Eight years later, it's mostly under control. I take my incredibly over-priced pancreatic enzymes, which lets my body actually recognise the food I'm putting in as food, instead of foreign rock invaders. I avoid everything soy, everything avocado / banana / latex fruit-related (except apples, because you have to take risks somewhere), milk, anything with high lactose, anddd most meat. And subsequently: it's been a few months since I last fucking fainted, which is absolutely lovely!

I still get sick if I forget to take enzymes, or just from fucking butter, which is an unfortunate staple to most of my recipes. But it's mostly managable now.

• potatoes rolled in paprika+lime+ginger+flour, fried in peanut oil, with misc veggies
• smoked gouda macaroni and cheese
• spinach + roasted brussel sprouts + red potatoes + sprouts, with a dijon mustard vinagrette
• pinto bean tacos, stuffed inside of green pepper shells
• herb roasted apples + onions + carrots, served next to celery egg salad
• butternut squash tomato soup + gouda grilled cheeses w/ sofrito
• baked ziti (just - no)
• an amount of stuffing that, in hindsight, was frankly absurd
• endless nights of ricotta ravioli with basil pesto + diced tomatoes

PHERES DYSSEU | 16 YEARS OLD / ~7 SWEEPS | 1,401 WORDS

Raphae’s hive is all done up in blues and pinks, cloying enough that it looks like it stepped straight out of a magazine. There’s dancing bears on the walls, and carved into the furniture, and decorating the couch. There’s stuffed birds with their glistening black eyes and tiny beaks everywhere. When Chapar reaches out for Iphige’s lusus, you don’t have time to warn him.

Turtleduckdad pulls his neck all the way into his feathers with a warning hiss, eyes snapping open, and Chapar drops him with a yelp.

“I’m so sorry,” you murmur, gently shooing the duck away. Chapar just folds his arms, tucking his hands into his sleeves.

“Wow. This apartment is definitely, like -” He exhales slowly as he looks around, but you can’t quite bring yourself to try and see it like he does. Maybe the first time you’d walked in, you’d been impressed. The only hive you’d ever seen back then was the Birdhouse, crowded wall from wall with trolls who’d never left and never would, and from the detritus of those long gone. Back then, it’d been breathtaking.

But now.. it’s been too many sweeps since the first time Sipara hauled you in. You’ve had too many customers since then, from cerulean to indigo, to even a violet, once, and next to all of that -

Raphae’s hive does look like it’s from a magazine. Unfortunately, it’s just not the priciest one on the rack, and when push comes to shove, there’s only so impressed you can be with any apartment that features a crying bear as the entryway’s centerpiece.

Chapar, though.. he’s never gone on deliveries like you! He’s never truly had a clade with the amount of wealth you’re used to. The closest he’s ever had to a clade is Malaya’s troupe, and when he’s fawned over Malaya’s apartment every time the two of you’d spent the day there, you’ve never been able to quite bring yourself to pointing out exactly how little a navy’s stipend can truly pay for. It was all very impressive, from the carpets to the television, and Malaya had expected the both of you to be impressed.

It’s just.. well. It’s hard to be impressed by a television, after you’ve been inside homes with proper theaters.

“It’s nice, isn’t it?” you say lightly, bouncing up on your toes. There’s an empty teacup on the nearest endtable, one of the ones that weeps rainbows from the mouth. You gently spin it around before Chapar can see, then drift towards the piano room, because - well, there’s no reason, really, except that the way his breath catches at the sight of it is uniquely gratifying. It’s real wood, with the sort of imperfections that come from being cohorts old. The one in Malaya’s house had been teak. "Ah, I want to show you the kitchens!“

"Don’t you mean the kitchen?” he says, faint.

“Ah - no. I hate to brag, but..” Chapar’s looking at you like he’s daring you to finish. You titter, hand flitting in front of your mouth, but it doesn’t quite hide your sheepish grin. His eyes widen.

“Would you believe,” you murmur, apologetic, while he just stares, “we’ve got three?”

He stays tight on your heels as you lead him through the front hall, and - perhaps you shouldn’t feel so smug about the way he’s just growing more and more skittish with every step. After all, this isn’t your hive, ultimately. This isn’t your home, in any sense of the word. You’ve always been on the very outskirts of the clade, just like you hover on the outskirts of Malaya’s, and while Sipara belongs here, you’re just her moirail. You’ve always slept in her recuperacoon, and you’ve always considered yourself lucky for it.

But - no, it’s not really like Malaya’s clade, is it? You’re not properly a part of that at all, for all that the two of you are practically matesprits. No, here, at least, you’ve got a key, and you’ve got a quadrant who lives here, one who’s willing to wear your colour and use your name. And Raphae’s said over and over that you’re free to stay around as much as you’d like. He adores you, the way clade’s supposed to, and Iphige tolerates you, and if Iconic brightens at the sight of you, for all the wrong reasons -

- well! Iconic’s supposed to be out tonight, which is why you dropped by. The rest of the trolls here are your clademates, and that means you belong here, even if it isn’t yours. If Sipara was here, she’d expect you to show it off, really.

And she should be here. Iconic’s out, but she didn’t have anything scheduled. You can hear clanking from the nearest doorway. You start to lift a hand, but when you glance back, it’s unnecessary: Chapar’s stopped by a telephone, his hands locked behind him like he’s afraid of breaking it.  “Sipa,” you call out, “are you here?”

There’s a clattering. Sure enough, Sipara flounces out from behind the doorframe of the kitchen, covered in flour.

A moment later, like a ghost, Iconic trails out after her, an arm slung loosely around her shoulders. He’s in the air - when isn’t he in the air, these nights? - and he’s making her tow him like a boat behind. “Siparaja,” he complains, and although his eyes narrow when he sees you, his voice doesn’t slow. “You’re going to tug my arms off, ashmite, and then where’ll we be? And the butter’s going to scald!”

But she’s not paying any attention to that. She’s looking at you, and then she’s peering past you, all the way back at Chapar.

Her eyes lock onto his symbol, but you can practically see her running the numbers in her head. The next smile she flashes is as bright and sunny as any she’d aim at you. “Pheres!” she shrieks, giving Iconic a shove as she shrugs him off forcibly. Her eyes are still fixed on Chapar, and - oh! If it’d been Malaya, you’d never have risked this. But you know how Sipara works.

You know she’ll take anything over a blueblood, even if it’s an olive with more blue hanging from his ears than skin.

And sure enough, she doesn’t so much as direct a snarl his way. Sipara gets right intp Chapar’s face, bumping her nose against his as he flinches back. “Hi!” Then she pivots to fling herself into your arms, full-bodied. When you stumble, she just wraps her arms around you, burying her face in your hair like it’s been perigees, not one week. “Pheres, tyrian tits, I missed youuu. Who’s this? The fuck, you didn’t say you were coming - you didn’t say you were bringing anyone –”

“Sipara,” you say, muffled. She’s butting her head against your chin like a cat, and you’re having to avoid curls in your mouth with every word. Perhaps you’d be better off if you just accepted them, because ID looks like he’s ready to cull you right here. “Hello! Ah - this is Chapar! I’ve told you all about him -”

“Hi,” Chapar squeaks, his ears pinned, and for a moment, you think Sipara’s going to say something. Her nose wrinkles like she just might.

You’re not expecting Iconic to beat her to it. “You’re bringing home strays now? My goodness gracious, Dysseu.” How much condescension can one troll fit into his words? Your face’s warming as he takes in Chapar, eyes dragging up and down him like he’s trying to judge. “I just didn’t know we were a gosh darn hostel -”

You open your mouth.

“Oh my god, ID, shut up,” Sipara snaps over her shoulder instead, before you can get the words out, and in the sudden silence, you could hear a pin drop. She doesn’t seem to notice, though. She just grins at you, toothy and eager, and twines her arm through yours as she tugs you towards the nearest kitchen. “C'monnn. We made honeypots! You should try ‘em. D'you like honeypots, dude? 'cause, like, spoiler alert, I’m the best cook for 'em in the entire fucking city –”

Beside you, Chapar’s brows are knit, but he’s trying to match her grin, nervous though he is. But when you beam, you’re not watching Sipara. No, your gaze is locked on Iconic.

He does not smile back.

SIPARA NZINGA & PHERES DYSSEU | eight sweeps

“My  back hurts,” he complains one day. He’s built a nest of blankets and  covers, and is now sprawled across Sipara’s concuscpecient couch while  she works on the floor next to it, husktop in her lap. He’s supposed to  be sleeping, but.

She isn’t paying attention. He reaches out and tugs on a curl. “Sipa~,” he whines.

She  turns her head, and he yanks his fingers away just before her teeth   clamp down. Sipara is the worst. “Take off the shirt, then,” she says   irritably. “Iunno why you even got it on still, jfc. I promise I won’t   cull you.”

Pheres huffs. “Like you could!” Still, she has a   point. His undershirt is hardly tight enough to be actively detrimental to his health, but… it’d be very nice to take it off. Let his skin   breathe.

He hooks his thumbs into the bottom, and pulls.

> VITILIGO

The shirt comes off easily enough. The shirts for hiding, not compression.

The  skin underneath is mottled with colour: not just the uniform dusky gray  of his hands and face, but lighter shades of pinkish red, where the  pigment has worn away, and rose gray where it’s in the process. Looking  at it makes his skin itch, and his hands curl.

It’s spread, since the last time he checked.

He wants to scratch it off, dig his claws in and rip until it all looks uniform under the rosewood of his blood. He used to do that as a grub, when the first translucent spot appeared: pick and dig and scratch, because the dark weal of scar tissue is ugly, but the piebald marks will get him culled.

He places a hand on his side, and Sipara clears her throat.

“Nice spots, dude,” she jeers, and he drops the shirt on her head instead. 

> SPHERES

The shirt is a struggle to get off.

The  bottom wants to roll, for one, and the top wants to cling. Every time he  tugs one way, the fabric wants to go the other, and when he finally  gets it over his head, it’s to be greeted by the sound of fabric  ripping.

“You broke the strap,” Sipara says, ever helpful.

He  makes a face at her. It’s nice to be uncompressed, and he takes a deep  breath, just for the novelty of it. After days in the undershirt, it almost hurts, but the feeling of his lungs expanding and detracting, unrestricted, is more than worth it.

The way that his spheres shake with the motion is a little disconcerting, though.

Pheres flops back down on the bed, and he’s promptly reminded why he wears the undershirt: he has to shift positions and figure out a new way to lay, because it seems like his rumblespheres are constantly in the way. Getting resettled takes a moment.

He’ll have to figure out a way to fix the strap before he leaves Sipara’s hive. He already has enough trouble with his horns: he doesn’t need a third rack always getting in the way, too. 

> SCARS

He pulls the shirt over his horns, balls it up, and tosses it to the corner.

He  isn’t planning on looking down: the scars haven’t changed in sweeps, and he’s worked hard to keep it that way. But curiosity gets the best of him, as it always does. The little nicks from knives and claws across   his collar and chest, the rippled flesh where a blueblood stabbed him on  his breastbone, the bite from Rmeros’s lusus… there isn’t much skin left unmarked, and he can feel bile rising in his gorge as he looks at it.

(Each one is proof of some mistake, writ large on his flesh, and he hates it, but what he hates more is the impression it gives. His torso is a mottled weal of scar tissue and damage. It’s not the skin of a docile book-keeper: it’s the skin of some sort of thug.)

“Hey, dude, stop eyefucking yourself,” Sipara says, and when he looks up, she raises an eyebrow and sneers. “My dads got better scars than that shit.”

“Hell, I bet your dad has better scars than that shit, and he’s dead.”

He huffs, flings himself back down on the bed, and bundles himself in one of the blankets, until there’s no skin showing at all, just fabric. It helps, a little. “Oh, shut up.” 

> GILLS

He  outgrew this shirt two sweeps ago, and wrestling out of it is a chore.  When he finally gets it over a shoulder, it gets stuck to a horn: when  he wrests that free, it clings around his face like a eggshroud, and  Sipara has to get up and pull it free.

He was hoping to avoid her, but now that she’s up, there’s no point in objecting  as Sipara performs her usual survey. She runs her fingers along his sides,  prying gently at the closed operculum and peering at the maroon gills  underneath. For once, she’s careful of her claws.

“Deep breath,” she orders, and Pheres obliges, dragging  in air through his lungs and forcing it slowly out of his protesting  gills. He doesn’t look down as she works, but keeps his eyes focused on  the cracks in the ceiling.

(Mutants deserve to be culled. But  he’s not a mutant: just a cusp, Sipara says, like her, like Myrrha, like Rmeros  and every other member of their line.)

(Of course, none of them have gills, not even Rmeros. He checked.)

“You need to use these more. Like, shit’ll starts rotting if you don’t  -”

“Use  them where?” he asks, incredulous. “In the river? Shall I remind you   that the last time I tried that, we had to cull someone?”

She   paps him in the face, her claws little pinpricks of pain as they drag on the skin. “No, dumbass,”  she says, patient: “In my tub. Come on, I’ll get my husktop and you can  like, blow bubbles or whatever. You need to get some water through  those fuckers, ‘cause if they start crumbling off, I’m not cleaning it  up…" 

>NOTHING

He doesn’t get much farther then rolling the bottom of his shirt before he gives up.

Logically  speaking, cloth is no protection. There’s nothing the opaque shirt does  to benefit him: it won’t stop knives, claws,  or even sharp words. But  the constant pressure against his skin feels like it could,  and he finds the idea of stripping and leaving nothing between his  thoracic struts and the rest of the world thoroughly unappealing.

Even if he’s only lounging around with his moirail.

"No,” he says, flicking one of her oversized ears, “I think I’d rather just complain.” 
 

>AFTER

> IN THE FAR, FAR FUTURE

Congratulations: after ten long sweeps, there’s finally blood on your hands.

Won’t Sipara be proud?

When you try to laugh, you choke on the sound.

The room is quiet except for your own ragged breathing. In the dark, againsnt the near-pitch of your skin, the blood on your hands looks mutant bright, the sort of swill you find in animals and the antagonists on pupa’s shows. The blood of a thing that deserves to be culled! But that’s just on shows. You have to be reasonable. This is still blue streaking your skin, and flaws like the saturation are just.. character traits, in bluebloods. Signs of nobility!

Quanin’s blood is nearly this bright.

The blaster in your hand slips, nearly clatters to the floor. You have to fumble to catch it, the slick plastic sliding against your hands, but you don’t dare to lose your grip. If you drop it –

The glance down is involuntary, then you’re jerking your chin up, squeezing your eyes shut. You suppose it doesn’t matter if you drop it. (She’s dead. Blueblood durability does not cure a hole in the head.) The blaster’s got blood on it. There’s blood on your lenses and your cheek, and when you try to wipe off your face, you just smear it. ‘Backwash,’ Sipara used to call this when she’d stumble out of the ring, covered in some unfortunate’s chrome and laughing from the pain of it.

You’ve seen people shot. You know how it works. Why didn’t you add some distance?

Why don’t you ever think things through?

“Holy shit,” Emerel says.

.. oh. That’s why.

He sidesteps the body on the floor. There’s still jade on his mouth where she hit him, but he licks it off of his lips absently. He can’t remove the jade on his face half as easily: even in the flickering, watery light of the room, the flushed green blemishes are already turning garish against his pale skin. Your gaze keeps drifting back to the mark on his face where her blaster’s handle struck. It’s still hard to believe that she hit him. Jades are vital to the empire, just as important and rare as any violet. People don’t hit them. People certainly don’t try to cull them for anything short of treason.

But right now, nothing makes sense. Not any of the past hour, not your own actions, not the way that Emerel’s looking at you, bright-eyed and startled. But at least he’s familiar.

Perhaps that’s why you don’t move when he closes the distance between you. You don’t even move when he reaches out, even though your heart is racing. If he’s going to take the blaster, then that’s fine. It’s not like he’s going to cull you! Emerel is your matesprit, and you just helped him: he’s not going to cull you for that, no matter what hue the legislacerator was.

No matter how hemoloyal he is. No matter how much this entire situation is unquestionably, undeniably your fault, because redroms don’t cull their partners: isn’t that what everyone says? Even knowing that, when he reaches out, you flinch all the same –

– but he just picks you up, hands sliding neatly under your arms, and pulls you in tight againsnt him. The blaster drops out of your fingers. Suddenly you’re clinging to him, burying your face into his neck. Everything feels brittle and awful and wrong, but he’s familiar. He’s safe. He’s yours, damn it, and even the faint reek of blood under his soaps and perfumes can’t ruin the way you relax into him.

(If he culls you, that’s fine. But he’s not going to.)

“Holy shit, Pheres,” he repeats. There’s something off about his voice. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“What else was I supposed to do?” It comes out muffled. You don’t want to lift your face, or break contact, so you shift your cheek instead and press your nose against his neck. You’re smearing blood on him. Emerel is probably the only person in the world who won’t mind, and at that thought, your breath hitches with something that’s close to amusement. “Let her shoot you?” you accuse him.

The pause lasts a moment too long. This time, when you laugh, you don’t choke on it. “Don’t be stupid,” you say, and if it’s brittle - if your voice is a little shaky - well. It’s softened by fondness. Emerel can’t help it. He is stupid, and you just culled a highblood for your stupid, stupid matesprit. “I’m not - if I thought -”

There’s mottled green blossoming along his jawline even as you watch.

“I wish I’d’ve shot her sooner,” is what comes out, vehement.

The arms around you tighten. Em makes a startled little noise, buries his face in your hair, and suddenly the blood on your hands barely matters at all.

SIPARA NZINGA | 15 years old / 6.92 sweeps

Sipara’s sprawled out across the floor of your cart, her head nestled into the bony curve of your lap. She’s gone and ruined her headfluff again since the last time you’ve seen her, combed and pressed and perm until it flows thin and straight through your fingers, and you don’t have the slightest idea how you can fix this sort of damage.

If she’d stay with you long enough, then you could deep-condition it. Give it a protein treatment, see how it responds. Trim the ends, maybe –

But she won’t, anymore than you’ll stay with her. Being near Sipara means dealing with ID, and being near you means dealing with Malaya and the rest of the troupe. Better to just sneak moments like this when you can then to deal with the stress of clashing with each other’s quadrants.

(Friends. Whatever the troupe is to you.)

So for now, you’ll have to content yourself with merely combing her headfluff. Your fronds are working their way through, and it’s much more difficult than normal: it’s matted in the normal tangle that she lets it fall into, but there’s scratches in there, too, and blood, slick as oil under your fingertips.

When you inspect your clawtips, you discover it’s blue.

She’s half-dozing under your attentions, rumbling away like a purrbeast. You flick a horn to get her attention, your digestion sack coiling with distress. “Sisi,” you murmur, “what have you been up to?”

She opens one orange-streaked eye and shifts until she can peek at you through the frizz. “Dude.” Her face is drowsy with sleep, and her words are slurred with amusement. You pap her just on instinct, and she laughs, nuzzles her face into the palm of your hand. “You don’t even want to know.”

How Sipara spends her nights is a mystery to you: she does her fights, but you know there’s other things, too, things that require new hives each perigee and act as a constant depletion of your bank account. She dismisses it as part of her prosthetics business, and you’ve never pressed further.

With blue on your fingers and scratches on her face, you remember why.

(“You don’t want to know,” she says, but you know what she means: she doesn’t want to tell you.)

(That’s fine. There’s things you don’t tell her, either.)

She butts her head against you, already asleep again and still purring away steadily. Quietly, so you don’t wake her, you go back to her hair.

It’s Saturday morning, and Malaya was supposed to be accompanying you and Chapar to one of his parties. The rest of the troupe had deigned not to join: Khaneh said it sounded lame, and Trieua had work, both of which you’d been grateful for.

You’d never admit it, but Chapar’s maybe your favorite person in the whole troupe. And of course, you never turned down an opportunity to have Malaya to yourself! (Or, well - mostly to yourself.)

But at the last moment, after the two of you had been dawdling in your cart for nearly an hour, Malaya’d arrived, his hair wind-tousled and already apologising before he’d even made it through the doorway. “Sorry! Mysore called,” he’d said, pressing the invitations into Chapar’s loose grip. “But you two have fun, yeah?”

And then he’d bolted back to whatever emergency his moirail had embroiled themselves in this time.

If you’d had it your way, that would’ve been the end of it: you’ve been to highblood parties before, and they’re not much fun, if you don’t know the people there already. (For one, no one wants to talk to the maroonblood, not unless they’re trying to order drinks.) But Chapar had insisted on going. “When’s the next time we’re going to get to go to a bash like this?” he’d asked you, pleading. “Come on, Pheres, I already picked out an outfit and everything!”

So you’d agreed.

And now that you’re here… well, it’s not exactly as bad as you thought it’d be.

Both you and Chapar are wearing white and one of Malaya’s scarves, the fancy ones embroidered with his symbol. He’d insisted on it, back when the three of you were supposed to be going together: for safety’s sake, he’d said! None of you are quadrants, but you’re a sort of clade all the same, and that makes showing off his colour like this alright.

And, surprisingly, it’s effective even without him here. No one’s mistaken you for one of the serving staff the entire time you’ve been here, and no one’s even really noticed your symbol: their eyes hit the white and then the scarf, and then they slide right off like oil on the water, like the fact you’ve got a rich highblood quadrant - friend - roaming the halls somewhere is all that matters.

If you’re honest, the party so far has actually been pretty amazing. People have been talking to the both of you, and not because they want you to take drink orders: they’re chatting and joking and flirting, which you’re used to, but Chapar’s face keeps lighting up whenever anyone so much as looks his way. It’s adorable.

Adorable, but a little exhausting, so you and Chapar have holed yourself up at one of the tables near the mostly abandoned buffet, making a game of stacking your plates full of the fanciest tidbits you could find. Chapar’s been winning, by virtue of the fact he’s more willing to rummage through the platters to find the sort of things they hide in the back. “Look at this, Pheres,” he crows, lifting the lid off of a plate bristling with roll-up bugs: “They’ve got stuffed idotea!”

“.. stuffed with what?” They didn’t bother removing the legs, or the antannae, and it looks like they’re ready to unfurl right off the plate. You blanche, wrinkling up your nose, but Chapar dumps a handful onto his plate like he’s not even bothered. “I dunno,” he says, cheerful. “But I’ll find out!”

You don’t even like food much, but every time you finish something, Chapar’s right there, dumping some appalling new find on your plate to try. (Not just stuffed idotea: they’ve got candied seastars. Gross.) And between bites, the two of you gossip about the people around you. Guessing who’s who’s quadrant turns into a discussion of outfits turns into –

“Look at her,” Chapar breathes beside you.

– bluebloods are so pretty.

And Chapar’s got an excellent eye for spotting the most striking ones. The girl he’s nodding towards is tall, with the sort of smooth, glowing skin and softness that only highbloods ever seem to quite get, and small, elegantly curving horns, so unlike the massive clodhoppers stuck on you and Chapar’s heads.

For one, she’s got jewelry on them, little gold chains that are just as delicate as the horns holding them up.

But there’s something off about the way she’s walking: jerkily, a little unsteadily, like she’s got on shoes that’re a size too small. (She doesn’t: she’s barely even wearing shoes, just blue slippers, and they’re perfectly fitted. So maybe it’s the way her skin is moving? It’s dimpling in a way you didn’t know skin could move, bunching up like rubber every time she moves.

It takes you a moment to realise it’s the fins.

You’ve never actually seen a seadweller before in real life! They stay in the docks district, for the most part, or with the Imperial Education Program, and you’re not allowed near either of those things - that’s the one thing that everyone you know agrees on, from Sipara to Malaya, like they think something terrible will happen if you even see one.

Nothing terrible’s happening, though, except for the way your mouth’s gone all dry and papery. There’s just enough off that it feels a little like you’re looking at a mutant - the sort of prickly unease you get whenever someone’s got too many pupils, or too few horns.

You’re just being silly, though, because when you glance at Chapar, he’s all big eyes and sunstruck looks. “Man, she is so hot,” he murmurs, and you bob your head before you can think twice, because that’s just the truth, no matter how you feel: she *is* pretty. She looks like everything a highblood should, even down to her clothes, and, yes, the fins. “.. but she’s too high caste for me,” he sighs.

“She isn’t!” The denial’s reflexive. You like Chapar so much: he’s the only other lowblood in the group, and he’s only half a sweep older than you, which means the two of you might as well be clutchmates compared to everyone else. More than that, he isn’t like Khaneh, or even sometimes Malaya. He’s always seeking you out, asking about your books, talking to you even when he isn’t bored or looking for attention.

He’s nice! And the idea that anyone’s too high for him feels like a personal affront. “You’re olive,” you huff, looking away. He’s staring at you like you’re speaking Common. “That’s only…”

You count off on your fingers, each movement slower than the next. “.. um. Six steps.”

“Seven. You’ve got to count olive, too.” He sounds glum.

“Ah, it doesn’t matter how much of a caste gap it is!” He sounds soglum. You puff out your cheeks and gesture with your free hand, a big, decisive swoop that nearly knocks the plate out of his hand. “Don’t you watch vids? Everyone likes analogous pairings, and you’re practically blue. You could talk to her! I’m sure she won’t mind.”

“I could talk to her first, if you’d like,” you add. “Just to show you how!”

He blinks at you, like he didn’t quite hear what you said. “What? Pheres –”

“Just stay right here,” you tell him, shoving your plate into his hands, and you trot over to her, ignoring the way Chapar’s spluttering behind you.

The crowd’s easy to navigate. Everyone here is so tall! (Everyone’s always so tall compared to you, but that’s alright: you’re sure you’ll grow soon enough.) All you have to do is bob and weave to duck the occasional wayward elbow and slip between the dancers, and then you’re next to the seadweller girl.

“Hello!” you chirp, angling your head up so that you can see her face. You’re going to get a crick in your neck if you try to keep this up, but you don’t care. You’re going to prove Chapar wrong.

She blinks down at you. The movement’s all wrong: too slow and too twitchy all at once, with a soft, wet noise you can hear from all the way back here. This close, you can see what you thought were fins are just a strange sort of ear, instead, and her eyes are purple as the church tents you see sometimes. She must be a cusp. You’ve never seen one of those before! “Hello,” she says, baffled, and you clear your throat, making your eyes big and apologetic.

“Ah, I’m so sorry to bother you, miss –”

“Oh, no, it’s alright,” she murmurs, still confused. This is why you love dealing with highbloods: they’re so reflexively polite, and it’s easy to use that to your advantage. You dimple at her, tilting your head so that your hair cascades to the side, and her smile becomes a little more genuine.

“- but I just saw your dress from afar, and I thought.. well, it’s just amazing! And that’s such a lovely colour.” It’s made of leather, and it has to be the most ghastly shade of black you’ve ever seen, somehow yellow and brown all at once, but her face lights up all the same.

She’s only said a few words, but they were thick, heavy in a way that you don’t really recognise. But you used to talk strangely, too, before you learned how to speak Standard properly, and it gives you an idea. “Did you buy it in Temasek?” you ask, widening your eyes.

“Temasek..? Oh! The city! No, no, I bought it from Blackstone.” She gives a self-conscious little laugh. “I’m not from around here,” she explains. “Farther up north. Much farther.”

“But, ah, I like your scarf,” she adds, reaching out and taking a hold of the end. You hold still patiently as she rubs it between her fingers, testing out the fabric even as her eyes flit down to your symbol. You’re used to this sort of thing: everyone’s always touching you, like being maroon means they don’t have to ask, but you suppose that’s alright. It’s not like you mind! “You’ve got a Juno as your matesprit, hm?”

“Oh, no, not my matesprit! Just my friend. Ah..” The conversation isn’t going where you planned: she’s talking to you right now, but there’s no way you can bring in Chapar, and that was the entire point of this.

But that’s alright. If the conversation isn’t working, you’ll just have to make it work! Luckily, she seems like the nicer sort, and you’ve always got a plan for those. You sigh, letting your shoulders fall just enough that she notices, and when she makes a little questioning noise, you put on a brave face: tilt your chin back up, furrow your brows just enough to look worried, and then you smile weakly, biting your lip just the slightest amount.

Most people like it when you look pathetic, and judging by the ways her eyes soften, she’s not any different.

“He was supposed to be here,  but I think..  well.  He just forgets sometimes.”

“Oh,  that’s dreadful,” she breathes, pressing the back of her palm to her mouth.

“Oh, no, no!” You shake your head, hard enough that your hair goes flying, and you make your voice high and earnest: “I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong idea! He’s just - you know -” You wring your hands, glancing up towards her long enough to make eye contact, and then letting your gaze drop back down to the floor. You can’t push it too heavily! People get mad when they think you’re trying to manipulate them. But a soft enough touch - “I suppose he just forgot Chapar and I don’t know anyone here,” you murmur, peering up at her through your eyelashes.

“You don’t know anyone? And he left you here by yourself?” She looks appalled. You hope she isn’t a gossip, or else Malaya’s going to find this all dreadfully unfunny. “You know..” She bites her lip, and then frowns, decisive. “You can sit with me at my table, yes. Plenty of people! Friendly people,” she says, emphasizing the word. “Not everyone here is friendly to little lowbloods, yeah? We will make sure you have good time. You and your other friend.”

“Oh,” you say,  clapping a hand to your mouth and letting your eyes widen. (The better to hide the way you want to laugh. Of course it worked, but – you can’t believe this worked.) “You don’t have to! Ahh, I don’t - if we’d be a bother –”

“I insist! Where are they?”

All the way back against the wall, Chapar’s looking at you like you’ve grown a second head, a toothpick full of vegetables dangling from his hand. You beam at him, give a little wave. “Chapar,” you call,  and the girl behind you turns to gesture with you. “Come here! She wants us to sit with her!”

Your name is Pheres Dysseu, you are seven sweeps old, and right now, you can’t swallow, because there’s a sword pressing into your neck.

To be fair: it’s a wooden sword! But just because it can’t kill you doesn’t mean that it can’t hurt.

Hasn’t Triệua has spent the last hour proving exactly that?

But when you’d actually made it to the field, you’d discovered the coordinator had had some crisis with her moirail, and the event had been cancelled.

The smart thing to do would’ve been just to go back to Malaya’s hive. But it’d been a three hour drive, most of which he’d spent behind the wheel, and he’d had different ideas. “We have the equipment,” he told the milling mass of your cohort, his eyes shining bright in the moonlight: “- and we have enough people! Why not just hold our own event, lah? Much better than theirs, anyway.”

And then he’d paired all of you up, given you the wooden practice swords and set you to work. He’d pulled you to work with him at first, of course, and that’d been fun: he’d spent most of that time correcting your pose, your grip on the sword, your posture, your stance, and you didn’t actually have to practice anything at all.

But then Khaneh had called him away, and Triệua had taken over as your partner instead.

There’s sweat pooling through the cloth of your shirt, and your hair is plastered wetly to your forehead, the back of your neck, the exposed skin of your shoulders. Every breath feels like you’re pulling air up from a well deep below, one with a ragged rope and a handle that doesn’t want to turn. You’re ready to quit. You’ve been ready since she landed that first blow to your side, but she won’t let you.

And worse yet, though her face is faintly teal, she’s not even really winded.

You could just teleport away. If it was just Triệua, then you would! (If it was just Triệua, you would’ve never agreed to this dumb training session in the first place.) But the rest of your cohort’s stopped practicing to watch, and everyone hates when you use your psionics. It hurts their eyes, they say, like they don’t get warning in the spark of your horns to close them beforehand.

At least right now, you’re not having to move. Triệua’s got you pressed up against a wall, her sword to your throat, and it’s a relief just to stand here and try to breathe - there’s no need for her to be this close, is there?

She’s got her free hand braced on your shoulder, the curve of her palm cool against the arc of your throat, and she’s leaned in close enough that you can smell her breath. (She ate fish for breakfast. It’s horrid.) She’s not saying anything, just glaring, and…

She’s won. She could step away. And even if she wants to make a point - what point? - then she’s got long arms: she doesn’t need to be looming like this to keep you penned. She’s close enough that you can feel the chill radiating off of her skin, warmer but less pleasant than Malaya’s, and that is entirely too close.

“Are you done yet?” you ask her, deliberately bright.

“When you yield,” she snaps, and your eyebrows go up. You’ve been shouting yield since the first time she hit you, and she didn’t care now: she just kept it up, forcing you to block, keeping you moving.

… herding you back into this corner.

When you peer over her shoulder, your cohort is still watching. Chapar is frowning, worrying his lip - Khaneh is leaning forward, her eyes narrowed like she’s trying to see - but it’s Malaya who you’re searching for. He doesn’t look concerned at all.

Just.. amused.

(She’s not winded, but her face is a blotchy teal.)

(Oh.)

You could still jump, the complaints of your cohort be damned. But a much more interesting idea’s just struck you. Leaning up just presses the wood in harder against your throat, but that’s alright: you can deal. Triệua isn’t that much taller than you! And you only need to lift yourself a few inches until you’re close enough to kiss her.

It’s nothing personal. You’ve kissed nearly all of the people in your little self-made cohort: none of you are properly clade, but it’s just a thing that’s happened. You spend most of your time with Malaya, but everyone here is handsome and older and blue, and they like you. They think you’re funny, and smart, and they laugh at your jokes, and most of them think you’re cute. 

(”Adorable,” Khaneh told you once, and you’d bit her for the indignity.)

If indulging that makes them like you better, then why shouldn’t you?

Triệua’s always been the exception, though. She’s never said it to you, but Chapar’s told you all about the sort of things she says when you’re not here. (Not even because you’re too young, which would be nonsense, but the sort you could almost understand - but because you’re too red, which doesn’t even make sense. Only animals are red! You’re burgundy.) You’d always figured it was a platonic sort of distaste, though. Triệua’s so much older, old enough that she’s got an official adult title and a job off in the city proper, and you’re… not.

So kissing her is just a way of making her back off. She’ll recoil and move the sword, and you’ll abscond before she can hit you. It’s the perfect plan!

Or it would be, but Triệua doesn’t pull away immediately: there’s a beat where her eyes go wide, and then she’s actually leaning into you,  her grip tightening on your shoulder, biting at your mouth until you’re tasting iron. She’s got teeth almost as sharp as Sipara’s. Each nip stings, and not in a pleasant way.

She’s heavier than you thought.

She’s not moving the sword.

You make a surprised noise, trying to twist away as the wood pushes in hard against your throat, and.. oh, thank heavens, she’s pulling away now, looking appalled.

At you? At herself? You don’t care. Your throat aches from where the wood dug in, your lip is bleeding, and there’s a wall to your back, but that won’t stop you from scampering away as fast you can. She doesn’t even react as you slide past her, just jerks back to get out of your way, and it’s a relief.

Malaya and the rest of your cohort are lounging there, and Malaya’s laughing. “Good work on the escape, la,” he calls out, his hands cupped around his mouth. You can’t see his grin, but you can see the skin wrinkled under his eyes, hear the amusement in his voice: “Unusual technique, but points for the execution!”

Behind you, Triệua is not laughing. Whatever dilemma she’d been having is over: there’s a snatch of air above your head, and you duck your horns low, pivot around to face her. It’s a mistake! She’s looming over you like a bad daydream, her blue eyes water-bright in the shadow of her face. She’s teal, barely blue at all, hardly worth paying attention to - hardly worth being afraid of, but when she’s baring her fangs like this…

“I have a fucking kismesis,” she snaps, like you all haven’t heard her whining about how Perlis does too, like there isn’t burgundy blood on her teeth. All you did was kiss her! She was the one that went and escalated it.

She was the one who penned you in in the first place.

You need to abscond. You need to apologise, because you thought you were just playing around, but she’s clearly taking it more personally than you thought. You should do a lot of things, but there’s burgundy blood on her teeth, your lip hurts, and she’s not supposed to try and intimidate you!

(She’s not supposed to hit you. You didn’t think that was how black-flirting went.)

“.. ah, but obviously he’s not as pretty as me,” is what comes out instead, sharp and brittle, and you regret it immediately. Triệua‘s eyes go wide enough you can see the red at the rims. Absconding is not an option, not when she’s this close, so —

When you jump, landing neatly in the stands behind Malaya, everyone’s too busy trying to calm her down to even yell at you.

The first thing you notice is that Riccin is much taller then you thought when you were drunk.

They’re leaning against the doorway of their hiveblock, arms folded and eyebrows raised. Without their facepaint, and dressed in pajamas, they should be less intimidating, not more.

But those pajamas look like they cost more than your entire annual stipend, despite the yellow embroidered neatly into the collar, and they’re not smiling: just watching you with their strange teal eyes, and waiting for you to speak.

“Hello! I don’t know if you remember me, but -”

“Guess the drones didn’t cull you,” they say, dry, and you laugh sheepishly.

“They didn’t! Lucky me. Ahh.. well.” You clear your throat and put on your most winning smile. “I’m afraid I didn’t paint the best picture of myself when we met. Being, ah, drunk and all. So I thought it might be nice to start over! Introduce ourselves properly.”

“My name’s Pheres Dysseu,” you say, “and it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

You hold out your left hand, the flushed skin of your wrist exposed and the palm empty for them to grab. Handshakes are a greenblood thing, but the gesture is one that is recognised by all castes.

You’d thought. The disbelieving stare suggests you were wrong.

“Alright,” they say, standing up. The smile Riccin gives is languid as their movements as they step forward. “Shit sounds fair. But cut the bileblood shit. You want to do a new meet and greet, brother, we’re doing this the church way.”

If all clown greetings involve tongue, you decide later, maybe you will start going to Carnival.

2. Indigo - 8 sweeps | PITCH

That is one thing you’ll give bluebloods: they’re very pretty.

Oh, not all of them: you’ve had customers missing eyes or teeth, with crooked horns or features that, put together, just really weren’t very flattering. And you’ve met a great deal of lowbloods who you would say go beyond being merely pretty. (Yourself included.)

But for the most part, your customers all have sharp teeth, clear eyes, and horns that they keep sanded and oiled. A higher allowance means more money towards food, and medicine, and self-care, and there’s certainly something to be said for the effect a healthy flush can have on one’s appearance.

Just because you think they’re pretty, though, doesn’t mean you’re interested. You don’t mind appreciating an attractive troll, and you’re friendly to everyone - but unfortunately, sometimes that means your customers get confused.

“I’m sorry, but - I do have to go," you say, laughing, but it’s not from amusement. Vignei’s been crowding you since you first came into her hive, and now that the caegars are in your account, you’d really like to leave. She’s always been one of your friendlier customers, but lately she’s been getting uncomfortably so.

Case in point: she’s draped an arm across your shoulder, and she’s tracing a finger along the spiral of your caudal horn, just hard enough that you can feel the scrape of her claw. Vignei has to notice you’re stiff as a wire beside her: it’s starting to strike you that she just doesn’t care.

(You shouldn’t have come inside. Some of your customers seem fine, but they’re bluebloods, and as far as they’re concerned, you might as well just be an especially clever animal.)

(There’s a reason they call your lot redbloods, and it has nothing to do with hue.)

"Whatever it is, it can’t be that important," she purrs. "Just give me a moment; I have a very convincing argument on why you should stay–”

Her lips are as cold as saltwater against yours when she kisses you, and that’s what finally spurs you into movement. Sometimes jumping is a chore: at others, like this, it’s instinctive. One moment her arm is around you, and the next you’re across the room, your horns ringing as you try to reorient.

Vignei blinks: for a moment, she just looks confused, eyebrows knit with growing displeasure as she scans the room. When she finally spots you, inching your way towards the open doorway, the look she shoots your way has entirely too many teeth to be flushed, and you flee.

3. BROWN - 7 sweeps | FLUSHED

It’s amazing how much will fit into a bag. You never thought much of the easy way Elilah’s things had spread through your hive over the past few perigees, but watching him pack, it’s striking you exactly how much of what you thought was yours is actually just his.

You stay tucked in the corner, watching him work. He made it clear he didn’t want your help, when he first said he couldn’t deal with someone who was just going to end up as a ship engine, and you should probably just have left then, let him pack in peace.

But if you’re never going to see him again, you want to lock him into memory now: the way he stands and moves, the clothes he wears. He’s been growing faster than you lately, all lanky legs and long limbs that you thought you’d get to see evened out, and you want to remember that, too.

“Well,” Elilah finally says. “That’s all.”

He looks at you for the first time in what feels like ages, and maybe he still does pity you, at least a little, because he comes up and presses a kiss to your cheek. If it’s any colour, then it’s white as snow, but you lean into it, because that’s all he’s going to give. “Later, Dysseu,” he says, picking up his bag. “Have a good life.”

4. Brown - 5 sweeps | PALE

Your snout is leaking like a faucet, and your ganderbulbs are rheumy and red where the vessels are oozing. There’s blood all over your face, and no matter how much you blot at it, the streaky rivulets won’t stop. And your pan aches.

There’s blood on your hands too, the same streaky rosewood as the stuff on your face, but this isn’t your blood: it’s Rmeros’s, and the thought makes you start crying again, wet, loud sobs that leave you aching from your horns to your toes.

Sipara was trying to figure out the cart controls, but she drops the ignition sticks and bolts over at the sound that rips from your chest. The noises you’re making are horrible, but your ganderbulbs and your snout and your pan all hurt, and you can’t seem to make yourself stop.

“I killed my moirail,” you wail, stumbling over the words. Each breath feels like it’s being ripped from your lungs, and no matter how hard you gasp for air, it’s not enough. “I killed him and he’s dead and it’s all my fault-”

“Shh,” she says, frantic, “sh sh shoosh!” She grabs your face with her hands, nearly jabbing you in the eye with a claw, and then she stops, like she doesn’t know what to do. There’s snot on your face now in addition to the blood and tears, and you are just a complete and utter mess, but she doesn’t seem to notice. Sipara stares at you, her eyes wide with fear and worry and determined concentration, like you’re one of her broken tools and she’s figuring out how to fix you -

And then she plants a kiss on your forehead and the shock of it makes you stop mid-sob. Sipara is all fangs and elbows and claws that scrape even when she’s playing nice, but right now, she’s holding your face like she holds her lusus, like you’re something she has to be careful not to break. “We didn’t kill your moirail,” she says, as matter as fact as if she’s telling you the moon was green, “because I’m your moirail, okay? So shoosh.”