Chapter Text
"Sam!"
The call rang through the house, but it did not reach the ears it was meant for. Those ears were preoccupied with something far less important. Splayed out lazily in the corner of the spare bedroom was Samantha Pierre, all by her lonesome. Her only companion at the moment was her phone, displaying a series she had been binging. A tangled wire connected shabby earbuds from her phone to her ears, drowning out the world.
A soft huff escaped her. Summer was supposed to be something fun to look forward to, but so far, this one had been not only boring, but downright irritating. For the past two months, she'd been stuck in the home of her uncle and her little cousin, Dewi, who was one of the weirdest and most bothersome little turds she's ever had to put up with. His mere presence ranged from tolerable at best to exasperating and sickening at worst, thanks in part to his undying obsession with insects. A part of Sam still held on to a dwindling hope that it was just a phase, and he would grow up someday, but it's been years, and there is yet to be a change.
"Saaam!"
Sam glanced over at the shut door with her eyes and her eyes only. Her thumb tapped on the center of her phone screen once, pausing the video. This time, she had heard the call. The voice belonged to her mother, Dory, howling her name from the kitchen. But rather than getting up to investigate—or even doing the bare minimum of responding with a shout of her own—Sam slumped her shoulders and resumed the video, blasting sound directly into her ears.
"It's probably nothing important," she thought grumpily. "Whatever she needs'll probably be dealt with by Uncle within the next ten seconds."
Fortunately for her, these were her final few days of being stuck here. Just a few more days of putting up with her cousin—among other things—and she would finally be going back home, where she would rather be all year round, if it were up to her. Of course, once back there, she still would hardly be doing anything productive, but that was besides the point. She could hardly stand it here.
"SAAAM!"
"Wryyygh..." Sam groaned, gritting her braced teeth in irritation as she begrudgingly yanked off her earbuds and turned off her phone, which she tossed to the side and hurriedly stood up. She reached the door and threw it open.
"What's so important, huh? It's barely been six minutes since I just started getting comfy, and dinner wasn't long ago either... Oh no, it's the dishes, isn't it? Goddammit."
With the eagerness of a convict being escorted to their cell, Sam stomped down the hallway, intending to get whatever was the matter over with as soon as possible. When she turned the corner, she found her mother standing in the center of the living room with her arms crossed. Sitting on the adjacent couch was her cousin, Dewi, staring down at a wide-brimmed hat that he was idly fondling in his lap. He appeared strangely well-dressed, as if prepared to head out somewhere. He pretended not to notice Sam when she walked in, and in turn, Sam barely glanced his way.
"There you are!" exclaimed Dory, annoyed. "Did I really have to call you three times?"
"What?" Sam questioned, unapologetic as ever.
Dory shifted her weight to one leg and pointed a finger to the hallway her daughter had just come from. "Go get changed. You and Dewi are going out."
Sam's knees twitched as she grimaced. "Huh?" she blurted. "What're you talking about?" Her voice cracked, getting defensive.
"Too straightforward for you?" Dory joked, though her face remained serious. "Dewi wants to head down to Great Debate Street Park a few miles from here, just to explore some parts he hasn't seen before. Unlike you, the poor boy has better ideas than being cooped up inside all day..." Her lips curled upwards as she waggled her finger. "So I've devised a plan of my own. A little bonding experience, if you will."
Sam's teeth clenched, her eyes wide. Every word that came out of her mother's mouth instilled more and more anxiety straight to her core. She hated where this was going. Across the room, Dewi didn't look too much better. He kept his gaze fixed on his hat, his brow furrowed. Though he was clearly just as irritated as his cousin, there was something else in his body language: defeat; a reluctant acceptance. Indeed, he had tried to bargain with Dory against this and failed. Now, Sam would have to face this impregnable wall as well.
"Sam, you're going to take Dewi to the park," Dory continued. "Just the two of you, on your own. Your uncle and I are so tired of seeing you two actively distancing yourselves from each other. Why do you think we make you both sleep in the same room? And yet you two still act like strangers—no, worse than strangers, you act like... enemies! That's not how family should be."
Sam's whole body shivered, her eyes bulging. Across the room, Dewi's own eyes went dim, looking half-dead. Unlike Sam, he actually seemed to be pondering Dory's words. He knew his aunt was right. He knew that as cousins, he and Sam should be good friends. But with her stubborn and bratty attitude—not to mention her disdain for the interests that drove him—he just couldn't see it working out.
Dory herself was unsure of how well this 'bonding experience' would work, if at all. But she knew she couldn't let this quiet enmity between her daughter and nephew continue to fester. So she stared Sam right in the eyes and declared, "Now, don't make me tell you again: go get changed. You'll have to be back before supper, so the sooner you two leave, the better."
"Ahh..." Sam stammered, her hands raising on their own to make some meaningless, nervous gesture, "c-come on, Mom, do I—"
"Samantha." Dory's stern tone made it clear she wouldn't take any argument. She once again pointed to the hallway. Sam froze for a second, her cheeks flushed red, before turning around with an indignant grumble, shoulders slumped and back hunched defeatedly as she walked back down the corridor.
"Whyyyy?! How could she... I was just three minutes away from starting Season 12 of Ancient Aliens! But no! Now I have to go and waste four or five hours at some boring park with that nerdy little brat!" she thought. Her bottom lip twitched, and she bit down on it, fighting the urge to cry her grievances out loud. "Dammit. He's probably gonna torture me with nature facts every thirty seconds. By the time we get back, I'll need to be admitted to a psych ward!"
As Sam stomped back into the spare bedroom, she had to keep her arms firmly pressed to her sides to stop herself from slamming the door closed. She instead gave the door a light kick. As the edge of the door kissed the doorframe, she took a quick breath and untensed her arms to close it with an aggressive nudge. Now she began to mumble to herself.
"Ugh, I guess I have no choice but to bear with it. Better than resisting and then getting grounded for way longer than just four or five hours. I'll just let Dewi do what he wants and keep to myself for the most part... Tch, 'little bonding experience', huh? At least I know I'm not the one who needs to change here."
Back in the living room, Dewi slumped forward in his seat with a huff, before bracing his hands on his knees and standing up. He flipped his hat onto his head as he walked towards the front door, then leaned against the wall beside it, just waiting for his cousin to return. A part of him hoped she would take forever.
"This idea is really optimistic of you, Auntie," he thought, begrudgingly acknowledging Dory's intentions, "but I don't think anything can get through to her. Definitely nothing I can do about it just by myself... At least I know I'm not the one who needs to change here."
Much to Dewi's chagrin, Sam did eventually return with a proper outfit. His uncomfortable, distant stare gave way to a suspicious squint when he noticed her zebra-striped pants. Those violated the Washington Convention, didn't they? He quickly looked away, not saying anything, but he sincerely hoped they were fake.
Pushing that thought aside, Dewi said his goodbyes to his aunt and then his father—who was busy in the basement. Something about going through and getting rid of old junk—before hurrying back to the front door. He opened it and strode outside, with a disgruntled Sam slowly following behind.
He took a deep breath, trying to see the bright side of things. Yeah, he was going to be stuck with Sam, who was surely going to be nothing but her usual annoying, apathetic self. But despite this, he still got to go to Great Debate Street Park. Despite being located less than ten miles away from his father's house, they hardly ever went there, usually because there were more exciting options available. There was a whole wooded area of the park that Dewi had never explored before, and he had recently become eager to explore it. Eager... until Sam had to get involved.
"Remember," Dory called to Sam as she leaned against the doorway, "be back before supper. Oh, and if Dewi comes back complaining that you ruined his fun somehow, your phone is mine for a whole week. Got that, missy?"
"Got that, Mom," Sam moaned dejectedly as she stumbled towards her mother's car. "I suppose you won't be happy if I crash either?" She sounded desperate to find any humor in her situation.
Dory scoffed. "Oh, you bet! I can't very well punish you if you're dead, now can I?"
Dory's response didn't offer the entertainment Sam hoped it would. "Right," she said, reaching the car and throwing open the driver's seat door and hopping inside. "Bye, Mom." She didn't wait for a responding goodbye, shutting the door.
The mother shook her head and sighed. With a couple more reassuring glances at her daughter and nephew, she turned back into the house, closing and locking the door behind her. Sam rolled down her window and poked her head out to glare at Dewi, who suddenly seemed fascinated by the deep, wooded area beside the house. A rather specific direction, at that.
"Hey, Earth to Dewi!" Sam called out, her glare turning suspicious. "Are you done staring into space yet? Hurry up and get in already!"
It took Dewi a full four seconds to even acknowledge his cousin's shout with a simple head turn. His expression seemed to be one of careful consideration. Rather than turning fully and moving towards the car, he instead took a small step forward towards the woods. He looked back to the woods, then back to Sam. Back to the woods, back to Sam.
"...I need to, uh... check on something," he finally spoke, before suddenly bolting away at full speed into the woods. "Give me ten minutes!"
"What?!"
...
At a comfortable thirty miles per hour, the car rolled along.
"Ten minutes, huh?" Sam huffed as she steered to make a right turn. "You left me sitting there waiting for nearly half an hour!"
"I said I was sorry, okay?" Dewi whined, slumping back in the passenger seat. "It, uh, took a while to find. And I need to get better with time estimations..."
"Oh, you don't say."
The longer the drive went on—which wasn't that long in the first place—the more bored Sam became. While Dewi seemed content to just stare out the window and watch the buildings and trees go by, having to pay attention to traffic as her only form of 'entertainment' was starting to get on her nerves.
"Ugh, this silence is gonna kill me!" Sam groaned. Her brain in dire need of stimulation, she pulled one hand away from the steering wheel to fiddle with the radio. When a Taylor Swift song came on, she stopped and grinned.
"Oooh! Perfect timing. Just when the good stuff is on!" Sam now wore a contented expression and a rare posture devoid of stiffness, but it still made her look just as bratty. She began to hum along, and that quickly turned into her singing along with increasingly passionate volume.
"Mm, baby, now we got ba~d bloo~d... Mm-mm, it used to be ma~d lo~ve... So take a look what you've do~ne... 'Cause baby now we got—!"
Sam's voice cracked, abruptly halting her off-key crooning as she turned her head and saw her little cousin staring up at her with the most menacing death glare she'd ever seen from him; one that could rival even her mother's. Her smile awkwardly froze, then flipped into an indignant scowl.
"Quit looking at me like that," she ordered with a scoff. "You're making me self-conscious."
"Good," Dewi replied, almost coldly. He leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms and looking straight ahead at the road in front of them. "Your taste in music is total garbage, and your singing is even worse."
At that, Sam's mouth gaped, and she looked away from the road for a second just to give her cousin a furious look. "Okay, let's get one thing clear, weirdo! Taylor Swift is awesome! My taste in music is perfectly—"
"I'm afraid I must concur with Deuwie on this matter, she-beast," a muffled female voice suddenly spoke.
"Wha—who—?!" Sam's face went pale, her eyes wide as tennis balls. Her eyeballs pivoted sharply just in time to spot the breast pockets of Dewi's jacket rustling. Something was moving about within them.
"N-no, you..." Sam stammered, her acne-ridden face now pouring sweat. "When you ran off into the woods... d-don't tell me you..."
A tiny, black claw emerged from under the flap of Dewi's left breast pocket, flicking it open to reveal a white mask with two long horns and two black, menacing eye sockets. The little creature lifted itself up, revealing a scarlet cloak draped around its body that caught the daylight like a wicked flare. In its right claw, it wielded an edged needle.
A hand emerged from the right pocket as well—tinier, stubbier, and an even darker pitch of black—flicking the flap up to reveal a cracked, rounded cubed mask with two little antler-esque horns and two oval eye sockets that seemed to devour any light that tried to enter. This one was even smaller in size, and had a gleaming, pale nail sheathed on its back.
"Your cousin presented human music to us once before," the spider cloaked in red—Hornet—said frigidly, "and I must say, the genres he selected were of far higher quality to our ears."
"AAAAAIIIIIEEE!!" Sam shrieked, instinctively throwing herself in the opposite direction from the two bugs. Her head smacked into the car door's window as she completely let go of the steering wheel for a second, causing the car to sharply swerve onto the wrong lane. When the jolt of pain in her cranium made her realize what she had done, it was nearly too late.
Dewi screamed in terror while the bugs clung tightly to his jacket. Sam shoved her fear of creepy-crawlies aside for a fleeting moment as she grasped the wheel and veered to the right. A furious horn blasted as she narrowly avoided ramming into an oncoming minivan by mere inches. Her overcorrection caused the car to rocket towards a road sign, requiring an extra veer to the left. There was a honk from another angry driver. It took several seconds for Sam to keep the car even somewhat steady.
Both humans were hyperventilating, drenched in cold sweat. The bugs were frozen, discombobulated and afraid. For an agonizing while, nobody spoke. There was only the sound of rapid, heavy breathing and the ambience of the road as driver and passenger saw their lives flash before their eyes.
It was Hornet who finally broke the taut silence. "Vile she-beast... what were you thinking?!" she viciously scolded in a terrifying tone she reserved for the most incorrigible of beings, laced with concern for the young human she was clinging to. "Your irrational panic nearly doomed us all!" The phantasmal form of the smaller bug—Ghost—swiftly drifted closer to Hornet, seeking comfort from their sister.
It was Hornet's telling off that helped Dewi find his own words. "S-Sam... Sam, are... I can't believe..." he stammered, his voice breaking as he fought back the moisture building up in his eyes. "Are you insane?! Oh my god, oh my god, we almost crashed and died because you... y-you... you're such a wimp!"
The entomophobic teenager's hands trembled like plucked strings, her mouth hanging wide open. Her eyes snapped from the road ahead to the critters on Dewi's chest in rapid succession. Her whole body was overcome with the urge to leap out of the vehicle just to get away from those tiny monsters, throwing herself and common sense to the wind.
"Hahh, ahh... w-why..." she stammered, her voice trembling at an octave higher as she struggled to drive the car in a straight line. "Why, why, whywhywhywhywhywhy?! Why did you have to bring your freaky talking bug friends along?!"
"Because you'd suck the fun out of everything if I didn't, that's why!" Dewi barked, even as he was still catching his breath. "You have your phone to distract yourself from me, but I still need something to help me forget you exist... You're going ten over the speed limit, by the way!"
"Nnngh..." Sam strained, slowly but surely regaining control.
Hornet and Ghost moved, crawling onto Dewi's shoulder. The red maiden began to speak, "Not to mention, we were hoping—"
"AAAIIEE!!"
And then it was lost. For a fraction of a second, the car swerved. The correction was fortunately just as swift.
"What the heck is wrong with you?!" Dewi cried, shriveling in his seat.
Sam was panting once again. "Dewi, Dewi, get them out of my sight, please! I feel like they're gonna pounce on me!"
"If you do not cease your whining and control this mechanical carriage properly, I may do just that," Hornet spat with a glare. Then, quieter, directed at Dewi: "Ugh, I still can't understand how humans can be brought to despair by creatures so diminutive in comparison." The mute Ghost shook their head, a smug agreement.
Dewi rolled his eyes. "Me neither, Hornet. That's just how it is, and I can't stand it." He reached up to pet Ghost on the head with a single finger. The gesture was comforting to them both. "But try to tone it down with the threats for now. It might make her panic even more."
Hornet sighed. "Yes, so be it. As I was saying, Little Ghost and I were also hoping to see more of what nature is like up here on the surface. These wooded 'parks' in particular are rather sublime... even if a bit existentially dreadful, knowing bugs could see a single tree as a spot fit to construct an entire city within while humans merely see it as common flora. Or a resource used to create paper."
"Ah, I'm happy to hear that," Dewi replied, finally smiling for the first time in what felt like forever. "That's pretty interesting, though. I never really thought about how you guys perceive things that are naturally gigantic. I guess that proves you right!" He leaned back in his seat, relaxed at last. "Trees can be kinda pretty. And they can also be home to—"
"Shut up, let me fucking focus!" Sam snapped, trying as hard as she could to concentrate solely on the road. "You can have your fun with your stupid bug friends, just keep them to yourself and far away from me!"
While Hornet and Ghost shot Sam a death glare, Dewi sat in silence for a brief moment, looking up at his on-edge cousin. Then, a smirk curved his lips, and he turned his head to look out the window, watching the scenery of trees and sparsely placed houses whizzing by.
"You got it, Sam."
