Author's Notes:

Hello! I would like to apologize for not updating much this year, I've been caught up with writing essays and stuff.

As some of you may have noticed, this chapter is somewhat different than most. Well, I will explain that.
Every now and again, I'll do a chapter that is different from the main story. A side story, if you will. It will basically entail about something that is going on with someone else, somewhere else, or something else. These always take place in the same universe as the main story, and always connect to it somehow. Though as for timing, they can take place after or before previous chapters, but never after future chapters.

If you don't want to read them, that's okay, you do not have to. They are just something I thought I'd do to help build the world and the story, but they are entirely skippable.

Other than that, please tell me if you notice any issues. Like grammar, story inconsistencies, or anything else. Thanks for reading, and enjoy!

Nothingness.

Nothingness is all he knew, all he’s ever known.

He did not remember where he was or why, all he knew was darkness. He felt himself enclosed inside something, something that had prevented him from moving around, and had no source of light, all he could ever see was darkness, he couldn’t even see his own hand in front of his face.

He wasn’t sure why, but some part of him knew he was inside of a coffin, though he didn’t know how.

Though he remembered the coffin used to have a slit above it, that used to be a sort of window that allowed him to see into the world outside. But it seemed the outside was just as dark as the inside, as he could not see anything still.

Every now and again, there would be a few moments of light, though only enough to where he could barely see outside, and not himself. In these moments, he saw what appeared to be the abyss itself. Outside was nothing but darkness, the source of light seemed to be something small and circular, and seemed to move. It kept moving until it was gone, and he was returned back to the darkness. Though in these brief moments of darkness, he could sometimes see the outlines of creatures, creatures that reminded him of fish. They were sometimes oddly shaped, or sometimes he would even see gigantic creatures, things much larger than any fish he had ever seen.

If he truly was inside a coffin, then where was he? He couldn’t be buried underground, then there would never be light. Then where?

He had many questions, but never once had he gotten any answers, as he was the only one who could answer them.

Sometimes he would try to remember as far back as he could, trying to figure anything about himself or where he was. But he never could.

He did not remember anything about himself, he did not even know his own name. He remembered a feeling of deep rage, a feeling that seemed to stay with him for decades. He remembered during these times of rage, he used to thrash and scratch at the thing that entrapped him, which never seemed to make a difference. Then he soon remembered the feeling of starvation, the feeling of his body beginning to waste away as he was left here to rot. But before that, he quickly felt the feeling of no air, the oxygen soon running out and he was no longer able to breathe. Now, he simply did not breathe, nor did he move at all, he did not have the energy to. He had felt that his body was barely more than a skeleton, the fat and muscle having eventually wasted away, any attempts at escaping the tight prison he was in never made a difference.

Soon, he had just accepted his position, that he would never be able to escape. He no longer felt the pain of starvation and dehydration, nor the suffocation of not being able to breathe, these soon became things he learned to exist with.

And yet, he was still somehow alive.

How long had he been down here? Truly, he did not know. Decades? Centuries? Millenia? He had been down here for so long, he had forgotten the very concept of time. Soon, his memories began to rot away just like his body did. His name, the name of his family or friends, any memories of before, had just faded. He did not who he was or why he was here. Though he did know one thing,

He was not human.

He could not be human, no human would still be alive. Then, what was he? Some kind of zombie? Perhaps a revenant? Was something keeping him here? Some kind of burning desire for revenge against the people who put him here?

Or maybe, he had been a truly evil person before this, having done terrible, unforgivable atrocities, and making him suffer like this was how the gods punished him. If this was true, then perhaps it was a good thing he did not remember who he was.

Then again, there was the possibility he was already dead.

That he had died long ago, and that the loss of his memories was not the result of him being down here so long. That when he died, his memories had been left in his body, and that he was the corrupt soul that was gone. That where he was now, was some form of purgatory. The Underworld had been too good for him, and that the only punishment suitable for his past crimes, was to leave him in the void of nothingness for all of eternity.

For as long as he’s been down here, these are the questions he’d always asked himself. And yet, he would never receive answers.

Suddenly, he felt something move outside of his coffin. This was rare, but not the first time this had happened. He had assumed one of the big creatures he had seen outside has bumped against the coffin. Some part of him hoped the big creature would swallow the coffin and him with it, digesting him and finally ending his suffering. But it seems the gods that had put him down here would not grant him such mercy, as he was still here.

But, a few moments after he was bumped, he had felt his coffin move on its own, as if it were alive. He felt the coffin lift its self off the ground and began to rise up, as if floating. Then, it picked up speed, moving upward faster than before.

He soon felt himself quickly being pulled upwards in the coffin, so fast and strong he had thought the gods themselves were pulling him out of the void. Was his punishment over? Had the gods decided he had suffered enough, and were releasing him?

He did not know, he did not even have the energy to speak, nor was he even sure he remembered how to.

Soon, he began to see light in the distance, though it seemed very far and wasn’t clear. He could see the sun again, something he did not realize how much he truly missed. But it seemed it was above the surface of the water, something he was under.

Had he been at the bottom of a lake? The ocean, perhaps?

He could not tell. What he did know, is that since he could now see water, he could see what was pulling him. It seemed to be some kind of claw, though it was not the claw of an animal like he had seen before. He was not sure how many claws this thing truly had, as he could only just barely see the one that was over the small slit his coffin had. But seemed to be made out of some dark material, darker than any material he had ever seen. It seemed to be wrapped strongly around the coffin, along with several others, he was sure.

Was this the hand of the gods themselves? It did not seem like something humans could make. Then again, he was not sure how long he had been down there or how the world may have changed. He did not know what they were now capable of.

Soon, he broke the surface, being pulled above the water. He did not have the energy to shield his eyes from the sudden light, blinding him as had become so used to the darkness.

Now, he had been released from his prison, from the nothingness that he knew. Not knowing who he was, nor why.

He did not even know his purpose, or if he was truly alive or not.

All he had ever known, was nothingness.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

In the middle of The North Pacific Ocean, a Tugboat stay floating on the surface of the water. The ship was rusted, it had been out on the ocean many times. It was the typical black and white ship, the outer parts of the ship were a dark black, though most of it was covered in rust. While the upper parts, the parts of the ship where the crew rested and steered the ship, was a bright white. And though much less so, there was still rust on it.

Unlike most ships, this one had few things on it. Not only because it was small, but the crew was the bare minimum of seven. This ship had only a few crates on it, with the minimum food and water required for the crew.

The only thing that made this ship different than most, was the gigantic machine on it that took up the majority of space on the ship. The machine was very similar to a crane in structure and appearance, but at the end of it was a large, metallic claw. It seemed big and strong enough to pick up most objects. There was also enough rope attached to allow it to go extremely deep inside the ocean, and the rope was strong enough to allow the claw to bring up anything it could grab.

Currently, the claw had been dropped in the ocean, and had been for quite a while as it reached deeper into the ocean. Five of the seven crewmembers were required to operate this thing. The two who weren’t were the captain of the ship, and the cook.

The captain was hanging over the side of the ship, staring at the spot the claw was at. Despite it being the middle of the day, he could not see the claw, though that might be more because of how deep it was. He was wearing a large, blue overcoat with silver buttons. A black and white sailors sweater underneath, a bland, white pair of jeans to go with it. He also wore a white captains hat, though it was also bland as it had nothing on it, the rims of the hat being black, the same shade of black that the boots he was wearing were.

He looked at the spot where the claw was, not with any sense of curiosity at what it might be pulling up, but more boredom. His eyes were the same dark color of blue as the ocean, though they had long dulled with age. His hair had long ago turned a dark gray, that being partly the reason why he keeps it short and tucked under his hat, he does not like being reminded of his age. Though, being out on the sea for so long due to his job usually meant he didn’t get to shave. There was already obvious gray stubble on his face, which he hated due to how itchy it was. Thankfully, smoking helped him ignore it. He currently had a pipe sticking out of his mouth, passively smoking it as he seemed to almost ignore everything else around him.

Almost.

“So, what are we doing at The Mariana Trench?”

The other crew member, who was the cook, was currently beside the captain. Though instead of looking at the spot where the claw was like him, he seemed to be more concerned with incessantly asking him questions. He was done for his cooking for the day, so he seemed content with just wearing a plain white t-shirt and black jeans and black boots. His hair was almost as short as the captains, though unlike the captains, it was a vibrant brown, the same color as his eyes. Though, strangely, he seemed to struggle when it came to growing facial hair. He clearly hadn’t shaved since they set out since he has some noticeable hair, but considerably less than the other crew members.

“You know, if you didn’t have a talent for making really good food no matter how shit your ingredients are, I would have kicked you off my crew for how many questions you ask..” The captain said with a groan as exhaled, a puff of smoke coming out as he did.

Ever since he took him into his crew, this is how it's always been. He’s always been far too curious for his own good, asking questions for no other reason than to sate his curiosity. It was annoying, sure, but never caused any real problems. But recently, some really weird guy paid him a lot of money to get something out of The Mariana Trench. Not only did he look and act weird, but he had all these weird details. He said that he was asking him to do it because he knew he had the right equipment and crew who didn’t ask questions, so he gave him a map, and a circled spot on the map with exact coordinates, and some money. He said all they had to do is send the claw machine as deep as it can go into the exact spot the coordinates were, which was a huge pain to do.

Normally, the captain wouldn’t do stuff like this. But he was offering a lot of money, like, retirement levels of money. None of the other crew members were asking questions, except for him.

“Oh, come on, you love me! Besides, you can’t tell me you don’t have any questions! I mean, just think about it. Some guy came up to you, with a really strange amount of details and a lot of money, to get him something from the deepest part of the ocean. That doesn’t make you curious, not even slightly?” He turned towards the captain, as if trying to convince the captain that he should be asking questions.

“Nope,” He said as he shrugged, not seeming to have removed his eyes from the spot where the claw was at. “I don’t ask questions about things that aren’t my business. Besides, I don’t really see the harm. The whole point of a tugboat is to pull things from the ocean, or through it. We’re just...overstepping our boundaries a bit. Haven’t you ever heard of collectors? That guy likely just heard there was some old relic or something down here, and wanted to add it to his collection, it’s not that weird.”

“I mean, that makes sense, I guess. But what about the coordinates? That seems strangely specific. I don’t know, man. Just something about this rubs me the wrong way.”

As he said that, the men at the claw machine began to struggle. The captain's eyes raised his eyes slightly in surprise as he saw the claw break the surface of the water, showing just what this object was.

It was somewhat bigger than a person, big enough to contain someone inside of it. The claw had its grip around it, though it seemed almost too big for it too. It was a rectangular object, and it looked old. It looked like it had been made out of marble and other stones, though being under so much pressure because of how deep it was, and being that deep underwater for who knows how long seems to have chipped away at it. It seemed like it used to be some kind of ancient artifact, something that might come out of a pyramid in Egypt. It was hard to tell, but there seemed to be some kind of carvings into the side of it, though it was hard to see those.

Parts of it had started to fall apart, or at least the parts of it that were visible were. It was covered in grime, seaweed, and all other kinds of things that had built up on it over the years. And though it had slowly started to be aged away, it didn’t seem enough to get to whatever was inside of it. Though give or take a few hundred years, and it eventually would.

As this object hovered above the water in the claw’s grip, the captain looked at it in surprise. He had never seen anything like that before, nor had he expected something like that to be at the bottom of the ocean.

Though the cook was also surprised to look at it, he was more so because he knew what it was. He was one of those people who liked to watch those long documentaries about history, stuff like the times of the Egyptians and the Romans. He found the stuff quite interesting, and he found it cool that stuff was still being found from those eras to this day. But never did he expect to find anything himself from them, nor did he expect to find something like this.

He didn’t usually swear, something he had to avoid doing now that his wife was pregnant. But his wife was not here, and he felt this may have been an appropriate time to.

“Holy fuck! That’s a roman sarcophagus!”

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Yes, I said I’ll need all seven of them. Can I pay for it? Of course I can, who do you think I am? I need them as soon as you can get them for me, I’ll have the money ready.”

Discord then shut the phone, still having a flip phone, as he loved the satisfying sound of shutting it after a call.

“I swear, no matter how long people know me, they still keep being surprised whenever I make weird requests. Well, at least I know I keep things interesting. “

As he said that, he put his phone back into his right lab coat pocket, then pulling out the journal he usual had on him.

Even though Discord was on his day off, he still liked to wear what he usually did. He wore his brown lab coat with his yellow jeans and his striped green and blue shirt, though today he felt like wearing his pink shoes instead of his purple ones.

Right now, he was sitting in the parking lot outside of a Subway, having just enjoyed some decent cucumber sandwiches, though they weren’t as good if he had made them himself. He didn’t like it either that when he asked for hot sauce on them, he got weird looks. Does no one have taste? The car he was sitting in was a clown car, which got even more weird looks. He didn’t understand the problem, it had so much space!

“Now, let’s see, what’s left. I need to get everything ready before they come back with him, he’s going to be pissed and confused. Heh, he might find the world unfathomable from the one he knew.”

Discord chuckled at his own pun as he began to flip through his journal, as if looking for something. He soon found it, stopping at a point in the journal. It looked like a grocery list, though instead of things to get, it was task. It seemed there were a lot of them, spanning down to near the bottom of the page. They all had boxes beside them, some of them had check marks on them signaling they were done. On the top of the page, were just the words ‘Preparation’ written in black.

As he scrolled down the list, check-marking some of them with a pencil he kept in the journal, and mumbling to himself as he read it, his phone began to ring again.

He groaned as he reached into his pocket and pulled it out.

“For the last time, Their blood type isn’t that important, so plea-Oh, hello Melvin.” Discord began, though he stopped himself when he heard who it was.

“Yes, I’m still running those errands I was talking about. Why, what? Why do you need me to come in? Melvin, you know this is the one day off I get every month, an-” He was going to start ranting, until Melvin began to nervously tell him what happened.

Then afterward, Discord closed his eyes and groaned as he shut the journal, putting it back in his lab pocket. “How bad is it?” He asked, somehow, he wasn’t surprised.

A few more seconds passed as Melvin explained the situation, the scowl on Discord’s face getting worse as he did. “I doubt she’s ate or slept properly either. And If my hunch is right, which it usually is, this happened because she got too confident in a fight with The Silent Killer or something. Alright, who saved her?”

When Melvin told him, he couldn’t help but smirk a little.

“Juno, bless that boy. Fine, I’ll come in. But one of these days Melvin I’m going to have to teach you how to treat her, so I won’t have to come in every time she get’s herself beat up.”

After he said that he shut the phone putting it back in his lab pocket with the journal, he then laid back in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose as he let out another groan. “Of course she’d do this on my day off. I swear, Pinkamena Diane Pie, you are the dumbest genius I’ve ever met. Igneous was the same way, but at least he was a quick learner! I swear, I can’t tell if she’s going to be good for The Syndicate or not, I guess that’s why we have The Council, after all.”

He leaned forward and turned the key in his car, causing the car to turn on. The radio began to play loud Tuvan Throat Singing, which got the attention of some of the other people in the parking lot.

As he began to back the car up and drive down the road, he started to talk to himself, one of his favorite ways to pass the time.

“That crew I paid to get him shouldn’t be back until next week, and who knows how long it’ll take until I can get him back to shape and teach him everything that’s happened while he’s gone. Ugh, always busy, even on my day off. And in the time I’m getting him ready, I need to make sure Pinkamena will be ready to meet him. Though with everything going on, that’ll be a hassle.”

He suddenly stopped the car at a red light, deciding he would have enough time to do one more thing.

“With things looking how they are, I may need to make extra preparations. Best case scenario: Pinkamena becomes friends with him, or she at least doesn’t actively try to kill him. Worst case scenario: They hate each other and fight, I already know who is going to win that.”

He pulled out his journal and flipped it to an open page, writing the word “operation” on the top page with a colon besides it.

“Now, what should the name be for this worst-case scenario plan? Hmmm.”

Discord asked himself as he tapped the pencil against his chin, looking down at the piece of paper. This is what Discord always did first with plans, come up with some clever name. If it were something he was researching, creating, or working on, he always put ‘Project:’ And then the name. But when it came to plans, he always put ‘Operation:’ and then the name. Making them was the easy part, it was making a clever title that he always found difficult, but satisfying.

“Ah! I know!”

He wrote the words ‘Rosea Vampir’ beside operation, seeming satisfied with the title. He never wrote the titles in English, that was no fun. He always put each word of the title in a different language, this time, the first word was in Latin, the second in German.

Though before he could start working on the actual plan, the light turned green, and the cars behind him began to honk.

He quickly closed the journal and put it in his lab pocket, driving the car to his destination, the Tuvan Throat Singing really helping him think.

As he drove, he wondered to himself how different things would be if Igneous would still be here. Would he even have to be doing this? Likely not, but who knows. Discord didn’t usually like thinking about what ifs.

He did know one thing, Igneous would have gotten along with him perfectly, Discord had no doubt of that.

Assuming the thousands of years of being at the bottom of the ocean locked in a coffin hadn’t completely destroyed his memory, anyway. If that were true, that would be a huge pain.