Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Each night Pearl settles into bed.

It’s nothing special, really; a deep red blank and slightly stiff pillow for her head and neck. Her langes dangle off of it if she’s completely splayed out, but Pearl can manage.

BigB’s room is no different—it’s right across the hall and Pearl has been in there more than her own. Mostly on restless nights or what the two deemed sleepovers (which was lounging in one of their rooms for them).

Pearl’s slipping under the bedsheets as she smiles at the thought.

Those nights consisted of using spyglasses and laughing about the rest of the server’s shenanigans. They are Nosy Neighbors, after all.

Her room is relatively empty. There are chests, sure, and a crafting table not too far away from her, but Pearl really needed to work on interior design. Especially for lighting; the most she had was the green luminescent glow from her wrist.

The timer set for twenty-four hours on her wrist clicked every second. She wasn’t progressing too bad with twenty hours left, Pearl decided. She built a house, made an ally…

She can’t help but let a yawn escape her. The forest’s temperature decreased each night, a sign of the Sun turning her back on them all.

Chilled air seeps through a window. The temperature drop in the spruce forest makes Pearl’s eyes droop.

Pearl wraps her arms around her pillow, knees curled into herself. Her eyes lull shut as she looks at the soft green light that glows from her wrist.

Chapter Text

Pearl doesn’t dream.

When she was younger, her vision would fade to black and resurface hours later. Her brother, on the other hand, would go on adventures. Pearl would be there to listen.

Tonight, as Pearl sees black, she can hear… laughter.

It’s giggles and chuckles and cackles and howls. They’re coming from everything yet nowhere. Too echoey to be real yet too real to be in her head.

You’re a different one, a voice boomed, aren’t you?

It’s loud— cold as a blizzard and heavy as steel.

Wounded by those you deem your companions, yet you still follow their lead?

Giggles upon giggles.

Wounded…wounded, how?

You’ve listened to those around you too much.

Pearl didn’t need to open her eyes to see what her nails had done to her pillow.

Far too much, to our distaste.

Sounds of agreement came from the black.

Isn’t it time to Watch what’s been done?

Pearl is falling.

She’s crashing downwards into the unknown—glints of purple and the black that swallowed everything and the green of her godforsaken  timer.

Pearl plunged to where she can’t see the ground.

Her eyes snap open with a start.

She’s standing at a spawn, leaning against the rough bark of an oak.

She’s mindlessly resting a hand on the silken fur of a dog’s head. Pearl’s eyes took the scene in, finding herself in front of an enchanting table surrounded by more dogs. (who they belonged to? She can’t recall)

At what seems to be all at once, a storm of bright, blurry pictures flashed in her mind. Pearl clutched her forehead, which ached terribly at the feeling.

She saw a confrontation between four people on a hill. Someone in armor being chased. Two people getting chased by a person wielding an axe.

A shriek resounded through her ears during the last image. Though it rivaled a phantom’s, it was more familiar.

She looks up and sees Scot t. He’s standing on a hill parallel to her. Something’s struck on his face; fear and contrite stirred in the mixing pot over and over and over, boiled down until he’s unreadable

She looks at moving lips that speak nothing but eerie silence.

Pearl can’t listen.

She looks at the wobbling tears that don’t seem—that can’t come down. A scar runs through his left eye. With scabs blossomed around it, it looks like it’s been treated on a countless amount of times.

Pearl can’t help but feel the phantom caress across her own left eye.

A flick of the wrist. That’s all it takes for a bundle of explosives to land a foot or so away from him.

Pearl feels a graze of heat to her fingertips.

A match is being twisted about in his hand.

His mouth is moving with more haste and she still can’t understand anything. His chest is heaving and his eyes are darting around to land on anything but pearl. He’s trying and failing.

Scott extends out his arm and lets everything go.

Tears fall down his face, a breath is released from his mouth, and match gone from his fingertips.

Pearl dreams of running, her hand outstretched. Heels pounding against hard ground and legs trembling.

Pearl dreams of hushed words that Scott chokes on—almost sorry.

Pearl dreams of an explosion. One small enough to heat the air yet grand enough to split her eardrums.

Pearl dreams of chasing what she’s missed.