Chapter Text
"Regect's gone?" Ze asks after logging onto his world with Moe greeting him, apple core—from an apple he just finished after apparently forgetting it on his desk—in his hand. He tosses it into the trash can next to him.
She speaks quick and almost frantic, telling him that yeah Regect went off to get stuff. What stuff? Oh, no don't worry about it, Ze! It's all so perfectly normal!
Ze narrows his eyes, tilting his head and hoping his silence speaks volumes of what he was thinking. That he didn't believe her. She couldn't lie to him, not like this at least.
She gives up, saying she doesn't actually know what Regect is planning just that it's for Ze.
Ze flushes, "Oh."
Moe's avatar moves quicker than Ze can process, pressing up against his screen as though she may– Are you blushing?! She says something else but that's all he can hear past the rushing blood in his ears.
"I just said one word!"
She laughs, shifting and pressing instead against the side of his avatar all to say they should go to the market. Ze relents immediately, telling Moe to hold on a second so he can go get diamonds and emeralds and gold in order to trade. She cheers, saying she'll grab her own stock. Ze tries to tell her that he'll pay. She boops his avatar probably where his nose would be and Ze scrunches his real nose. Before he can say something, she's gone, so he just sighs and follow her trail up the stairs.
He walks by Regect's room before turning into his, it's… a bland Minecraft room. Bed, chest, paintings put up by Regect and Moe because his room in their eyes was just too sad. In reality, he thinks—maybe it's he hopes—they wanted him to feel included because he didn't live in the world like they did.
Ze's eyes turn from the computer in front of him to the posters on his walls, the few shelves of things he owns, and he thinks of the bookshelf in his living room filled mostly with movies but a few books too. He thinks about the gifts from Mason and his sisters that litter his home and the Build-a-Bears that sit on his bed. He looks at the cow his sister had built him before his birthday. Like, literally his birth. They were meant to go to Build-a-Bear in order to get her a bear, a gift from their dad to "make up" for him being born. For, well, for taking up their parents' attention but sometimes he thinks it was genuinely just his birth that his dad thought would be some sort of punishment for his daughter. Apparently their dad said it was either get one bear for Ze or one for Phoebe.
Phoebe says that was when she began to distrust their dad. That how he spoke about Ze and how he gave the ultimatum broke some part of her, that Phoebe saw something in their dad. She says he broke her trust everyday with Ze after that. Ze never knows what to do when she says that. What to do when she expresses love and affection openly. Phoebe doesn't openly express herself all too often, or ever really.
Ana does, Ana always had. It was her own form of protest.
Ze moves towards one of the chests, an ender chest after Regect had stolen his shit one too many times, to gather his bartering tools. As well as a gun from his guns chest. It was its own form of bartering tool if he had to use it in such a way.
Ze watches his character reload it, wondering if somewhere there was a life where he wasn't broken.
He rushes back down the stairs before he can spiral too far into that train of thought. Inventory filled, not really he hadn't grabbed everything in his chests, and gun grabbed Ze is ready to head out. Moe meets him at the base of the stairs.
She moves into his space and takes up the entirety of his camera. She asks him if he's ready. The two head out, taking a brand new car that Ze just got and if Regect somehow destroyed it he was going to destroy Regect. He tells Moe as much, she giggles, scolding Ze to not threaten Regect when he wasn't even there to defend himself. Ze shrugs, getting his character into the car and saying he's driving. Moe is silent until Ze switches seats.
"Your birthday is coming up, I can't treat you?" Ze lightheartedly complains, resting his chin on his head and Moe drives.
Moe says spending time with Ze is more than enough gift. She says she loves him.
"Oh."
She laughs. She asks if he's blushing.
"Shut up! No."
She expresses doubt.
"Shut up," Ze pauses for a moment and Moe doesn't fill it. Like she knows he's about to say something else, "I love you too."
Moe gasps excitedly, telling him how much she cares. The flush on Ze's face darkens and he buries his face in his hands. She continues on for a moment before she gasps and tells Ze they're there. Ze waits until after she parks to turn into the backseat and grab her bag for Moe. She thanks him as he climbs out of the car.
She reaches for her bag and Ze passes it over without fanfare. Moe leans into the side of his camera view, honking once without a real meaning behind it or at least not one Ze can parse, and bounces away immediately after. Ze rolls his eyes, fondly unfortunately, and follows slowly after her. Moe tries to drag him to a weapon stand first, even as he tries to fight against saying they should go to stands for her. Her hand lands on his face and she honks once, short and sweet.
"Did… did you just boop me???" Ze's voice is shrill.
The market is loud, music from stages and speakers play over the sounds of people talking to one another. It's almost over stimulating but Ze clicks open the sound settings and turns down a few settings that he knows won't affect Moe and her horn. Moe speaks as he does this, she gestures to the rows and rows of stands and few buildings that almost resemble a larger city's festival with open buildings that are doing sells. It feels like something he did as a kid, with his sisters.
"What do you mean of course I react to this and not the other thing? What other thing???"
She rolls her eyes, her whole head going with it. Moe points to the weapon stand again then to behind it which is a store filled to the brim with plushies and blankets and pillows from what Ze can see. She says if he so graciously allows them to stop by the weapon stand first for him that she'll let him buy her whatever from that store. Since he can't just let her buy her things, she teases.
The store behind the stand looks a lot like Build-a-Bear. Including a bear logo and the blue-yellow themed colors. Moe waits while Ze thinks.
"Okay, fine, but anything I want I also buy myself. Both store and stand."
Moe huffs, throwing her hands up with a honk-grunt of fine. She grabs his avatar and drags it along. Drags him along. Ze moves with her, moving his avatar in order to make her journey easier. There's knives upon knives and an equal amount of swords on the stand. Moe greets the seller as Ze looks at the wares. Some of the knives and swords look perfectly normal, maybe with different materials, shapes, and handles but normal all the same. One of them was shaped like a hammer with two sharp swords instead of the flat sides of a hammer. Ze pointed it out to Moe, who giggled softly and said that if they got that anywhere near Regect he'd find a way to chop off a limb. Ze laughed with her.
"Regect would do that even with a normal sword," He says, voice bordering on too fond. Moe shoves his character, causing him to take half a heart of damage, and tells him to be nice.
Ze rolls his eyes and huffs.
Moe points out a set of ten throwing knives that are neon yellow. They're dagger points, almost kunais, with a triangle base past its handle too. Moe turns to him, bright eyes and probably puppy dog eyed. He wondered how they were made, if they were made in a similar way to the stainless steel golden colored throwing axes he was looking at.
Moe honks to get his attention turned back to her. He doesn't, he turns to the person behind the stand pointing out Moe's throwing knives and his axes. Moe cheers. Bouncing away and twirling. Ze smiles behind the screen as he shoves the two sets of weapons into his inventory. Until his inventory was too full he'd be carrying everything. Despite Moe asking, unless she wanted to go somewhere to throw them or to look at he wasn't passing them over.
His sisters taught him well in that regard.
Ze also opens the door to the—he glances up at the sign—Stuffs'n'Softs store. Moe immediately runs off to a shelf. She crouches to grab something before turning and holding out a black goat with a missing leg, honking that she spotted it as soon as she walked in. It's in the bargain bin, a mistake or…
Moe frowns, the leg was torn off.
Damaged.
"Looks like Regect, huh? Do you think we should get it for him?" Ze asks, crouching to see the goat up closer.
Moe gasps, shoving it at him to keep. We should get one of each of us! She says.
Ze looks at the goat in his hot bar, swallowing thick spit and blinking rapidly. There is a burning in his eyes as he agrees to find something that matches himself. And his words barely make it out past the growing lump in the back of throat. He wanders aimlessly, he is trying to look but something sticks out to him. There's birds, a orca, sheep, and a plethora more of animals. In the back of the store Ze spots a cow plush. It's not special—black and white, little horns, sitting—but… He grabs it. He has to he thinks. He doesn't really have an animal that suits him, that he or anyone who knows him sees and goes that's Ze. Such a thing doesn't exist, but this cow looks like the Floppy Cow II from Build-a-Bear. It looks like the torn and restitched, hugged to death, restuffed, and more cow that sits on his bed. It looks like his Floppy Cow II.
He shows Moe once he finds her again, who cheers and grabs it to press to her face. She calls it cute and perfect and that it suits him. Moe shows him a parrot plush she found and he says it's perfect too. It's larger than the two he has now, bright and colorful with a silly jester's hat.
He pays for them. She doesn't fight him on it, holding herself to her promise, even as she clings onto his back. They spend the rest of the day, hopping from stand to store to stand and so on. They find a lot, but Ze keeps opening his invetory to look at those three silly, bordering stupid, plushies. They both end the day with stuffed inventories but Ze is happy with that. He's going to end to go mining the next time he logs on, or go trading with a village, to regain a fraction of the diamonds and emeralds he spent but…
Moe laughs as she swings the door open and spots Regect sitting in front of it like a disappointed parent.
Being broke was so worth this stupid joy he was feeling and the excitement that Moe was pushing out. They force Regect into helping put things up, even things that would go into their rooms. His included. Moe made sure they got Regect a lot of things too. Ze did too but when Regect smiled and teased Ze, he made sure to deny that any of it was Ze's idea. Ze was sure Regect didn't believe him. That was fine.
After it all, they sit on the couch and Moe mutters something about feeling like she was forgetting something. Ze puts the goat plushie on the coffee table. They'd gotten the store clerk to sew up the hole so now it was just a single legged thing. Moe claps before picking up the plushie to press a kiss to its cheek with a meaningless honk and explains what it is.
"A GOAT? I am NOT a goat," Regect scoffs, voice dripping with something that Ze refuses to name because then he would also have to confront it.
"Not the point, man," Ze shoves him, dropping the cow into his lap, "Do you think I'm a cow? Don't answer that."
Moe laughs, telling Regect to make sure the next words out of his mouth are nice.
Regect places the goat next to him as he picks up the cow, "I'm finding it."
"It take you that long?"
Regect laughs when Ze and Moe finish the reference. The laugh is more absent though. He's studying the damn cow and all of the sudden Ze feels too hot like a spotlight was shining on him. Regect twists it to look at its face.
"Is this you because of the colors?" Regect asks.
Moe honks right after to say that's what she had assumed.
"Ah," Ze sighs, eyes flicking to the cow in his room, "No?"
Moe pushes for information. Ze throws her plush at her and she passes it to Regect so she can take the cow. She sits the cow in her lap and leans down to smush her face against its head. Moe makes eye contact with him.
"What else is there? What you calling yourself a cow? Fat ass," Regect teases as he studies the parrot like he had done to the other two.
"No," Ze punches Regect who yelps and Moe scolds both of them, "I have that on my bed."
In real life? Moe asks with a gasp.
"A similar one, yes. Uh, Phoebe got it for me."
Regect coos, "Awwww, that's so cute. She already knew you were going to be–"
Ze punches him, "Fuck off. Actually."
Moe asks why she got it for him. Or if it was just a random gift one day.
"Oh, no, she… she got it for my birth day. Wasn't even born yet and she had my first gift."
Moe coos now, saying how cute it is. Ze threatens to log off and they drop it for now. Before he really does log off though, those three plush toys sit on the couch together with cow Ze in the middle, parrot Moe on his left, goat Regect on his right. Moe had made sure they held hands. Regect had adjusted his so that it practically draped across Ze's. As his computer screen goes black, his buries his face in his hands and breathes slowly. Swallowing back sobs, as he had done for as long as he could remember. He wasn't sure why it was an effort now.