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Green couldn’t keep up. He couldn’t keep up with it all. He really tried. He did. But his arms couldn’t work, and all he could do was lie on the ground and practice breath ing.
It hurt s. All the noise blends together. Into a cacophony. Into an orchestra. In to sta tic . And yet. It hurts. Is the loudest instrument of it all.
His breathing. A beat. The met ronome. Uneven. Untimed. Wrong.
Green’s eyes lazily flicked to the bug s fighting. He wants them. One of them gets close after being shoved by the monster.
It was
Second.
“..en?”
It hurt s.
“G een? tay wit me!” The bee spoke loud er.
Green
winced.
Lo ud .
Ever thing s so lou d .
Gree n opend his mouf. He wa sn’t sure what he did af ter.
“Jus keep talk ng! H w are ou fe ling?”
Green
curled in
on himself.
Through one beat breath .
“Hhungry.”
Hands clasped at his stomach. I t hurt s .
It’s s o
har d
to
th ink .
Second frowned seeing his friend. He was in awful condition beforehand, being physically sick. It was painfully obvious from his coloring and now Second was beginning to worry about a head injury.
Looking around, the Amalgamation was focused on the others. It was far enough away from Green for now, so Second pulled open his bag and dropped a mushroom skewer in front of Green.
He wasn’t sure if it would help. Green wasn’t unconscious but he should be. Most would say it was lucky but to Second it felt so wrong. As soon as Green noticed the food he turned around to let him eat.
“Green’s not doing too good!” Second calls out to the others as he rejoins the fray. “He’s really out of it!” He pulls out his needles and deflects an attack from the hologram. He really hated this thing. “He also said he’s hungry? I’m not sure if that was shock but I gave him a skewer.”
“That’s what burnout and being a major douche does to a bug,” Blue said, bitterness still fresh on their tongue.
“He’s still too close to the fight for comfort. Someone should move him,” Yellow said, sternly. She was still mad at Green, yes, but she could be properly mad after the fight. Until then she’d redirect her anger to the corrupted spy data wearing her friend's face.
“I’ll move him,” Red volunteered, mostly because he wanted a break from dodging the hologram’s attacks. He let Yellow, Blue, and Second take the aggression while he rushed over to Green and immediately could tell what Second was talking about.
His eyes looked so unfocused. He was looking between all of them but there was not a hint in recognition in his expression. His breathing was also worryingly heavy and ragged, and he knew Green was beat up from burnout and the fight, but he should’ve been knocked out. But most worryingly there was a steady stream of saliva falling from his mandibles.
Very carefully, Red hooked his arms around Green’s and began dragging him further from the fight. The grasshopper winced and groaned, his breathing sounding even worse. But he couldn’t help but notice something as he dragged Green away.
“Are you sure you gave him a skewer Second?!”
“Yeah!”
Red doubted that. There was no skewer. And judging by how Green curled in and held his stomach it was safe to say he was still hungry. He wasn’t sure how Green could even be thinking about food during this, but maybe he was in shock.
He gently set Green down a safe distance from the fight. He was ready to rejoin and run off, when something grabbed his foot. Looking down and wincing, because those claws were digging into his foot and drawing blood, he saw Green staring at him.
Still unaware. Still that hazy look. It made Red shiver. Red tried pulling his foot away, it only made those claws dig in deeper.
“Let go—“ Red whined. It stung badly and he needed to walk to defend Green.
“St- sth— sta y—“ Green pleaded with great difficul ty.
“I
ca n’t .”
The ladybug sa id.
And then the ladybug left.
I t left .
It
was
so
c l o s e .
His ha nd rem aine d in the air . It fell whe n energ y left to.
The y hate d hi m .
T he y
h ate
hi m.
Aba ndo ne d
He lie s t her e
h u
n g
R
y