False was worried, which was normal for her. She was very paranoid. She walked through Cogsmeade, gingerly resetting her sprung traps that she had put around everywhere in case anything bad happened. When you were a traumatized amnesiac from another dimension with a sketchy backstory, you had to be prepared for anything.
Get a grip on yourself, False, she told herself, semi-angrily, for being so spooked again. You killed the other False and she and the hermits are gone. You should be safe now, like the sign said.
And yet I'm still worried.
False sighed, readjusted the last tripwire hook, and began walking back home, making sure not to trigger any of the newly-set traps. She had the layout memorized by heart, but no one could be too careful. False walked through her door, dodged the flying knives, and tried to stay calm. She was probably just on edge after the second multiversal crisis in a few months. Those new emperors, she wasn't sure what to think of some of them, particularly Farmer Queen Pearl, who looked just like Pearl from Hermitcraft, where the other False came from. Stop thinking about other False. She's not a danger to you anymore.
But I'm a danger. To everyone. Those new emperors could easily wind up dead in the middle of the night, more victims to add to my sleepwalking body's kill list. False shook her head, and then suddenly noticed Pumpkin Jack out of the corner of her eye, standing there eerily as if he'd been there the whole time. The scarecrow leant on a sign hammered into the ground, with another message for False from either her subconsciousness or who knew who. False tentatively looked at it.
Beware the stalker
Listen to the helpers
Listen to the voices
Well, False thought, that's rather straightforward. But which voices, I wonder?
All of a sudden she heard a strange sound. Her hand instantly went to the hilt of her sword, but the sound wasn't frightening, it was just very sudden. She listened, and realized that she was now holding a strange note in her hand. False read it, slightly confused.
Dear forgetful creature,
Don't fear us. We just want company, for now. And a little help.
Please come to the mountain near Dawn's gate.
Bring tea and a kettle.
False read it again, even more confused. What was going on? She glanced at the sign again. Pumpkin Jack lopsidedly grinned back at her. Well, the sign told her to listen to the helpers and the voices, maybe the ones who had given her this mysterious note were those helpers and voices, even though the weird sound she had heard probably wasn't a voice. But at any rate, now she needed a kettle.
False groaned. How could she have an iron farm and have iron as an export but not have a single iron kettle in her whole empire? Maybe she should go borrow one from another emperor. Yes, that was probably the best idea. She left her empire, walked around all her traps, and set off on the search for a kettle. Her idea had been to ask Sausage, because she trusted him and trusted that she wouldn't kill him and that since she'd been in his tavern she knew for a fact that he had quite a few kettles, but she ran into the Lizzies first. They'd apparently gone on a pranking spree and randomly stolen someone's chest to drive him crazy, and were now running form him, chest in tow, and had ran into the grand architect of Cogsmeade. False never found out who they had stolen the chest from, probably the sheriff, but what was helpful was that when they opened the chest to show her what was in it, she found a kettle.
"Can I keep this? At least for a little bit?" False asked, picking up the kettle and inspecting it. It looked usable. "Sure, but why do you want a kettle?" Lizzie asked. False related the story of the strange notes, and while the axolotl Lizzie looked confused, the cat Lizzie began nodding. "Oh, of course, the Fae." "The what?" Lizzie and False asked at the same time. "The Fae. They're these mysterious beings that pop up around all the empires from time to time. They ask us to do random errands for them, and if we don't then they'll bother us until we do, but when we do what they asked then they usually give us stuff in return." Mayor Lizzie explained. "I've got a whole district in Animalia where only Fae live." "So the Fae want a kettle?" "Yes, that's what the note said." "Can we come along?" "Uh, sure, why not?"
As they climbed up the mountain near Dawn's gate, they could hear someone shouting at the top. They walked faster, and found Princess Gem holding a note in her hand with a weird look on her face. "I can't tell them! I can't," She repeated, and then blanched as she caught sight of False and the Lizzies. She stepped backward. "What are you doing here?" "False got a note from the Fae too," Lizzie said, nodding at the architect. False waved the note around and realized that now she had gotten another one from the Fae. "Thank you for coming, forgetful creature," She read aloud. "And we see you have brought the furry creature and her past self with you. However, we see the kettle, but we do not see the tea." False blinked, feeling embarrassed. She'd been so worried about not finding a kettle that she hadn't thought about tea.
Then Gem got another note too and read it aloud. "Sweet creature, tell the forgetful creature that we do not mind her forgetting the tea, and that we had asked you to bring it because we anticipated this." With that, Gem reached into her pocket and pulled out a few homemade teabags full of tealeaves. The girls stuffed ice and snow from the mountain into the kettle, with reassurances that once it boiled then the water would be safe to drink, and hung the kettle over the fire. As the water boiled, they chatted over why there were here.
"We were having a pranking spree to celebrate the end of our ridiculous feud," Lizzie was saying, and the other Lizzie nodded. "Then we found False looking for a kettle and tagged along." "The Fae asked me to bring a kettle and tea here so they could... talk to me, I guess. They said they wanted company and help, but I don't really know for what." False said, and then they looked at Gem, waiting for why she was there. Gem hesitated before speaking.
"The first note only asked for tealeaves. That was because they expected False to forget, I suppose. Then I got a second note here telling me to not be afraid about telling my secret." She glanced at the rest of them but they said nothing, just waited for her to continue. "How do you think everyone would react if I told them a really big secret?" "Well, considering they're fine with me secretly being a cat the whole time, I'm pretty sure they'd be fine with whatever secret you have, Gem." Mayor Lizzie stated. "I don't know you future emperors that well, but if they're anything like the ones from my time, they'll be pretty okay with whatever you're going to share." The Ocean Queen said.
"And um, I don't know everyone that well either, but considering they let me stay around even after... everything... that should say something about how they accept friends." False added awkwardly. Lizzie and Gem nodded in understanding. Not everyone knew the full details of what False had been up to, but everyone got the gist of the dangers and knew that there was something very, very off about her. "But I can't tell anyone. I can't," Gem protested again, although to False she sounded less and less sure of her words. She sighed and shrugged, her butterfly wings drooping.
"Sorry, force of habit. When you keep secrets for a really long time it feels weird when you contemplate how other people might react to it." After that she got up and flew away. None of them followed her, knowing that she probably just needed some alone time. The Lizzies left soon afterward, saying that they had an interesting day planned and had to get back to pranking. False was about to head home too, but just then the kettle whistled and she realized that everyone had forgotten about the tea.
So she put the teabags in and drank it herself, pouring the tea from the kettle directly into her mouth after it had sufficiently cooled. False was pretty sure that wasn't how normal people drank tea, but it was her way of doing it, and at any rate she couldn't remember the regular way. After about half the teapot was empty, a new note from the Fae appeared in her hand and she read it.
Oh, forgetful creature,
Thank you for coming. Some of us weren't entirely sure you would come.
We're aware of your history with the other False and your mental habits.
We know how you're scared all the time. And we know danger is coming.
The tea you just drank has a potion we made mixed into it.
It will keep you safe.
Take it as a gift from lonely beings who enjoyed your visit.
False read the note again, feeling less inclined to drink the rest of the tea after finding out it had been contaminated. Then again, safe was always better than not safe. Still, she supposed she had drank enough of the tea to justify not drinking the rest of it. She took the teapot and flew back to Cogsmeade, dumping the rest of the tea in a nearby pond on the way back. She had a lot to think about.
And then as soon as she got home, someone tried to get in her head.
Xornoth tried to make sense of the new body he controlled. It was human, it was supposed to be human, but something about it was... off. He couldn't figure it out. He knew from gossip that this emperor, False, was from another world, so maybe that was it. False was a solitary fellow, very skittish, and he hadn't seen her around the other empires other than when he first arrived at spawn, so possessing her was his only way of trying to get any information, unless he wanted to listen to her talking in her sleep again. Xornoth didn't have any access to the memories of whoever he possessed, but he was hoping to evaluate False's danger level and if she had any special abilities that he needed to learn about and
And then he was expelled forcefully from her body, his control of her slipping through his fingers as he tried to hold on.
False clutched her head. She knew someone had just been in it. It was an all too familiar feeling. Her hand immediately went to her sword and she sliced the air around her, at the spot where she felt the thing escape her body. An audible gasp told her that she had just sliced through empty space but was very, very close to whatever had taken over her. "I know you're there!" She shouted, feeling like her deranged, murdery self again.
"There's no need to fight," A voice told her. "I only wanted to help." "Help? How?" False asked skeptically, her eyes straying to the sign that was still hammered into the ground. Listen to the helpers. Listen to the voices. "By getting into my head?" "Who says it was on purpose?" The voice said apologetically. "I'm a lost soul, and I had just walked into you. Then some magic effect you have pushed me out." False quickly remembered the tea. It will keep you safe. "What do you want?" She asked. Mysterious voices always wanted something, according to her experience. "I've heard you talk in your sleep. I've heard you scream in your nightmares. Your body feels strange; I learned that in the few seconds I possessed you. You need mental help from someone. I can help you." False couldn't really argue with that, but all her instincts were screaming at her to not trust the voice. Although...
Listen to the voices. False had always trusted her signs. Maybe this voice was the one she was supposed to listen to, although the sign asked for plural. Maybe the sign meant the Fae. But the Fae communicated through notes, not speech, and certainly not through voices. Listen to the helpers. This new voice was saying he could help. But the Fae seemed to also want to help her, but they didn't really say that explicitly, they just shoved notes into her hands and told her to bring them things and practically poisoned her tea, although a potion to keep you safe wasn't exactly poison. And which one of them was the stalker her sign mentioned? Both just randomly talked to her out of nowhere with knowledge of how her mind worked and had apparently been watching her. False was confused, although she was used to that. All mysterious voices were, by default, mysterious.
"I can help you," The voice repeated. "How?" False asked. There was a pause, like the voice was thinking of a suitable answer. "I have power. And eventually I will have more. I can use it to help. Think. You can have power too. And then you will be finally in control of your body. No more sleepwalking. No more stalking in the night. And with your newfound power, no one will even consider harming you. You will be safe. Safe." False was getting freaked out at how much this new voice knew about what she wanted. Although, she shouldn't really be surprised, if he'd been listening to her mutter in her sleep. But now what was she supposed to do?
He seems to want to help. But how do the Fae fit into this, then? Their potion is supposed to keep me safe from prophesied danger... But if it threw that voice out of my head, then doesn't that mean he's the danger? What am I supposed to do? False fretted. When people kept talking about how they wanted to rule the world, they seemed to forget about how many decisions emperors had to make. Now what was she to do? "Choose me." The voice ordered, like he'd been reading her mind, or at least read the thoughts parading across her face. "Choose power. Choose what you've always wanted. I can help." False stepped backward, sure of only one thing: that she didn't want to choose anything now. "Stop talking to me," She said softly. "I'll... tell you about my decision some other time."
There was a soft sigh and then silence. False figured that the voice had gone. She walked to her room, feeling very tired and primed for a nap. She didn't want to make any more decisions today, but there was one choice that she didn't even have to think about to choose to do it. She wasn't telling anyone about the new voice.
This was something she had to deal with herself.