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illmoraineakoi · 2 months

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Or, continuing from this, consider:

Perhaps, the human-turned-Vessel isn’t alone when they wake up. Perhaps they aren’t the only Vessel left trapped in the Abyss. Perhaps, these others that look similar to what they now are can help them.

If they can communicate, it soon becomes clear that the others aren’t like themselves; they’re not human people shoved into these bodies. They seem to have been born into them like normal. They’ve been here for a long time.

If they can’t, the human still gets the impression it’s unique among them, through observing their behavior and their reactions.

Regardless, the others seem fascinated by them, how differently they act and behave. Maybe the others begin to mimic them.

Perhaps it’s the others who tell them of their memories, of the bright white light that they once saw shine from the top of the pit, calling to them, drawing them to ascend, that vanished before they could reach the top. Never returning. Maybe it’s that story, the insinuation that there’s a way out at the top, that provokes the escape attempt. Maybe the others are hesitant, fearful of the climb (of falling and cracking and breaking, irreparable, dying a slow painful death) but they chose to join them regardless, to help, the idea of freedom from this place too tantalizing for them to resist.

It’s easier to dig through several feet of hard dense rock with multiple ‘people’.

(Far harder to make a hole big enough to compensate for all of their horns.)

The result is the same: the sounds of their digging was heard by those in the Basin, and the King was notified. And given the area of origin, the King himself investigates.

He does not expect to come upon the sight that he does: a sub-adult Vessel helping another sub-adult try to wriggle through a hole carved through the hard basin stone, completely circumventing the sealed door entirely.

It is...almost amusingly ingenious of them. Had they not been Vessels, he would’ve been quite proud.

(Then again, if they hadn’t been Vessels, they would have never been in the Abyss in the first place. They would still be his children, carapace a healthy gleaming white, eyes full of emotion and thought, bodies full of life--)

As it was, the sight is neither amusing nor one to be proud of.

Instead, it is concerning.

Vessels should not have been able to do this. They should have the cognitive ability to do this. There shouldn’t have even been any left alive after so long down there, their bodies should have destabilized long ago…

So the fact that it was not just ONE Vessel but TWO that had managed to do this, to survive, to literally claw and dig themselves out of the proverbial grave he’d sealed them in, like the undead zombies he’d cursed them to be…

It was beyond unsettling.

He needed answers. He needed to figure out how they’d done this. All of it. How they’d survived, how they’d figure out how to escape, how they’d figured out how to cooperate, and most importantly: what it meant for the Pure Vessel plan.

His presence to them did not go unnoticed, and neither did the way they both seemed to freeze at the sight of him.

Their gazed locked for an uncomfortably long time, until he forced himself to break the standoff.

He unsealed the door with a wave of his hand, startling the two Vessels. Startling them. They startled-

There were more.

Beyond the door, crowded atop the metal platform in a way that looked both uncomfortable and precarious, were at least a dozen additional Vessels. And that wasn’t even all of them, because he could see, deeper into the shadows beyond the platform, at least two other heads sticking up, likely from a lower platform. There could be even more on platforms even further down he couldn’t see.

He felt pinned by the weight of so many empty black gazes. They all felt accusatory, even though he could see that they weren't.

The situation, his concerns, had become significantly more dire.

One of the Vessels – one of the first two he’d seen, the one completely free on his side – moved. Stood, and moved to stand before the now open door, body hunched, ragged cloak membrane flaring a bit. It lowered it’s head, brandishing it’s horns towards him.

Defensive, he realized.

A defensive posture. Protective.

It held an old void-ravaged metal spike in it’s hand, the tip clearly blunted from when it had been used as a digging tool. As though it was ready to use it as a weapon should it need to.

The one still stuck in the wall was slowly wriggling back into the Abyss side of the hole.

There was something in his gut that was screaming at him, telling him that something was wrong, this wasn’t right, this couldn’t be happening--

He needed to figure this out.

It took quite a bit of coaxing, but eventually he was able to get them all onto solid ground out of the door and then to follow him back to the Palace. And it was during this time that he was confronted with the obvious fact that these Vessels were impure; very impure.

Impure in ways he hadn’t expected them to be.

They were remarkably physically stable, but they behaved unlike how he expected. They were wary of him, uncertain of their new surroundings, and yet also curious. Inquisitive. Upon arriving to the Palace, several heads kept swiveling to look at everything and anything with refrained fascination, while yet others did not seem to care in the least. There was one who particularly seemed inclined to get close and to touch things, to nose at them. Another seemed wary and uncomfortable with the wide open spaces. And yet still another to stare at him the entire walk, gaze hot with an emotion that he couldn’t read.

They had thoughts. They had emotions. And judging by the escape attempt, they were at least decently intelligent.

Vessels were not supposed to be like this. None of them were supposed to be like this. The Void was supposed to purge such qualities long before they ever hatched. It was supposed to make it impossible for them to develop such qualities as well.

He’d rechecked his work so many times before putting the plan into action. Looked at every future he could, despite his bluing foresight. He and Monomon had gone over everything with a fine-tooth comb.

This wasn’t supposed to be possible.

They weren’t supposed to be…

The first thing he does is write for Monomon, stressing that her presence within the Palace was urgent.

If Vessels could retain some innate qualities of livelihood, or if they could develop the ability to have such things despite their void nature...it jeopardized the entire Pure Vessel plan.

It was no longer a guarantee that the Vessel was empty like he’d assumed it to be.

He and Monomon would have to assess every new Vessel, run a plethora of tests on them. Figure out how, exactly, they were functioning and what, if anything, was inside of their heads.

(In the meantime, as he waited for her to arrive, he sends them off to the baths, because each one was utterly filthy from the Abyss. Particularly one who looked like they’d taken a dip into the Void Sea itself, somehow.)

(This turned out to be a mistake with at least a third of them. They soon became much more interested in playing in the water than cleaning themselves.)

Upon the completion of the assessments and the tests, all of which the new Vessels did not seem to enjoy, the data collected was exactly as the King had feared it would be. It showed, in undeniable terms, that every single one of the new Vessels not only had minds, but also an individuality about them. They had unique personalities.

They were still alive.

They were still his children.

Every. Single. One. Of. Them.

It was an agonizing revelation.

If all of these living Vessels were like this, then what did that say about how the ones littering the floor of the Abyss used to be?

Had he stood there, watching, as his children, still in possession of their personhoods despite the void infused into their beings, fell and died? Had he stood there, watching, and done nothing as they died?

He’d thought they were all empty. He’d thought that the ones who were incapable of climbing were defective, unstable, failures. Imperfect. That it didn’t matter, because they were nothing more than hollowed out corpses. Nothing more than void-corrupted bodies shackling a shade, devoid of thought, devoid of emotion, devoid of the ability to feel pain…

That there wasn’t anything left of the children they were supposed to be. That those children had died the moment the void consumed them, long before their residual bodies hit the floor.

He’d been wrong.

The models had been wrong, the predictions had been wrong, all of the work he and Monomon spent years developing and perfecting and working for months to make sure it was absolutely, perfectly correct…

It was all wrong.

And an uncountable number of his children had died because of it.

And he’d watched.

Likely, the only Vessels still alive were the ones he’d recently found, and the Pure Vessel. Why would any other remaining Vessels not come with the new Vessels in their escape attempt? No, the ones within his Palace, within the room he’d hastily set up as a sort of holding play room, were all that were left.

Two handfuls, out of so many…

Less than two dozen...

At this point, if the Pure Vessel was indeed born pure, and somehow remained so until now, it would be the biggest case of sheer luck he’d ever had. It would be the most extreme statistical anomaly possible. Somehow, despite everything about their work being wrong, they would have gotten what they needed out of it.

They only needed to confirm that it was still pure.

And if it was, they needed to isolate it from the other new Vessels, to prevent any potential influence from ruining it.

But there was also the matter of what to do with the new Vessels as well…

They needed care, and then tutoring. They had much they needed to learn, to catch up on. They needed to be taught how to read and write, how to socialize, manners and etiquette, personal care and proper behavior. How to be careful with any void they spill to not harm others. How to be royal children.

Plus whatever individual skills they might take interest in.

He does not know how to tell his Root.

No matter how delicately he tries to word it, how gently he tries to say it, the truth will hurt her. His mistake, his failure, will cause her pain. He does not know if she would even want anything to do with them.

Alive they might be, they were still Vessels. They were still a tainted, corrupted, disfigured mockery of how their children were supposed to be. Looking upon them as they were made his heart ache, he could not fathom how much the sight of them hurt her. Seeing them as they are, as Vessels, behaving and acting like normal bugs, possessing personalities like normal children, might be too much for her to bear.

But even if she could not give them her love as their mother, he would give them his. They deserved it, they’d deserved it long before now.

It would not be easy, figuring out how to manage and educate so many Vessels, but he would do his best to do so. To keep them safe, to offer them a comfortable life long overdue, to give them as much love as he’s able.

(The human-turned-Vessel is not sure what to think about this. They don’t understand the situation they’ve found themselves in. The King was calling them, and the others like it, his children, and it made them feel a bit uncomfortable. The others had been wary at first, but then accepted the role and designation of the King’s children fully and eagerly. They were struggling with this. They felt like an imposer among them, they were not like them, they were not the King’s child, adopted or otherwise.)

(At the same time, the others like them were treating them like a sibling. Calling them a sibling. Loving them like a sibling. They considered them a sibling, and the human-turned-Vessel wasn’t sure if they really understood that they weren’t. They felt like a hijacker of this body. But despite that...they enjoyed the bond they share with the others. They love being considered a part of a group. They enjoyed the companionship, they enjoyed not being alone. They found themselves wanting that love and affection the others freely give, but in doing so, they feel guilty. Their feelings are a flurry of conflict ions and uncertainty.)

(It did not feel right to simply accept it all without question. It felt like they were being greedy. Taking something they had no right to.)

(There was also the issue of the other that they had seen once before, but that did not join the rest of the ‘siblings’. They had clearly been the same as the rest of them, an identical creature, but they’d not seen it since that first initial encounter. Where they had seen and heard the King order it, like it was a servant. This concerned them. They did not understand why all the rest of the King’s children, the ‘siblings’ were always bundled together, yet that one was not.)

(It had already been outside of the terrible place. Beyond the barrier that looked uncomfortable like a door. Why?)

(There was so much going on in this place they did not understand, so much that seemed to be going on above their heads. It was unnerving. They didn’t like it.)

(They wanted answers.)

(And if they had to conspire with their ‘siblings’ against their new adopted ‘father’ to get information and figure out what the hell was happening, what they were, what that dark pit closed off from the rest of the world was...well…)

(So be it.)

#hollow knight #hk oc insert #hk pale king #This accidentally became a PK centric wHOOPS #This was the second version of the original idea #It's a lot less angsty lmao #I just love the image of PK just rolling up to the entrance to the Abyss to find a Vessel trying to pull another through a hole in the wall #And then when he opens the door there's just a crowd of them staring at him like a gang of raccoons getting caught in the trash cans #Pure Vessel is having a constant panic attack watching their siblings be blatantly not hollow and putting their whole purity act at risk #PV: oh my god the King's gonna figure it out the King's gonna figure it out tHE KING'S GONNA FIGURE IT-#The 'glaring' Vessel is Ghost btw #They're a bit salty PK shut the door in their face

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