Chapter Text
Getting the Vessel out of the ruined temple is agonizing. They can’t bear their own weight, not even leaning on their nail for support, and every breath is a horrible, rasping wheeze as air whistles through the places they’ve impaled their own frame. They keep moving seemingly through sheer force of will, gaze fixed near-constantly on Hornet, giving distressingly little sign of the agony they must be in.
At one point, they lurch, stop, and managed a distressed wheeze, clawing at a cyst of Infection on their flank. Any attempt to stop them only seems to distress them more, until Lachesis, understanding, draws a small dagger and slices through the cyst himself. It drains for far, far longer than it should, disgorging gold-stained Infection and what looks uncomfortably like fragments of glimmering moth scales. The Vessel is not a moth, and has no wings. Those are not their scales.
- - -
The hot springs terrify them. Not on sight, but on touch. They are no longer standing even remotely under their own power, but, when they feel the heat of the water, they muster what must be the last of their strength in an effort to get away, body language conveying absolute terror for the moment before they shut down. When lowered to the cave floor, they stay perfectly, agonizingly still, save for the heaving of their chest as they fight for air, stab wounds still spattering Void and Infection (the latter thankfully dying rapidly) with every gasping breath. Utterly petrified, at hot water touching their legs.
With Lachesis wrapped in shielding charms and distracted by the sheer breadth of their pain, Ghost is the first one to figure it out. Angrily signing "Radiance BURNS", they pull a length of bandaging from storage, dunk it in the spring, and hold it tight to their statue-cold chest.
When the wet, chilled, slightly glowing bandage is wrapped experimentally across their arm, the Vessel shivers, almost imperceptibly, but does not panic. They stay desperately still, like a hunted thing, staring into space rather than at Hornet.
Pouring cups of Ghost-chilled, soul-infused water over their many wounds probably has some benefit, at least to clean the wounds if nothing else, but brings concerns with it. The Soul doesn't linger in the water long once taken from the spring, and the last thing the Vessel needs is hypothermia. If they're capable of hypothermia. Which they might be. As far as any of them know, the best thing is for the Vessel to get into the spring, but none of them want to force the poor creature in. Even if it might do something for their pain.
PATCHES
Therefore, Patches sets about reassuring them.
It’s a difficult task, with someone who’s terrified of- well, Lachesis’ half-aware repetition of their own desperate internal litany, the first and only time he’d touched them without extra shielding, had made that clear. Do not think, do not feel, do not hope, over and over, until he’d been pulled away. Left, dazed, to explain that they blamed their own flaws for their suffering. That they placed the responsibility for their torment, and the deaths of nearly every bug in Hallownest, on them being capable of feelings.
Which leaves Patches with some feelings of his own. Mostly fury.
He keeps it to himself as well as he can, in favor of sitting by the Vessel’s head, stroking their horns. Talking to them, softly, trying not to give away how much he wants to scream on their behalf. Or go and desecrate the corpse of a king.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. Reflex is a good thing, when we’re faced with something that reminds us of a threat. But the hot springs won’t hurt you, all right? It’s only water, and Soul. Ghost, would you hand me a cup without chilling it, please?”
He isn’t sure how well they can see, particularly not out of the eye that seems to have been damaged when their mask was cracked; that eye has been steadily weeping Void, and they make a visible effort to watch him out of the other eye. But he holds up the cup regardless, showing them the contents. “Nothing dangerous here.”
Aiming both to prove it, and to distract them, he curls his tail around and pours the cup down most of its length. He’s probably getting soaked today anyway, and bugs seem to find his tail, and the way his fur slicks down and reveals its actual size, interesting.
They’re using their one remaining arm to support their weight, so he can’t take their hand and dip their fingers into the next cup. Instead, he dips his own hand in, then slowly reaches out and touches their arm. When they flinch only slightly, he does it again, gently dabbing water onto a relatively unmarked spot. “You had very good reason to be” terrified of more pain “…on guard, sweetheart. But the springs will help you heal much, much better, if you can get into them. Now that you’ve had a chance to see what’s going on, do you think we can do that?”
No response, but their breathing has been getting more labored. Still telegraphing his movements, Patches pours some of the still-hot water over the back of their hand. They stare at it, but do nothing else. No panic. No response at all.
“…that’s as close as we’re going to get to permission, isn’t it,” he mutters, then gestures to those around him, and they start the difficult task of moving the Vessel.
Even though he knows they won’t take the offer, he makes it anyway. “You can get out whenever you want, darling. This is up to you.”
Despite having no voice to cry out with, the Vessel makes a noise as they’re lowered into the pool, a long, shrilling hiss that sounds more like their lungs failing than anything else. They go rigid, but they don’t move, and they’re fortunately tall enough that none of the puncture wounds into their lungs are submerged yet.
The Soul glow in the water visibly fades around them, as if being sucked away, from the instant they touch the surface. Their draining presence would clear the water, if not for the fact that the murky glow is immediately replaced by something much more sinister; the mixture of half-set Void and Infection dripping down their frame.
Miracle of miracles, they eventually start to relax. Their labored breathing settles into something slightly less desperate, and they shift their head, looking at Hornet (and Ghost) rather than staring blankly at whatever happens to be in front of them. They’re still clutching their nail; Lachesis has to gently coax it from their hand, murmuring about how it will get in the way of helping them.
(No one mentions the fear that, if startled or panicked enough, they might simply run the nearest person through. It would be understandable, but no less deadly for that.)
Patches hates to disturb the start of their calm. Unfortunately, there are still pockets of Infection up and down their mangled side, dying for lack of magical support but still very present, and he doesn’t want them to realize that and panic again. Nor does he want to leave them with the dying remnants of an angry god’s curse embedded in their body, or any scrap of her left intact. She’s done them enough harm, caused them enough pain.
They’re uncannily compliant as he and Lachesis shift them, far too light for their size. Patches winds up supporting their head as they curl onto their side, quickly accepting the somewhat comical amount of bedding that Ghost shoves at him in order to keep their horns from scraping against the ground. They don’t fit in his lap by any stretch of the imagination, but he tries anyway, unwilling to pull away from trying to offer them some sort of comfort. Lachesis has steady enough hands for what must be done, and, unlike Patches, those hands aren’t shaking.
[the Vessel]
The Vessel listens distantly, outside its body, some tiny part of it confused at being alive, as a strange creature explains to it that its wounds must be opened and cleaned. It knows this, and so puts its last few scraps of focus towards figuring out what this creature -touching it so, so very much- is. It had borne a hard shell, until that shell had been removed, revealed to be hinged armor plating instead of something natural-grown. Its body is covered in fuzz, it has a long, soft tail, and-
It has ears. Not horns, but mobile external ears, flicking in expressions the Vessel is not familiar with.
It knows creatures like this, from tales overheard from wandering knights and travelers. This is one of the strange creatures with no chitin, with hard supports only on the inside. The Vessel has heard stories of glorious conquests, of slaying terrible, predatory beasts, soft-skinned but agile and quick all the same.
It had not realized any of those beasts could speak.
Nor would it ever have thought to contemplate how soft such a creature’s touches could be. How gentle, running up and down its horns. As if it is a living thing, needing comfort. As if it could deserve any comfort, even if it desired such a thing.
The very concept that it might want to be touched sends a surge of fear through it, yet another aspect of shameful failure, such that it barely notices the first touch of the knife to its flank.
The blade is razor-sharp, barely causing pain even on such inflamed flesh as what covers the ruin of where its arm had been. The pressure that follows after seizes the whole of the Vessel’s attention, firm touches turned agonizing by the inflammation around-
The terror that grips its very core at realizing what is happening is so great as to completely remove its ability to be ashamed of itself for the reaction. There is a rush of heat and a glimmer of golden light, of light, a far, far worse thing than even the pain and the sensation of its innards shifting-
It is, abruptly, no longer absent from its body at all.
Soft warmth wraps around its mask as it tries to claw its way free, something covers its one working eye, and it-
For the first time in its life, pure desperate instinct seizes both body and mind. The Pure Vessel, arm trapped beneath it, weaponless and unable to aid itself, strikes out in the only way it can; biting down on whatever is in front of it.
It realizes its mistake only after strange blood bursts into its mouth, running rich with Soul between its mandibles and down its throat, and an alien cry of pain reaches its senses.
PATCHES
Patches very nearly bites the Vessel’s horn in instinctive retaliation, stopping himself only by virtue of long training not to react to patients lashing out. Still, his vision goes white for a moment, his claws skidding uselessly over their mask as he reflexively tries to pry those terrible jaws free- the biting is perfectly understandable but their mandibles are grating over bone-
Smaller hands pry its jaws from his arm, and Patches almost lurches away, almost puts himself out of range of another bite. Until the Vessel pulses an impression of sorrow, strong enough that even a creature not of the Void can feel it when sitting so close, and moves. Not trying to get away from Lachesis again, but away from Patches, threatening to submerge themself entirely into the pool.
Patches isn’t sure what drowning will do to them, considering that being repeatedly impaled hasn’t killed them, but he doesn’t want to find out. Largely ignoring the deft hands wrapping silk around his gashed arm, he grips the Vessel’s horn with his more compliant hand, leaning his weight back and forcing them, as well as he can, back down into his lap. “No- stay here, sweetheart, it’s-“ stars above, that hurt, and it still hurts, hurts, hurts, racing lightning-strong up and down his arm, but- “-it’s okay, it’s okay- I’m sorry, darling, I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have covered your eyes like th-“
He nearly gets smacked in the face by a horn as they struggle, still trying to get away from him. He’d let them, too, everything in him hating the effort to restrain someone so terrified- except that there is no away. They’re trying to get deeper into the pool, frantically trying to get into the water, even as the waves from their struggling flood some of the holes in their torso and they start coughing again. Choking, really, lungs rapidly filling with fluid. “Darling, no, you’ll- Hornet, do they listen to you?”
[the Vessel]
The first being to show it kindness in centuries, and it bites them. It is more than a weak, broken, useless failure, it is a monster, a creature fitting every dark rumor ever whispered about it, about what it has eaten to grow so large, what has been done to make something like it, it is dangerous-
Reeling from the possibility of causing further harm, the Vessel continues to try to escape, tries to drag itself away in the hope that drowning might end it in a way nothing else had. Even though it has drowned, already, again and again, whatever passed for lungs filling with Infection- or had that only been in the dream world? This body might be more vulnerable, if only it can-
A heavy weight settles against its back, bearing down, and the only thing keeping it from panic is the realization that the weight is no chain, no armor pauldron, but something alive. The bug with the knife, the one who had understood its distress and freed the Infection from its side, who has been-
-who had-
-there is-
There is no threat. There was never any threat.
It has lashed out in response to someone trying to heal it.
Trembling, it goes still again, some blasphemous little part of it wishing it had a voice with which to cry its remorse. No matter that it is meant to be incapable of feeling guilt, it is sorry, it does not wish to hurt- that is not what it is made to do-
It is dimly aware of a healing spell being cast somewhere over it, no doubt to treat the wounds it has inflicted, but is distracted by small hands on its mask. By the sight of another creature whose shape it would never, never forget.
Sister. Little Sister.
Little Sister is- crying? No- impossible. She has not cried since she was tiny. Small enough to fit in its hand. She had grown, she had aged, she had-
She had been so angry. So angry, when she finally realized that it was not her sibling. That it was the mindless embodiment of the void that had snuffed her sibling’s life out in the shell. When what Father the Pale King had told her finally sank in, after it failed to respond to her far too many times, after it did not, could not respond to her.
She must be angry now, that it has hurt- her companion? Little Sister does not get this close to anyone she does not respect. It has attacked her companion, unprovoked, and now she-
Little Sister lunges, but she has not drawn her needle. Nor does she push it away, make any move to strike it down.
Her arms wrap around it, her face presses tight to its throat, and she sobs, holding it tight.
Hugging it.
She has not done this since before its third molt. It had been only somewhat larger than her, then, and she had still thought it was a person. Thought it a playmate.
She cannot, does not think that now. She knows better, she is far too intelligent for that.
She knows what it is. And yet-
Little Sister presses so tight she could almost begin to sink into it, fitting her mask under its chin as she did when she was very, very small. When she still thought she loved it.
Something pulls taunt in its throat. Fear and grief and confusion and shame curl in its gut, seizing at something it had not fully known it could do, and every moving entity in the room freezes as the Vessel finds a voice it is not meant to have and wails.
The action is heretical, blasphemy, the antithesis of its very nature and its very purpose for being, but it cannot stop. Centuries of agony and shame, and a new, sharper despair at its own violence, have found an outlet, and it cannot, cannot stop itself, cannot move enough to sink its claws into its mouth, its throat, cannot silence itself as its body cries out its pain and fear and the thousand thousand things that are wrong with it, cannot stop-
Wrong, wrong, wrong- this is not it, this is Her, is the one thing She had made within it rather than breaking, She had pulled together pieces of it and Herself and had made it a voice with which to cry her rage, a voice that, in a moment of weakness and despair, it had used once to call out its own pain- a voice that sounds of Her.
It tries to claw at its own throat, but Little Sister is in its way.
It tries to struggle free and drown its blasphemy in the waters around it, but is held fast.
Its own cursed body betrays it, screaming out its weakness for all the world to hear, in a voice that steadily grows harsher and harsher, rasping, warping, layering over itself with the whispering of a thousand thousand lost souls, until-
Its wretched voice breaks. Something snaps wetly as its ruined lungs force air and water through its throat.
It lurches, gagging horribly, and is allowed to move enough to turn more onto its front as the heaving of its chest brings up Void, Infection, clear water, and a spattering of bright red blood. And, after a moment, something else.
PATCHES
Everyone in the room, even those whose eyes are still clouded with tears from a pain not their own, stares in varying degrees of horror as the Vessel spits up a twisted golden structure that very clearly does not belong in their body.
Patches’ ears are still ringing too badly for him to identify who it is that faintly asks “…is that a set of vocal cords”, and, really, who’s asking questions he already knows the answers to does not matter right now. Shifting around (and mindful of the mandibles still somewhat revealed- stars, what an odd mouth, and oh they could take a limb off), he brings his tail up to block their view, careful to keep it far enough away that he isn’t actually covering their eyes. “Looks like it was- not any more. Someone- someone should burn that, I think, please, or find some acid. That's- oh, oh dear, I'm so sorry."
He’d hoped, hoped, that there was some truth to the idea that the Vessel couldn’t feel anything, that the Pale King hadn't locked away one of his children to burn forever. Hoped in vain, and he knew it- he'd known it wouldn’t be true, from the moment he’d heard the idea. Ghost, after all, was not just a feeling creature, they were a person. A child raised from birth on the idea that only absolute purity would save, not just them, but the entire world, would of course act strangely. But he’d hoped that maybe the Radiance had- something. It would have been a mercy for her to kill them, or to destroy their mind so thoroughly that there was nothing left to suffer.
She has, from the looks of their innards, been trying. She has, it seems, entirely failed.
No creature incapable of suffering can scream like that.
LACHESIS (more or less)
Bugs are incapable of going pale when distressed, at least not in the way that some other creatures do, but Lachesis is likely making a rather good effort at it. He has to pause for a moment, leaning on the injured Vessel both for whatever comfort and whatever restraint he can provide, head low as he binds another charm into the network of enchanted silk woven around his horns. If every shielding charm breaks -as several have already done- and he is left to drown in their pain, he will be of absolutely no use, unable to manage anything other than leaning against them and snarling at anyone who comes close.
Long practice keeps his hands steady, and his voice nearly so, as he speaks to no one in particular. “To make them capable of anything like speech is antithetical to what they are. Much as their silence can cause our small friends annoyance, that lack of a voice is part of the nature of a Void creature. To so thoroughly defy a living creature’s very nature, on top of everything else…”
He falls silent, and, having gotten the charm integrated, strokes a hand carefully down the Vessel’s back. Skirting around the impalement wounds, carefully, as he leans down to speak to them.
He can get no impression of what they think of Patches' reassurance, but he knows, knows in the way he knows the sense of another's pain washing over him like blood on the wind, that they will want what he can offer. “Hear me, forsaken one. If you can bear me, I will find every scrap of her that remains, and I will pull it from you and destroy it."
They shudder, and he rumbles a low note, the closest he can come to a purr. "Easy. Already her rot dies, without her to support it. Already it leaves you, leaves your body to be yours once more."
He will not mention the shower of glittering scale fragments that pour out of every deep cyst he cuts into. They float; he will make a personal effort to recover and destroy every single one of them that taints this spring, if they fail to dissipate on their own. For now, he will focus on removing her influence from the Vessel themself- not from the environment.
Meeting their eyes is an effort, with their position. He tries regardless, no matter that they are gasping, still, staring at nothing in particular. “You have endured far too much, for far too long. I would grant you peace now, if I could. But I must instead ask you to endure me, so that I may help you. So that, together, we may purge the last of her influence from you.”
And. Hm. Something here that confirms a suspicion he and Patches had discussed.
Quietly hoping he's not about to make them feel worse, he taps near one of the punctures higher on their back, glancing up to meet Patches’ eyes. “We were right about their throat being damaged. I see your blood here. It’s leaked from where they swallowed it.”
PATCHES
The Vessel lurches a little at that, and Patches rushes to calm them, stroking their horns with both hands now that someone has very helpfully wrapped his arm for him to heal out of bleeding. “-oh dear, that’s not a good sign. It’s all right, sweetheart- you’re welcome to my blood, and to all the Soul I can spare, if it helps you heal. I would prefer we extract it a different way” because his arm still throbs “but I have extra. And I’m not angry with you for your instincts, goodness."
Hopefully they don’t object to the idea of having instincts.
“Biting when we’re threatened or in pain is a very reasonable response. You’re far from the first person to bite me,” though, by far, the most painful, “and I suspect you’re far from the last. You haven’t done any permanent harm, and you didn’t mean to hurt me. I’ll just be careful to stay away from those mandibles, darling."
He has moved, slightly. Mostly what he’s doing is keeping an arm over their horns, and watching for when they tense up. It won’t be hard to keep himself away from their biting, not with handholds like these- though, he rather suspects they aren’t going to bite him again, even out of instinct. If something does hurt or scare them enough to make them bite again, despite being so ashamed of it that they’d seemingly tried to drown themself, he will be stopping whatever it is immediately.
Oh, if only they could do anything for the poor darling's pain, but- “I don’t think we can give them any painkillers, if it’s not likely to even make it to their stomach,” he sighs, glancing over to Lachesis. "I don't think it would be safe to put the medication straight into their body cavity, and we'd likely wash it out away. Let me see if I can purr anything up to help slightly, but… I think we need to get them cleaned up, and see if they can heal a little afterward. Once they have a working approximation of a digestive system, then we can drug them up to their non-existent eyeballs. I do have something that should work, sweetheart, I promise I'll do my best, but I-I don't think we can safely give you any right now."
His healing magic has taken rather a lot of practice to use effectively on pseudo-invertebrates, rather than the mammals he's learned it on, and will unfortunately have little to no effect on a creature of Void. He can still attempt pain relief, though, as that spell works by interfering with how pain reaches the brain- and Vessels do seem, at least, to have (very) loose approximations of brains. This spell has worked for Ghost, to some extent, but won't be as strong as it could be if he had help.
If only he had his packmates with him-
No. They aren't here, and he is. He has to, at least, try.
Curling his tail around himself, Patches shifts his position to sit more neatly, presses in as close as he can without getting in the way, and starts to purr. Softly at first, so he can manage some amount of speech. Heavily vibrating speech. “I don’t know of any bugs that purr, sweetheart, but this is something we do where I’m from. We use it to comfort each other.”
And sometimes to express happiness, contentment, or ‘that was some excellent sex just now’, but none of that is important right now. Best not to confuse the poor thing. “I’m a healer, so I’ve learned to weave some healing magic into my purring. It’s probably going to get a bit loud right next to your mask, and I’m sorry for that. If the vibrating starts to bother you, pull away from me, and I’ll stop. I’m going to try to spin up a spell to help with your pain, so, even if the purring doesn’t mean anything to you, I’m hoping this can make you feel a little better. Let me try, all right?”
No response. Not that he expected one. Still, he purrs anyway, drawing it up a bit louder and starting to integrate a soft, vocal trill. It’s not quite the healing songs he’s used to, but, as he concentrates, especially with the spring so close by, he can weave a pain relief spell into it. Whispering reassurance to that little part of the self that focuses so hard on survival, coaxing it to ignore things for awhile. To let any pain signals go unfelt, to let adrenaline (or whatever they have in place of that) settle out and fade away. To let them relax, finally.
There's only so much he can do. The Vessel still tenses when Lachesis resumes his work, claws digging into whatever comes to hand. But they don't jolt away, or struggle, and their ragged breathing doesn't worsen.
After a few moments, caught in a spell that sings for calm, for peace, for relief from stress and pain, their breathing gradually begins to even out.
As more light drains from the spring around them, the tear-drips of Void from their damaged eye slow, and stop.
Still, still, they do not move.
Their claws dig into the floor, their frame locks statue-still, and everything of their posture cries of terrible pain, but they do not move.
[the Vessel]
It could not move if it wanted to.
Little Sister is whispering for it to be still, to let the strangers help. The pull to obey Royalty wants to listen, and far, far stronger than that is the loyalty to its Little Sister. The drive to do anything that might make her stop crying. Anything.
And it wants, Father Pale King forgive it, it wants to be still. It wants to let this strange bug, whose presence sings of a quiet, foreign magic, dig the last of Her out of its body. It wants.
Even though it hurts. Oh, it hurts, his touch is fire and the pressure is molten against any parts of it that still bear the wretched ability to feel pain, it has long since grown familiar with blades inside it but it hurts- and it forces itself still.
Must not move.
Must not.
Even though the next step, after draining the cysts visible on its side, is to reach deeper to access the ones within its body.
Quite abruptly, it wants to move, and some traitorous, terrible little part of it wants the voice back so it can cry out- but it endures the sensation of claws inside its torso as best it can. No matter how much it wants to fight. No matter the urge to kick and writhe and try to escape.
It can do this.
It endured Her for centuries. It endured being trapped with a furious god that had no other outlet, save for ravaging its body and mind. It endured (for it had no other choice) having its dream-self torn apart over and over, filled to bursting with Infection until its trapped shade scattered to fragments, with no relief save for the days she turned her fury elsewhere. It has been taken apart in more ways than it could have known (if it were a knowing thing) were possible. It can endure one mortal bug-
The claws scrape and tug, and it wishes it could vomit as living things do, if only to relieve the sensation of something squirming inside it.
A hand settles on its back, and a voice joins the purring against its horns. Lower, raspier, but harmonizing, the sensation of magic swelling against it. Tugging, gently, coaxing.
The Vessel drifts further away from the awareness of its body, and makes no effort to fight.
It does not want to be here.
There is nothing to keep it here.
Nothing at all.
Until the strange bug interrupts the song to snarl at something, rough and dangerous, snapping its attention back to him. His hand is gone from its innards, but something still moves within it, squirming, twisting- and jumps.
The worst of the burning heat pulls itself free, but the Vessel cannot feel any relief at that, not when-
A shape somewhere between caterpillar and Lightseed, freed from within its own body, lands at the edge of the hot spring and bolts.
The strange bug lunges for it, the fuzzy creature snarls, Little Sister draws her needle, a familiar shape reveals a nail, the thing darts past them all-
And a lanky shadow the Vessel had not noticed before snatches it up. One, quick, striking motion.
There is a brilliant flash as the thing’s tail comes free of the rest of it,
it is cast back into the center of the room,
and in an instant, there are three knives sunk through its body.
It shatters into fragments of Essence, and is gone.
No One In Particular
Everyone in the room looks at Gravescratch, who has been guarding the entrance to the cavern. Who has a habit of reflexively striking at small prey, a habit he’s only recently begun to work on overcoming. Who looks mildly distressed, but completely unharmed, despite having swallowed the tail of what appears to have been a godly parasite.
“What was that,” Hornet declares, marching over to him. “Open your mouth.”
He does. A faint golden glow clings to his tongue, which looks slightly burnt, but there is no other foreign light. His throat is intact. He isn’t writhing in pain, or burning up from the inside, or lunging in sudden, mindless fury. Only, after a moment's frozen bafflement, pawing furiously to get the taste out of his mouth.
No one particularly seems to know what to do with that.
LACHESIS
Lachesis puts his hand back into the Vessel’s body, while they’re hopefully slightly distracted by Gravescratch, and extracts the thing he’s been trying to pull out. The thing that he had taken for a particularly bad cyst, writhing with lingering fury, until slitting it had set something free.
This cyst is far thicker-walled than the rest, and, as he pulls the remnants of it free, it disintegrates into a handful of what looks unnervingly like silk. A strange, parasitic cocoon. Some contingency plan, perhaps, or a failed attempt at escape into the physical world- a fragment of a god's power, separate enough to endure past her death, if only for a little while.
Vile. Turning a living, suffering creature into something between cocoon and brood-nest, growing an attempt at a new body inside them.
Stifling a growl long enough to murmur a warning, he discards the tangle of melting silk and carefully pours water into where the cocoon was, trying to avoid their lungs. Trying to wash away the worst of the rot.
The Infection appears to have formerly been contained, but the massive nail wounds through their entire body punctured many of the internal cysts, spilling corrosive liquid into their organs. It’s no wonder their breathing sounds like something that should have died a long time ago.
The water dislodges a flood of Infection with the heaviest golden tint he’s seen yet, and a large number of, not just scales, but fragments of exoskeleton. Mostly not their own; he’s pulled out a handful of shards of black carapace, and what might be a small piece of wing bud, but the majority of these are glimmering golden-white.
Some are left behind. Whispering “nearly, warrior, nearly done”, he reaches in to pull those fragments free, crushing each one in his hand once it’s out and adding it to the heap of vile things to be disposed of by whatever means is required.
The shards come out easily, but there is something else. Another portion of feverish heat, under a layer of Void-made-flesh, with something hard inside.
The Vessel is a Void entity. Their body needs much less support than other bugs. They have a carapace, but no internal chitin.
There shouldn’t be anything hard here.
Their self-control is incredible, but Lachesis doesn’t want to demand that they simply remain still for this. Keeping a hand on the Vessel’s back, he leans all his weight back on their frame, pinning them in place and giving Patches a warning look. “One more thing, warrior. One more. Brace yourself, and… I am sorry.”
He joins Patches’ song again, waits a moment for the magic to sink in, and then picks up the knife.
Incredibly, the Vessel does not move as he cuts into them. Their claws gouge chips out of the stone under their hand, and, even through the dulling influence of the charms, he catches a combined urge to bare their mandibles and shame at what they take for an impulse to be violent. Other than that, nothing. Nothing but do not move do not move do not move be good be good be good do not move-
Black Void-flesh parts under his blade, dying Infection gushes free, and the object is revealed.
A splintered, broken partial weapon, some dagger or knife, made of hardened light.
Binding another layer of silk around his hand, Lachesis murmurs a warning and apology all in one breath, grips the thing, and pulls. No matter that it burns his fingerpads as soon as he touches it.
Black claws dig further into solid stone with what sounds worryingly like a crack of chitin, but they do not move, do not move, do not move-
Until a knife-blade longer than Lachesis' hand is free of their body, and its sudden absence seems to shift something.
The Vessel coughs, lungs visibly seizing-
And convulses, nearly throwing Lachesis off, head arching back despite Patches' grip until their horns press nearly into their own stab wounds, chest heaving, kicking out like a drowning thing fighting for its life as burning golden-orange liquid floods over and into their mangled lungs.
Hornet and Patches brace themselves in a hastened, near-insufficient effort to keep those elegant horns from carving the Vessel's back open further, Hornet's choked-back sobs breaking into "-easy, easy, let them help, easy, be still, they will help if you can only be still-" as they work to hold the Vessel where the rot will drain away, as Lachesis, despite the sensation of his shell and fingerpads being eaten into, fits his hand back into the terrible wound in their flank to scoop the half-clotted Infection out as fast as possible. He can bear this- they cannot, they cannot, they cannot, they do not need to burn any longer-
[the Vessel]
It does not want to drown again.
Its world narrows to nothing but the liquid fire in its lungs, the way its throat closes as it tries and fails to breathe, the sensation of Her flame surging into it once again, burning twisting searing no no no-
Far past blind panic, it claws at the stone under it, back arching, fangs and spurs and claws trying and failing to find something to fight, trying to rip its own chest open and tear Her out of it, trying-
It retches, chokes,
coughs up a splattering of orange and far more clear water, the all-consuming heat flooding away in a surge of something that is still far too hot but is nothing in comparison to Her,
and goes shudderingly limp.
Its body continues to twitch and cough, fangs parted, slumped limp on the stone in a disgrace to everything it was ever meant to be-
But it can breathe.
It can breathe.
The world expands again.
There are hands on its horns once more, stroking gently. Base to tip, up and down, pulling something of its awareness away from the agony that is existence.
When the coughing stops and its breathing settles enough that its chest is no longer heaving violently on every inhale, someone pours water over its mask, carefully avoiding its eyes. Washing its face clean.
There is, still, a hand inside it, but it can find no will to fight or object; the claws working within it are pulling the last embers of burning heat away.
The heat of the water begins to fade.
It had shed the worst of Her burning flame as soon as She was vanquished, but now, for the first time in centuries, purged of the feverish heat of Infection, its body begins to cool.
The spring is hot, but the Void in its nature is inexorable.
It takes a breath, and, as its head is shifted back into the fuzzy creature’s lap, it feels that the air it exhales is chilled.
The creature seems delighted with this.
It praises the Vessel, for such a simple thing as breathing. Murmurs "oh, there we are, darling, that's good- that must feel so much better. It's all right- just breathe, deep as you can. Cough if you need to. You're- you're okay. You're going to be okay."
It would listen to this, to the strangeness, to the reassurance, if not for something far more important. The gradual approach of a being it must not ignore.
LACHESIS
Having pulled out every piece of foreign material he can find, Lachesis picks up the blade of light from where he’d dropped it in his rush to help, and dashes it against the stone near the heap of scales and carapace fragments. It shatters into several pieces, and begins to dissolve; more of a construct than a physical object.
When he gently tilts the Vessel to look into the wounds again, there’s no sign of any light. No glimmer of anything foreign, only the dark Void-flesh and traces of swirling, agitated pure Void. Rapidly cooling to the touch, at least in their core. Good.
Gravescratch is still relatively close to the tunnel entrance, but has been edging closer and closer, watching the Vessel’s struggles. He’s trying to look inscrutable, but is mostly managing to seem several degrees of perturbed. For himself, for the Vessel- unclear. Still in no apparent physical distress.
Lachesis raises his voice slightly to make it clear that he means to be overheard, though he knows those ears are keen enough to hear him whisper. “Warrior, that one over there is Gravescratch. He is not nearly as much an embodiment of a primal force as you are, but the teeth and senses of a hunter are not something to be trifled with. Friend hunter- come here.”
The hunter comes, cautiously. He’s too fast for the Vessel to harm him, but his preference is to vanish when off guard and uncertain, not to approach the source. Still, he approaches, staring the Vessel down, and lets Lachesis set a hand against his flank to focus.
"Gravescratch is particularly gifted, when it comes to digesting the indigestible, and the sheer intent of predator against prey is a powerful thing," he murmurs, watching where the creature had been before the knives struck it, "as is the intent to destroy a threat to friend, ally, or family. There is no foreign presence here, friend; the creature is dead. Whatever atrocity that was, I do not expect it to rise again. Would you lend your senses to looking for any further traces of our mutual foe?"
The tension in Gravescratch’s expression bleeds out slightly, though he is still staring at the Vessel. “Mortifying, ridiculous way to die,” he mutters, glancing away, not bothering to clarify if he means himself or the god-fragment; reflexively swallowing a burning thing for its resemblance to some small prey animal would not be a good death, nor was being mistaken for small prey and prevented from escaping rather than being granted any of the respect a god-fragment might otherwise have.
Whatever the case, he lowers his head to sniff at the Vessel, even edging close enough to scent around the gaping hole in their side. “Void-creature Vessel, traces of dead Infection, what I would say was purged gangrene on another body… no Radiance. Her magic smells of bleaching sunlight. They smell only of the quiet dark. And pain.”
Hornet, returning herself to where she was before the Vessel's thrashing dislodged her, eyes Gravescratch with something between wariness and gratitude. “If anyone could eat a fragment of a god and come out fine… suppose it would have to be you,” she mutters, hands skirting rather close to where the Vessel’s mandibles are tucked away as she wipes drops of Void and Infection from their face. “If you start glowing, I am going to tie you up and throw you into the Abyss. W- Kn- Hollow, did you hear him? The Old Light is gone," she whispers, and-
She does not fit neatly against their throat. Not at this position, in this angle. She tries regardless.
[the Vessel]
The Vessel, too shocked to feel ashamed of its astonishment, stares up at the creature that has just prevented the escape of a last fragment of Her. If that scrambling thing had any fragment of Her presence in it, anything of Her mind, anything to give Her a hold on the world again-
Disaster. Unfathomable disaster. The ultimate failure of its purpose, beyond anything else, and death for uncountable multitudes.
A disaster that has been prevented, in one quick, decisive gesture.
Moving is agony. Not only for its injuries, but for the requirement of pulling away from Little Sister, from the fluffy stranger’s painfully kind touch, from the numbing spell being woven over its body. But it pushes itself up, because it must, and it manages to pull itself away from the hands that try to trap it.
It is not strong enough to keep itself up for a proper bow. It winds up resting its horns on the floor for support, pain lancing through it at the pressure on its cracked mask, back arched painfully as it tries to sweep its arm across its front in an appropriately courtly bow. Trying to offer some form of thanks, for the destruction of-
The one it is trying to thank hisses “stop that”, and pushes it down into the fluffy one’s lap.
For one, horrified moment, it thinks it has been rejected. Judged unworthy even by them-
Then they bump their snout into the side of its mask, voice a low rumble as they murmur to it. “Do not debase yourself. Do not hurt yourself. Rest. If you want to offer thanks, live, and defy all that has tried to smother your mind. Rest. Stay down.”
With that, they whirl away, pacing towards the cavern entrance (on four limbs, oddly) to take up their guarding position again.
The Vessel, stunned, confused, and exhausted, does as it is told.
It rests, as well as it can.
It does its best to stay still for the final touches to its innards, pitiful though its best may be.
The lack of pressure is helping; as light and strange as it suddenly feels with much of its flank hollowed out, one not-lung now has far more space to expand into.
Its breathing comes steadier, easier, each breath more effective, as it contemplates what has been done to it. Distantly, once more dislodged slightly from its body.
Hollow. It feels hollow. Different than before Her; far less empty of disgraceful weakness. But its body feels light, drifting, and there is a sensation as though someone has reached into it, scooped out something twisted and awful, and thrown it away.
Understandable- someone has. But it feels as though much of the hollowing was done when it pulled Her voicebox under its control and screamed. As though physically ripping the last pieces of Her out was an afterthought, compared to crying out its pain.
Shameful. Disgusting. Blasphemous. An utter betrayal.
Or, it would be, were the Vessel not too exhausted for shame.
The strange-magic bug pokes at it still, examining its wounds.
Water is poured into the wounds, cleaning them, with some effort made to keep its lungs clear. When it coughs, its back is gently patted, and its frame is supported so it can clear its lungs properly without immediately inhaling water again.
As the work proceeds, the sensation of its body finally, finally beginning to cool proceeds as well, fever-warmth leeching away even in the heat of the springs. Void is inexorable, and this, for once, is a mercy.
The odd bug something to its internals that feels exceedingly unpleasant and then immediately much better, then, stroking a hand up its back for a purpose it cannot determine, turns to speak to the fluffy creature. "As far as I can see, their organs" -their, why does this bug speak as though it is a person, has no one explained- “are all in the proper places. I hesitate to try to use any true healing magic on a Void entity, and I do not believe any of our other Void friends can cast outward magic yet, so- forsaken one, breathe for me, and see if you can heal yourself.”
It does not listen. They are not Royalty, have not been granted control over it- these are not proper orders.
Regardless, it lacks the energy to try.
It wants, still, in a thing it would be ashamed of if it were not so, so utterly exhausted, and what it wants is to be left to the quiet dark and the floating daze of the spell being woven over it.
It wants to be done. Wants to be left to fade, like the broken, discarded, useless thing that it is.
It wants to end.
They ask again, and it ignores them again. Even as Little Sister makes a worried noise against its mask. It has no need to obey them- grateful as it is for the relief, for their delicate work, they do not have the authority to command it.
It wants to end.
Let it.
A scuffle sounds, someone arriving (or returning?), and a tiny frame barrels into Little Sister. A familiar shape embraces her, then steps free, dark eye sockets meeting its shaky gaze. Drawing its attention in a way nothing else could.
The Knight. The little, rejected sibling that had been cast aside by Father the Pale King, that has spent months steadily defeating more and more fearsome enemies all throughout Hallownest, glimpses of black and white and sheer, utter determination under Her furious gaze. The tiny shape that had come to it, and cut it from its chains, and fought it to its knees. Had defeated, not just it, but Her.
It had thought they were all dead. All of them. Thousands and thousands of newborn siblings, sealed away in the dark after it had proved itself.
Its selection doomed the rest of them, those that had managed to hatch at all, those that had made it past the crawling things and the deadly falls and clawed their way towards the light. It had been mistaken for something Pure, and it had been chosen, and they had all been doomed.
But. Father the Pale King had been wrong. It had deceived him- it is not Pure. The real Pure Vessel must have been locked away in the dark, must have died alongside all the others. Its failure to contain Her has proved it; it was the wrong choice. A wrong choice that had condemned all of Hallownest, alongside whatever Vessel had truly been meant to keep Her captive.
Is this the true Pure Vessel? The sibling truly meant to bear Her fury?
The Knight touches their mask, its tiny paw a welcome coolness, and a flicker of nameless, wordless greeting, of kinship, presses from them to it.
They are so, so small. So soft that they had been injured if they so much as brushed against the Vessel’s frame as they fought it.
Entirely unbidden, the Vessel's mind is filled with an image of this little, fragile thing, bound and forced to bear Her fury with no means to defend itself, heal, or escape.
This is an entirely new pain. One not anchored in the body it is attempting to leave behind.
A simple thought has no right to ache so badly.
PATCHES
“There you are, Ghost,” Patches croons, relieved. He’s still not clear on exactly what has happened to Ghost; their mask is still faintly cracked down the center, though rapidly healing, and something strange presses against his whiskers when they get close. They seem intact enough, but they'd been forced to leave, watching their sibling in pain; they had been coming apart at the seams, literally, the sound around them growing faint, radiating something that had put his hackles on end if they stood too close, and had needed to leave so they could calm down.
They do seem more solid now, trying to figure out a way to sit closer to the Vessel. Patches would happily let them in his lap, as he’s well-insulated from their chill and he doesn’t think he would mind regardless, but he needs them for something else right now. “Ghost, darling, we’re trying to convince them to heal. They should have some Soul reserves now, but they don't seem to be trying, so- I don't know if they're too tired, they can't manage the will, or if we're not asking the right way. Could you demonstrate for them, in case it's the latter?"
Hopefully this, or something else, works. None of their friends can cast healing spells appropriate for Void entities, so if the Vessel can’t, or won’t, heal their own wounds… there isn’t much that can be done to help them. Not even pain relief, if anything put down their throat is likely to end up dripping out of their chest. The hot spring should help, but the hot spring is slow when someone's injuries are so widespread, and- oh, if he has to wait for that to sink in to help them at all?
Patches, still stroking the Vessel's horns, presses his forehead to one and quietly prays to nothing in particular -he's brought no god of his own- that they might manage to listen.
Ghost crouches in front of the Vessel’s face, meeting their eyes, and summons their Soul magic. It’s not quite the sort that Patches is used to, but it feels of life-magic all the same, though with a strange wave of something else. Like the air here is too cold for scent. Though- he’s seen them heal before, and he swears it wasn’t nearly so swirled with black.
The Vessel doesn’t move. Quietly wondering if their hearing is all right, Patches gently rubs the spot between their horns, his voice as soft as he can manage. “Come on, sweetie… I know you’re exhausted, but there must be enough Soul here for you to at least try. Can you hear me? Do you understand what we’re asking?”
[the Vessel]
It understands.
It does not want to heal.
It still has not properly been ordered.
It wants to stop.
It feels hollowed out, exhausted. It wants to stop.
Perhaps, if it simply does not heal itself, its cursed heart will fall still for good.
It does not want to heal.
It watches its little sibling heal again, as if trying to encourage it, and it does not respond.
It does not have to.
Tiny, cold hands rest against its plating, and the little creature (how has it drawn itself down this small? It was so much larger before) casts the spell one more time, projecting the impression of trying to heal it.
They fail. The magic is powerful, but untrained, and is wrapped too far inward. The Vessel shivers at the sensation of the spell’s edges, and a piece of its cracked chitin repositions itself slightly from where its own nail pushed it inward, but nothing else happens.
It wants to stop. It wants to stop, to let itself end. To be folded back into the nothingness of the Void and left to something like peace. It wants to stop, not-
Pressure against its face. Another mask pressed to its own.
Little Sister is shaking, and something wet drips down its face. Little Sister is crying again.
That hurts, too. The world hurts, but- this is, somehow, the worst.
It is not a thing meant for comfort.
Exhausted, far beyond shame, far beyond all but the need to stop, it presses into her with what little energy it has left. Nuzzles against her, mask to mask, a twisted, warped thing's mimicry of a comforting gesture it has seen. No matter that it is not a thing able to provide comfort, it presses into her, and tries with all that it has to project a plea for her to let it go.
If she hears, she does not respond. Instead, she nuzzles it in return, heedless of the audience, heedless that this sentiment is being seen. “Hollow, please,” she whispers, sounding as though her heart is about to break. “Please try.”
Little Sister calls it by a name that it does not have, rather than by its proper title. Refuses to let it go.
Something in its chest tightens painfully, and it-
It hurts. Oh, it hurts. But Little Sister is crying for it, pleading for it, and it-
For her. For Little Sister. It will try.
It nuzzles into her once again, then takes the deepest breath its mangled lungs can manage and pulls itself together.
Its first attempt fails. Soul begins to flicker around it, but it knows this will hurt, it shies from the pain, and the spell fails. No matter that it has already endured so much, no matter that this is a mere drop in an ocean of agony, it flinches.
Shameful. Weak.
Little Sister gasps and squeezes it more tightly, her voice changing as she whispers "please, Hollow, please" in her mother's tongue, the tiny knight squeezing between her and it to press against its throat, and it-
It steels itself, draws on the pain in her voice, on the forbidden-wanted-needed desire to make her tears stop, and puts everything it has into the effort.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, its ruined body trying to force itself back together, its lungs seizing inside it, its heart lurching, its limbs beginning to draw up as it pours the last of its strength into the effort, it hurts-
It succeeds. The spell sinks into it, its breathing comes slightly more easily,
and the last thing it hears as the world fades to black is Little Sister sobbing in relief.
The last thing it knows is careful touches to its horns, its mask, its throat, as gentle as it has ever felt.
It does not dream.
