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feel the weight of what we owe

Summary:

CARSON: So -

[Papers rustling.]

CARSON: So, for the record, whose idea was it to kill the Olde One?

(or: an oral history of the assassination of the olde one by the gamma 3 crabs.)

Notes:

welcome! the crabitat lore gang had the idea after ella died that it was sort of a turning point that inspired the gamma 3 crabs to kill their timeline's version of the olde one, who is trapped under the frozen harbor and has been keeping baltimore in a wintery time bubble where every day is exactly the same. i have been thinking about it for weeks. so i made this!

the format of this fic is loosely inspired by black hole oral history project by @waltztangocache, which you should absolutely go read.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

ATHENA: Is the tape going?

CARSON: Uh, yeah. Can you say your name - just, for the record?

ATHENA: Sure. Athena Valera.

 

***

 

CALLUM: Callum Toliver.

 

***

 

DARTH: Darth Gamble! Shadowy scourge of Baltimore!

CARSON: Okay, just - just the name.

 

***

 

OOZE: Ooze Gunn.

 

***

 

QUILL: Quill Harrow. In the process of getting it changed back to Stein.

CARSON: I don’t - I don’t think that’s relevant.

QUILL: Sure it is.

 

***

 

LIVER: Modern Liver. Liver’s fine.

 

***

 

ELIOT: Eliot Schofield.

WILLUM: [Clearly ELIOT’S voice, an octave lower] And Willum McKinley.

CARSON: That’s - okay.

ELIOT: I can drop it, if you want? I mean, guy’s pretty much served his purpose.

CARSON: If it helps you -

ELIOT: It’s fine. No puppet. I’ll be myself, for this one.

 

***

 

RYLAN: Rylan. Dogwood.

 

***

 

OLIVE: I can’t do this.

CARSON: Olive - it’s - if you could -

OLIVE: No, Carson, I’m sorry. I can’t do this. Talk to someone else.

[Fabric rustling, likely OLIVE removing a microphone from her lapel.]

OLIVE: [Distant] Good luck.

CARSON: Yeah. Thanks.

 

***

 

CARSON: So -

[Papers rustling.]

CARSON: So, for the record, whose idea was it to kill the Olde One?

ATHENA: Oh, that was all Eliot. Dude went off the shits when Ella died. I mean, you know. You were there for all that.

CARSON: I’d like to hear it from your perspective.

ATHENA: Who’s gonna hear this when you’re done?

CARSON: I don’t - I don’t know yet. I just want to make sure there’s a record of everything.

ATHENA: What, in case it happens again?

CARSON: Because someone should keep track of what happened. For the people who weren’t there.

 

***

 

CALLUM: Yeah, it was Eliot’s idea! I was surprised, like, here I thought he was just this mild mannered guy who makes puppets. But I guess when your best friend dies -

CARSON: Did you know Ella Goodman well?

CALLUM: Uh, about as well as anyone else, I guess. She came to all the team get-togethers and shit. But Eliot’s known her for, what, the whole time they’ve been in here since the 70s? That’s like forty years!

CARSON: Right.

CALLUM: Anyway, yeah, it was his idea.

 

***

 

QUILL: There was no plan. Just an idea. I don’t even know if he intended to follow through with it at first, or if he was just pissed off and throwing things at the wall to see what stuck.

CARSON: You don’t think he wanted to follow through?

QUILL: Not until we agreed with him.

 

***

 

CARSON: Do you remember what you said to all of us at the first practice after Ella died?

ELIOT: Yeah. Of course I do.

CARSON: Can you - for the record?

ELIOT: Sure.

[A beat of silence.]

ELIOT: I was mad. And - I think I was more tired than mad, actually. You know? Just tired . Tired of doing the same shit every day, only now I have to wake up and do it knowing Ella’s not gonna be there doing it with me. And I thought - what’s the point , right? What’s the point of the city being frozen, if people can still get hurt? If people can still die, and not come back when time resets the next day? What’s the point? If people are going to get hurt, and no one can move on, because time doesn’t fucking move…am I allowed to swear?

CARSON: Sure.

ELIOT: Well, yeah. You get the point. And that’s pretty much what I said to you guys.

CARSON: Did you expect people to agree with you?

ELIOT: To me saying we should kill the Olde One? Uh, there was definitely more enthusiasm than I expected.

 

***

 

RYLAN: I wasn’t on board at first.

CARSON: Why?

RYLAN: Monique. We all knew she’d probably fight us. She was probably the closest thing to a disciple the Olde One had left, and she wasn’t about to let anyone get close to that part of the Harbor. And I hated her, but - some of the solutions everyone else was coming up with were, uh, too intense for me.

CARSON: What changed your mind?

RYLAN: Well. You saw what happened to Monique.

CARSON: Can you describe it for me?

 

***

 

LIVER: Monique was a stone-cold bitch, but she didn’t deserve what she got. Pretty sure nobody deserves that.

 

***

 

OOZE: I think we were all afraid it would be one of us.

 

***

 

ELIOT: I knew it would be Monique. I just knew.

 

***

 

CALLUM: I thought for a little bit it would be me. And I was definitely scared. I didn’t - I can’t leave you guys behind. I mean, mostly Athena, but definitely the rest of you guys too.

 

***

 

DARTH: Scared? Me? The scourge of Baltimore is never scared!

 

***

 

ATHENA: Nah, I wasn’t scared.

 

***

 

QUILL: I’m glad it was Monique.

CARSON: I know you are.

QUILL: I thought you were being an objective observer?

CARSON: I’m observing that I know you’re glad that Monique was charged.

QUILL: Well, I was. I think the fans made the right decision, to get her out of the way.

CARSON: Do you think they did it to make Eliot’s plan easier to play out?

QUILL: I think they did it because it was strategically sound. Frankly, I’m not sure they gave a shit about Eliot or his plan. I think that was a happy accident.

 

***

 

CARSON: Tell me about the plan.

ELIOT: We needed a distraction.

 

***

 

RYLAN: We needed people.

 

***

 

LIVER: We needed something that would break through the fucking ice.

 

***

 

CARSON: The distraction -

CALLUM: For Darth?

CARSON: Uh, yes. Tell me about that.

CALLUM: Well, me and Athena knew that Darth probably wasn’t gonna be too happy about us trying to kill the Olde One. Because they made Ooze, right? And Ooze is, like, one of the only things that’s ever actually been created in the city that hasn’t just reset the next day. And she’s like Darth’s daughter or whatever, obviously. So we didn’t know what was gonna happen to her - even though she was on board with the whole plan. And, uh, we knew Darth was gonna be pissed.

 

***

 

DARTH: Of course I knew I was being had! You cannot possibly hope to pull one over on me! I know Ooze better than she knows herself!

 

***

 

OOZE: Oh, yeah, they had no idea it was a distraction. Just thought it was a nice brunch to celebrate getting through the season.

CARSON: They didn’t think it was odd that the whole team wasn’t getting together?

OOZE: No. Darth and I go out together all the time, just the two of us. It was just…normal.

CARSON: How did you feel about being a distraction?

OOZE: I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel a little bad. But it was for a good cause, right?

CARSON: You think so?

OOZE: Yeah. I think so. Especially because I’m still sitting here talking to you.

[OOZE laughs.]

CARSON: Why did you agree to be a part of the plan?

OOZE: I wanted to know what would happen. If killing the Olde One would actually free the city.

 

***

 

CALLUM: I’m a supervillain! I wasn’t about to pass up the chance to kill a god!

 

***

 

ATHENA: I didn’t want anyone else to get hurt. Not in a permanent way.

 

***

 

LIVER: Fuck the gods.

 

***

 

RYLAN: The Olde One got what was coming to her.

 

***

 

QUILL: I - hold on.

CARSON: What?

QUILL: Why did you agree to be part of the plan?

CARSON: I’m not - this isn’t -

QUILL: No, Carson, tell me. Why?

CARSON: I’m interviewing you.

QUILL: Not anymore. Why did you come out there on the ice with us?

CARSON: That’s not important.

QUILL: Isn’t this supposed to be an oral history? You were a part of it. You can’t just act like you’re some impartial reporter, when you were right there breaking through the ice with the rest of us.

CARSON: Fine. I was there. I helped.

QUILL: Why?

CARSON: Because Eliot was right.

 

***

 

CARSON: Tell me about breaking through the ice.

LIVER: Oh, that? Pretty sure Harrow and his sibling took care of the tools for that. He showed up with a bunch of these - drills, and pickaxes, and shit. Never asked where he got ‘em from.

 

***

 

QUILL: They were reinforced, to get through the ice and chitin. I would have brought laser tools, but they seemed…

[A beat of silence.]

CARSON: What?

QUILL: Inelegant, maybe. Too quick. Too easy. I wanted something we all had to do together, instead of just one person operating.

CARSON: To make us all culpable?

QUILL: Sure, if you want to be practical about it. No observers, no witnesses.

CARSON: You were being more theatrical than practical.

QUILL: Is that an accusation?

CARSON: It might be.

QUILL: Maybe I was. But the weight felt important.

CARSON: Why?

QUILL: Killing a god should have weight to it.

 

***

 

CALLUM: It was cold. Freezing. Well - you were there! We were all bundled up in layers and scarves and everything. I was still scared we’d fall through the ice when we started cracking it. I remember my mom telling me not to walk out on the Harbor, like it’d ever unfreeze, but - but when we started cracking through, it was solid ice all the way down. I didn't expect that.

 

***

 

LIVER: It wasn’t that cold once we started working. Even lugging all those tools out to where the old bitch was made me work up a sweat.

 

***

 

ATHENA: It was hard. The tools were heavy . We were all just kind of picking at the ice for a bit, trying to figure out what the best way to go about it was. We knew we didn’t have that much time. We had to get into it before anyone really saw us out there. But once we were there, standing over where she was - it was like, “are we really gonna do this?”

 

***

 

ELIOT: We needed to break through the ice, all together. And then keep going, get through the shell. But it wasn’t going to work if we didn’t all do it together.

CARSON: So who was it that came up with the idea -

ELIOT: Rylan.

 

***

 

RYLAN: Well, we needed to keep time, somehow. So we’d all be hitting the ice together.

 

***

 

CALLUM: And - oh, so Rylan starts singing. That shanty, you know. And we’ll roll the old chariot along -

 

***

 

ATHENA: - we’ll roll the old chariot along -

 

***

 

LIVER: - we’ll roll the old chariot along -

 

***

ELIOT: - and we’ll all hang on behind.

 

***

 

QUILL: And then we hit the shell. And kept going.

CARSON: What was that like?

[QUILL laughs.]

QUILL: A lot of blood, mostly. I think someone threw up. Callum, maybe.

 

***

CALLUM: It was disgusting. Going through the shell - to all that meat. All that blood.

CARSON: But you kept going?

CALLUM: What else were we supposed to do, at that point?

 

***

ELIOT: I don’t know how we knew when she was dead. We just - we just kept going, until it felt right to stop. Until it felt like we’d chewed through all the meat of her.

 

***

 

RYLAN: It felt like Julius Caesar , you know. The - stabbing. Over and over.

 

***

 

QUILL: It was more visceral than I expected. But there was no screaming, or anything. Just the noise we were making. 

CARSON: And the singing. 

QUILL: And the singing. Someone always kept singing, to keep us in time. 

 

***

 

CARSON: And after that?

ATHENA: What?

CARSON: What’d you do after?

ATHENA: Man, you know what we did. We all walked back across the ice, and went home, and took showers. And waited to see if it worked.

 

***

 

OOZE: I still can’t believe it fucking worked. Can you?

CARSON: No. Uh. No.

 

***

 

DARTH: I still can’t believe you thought you could pull the wool over my eyes! I should freeze this city again tomorrow!

CARSON: What are you going to do tomorrow?

[A beat of silence.]

DARTH: We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it!

 

***

 

RYLAN: I don’t know. I’m not used to there being a tomorrow.

CARSON: I imagine most people here aren’t.

RYLAN: I guess it’s one day at a time for all of us.

CARSON: Do you have any ideas?

RYLAN: Maybe I’ll do some traveling.

 

***

 

LIVER: I’d like to check out the mountains. Again.

 

***

 

ELIOT: I - I’m going to scatter Ella’s ashes somewhere sunny.

CARSON: Oh. I think she’d like that.

ELIOT: Yeah. I think so too.

 

***

 

CALLUM: I’m finally getting married!

 

***

 

ATHENA: Yeah, Callum and me are tying the knot. Finally.

CARSON: Congratulations.

ATHENA: The only part that sucks is that if we’d done it earlier, our honeymoon could’ve been killing a god.

 

***

 

OOZE: I’m running for mayor.

CARSON: I thought you were the mayor already?

[OOZE laughs.]

OOZE: Oh, I am. This is pretty much a formality.

CARSON: …I see.

 

***

 

QUILL: No idea. What are you doing tomorrow?

CARSON: I was hoping you had thoughts.

QUILL: Well, I guess we’ll find out together, won’t we?

CARSON: Hm.

QUILL: Hm?

CARSON: I guess we will.

Notes:

cold: the air and water flowing
hard: the land we call our home
push to keep the dark from coming
feel the weight of what we owe

leave a comment or come find me on tumblr as kentuckycorpserevivers to yell about snow crabs with me. or find me in the crabitat discord as just marn!

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