Work Text:
At the center of the Condesce’s superior empire was a lone planet. This planet was not her original home; she had abandoned Alternia for more favorable conditions long ago. This planet appealed to the Empress in that it was almost completely covered in water and glistening coral islands. The Condesce had called all seadwelling Alternians to the glistening water world. Her aquatic empire separated itself from the landdwellers; a bold, defining move in the civil war of Alternia.
However, the civil war was practically quashed. The lowbloods couldn’t hope to make a lasting blow on a people who no longer inhabited their planet; they were oppressed from afar.
Of course, there were a bare few seadwellers still living on Alternia. The Mother Grub still produced offspring of all kinds; moving her had not been an option. The New Alternia was close enough that the Condesce could continue her influence on her lusus. Every few sweeps, a group of seadweller soldiers took a shuttle to Alternia to collect the seadweller wigglers who were of age. It was important to not take them early, seeing as it was an important part of growing up for trolls to undergo trials in the caverns, obtain a lusus, build their own hives, and interact with others, though it was constantly stressed to the young seadwellers that they were superior, they were above the landdwellers.
The young seadwellers were confined to the Alternian ocean, one less glamorous than the New one. Nobody complained. It was for the best. Nobody wanted to interact with the landdwellers. Nobody wanted to acknowledge them.
Nobody.
At all.
No one.
Not a single person.
“Eridan, get off of that rock!”
“Ssshhh, Fef! You’re gonna blow my cover.” Eridan looked over his shoulder, but the waters were empty. Feferi broke the surface right next to the rock on which Eridan was lying, using it for cover as he spied on the nearby shore. She rested her arms on the base.
“Leave the landdwellers alone, Eridan. They have done nothing to you.”
“They’re breathin’ my air, Fef.”
Feferi rolled her eyes, looking entirely unamused. “They wouldn’t be breathing the same thing as you if you breathed underwater, like a normal seadweller! And then you could ignore them, like a normal seadweller!”
“They are taintin’ our society, Fef.” Eridan narrowed his eyes. “They deserve what’s comin’ to them.”
Feferi pressed her mouth into a thin line before suddenly smiling and swimming behind Eridan. She braced her foot against the rock, reached up and grabbed a fistful of Eridan’s cape, and pushed off, dragging the violetblood into the water. Eridan jerked back with a startled yelp, plunging into the dark depths.
“Fef!” Eridan gurgled, accidentally swallowing water instead of breathing it. He was forced down for some time, until what was pulling him instead became something holding him, Feferi laughing into the fabric of his cape.
“You’ve been able to put up with them for sweeps, Eridan,” Feferi said as her friend untangled himself from his cape, “Put up with them for one more day. Tomorrow, the shuttle will be here.
“And I’ll finally get away from those filthy lowbloods.” Feferi smacked him. “Ow!”
“Don’t say that! Some of those lowbloods happen to be our friends.” Feferi pouted, losing her patience with Eridan’s narrow-mindedness.
“Your friends, Fef. I don’t associate myself with landdwellin’ scum.”
Feferi narrowed her eyes and swam forward, grabbing Eridan’s cape and pulling it over his head. As he struggled to get free, she swam away.
~~~
“Fef? Feferi! Come on, I’m sorry! Please, Fef,” Eridan called out, searching the watery deep for his friend. She’d completely disappeared by the time he’d managed to get his cape unwrapped, and now he was having to comb the oceanic expanse to find her, all on his own. “Feferi! Please? Fef!”
Feferi, for her part, had cooled down entirely, but wasn’t ready to let Eridan get off the hook that easily. She had long ago emerged from her hiding place and was now following Eridan, just far enough so that she could hide if he turned around, but close enough that she could still see him. This wasn’t the first time they’d argued over his prejudices, Feferi relented. She couldn’t really explain his driving need to put down everyone around him, everyone who wasn’t like him. Maybe it was just a complex. She’d tried to wane him away from that sort of thinking, but they were more than six sweeps old, and she wasn’t even close.
“Feferi!” Eridan called again. Deciding she’d given him enough grief, Feferi quickly swam up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder.
“Wwah!” Eridan turned, completely shocked. He breathed an underwater sigh of relief when he saw it was her. Still, she had her arms crossed, and looked very irate. His face crumpled.
“Fef, I’m sorry, I really am. I just-”
“I know,” Feferi said, uncrossing her arms and swimming into him, wrapping her arms around his chest.
“I fish you could sea it my way, Eridan. It really is best! But let’s not fight, okay? The shuttle’s coming tomorrow; I’d hate for our last day on Alternia to be angry.” Feferi knew that her begs would fall on deaf ears; she’d been trying for sweeps to get him to abandon his old ways of hate. She’d let it go for today.
“Mm-hmm,” Eridan assented, resting his head atop hers.
~~~
In more than a hundred sweeps, there had only been two tyrianbloods born on Alternia, and relatively close to each other. But Feferi Peixes had never met the other of her blood color. She had never given it much thought; from what she heard, the other had renounced her claim to the throne.
Feferi had a plan; she knew that the landdweller’s feelings towards the Empire were less than positive, but she wanted to change that. Without another vying for the throne, she had an opening to swoop in and snatch the power, restoring Alternia to the glory that she had only dreamed of.
But just because the other tyrianblood had renounced the throne, that didn’t mean she wasn’t hatching plans of her own.
Or, she would be. She had been. But now, she had other things on her mind.
Meenah Peixes, three sweeps older than Feferi Peixes, and the original heir to the empire before her unexpected renouncement, bent over, clutching her aching, bruised sides, and spit blood onto the dirty stones.
“Cronus,” she groaned, her voice nothing more than a hoarse noise. “Cronus.”
She’d been walking for a little less than an hour, but it felt like forever. She was covered in gashes and bruises and scrapes, and had lost too much blood. Her legs, which screamed in pain, finally gave out, and she pitched forward onto the sharp rocks of the battlefield. From what she could see from her position, barely turning her head, she was alone. Completely alone.
“Cronus!” she hacked, more blood spraying on the rocks by her face. “You-I’m gonna glubbin’ cull you! Cro-” Her body spasmed, coiling in on itself, sending another painful jolt to every inch of her body. “Don’t abandon me, you yellow-bellied cuttlefish! Coward! I-” She coughed again, her eyes squeezing shut.
But just because she couldn’t speak, didn’t mean she couldn’t hear. And the approach of her companion was announced by the crunching of footsteps.
“Cronus,” she whispered. She sneered, though she had no way to know if he could see her face.
“I’m reel-ly sorry, Meenah. I am.”
“You abandoned me, you fu-chk-ing piece a shit.”
“I’m sorry.” Cronus leaned down, resting a hand on Meenah’s shoulder. She winced, cracking her eyes open.
“Sorry don’t cut it.” To her surprise, Meenah could detect a hint of a smile on Cronus’s face. She frowned, spitting blood out as she did so. “What you got to be smilin’ boat, buoy.”
“You can kick my ass about this later, okay?”
Meenah sneered again. “Later? What later? I’m dyin’, here, ‘chief’.”
“Yeah. I know.” Cronus stood. Meenah saw a blur of blue that she knew to be the infamous “Ahab’s Crosshairs”. Her face drained of blood as he raised it, aiming for her chest. The usual cocky grin on his face dropped, replaced by solemn, sullen concentration. His shoulders slumped.
No, Meenah thought, but when she opened her mouth, nothing came out. No, no, no, no!
Cronus’s eyelids drooped halfway, and when he pulled the trigger, he wasn’t watching her face. Meenah, however, kept her eyes on him. The last thing she saw before darkness overtook her was another flash of blue; something smaller, brighter, and affixed on the middle finger of his right hand.
Cronus turned away. “I know.”
He walked sullenly away from the bloodied corpse of his former crush as he ambled through the barren battleground, following the direction Meenah had been going mere moments before. A lone tear graced his cheek, cold stone in its expressionless set.
His fins dripping downwards, Cronus set his jaw and put Ahab's Crosshairs back in its holster across his back as the ring on his hand glows brightly. The blue glow grows rapidly, and in the space of a second, Cronus was rocketing through the dry, cold air as quickly as possible.
~~~
“You’re bein’ really immature, Fef.”
“Oh, really? I’m the one being immature?” Feferi crossed her arms and puffed out her cheeks, trying to look intimidating. Eridan just scoffed.
“We’re going. Now.”
“I just want to-”
“Now, Fef.”
Feferi swam away. “They’re my friends, Eridan! I’m sorry if I want to tell them goodbye. Does that mess up your plans?”
“It does, Fef. We can’t be late for the shuttle.” Eridan moved to grab Feferi’s arm, but she continued swimming.
“I’ll be there. Even if you don’t want to come with me, I’m going to say goodbye to them.”
“Fine!” Eridan called, but Feferi was already on her way away. “Fine! Whatever!” He swam off in the other direction, heading to the surface. The shuttle was built for interstellar travel, but not underwater, so the seadwellers would be forced to make the trek to the surface to get picked up.
When Eridan’s head broke the surface, he could see a lot of other seadwellers heading up the cliffs to the pickup. He quickly joined them, curtly greeting the ones he knew and ignoring the ones he didn’t. He walked with a purpose. Being the moirail of the heir awarded certain perks to him. The masses parted to him.
Eridan Ampora took his place at the front of the crowd, right at the shuttle landing site.
~~~
Something was wrong. Very, very wrong.
After waiting for hours, and with the shuttle nowhere in sight, Eridan was pacing. Other seadwellers had taken to just sitting and waiting, oblivious to the impending doom that was waiting for them.
Eridan was sure that they were doomed. Definitely.
Maybe he was exaggerating. But he’d been sitting, waiting, telling himself to hope that in the next minute, next five minutes, next half hour, Feferi would be there. He was wrong.
Very, very wrong.
They shouldn’t have taken this long. Saying goodbye shouldn’t have taken hours and hours, but that was how long she had been gone. The shuttle was late, it could arrive any minute, but Eridan would be damned if he was just going to let his… moirail… get into trouble like this. He rudely shoved his way through the hordes of other seadwellers and headed for the populated shore.
“Fef…” he bit his lip.
~~~
There was something happening. Something big.
Eridan could hear the sounds of people shouting, metal clanking, and feet trudging against the ground as he followed the path from the shuttle landing zone. This was the way Feferi would have gone. He pushed up a cliff and rushed through a few scattered hives, his bloodpusher pumping with every step closer, because he had no idea what was going on. He was scared, worried, for Feferi. He breached the edge of living spaces and faltered, nearly crashing to the ground as he caught sight of the event.
There were trolls everywhere. Some were fighting, and blood of many colors mixed on the stone. There were bodies, dead and almost dead, littering the ground as their living comrades stepped on and over them. Eridan’s eyebrows rose in shock and confusion. There were seadwellers there, too. Seadwellers that were older, that should have left. But why were they here? No seadwellers opted to stay on Alternia past their date. And these adult trolls were wearing Imperial uniforms, no less.
How would Eridan be able to find Feferi in all of this?
He started to push his way forward, trying to avoid the blood that covered the surface upon which he walked, though the dark sludge still stained the bottom of his shoes. He bumped against a group of rustbloods hashing it out with each other, completely brushing past them and managing to get a splash of blood on his shirt. He raised his arm to shield his face from the blood, his eyes widening more. These people were fighting their brethren, their comrades, and not just their enemies.
He nearly shrieked when a severed head rolled towards him. The blood was just barely darker than his own.
Eridan was knocked to the ground then, by a two-on-one wrestling match between two seadwellers and a mustardblood, the latter of whom was unable to completely hold the others off with his psychic abilities. They forced him to the ground, and one raised his pistol, firing a blast into the head.
There was a general spray of blood of almost all colors that slowly began to color the black shirt he wore. The screams of the mutilated echoed over and over and over in the air, which was full of dust and smoke and Eridan began to choke. He unwillingly hunched forward as a cough wracked him, and his face soon met the rock when somebody crashed into him and landed on his back. Before he could revel in his pain, though, somebody was grabbing the back of his shirt and hoisting up. He found himself face-to-face with an oliveblood he’d never met before. The landdweller bared his fangs, beginning in on some rant about how Eridan had a lot of nerve showing up here, now, but Eridan cut him off.
“Please! I don’t wanna fight you. I just wanna find Fef! My moirail! Please!” he begged. The oliveblood shut his mouth and cocked his head in interest, but then scoffed and pushed Eridan to the ground again, storming off to find better prey. Eridan gratefully pushed up to his feet again.
“Feferi!” he called over and over, and he started to feel sick when he realized that this was so much like what had transpired the day before. But now, the stakes were higher.
There was some sort of gap ahead, near where the rocks ended. The masses of people began to thin out. Near this gap, the fighting was beginning to slow; some were just watching. Watching what?
“Excuse me! Excuse me! Stop! Everybody, stop!”
Eridan gasped. Above the din of the fighting, he knew that voice.
“Feferi!” he screamed again. He heard her voice. Everyone was starting to quiet.
“Everybody stop! Please! I am asking you this as your future empress: Feferi Peixes!”
Almost all of the fighting, by this point, had stopped. All eyes were on the tiny form of the future empress. Her face was set in determination, her hands smoothing her skirts. Everybody froze to find out what she was going to say.
“Thank you. Now, since you were able to listen to me thus far, I beg of you, stop fighting! Hasn’t enough blood been spilled yet?”
“Enough of your seadwellin’ blood, is that it?” a voice came from the crowd. Feferi directed her attention to the general direction of the voice.
“Enough of everyone’s blood. This isn’t just about seadwellers; it takes everyone to make up our society! I’m tired of this bloodcaste, I’m tired of discriminating towards someone because of something they can’t help! I want to help everyone! This tyrannical treatment of the people on the ‘lower’ end of the spectrum needs to stop. I have friends who’re considered lowbloods; I don’t care what shade runs through their veins! When somebody said it was what was on the inside that counted, they didn’t mean blood color. I want to end this. I want all of this, this fratricide, to stop!”
“They aren’t our brothers, Empress-to-be.” That was obviously a seadweller. “I suggest you step down now, before we have to use force.”
Eridan gulped and began to push forward again, almost reaching the break. He had to get her out of there.
“You wouldn’t. And I’m not going to stop! How can you treat each other like this? We’re all trolls! We’re all the same species! Why can’t we act like-”
A loud blast resounded in the air. The blood drained from Eridan’s face. Feferi hunched forward, fuchsia spurting from her midsection. A single word passed her lips with the blood now dripping from them.
“…it…”
She fell.
Eridan broke through the crowd just as chaos broke out once more, each troll blaming their opponent for the shot. Eridan didn’t care, though; he just wanted to reach her. Reach Feferi. Help her. Save her.
But when he knelt beside her, he knew he was too late. Her body was still, her eyes staring blankly, half-open. No breath passed her lips or gills, and when he reached for her neck, his nimble fingers found no pulse. He choked out her name and bent over, burying his face in her torso, letting his violet tears soak through her shirt as he sobbed and screamed.
Nobody paid attention to the dead empress-to-be’s moirail, though. The masses had turned once more to fighting each other with renewed vigor, spilling blood that ran rainbow and black. The sound of the carnage was heard by nobody but the participants, however, since the only sound that reached Eridan Ampora’s ears was the sound of his own cries. He held Feferi’s body close, and he was numb to the world.
Everyone else must have thought he was dead, too, because nobody touched Eridan. When he was finally able to look up, the sky was starting to lighten, casting a strange glow over the bodies left behind. If there were any survivors, they had left, because Eridan was the only living person on the cliff. The tears still poured from his eyes, but he knew he had to move, so he leaned and looked to Feferi’s still open eyes.
“I’m sorry, Fef. I’m so sorry,” he said as he gently closed her eyes.
~~~
Eridan did not give Feferi the proper seadweller send-off, which would have consisted of an eventual devouring by the Mother Grub. Instead, he buried her in a sea cave. Her grave was adorned with jewelry and trinkets from her hive. For the next week, Eridan only left his own hive to visit her grave.
At the end of the week, Eridan entered the cave with a plan. He crouched by the headstone.
“Hey, Fef. I just wanted to tell you that… this is gonna be the last time I come visit you. For a while.” His fingers subconsciously turned something on his hand. “Somethin’ happened this week, after you died, Fef. I’ve been thinkin’, now… I’ve been thinkin’ a lot.” He looked up to the gravestone for the next part. “Fef… you used to tell me, always, that you wanted this perfect world. You made plans for… for when you were Empress, that you’d make a world free from oppression, from judgment based on blood color. Well, Fef, I’m here to promise you somefin. You never got to see that, when you were alive, but now…”
A light pulsed in the corner of his vision, and Eridan looked down to his hand. It was time for him to go. He stood, the edges of his eyes tinting purple with tears once more, but he wiped them away.
"Goodbye, Feferi. I'm going to make that world a reality."