Work Text:
Pearl stared at the red string around her index finger.
After she’d seen the lightning mark Impulse and Bdubs’ deaths, it seemed more like a chain than a thread. Binding her to a soulmate who didn’t want anything to do with her.
She knelt over Tilly’s grey-furred body, gently unbuckling the yellow color around her neck.
The rest of the wolves hung their heads, as if sensing the heavy death in the air. They followed Pearl silently as she treaded past the snowy forest and back into the grass.
Suddenly, an arrow whistled through the air and straight past Pearl’s head. She felt a sharp pain race up her foot and dissipate, a telltale sign that Scott must have hit the ground too hard.
“Where is she!?” Martyn yelled, plowing towards Pearl.
Pearl turned forwards towards her with a manic smile. “Martyn!” She sang. "I wouldn't think that you would be the one to betray me."
“Where is she?” Martyn repeated, sword in hand. “Where is Tilly!? She’s the one who’s been corrupting you this entire time!”
More arrows whistled towards Pearl, likely from Martyn’s soulmate Cleo this time. Pearl ignored them.
Pearl clutched the collar in her hand, then chucked it straight at Martyn. It hit him straight in the face.
He stepped back and blinked to readjust, opening his eyes to see Pearl suddenly half a foot in front of him.
“Tilly’s not alive anymore.” She whispered.
She pounced forwards, her crystal axe meeting the blade of his sword as he pushed back. The two swung back and forth in a flash of red and green, blades catching the flares of the sunlight and clanging together. Soon, Pearl’s wolves began to pounce as well.
Another sharp pain raced up her back, then her left leg, then so badly up her arm that it buckled, but she continued to swing.
Martyn shouted something about the wolves as Pearl made her way towards the treetops, catching sight of Cleo, who was shuffling through their bag, likely trying to find something to ease off her pain.
Pearl bounced through the trees, leaving Martyn to her wolves and watching with a sick glee as Cleo winced and hissed, feeling every single bite and slash Martyn felt.
She turned around just a second too late as Pearl’s hands collided with their back.
Two strikes of lightning struck the air as Cleo’s body fell straight in front of Scott. He didn’t see Pearl as he dropped his bow and stared at the corpse.
He picked up Cleo’s body gently and turned down the path and started walking. Pearl swung through the trees after him.
She found him laying down Cleo’s body on the grass.
Pearl stuttered for the words. This was the first real interaction they had that wasn’t planning for battle or parting ways.
“Hi, Scott.” She blurted.
Scott kept his head down towards Cleo, pressing a flower into their limp hand.
“I didn’t think it would end this way.” He murmured with a bitter laugh.
“Neither did I, to be honest.” Pearl shrugged.
Scott looked up with the ghost of a smile. For a moment, Pearl could’ve sworn the light reflecting in his eyes was violet.
“I didn’t think it would come down to the two of us. To be honest, I still don’t know how Martyn and Cleo died.” He turned up to the sky. “They tried to turn on me after you killed the other two.”
For a moment, the two started laughing together about how their enemies had gone out. It… felt nice.
“I…honestly didn’t have a lot of faith in us.” Pearl quipped, sheathing her axe back on her back. “But I had faith in my dogs—I had faith in myself and Tilly.” She sucked in a breath, her smile fading. “...But Tilly’s now passed away.”
As she said the words, the sky seemed to almost darken, and whispers filled the air. The whispers of her old enemies, those who had fallen.
Pearl, kill him.
Do it.
“Pearl,” Scott’s voice brought her back to reality. “I think you deserve this more.”
Do it, Pearl.
Scott took one last look at Cleo, then reached in his bag and pulled out a familiar cylinder of red and white as he knelt by their side.
“Excuse me!?” Pearl yelped and stumbled back, pulling the wolves away. “What do you mean?”
“In the same way,” Scott smiled.
“Tilly death do us part, Pearl.”
Pearl wasn’t hallucinating that violet. She saw it clear as day as it completely inked into his iris.
‘Tilly death do us part.’ Those five words clanged through her head. Even the whispers went silent in shock as the bomb in his hand began to spark.
“Wait.” Pearl stepped forward, eyes wide. “Scott, what are you doing?”
Scott closed his eyes.
“Tilly death do us part.” He repeated, the spark closing around the line of the bomb.
Realization slammed into Pearl’s mind. She took off, running forward. “Scott, what are you doing—”
“SCOTT!”
Pearl closed her eyes hard, and felt her hand close around Scott’s as the world disappeared in a crack of lightning.
She opened her eyes and stared forward. A split second revealed three symbols glowing ahead of her as she turned to her arm—
—and saw a clock.