When others tell you that you take too many dangerous risks, you simply tell them that stepping out of your house - er, you mean hive - is a dangerous risk in itself. Which, for you, it could be. You're not on the higher end of the hemospectrum. You're not even in the middle of the hemospectrum. No, you are cursed with disgusting yellow blood. A more saffron color, to be exact. You're a terrible, awful, inferior lowblood. At least, that's what you're told by every higher color. It doesn't make sense to you. You revel in the legends that there was a brief moment when all trolls and humans co-existed harmoniously. You like to think those times could re-ignite. Maybe. Probably not.

The most frequent apparently dangerous risk you take is wandering to the edge of the neighborhood. The neighborhood you live in is adjacent to the easternmost wall of the nearest human container, referred to as The Muck. There aren't very many trolls near the wall, save for a few older ones who are kind in comparison to the average troll. They've never ratted you out before, and you don't suspect they will any time soon.

Although, it isn't just wandering around the edge of the neighborhood. What you do is much more frowned upon, and it could get you fined or punished physically, if not culled altogether. But you don't care, for several reasons. One, you love the rush. Two...

You just love visiting the humans.

There's a small tunnel dug out underneath the wall that allows your small, wiry frame to squeeze to the other side. Even for you, it's a tight squeeze. You don't know if it was an attempt by a human to escape or if a curious animal just formed the hole, but it was enough for you. There's a family that lives not far from the wall. You don't know their surnames, but you know the woman and the girl well. The girl doesn't seem to be much younger than you in human years, maybe by two or three. They both have yellow hair, which is strange to you, but then you remember that your hair is white as opposed to the 99.9% black that other trolls sport. (You're the 0.1% by the way. It's you.)

You've been squeezing under this tunnel to visit this family ever since you were young. Ever since you can remember. They're like your own family, to you. Both of them are very friendly and optimistic despite their circumstances and living situation. You like to share the history you learn with them. For the better half of your life, it was the woman who listened intently to your lore and stories. Lately, it's been the girl.

That's where you're going now. You have a small, colorfully wrapped box with "Lucy" scribbled over the top in chicken-scratch human English writing. It's in your pocket, moving around slightly as you walk down the road that turned to dirt rather than concrete not too long ago.

You live way, way out West, and the world is your oyster. Unless, of course, that oyster makes any sudden movements, in which case it most certainly is not your oyster and you must make swift arrangements to get the darn-tooting heck away from that freaky oyster. Anyway, even though you're on the lower half of the hemospectrum, you're not particularly afraid of being culled. It might be because, as heavy and unwieldy as it is, you make sure to carry your shovel with you wherever you go. It also might be because your lusus, or as you'd like to call him, Papa Prongs, is ridiculously fast even when you're riding his back and he is far from afraid to gore a threatening-looking troll to death. You know: he's done it before.

Anyway, that's what you're doing right now. You are riding atop your lusus, far from your hive. You can see the wall now, the one that keeps the humans in their city separate from, well, the rest of everything. You've admired it fairly often, but, like every other troll, you've never been––

Hold that thought.

And then drop it. Is that a yellowblood crawling under the wall?

"What the..."

A snort stops you right there, before you can swear and offend your lusus. You watch the stranger disappear into what must be a tunnel, and your vascular pump starts beating faster. Papa Prongs flattens out his ears, as if he can tell that you're thinking about following this strange, white-haired troll. Of course. He can only do so much to prevent you from being culled.

Still, you slide off the hornbeast's back and give the creature a reassuring pat on the shoulder. His eyes are wide and worried. You give a smile, and in return get a defeated-sounding huff. It's almost as if he's asking you to be home by sundown, which of course, he is physically incapable of doing. Still, it is a comforting thought. You nod to your lusus and he turns around, bounding away at an astonishing speed. It'll be a long walk home, but that's okay. As pudgy as you are, you are a deceptively good runner.

The tunnel is tiny, and you wonder how this other troll managed to get through. This is one of the rare cases in which your pudginess has not been in any way helpful to your cause. You look to your left, to your right, and behind you. And then you dive on in.

This is terrible. It's worse than the trials you faced as a wriggler. At least you could fit through suffocatingly-small tunnels then. Well, you've still got it, right? Just a little farther! You can see the light! You're almost out, after bumping a horn painfully against one side of the tunnel, and...

And you are stuck.

Panic rushes through you and your heart clenches. You struggle against your newfound earthen prison, to no avail, and you can see the white-haired troll walking ahead of you. You claw at the dirt, and it doesn't help at all. You're getting a little corn-shucking desperate, here. It shows when you call out, softly in case someone on the other side of the wall could hear, "Hey!"

As the sight of Lucy's house comes into view, you're stopped by a small sound. Sort of like someone struggling and panicking, which isn't too much of a common sound in human cities because they're far more hospitable than trolls, especially toward one another. Then, you hear a soft, acute, "Hey!" and you're sure someone around you is in trouble. It's not usually your business to help anyone, but that's when you're in the troll society. In the human society, you like to pretend you're one of them. That isn't not laughable and weak to help someone out even if they're not in your quadrant.

When you look around, you don't see anything unusual. At one of the small, shackled properties near the border, an older man stands in his garden, hoeing at the ground. You used to help him when you were younger and less involved with Lucy and her mother. But he doesn't seem to be in any trouble, nor does he look like he called out to anyone.

Looking further, you fully turn and look at the tunnel you came from. If your sight wasn't so sharp, you'd assume you were seeing things when you saw the peeking of the tip of a horn coming out your end of the tunnel. You walk a little further toward the tunnel and see the tops of eyes peering at you, and then a little further shows, indeed, the head of another troll poking out from underneath the wall. The only thing you can do as you increase your speed is gape. You can't even form a single word.

"How did you-" you finally manage to breathe out, stopping short because it's obvious that the troll didn't fit through the tunnel. Kneeling down onto your knees, you try to grip the troll's slightly-exposed shoulders and fail, as they're too lodged into the earth to get a grasp on. You frown, knitting your eyebrows together, before holding up a finger to signal him to wait. You don't know if he's being suffocated from pressure, so you run to aforementioned elder's tool shed and grab a significantly dulled pickax, which could or could not prove use to you right now. But you're a bit desperate, and you know your strength is superior to a human's.

The first swing could have proven fatal if trolls' skin weren't thicker than humans'. A lot of the stone wall crumbled onto the troll beneath it, but the hole was widened enough that you could throw the ax down and grab his shoulders. One hefty heave later, and you were sprawled on your backside with the freed troll next to you.

He turns around––he heard you. When he sees you and his eyes widen just slightly with what looks like surprise, you don't know whether to be relieved or terrified. You're too scared to even speak and he's already gone. Dang it. He probably absconded, afraid you were here to cull him and––no! No no no!

You open your mouth to scream but nothing comes out but a shuddering wheeze as the troll brings down a corn-shucking, diddly-gosh-darn pickaxe just above your head. Bits of rock tumble onto you, and your chest is heaving faster than it ever has and you can't seem to get enough air. You writhe briefly, and then the stranger's grasping your shoulders, and you pop right out of the narrow hole that was almost your tomb, like a baby mammal out of its ancestor's nook. (That is such a disgusting thought, and it makes you shudder.)

Carefully, you lift your head from the dirt and regard this weird, white-haired troll as if he's grown a second head. And, predictably, you ask, "Are you out of your mind?"

Luckily, you didn't fall completely onto your back. You're recovering from the slight shock of the wrenching movements, propped up by your palms. The ax is right near your feet, and you stare at it to grasp your bearings before you hear the troll exclaim, "Are you out of your mind?!"

In response, you give him an incredulous stare. It didn't occur to you as you were rescuing this troll that it could have been one out to kill you or get you in trouble. You often forget that trolls are inherently more hostile than humans. So, you muster the most stone fearless expression possible and scoff, "Are you out of your mind?!"

It was then that you get a good look at the troll. He's very chubby. So chubby that if it had been you, you would not have even thought about trying to squeeze through that hole. Though, he's not exactly fat. There's also some stone crumbs and dust sprinkled in his coarse hair and on his face, which is now reddened and slightly dirty from the fall. By the faint coloring of his pupils, you know he's a mid-blood, but you can't quite tell if the color is a blue-ish or green.

You don't answer, and it might be because you are genuinely wondering if you are out of your mind. You cough and spit a mouthful of gravel onto the ground. This troll's stare is making you extremely nervous, but you don't show it because you can't. If you do, he will perceive your weakness and take advantage of it. So, before he has the opportunity to notice your shifty expression, you retort, "I asked first, dipstick," and brush the pieces of rock out of your hair with a disdainful grimace.

Naturally, your eyes travel down to the pickaxe and your stomach turns. Even though the stranger isn't exactly holding the tool, he may as well be armed. You have to do something.

Forget trying to find out what in the heck this troll is doing: you lunge for the pickaxe.

You disregard the insult, although the lack of profanity piques your interest. Any other troll would have started spewing word vomit with chunks of obscenities. Your heart gives a weird, unwelcome nudge when he shakes the bits of rubble out of his hair, frustrated, and you want to reach inside your rib cage and pull the annoying pump biscuit right out. Both feelings are quickly disposed of, however, when you see the troll's eyes wandering to the ax by your foot. You tense, bracing yourself.

Then he lunges.

Your first instinct is to kick him directly in his already battered face. In the same movement, you roll onto your knees and grab the pickax with one hand as you try to push yourself to your feet. You sway, stumble, but steady yourself and grip the handle with both hands, raising it in threatening defense. Of course, you have no desire nor plan to fatally harm this troll. But you know you can be intimidating, and you tower far over him.

Your attack is embarrassingly unsuccessful, and you are given a sharp kick straight in the face that sends you sprawling, sticky olive blood leaking from your nostrils. You manage a half-distressed, half-enraged snort, and grit your teeth. This is probably a fight to the death now, and you're going to have to be faster on your feet if you want to be the one who walks out of this alive.

You plant your hands on the ground and shove yourself up, lurching to your feet. Then you lower your head, pointing your horns at your adversary, and charge. You headbutt him in the chest and keep on charging until the smaller troll is up against a wall.

You recover from the headbutt, and...oh. Oh, no.

This is way too black. And right off the bat, too. You grunt more to yourself than the handsome stranger and grab his shoulders, slamming him into the wall.

You get a glimpse of green-ish, olive-ish blood before the troll in front of you snorts like a bull. Giving him a weird look, you brace yourself when he shoves himself to his feet and starts charging at you. The hit is much harsher than predicted. The pickax flies from your grasp, and you seem to black out for a moment before you find yourself pinned against a wall. There's a split moment where you both look at each other, and he gives the same awkward look that you do.

There are definitely some black implications of your current situation, however oblivious any on-looking humans might be.

Before you can directly react, he grabs your shoulders and slams you into the wall. You feel a sharp pain in your back -- you definitely hit a jutted brick. You let out a pained cry and then growl, grabbing the front of the troll's hair and slinging him backward off of you. As he stumbles back, you push yourself off of the wall and raise your leg to give him a hefty kick to the chest. You look at him, feeling the primitive urge to go after and rip his windpipe out of his throat.

Then you turn and start running. You don't want to kill him. You don't want to fight him.

At first, you are certain that you have the upper hand and are going to keep it. But the hesitation from realizing the caliginous nature of this interaction allows the stranger enough time to shove you off of him and then––oof. You stagger backward, winded by the powerful kick, and instinctively raise your arms to shield your head and throat, because there is no way he won't take advantage of your weakness and try to tear your throat out.

But he doesn't. He just... absconds, leaving you clutching your chest and trying to catch your breath. You wipe your face with your forearm, which turns out to be a mistake because it just leaves an olive smear across your face. Papa Prongs is going to be out of his mind with worry if you don't clean up before you get home.

...How are you going to get home? You are not willing to try crawling through that hole again.

Oh. And there are humans staring at you. Humans. You've never even seen a human before, save for a small dead one. They look scared, which is ridiculous because you are outnumbered and weakened and terrified. You put a hand up, hesitantly, and say, "Hi?" to the onlooking mammals.

For the next several minute, you don't stop and you don't look back. You don't until you reach Lucy's house. You race up the steps of the porch and then collapse in front of the door, heaving in gasping breaths and looking back at your path, half-expecting the troll to have followed you. But it doesn't seem like he did.

Exhaling with relief, you reach into your pocket. It's empty. The small box containing the golden chain necklace you were going to give Lucy for her birthday is gone. You must have dropped it in the struggle, and you groan inwardly. You start fiddling with and twisting the ring on your thumb, anxiously biting your lip and going over what on earth you could do to get it back. If the troll noticed it on the ground, he probably took it and will probably sell or trade it. But there was still the possibility that he hadn't noticed it.

Frowning, you place a hand to your chest and press lightly. The spots where his horns had punctured you are achy, and the slightly damp spots indicate that it had literally punctured you and was bleeding. Your back is still throbbing from the impact of being thrust against the wall. This was not how you expected this day to go.

There's alarmed chatter all around you. These are not happy primates, you can tell. At least you had an idea what to do when there was another troll around, even if that was fighting. You rub your sore scalp and look at the ground, feeling extremely awkward with all these humans just watching you.

When you look down, you notice a box and carefully, slowly, pick it up. There are people on all sides and you can't keep an eye on all of them at once, which makes you all that much more scared of them. Someone could be preparing to throw a spear into your back right now. With that in mind, you swiftly abscond with the box. Of course, since this place is pretty much a labyrinth of human hives, you only get lost. There aren't that many places to hide.

You lean against a hive's outer wall and sit, letting out a very loud, frustrated groan. "Fu––fudge!"

Then, just as you almost find the courage to pull yourself up and go back in search for the box, you hear a voice. It isn't a human voice. Human voices are softer and quieter. It's definitely a troll voice, and that means it can only be the troll that you just had the scuttle with. You inwardly groan, but keep low the ground as you make your way down the staircase. You look back to see if anyone had opened the front door - they hadn't. Good. You didn't want Lucy to end up getting hurt. Or her mother, for that matter.

As you start inching along the dirt path, you see the troll sitting up against the wall of a nearby house. In his hands is the box. Just as you expected. He's going to take it and try to sell it or pawn or something. No way. You will not let that happen. That is Lucy's birthday present.

"Hey," you growl, approaching him. You gesture at the box in his hands, "That's mine."

The troll that beat you up looks like he's bleeding where you headbutted him––good. He speaks to you and you hardly even hear him over the roar of adrenalines and general stress hormones. You can hear your heartbeat in your throat, and you give a weak snarl that isn't very intimidating because you never learned how to be intimidating. In fact, you really don't want to fight. The urge to run away is overwhelming, and you're getting a horrible, choking feeling of panic because you're already lost and you're surrounded by humans and there is nowhere to go.

You stand up as quickly as you can. "Shoo," you grunt.

Shoo?

It takes you off guard and you look at him incredulously. He just shooed you like you were some stray or pesky animal. How degrading. With an irritated huff, since you have no desire to get into another scuttle, you wrench the box from his hands and shove it safely back into your pocket. "Don't shoo me," you growl, although with so much sass that you're not used to possessing. With that, you turn and start to make your way back to Lucy's house.

You don't take kindly to having things wrenched from your hands, even if they don't really belong to you. You snarl at the troll and kick some dirt at him moodily as he starts to walk away. "You're not even supposed to be here. We're not supposed to be here. The highbloods are going to put our heads on stakes." The anxiety is creeping into your voice. You have nothing to chew.

You stop in your tracks.

Then, for dramatic effect, you slowly turn around to face the troll and scowl at him. "Well," you snarl pointedly, "They'll only have our heads on stakes if someone rats us out. Won't they?"

Your heart is racing and you feel genuinely lightheaded, but even then you still somehow manage to snarl back because how dare he look at you like that. He is playing on your fear and you know it.

"Well, maybe if I confess, they'll spare me the torture. You, on the other hand...they'll take their time."

"So then, my choice here is simple," you snarl, baring your teeth. You start to re-approach him slowly. There are some humans watching discreetly, but you know they wouldn't dare get involved. "I'm a regular here. I have this entire human neighborhood at my disposal. Hundreds of us," you grab the front of the troll's shirt and pick him up, then slam his back against the wall of the house. "And one of you."

You let out a dry cough as you're slammed against the bricks of the hive and threatened. You're terrified. Your vision is blurring over with panic, and you try to shrug it off, try to be like one of those shucking psycho purple-bloods that quite literally probably eat lowbloods for breakfast. For now, you manage to keep up your walls. They're thinning, but they're up, and you spit in the yellow-blood's face, unable to retort verbally to his bluff.