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“I ain't too worried about it!” Cuphead shouted as he bolted upright. Ugh, it was that stupid dream again. He hoped the dreams would’ve stopped after that whole sweater thing, but ever since he lost it the dreams have been back and stronger than ever. He knew that he had made the devil mad, and he would probably be coming for his soul any day now. He had no idea if everyday would be his last.
“What aren't you worried about Cuphead?” Someone asked. Cuphead froze. That wasn’t Mugman’s voice. That was…..
“Elder Kettle!” Cuphead shouted. “Nothing! Nothing’s wrong! It’s just a bad dream, that’s all!” Elder Kettle gave him a concerned look.
“Are you sure? You’ve been having them a lot more lately. Is everything alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine! Everything’s fine! You know me! Just have an active imagination, heh heh.” Cuphead said, a nervous smile on his face. Elder Kettle looked unconvinced. Maybe he would’ve believed that if Cuphead didn’t look like he was sweating bullets. Mugman noticed his brother struggling and jumped in to help.
“Don’t worry Elder Kettle, I’ll calm him down.” Mugman cut in. “I’m pretty sure I know what’s bugging him.”
“Well, ok, if you’re sure.” Elder Kettle said hesitantly. He did want to help, but maybe it would be better if Mugman handled it? He knew that he could get Cuphead to confide in things better than he could. Besides, if it was serious they would tell him, right?
“I’m sure, now go get some rest.” Mugman said, practically shooing him out. He gave Cuphead one more concerned look before leaving and closing the door to their bedroom.
“Thanks for covering for me Mugsy. That was a close call.” He heard Cuphead say right after he closed the door. Elder Kettle hesitated, should he be listening to this? Nobody liked a busybody, and he did just learn a lesson about how the things he hears could be taken out of context. But he couldn’t help himself, he had to know what was wrong.
“Cuphead, you can’t go on like this forever, you’re going to have to tell him eventually.” Mugman said on the other side of the door.
“No way. Do you know how grounded I would be? I’m taking this to my grave.”
“Cuphead, “your grave” is exactly what we’re trying to prevent here! Maybe he can help!” Oh boy, that didn’t sound good. Was Cuphead in some sort of danger? Maybe it was an exaggeration, Elder Kettle thought, it just had to be.
“Look, it’s been a couple weeks since the sweater incident and The Devil hasn’t come back yet! Maybe he forgot all about me!” Elder Kettle slapped his hand over his mouth to stop himself from gasping. The Devil? How on earth did Cuphead get mixed up with that guy? Part of him wanted to bust in there and demand Cuphead tell him everything that’s going on, but he stopped himself and just kept listening.
“Do you really think that he’s just going to forget the fact that you owe him your soul?” Owes him his soul?! Elder Kettle couldn’t help himself, he let out a large gasp, his kettle whistling throughout. There was silence on the other side of the door.
“....Do you think he heard us?” Cuphead asked after a beat.
“Oh. he definitely heard us.” Mugman confirmed. Cuphead sighed.
“Elder Kettle, we know you’re there. You can come in now.” he said. Elder Kettle opened the door to find an extremely guilty looking Cuphead and Mugman. Well, this is definitely not how they wanted Elder Kettle to find out, his worried looking expression was already causing the guilt to pour over them. They were going to be in so much trouble.
“Cuphead? Is this true? Do you really owe The Devil your soul?” Elder Kettle asked worriedly. Cuphead nodded, a few tears escaping from his eyes. Fear struck Elder Kettle’s heart. This couldn’t be happening. Cuphead, his Cuphead, couldn’t be in the clutches of The Devil. Not his boy, not his creative, curious, wonderful boy. This was so much worse than when he thought they were gonna kill him. He at least had lived a long life. Cuphead….he was still so young. He knew he could get into trouble sometimes, but how did something like this even happen?! Cuphead looked at his caretaker’s terrified face and let out some more tears.
“I’m so sorry Elder Kettle! I didn’t mean to! It was an accident! We were going to get more supplies for the fence, but I got distracted by a carnival and Mugsy tried to warn me but I didn’t listen and ....”
“It’s my fault too Elder Kettle.” Mugman added. “I caused him to miss the shot on the soul ball machine! If I hadn’t done that maybe he would’ve…”
“And I didn’t know the carnival was evil when I went there!”
“The Devil showed up and I was just so scared that…”
“Boys! Boys!” Elder Kettle interrupted. “One at a time, please! Now just tell me what happened, from the beginning.”
“Ok…” Cuphead replied. And they did just that. They told him everything about the carnival, the soul ball machine, Quadratus, the sweater, everything . Elder Kettle was shocked by what he heard but tried to keep calm for his boys’ sake. “....and now I don’t know when he’s going to come back, or what I’m going to do when he does. I’ve been having nightmares about it for weeks. I’m basically as good as dead!” Cuphead finished. Despite the fear in his tone, there was a bit of relief mixed in as well. As terrifying as this was, he had to admit, it was nice to have an adult know what was going on, and one he trusted at that. Although he was still worried that Elder Kettle was going to ground him for a millennium after hearing all this.
“Cuphead…” Elder Kettle started. He wanted to reassure him, but what could he say? This was way bigger than anything they’d had to deal with before. To be honest, he was impressed that Cuphead had already managed to get away from The Devil twice.
“No, you’re not.” Mugman told him. “Just like you said earlier, I’ll be there to protect you. And I’m sure Elder Kettle will too now that he knows what’s going on.”
“Of course I will.” Elder Kettle said. “I have some books on magic around the house. I’ll look through those for a solution. If there’s nothing there, I’ll check the library. There’s got to be another way to protect you besides the sweater.” Cuphead wiped some tears from his eyes and went over to hug Elder Kettle.
“Thank you.” He whispered. Mugman joined in the hug and Elder Kettle reciprocated, making it a group hug. He held onto his boys tightly, not wanting to let go. Now that he knew about the danger they were in, he didn’t know how much time he had left with them. No, he couldn’t think like that. There had to be a way to get Cuphead out of this, there just had to be. If there was any way to protect his boys he would find it. He couldn’t lose them now.