Chapter Text
Red had known it was there before Blue brought it inside.
He'd seen it flying around his rooftop enclosure. It flitted between the leaves of the tree before darting out of sight. He hadn't been able to identify what kind of bug it was, but from the quick glimpses he'd gotten, it might not be one he'd seen before.
He had pretended to not notice it, hoping it would lose any timidity and fly closer so he could get a better look. He simply sat in the grass and spawned rabbits to play with. Small, quiet animals that hopefully wouldn't frighten it away.
It had been several days of this before the little thing got close enough for him to properly see. He hadn't even been in his own garden, when it had happened; he'd been in Blue's garden, down on the ground, helping him pull vegetables up out of the tilled soil for that evening's dinner. He'd moved to get a better grip on a carrot, and his eyes had caught on something the next row over. An unexpected shape, an out-of-place color, nearly hidden in the shade of a beetroot leaf.
It had picked a good hiding place; its color didn't stand out much against the beetroot in the reduced lighting. It sported the same warm, purple color all over its body, from its feet to its pectinate antennae. The lone exception to this being the appendages resting across its back, which appeared to be a dull, cool grey. From the shape of the things, he could guess they were an elytra shell, likely shielding a pair of fine, more delicate wings underneath.
Some sort of beetle, then, he would've guessed.
Except it also looked a lot like a stickfigure.
A lot more like a stickfigure than any beetle, or indeed any sort of bug had any right to look. A body that wasn't segmented, no discernable exoskeleton, only four limbs, two of which were obviously arms instead of legs-
...and two eyes, meeting his gaze from across the furrows.
Oops.
He stared at it.
It stared back.
He pulled up the carrot.
It didn't move.
He turned to put the carrot down gently with the others. Blue didn't like it when they got rough with the produce.
When he looked again, it had vanished.