All Bark (No Bite) ~ PPAU Event Quest

    Alliance reinforcements arrived at Reverie on the seventh of April with the typical amount of fanfare. 

    That’s to say, with the typical amount of yelling, screaming, and flailing of weapons. 

    Plover, who’d been enjoying one of the few minutes of silence they’d gotten since– Snowdrop died, most of the camp evacuated, six people got their heads bashed in, the camp unevacuated, and thirty-plus confused, wounded, and distraught people woke up in a serial killer’s basement– everything, was unimpressed. 

    “Would you quit your yelling? You’re two days late for any action,” Plover groaned, raising their head from their comfortable pillow in the sun to glare at everyone. 

    The Alliance reinforcements blinked, glancing around the relatively peaceful camp in confusion, quickly reassessing their plans of swooping in to save the day. One of the reinforcements– Cassava– stepped forward, her remaining eye narrowing into a scowl. 

    “You were supposed to be on a scouting mission,” Cassava snapped, smoke curling from her lips.

    “Well, we scouted it. And then we stopped it.” Plover resettled their chin on their claws. “Would you rather we didn’t?”

    Cassava didn’t rise to the half-formed taunt, but very few people had a poker face that got around Plover– and it wasn’t hard to spot the white flash of bared teeth. “It only took two days?”

    “Yes. Do we get a speed-run medal or something? That would be cool.”

    “You fixed everything in two days.”

    “Sort of, yeah,” Plover hummed. Their gaze fell to trace patterns in the disturbed soil. The fighting and fleeing and burying a body had kicked a lot of it up around camp. “Solved the mystery, caught the bad guy, stopped him and saved everyone we could. ‘Didn’t take too long– pretty decent amount of Tuesday, but we finished by lunch on Wednesday.” 

    As Plover traced the ground, a noise between claws against stone and a particularly pissed-off bluejay came from above them. Their brow furrowed as they glanced at Cassava, whose eye twitched violently enough that her whole head jerked with the motion.

    Plover blinked. “Is everything alright?” 

    Towards the back of the assembled crowd, someone laughed. “Don’t worry; Cassava’s only upset that you set the bar so high. ‘What happens when the world expects next-day Alliance delivery?”

    “I don’t know–” Plover looked up just in time to catch a flash of seafoam green scales running towards them. “Papa?!” They slapped their tail on the ground just quick enough to brace themself against the full force of Benthos’ bear hug. After a moment, Plover huffed, bonking their head against their papa’s chest, leaning into it. 

    “Hi, papa. ‘Nice to see you. I didn’t think that my letter got to Mezzo that fast.” 

    Benthos laughed, shaking his head. “Oh, no, I’m here on business, not pleasure. Besides the pleasure of checking up on my baby bird and my glorious kingdom– the Leaf Kingdom’s gone far too long without a visit from its favourite royal.” 

    It took a moment for Plover to process those words and glance back at the hut towards the basement underneath. 

    “Uhh– about that.”

    The journey Benthos’ expression took was mesmerizing as he stood there frozen while the reinforcements dispersed into the camp around him. Confusion was first as his brow furrowed, glancing between Plover and the hut while trying to trace the conversation backwards.

    They could clock when it clicked in Benthos’ head as his eyes widened, and he leaned back from Plover, still gripping their shoulders.

    “...No,” he hissed, even as his expression darkened into a cruel smile. “Don’t tell me he’s here.”

    ‘He’ was Venus. Venus was Benthos’ father– ex-father, as he had thrown out an infant Benthos to live with his mother, whom Venus knew to be a thief and murderer without morals. He’d abandoned a child so nobody would learn he’d had an affair with a Seawing while he was a staunch preacher of Leafwings marrying for stronger leafspeak. 

    Venus was the Barron of some Leaf Kingdom town whose economy struggled under the weight of all the jewelry Venus bought. 

    Venus was the reason Plover’s papa existed, but that was the only good he’d ever brought to the world.

    “Venus got his ass kicked by a half-serial killer and is currently in said serial killer’s basement,” Plover chimed, and they couldn’t bring themself to sound sorry for their kind-of-grandfather. However, they did wince as they continued. “I’m sorry– it would’ve been worse, but we couldn’t hurt him without hurting many innocent people. It’s a long story.”

    Benthos’ smile ticked from cruel to caring as he squeezed Plover back into that tight hug. “No, no, you did wonderfully. You saved the day, and you kept the bastard alive. Oh, I couldn’t have asked for a better baby bird.”

    Plover huffed, trying to smile as they leaned back into their papa’s embrace. “‘Love you too. Just don’t do anything dumb, papa.”

    Benthos, of course, did something dumb.

    To be fair, Plover had made said dumb thing possible. They had ensured they were the only person on shift to tend to the previously comatose dragons. That was perfectly reasonable, as was allowing a patient’s relative in during visiting hours. After all, Benthos had the right to visit Venus since Venus never filled out the proper paperwork disowning him (pretending someone didn’t exist did not legally expel them from your family).

    And, yes, they did know Benthos was planning on verbally and physically beating Venus, but they’d made him promise not to murder him, so why was everyone so upset? Frankly, the fuss was uncalled for.

    Hen sighed, raising her prosthetic arm to rub at her furrowed brow before she began. “Baby, this is why Master Tidebreaker doesn’t send you on Alliance missions.” 

    Benthos laughed. “Aww, I love you too.”

    “You can’t be beating people up on missions–” Hen whined, and she was doing a fantastic job at impressing the seriousness of this situation. Plover was sure Benthos felt properly chastened. “While you’re on the clock, you’re representing the Alliance, remember?”

    “I wasn’t on the clock, though?”

    “Plover was.”

    And suddenly, both pairs of eyes were on Plover. They tried to glare and show off how stupid this was, but all they could manage was a huff and ducking their head to stare at the floor. 

    Thankfully, Benthos managed to be upset for them. “Oh, that is patently unfair.”

    “Agreed,” Hen replied, something heavy in her voice that Plover couldn’t parse. “Even if I know why you did it, the rules say there must be consequences. We wouldn’t let anyone else get away with that, so we need to show even fairness for–”

    Plover cut Hen off with a shake of their head. “It’s fine, just some community service on Mezzo, right?”

    Hen huffed. “Oh, nothing as drastic as that, baby. I was thinking you two just stick around and help out Reverie! That’s all.”

    Oh.

    That was all.

    Plover kept staring at the ground, shrugging along with the punishment. Benthos, on the other hand, hummed and cocked his head to the side. “Do I get to keep the bastard’s jewelry?” 

    “I–” Hen croaked, glancing down at the bloody nose ring Benthos was wearing on his wrist. “I’d suggest washing it. But I don’t see why not.”

    Benthos grinned, pumping his fist in the air, and the nose ring bracelet jingled along with the movement. “Eyy, a baby bird and Benny mission! We may not get to fight some bad guys, but we can help some good guys!” He chirped, wrapping a wing around Plover. 

    Again, Plover just huffed, a ghost of a smile crossing their snout as they leaned against their papa.

    “Yeah… it’s nice.”

    And it was nice.

    Reverie was the kindest, friendliest hell-on-earth that Plover had ever visited. 

    And it was also an active crime scene. 

    There were the softer moments– Plover smiled, laughed, and joked with Coneflower and Rosefinch, two of the older dragonets in Reverie, while teasing out how Sentry treated them. And then they blinked, missed some time, and found themselves comforting the two while they cried over the grave of Snowdrop. (Plover noted down each reaction in their evidence packet.)

    There were the more professional moments– Plover watched as people bagged up a piece of the shattered necklace conduit to take back to the Illumote vault (they’d bury the rest because they couldn’t bury Perseverance’s body; it had been a year, and they’d assumed his body to be lost and decomposing in thick Leaf Kingdom woods). And they blinked, missed some time, and found themself folding up the scraps of torn evidence that Snowdrop had hidden in the library, carefully pressing them into the folds of their planner. 

    There were the more hectic moments– the thirty-plus patients in a serial killer's basement took up most of Plover’s time. Though the magic connecting them to the Everlasting Shadow kept them from dying of starvation or thirst, muscle atrophy and bed sores were still real issues. And Plover was so busy, darting from bed to bed, and they blinked and found themself– 

    ‘Standing in front of Benthos, somewhere at the edges of the camp, halfway into the woods. They blinked again, their gaze narrowing on their papa’s pinched expression. “Is everything alright?” Plover chimed, tilting their head to the side, trying to see why Benthos was frowning.

    They didn’t spot anything, but Benthos frowned even more. “We’re leaving,” he said.

    Plover balked, shaking off the last of the dissociation clouding their mind as they chased after an already leaving Benthos. “We can’t leave! We’ve got community service! You heard ‘ma!”

    “Aww, it’s cute you think Hen can stop me,” Benthos laughed, sharp and cutting and so unlike himself, as he kept walking. “You’ve got everything on your person, so we’re going. ‘You can blame it on your eccentric papa wandering off and dragging you along.”

    “I can’t!” Plover snapped, running up to grab Benthos’ wrist and pull him to a stop. “And you– you shouldn’t run away from your issues–”

    Benthos turned around, and he blinked, the sharpness in his expression melting into concern as he turned his wrist to hold Plover’s hand. “Baby bird, this isn’t about me–” he huffed, and despite the roll of his eyes, there was fear in his voice. “This is about you. I haven’t seen you hold an entire conversation with anyone since I got here. I don’t know how conscious you are. We’re leaving.”

    And Plover wanted to glare, to snap back that they were fine, but–

    “You still haven’t washed that bracelet….” they whispered instead, running their thumb along the pale ivory nose ring around Benthos’ wrist, still stained brown with flaky blood. 

    “Baby… you know I won’t pepper you with questions,” Benthos sighed, squeezing Plover’s claws tight. “But if anything I’ve done made you uncomfortable….”

    “No,” Plover replied, shaking their head. “It was the right thing to punch the bastard’s lights out. It was the right thing. He threw you to a murderer– you. He left you, a tiny dragonet, in the care of someone he knew was a thief and murderer who didn’t care about you. He deserved what he got.” 

    And Benthos nodded along, a tension Plover hadn’t noticed slipping from his shoulders. “That’s right.” 

    And he said it so easily. Without hesitating, without a hint of remorse, and Plover– 

    “Snowdrop left six dragonets under the eye of a murderer who kept their families locked up in his basement. She did that,” Plover said, forcing their lip not to quiver and their gaze to cut as they spoke the truth, staring straight into their papa’s eyes. 

    The truth hung heavy in the air for a long moment.

    “Ah,” Benthos eventually began with a click of his tongue. “Okay, this is what that’s all about.”

    Benthos stood up straighter as he resettled his wings on his spine, and Plover could see the speech about to leave his lips. But Plover wouldn’t allow it. 

    “Papa–” they hissed, their gills flaring with the weight of the– truth, their fear, they didn’t even know– the breath they gasped. 

    “Papa, she watched Sentry kill Perseverance and trap his soul into a monster at his control. She watched him trap others, sacrificing their lives to care for his beast. Snowdrop watched him do that, and she said nothing. Worse than that! She lied for him. She covered up all the evidence, twisted our knowledge, and what did she do when we called her and Sentry out? 

    “She let Sentry sic that monster on us, so she and Sentry could have a proper duel. She let him tell the beast to kill us and then died for it, and– 

    Plover ripped their hand out of Benthos’, slamming it against the disturbed soil beneath their feet.

    “Nobody’s fucking saying anything about that! Everyone’s crying and saying how good of a person she was and how she didn’t deserve to die. They’re talking about her like she was a good person. She wasn’t!”

    Plover glanced back up, expecting to see– understanding, disgust, anger– something in Benthos’ expression. But they didn’t; all they saw was that same concern as Benthos lifted a claw to his chest.

    The ivory bracelet jingled with the movement.

    “Breathe. It’s–” Benthos paused, gnawing at his lip before sighing. “This has been weighing on you for a while.”

    Plover wanted to laugh. Or cry. Or something, except snarl.

    They snarled anyways. 

    “Papa, she saw him trying to kill us and let it happen. I have an evidence bag full of everything she did to keep Sentry safe– the one I use for Sentry. I physically can’t separate his crimes from hers, but they call her a good person and Sentry a monster.”

    “So, I’m wondering– what the hell is Venus?”

    Benthos blinked, his jaw working as he tried to follow the conversation. He raised his claws, rubbing at his pinched brow. “It’s– he’s–”

    “A horrible person!” Plover hissed, waving their claws violently through the air. “You said so yourself! So what the fuck is she?”

    “Baby bird, it’s complicated….”

    “It’s a yes or no question!”

    Benthos sighed, ducking his head to meet Plover’s gaze– like he had to duck down to talk on Plover’s level. “Yes or no questions can still be complicated,” he huffed, reaching out to brush his claws through Plover’s sail.

    Plover jerked back with a snarl. 

    “She covered for him for years!” they snapped, shaking off Benthos’ touch– he hadn’t even come close, but they could still feel sharp claws ripping through their sail. “For YEARS! And nobody can see she’s a bad person except for me. Nobody except me. Why doesn’t anybody see it except me!?”

    And this was supposed to be an argument. Plover had the weight of the truth on their side. They were right.

    Their voice shouldn’t have cracked. Their eyes shouldn’t have stung.

    But they did.

    And gods, did they hate it.

    Benthos sat there, his claws hanging in the air, doing nothing. He did nothing– no yelling, disgust, or anger– except sit there with that stupid concern on his face. “Honey, everyone sees it,” he whispered, shaking his head sadly. 

    “But right now, I don’t know what you’re seeing. You’re taking this personally; I just can’t understand why. I– please, baby bird,” he croaked, and his claws twitched before he put them firmly on the ground. “Please tell me what I can do to help you here.”

    Plover blinked and bit their tongue. They refused to let their eyes water, voice crack, or spine bend. They were right and knew what they could say to win the argument.

    And Plover opened their mouth and–

    …

    They winced.

    ‘Because they didn’t want to win. They didn’t want him to know.

    The truth was sharp and cruel, and… Benthos was their papa. He was the only good thing to ever come from Death Trap. 

    And Plover didn’t want him to know.

    And Plover’s eyes watered, and their voice cracked as they bent themself to duck underneath Benthos’ wing.

    “...I want to go home,” they said instead of– …everything.

    And Benthos blinked, and he sighed, wrapping his wings around them. 

    “Okay. We can do that.”