Chapter Text
They don’t kill each other here.
That’s what stands out to Pearl the most. Where she comes from - what she remembers - your neighbours are your allies at best, and your biggest threats at worst. Trades are less a mark of economy than of survival instinct, of good faith but not fealty, and definitely not a gesture to be taken lightly. You steal what you can, unless you’ve sworn otherwise, and you always keep a threat on the back burner just in case.
Pearl has learnt to be a threat. Something wicked, something dangerous, the demoness that comes for the dogs and warriors of the world. Pearl has learnt to walk quietly and carry a sharp axe, and she has learnt that if she wants something done, it is best to do it herself, lest a worse decision be made for her.
(She can’t forget the feeling of being torn apart at the seams. That’s burned into her brain for as long as she may persist. Turns out explosion is just as horrifically painful when you’re not the one who’s being blown up.)
But here…
Pearl finds herself, more often than not, passing out under trees and swiping food from behind people’s backs instead of asking nicely for a bed or meal or conversation. She’s got dogs here; that’s a comfort, at least. Two dogs now, with hopes to find a couple more out in the forest later. The dogs would protect her if any of these weird unstrangers tried to -
But they don’t, is the crux of it. They don’t try to hurt her, or kill her, or anything. Nobody here knows how to watch their damn back.
Sausage put her in prison, sure. Princess Gem gave her new clothes - not that she’s planning to wear them. And whatever the hell is going on with this new version of Joel, red menace turned weedy “sheriff”, who can’t even remember who she is - and let alone -
It’s not him. It’s not the man that loved her - that left her - that killed her with the same strike that killed himself. It’s not.
… It looks like him.
Pearl has been trying to steer clear of Not-Smajor (a pun she’s very proud of) ever since he’d stared her down from the deep-darkened floor of Gobland and asked her what she’d done to be put in jail. It was the first time she’d met any of these… new… versions of people she knew before. It did not go well. The one other time they’d run into each other was when she’d foolishly taken Tallulah and Tito for a walk through Animalia, his territory, his weird fox-frog village, and they’d snapped at each other with such ferocity that she’d decided never to touch the place again.
If it were home, she could have killed him by now. But this is not home, and the Empireans - naive, stupid, she’s unsure - insist on being nice.
Pearl can’t handle that.