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Quirrel pores over the contents of one of Lemm’s Wanderer’s Journals, trying to decipher the foreign language. He vaguely recognizes the script from a different kingdom he has been to, but some parts of it are different from what he recalls. Perhaps a dialect…? Maybe he should pay the Archives a visit and see if anything there can help him.
Just as he’s about to get up and risk spending a sleepless night surrounded by electricity, acid, and the distinct lack of a bed, he hears a knock on his door. A strict, controlled tap-tap-tap; one he knows quite well. Only Hornet would be so disciplined about knocking on doors.
“Come in,” he calls, and then remembers that he’s not exactly close enough to the door for her to hear him. Reluctantly, he rises to his feet, wincing at the way they creak and ache. His age is starting to catch up with him — and he’s been sitting for too long, if the stiffness in his joints is any indication.
He makes his way to the door, idly wondering whether he should invest in a cane or not, and when he opens it, he can’t help but stare.
Hornet looks awful. Her shoulders are slumped, needle dangling by its eye between two fingers. Her cloak is stained with dirt, mostly around the hem. Her head is lowered, and she won’t meet his eyes. Maybe she can’t — not like this, at least. Whatever happened out there has affected her greatly.
It’s been a long, long time since Quirrel has seen her this upset.
“Come in,” he says again, softer this time. The dread of having to clean the dirt off of his furniture and floor is the last thing on his mind as she trudges in, propping her needle up next to his nail (which Ghost had brought to him at some point, since he initially left it at the Blue Lake) to the left of the door. A rule he had set up to keep Ghost from trailing blood everywhere, but it ended up applying to everyone when they began hunting — and searching for survivors.
And today, Hornet had gone down to look for survivors in —
“There are only two survivors in Deepnest,” Hornet says as she sits down on his sofa. Quirrel sits in the chair across from her. “Midwife and the Mask Maker.”
“…I’m sorry.” It’s all Quirrel can think of. All he can say. He knows that Hornet was anxious about returning to the land of her birth, and even more apprehensive about looking for any sign of life after the Infection ravaged it. To finally muster up the courage to go and find all of her fears realized… no wonder she’s so upset.
“Neither wants to leave.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
Both are silent for a time. Quirrel knows from experience that it’s best to wait for Hornet to speak first — if she has something to say, she’ll say it. Otherwise, don’t push — less for her sake and more for his own.
“I went to the weaver’s den, and…” Hornet takes a deep, shuddering breath. “It’s so quiet there. Corpses… nothing but corpses. They’re all dead. Every last one of them.” Her breathing briefly halts, and then she takes another deep breath — staving off a sob, no doubt. Even in her vulnerable state, Hornet would never let anyone see her cry.
Quirrel feels her pain. He had friends and family here, before the kingdom fell, and to find their remains — if there even were remains, which more often than not was not the case — was a horrific ordeal even before he regained his memories. The mind forgets, but the heart remembers. He knew who they were.
“I found my mother infected in the Crossroads,” he says.
“You did?” Hornet risks a peek at him. He sees the gloss over her eyes — she’s fighting tears.
“I did. I didn’t have my memories at the time, but I had my intuition. I knew it was her.” Quirrel taps his fingertips on his knee. “I didn’t think the infected could be saved at the time, so I killed her — or rather, what was left of her. Needless to say, I deeply regret my decision.”
“…I see.” Hornet sighs. “The weavers… they were like family to me, so I suppose we have something in common.”
Many things, in fact, but Quirrel says nothing on the matter.
“I… as I was standing there, staring at them, all of these memories started flooding my mind, and I just… fell.” Hornet gestures vaguely with an open-palmed hand. “I couldn’t get up. I wasn’t hurt, but I couldn’t get up.”
“Sometimes our emotions are so powerful that they paralyze us,” Quirrel says. “It happens to everyone at some point. Don’t stress too much about it.” Knowing Hornet, she probably thinks that it was an entirely new phenomenon and that something is deeply wrong with her.
“Right.” Hornet fiddles with the dirt-encrusted hem of her cloak. “I ended up leaving once I could move. I didn’t even stay to give them proper send-offs. As the princess of Deepnest, I should… I should’ve…”
“Hornet.”
“I’m a horrible excuse for a spider —“
“Hornet.”
“Maybe I should let that Nosk that’s been running around kill me —“
“Hornet !” Quirrel says, louder this time. “Stop thinking like that. You’re not a bad person for running away. You just need some time to process what you’ve seen.”
“But —“
“No buts. Take a few days off — you can’t hunt or search with your mind otherwise occupied. Stay here if you like, or go back to your place, but don’t leave Dirtmouth unless it’s for a casual walk. Overworking yourself won’t help.”
“Since when do you have the authority to order me around?” Hornet is bristling, but Quirrel refuses to let one of his closest friends slowly kill herself through self-neglect and stress.
“Since you told me to stop you if you’re putting yourself in danger,” he retorts. She had done that; weeks ago, in fact.
“Fine.” She sighs again. Quirrel has to work to hide his smile as the spider hybrid pouts. It’s such a childish expression on an otherwise stern individual — certainly worthy of a laugh. But he doesn’t want to make her feel even worse, so he holds his tongue and keeps his expression neutral.
“Good,” he says instead. “You should start your recuperation by cleaning your cloak. You’re staining my couch.”
“…Ah.” As if only noticing the sorry state of it now, Hornet stares down at her cloak with a surprised expression. She stands, wincing as a few crumbs of the stuff fall to the floor. “I’ll be on my way, then.”
“Feel free to come back at any time,” he calls, but she’s grabbed her needle and closed the door behind her before he can finish the sentence. He sighs fondly — she’s always in such a rush — before staring at his couch with no small amount of dread.
With a shake of his head, he gets up and trudges on over to the broom closet. This is going to take a while. But given everything leading up to it… he figures it is worth his while.