For @rotgsecretsanta prompt 14: Jack and Bunny investigating a crashed spaceship! ...There was a fic planned, but it’s in various stages of Doesn’t Like Me Right Now, so have a snippet instead.
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Hollow Spaces
“See? Weird, giant... metal... cave. Thing.” Jack finished eloquently, gesturing to the open space.
It wasn’t a cave. E Aster Bunnymund knew that down to his bones. Despite the wear and tear, the weathered metal and the cracks littering the hull, and the fog obscuring the ground--he could still recognize it. The domed shape, the elegant archways, the broken, ancient technology littering the narrow path.
“--Mate, you don’t understand,” Aster said, awed. “This isn’t a cave. It’s a buried Alien Spaceship.”
“What?” Jack echoed, confused. “No? There’s no way it’s a--”
Aster could hear as Jack’s voice died in his throat as he looked around, examining the surroundings with a new eye. In Aster’s peripheral vision, he saw Jack do a 180, then snap back to face him with a blush.
Jack cleared his throat. “--Alright, in my defense,” he started up again, “I found this place WAY before anyone was ever talking about extraterrestrials. So.”
Aster almost couldn’t speak, he was so overwhelmed. But the words needed to be said. Spoken, perhaps, into existence. Swallowing, he forced out a whisper, immeasurably small and breathless.
“...It’s Pookan.”
“Well, I knew THAT,” Jack rolled his eyes. “I recognized the sigil on the door. But I just - I thought it was yours?”
Aster laughed, something between bitter and disbelief. “It’s not.”
“But-” Jack started, then immediately went quiet, understanding the implications. The ancient race, the spacefaring Pooka, the genocide. “Wait... if it’s not yours... Then who’s is it?”
“That’s the million dollar question, yeah,” Aster said, closing his eyes for a brief second before the need to see--to keep an eye on this anomaly, this impossibility, to keep it from vanishing from underneath his nose--forced his eyes open again. He looked upon halls he never thought he’d ever see again, rolling out in all directions, an endless possibility. And he frowned. “...Whose indeed.”
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