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“The highbloods disa-purr-ove of us Fefurry.”, Nepeta muttered into her hat. Feferi looked up from her husktop, her hair fluttering in front of her eyes.
“Why would they do that?”, She replied, setting the husktop down on the table beside her. They were at Nepeta’s hive, mostly because the oliveblood couldn’t breathe underwater, but also because according to her, she had the ‘most com-fur-atable cave in all of Alternia’. Feferi didn’t exactly disagree, but it had a little too much fur and blood on the walls and too few cute cuttlefish for her tastes. Nepeta was leaning up against her shipping wall, right next to a rough sketch of Eridan to which she had been adding an unflattering mustache and bulged out eyes. “You’re an ab-shoal-utely perfect matesprit, not to mention positively adorabloodthirsty”, she continued. “Why would anybody disapprove of anything to do with us. I mean shore we’re planning a rebellion and all, but nobody knows anyfin about that besides the usual twelve.”
“Well, I mean, it might be beclaws I’m so low on the hemospectrum, but it’s probably since...”, Nepeta paused, looking at a spot on the cave wall behind Feferi’s head. Feferi leaned forward, nodding encouragingly for her matesprit to continue. “We’re the purr-fect ship and all those buttholes are just jealous!!”, Nepeta yowled, laughing so hard she slumped over sideways onto the floor of her hive. Feferi cackled, her tablet temporarily forgotten.
“Glub! I totally agree gillfrond!”, she shrieked, tipping over to join the oliveblood on the floor. “When I become the Empress I’ll be shore those guys get forked first!”, she grinned, gesturing with her trident and almost knocking over a whirling device sitting nearby.
The two were still tangled together on the floor when Nepeta’s husktop made a screeching meow, alerting her to an incoming message.
--centaursTesticle (CT) began trolling arsenicCatnip (AC)--
CT: D -->Nepeta
CT: D -->Answer at once
AC: :33< *ac pounces on her lovely morail as she is pawsitively ofurjoyed to see equius*
CT: D -->Nepeta
CT: D -->This is not the time for roleplaying
CT: D -->I have received word that a unit of imperial troops have been ordered to e%ecute you and the Heiress
CT: D --> I am afraid that I am too far away from you to be of any assistance, but I wished to inform you of the threat so that you could prepare for the worst
AC: :33<*the mighty hunterrorist nepeta would like to thank you fur informing her about the enemies but assures you that she and fefurry have it purrfectly under control*
CT: D -->Oh
CT: D --> Well then
CT: D -->I will leave you and the Heiress to it
AC: :33< oh okay bye equius!!! <> <>
CT: D --> .... <>
--centaursTesticle (CT) ceased trolling arsenicCatnip (AC)--
“Ugh!”, Nepeta groaned. “No matter how many times I tell him that you don’t mind being called your name and not your title he ne-fur listens.”
“Oh I’m shore he’s just being stubborn a-boat it, He’ll come around you’ll sea!”, Feferi cheerfully giggled. “In the meantime it looks like we’ll be having some company soon. We can’t just stand around carping like doo-fishes!”. She grinned nastily, showing needle-thin fangs, “We’ve got some assassins to take care of!”. Nepeta leapt up from her position against the wall with the husktop, setting it down in a pile of hopbeast pelts. Feferi stood, brushing her hair out of the way and repositioning her tiara, the epitome of seadweller perfection. As she did that, Nepeta quickly gathered her jacket and pulled her hat on over her horns to sit jauntily on her head. The two trolls quickly moved out of the hive, not wanting the Empress’s troops to know where Feferi was spending most of her time.
When they were about five minutes out from the cave, the two heard the sounds of fighting. Picking up speed Nepeta and Feferi unsheathed their strife specibi, brandishing them as they rapidly approached the soldiers. When they got there however, all they saw was a rather satisfied-looking Pounce de Leon sitting in a clearing surrounded by highblood corpses licking blood off her paws. Nepeta scanned the clearing for any survivors before dashing across the glade to hug her lusus. Feferi walked over as well, making sure not to accidentally step on anybody’s blood splatters or remains. As she drew nearer, Pounce de Leon shifted, revealing a battered ruffiannihilerator covered in ultramarine blue blood and white meowbeast fur. The ruffiannihilerator coughed, hacking a little blue onto the grass of the forest floor and barely missing the toe of Feferi’s shoes.
“You bitch...”, the blueblood spat, glaring at her. “The Empress is gonna put a cullin fork in your chest and that’ll be that”. Both Nepeta and Feferi stiffened, Nepeta flicking her claws a little further out threateningly. Feferi reached out and placed a hand on her chest and shaking her head at her matesprit slightly. She stepped forward, placing the point of her trident at his throat.
“Watch it buster, you interrupted me with my lovely matesprit. We were having a nice time and then you bust in here with your crabby attitude. I reel-y hate it when bassholes like you come in and ruin a perfectly fin-tastic outing. I’m reel-y starting to get annoyed with my glubbing ancestors antics. I know she’s only doing it to piss me off!”, Feferi yelled, staring down the blueblood. “I’d tell you to send her a message but I can’t reel-y leave you alive otter-wise she’ll just send more people for us to krill”. The ruffiannhilerator paled slightly, attempting to swallow around the lump in his throat.
Finally seeming to find his nerve, he spoke up, “Go get swallowed by a giant tentaclebeast, fishbit-”. He was abruptly cut off when Feferi shoved the prong through his neck, killing him instantly.
“We could’ve purr-obably gotten some in-fur-mation about the Empress from him.”, Nepeta commented, poking the corpse with her claws. “Oh well, at least now I have some blue paint fur my shipping wall.”.
Feferi pulled her trident out of the body with a wet squelching noise. “I don’t think he had anything useful to say, but I suppose now we have to go inform the others that I’m still alive and splashing. Ugh I don’t understand why my ancestor has to be such a pain in the buttand cause all this trouble.”, she groaned. Feferi wiped the ultramarine blood off the prongs of her weapon before tucking it back into her specibus and turning towards her matesprit, who was collecting some of the blood in a bottle. “Sorry Nepeta, I kind of lost my temper at that dummy.”, she said sheepishly.
“It’s okay Fefurry. It is sad though that we have to go talk to those snobs when this was supposed to be a day all to ourselves.”, Nepeta replied, putting the bottle inside one of the pockets in her massive trenchcoat. Feferi’s face softened, her bladder-based aquatic vascular system throbbing with pity inside her chest. She leaned forward, pecking her matesprit on the tip of her upturned nose and then pressing her lips to Nepeta’s. Nepeta giggled into the kiss, sheathing her claws so she wouldn’t stab her girlfriend when she put her arms around her waist.
The moment was ruined when Pounce de Leon slid in between the two of them and put her entire weight on Nepeta’s legs, almost knocking her over. “Pounce!”, Nepeta shrieked, attempting to push her lusus away, but the beast just looked at her in a way that seemed to imply that they should stop wasting time fooling around in the clearing and go take care of business. Nepeta sighed, “Ugh I suppose we should do stuff now.”
“ I guess...”, Feferi answered. reluctantly letting go of her matesprit to pull her portable husktop out of her sylladex. “Here I’ll message Eridan and see if he and Crabcakes can organize a meeting in a couple of hours.”
--cuttlefishCuller (CC) began trolling caligulusAquarium (CA)--
CC: )(ey you big dummy 38O
CA: um hey fef wwhat wwere you needin
CC: I need to set up a meeting with everyone
CC: T)(e --Empress just tried to assassinate me
CC: AGAIN
CA: im kinda busy here fef i got other things i gotta be doin
CC: ----Eridan this is serious I reel-ly need your help 38U
CA: ugh fine ill get evverybody together at the north end of the beach
CA: just meet us there i guess
CC: Thanks --Eridan Ill owe you one
CA: ummm does this mean youll consider my offer for a date
CC: NO 38C
CA: ugh fine wwhatever ill go do it
--caligulasAquarium (CA) ceased trolling cuttlefishCuller (CC)--
Feferi sighed, slipping her portable husktop away.
“Ugh, so much for a romantic getaway with no snobby bluebloods getting in the way.”, she muttered. “Eridan says he’ll gather everybody at the beach so we can discuss the newest developments.”
“Just ano-fur day in planning a revolution to overthrow the hemospectrum and kill your ancestor, huh Fefurry.”, Nepeta giggled, “At least we get to see Karkitty and some of our o-fur friends.”
“Yeah it’ll be nice to see everyone face to face instead of just carping to beach other on Trollian!”, Feferi replied, “And most of the other leaders aren’t that bad, it’s mostly just Cilion and Estoro who are reel-y annoying.”
“Yeah but Ellfen keeps giving me this dissa-purr-oving looks e-fur-ytime he sees us together and it’s starting to get on my last nerve.”, her matesprit hissed, kicking a wad of turf into the air as they started heading to the beach. “I guess ne is still kind of one of those trolls who thinks that we shouldn’t date outside of our bloodcaste. Which is ridiculous of course! Blood color shouldn’t affect shipping at all!”
“Yeah I reel-y fish some of the trolls on the council weren’t so bigoted. If they weren’t ab-shoal-utely important I would just fire their basses.”, the Heiress proclaimed.
The two continued through the forest. Luckily Nepeta knew the forest like the back of her paw and both of them were able to run pretty fast so it didn’t take long to reach the seashore. When they reached the area where the trees and soil slowly turned to sand and palm fronds, they saw a group of figures standing a little ways from the water’s edge. The area between the woods and the ocean was generally considered neutral territory for both landdwellers and seadwellers. Thus, it was an ideal meeting spot for parties from both bodies.
Eridan and Karkat could be seen standing toward the edge of the group, Karkat mostly ignoring the seatroll as he tried to chat him up. Other trolls from various parts of Alternia and varying bloodcastes were also present. Karkat was the first one to see them, waving grumpily at the two girls. He looked eager for an excuse to stop talking to Eridan and jogged towards them.
“Thank fuck you’ve come to save me from wasting anymore time with this writhing bucket of festering discharge. I was starting to contemplate snapping one of Hipster Fish’s horns off and using it to gouge out my auricular sponge clot so I wouldn’t have to listen to this raging shitstorm of frothing nonsense anymore.”, Karkat exclaimed, probably a little louder than was necessary. Eridan paled slightly, putting a hand up to massage at his horns, as if making sure that they were still attached and hadn’t stealthily been sawed off. The other trolls closer to the water turned, watching Feferi and Nepeta approach. A few of them looked disapprovingly at Karkat as he continued, “So I hear your batshit crazy fishbitch of an ancestor tried to kill you, as if I don’t have enough things to worry about on my nutrition plateau. Now all we need is some bulge-fondling clown to show up and start ranting about the end of the fucking world, wouldn’t that just be perfect, let’s just have the world screw me over a little more tonight thank you very much.”
“Sorry I got into trouble Crabcakes. I didn’t exactly invite him on my date.”, Feferi said, attemping to scoop him up into a hug.
“No, no it’s not exactly your fault that the entire fucking empire is trying to kill you. I’d ask if you were okay, but that’s probably a stupid question because you and Nepeta are probably the best equipped to deal with a laughassassin here.”, he said, moving out of Feferi’s reach to avoid her embrace.
“Hey!”, Eridan yelped, glaring at Karkat, “Are you sayin’ I can’t handle myself in the field?”
“Eridan you burnt premade noodles once because you forgot to add the water first.”, Nepeta sneered, poking him in the ribs and watching him jump.
“Wow guys, one time. It was one fuckin’ time.”, he grumbled, rubbing his side and glaring at the oliveblood.
“Eridan, shut up.”, Karkat and Feferi said in unison. They had almost reached the rough circle of older trolls standing at the water’s edge. Most of them had stopped their previous conversation in favor of watching the four’s arguments. A few looked slightly amused, but others were glaring venomously at Feferi’s lowblood companions. Nepeta glared right back, baring her fangs at Dargin Estoro, a blueblood with horns that resembled antenne spiked like pinecones. He huffed, turning his nose up at her.
“I ssssee that everyone issss here now.”, a greenblood hissed out, attempting to get everyone’s attention and direct it towards Feferi, “Sssso I would assssk that we all give the Heiresssss the attention that sssshe sssso rightly desssserves.”
“Who put you in charge Strolm?”, a seadweller with curling horns like vines called out where ne was dipping nir feet in the water.
“No one Ellfen. I jusssst assssumed that becausssse nobody elsssse wassss paying any notice that I would sssspeak up.”, Strolm huffed.
“Okay, okay everyone. Let’s not argue who’s in charge here!”, Feferi cried. Everyone turned to look at her with a little bit of surprise, as if they had almost forgotten she was even there. “The whole point of having a group of advisors is that everyone gets an equal say in whatever is going on!”, she continued, “We only have a little bit of time before the Condescension returns and I have to face her in the fight for the throne! I need plans and I also need a council that is willing to cooperate for the good of Alternia. Can we do that?!?” The trolls around her nodded, some reluctantly, but everyone seemed to agree with Feferi’s statement.
Karkat sighed, “Well, now that that’s out of the way and I don’t have to yell at you assholes about it, we need to discuss what our plans are for when the imperial army arrives to throw everything down the load gaper. We can’t just hand Feferi a massive fucking fork and throw her to the Empress like a piece of grubloaf we’ve slaved over for weeks and weeks for her to poke full of holes like it offended her delicate sensibilities somehow. Then we can all just go up and beg her to maybe cull us quickly and not draw it out too much because treason is fucking punishable by death like everything else on this gogforsaken planet.”
“Actually if you jaywalk you just get a few limbs taken off!”, a petite yellowblood with sparks jumping between her angled horns interrupted cheerfully.
“Oh wonderful. Thanks thats so reassuring. You just get your fucking legs cut off so they can cull you later for being a useless slug of genetic waste oozing around on the face of the world!”, Karkat shrieked, blood rising to his cheeks as he got more and more upset.
“Karkitty! Don’t worry about it so much! Me and Fefurry have been training really hard so she can beat that mean old Em-purr-ess up!”, Nepeta interjecting, trying to calm the mutant down, “Equius even agreed to build us some purr-actice robots to fight against.” Karkat groaned, rubbing his face with his palms as he took several deep breaths.
“Ok so the Heiress and her catgirl girlfriend are training in their weird cave of a forest getaway, what are the rest of you doing?”, he asked, focusing his gaze on Feferi’s advisors.
“I’ve been feedin’ Fef’s monster of a lusus, sorry Gl’bgloyb.”, Eridan volunteered, “I was also thinkin’ about getting Vris and lookin’ for some of those legendary weapons she’s always talkin’ about. Maybe some of them would be useful against the Condesce.”
“Okay sure Eridan, just make sure you’re keeping the senseless murder of wrigglers to a minimum, okay? I know about you and Vriska’s FLARPing adventures.”, Karkat replied.
“Don’t be too hard on her Kar, she was just tryin’ to feed her lusus. Anyways Spidermom’s dead now so she isn’t really doing that kinda thing anymore.”, Eridan muttered, wrapping his scarf tighter around his neck. Karkat rolled his eyes dramatically before attempting to forget that Eridan was there at all.
“Me and Hekell have been going around to all the local hivestems talking to people.”, a skinny maroonblood piped up, throwing zir arm around the brownblood next to them. “I was also going to go see your friend Nitram and talk about possible advertising, you know, because his ancestor was the Summoner, but we got called here instead. We can do it tomorrow though!”, ze continued.
“Odiush I have asked you time and time again to refer to me by my last name, please do not address me so casually.”, Hekell said, trying to shrug the taller troll’s arm off his shoulder.
“Awww but Abiska sounds so snooty! I’ll call you Abiska when you call me Ummuze!”, the maroonblood whined, wrapping zir arm even tighter around him.
“Well, while they’re pitchflirting over there, I’ll tell you about what Royafe and I’ve been doing.”, the previously interrupting yellowblood interrupted again. “We’ve gotten in touch with Captor like you suggested Miss Peixes, to talk about communicating with the Empress’s Helmsman, but it’s rather hard to get work done when all he does is be disagreeable and occasionally try to blow up our husktops.”, she continued.
“Yeah but thats mostly normal for Sollux. He’s awfully grumpy, but he’s very smart when he wants to be! I’m sure you and him can work it out Amupaw!”, Feferi interjected, waving a hand a little dismissively. “Just keep reminding him how important this is and try to keep him on task. It shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”
“Okay, Miss Peixes, I’ll keep trying.”, Amupaw replied, backing away slightly to whisper in the ear of her morail, Royafe. They grinned at her before turning to wink at Nepeta. Nepeta smiled back at the copperblooded troll. Gloaro Royafe had always been one of the few trolls who openly supported her and Feferi’s relationship.
Most of the nobles were at the very least disapproving of Feferi’s choice of Nepeta, mainly because they didn’t quite understand how their beautiful, pristine princess would want to date a scrappy oliveblood who lived in the woods and wore animal pelts as clothing. A lot of the lowblood population that knew about their matespritship were ecstatic to see the Heiress quadranting with a member of the masses. To them, Nepeta was a symbol of Feferi's proposed reforms. She had almost become a minor celebrity along with Feferi.
As the various advisors argued in front of them, Nepeta shot a toothy grin at her matesprit. Feferi winked back, elbowing her fondly in the ribs.
“You know Fefurry, we could just get out of here and let Eridan and Karkitty handle this for right now. This is supposed to be our special day! We should go out and enjoy it together.”, Nepeta whispered into Feferi’s finned ear. “They can handle it. Karkitty will make sure Eridan doesn’t mess up to bad.”
“That’s not exactly rea-shore-ing Nepeta.”, Feferi replied, glancing back at the bickering trolls, “I reel-y don’t know if that would be a good idea...”
“It’ll be fine, really!”, her matesprit said. “I can message Karkat to let him know without interrupting anything.”
“Oh. Well, I suppose it can’t hurt just this once. I am the future Empress after all, they can’t get too mad at me.”, she giggled. Nepeta pulled out her portable husktop as they slowly moved away from the group.
--arsenicCatnip (AC) began trolling carcinoGeneticist (CG)--
AC: :33< *ac sneakily pounces on the unsuspecting grumpy-troll*
CG: WHAT THE FUCK I’M LITERALLY SIX FEET AWAY. WHY ARE YOU TROLLING ME?
AC: :33< *ac would like to tell you that her and her lovely matesprit are going to go hang out in the woods and were hoping you could handle everything for them*
CG: WHAT. WHY?
AC: :33< *ac says its beclaws youre a furry nice troll and also a hopeless romantic *
CG: THIS IS TRUE.
CG: WHY THE FUCK AM I TELLING YOU THIS. WHY THE FUCK ARE WE EVEN ROLEPLAYING HERE.
AC: :UU< purrlease karkitty?
CG: UGH FINE. GO ENGAGE IN SLOPPY MAKEOUTS OR WHATEVER YOU TWO DO IN YOUR FREE TIME.
AC: :33< *ac tacklehugs the adorabloodthirsty cg and runs gl33fully off into the forest with fefurry*
CG: BYE. YOU’RE WELCOME I GUESS.
AC: :33< thank you karkat!!!
--arsenicCatnip (AC) has ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist (CG)--
“He said he’d co-fur for us so we can get out of here!”, Nepeta said, grabbing Feferi’s hand and starting to try and tug her faster towards the line of trees at the edge of the forest. Feferi had to cover her mouth with one of her hands to keep from laughing out loud and giving away their escape at the look on Nepeta’s face. She managed to muffle it enough that what came out was a bubbly, but quiet, little giggle. Letting her matesprit drag her into the forest, she turned her head slightly to take in the sight of Karkat shouting a bunch of her advisors back into line and trying to order the chaos somehow. Eridan, per usual, was being no help at all and was trying to show off Ahab’s Crosshairs to one of the other seadwellers on the beach. When they reached the forest, she quickly turned back around, just barely missing a low hanging branch that might’ve taken out her eye, or at least left a nasty cut on her face, if she’d had slower reflexes.
When the two girls were out of sight of the beach, Nepeta spun around from where she had been leading Feferi, tugging her in for a kiss. She had to go up onto the tips of her toes slightly to reach Feferi, and the taller troll leaned down to meet her in the middle. When she pulled away, Nepeta stuck out her tongue at her and bugged out her eyes, making her shake with laughter.
“You taste like fish, princess.”, Nepeta giggled, before coming up to kiss her again. “It’s a good thing I like fish!”, she continued. Feferi grinned into the kiss. Nepeta’s lips were warm and slightly chapped, in contrast to her own chilly, smooth lips. She tasted vaguely of fruit when her tongue slid slightly into Feferi’s mouth, brushing over her sharp canines. When she pulled away, she tugged a little at Feferi’s bottom lip, before letting go completely. Feferi glanced at her matesprit, her eyes drawn to Nepeta’s slightly blown pupils, green cheeks, and lips slightly swollen and stained with fuschia lipstick. She grinned, leaning down to peck her on the mouth. When she stepped back, straightening up, she looked up at the lightening sky above her.
“You know Nepeta...”, Feferi murmured. “This actually might work out okay.”, she continued, taking her matesprit’s hand as they headed back to rejoin the others.