Chapter Text
It started off as a joke but now he was addicted - emotionally invested even.
Ramuda and Dice know there's something off about Gentaro, but no matter how much they pester him, he denies everything. They noticed how occasionally he would claim he has business to attend to and that they wouldn’t understand because they aren’t authors like him. He even said how he has a new manager.. ‘Zen’ was it? Dice fell for the lie completely, before Ramuda told him he still felt something off and Dice eventually felt it too. In order to gain more information on what their friend and teammate was hiding from them, Ramuda thought of a plan - a sleepover. Ramuda had unsuccessfully tried to use this trick before, however he was certain it would work this time. He knew Gentaro’s phone password, and he knew Gentaro either went to sleep at around 9PM, unless he was working on a novel, in which case he would take a long nap during the day.
It’s currently 2:30 PM, an hour after the time Ramuda arranged for the sleepover to begin. Dice is literally wolfing down food in the corner of Ramuda’s kitchen and Gentaro is sitting in the seat in front of a kettle watching him with a fond smile, or at least he was before he started… staring down at his phone..? Did something happen? Ramuda doesn’t really understand what's even going on but he sees an opportunity.
“Dice, Gentaro! Would you like some tea? ~ ✰” He doesn’t bother listening to their responses as usual. He took the milk from the fridge and put it on the counter before pulling out 3 cups from the cabinet below. Once he was sure Gentaro wasn’t suspecting anything, he glanced over his shoulder to see what he was so enamoured with.
What…? Someone named ‘Zen’ is flirting with Gentaro…? Or is Zen a secret lover of his? No, that couldn’t be right. Ramuda is sure his teammates were not-so-secretly gay.. If they’re not then why does he feel like a 3rd wheel 70% of the time.
The kettle finished boiling before he realized it. He finished the teas - black tea with 1 sugar for Gentaro, just a glass of milk for Dice, as for himself, he made tea with an atrocious amount of milk and 5 sugars.
As he starts putting in the sugars he feels his friend’s horrified stares burning holes into his back at the amount of sugar he’s putting into his tea before he turns around and hands them their cups with a smile. Gentaro and Dice feel a shiver run up their spines, meanwhile Ramuda just giggles.
Dice obliviously asks Gentaro what he’s doing, to which Gentaro claims he’s just “proof-reading the manuscript” that he has been working on as of late. Ramuda knows he’s bullshitting them both, now he just had to figure out his motive for doing so. If he wants Gentaro to admit it, then he needs irrefutable proof. To be fair, that ‘Zen’s’ flirting is pretty cringe.. Something about unleashing a beast..? Part of Ramuda wished he could find a way to bleach his eyes without causing further damage to them than reading that text did in the first place. It made him partially grateful that Gentaro wasn’t telling them anything after all.
He took a seat at the table and took a board game from the stack he had prepared earlier that day before Gentaro had arrived (Dice was there since he arrived 2 hours earlier than the arranged time to beg Ramuda for food and money after he bet all of his possessions again, thankfully he was wearing clothes this time.)
As he was setting up the board game, Gentaro once again claimed he had something to do and he needed to go somewhere quieter to focus. Ramuda led him to the workshop in his house, a medium-size room with some comfortable chairs, a work desk, piles of horrifically colourful clothes and some mannequins that were adorned with some unfinished pieces that Ramuda was presumably still working on. One of the more masculine mannequins had a wig - it had white hair styled with a rat tail and wore a slightly off-white coat with black buttons. Upon closer inspection, Gentaro thought it looked like someone familiar…
Once Gentaro had settled down at the work desk, Ramuda left him be and returned to the kitchen table to continue setting up the board game for when Gentaro returned.
While Ramuda was finishing up arranging the board game, he noticed Dice looked deep in thought - which was somewhat uncanny.. The expression was a rare one to see on Dice and as a result feels out of place when he does see it once in a blue moon.
After a few minutes, Ramuda decides he doesn’t like it, so he asks Dice what he was thinking about.
“Ramuda… are you okay? I dunno, you look kinda pale.” Ramuda sees this as an opportunity to relay the information he has found so far to Dice.
“Well.. when I made tea earlier, I glanced at Gentaro’s phone to see if I could find anything out about what he’s hiding from us and…”
The text from earlier flashes back into his mind and causes a painful sensation to well up in his head.
“And… I think someone might be hitting on Gentaro.. Ahaha…” Dice feels his eyes widen for a moment.
“Oh…” The room then falls silent save for Ramuda filming some god-awful tiktok first traps in the corner, not realising Dice could be seen in the back of the video while loudly slurping soda.
After about 8 minutes of filming, Ramuda leaves to check on Gentaro to see what is taking him so long. Simultaneously, Gentaro finishes ‘proof-reading the second chapter of his unreleased novel’ (Definitely not a Mystic Messenger chatroom).
They bump into each other just as Gentaro opens the workshop door, so they walk back into the kitchen together for a few rounds of Monopoly, knowing full well Dice would lose every single round.
-☆-
2 hours have passed since their game started. Dice lost within 30 minutes of each round, most recently after having to declare himself bankrupt after landing on Ramuda’s property, Mayfair with a hotel. Currently, he was setting up a pillow fort while waiting for the game to finish, cringing at the amount of sequins and glitter attached to the assortment of DIY cushions Ramuda owned, one even having an embroidery of Barbie on the back. Personally, Dice is more of a Raquelle stan.
Before long, Ramuda wins. (Well, not exactly. Gentaro got bored and forfeited.) By now, it’s 5PM and suddenly, Gentaro’s ringtone echoes throughout the room.
“Please excuse me.” The corners of Gentaro’s mouth downturned into a frown in faux-disappointment for a brief moment before he covered it with his sleeve and looked to the window. “I must be going now, something urgent came up.”
“Awww but that happened last time too.. hmph!~✰”
“I’m sorry, Ramuda. Maybe next time… well, that was a lie. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He smiles.
Gentaro steps outside to take his call, unknowingly being followed. He answered the call with a happy sigh, unaware of a certain someone listening in.
As he steps outside into the cold rain, Gentaro realises he forgot his earphones, but he’s alone so he figures it’d be fine to take the call anyway.
“Hello? Oh, babe. You picked up right away. Were you.. Waiting for my call?” Gentaro giggled at the pet name like a lovesick school girl.
Gentaro continues listening to the voicelines and clicking the dialogue options he thought best.
“Hmmmmmm! … The beast inside of me grew 5% because of that now. If it becomes 100% and breaks through… you have to be responsible for it. Okay?” Pausing for a moment, he blushes at the implications and squeals to himself.
Dice slowly retreats, most likely retaining some permanent psychological damage from what he just witnessed
Carefully sneaking back inside, he makes his way back into the living room.
“Oh! Hey Dice! What’s goin’ on~” Ramuda chimes with a smile before looking up at his friend, noticing his aghast expression.
No response. Now he’s concerned, even more so now at the uncharacteristic lack of response. “Dice…? You good?”
“Oh, hey man..” Dice’s expression finally relaxes, but he still looks as though he just saw a ghost.
The gambler finally walks further into the room, sitting back down into the same seat as earlier, opposite Ramuda.
“I followed Gentaro outside n’ some dude was flirting with him… and… and he fuckin’ squealed. Y’know… like your girlfriends do when you say corny shit like that.” Tears threatened to spill as the memories regurgitated back into his head.
“I-I see… um.” For once, Ramuda was at a loss for words.
Both taking a lollipop from the bowl in the centre of the table, the two continued sitting in silence, not knowing how to continue their conversation.
Gentaro finishes his phone call with Zen but continues standing outside for a moment to calm down. After all, Zen was just so… babygirl.
Now walking back to the living room where he supposes Ramuda and Dice are, Gentaro can’t help but notice it’s awfully quiet. Especially considering how loud they usually are - he’d received several noise complaints over the course of the past month or so because of them and their petty disputes over their prior monopoly games. Were they really just sitting in complete silence..? The author stood outside of the living room door, unable to decipher what was going on and if he really wanted to enter.