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Riz was an incredible lightweight. For starters, he was far too young to be drinking to begin with, and really, in the grand scheme of things, all of the bad kids were lightweights except perhaps Fig, whose anxious fathers had watched carefully to see that she didn’t follow the path of her rebellious mother too closely. But different races metabolized different substances differently, typically depending on size. Elves tended to have lower constitution for such things, thus Fabian’s uncharacteristic weakness around the substance, while humans were a little better off, leaving Kristen more stable even despite her conservative upbringing. The beefier the race, generally speaking, the better off they were in the presence of ale. Fig’s tiefling blood made her nearly impenetrable, and it took Gorgug and Ragh truly fountainfulls of booze to have even the slightest effect. Following this logic, of course, goblins went down almost immediately, and at half a glass of wine your standard goblin was shitfaced and muttering in the corner. But Riz was not just your standard goblin, nor was he just a teenage goblin - on top of that, he had a higher metabolism than nearly all of the bad kids. While Fabian worked out constantly to keep himself in shape and lost his glimmering six pack over one cheat weekend, while Kristen and Fig proudly wore their muffin tops after a holiday dinner, Riz ate - well, like a teenage goblin - and his ribs were still visible under his tattoos.
For some combination of these reasons,an hour into the party Riz had overshot it and was hysterically sobbing in the corner, totally unconsolable. The last thing they’d gotten out of him was some muttering about birds and how ‘they’re always flying but they’re never free’ and it was decided that it was high time he headed home. Gorgug, as the strongest, most sober, and least interested in partying, elected to take him home. Riz hardly seemed to notice while Gorgug threw him over his shoulder by the feet like a sack of flour, and gently muttered “Come on, buddy, let’s get you home.”
It was Adaine’s idea, as the thoroughly sober one at the party, to get him home. The rest of the teens looked up with betrayal as they saw Gorgug lugging Riz to the door. Fabian, who was shirtless with beer in his hair, objected loudly. “Oh- wh- hey, you guys are leaving already? The party’s just starting!”
“I’ll come back, I think, but I think it’s time to get Riz home,” said Gorgug, briefly turning around and offering a cordial smile.
“Why?!” Fabian whined.
Kristen took a break from giggling and kissing tracker from her position against the wall with Tracker pressed into her chest. “Aw, Riz is still sad, don’t be sad Riz! We love you!
“We love you, Riz,” Tracker mimicked.
Fig and Ayda were far too engrossed in making out on the ping-pong table to notice the events.
Riz muttered something incoherent.
“Yeah, let’s - let’s get him back home,” Adaine assured Gorgug with a firm nod. He nodded back, and grinned.
“I’ll be right back, guys! Keep some drinks cold for me.”
Fabian enthusiastically let his head fall back and raised a glass. “You got it! Hey, take good care of my Ball! Don’t cry the Ball, I bet birds are like, so happy about it!”
Riz didn’t answer, fully accepting his position and letting his arms go limp against Gorgug’s shirt.
At that point, it was about twelve thirty, and the sidewalks were completely dark. It was a pretty short walk to Strongtower Luxury apartments, and either way, it was a warm, starry, summer night. The only thing that could make this walk problematic, thought Gorgug, was if Riz decided to throw up all over his shirt which, knowing his history, was not terribly unlikely. So far, though, that hadn’t happened. That said, his shirt was wet, but it was closer to the shoulder, and he could tell from the occasional sniffing and murmering what it was. Sympathetically he raised the hand that wasn’t carrying Riz and gave him an affectionate pat on the back.
“There, there,” he said gently, “It’s okay, I’m bringing you back home.”
Riz sniffed. “Everybody is so lonely!” he exclaimed. Gorgug had given up on trying to understand his ramblings, so he went back to pure consolation.
“I know.”
“Everyone, all the time!”
“I know.”
“Where’s Fabian, and Kristen, and everyone, did they- did they get ‘em, are they dead?”
Gorgug half-chuckled. “They’re totally fine, dude, they’re back at the party.”
Riz repositioned himself slightly on Gorgug’s back, and Gorgug felt little elbows propping Riz up as he went on speaking. “Every time we aren’t… not lonely anymore, it’s because of something that’s like… a bowl of slime! Just… fragile, and tiny, and little, and if you drop it, then… then you’re just even more lonelier! Lone-lonelier, lonely.” he explained frantically, as if it were very important.
“...What?”
“We’re not so strong, Gorgug,” he groaned, “We’re all just… just powered by the- the slime in our heads, dude! And that’s… that’s so fragile!”
Gorgug creased his eyebrows. “Are you talking about our brains?”
“Myeah,” Riz said, voice muffled by shirt, “It’s just that much, and… they die! I could… I could use my gun, and… if I- if I shot Fabian? He would die. If I shot Adaine, she would die. If I shot Fig, she would die. If I shot Kristen…” Gorgug could only tolerate him listing a few more of his friends and family who’d die if shot in the head before the miserable tone of it all was just too much.
“Yes, but, why would you do that?” Gorgug asked.
“What?” Riz asked, now on the edge of hysterics again.
“You wouldn’t shoot your friends, you’d have no reason to do that.”
“What if I’m possessed? What if someone else takes my guns or… controls my fingers?” he shouted, his volume spiking unpleasantly in Gorgug’s ear.
“Okay,” he whispered, beginning to get a little tired of comforting Rig’s drunken ramblings. “Well, if that happens, I promise we’ll stop you from killing us. We’ve done it with our friends before, we could do it with you too.”
There was a blissful moment where Riz was quiet, totally limp against Gorgug’s shoulders. After a moment he squirmed in an odd sort of way, and it occurred to Gorgug that he was pressing his face into his neck. After a few minutes of walking he had repositioned into a position with one arm over his shoulder and the other clinging onto his arm, his still teary eyes nuzzled just behind his ear. Perhaps Gorgug was a little tipsy himself, but he could have sworn Riz was being... physically affectionate . He stopped entirely in the middle of the dim sidewalk. Now this was something he’d never seen, drunk or sober. Riz smelled like wine, but beneath it was his usual scent of black coffee and freshly ironed cotton. It occurred to Gorgug that the feeling of his skin was new, soft and surprisingly childlike (though part of that was likely just the size of his hands). Slim, lithe fingers laid gently against his shoulders, occasionally touched by the painless claws like the ends of a pen, like an affectionate cat whose claws were ever-so-slightly too long. Mystified, Gorgug soaked it in. He was certain that, however he felt about this, it was the only time anyone except perhaps Sklonda had felt it. He lifted a heavy green hand and placed it on his back, which began rising and falling much more regularly, the gasping of his tears coming to a close. There they stood for a moment on the dark sidewalk, in absolute silence.
“It got so lonely, Gorgug…” a tiny voice soon piped up. Now, he was listening, though he had forgotten how to walk.
“What did?” he asked.
Riz pushed himself slightly off of his back, seeming to sober for a slim moment. “Middle school, no one liked me in middle school,” he said, “I hadn’t had a friend in all my life. Everyone else had… clubs and-and sports. I tried, Gorgug, I tried… I just was so bad at it, I couldn’t - I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know what I did wrong,” he admitted, “‘N then… all of you guys just… you just got me. I didn’t do anything different. I even used the… fucking… business cards. Some last resort they were.”
“Well you killed it in the corn fight!” admitted Gorgug optimistically, “Plus you didn’t have to… do anything. You’re Riz. We like you for exactly what you are.” Gorgug paused for a moment, picking a spot on the sidewalk to stare at, “I didn’t really have any friends either,” he admitted, “Friends are… pretty hard to make!”
Riz sniffed. “I don’t understand why they like me, Gorgug!” he exclaimed, “And that is so stressful, because what if I stop doing the thing that makes them all like me!”
“Are you kidding?” laughed Gorgug, “Did you hear them as we left? Fabian was practically begging you to stay! They all love you!”
Riz laughed tearfully. “I don’t want all my friends to die, Gorgug,” he said grimly, “Everybody else, they can make new ones. I would just die alone… forever, I’d just… just die,” he wept, drunken illogic falling back onto him in seconds.
“Well, I don’t know how to make friends either,” answered Gorgug, “It’s honestly super dumb. I sorta just… ran into you guys.” He laughed meekly. To his surprise, Riz’s response was to wrap a clawed hand a little tighter around his shoulder.
“You’re so nice for taking me home. You’re a really good friend, Gorgug. We don’t hang out enough, we should - I want to - I want to see you more.”
Gorgug grinned. “The green team!” he enthused.
Riz punched a weak fist towards the air. “Green team…” he muttered in response. Gorgug, grin on his face, gave Riz another pat on the back and then got back to walking. Strongtower Luxury Apartments came into the distance, the great pillar dotted with white lights blocking out the moon. Not far now.
“I didn’t know you were this chill with being touched,” Gorgug said casually.
“It gets stuck in a loop,” Riz answered, muffled once again by his shirt.
“A loop?”
“You don’t like- it’s when it’s- it’s strangers. The strangers don’t touch you anymore, and then like, if the strangers become your friends, now they know you don’t like to be touched…”
“Oh, I see,” Gorgug said with a nod, “Well, you could have told us. We wouldn’t mind. Fabian, Fig, they’re both super touchy, I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”
Riz winced. “No, that’s weird. You want me to tell my friends I want to be touched?”
Gorgug mimicked his grimace. “Well, when you put it like that…”
“Yeah.”
“I can see the problem.”
“Yeah.”
“Well…” elaborated Gorgug, “It’s been really nice to… talk to you! You don’t really talk about stuff a lot. We all um… I mean we kinda… worry about you sometimes,” he explained meekly. He wasn’t certain if he should have been telling him this, but the slight tipsiness swirling occasionally in his head had softened his filter, if it hadn’t broken it. But he’d at least exchanged looks with all of the Bad Kids about the safety of Riz, and the majority of them he’d had at least some conversation with about it. Fabian’s catchphrase during Bloodrush practice when Riz was brought up had become ‘Do you think he’s alright?’ and he rarely seemed convinced by the answer. He knew, as well, that Adaine had weekly study sessions with him, despite the fact that Riz very rarely benefitted from team studying and usually spent most of it with his head buried in his own book. He also knew full well that Adaine only did it to make sure he was okay. Fig would discuss Hell with him from time to time and shoot him some encouraging words, Kristen would always notice when it looked like he hadn’t slept. They all noticed, really. Of all the Bad Kids, Riz was the one who really never talked about himself. For that reason, this moment felt sacred, and Gorgug dared to press on.
“Worry?” Riz asked, “‘Bout me?”
“Well - it’s just - you never really talk about yourself,” answered Gorgug, “And we’ll, you know, see you and you haven’t… slept, or whatever… Just sort of. Worrying, I guess? Cause I mean I guess you’re about the same amount of traumatized as everyone else but we never hear like, how you’re doing, or… if you’re okay. Are you… okay?”
Riz shifted slightly, responding with a long, uncomfortable silence. “I’m not good at talking about it,” he admitted, his voice threatening to crack once again.
“Well, I get that,” Gorgug sympathized. But it was only sympathy - his parents were as open as they come, and he was really only a few pegs below them on the communication scale. He didn’t get it, not really. “But we are your friends. I mean, you could tell us, if you wanted to.”
“I want to but I can’t,” he raved hysterically. Suddenly his voice dropped to a wine-scented whisper. “Gorgug- Gorgug- I gotta, I hafta tell you something, it’s a secret though, so put me down, put me down.”
Gorgug complied, gingerly taking Riz under the arms and placing him on the ground. Immediately he stumbled, nearly falling, before getting back to his feet. He winced and raised a finger, seeming to focus on something.
“You gonna be sick?” asked Gorgug politely.
There was a long pause, Riz’s hand still up to stop him, before he let out a heavy breath and answered, “I’m good, I’m good.” He thrust a finger out enthusiastically, and it was almost enough to tip him over. “I wasn’t always the Riz Gukgak you know!” he exclaimed, “I…” he faltered for a moment, disheartenment returning to his face. “In middle school I would… tell anything to anyone. I wanted to be everyone’s friend so I’d just lay it…” he gestured vaguely forward, nearly toppling onto his face. “‘Twas all on the table. And then… I didn’t make any friends and nobody liked me, and I just… just wanted people to like me, so… I just. Stopped talking about it! More and more until I just sort of never told anyone anything, cause when you tell people stuff they use it and they… they get you, they use it against you like some sort of… fucked up weapon.” He swallowed, still tears still drying on his cheeks. “”Swhy I don’t talk to anyone anymore,” he admitted, “And it’s so sad because I used to be really open and then…” He put a hand to his face, tearing up again.
He was outrageously drunk and had been crying about everything for the past thirty minutes, so his tears packed somewhat less of a punch than they normally would have. Still though, Gorgug had never known that - he supposed it made sense. The fact that his filters came completely down and he was nothing but loving and affectionate when he was drunk was a good sign that that was some part of him underneath at every moment. A truly stoic person would just be a stoic drunk, wouldn’t they? Gorgug wasn’t sure. Either way, he cast Riz a sympathetic look, and cocked his head. “Riz, that… I’m so sorry about that,” he said softly. “Did you just like overshare a bunch, or…”
“Yeah, I overshared a bunch!” he admitted, and ran a hand through his hair. “Apparently ‘I think you would make a cool friend’ is not a super… not a super fun opener when you’re in seventh grade, but… I didn’t know… I just… did bad and I ruined my social life forever!”
“Well, clearly you didn’t, since you’ve got us friends now,” said Gorgug, “I don’t think you need to worry about that stuff anymore. We’re not gonna die. I mean, I don’t think. No offense but there’s a lot of tougher things that have tried to kill us than you,” he chuckled softly.
Riz sniffed, teary eyed again. “Thanks, Gorgug,” he said, “It means a lot.”
“You ready to go back home?”
He nodded, holding his head. Gorgug started out walking and Riz turned around, but he spun too fast and got very close to falling completely over, before Gorgug caught him and propped him back up again. “You want to get back up?” he asked.
“Don’t tell the others,” Riz murmured.
“I won’t,” said Gorgug, and hoisted him easily back over his shoulder.