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Trust.
Sam looked at his two recently ex -guards, stunned.
They were talking about… Trust .
They don’t “trust” him. Bad and Antfrost didn’t trust him.
Sam was shocked, and put a hand over his mouth as they waited for his response.
But the only sound that could come out was a laughing scoff.
“Sam!” Ant yelled at him. “Do you think this is funny?”
Sam raised his hands and gave them a most genuine concerned look. “Oh no,” he couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of his voice, couldn’t keep the anger rising in his throat. “I don’t think it’s funny at all. Trust is very serious to me.”
“Well, you’re not taking it very seriously,” Bad crossed his arms, pouting . He always acted as the innocent so well when he never had the right. All he had to do was make his eyes go as big and as sad as his dog’s, and everyone would eat it up.
“Oh, trust me, I know exactly how serious of a topic trust is,” Sam sneered. “At least I’m starting to. I guess I didn’t know it well enough, considering everything you two have done. To me, to Tommy, to the whole fucking server.”
“Language-”
“Oh shut the hell up, Bad! Stop acting like you’re so innocent in all of this! Both of you! You want to talk about trust?” Sam leapt over the front desk, sitting on its edge and slamming the stem of his trident on the ground. “You want to criticize me for keeping a few secrets from you? I had every right to not trust you with them.”
“And there he goes again,” Ant scoffed. “Shifting the blame on someone else.” He barely got that sentence out with a straight face. He knew what Sam was going to say, and he already looked guilty.
Sam tried not to let the hurt in his heart show through in the eyes of this body. He spoke as calmly as he could muster, trying to keep the shake from his voice.
“Bad, you’re telling me you’re concerned about “screams”? You were happily doing patrols while working for the Egg when they started. You had months to tell me you had a problem with it,” Bad opened his mouth but Sam stopped him. “Don’t even think you can tell me you were “scared” of what I might have done. You were in the middle of planning that fucking banquet. You didn’t care about what was happening in that cell, you only care about people hurting when it suits your plan to be everyone’s favourite kicked puppy that can do no wrong.”
Bad stuttered, then finally came up with a weak “That- doesn’t mean I can’t care now . We weren’t always sided with the Egg. You’re still wrong here.” He sounded like he barely believed his own words. Sam sighed, another attempt to keep his voice steady. Another attempt that was failing fast.
“I trusted you two. With everything . With this job, with my life . I trusted you two with everything I was, and you two… Just. Threw it away, gave into the Egg so easily . You took my trust and you tried to kill me. You fed me to that thing and you celebrated . You tried to kill Tommy, you knew how much he means to me! Where were you when I was grieving? Were you celebrating his death too?”
Ant flinched. Bad was frozen. He stuttered out “It wasn’t- We were just doing what it said, you realize it was mind controlling us, right? Ant?” Antfrost, at least, wasn’t a total idiot. He looked at the floor, knowing he couldn’t defend himself. Sam shook his head at Bad in disbelief.
“Don’t say that. You don’t get to say that to me.” He could feel it welling up in his throat now. “You don’t get to tell me you weren’t acting on your own when you used my love, all my trust, and you betrayed me again and again, don’t tell me I don’t care about the Badlands when you betrayed it first, I was the one trying to keep us together, I was the one trying to help you! Me !” He couldn’t stop the tears as he stepped down from the desk and grabbed Bad by the shoulders, hoping he could get something across to him. Bad looked like he was about to cry himself.
“And even after betraying me, hurting the people I loved, I still trusted you, I still loved you.” Sam lowered his head, hands still tight on Bad’s shoulders, voice broken. “How could you lecture me about trust when I’ve given you more trust than you both ever deserved? How could you say that was then and this is now, when I still have the scars of what it made me resort to, I still have nightmares about what it did, about what you did? And I still let you both back in here, because I thought once we got rid of that thing I could have my friends back. I thought I could have my family back. But no. I didn’t trust you with all the prison’s secrets. I didn’t trust you with the reasons for my business with Ranboo. Because as much as I wanted to trust you I still couldn’t forget everything you two have put me through. The only thing I could trust was this prison.”
Sam stepped back, catching his breath and letting go of Bad, holding his shaking hands to his own chest. He slumped back against the desk and slowly slid down it until he was on the floor, and they were looking down at him.
“... Sam, I...” Ant began, then trailed off. He didn’t have a thing to say. He sighed. “Bad, let’s just go.”
“What? But-”
“I think,” he interrupted. “We’ve all shared what’s on our minds. We’ve both already resigned. There’s no need to push it further.” Sam looked up at him for a moment. Ant looked like there was a lot more he wanted to say. Sam did too. He wanted to tell those two that it was okay. He wanted to beg them to stay, that they could work it out, that they could all still trust each other even though they didn’t deserve it from each other. He wanted to tell them all of his secrets, about his bodies, his deal with Quackity, every word Dream said to him that made him wake up screaming. He wanted to cry into their arms and tell them just how afraid he was of this place, not of the building but of how dependent he’d become on it. He wanted to tell them how empty he felt, he wanted to tell them he wanted to leave this place behind and burn it to the ground but he didn’t know how, that he didn’t know what he was without Pandora’s Vault, without Dream . And more than anything he wanted to beg them for their help and for their forgiveness and ask them what he needed to do to bring him with them because he would do anything.
But Ant didn’t say anything, and neither did Sam. Ant just looked like he was sorry, and walked into the portal.
He hoped Ant could see he was sorry too.