idiot
She still felt awful about that. He had proven himself to be a better friend than she ever would, she had guilt-tripped him into coming with her.
She wondered why anyone would want to be her friend. Marcy and Sasha were always going to be there for her. Sasha would always tell what the right thing to do was and Marcy always was grateful for the help Anne gave but... well she knew deep down she was more of a burden to be around than anything else, Sometimes she wondered what they saw in her.
She looked at the stars again And noticed the darkness surrounding them.
In a way that kind of summed up her feelings right now.
She was star surrounded by darkness, Part of her felt stupid for being so overdramatic but she wasn't wrong, right now she was just one girl stuck in the middle of nowhere, a world full of monsters that wanted to eat her, the people who lived in the town thought she was a monster and would kill her if they thought she was a threat at any moment and even if she could leave where else could she go.
Even if she did survive all of that, well there were the bigger things to worry about, She didn't even know if she could get home, The box seemed to have stopped working, Her parents were probably terrified already, She had no idea if Marcy and Sasha were here or even if they were alive, and even if they were would they forgive her for opening the box.
She pulled her legs to her chest, She wasn't going to cry she had done that enough in the first few nights in this world. That didn't stop her from feeling hopeless
“Anne?” said a voice from behind her. “Are you okay?”
Anne turned to see Sprig standing there, He was carrying some books in one arm and a candle in the other.
“Yeah, I'm fine," she said Lying to herself.
“Cool.” Said Sprig, Looking at the starts huh?” Sprig sat down next to Anne leaning on the post he put the candle down.
“Yeah, The stars look a lot brighter than they do at home.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I live in a city. The light from the buildings leaves an orange glow on the sky.”
Sprig looked at her and then “Cool,” he said.
“Anne looked at him confused, “It's not that cool.”
“The sky glows in your world, that sounds amazing.”
Anne laughed “Did you come to see me for something?” she asked, she had last seen the frog boy sleeping on her mattress, after the day they had she was surprised to see him awake
After the day they had, She was surprised he still wanted to be her friend.
“Kinda, I come out here to read, I saw you out here and thought maybe you wanted to the same, So I brought a book for you.” he held the book out to her
She took the book and read the title
“Patricia of the bugs, What's this?”
“It's a book Hop Pop use to read to us, It's about this girl who got lost in a world of bugs, I liked it, so I thought you might too.”
Anne looked at the weird little frog boy and smiled, “Thanks Sprig.”
Sprig sat next to her and started to read his own book,
Anne read the book, she had, to be honest, the book did speak to her, a young frog girl lost in a world full of talking bugs, IT was kind of funny reading about a girl who had to hold back her desire to eat her new friends, (That was never going to be a problem for Anne, She never wanted to eat for during her trips to Thailand and didn't want to start now, Thai people really did like eating frogs though, Tadpol soup was the one that creeped her out.) however this girl had it a lot easier, she had a home in a day, Anne was still having flashbacks to the cave, but in a way reading this book did make her feel a lot better about her situation.
“Hey, Anne?” said Sprig.
“Yes Sprig" she replied lowering her book to look at him.
“Thank's for coming back for me.”
“What?”
“You know,” Sprig said sheepishly “When I was hanging from the trap you could have left me but you came back, twice.”
Anne looked at him confused “Sprig I had to do that, you were in danger and someone needed to rescue you.”
“well yeah but that's what makes you great you could have left me and I wouldn't blame you, those mantis things can suck your insides out,”
Anne shuddered, SHe really hated the wildlife of this world.
“But you didn't you come back for me without even thinking about it."
“I did think about it,” said Anne somewhat ashamed.
“And you still came back that's amazing,” replied Sprig.
“I guess,” said Anne smiling.
“Man I'm lucky to have found you,” said Sprig smiling, He then went back to his book.
Anne thought about it for a second, she wondered why she did go back for him, it's because he was in the same situation, she stuck terrified of being eaten by any sort of monsters, she already knew how scary is way to be alone in a world where everything wanted her dead, she just couldn't do that for him, She still felt a little insulted for the ugly cracks but still.
There had been the whole getting captured thing, but even then they had worked together to take down that Mantis, and then Sprig had stood up to a mob for her.
If she had one friend then obviously she wasn't so alone, and someone who stands up to a mob is always someone worth knowing.
“Hey, Sprig? Thanks for finding me.”
The response she got was a snore. Anne turned around to see Sprig laying there his eyes closed his mouth open.
She smiled, he was kind of cute sitting there just sleeping.
She blew out the candle and looked to the heavens again, Maybe she wouldn't make it in this world, maybe she'd never get home, but right now she had one friend, Maybe they could start a constellation.