It Started With a Spinny

A Truth Hidden

The night sky is so much more colourful away from the festival lights, the countless white stars shading towards warm golds and cold blues all shining out of a swirling canvas of indigo and violet. It's so beautiful, and Vee lets herself get lost in the vivid cosmic tapestry as the two of them-

"Wait!"

Vee freezes! Slowly, she looks over. For a moment she doesn't recognise the shadowed figure standing next to her: the dark green cape, black clothes and long black hair look so unfamiliar in the half-light, so unlike Luz's normal colourful, expressive, joyful self, one brown hand held up as a warning.

Vee swallows, "Luz? What, what's wr-"

Without a word she points down before them, where the mud between two trees bares a single footprint.

Vee stares, "Is, is that-"

"It would appear we are not alone."

Her voice is so cold, making Vee shiver despite herself as she looks around the dark shapes of the trees surrounding them on all sides with watchful shadows. Her voice comes out so small: "m-maybe we should... Luz?"

She's kneeling, carefully examining the footprint.

Vee steps closer, stares down at it too, trying to ignore the persistent smell of rot as she examines the distinct imprint of a boot. Her eyes widen, "Hunter?"

"Interesting: how can you tell?"

"The, the tread. It's distinctive, not as pronounced as Willow's combat boots but still quite," Vee blinks, "wait how can you tell Luz?"

"He was running."

"How, how do you know that?"

She points, "The track is clearly deeper at the toe."

"Huh, but where did you – hey LUZ!" but she's already running, the fog whirling apart and resettling between the silent shadows of trees, leaving Vee suddenly and completely alone.

She swallows.

For just a moment she has the selfish impulse to turn and run, run all the way back to the brightly lit festival, to Amity and Masha and Camila and everyone so all of them can come back together and... and Luz has the map!

The wind whistles as it moves the fog through the looming trees, the half-light turning the orange foliage into dark shades of violet and plum and wine and maroon and, and – and for a long moment she's back in the Boiling Isles, panting and heaving in a blind panic as her time runs out to find a tall tree or a sturdy enough log to keep her safe from the stirring packs of ratworms and maybe, maybe, get some desperately needed sleep!

Vee shakes her head. This isn't the Demon Realm, this is the Human Realm... and she's alone again. It's not the cold that makes her hunch inwards over her pounding hearts, holding her own shaking arms as she calls out: "Luuuz? Luz I don't-"

"You wouldn't leave me alone out here," a voice echoes back, "would you?"

She stops, "No, no never! But, but I-"

"I can't do this without you," the voice becomes so sad, "Please, I need you!"

And just like that she's running towards the voice, startled to a gasping stop by a shadow lunging out of the fog – resolving into Luz's forest green cape snagged on a branch. She holds her hammering chest, her painful breathes wheezing out of her! She fights her own shaking hand to nervously take the forgotten cape, holding it so tightly to her chest as she rushes forward again, "Luz? Luz wait I'm coming! Luz?!"

She bursts out of the trees and all but tumbles into the lake, a panicked flap of her wings pushing her back to collapse on the muddy shore, panting hard! She's still holding the cape to her heaving chest, still whimpering at the painful hammering of her hearts and the desperate aching of her lungs!