Work Text:
Once Upon A Time
It Was A Bright And Ominously Tepid Day
It Was A Bright And Ominously Tepid Day And The Hot Oppressive Yet Strangely Alluring Sun Had Just Begun Its Ascent Over The Bleak Alternian Horizon
If One Had A Keen Or Especially Attuned Eye It Might Even Still Be Possible To Make Out The Outlines Of The Planets Twin Moons Which Formed The Barest Shadows Of Silhouettes, Palest Pink And Luminous Green Respectively, Against The SDoes Anyone Even Care About The Relative Brightnesses Of The Moons
Oh God This Is Boring Isnt It
You Arent Required To Answer By The Way That Was A Rhetorical Question
At Any Rate There Are Things Far More Important Than The Astronomical Conditions Of The Alternian Day
Such As
Its Effects On The General Population For Example
You See Daylight Was To Most Trolls Something Akin To What Being Dissolved In The Gastric Juices Of A Carnivorous Tiptiwichet Would Be To A Hapless Bleatbeast Which Is To Say Painful Excruciating And Honestly Sort Of Deadly
Their Eyes And Skin Were Too Delicate To Withstand The Blistering Of The Suns Rays Which Is Why They Generally Preferred To Metaphorically Enrobe Themselves In The Smooth Cooling Breezes Of The Night Air
Rather Than The Abrasive And Uncomfortable Daylight Conditions
Is That Metaphor Too Much Do You Think I Think Its Rather Ingenious Myself
They Left The Light Hours To The Lesser Intelligences Of Alternia And Also To All Manner Of Fearsome Terrifying And Frankly Legendary Creatures Who Delighted In Rushing In Where Ordinary Trolls Feared To Tread, Such As Shadow Droppers And Spark Shamblers And Most Importantly Rainbow Drinkers
However That Was Only The General Rule
And As With All General Rules There Were Exceptions To This Particular Rule
Which Is To Say That Although Few And Far Between There Were Otherwise "Ordinary" Trolls Who Had No Fear Of The Sun At All
Who Might Even
Hypothetically
Enjoy The Brightness And Warmth It Brought With It
*
Using her nudge protrusions, she found the edges of the recuperacoon and hoisted her face above the slimeline with a squelch. She wiped the remaining traces of sopor away from her eyes as best she could before opening them, but she still thought that, ironically, it stung more than any amount of exposure to the sun's rays.
Wisdom, Kanaya decided, lay partly in understanding when a cause was hopeless and being attuned to one's true destiny. (Actually, she had taken this thought from an old novel about the mysterious Cult of the Light-eaters, but it certainly sounded nice.) The sun had climbed high in the sky, signaling that almost half the day had already come and gone, and slumber still eluded her.
She thought that, perhaps, she was not meant to sleep at all.
She was very tired.
With a sigh, she toweled herself off carefully--she had recently obtained a number of very interesting fabric scraps, and it wouldn't do to get slime on them--and plodded over to her husktop in the corner. It didn't happen often, but perhaps, today--
--but no, of course, her chumproll was empty, but for a single name.
grimAuxiliatrix [GA] began trolling arachnidsGrip [AG]
GA: So
GA: I Suppose You Are Currently Engaged In More Of Your Silly
GA: And Frankly Dangerous
GA: Games
GA: But
-- arachnidsGrip [AG] is away! --
Away message: Heeeeeeeey obsequiousPantaloons!!!!!!!! 8nd your wimpy little moir8il too, that's right! Guess who is a8out to 8e D8AD MEAT.
It's you, you dipshits!!!!!!!! YOU ARE 8OTH A8OUT TO 8E D8AD MEAT!
Oh, yeah, any l8meity l8me meddlers who don't play the 8est g8me in the world for some stupid reason like 8eing w8y too fussy for their own good, I'll get 8ack to you after I finish wiping the floor with these 8ozos. L8r!!!!!!!!
-- End away message --
GA: I See I Supposed Correctly
GA: Sigh
GA: That Was Literal By The Way I Actually Just Sighed In Real Life
She closed the husktop again, looking once more out to the window. The Flarp campaign had probably gone on for many hours by this point. It couldn't possibly be much longer, she decided. Maybe Vriska would finish soon.
Maybe Vriska would have gotten herself recklessly injured again, and Kanaya would have to consult her painstakingly-compiled first aid notes to help her.
Probably, she decided. Anyway, it was best to be prepared.
*
Which I Suppose Is Just A Really Long And Roundabout Way Of Saying
That There Was A Girl
And She Was A Rather Notable Exception
And She Is Who This Story Is About
*
Wow Where Do I Even Go From Here
Er
Anyway The Troll Girl Lived On The Edge Of The Parched And Inhospitable Alternian Desert
And She Knew Almost From Her Hatching That She Was One Of The Aforementioned Exceptions, Which Is To Say That In Almost Every Way She Was Different From The Other Trolls She Spoke To Through Her Husktop
Or The Ones She Read About In The Ancient And Sacred Schoolfeeding Texts
For One Thing
She Was Really Much More Refined And Discerning In Her Aesthetic Tastes Than The Vast Majority Of Her Species Who Seemed To Lack Even A Basic Idea Of What Color Coordination Was
She Appreciated The Beautiful And Well Designed Things Which Many Of Her Comrades Seemed To Disdain
She Found Order Soothing Where They Tended To Delight In Chaos
And To Her The Illumination And Glow Of The Alternian Proximal Star Was Infinitely More Soothing Than The Obtuse Blackness Of The Night
Her "Peers" If I May Use The Term Loosely Did Not Keep The Same Hours As Her And So To Occupy The Long Days She Spent Her Time Tending To Her Wardrobe Which Became, If I May Make A Subjective Judgment Here, The Most Attractive On All Of Alternia
And Also To The Garden Outside Her Home Which Grew And Flourished Under Her Supervision
Passing The Days In This Manner Was Not Unpleasant But The Troll Girl Soon Found Herself Dissatisfied
She Had A Talent And Affection For Nurturing Life (And It Is A Shame That More Of Her Cohort Did Not Share The Same Inclination) But In The Back Of Her Cranial Apparatus She Knew That It Was Not The Only Thing She Could Do
Nor Indeed The Only Thing She Should Do
She Could Not Escape The Feeling That She Was Destined For Greater Things
Destined To Become Something Quite Extraordinary In Fact
And As It Turns Out
That Is Exactly What She Was
*
> Kanaya: Wake up.
You don't want to wake up.
It hurts.
It hurts.
It hurts.
*
And She Knew That Once She Became Whatever She Was Meant To Become
Things Would Be Even Better Than They Were
For Sure