Chapter Text
Benrey paced around the living room, chewing on one of their chullo strings.
They were alone in the apartment again. Gordon had left to go get his kid. Mini Feetman. Joshua. The baby in the locker photo. Tiny human. How small were babies? They had a general idea, but they couldn’t picture it, so it didn’t give them much to go off.
They knew a lot about everything else, though. Feetman had given him a whole walkthrough on How To Act Around His Son. No cursing, no being mean to him, don’t scare him, don’t say he “looks a bit shit,” all that stuff. They memorized all the do’s and don’ts. All the info, all the instructions, this was gonna be fine.
So they really didn’t know why lime and dull yellow sweet voice kept bubbling out and trailing in a circle around the room as they paced. They weren’t nervous. Not nervous at all. Nope. None of that. Totally fine totally cool great cool epi—
The doorknob turned and Benrey almost fell over in shock. Oh shit. They were back already? Oookay cool! Cool cool cool time to be chill, chill mode activated, let’s go.
The door opened and Gordon stepped in with Joshua in his arms. Benrey’s mind went blank as they looked at the kid.
He was so little.
Joshua looked at them with his big brown eyes and ridiculously small hands clinging to Gordon’s shirt, and all Benrey could think was that this child was so little, so fragile, and they immediately understood why Gordon was so worried about keeping him safe. They were, too.
“Hey lil dude,” said Benrey with a wave. “Heard, uh, heard lots about you.”
“Joshie, this is Benrey,” Gordon said as he put Joshua down on the floor. “They’re living here for now.”
The two of them looked at each other for a moment before Joshua raised his itty-bitty baby hands and… did something? He moved his hands together and smiled, and Benrey had the distinct feeling that they were out of the loop. They looked up at Gordon for help.
“He says it’s nice to meet you,” Gordon translated. “Joshie uses ASL—sign language—and text to speech to communicate. I, uh, I guess I’ll have to translate.”
“Oh sick, talking with—with your hands and stuff? That’s cool bro.” They held their hand out for a high-five, which Joshua gladly returned.
Benrey wasn’t sure they’d ever get over how tiny his hands were, holy shit.
When they looked back up at Gordon, he was smiling at both of them. There was a sign of clear caring and affection in there that made Benrey’s heart melt. A little light purplish-blue sweet voice whistled out, to a gasp from Joshua.
He signed something and started flailing his hands and jumping, trying to catch the little glowing orbs. Gordon laughed, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Okay kiddo, we can play with bubbles later,” he said, ruffling Joshua’s hair a little. “C’mon, we gotta set your room up and put away your stuff.”
Joshua nodded and ran up the stairs on all fours to his room. Gordon looked at Benrey and smiled again.
“Thanks for being cool with him,” he said, and followed his kid up the stairs and out of sight.
This was terrific! Mini Feetman bonding! They couldn’t understand a bit of what the kid said, but by the looks of it, Benrey did and said the right things.
Fuck yeah. This redemption arc was going off perfectly.
Having his son back felt both relieving and completely overwhelming, Gordon realized. While he was glad that Joshua was okay, glad to see him again, glad to hear his laugh and see his face that Gordon thought he’d never see again, it was also a reminder of how much energy it took to care for a kid.
Energy was hard to come by ever since Black Mesa. Would he be able to do this? What if the last few good days had just been a fluke, and he started spiraling again? What would he do? What could he do? He couldn’t fail his son again, he couldn’t, he wasn’t going to fail as a father—
A foghorn noise snapped Gordon out of the spiraling thoughts that he’d been falling into while putting clothes away. He jumped and turned around to see Joshua, holding his TTS tablet and grinning ear-to-ear.
Ah, yep. He’d forgotten how much his kid loved making that noise.
“Careful with that, Joshie, you startled me,” Gordon said with a smile as he picked Joshua up again and walked out of the bedroom. “Alright, how does mac and cheese sound for lunch?”
“Good!” Joshua replied on the tablet, kicking his feet. “Can I play Mario Kart?”
“Sure, I’ll tell you when the food’s ready. Need help setting it up?”
“No, I know how,” he said as Gordon put him down at the bottom of the stairs.
“Right, you’re a big boy. Alright, have fun and don’t be too loud, mkay?”
Joshua nodded and ran past Benrey on the couch to get to the TV. When he turned around and saw them sitting there, Gordon watched as Joshua picked some more words on his tablet.
“What’s your name?” he asked. Benrey looked surprised. Had they never seen a TTS tablet before?
“Uh, Benrey,” they replied, watching as Joshua typed the name into his tablet.
“Benny!” it said.
“Y-yeah, sure, uh, Benny is good,” Benrey said with a smile that was almost as bright as when Gordon got them their chullo. Fuck. This was adorable.
“Want to play Mario Kart?” he asked, pointing to the controllers with his free hand.
Benrey picked up one of the controllers and nodded. “Sure, uh, you… you got a license for that?”
To Gordon’s—and apparently, Benrey’s—surprise, Joshua nodded. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a little plastic sheriff’s badge, holding it up.
“…Dang,” said Benrey as they leaned in to get a closer look. “Yeah. Looks like you’re a certified Mario Kart, uh, cowboy. Mario Cowboy.”
“Yeehaw!” said the tablet in the robotic voice, and Benrey cackled. Gordon watched as the two of them settled on the couch and started playing before he finally went into the kitchen. He’d been worried—terrified—about how Benrey would interact with Joshua, what they’d do, what they’d say, everything that could possibly go wrong, but… so far, they seemed really good about it. He trusted them.
The thought hit him like a speeding train.
He trusted Benrey. He trusted Benrey. He trusted the person who sold him out to the military, who got his arm cut off, who nearly killed him and who he killed. He trusted Benrey with his own son.
And the worst part was? Making those connections, remembering everything that Benrey had done, what he’d been through, it didn’t make him run back into the living room to get Joshua away. It didn’t make him regret letting them stay. It didn’t make him fear for his son’s safety when Gordon wasn’t looking.
Because he did trust Benrey. He trusted the person who got him through a panic attack, who made him laugh, who helped out around the house and literally lit up with joy whenever he did something nice for them.
Gordon chuckled softly as he pulled a box of macaroni off the shelf. Damn, he really was a bleeding heart, wasn’t he? Maybe that was for the best. After all, it had been nice living with them around for a while. He wasn’t so alone with his thoughts, he had a reason to cook food instead of just eating stale chips and granola bars from the back of the cupboard, he had someone to talk to and someone to sit in silence with when words were too much for them both.
And, apparently, someone to keep Joshie occupied and supervised when he was busy and needed an extra set of eyes and hands. Hey, takes a village, right? Yeah. Yeah, this was nice.
Benrey could not have been more thrilled with Joshua. They had been nervous as all hell to be interacting with a tiny, fragile human, but it was going great so far. They could make him laugh and smile and they had fun together, and with Gordon, too.
Gordon acted different when Joshua was around, and Benrey felt like they were getting to see some secret part of him. It felt special to be able to witness the way he looked at his son like Joshua was the most important thing in the world. And honestly, looking at the kid, Benrey found themself agreeing.
They knew their childhood hadn’t been that great. Pretty terrible, actually, though they tried not to think about it too much. Nothing they could do about it now. But they could make sure that Joshua would be okay. That he’d be happy.
Was this kind of protectiveness how Gordon felt all the time? And it was probably even more, since Joshua was his kid. How did he even deal with all those feelings at once? All the time? And without any sweet voice to even let it out?
Maybe it was a human thing. They must be better at having all those feelings in their bodies and not exploding because of it. Yeah, that would explain it. Benrey just needed some practice.
Gordon found it kind of funny how, just like the way Benrey watched All Dogs Go to Heaven 2 without having seen the first one, one of Joshua’s favorite movies was Toy Story 2 despite never having watched Toy Story in its entirety.
They’d tried, once, but Joshie just said he wanted to watch the one with Jessie and Bullseye, so it was right back to Toy Story 2. Gordon had memorized the plot by now after having watched it at least thirteen times.
And now a fourteenth, as he and Benrey sat on the couch with Joshua in between them, enjoying a chill movie night. Joshua leaned against Gordon’s torso, steadily dozing off as Gordon brushed his hand over the toddler’s hair. The volume on the movie was turned down low enough that he wouldn’t be startled awake—it was past his bedtime, anyways.
Gordon turned to Benrey, about to ask them to go turn the TV off so he could put Joshie to bed, but he stopped himself when he saw the way they were looking at the child asleep between the two of them.
He’d never seen that kind of softness in Benrey’s face before—a faint smile, half-lidded eyes, all filled to the brim with warmth and protectiveness and pride. The shifting light of the TV screen softened the edges to their face and reflected in their eyes, accentuating the contrast between their dark lashes and golden irises.
Gordon didn’t realize he’d been staring until Benrey looked up at him, snapping them both out of their reverie. Shit. Gordon turned away, his cheeks burning, while Benrey swatted away a bubble of pink sweet voice that they’d accidentally sung out.
“So, I, uh—Joshua seems to like you,” Gordon stammered in an attempt to change the subject. Thankfully, Benrey seemed to agree with that conversation topic.
“Yeah, he’s super cool. Fun lil’ dude,” they said with a quiet laugh. “Didn’t expect him to be so tiny, though.”
“I mean, he’s four. He’s still really young.”
“They’re all that tiny?” Benrey looked back down at Joshua, eyes wide. Gordon laughed.
“Yeah, man, most four-year-olds are. He’s almost five, though. Growing fast.” He brushed his hand across Joshua’s cheek. “Feels like just yesterday when he was a newborn.”
There was still a lingering ache, a regret that he didn’t think would ever leave him, from how he’d disappeared from his son’s life in Black Mesa. He’d survived, and he’d come back, but that was time he was never going to get back. He wanted to treasure every moment now.
“How do you deal with it?” Benrey murmured from across the couch. “All the… feelings. I’ve only known him for, like, two days, and I already just…” Their voice trailed off into a quiet string of periwinkle. For some reason, the way the glowing lights drifted across the room reminded Gordon of beaded jewelry.
“I mean, you just kinda get used to it, I guess?” He shrugged. “It is a lot, though. It never really goes away.”
“Never?” Benrey’s eyes were wide as he stared at Gordon. “You just always feel that stuff, all the time?”
“Yeah, pretty much. In the background sometimes, but it’s always a little bit there.”
“…Explains a lot,” Benrey mumbled as they looked away again. “Gonna take some getting used to.”
“Getting used to what?”
“All the stuff. Thoughts and feelings and all those head things and wavy words.” Benrey wiggled their hand around to express whatever point they were trying to get across. “It’s so much.”
“Is it,” Gordon asked, unsure if he was getting close to crossing a boundary, “is it stronger now than it was… before?”
Benrey was quiet. Gordon was about to take back his question, to tell them that they didn’t have to answer if they didn’t want to, when they nodded and spoke up again.
“Yeah,” they whispered, one hand tugging at their other sleeve. “A lot. Kinda felt like, like static or something. Uh, sounded like all the feelings were above water and I couldn’t hear them. I think I tried not to feel, just to… to make it easier.” Their voice was almost inaudible by the end. Little balls of blue-gray sweet voice dripped from their mouth like raindrops.
Blocking out feelings, huh? It certainly explained a few things about the way they’d acted and how much they seemed to regret it all afterwards. The idea of forgiveness floated to the top of Gordon’s mind, but he set it aside. He still didn’t know if he could forgive them for everything that happened, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t both move on and get better.
“I get what you mean,” Gordon said. Benrey glanced over at him and he continued. “Felt kinda similar afterwards. Just tried to forget everything. It didn’t really work. Honestly, I don’t know what would’ve happened if Tommy and Bubby and Coomer hadn’t been there to make sure I didn’t… that I didn’t do anything too stupid.”
Benrey nodded and their grip on their sleeve tightened. Gordon looked them up and down, trying to take note of their body language even though neither speech nor sweet voice left their mouth. It looked like they were trying to shrink into the corner of the couch with how close they were pressed against the armrest and how their grip stretched the fabric of their sleeve taut. Maybe it was time for a change of subject.
“Joshua too,” Gordon added, running his hand through the boy’s hair again. “Felt like I needed to get better for his sake. Be the best I could, make sure he could be happy and safe.”
“Mhm.” Benrey’s hand finally let go of their arm as they looked at Joshua with a gentle smile. “Think I kinda get that. Don’t want anything bad to happen to him. He’s so… fragile.”
There was something about Benrey’s expression that worried Gordon. Not worry as in he was afraid Benrey would hurt Joshua, but worry as in… they seemed really insistent on specifically preventing harm from coming to Joshua because he was young, small, and defenseless.
He wasn’t sure if the questions forming in the back of his mind would be answered in a way that would reassure him, but he was fairly sure that asking them now wouldn’t be a good idea either way. Something was going on under the surface of Benrey’s impassive exterior, and whatever it was, Gordon didn’t think he was prepared. He didn’t think anyone could be prepared. It would come out eventually, inevitably, and he would deal with the fallout when it hit.
But for now, it was quiet and peaceful. The three of them sat blanketed in the darkness that was just bright enough to be comforting instead of unsettling. Joshua was sleeping, Benrey was smiling again, and Gordon tried to cement the serenity of this moment in his memory before it had to end.