“Ah, Viola! Just who I was looking for.”

“Huh?” Viola found herself completely caught off guard. Her mind had been elsewhere – which, really, had been the norm for a while now. Specifically, she’d been absorbed in her PET, reading up on the latest news from Locksmouth. She probably wasn’t the only one, either – they were fresh on the heels of yet another Incident. This time it had gone dark for a full half a fucking month. There were still, in spite of the first Locksmouth Incident, a lot of people in Esterwood who worked in Locksmouth or had family in Locksmouth. If anything, there were more people with ties to Locksmouth than ever before, what with the new Fabricatory that was apparently in the works? Construction still hadn’t started yet, but it felt like every other day new people were showing up with the explanation that they were going to work there when it was built. So it made sense that a lot of people were invested in the current events.

But, well, Viola was a bit different. She’d been paying very close attention to Locksmouth since pretty much directly after the Incident. And, more specifically, she’d been keeping tabs on one Natalie Greyswift. For personal reasons. She couldn’t help but be curious about the girl who had done the impossible and beat a god.

And also maybe because Natalie had a gigantic fucking ass but listen most of it was the former okay she was still getting used to the whole “having a functional relationship” thing and being able to have sex with any of several very attractive women at basically any point she wanted so in theory her libido shouldn’t be nearly as out of control as it used to be but in practice no she was really just that fucking horny at all god damn times okay there she said it now stop judging her.

Besides, Viola had other reasons to want to pay attention to Echelon’s host. Less ass-related reasons.

The point was that Viola had been absorbed in her PET while walking from math to study hall and had been caught off guard by Dr. Baas. Who apparently wanted to talk to her. Which was usually a bad sign. “Um. Oh. Am I in trouble?”

Dr. Baas frowned slightly. “Have you done anything that might get you in trouble recently, young lady?”

“N-no...”

“Then you’re not in trouble.” Her expression softened. “Don’t worry, you girls have been on your best behaviour. I just wanted your help with a new student, that’s all.”

“Oh.” Viola did her best to suppress the reflexive cringe. She’d never exactly been the best at dealing with new people. She wasn’t quite at hide-behind-Vienna-at-all-times-and-never-say-a-word levels of shyness anymore, but she still didn’t like it. “Um. Do I have to?”

“Well, no.” Dr. Baas replied. “But at this point pretty much everyone is showing around at least one person except for you and Lars.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry. I know you’re not really... up to this kind of thing,” Dr. Baas said apologetically. “But I really don’t have any other options at this point. If it helps, you’re only really expected to show her where her classes are and show her around town.”

“Oh.” Really, Viola still wanted to say no. Technically she wasn’t expected to socialize. But in practice it would be entirely reasonable for this person to just sort of assume Viola was their first friend in this new town. And... Well, honestly, if she didn’t at least try, she would feel like kind of an asshole. And so she’d rather just not be in that situation in the first place.

But, well, on the other hand, Dr. Baas wasn’t really wrong that Viola and Lars were the only ones not showing anyone around. She got the impression that she didn’t really have a choice in the matter. And, well, they got along very slightly better, but she’d still not wish Lars on her worst enemy. “Okay.”

“It’ll only be for a few days, I promise,” Dr. Baas said gently.

“I’ll manage,” Viola replied as diplomatically as possible.

“I have her waiting in my office. I took the liberty of assigning you the same class schedule.”

“That makes sense.” So she’d been right about not having a choice. If she’d had a choice, then Dr. Baas wouldn’t have given them the same schedule.

“Follow me, please.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Viola had been to Dr. Baas’s office often enough that she didn’t really need to be shown where it was. She followed anyway, in spite of the nervous glances it got her. Oh look, one of them is in trouble again. Didn’t they cause enough commotion back in August? Why can’t they just stay in their lane?

Admittedly, most of that was probably just Viola projecting. She was very used to everyone in school knowing everyone else in school, or at least everyone who stood out even slightly, because there were so few students. Now, though, with the influx of people from Locksmouth and the Ring – and, to a lesser degree, Harbington and Anchorsway and several others to boot – the vast majority of people in the halls were new faces. Which, honestly, was almost worse. How many people’s first impression of her would be her sheepishly following the administrative head of the school to her office? She didn’t wanna think about it. Honestly, the majority probably didn’t care. But she was used to people caring and so couldn’t help but feel a bit self-conscious.

Thankfully, the school wasn’t particularly large. It didn’t take very long for them to reach their destination and therefore she didn’t need to spend too much time being stared at. “Viola, this is Miranda Lockheart. Miranda, this is Viola Coniglio. She’ll be showing you around school and around town. If you have any questions or just need someone to talk to, you can always go to her.” Viola winced slightly at that. Dr. Baas had very specifically implied that she wouldn’t need to worry about conversation, just acting as a guide.

Surprisingly, Miranda seemed to feel the same way. She sat, clearly unimpressed, with her arms crossed – all six of them, which was an impressive logistical feat. “I’m not exactly in the market for new friends right now.” Viola had to suppress the urge to let out a sigh of relief, lest she make an even worse first impression than she was probably going to give anyway. Though apparently she didn’t do a good enough job, as the spider girl frowned. “You look awfully pleased about that.”

“Oh, um. S-sorry.”

“Girls,” Dr. Baas interjected sternly. “Please behave yourselves. Especially you, Miranda. I assume you don’t want to get in trouble on your first day?”

“Whatever, I’ve only got a few months left and then I’m out of your hair.”

“I trust you to do your best to make those few months left go as smoothly as possible. There will be consequences if you don’t.”

Miranda looked defiantly up at the much larger woman. Or at least she tried to, and failed miserably. Even Maggie Corven herself had frozem up whenever faced with an angry Dr. Baas. Miranda didn’t stand a chance. “Yes’m,” she said, her tone of voice making it clear she wasn’t particularly pleased about being browbeaten into obeying.

“Good. That goes for you, too, Viola. You don’t have to be friends, but at least make a concentrated effort to get along.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good.” Dr. Baas fiddled with her PET for a moment before nodding. “You have chemistry next, but afterwards you have a free period which should give you two an excellent opportunity to get to know each other.”

“Oh boy.”

“Miss Lockheart.”

Miranda threw up all of her hands at once in a defensive gesture. “I’ll behave myself, don’t worry.”

Dr. Baas continued to frown, clearly not entirely convinced. “Miss Lockheart,” she said sternly after a moment. “I would like to make one thing abundantly clear. I don’t know what kind of school environment Locksmouth has, but I’m not an idiot. I know the warning signs of a bully when I see them. It has been a very long time since this school has had any kind of bullying problem, and I will not tolerate it happening again.”

Miranda winced, like Dr. Baas’s words were a knife to the gut. “H-hey, I’m not a bully.”

“Good. Prove it to me, then.” With that, Dr. Baas calmly took a seat behind her desk. “That will be all. I have work to do, and you’ve got classes to get to.”

Miranda opened her mouth to object, only to be cowed by one final stern glare from Dr. Baas. “Yes’m,” she sullenly muttered before getting up and turning to face Viola. “Let’s get going, I guess?”

“Um. Yeah.” Viola took this opportunity to actually take in what Miranda looked like. She was taller than Viola, but not quite as tall as Ursula or Erin. Her skin was a dark, slate grey – almost but not quite black, with yellow stripes on the side of her face that went down her neck, at least all the way to her petite chest. Or, rather, her fur, now that she got a good look at it. Not a lot of fur, just a thin layer of fuzz. Which probably made her specifically a tarantula, though Viola was admittedly not intimately familiar with the many, many different varieties of spider subtype. She had blue eyes – solid blue, with no pupil or sclera – and long, golden blond hair that was tied back in a ponytail and held in place with a black headband that matched her black leather jacket and belt, and contrasted the pink choker and the bodysuit that acted as the bulk of her clothing. It was mostly featureless aside from some seams and what seemed to be some sort of decal of a poodle on the right leg? With a long, winding leash that went all the way up to her belt.

It was also very, very tight-fitting, drawing Viola’s attention to the absolute dumpster of an ass that she’d been trying really hard to not think about while Miranda led the way out of the office but oh man was that a fucking feat. It was easily a match for Erin’s boobs, dominating the spider’s figure and inexorably drawing Viola’s eyes to it.

“Okay. Ground rules,” Miranda said tersely, not seeming to notice that the rabbit’s eyes kept on darting back to her butt. “If anyone in this relationship is the boss, it’s me. Okay? I’ve had more than enough being on the bottom of the social hierarchy, so I’m nipping all of that in the bud right here and now.”

Viola frowned slightly. She didn’t particularly see the need for anyone to be the boss if they were going to try and be friends, and even less need if they were going to just be two people who knew each other. And, well, she almost said as much, making it abundantly clear that regardless of how passive a person she might be, she wasn’t going to let Miranda walk all over her any more than Miranda would allow the opposite.

But, well, she was a passive person, very much so. And besides, they’d already not made the best of first impressions. Dr. Baas had implicitly told them to act like the god damn adults they basically were at this point, and even if Miranda wasn’t particularly interested in being civil, Viola wasn’t going to be the one to rise to the bait. No, she was going to at least try and extend an olive branch. Ignore the aggression and give Miranda the first compliment that came to mind.

Though, uh, on the other hand, the first compliment that came to mind was “nice ass.” She wasn’t quite sure just yet if Miranda would be okay with that kind of thing. “I like your jacket,” she settled on instead.

“Oh, thanks!” The spider’s mood seemed to do an immediate one eighty – all the sullenness vanished, replaced with bright and bubbly enthusiasm. “I made it myself.”

“Really?”

“Well, I customized it myself. I’m not quite at the point where I can make my own leather, but I added the extra arms and the wing decal on the back.” She turned around, showing Viola her back, and the rabbit tried her very best to focus on the two little wings on the back of the jacket and not on Miranda’s trunk full of junk.

“It’s, um. Nice.”

“One day, when I’m good enough, I wanna actually make one completely from scratch, but for now I mostly just knit.”

“You knit, too?”

“Yeah!” Miranda turned back around, smiling eagerly. “If you’d like I could make you a scarf or a sweater or-” She paused, all her enthusiasm slowly melting away. Like she’d just caught herself letting a facade drop and was desperately putting it back up before she got caught. “Um. I mean... Whatever. Let’s just go.”

“I wouldn’t mind a scarf,” Viola said softly.

“O-oh.” This time, she hadn’t quite managed to blow through the facade, but Miranda still blushed and her expression brightened, ever so slightly. “W-well, um. I’ll make one for you at some point then.”

“I’d like that,” Viola said, just a bit less nervous.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

~~~~~~

Sophie glowered. She didn’t really have any legitimate cause to be particularly upset, and she couldn’t even particularly say why. There were a lot of new faces in Esterwood of late so there wasn’t any reason to get hung up on a particular one but damned if she hadn’t managed to do exactly that. She also couldn’t really quite put her finger on how she felt, beyond that it wasn’t really a good feeling. She wasn’t really angry, but she also wasn’t really sad either. She was just... She didn’t really know, which was the problem.

“Sophie, you should really probably drop it.” Viktor Burov was doing his best to keep quiet, but he wasn’t very good at it. In spite of being the smallest of Sophie’s packmates, he’d always had problems with volume control. He whispered, or at least he was clearly trying to whisper, but it was loud and harsh.

“Maybe you should drop it, buttball.”

“Stop calling me buttball!”

“Guys stop fighting,” Greta Lang interjected nervously. Unlike Viktor, she didn’t have a problem keeping quiet. If anything, she had the opposite problem, sometimes struggling to make herself heard. This was in spite of easily being the largest. Puberty hadn’t quite hit for the other three, and even Greta hadn’t started filling out yet, but she had sprouted like a weed over the past year. The other three were no more than four feet tall, while Greta was just slightly over five and showed no signs of stopping. There were a nonzero number of upperclassmen and even a few teachers who were shorter than her.

“Greta’s right, you’re both gonna get us in trouble. Again.” Siti Ramali was the newest member of Sophie’s pack. She’d only lived in Esterwood for a month or so, and Sophie had been assigned to show her around the school and the town. And, well, from there it had only been natural that she’d just fallen in with Sophie’s pack. She, like Greta, was also softspoken, though in her case it was less that she was shy and more the result of chronic health problems. Which was part of why she fell in with Sophie’s pack so easily – she had spent a lot of her time in Locksmouth sick and so most of her old friendships had started to deteriorate. Not that she particularly minded. She was ten, after all, so those friendships weren’t quite as big a deal as they might have been if she were older. She could always make new friends.

Once she’d moved to Esterwood, though, all of that had changed. She still had a fairly weak constitution and low energy, but Sophie had been assigned to show her around town and, well, Sophie was a very stubborn sheep when she wanted to be. She had just sort of decided that Siti was in their pack now and everyone had to go along with it. And, of course, Sophie wanted to spend time with her new packmate. So what if Siti was often bedridden, if that happened then they could just hang out at her house and play video games. And if Siti was up to it then it wasn’t too hard to convince Vicky to take them to the Arcade. It was kind of kitschy and lame and frankly Siti wasn’t entirely sure how she seemed to be the only person in the group who found the mascot a bit creepy. But on the other hand, they had a lot of games – both of the video variety and also of the carnival variety. And the ticket economy wasn’t too bad and some of the prizes were pretty good. She supposed. Also they had pizza and burgers and chicken (in both tender and nugget form) and spaghetti, which was basically all any ten year old could ask for.

“Besides,” she continued, gesturing with her head. “She can pretty clearly hear us.”

“Oh.” Sophie slowly and awkwardly turned her attention back to the source of her consternation. Ami stared right back, an expression of mild, nonplussed confusion plastered on her face.

“Hi?”

“Do you want to hang out after school? We were going to go to the arcade.”

“Oh. Um. Sorry. Maybe another time.” And just like that, she turned her attention back to the front of the class. And that, right there, was the source of Sophie’s consternation. Ami had joined their class shortly before Siti, and was being shown around by one of the older kids – they were cousins, apparently? Which was all well and good, but Sophie knew from experience well that family wasn’t really the same as a proper social circle, especially when your family were like eight years older than you. You needed people your own age to spend time with. And, of course, Sophie had decided that she and her pack were going to be that for Ami.

Except where Siti had almost immediately caved to Sophie’s stubborn insistence that she was a member of their pack now, Ami had completely stonewalled her every attempt. She wasn’t mean about it or anything, either. She was perfectly civil and social and even gave clear indications that she wanted to be friends. But every time Sophie made any kind of offer to cross that bridge, Ami turned it down immediately and the sheep just... didn’t get it. Was she doing something wrong? Did Ami not like her? She could accept Ami just not liking her except, again, that didn’t seem to be the problem.

“Ugh.” Sophie flopped forward onto her desk, face down, and sulked. Viktor rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to the front of the classroom, waiting about as patiently for Mrs. Singh to begin the next period as a hyperactive ten year old boy was capable of. Greta fidgeted nervously. She had a hard time articulating it, but she felt the same as Sophie. Ami always seemed so... lonely. It was difficult to put into words, especially since she was only ten years old, but it somehow almost seemed like Ami wanted them to push harder.

Siti, for her part, reached over and gently scratched the back of Sophie’s head. She didn’t say anything, but the siamese cat’s intentions were clear; “It’s okay, just let her take things at her own pace and she’ll eventually come around.” Sophie let out a frustrated baa. Siti was right, though she hated to admit it to herself.

“Hey, um, is she okay?” Ami said.

“I’m fine,” Sophie lied.

“Look, it’s not that I don’t like you or anything, it’s just...” Ami cringed, her expression contorting into something that neither Sophie nor her packmates could properly read. “Uh, never mind. It’s a long story and the teacher’s almost here.”

“Right.” It was pretty clear that she was actively attempting to change the subject, but she did have a point. Mere seconds later, Mrs. Singh re-entered the classroom and began writing on the board. Sophie struggled to muster up her usual enthusiasm for learning.

“This must be what Vicky feels like all the time,” she muttered to herself as the lessons began.

~~~~~~

Ursula still hadn’t entirely gotten used to coming into gym class without having a buttload of extra anger to work off by punching shit. Which, really, shouldn’t have been the case quite as much as it was. It wasn’t like every single school year had her schedule be math with the entire pack followed by gym.

But, well, this year had been going on long enough that the change in dynamic had thrown her off. Things were hardly perfect, not yet. They still had their disagreements, of course. They were only human, no one could get along one hundred percent perfectly all the time. But even their disagreements felt... well, like disagreements. Not the big, borderline relationship-ending fights that they used to have all the time. If this was what having a normal, functional relationship was like then god damn she kinda wished they’d tried it sooner. She could box without being super pissed off and it felt really weird. She didn’t feel the need to go completely all out on the poor, long-suffering punching bag. Though she did still have to put in conscious effort not to punch too hard, lest she accidentally break it. Again.

Another side-effect of the new relationship dynamic was that she found herself much more motivated to do other types of workout. Not that she didn’t occasionally lift weights or do cardio or whatever before, but she always dedicated most of her workout to beating the everloving shit out of the punching bag. But now that she no longer felt the pressing need to work out her frustrations with her relationship, she found herself quickly coming to terms with the fact that she wasn’t really used to other types of workout. Not that she couldn’t do them, but that she felt rusty. Like she probably should be able to do more than she could, but couldn’t because she’d neglected those particular skills for so long. You would think that after several months she’d have gotten a bit better at bench pressing, but whatever. She was willing to take things easy for now. It wasn’t like there was any kind of pressing need for her to get good at bench pressing. Adequacy was good enough.

Well, sort of.

“Okay. Think that’s enough bench presses for the day. I’m gonna do some laps to cool off then hit the showers.”

“You sure? I bet you could manage at least a few more reps before calling it.”

Annnnnd that was why there was only sort of no pressing need for her to get good at bench pressing. Or just, like, workouts in general. “I’m good for today, Renee.”

“Couldja spot for me first, then? Then we can run and hit the showers together.”

“Yeah, okay.” Ursula was pretty sure that Renee was hitting on her. Not that she really minded; Renee was kinda hot. Growing up in Anchorsway tended to do that to folks. The Soak and all that. Ursula didn’t exactly understand the scientific details of why living underwater tended to make you thicker in all the right places but she also didn’t fucking care. She wasn’t going to complain that the cute butterfly girl she’d been told to show around town happened to have a big ass. She wasn’t exactly flat-chested either, though Ursula didn’t particularly care one way or another in that regard. She was in a relationship with Erin Leroux, after all, she had more than enough boob to last a lifetime.

But, well, it was a bit more complicated than that. Ursula wouldn’t even be having this train of thought if Renee were just some cute girl she shared gym with and who didn’t seem completely terrified of her.

“Oi. Fairbreeze, Lula.”

Ursula groaned at the use of her childhood nickname. “Yeah, Coach?” Renee said, completely ignoring her companion’s frustration.

“I want y’all to get some sparring in before class is over.”

Up until now, the only person who had ever posed any kind of threat to Ursula in the ring had been Maggie Corven. Which was where the problem with Renee, if you could even call it that, came in. Underneath all the soft curves and the abundance of pink frills and bright colours, she was fucking ripped. And, more to the point, she was a boxer. And, unlike everyone else on the Esterwood boxing team except Ursula herself, she was a damn fucking good one.

Possibly even better than Ursula. She didn’t know that for sure, of course. They’d not actually gotten around to properly fighting yet. A big part of Ursula was extremely thrilled at the prospect of fighting someone who could actually hold their own in a real fucking boxing match. But an equally big part of her was terrified that she was going to be faced with the cold reality of being a big fish in a small pond. After all, she’d never managed to beat Maggie, and she’d only beat the Marquess and Makoto by abusing Delphi – and the latter hadn’t even been a proper boxing match. Meanwhile, Renee was a complete wildcard. She’d only ever seen her fight against the other boxing team members, and while it was clear none of them were on her level, they weren’t really on anyone’s level. 

“We were gonna do some cardio.”

“Y’all can do cardio on your own time, Lula,” Coach Eckstein replied, his tone of voice making it abundantly clear that this was the final word on the matter. The implication was obvious – you’ve put this off long enough. You two are going to have to fight eventually. No one else in this school poses any kind of challenge to either of you, and neither of you are going to improve unless you have someone of your skill level to practice against.

“Actually, uh, class is kinda almost over,” Renee interjected. “I’m down to fight Ursula, but I don’t think we’ve got the time for a proper match.”

“I didn’t say y’all need to do a proper match. Just some sparring is fine. Practice your form.”

“But I want to do a proper match.”

“Okay, okay, hold on. Compromise. Why don’t we just practice our forms for now and then we can do a proper exhibition match after school? It’s not like I’ve got anywhere better to be.”

“Community service, Lula.”

“Yep. Nowhere to be and nothing to do.”

Coach Eckstein rolled his eyes. “Fine, fine. I’ll call up Mr. Stefanowitz and let him know you’re gonna skip out today.”

“Hey, hey, I can do my community service late! It’s fine!” Her father gave her a pointed Look. “Okay, okay, fine then. I’ll talk with Mr. Stefanowitz, and if he’s okay with me being late – not skipping entirely – then we can have an exhibition match today. And if not then we can do one on Monday after warming up. Is that okay with y’all?”

Coach Eckstein sighed. “Fine, fine. If you girls are that dead set on having a proper match then y’all can have a proper match. But only if Mr Stefanowitz is okay with it. I don’t want you skippin’ out on your obligations.”

“Yes, sir,” Ursula replied, just a bit impatient in that way all teenagers were when it came to their parents nagging them. “Can we go get those laps in now?”

“Yes, you can go run some laps,” Coach Eckstein said, rolling his eyes.

“You heard the man!” Renee said, eagerly hopping back and forth from one foot to the other. “Let’s get going!”

“Right,” Ursula replied. She felt... weird about this development. Somewhere between excitement and apprehension. She was going to be fighting Renee, sooner rather than later – Monday morning at the latest. And today at the earliest. All of the anticipation of fighting someone who actually knew they were doing and the anxiety that she might lose miserably were coming to a head at the same time and, frankly, Ursula wasn’t sure she could deal with it.

“Hey, Ursula, you coming?”

“Yeah.” Well, whatever. All of that was for future Ursula to deal with. Right now she had some laps to run.

~~~~~~

Lunch was a bit of an odd time of day for Vienna. She couldn’t speak for the other three, but she at least had gotten very used to eating alone. In theory, this would be the time of day when the entire pack would gather and spend some time together without having to share a class. But... well, for obvious reasons, none of them had been all that interested in spending time together unless they had to until recently. And old habits die hard – which was probably partially why Ursula and Viola weren’t around.

“Viola has apparently finally been made to show someone around the school.”

“Hoooo boy.” Well, that explained that, then. “How did she look like she was holding up?”

“Well enough,” Erin replied. “Her new friend seemed... nice enough.”

Vienna sighed. “Erin, I know you’re trying to tone down the bitchiness, but there’s a time and a place where it’s okay to be a bit catty. And, uh, in this case I think it’s specifically a bad idea to tone things down for the sake of being polite.”

Erin shrugged in response. “I couldn’t really tell you much about her as a person. She’s a spider, she has blond hair and a leather jacket and an impressive rear end. But, ah, we didn’t exactly have time to converse. Organic chemistry is rather complicated and I had to pay close attention to be able to follow it. For what it’s worth, she did not particularly seem to want to be there.”

“I mean, who the fuck wants to learn organic chemistry?”

“I hope that’s all there is to it. She did give the impression of being a tad...” Erin paused, frowning as she tried to find a charitable word for it. “Surly,” she eventually settled on.

“Well, that could just be you reading into things.”

“As I said, I certainly hope that’s the case.”

“Who knows, maybe she’ll end up being another new friend?”

“We’ve... not had much luck on that front, darling.”

“Renee seems nice.”

“Renee only really interacts with Ursula,” Erin retorted. “I’m fairly certain she has, ah, romantic biases, as it were.”

“If you say so,” Vienna replied with a shrug. “She still eats lunch with us sometimes.”

“With all due respect, so does Lars.”

“... Fair enough.”

“Not that I dislike her or anything. I just find myself doubtful that she’s really anyone’s friend aside from Ursula’s.”

“Fine, fine. What about Jake?”

“Ah. Well, speaking of romantic biases...”

“Oi.” Vienna frowned, gesturing firmly at Erin with a french fry. “Remember when I said there’s a time and a place for being catty? This ain’t it.”

Erin inhaled sharply, making an awkward hissing noise as air rushed through closed teeth. “It’s not that he’s not... nice, darling. It’s just that, much like with Renee, it’s less that he’s our friend and more that he’s your, ah, boyfriend.”

Vienna frowned more deeply, leaning back into her chair slightly and crossing her arms. “We’re not actually officially dating yet.”

“That ‘yet’ is a salient term, darling.”

“I know, I know, it’s just-” Vienna bit her lower lip nervously. “I’m already dating you guys. It feels... weird to be dating someone else outside of the pack.”

“No one’s judging you for it, darling.”

“I am.”

“Yes, well, as we’ve very thoroughly established at this point, you have a longstanding habit of judging yourself far too harshly. That said, if you’re really so hung up on him not being in our pack, why don’t you ask him if he’d like to join?”

“As if Viola’d be okay with that. You know she hates him.”

“Vienna, with all due respect, she barely knows him. And anyway, I find it hard to believe that you could be so close to someone but your identical twin finds that same someone completely repugnant.”

“Yeah, well... Whatever.”

“Just give them some time to get to know each other.”

“Let’s change the subject.”

“Of course.” Erin pointedly didn’t mention that Vienna was the one who brought this subject up in the first place, which the rabbit appreciated even if they were both very obviously aware of that fact.

“Anyway, even if we’re not exactly close with any of the new folks, you can’t really deny that Vicky and Lars-” She paused. “Well. Okay, I wouldn’t call them friends, but they’re definitely not enemies anymore either.”

Once again, Erin responded by inhaling sharply through closed teeth. “That relationship is... complicated.”

“Yeah, okay, fair enough.” Really, if Vienna could help it, she would spend as little time with Vicky and Lars as she could reasonably manage. But... well. There were extenuating circumstances that made it prudent to keep an eye on them. They weren’t officially members of the pack, not really. But in practice they might as well have been. And not because anyone really wanted them around, either. But, again, it was prudent to keep an eye on them. And both of them seemed almost unusually willing to let that be the new status quo.

But at least both of them had kept their fucking mouths shut about the whole Inkling thing. “What about Ami?”

“Also complicated.” The issue with Ami was almost the exact opposite – they all wanted to spend time with her, if only because the other option was leaving her alone to go even more stir crazy from centuries of isolation. The problem was that, well, her cover identity was ten years old. It wasn’t out of the question for Ami to spend time with them, but they couldn’t be together for essentially the entire school day because Ami was technically still in elementary school. And it was probably a little weird to outside observers that she’d not made any friends her own ostensible age yet. But, well. Ami had her own reasons for that. She’d explained them, and everyone had collectively decided it was probably for the best to not push Ami to deal with them.

“Okay fine. Maybe she’ll be the first proper new friend we’ve had out of this whole stupid fabricatory thing.”

“One can only hope.” There was a brief pause as both girls ran out of things to say for now. In the past, this would have been an awkward moment. As it was, it was just... natural. Normal. Which felt weird and novel, but then again so did a lot of things. Like, for instance, eating lunch with other people. Being able to sit here with Erin in silence and not having it be the result of open but unspoken hostility was weirdly nice.

Unfortunately that silence didn’t last particularly long. “Heyyyy, Erin! Vienna! Just the girls I wanted to see!”

Erin’s face soured, ever so slightly. “Hello, Roxie.”

In a vacuum, Roxie Gaze was a perfectly nice, pleasant person. There was nothing about her that would particularly preclude Erin from getting along with her at least on a civil level. Probably not quite as swimmingly as Ursula and Renee or Vienna and Jacob, but at least they could in theory have been friends, and it was through no fault of Roxie’s that they weren’t. “Sooooooo, how’s everyone doing today?”

“What do you want.”

“Have either of you seen Vicky? I, uh, need to talk to her. About something.”

“She will very likely be here soon enough if you’re willing to wait,” Erin replied tersely, knowing full well why Roxie would want to see Vicky.

“Yeah, no, it’s fine. I’m not in any kind of hurry or anything. Actually it’d prolly be more convenient to talk to her at the end of the day.”

Erin tried her very hardest to keep civil. “Perhaps,” she said, as diplomatically as possible. Her words were slow and deliberate, but also somewhat cold. “Perhaps it would be better for your sister to talk to Vicky herself.”

“Yes! Yes, that’d be, um. That’s a very good idea and I would love to suggest it to her if I had any idea where she was.”

And that was the problem. Roxie was perfectly inoffensive. But, much like Vienna and Viola were a package deal, Roxie came with her own identical twin. And while Roxie was nice, perky, maybe a bit too laid back for Erin’s tastes but not to the point where it was a problem, Lola Gaze was...

Well, she was kind of a thoroughly unpleasant person.

“I believe that it would be in everyone’s best interests for you to stop covering for your sister’s complete inability to bother showing up to class, darling.”

Roxie visibly drooped. Her ears flattened and her tail slipped between her legs, almost like she was a dog and not a raccoon. “H-hey,” she said defensively. “She’s been having a really hard time, okay?”

“Everyone’s been having a hard time, darling,” Erin retorted coldly, earning a dirty look from Vienna. “But everyone else actually bothers to show up to school at least once a week.”

“Erin.”

Erin’s instinct was to retort by pointing out that she was right about this, god dammit. But she held her tongue. Just because she was right didn’t mean she needed to be a bitch about it. “... Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Roxie replied, though her tone of voice made it clear that it really wasn’t fine. “You’re... not really wrong, but... I don’t know.”

“I think that perhaps you should have a frank discussion on the subject with her.”

“I mean... Yeah, but I don’t really wanna start another fight with her.”

“Have you talked with your parents about this?”

Roxie visibly winced. “That’d absolutely just make things worse.”

Erin pursed her lips. “Alright then. What about-”

“Look, it’s not that I don’t appreciate the advice, but... I get why she’s so upset. She just needs more time to process things. Between the invasion and then moving here, there’s just been so much happening at once, and we don’t even have our pack around to help anymore.” Roxie trailed off. “I mean, it’s not like we can’t talk to them or anything? But weekly phone calls aren’t the same as seeing them in person all the time and like there’s also been a bunch of stuff going on with them recently and so things are weird and awkward and I don’t know what to do.”

Erin found herself at as much of a loss as Roxie was. She had pretty much exhausted all of the lines of advice she could think of at the moment. Still, she felt like she should say something and so opened her mouth to give some sort of pithy encouragement.

Thankfully, before she embarrassed herself, Vicky decided to show up. The sheep collapsed into a seat beside Vienna, face down on the lunch table. “... You doing okay?” the rabbit said, mildly bemused.

“No I’m dead.”

“Couldja maybe die somewhere else?”

“No.”

“Ah! Vicky! Could you do me a huuuuuge favour and email your notes to Lola?”

Vicky laboriously pulled her face up from the table to give Roxie an inscrutable look. Her bleary eyes were underlined by heavy bags. “Okay but I slept through most of math and all of lit, so they’re gonna be shitty notes.”

“That’s better than nothing!”

“You’re prolly gonna wanna try and catch me after class because I am absolutely not going to remember that long.”

“Okay! Good to know!”

“Right, if that’s everything, I’m gonna pass out again.”

“That’s everything! Thanks!” With that, Roxie turned and left.

“No but seriously, you look like shit.”

“Yes, well, that’s what happens when you don’t get a good night’s sleep for like three fucking months straight.”

“Geeze.”

“I’ve said as much before, but you should really probably see a doctor about that, darling.”

“Don’t call me darling,” Vicky grumbled. “Do you think anyone would give a shit if I skipped out on the town meet today?”

“So long as you don’t skip out on community service you’re prolly fine.”

“Ughhhhhhhh,” Vicky groaned. “Fuuuuuucking community service. I’m like ninety percent sure it’s because of this stupid fucking community service bullshit that I’m so fucking tired all the time.”

“You could probably convince Mr. Stefanowitz to go easy on you.”

“Ugh. Yeah maybe I’ll talk with him about it today. If I remember.” Of course, this wouldn’t be the first time Vicky asked Mr. Stefanowitz for a day off. He would almost certainly agree to it – he had done so every other time, after all. Ancient he may have been, but he wasn’t blind. It was blatantly obvious to anyone who cared to pay the bare minimum of attention to her that Vicky was exhausted all the time, and had been so almost constantly since the Locksmouth Incident had resolved itself. He was more than happy enough to claim that she worked as normal while she surreptitiously got a nap in. 

But it generally tended to not actually help. Whatever the problem was, it pretty clearly went deeper than just not getting enough sleep or not being cut out for the physical labour. She rested her head on the table and almost immediately drifted off to sleep, snoring loudly enough to earn some dirty looks from nearby tables.

And, shortly after that, began to intermittently twitch and whimper, like a dog having a nightmare. Both Vienna and Erin gave her concerned glances. “... We should really probably force her to see a doctor about this.”

“What doctor?” Vienna replied. “Like, what, is she gonna go all the way to Locksmouth only to get told that they can’t help her with nightmares?”

“Well, it’s certainly better than doing nothing.”

Vienna shrugged. “Vicky’s an adult. She can take care of herself.”

“Mm. Well, I suppose you’re right,” Erin said with a shrug.

Their conversation was interrupted by a particularly loud snore from Vicky. “... I hope she doesn’t snore in class or she’s gonna get in trouble.”

“Perhaps she should invest in some nose plugs.”

Vienna choked back a laugh. “Oh my god. Don’t be mean.”

“I’m not being mean,” Erin replied with a wry smile. “Just looking out for her. That’s all.”

“Who’re we lookin’ out for?” Ursula interjected as she took the seat on Vienna’s right, an unreasonably large sandwich in hand.

“We were just discussing ways to keep Vicky from snoring in class.”

“Get her a shock collar, duh. If she starts to fall asleep, bam! Eight billion volts.”

“... That seems like a lot of volts, darling.”

“She can take it,” Ursula replied after taking a bite of her sandwich, which earned her a dirty look from Erin. “What? ‘m hungry.”

“Have you seen Viola?”

“Not since math. I’ve got history with her next period though. Why?”

“Apparently she’s been roped into showing a new girl around.”

“Oof.”

“Yeah, that was my reaction too.”

“I’m sure she’ll be fine,” Erin said. “She’s really been improving when it comes to dealing with people.”

“If you say so, babe. Mostly I’m just hoping she’s less... you know, than the others.”

“Hey, Jake’s nice if you give him a chance.”

“He’s also, like, visibly terrified of me,” Ursula retorted.

“... Yeah, okay. Fair enough.” It wasn’t like he was the only person who was visibly terrified of Ursula, but that clearly wasn’t the point. “Just give him a chance to get to know you.”

“Thaaaat’s up to him,” Ursula replied with a shrug and another bite of her sandwich.

“I guess...” Vienna sighed, glancing wistfully at the entrance to the cafeteria as more people slowly filtered in, sullenly poking at her fries.

Her expression brightened slightly when she saw Jacob Weiss enter. She perked up and waved, while also trying not to seem too enthusiastic because that would be weird. Still, Jake didn’t seem to notice or care if she was being weird. He smiled and waved back, quickly making his way over to the table. Vienna not so gently shoved Vicky over slightly to make room for him to sit next to her, which drew an annoyed bleat from the rudely awakened sheep. “Oi!”

“You don’t have to move her,” Jacob said diplomatically.

“Yeah, what he said,” Vicky said, though she also took a moment to give the larger hyena a dirty look. For some reason she’d never seemed to particularly like him, though Vienna wasn’t really entirely sure why. Whatever, though, Vicky’s thought processes were inscrutable and she didn’t really care enough to decode them. The sheep turned her dirty look to Veinna before pointedly scooting right back to where she was with a huff. “I was here first, he can sit somewhere else.”

“Don’t look at me,” Ursula grumbled. “I ain’t goin’ nowhere until I’m done with my sandwich.”

“He can sit beside me,” Erin said succinctly, scooting over so that he could be across from Vienna. “It’s really not that hard to scoot slightly to the left.”

“I do have to go get my lunch first,” Jacob said. His tone of voice and body language made it clear that he would really rather be sitting beside Vienna, but also he similarly didn’t want to impose on Vicky and really didn’t want to impose on Ursula. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Erin we’re switching places.”

“Is it really such a big deal that you sit next to this guy?” Ursula said through a mouthful of sandwich.

“Is it really such a big deal that she not sit next to him, darling?”

“Enh, touche.”

Vienna chose to ignore the conversation, sliding her fries across the table and then circling around herself while Erin wearily did the same. “Are you seriously only eating fries?”

“I like fries.”

“Could you not at least have, like, a burger or something? Just a massive plate of fries can’t possibly be healthy.”

“You’re one to talk, look at the size of that sandwich.”

“Oi, just ‘cos it’s big doesn’t mean it’s unhealthy,” Ursula retorted. “There’s veggies, there’s protein, there’s carbs. Your lunch is just starch and fat and salt.”

“You’ve seen what I eat at home,” Vienna replied succinctly. “Mama wouldn’t let us eat fast food so I reserve the right to eat fries at every opportunity.”

“Fast food sucks anyway, you’re not missing much.”

“I’m missing fries.”

“Like I said, you’re not missing much.”

“You’re just saying that because you’re still bitter about your time at Burger Dictator, darling.”

“God, please don’t remind me of that. It was the most fucking miserable three months of my life.”

“I don’t know,” Erin said with a wry smile. “You certainly seemed to enjoy yourself.”

“Are you kidding? It was completely fucking dead for like ninety percent of the time until suddenly literally everyone in town decided they wanted Burger Dictator tonight. Literally the only reason I didn’t lose my job within the first week is because technically losing your temper and yelling at the customers to slow the fuck down or fuck off is considered a bonus.”

“Remember that time I ordered the Dictator’s Choice and you gave me a single hash brown and a stern glare?”

“I did that literally every time someone ordered the Dictator’s Choice. Fuck the Dictator’s Choice. Whatever motherfucker came up with the Dictator’s Choice should be considered a god damn war criminal.”

“Well, you were very good at it,” Erin said, leaning on Ursula. “Even if I didn’t say as much at the time.”

“Yeah well I’m prolly gonna have to go back there so you’ll get as many hash browns and stern glares as you can stomach.”

“You are?”

“I still gotta replace my PET,” Ursula said with a sullen frown. “I saved up for months to get a really nice one and then lost it within like a week.”

“Oh. Right.” Their cover story meant that, by necessity, they had to leave their PETs behind. Ursula’s initial plan had been to ‘find’ hers at a later date, but that plan had been well and truly scuffed when it turned out that Ami had cannibalized them for parts in order to build her remote projector.

“Bleh.”

“Well, I wouldn’t know,” Vienna said with a shrug before eating another fry.

“Technically you don’t live with your parents anymore,” Lars interjected as he took a seat as far away from the others as possible. “There’s nothing stopping you from eating fast food for every meal.”

“There’s me. I would stop her.”

“You know, though, he’s got a point.”

“No.”

“It’s my house.”

“Technically it’s my house.”

“Technically, darling, it’s no one’s house,” Erin interjected diplomatically.

“Well it’s not like anyone else lives there. And anyway, Mom says it’s fine and she’s an Arbitrator so I think that counts as us owning it.”

“If it’s us that owns it then I can decide if I’m allowed to have fast food in the house.”

“Alpha veto.”

“Co-alpha, darling.”

“I’m pretty sure Viola’ll agree with me.”

As if on cue, Viola finally arrived with a massive plate of fries, taking a seat on the far side of her twin from Lars.

“oh come on.”

“It’s been a long day,” was the only explanation she gave before digging in.

“Ah, yes. How is your new, ah, acquaintance?”

“Enh.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Mnnnn, she’s not bad?” Viola said, though she was clearly uncertain about that. “She just needs some time to warm up. That’s all.”

“Hey, if she’s a bitch, that’s fine, you can just show her around school and then ignore her. No one’s gonna judge you for that.”

“Dr. Baas made it pretty clear that we’re to be friends.”

“Oof.”

“Where is she, anyway?”

“Still getting lunch. She’ll be here soon.” Viola cringed slightly. “... Hopefully she gets along with everyone.”

“Eh, it’s no biggie if she doesn’t,” Ursula said with a shrug. “It’s not like we have to be friends with every new person in town. We’re barely friends with the old people.”

“Yes, but...” Viola sighed. “I don’t know. It’s hard to put in words, but- but she does actually seem nice, it’s just that she’s trying to not seem nice for some reason?”

“I’m sure she’s got her reasons, darling. Perhaps she just misses her friends from back home?”

“Maybe.”

“Just give her time to settle in.”

“Give who time to settle in.”

“Oh. Um. You, I guess.”

“Hmph.” Miranda seemed extremely dubious on that front.

“Are you going to introduce yourself, darling?” Erin said.

“No.”

“Oh.”

“Her, um. Her name’s Miranda.”

“Yeah, whatever. Nice to meet you or something.” She took a seat that was, in the strictest sense, technically beside Viola, though she almost pointedly seemed to keep her distance. She slowly scanned the entire table, giving everyone gathered a once-over. Clearly, going by her facial expression, she wasn’t impressed. One pair of arms was lazily crossed behind her head, another across her chest, and the third buried in her pockets, managing to be noncommittal in three ways at once. “So who’re these clowns, then?”

“Um-”

“Hey,” Vienna interrupted. Viola cringed again, a familiar sinking feeling welling up deep in the pit of her stomach. It reminded her far too much of the old days and she didn’t like it. Not one bit.

“What,” Miranda snapped.

“Don’t be a dick.”

“Hey, fuck you, don’t go around calling random strangers dicks for no reason.”

“I’ve got plenty of reason to call you a dick.”

“Like what?”

“How about ‘cos you’re being a dick?”

Viola winced, giving Ursula a pained look that the doberman reciprocated. Sighing, she placed her sandwich down on the plate. “Vienna. Don’t pick fights.”

“But-”

“Don’t.”

“She... hasn’t exactly been making the best of first impressions,” Erin said, trying her level best to mediate.

“Hey, fuck you too,” Miranda snapped. “Don’t act like you’ve been making a great first impression to me.”

Erin’s nose wrinkled. “Excuse me?”

“I barely show up and you all stare at me like I just took a shit on the table and then the first thing you say to me is you call me a dick.” She idly took a sip from a can of Carbolate, pointedly not breaking eye contact with Erin. “If you asked me, just going by first impressions, I’d say Viola could use some less shit friends.”

“Excuse you?!” Vienna said indignantly.

“You heard me. You’re an asshole.”

“We’ve said like five fucking sentences to each other.”

“And less than that was enough for you to decide I’m a dick?”

“Guys.”

“You were being a dick!”

“And you’re being an asshole!”

“Guys.”

“Fuck you!”

“Anyway, I’ve got enough experience to know an asshole when I see one and all of you are setting off all my asshole red flags except maybe Viola, and even then.”

“Fuck you!”

“Guys!” Ursula drew all attention to herself by slamming her fist on the table before scraping the bench backwards as she stood up. Not just everyone at the table, but every eye in the entire cafeteria was on her. “Fucking stop it. Both of you. And especially you, Vienna, you’re acting like a god damn two year old.”

“But-”

“Don’t. We can’t go around picking fights with random fucking strangers over basically nothing.”

“She started it!”

“And you continued it holy shit how do you not see how that’s a fucking problem?”

“I don’t need you to defend me,” Miranda interjected.

“I’m not defending you, you’re also being an asshole but I’m not your alpha so it ain’t my job to tell you not to be an asshole.”

“Hey, fuck you too.”

That drew Ursula’s ire. The doberman turned her glare from Vienna to Miranda, leaning over the table to get in the spider’s face. “You wanna say that again?”

“I-” Miranda said before freezing up completely. She stared up at the much larger girl, shaking slightly. Ursula’s furious glare slowly shifted into one of confusion. “I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me.”

“I ain’t gonna hurt you?” Ursula said, trying to be reassuring but not doing a very good job of it because she was honestly still kind of pissed off. Which was reflected in Miranda remaining stock still aside from terrified shaking, like a deer in the headlights.

“Word of advice, you should probably be careful what you say.”

“Not the time, Nilsen.”

“Eckstein is known for having a short fuse and a willingness to use violence.”

“Shut the fuck up, Nilsen.”

Ursula was too late, though. Lars’s words were enough to push her over the edge. She dropped her drink and ran as fast as she could from the cafeteria. “W-wait, Miranda!” Viola said before quickly running after her.

“God dammit,” Ursula muttered.

“... We should prolly go after them.”

“I’ll go after them. You all stay put.”

“I wanna go too,” Vienna said sheepishly. “This... kinda feels like my fault.”

“Yeah but we’re already prolly gonna get in a lot of trouble over this with just two of us leaving school in the middle of the day. And anyway we all have next period together so hopefully we can calm her down and get her back in time.”

“That’s-” Vienna drooped slightly. “Yeah, you’re right. Sorry about this.”

“I believe we all could have handled that situation better, darling. Miranda included.”

“Yeah, I’m off. Oh, and Vienna? When I get back, remind me to give Nilsen the mother of all noogies.”

“Hey, no noogies.”

“You don’t get to decide that, buddy.”

“I’ve got a mane, do you have any idea how much of a nightmare noogies are?”

“Yes. That’s why you’re getting one.” With that, Ursula left the cafeteria in the same direction as Viola and Miranda as fast as she could at the same time as Jacob returned.

“... Did I miss something?”

Vienna sighed. “No.”

“It kind of feels like I missed something.”

“Eat your lunch, babe.”

~~~~~~

In retrospect, running away in a blind panic hadn’t been the wisest decision. It had been more the result of instinct than any actual conscious thought on Miranda’s part. And, now that she’d done it, it was kind of too late to take it back. She had absolutely no clue where the fuck she was anymore – she hadn’t had any clue since leaving the school. She barely knew her way around Locksmouth and she’d lived there for eighteen years. She’d only been in Esterwood for a few hours at this point, the only places she’d even been were her house and the school.

It probably didn’t help that she’d wandered into what she could only assume was supposed to be some sort of park. It felt more like she’d at some point wandered out of the dome entirely. She hadn’t, she could tell because she’d managed to find the edge at some point. It was, she noted, made of plastiglass. Intellectually, she knew that it was more than durable enough – you’d have to throw several hurricanes at it at the same time before there was any risk of it going down. But it was just so... archaic. She couldn’t think of any other dome that was still a physical dome.

Though, to be fair, Miranda wasn’t exactly the most well travelled person in the world. She’d been to Locksmouth, to Anchorsway (once), and now she’d been to Esterwood. For all she knew, this was more common than she was assuming. She doubted that severely, but it was hypothetically possible. Hypothetically.

There was also what seemed to be an emergency exit of some sort. A big metal door inlaid into the dome with a big line in the middle. To the side, there was a panel with two buttons – open and closed. So simple that even a child could open it. Which was probably actually a really fucking stupid idea because you don’t want children wandering out into the wilderness. In any other situation she might have found it almost funny. As it was it was mostly just kind of depressing. She stared at it. Impulse told her to open it and keep right on running. And, really, she was surprised at just how seriously she found herself considering doing just that. She wanted to go home. Intellectually, of course, she knew that she hated living in Locksmouth significantly more than she hated living in Esterwood. Not that the place had made the best first impression, granted. But one bad encounter had absolutely nothing on what she’d gone through back home.

“Maybe I can go to Clarkston,” she muttered. “I can knit sweaters for all of them in exchange for room and board. Or something.” It sounded frankly insane – like a bunch of naturalists would just sort of allow her to move in. Best case scenario they’d throw her right the fuck back out. Worst case scenario they’d decide to tar and feather her or something.

Idly, she pressed the open button. She didn’t intend to go out, not just yet at least. But... “Ugh.” She didn’t know what the fuck she was doing. All she knew was that Esterwood was shaping up to be just Locksmouth again after all. She’d not been here a fucking day and she’d already found the local equivalent of Cedric and gotten on her bad side. Brilliant. That hadn’t been the god damn plan, Miranda, but damned if you’d not managed it anyway. “Fuck.” She stared out into the wilderness, not leaving but also pointedly not closing the door either.

She barely registered Viola arriving. Not because the rabbit was particularly stealthy, mind – her breathing was heavy and ragged, coming in loud wheezes as she bent over forward, like... Well, like someone who was extremely not used to running long distances who had just been made to run a fairly long distance. It was just that Miranda had other things on her mind right now.

“Are- are you okay?” Viola managed after a few minutes to catch her breath.

“No.”

“Oh. Do, um. Can I do anything to help?”

“Probably not.”

“Oh.” Viola fidgeted nervously. “Um. Sorry about this.”

“Why are you apologizing? You didn’t do anything.”

“That’s the problem.”

“It’s not your fault your friends are shitty.”

Viola frowned. “They’re not shitty.”

“Seemed pretty shitty to me,” Miranda said, turning to face Viola.

“They’re not shitty,” the rabbit repeated, more firmly.

“I could tell just by looking at them,” Miranda retorted. “The mouse was a bitch-”

“She barely said ten words to you!”

“And yet she still managed to be a bitch. And the dog threatened me.”

“No she didn’t!”

“If she wasn’t trying to threaten me she did a shit job of it.”

“She said she wasn’t going to hurt you!”

“Could’a fuckin’ fooled me! And what about what that lion guy said?”

“Lars is an asshole.”

“I thought you said your friends weren’t assholes?”

“Lars isn’t my friend, he’s just-” Viola frowned, pausing as she searched for the right words. “I can’t get rid of him. For reasons.”

“Okay, fine, he doesn’t count. What about that other rabbit, though? You can’t possibly tell me she wasn’t being a dick.”

“Y-you started it, though!”

“I called them clowns. That’s hardly anything. Definitely not worth starting a huge fight over. Who the fuck did she even think she was!”

“My sister. We’re twins.”

Miranda winced. “... oh. Um.” Miranda didn’t really know how to respond to that. “Well, uh. I guess you can’t choose who you’re related to?” Viola didn’t respond, just silently frowning up at the spider. “Look, I’m not gonna just ignore the fact that she’s an asshole because she’s related to you, okay?”

Viola continued to glare. Miranda found herself fidgeting slightly under the rabbit’s stern gaze. Eventually, the smaller girl opened her mouth to admonish her again.

But no words came out. Her frown faded as her eyes widened and her ears drooped, her mouth slowly closing as she took a nervous step backwards. “... What’s wrong?”

“B- b-”

“What?”

There was a loud, low, grumbling noise from behind her, followed by a snort of hot, moist air that absolutely reeked. Viola collapsed backwards, landing on her butt. “B-bear!” she squeaked, barely audible.

Miranda’s heart sank as she remembered that she’d not actually closed the emergency exit. Moving as slowly as she was capable of, she turned around to find herself face-to-snout with the biggest bear she’d ever seen in her life. Which, granted, wasn’t exactly saying much because it was also the only bear she’d ever seen in her life. Her only exposure to the animal otherwise was the occasional bear subtype. In spite of that, she somehow got the impression that this was not a small bear. Though on the other hand her impression might have been skewed by the fact that it was literal inches from her face. She could feel its hot, moist breath washing over her face as it growled, gently blowing her hair. God, it smelled awful. Like nothing she’d ever smelled before. There were layers to it – dead fish and morning breath and something else that she didn’t have words for but she really didn’t like it. It was also, once again, mere inches from her face and very very big with very very big and sharp teeth that it was doing an admirable job of showing off to her.

“Oh my god.”

“D-don’t move!” Viola hissed in a panic.

“Wasn’t planning on it.” Still, she wasn’t exactly comfortable with how close it was to her. Especially considering how extremely not happy to see her it appeared to be. It let out another low, rumbling growl. She moved as slowly as she was physically capable of, not even lifting her feet – she just shuffled herself backwards, inches at a time.

The bear, it turned out, didn’t like that. It roared, and Miranda found herself knocked off her feet – whether that was just the result of being startled or if it had really roared loudly enough to knock her over, she wasn’t entirely sure. Either way, she didn’t let that stop her. She scooted back, not even bothering to move slowly at this point since it didn’t seem to be making much of a difference, until she found herself hitting Viola. “We need to run.”

“What if it’s faster than us.”

“M-maybe it’ll just let us go?”

As if in response, the bear slowly pulled itself up to its hind legs and roared again. God, it had seemed big when it was on all fours but that was fucking nothing in comparison to its full height. It had to be like ten fucking feet tall, easily twice as tall as Viola and significantly more than twice as big.

“I, um. I don’t think it’s going to let us go.”

“Shit.”

“Just... try and stay calm. I think I have a plan.”

“Okay, well, I hope it’s a quick plan.”

“Stand up. Slowly, no sudden movements.”

“That’s not very quick.”

“If you rush it might decide to attack us and if it does then we’re fucked.”

“... Right.” That was, Miranda supposed, fair. In spite of the tough girl act, she really wasn’t much of a fighter. She had some tricks up her sleeves, sure, but she was pretty confident that no matter what tricks she used they wouldn’t make up for the fact that this was a ten foot tall wall of muscle. And, frankly, she’d rather not have to find out if she was wrong on that front. Slowly, using Viola’s body to steady herself, she stood up.

“We need to get it out of the dome and then lock it out.”

“Right okay yes that makes sense,” Miranda said, clearly not enthused with that part of the plan. “Can we maybe try and get out of here alive and then deal with that later? Maybe with, like, some backup?”

“If we run away it might follow us,” Viola said. “And even if it doesn’t, the woods are huge and who knows where it might wander off to. We need to get rid of it as soon as possible.”

“Okay, but as a counterpoint, what if it kills us.”

“... I, uh, have a plan?”

“Forgive me if I’m not super confident in a plan that starts with ‘let’s risk our lives trying to lure the giant fucking bear back outside’.”

“I just... need you to trust me on this, okay?”

“That’s kind of asking a lot of me right now.” But, on the other hand, the longer they dragged their feet, the more likely it was that the bear would take the first action. And said first action was almost certainly going to be attacking them. It didn’t help that all of its attention was squarely on them at the moment. “Maybe some kind of distraction?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know maybe throw a stick or something?”

“It’s a bear, not a dog.”

“Well that’s all I’ve got and we’re not gonna be able to do anything with all its attention on us.”

“... That’s a good point,” Viola said, swallowing heavily. “I, um-”

“Delphi!”

Miranda wasn’t exactly sure what happened next – it all happened too quickly for her to properly process it. Something dropped out of the trees, punching the bear in the face. It was vaguely humanoid in shape, and she was pretty sure the voice was that of the dog from lunch, but its body was dark blue with a purple-red outline. She didn’t get a good look at the action before Viola grabbed her by the arm and ran, and frankly she valued her own life far more than getting any kind of concrete confirmation that Viola’s friend was Inked. She just focused on getting the fuck out of there as fast as possible.

It wasn’t until they reached the edge of the forest that Miranda even really had a moment to think about what was happening. Everything devolved into a vague blur until they stopped running. “What the fuck was that.”

“I’ll explain later.”

“No, seriously. That was an Inkling.”

“I- Look, I’ll give you answers eventually but I don’t have time right now, I have to go help Ursula.”

“Are you insane?! That thing was huge!”

“That’s exactly why I can’t just leave her to deal with it alone!”

“Oh my god, you are insane. Or maybe just stupid.” Viola frowned, before turning to leave. “Look,” Miranda continued, grabbing the rabbit’s arm. “What do you even hope to accomplish? Show up, distract her, get her killed and then die yourself?”

“I can handle it!”

“No you can’t! She’s got an Inkling, and honestly? Unless her power’s, like, the ability to make bears explode, my money’s on the bear.”

“That’s even more reason not to leave her to handle it alone!”

“You need to focus on yourself right now! How the fuck do you think she’d feel if you got yourself killed trying to help her? We need to... I don’t know, call the police or something, not charge headfirst into a situation that we know is going to get us killed.”

“I’m not going to get killed!”

“Yes you are! Again, she’s got an Inkling and you don’t! You’re just going to be dead weight, and I’m not gonna just stand here and let you get yourself eaten by a god damn bear because your idiot friend decided she didn’t want to live anymore!”

Viola slapped her, harder than Miranda would have thought her capable of given her appearance. It hurt, quite a bit. The spider reached up and gently touched the point of impact, wincing slightly. “I-”

“Shut up,” Viola snapped. “Don’t you dare say another fucking word.”

“I-”

“Don’t.” The rabbit glared, her eyes smouldering with cold fury. “What is your fucking problem?!”

It took Miranda a moment to realize she was expected to respond. “I just don’t want you to hurt yourself, okay?”

“Fuck off, you’ve been nothing but an asshole for the entire time I’ve known you.”

“You’ve only known me for like three hours!”

“Yeah, and you’ve spent those three hours being a sullen jerk and actively antagonizing everyone who tries to talk to you! Don’t act like you care what happens to me.”

“I don’t have to care what happens to you to not want you to kill yourself holy shit!”

“Oh, but you don’t give a shit about Ursula?”

“She’s got an inkling, she’s got way more of a chance of actually surviving a fight with a bear than you! And anyway, in case you didn’t notice, she’s clearly a fucking psychopath so even if she doesn’t you’re prolly better off-”

Miranda found herself cut off by another slap to the face. “She’s barely said ten fucking words to you, you have no fucking right to judge her!”

“I-”

“Shut the fuck up.” Viola yanked her arm out of Miranda’s grip, before turning around and heading into the woods. “I’m going to help her. You can just stay here like a coward if you want. I don’t care anymore.”

“Viola, listen-”

“Shut up. And before you say anything, I’ve got an Inkling too. The only dead weight here is you.”

Miranda winced. She probably should have seen that coming, if she was honest. Inklings, in her experience, tended to come in groups. A leader and a collection of minions. And even when it came to solitary Inklings, they never seemed to stay solitary for very long. If one member of a pack became Inked, the others would eventually follow suit. There were only a handful of exceptions she could think of – usually involving the Inked individual keeping their Inkling a secret.

She had a lot of experience on that front.

“If I may interject, Miranda.”

“Rakni, now’s a bad time.”

“You should really go help them.”

“I know.”

“And yet I notice you haven’t gone to help them yet.”

“I know.”

“Think of it like this. You came here intending to turn over a new leaf, no? No more being a victim to people like Cedric.”

“So?”

“So, although you seem to have convinced yourself otherwise, that Ursula person seems to be very much not like Cedric at all. If anything she reminds me much more of Carrie.”

“Oh like that’s so much better.”

“The point I am making is that she seems more the type to punch someone like Cedric in the face. Several times.”

“So?”

“So perhaps it would be prudent to befriend her rather than antagonizing her and her friends.”

“... Ugh, fine. Point taken.”

“Now, are you going to go help them? Or do I have to take matters into my own hands.”

“I’m goin’, I’m goin’. This is stupid and is absolutely going to get us killed, but I’m gonna do it anyway.”

“You underestimate my abilities, Miranda.”

“Yeah. Sure.” She stared at the deep, dark, densely packed forest. Its atmosphere was certainly appropriate to the current mood. “Let’s just get this over with.” With no more hesitation – lest she end up dragging her heels even further – Miranda stepped into the darkness.