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Compared to last year's holiday accident of somehow getting wrapped up and suspended from the roof with fairy lights, Shadow really thinks the burn isn't that big of a deal. Regardless, after Red finished checking him over, the others all voted for him to be banished from decorating duty. Dramatic idiots. Now he's stuck “supervising” from the frankly excessive pile of decorative yule pillows that obscure what used to be the couch.
Watching Blue and Green argue about the stockings again, maybe he should be thankful to be avoiding this whole mess. Vio at least keeps shooting him envious looks as he tries to remain looking busy enough that Blue doesn't decide to make him rearrange all the ornaments. Again.
Meanwhile, Red is desperately trying to salvage the remains of the cookies that Shadow risked his hand for. From the muted noises of distress emanating from the kitchen, that's not going too well either. To think his noble sacrifice was all for not.
He's not left to pity himself for very long though before his vision is obscured by some tacky garland being tossed onto his head.
"Hey Rudolph, let's bail while Green has Blue distracted." Vio whispers to him as Shadow wrestles himself free of his new jolly binding.
"Rudolf?" Shadow questions, pouting as he somehow gets his arms tied together.
Vio snickers, "Oh Rudolf, with your burn so bright, lead me to my room tonight?" And then reaches over and frees him from the garland with a single tug. Prick.
"I suppose if you insist, I can be gracious enough to grant you my company tonight." Shadow leaps up from the nest of pillows with his usual level of dramatic flair, which is to say, a lot.
"Oh please, I'm just inviting you because you'll find your way in there at some point regardless." Vio scoffs, but still grabs Shadow's outstretched hand. "This saves me the trouble of having to be woken up by your obnoxious self. Now come on."
And with that, they head to bed.
Or tried to at least. Who knew a recent burn would be just painful enough to keep you awake? Well, Shadow did know this, he's had lots of experiences with burns and every other minor injury you could imagine, (and some major ones too!) but he'd been optimistic. Now he's gonna be stuck here all night unable to sleep. Which usually wouldn't bother him (what can he say he's a creature of the night) , but he's actually excited for tomorrow and would prefer not to sit stewing in said excitement all night.
Last Yule, he'd been bewildered about the whole holiday. He'd only been in the light world for a couple of months at that point– not counting his whole unhinged era of committing atrocities – so when the other four started spouting about an old man breaking into the house, he'd felt concerned. Not too concerned of course, what's some old geezer gonna do against the Heroes of Hyrule after all? But, it still had him questioning the sanity of light worlders in general. This year though, since he knows what to expect, he has been unapologetically sharing his enthusiasm for the holiday with anyone who will listen. After all, if some portly old man wants to come into his house to give him presents, well, who is he to complain!
And with that thought, he is unceremoniously shoved off the bed into the floor.
"If you're gonna keep moving. Go." Vio groans into his pillow. It's pretty hard to make out honestly, Shadow's lucky he's particularly good at Vio speak. And being fluent he takes the warning for what it is rather than face further retribution when the beast actually awakens. Besides, Shadow's more than happy to get out of there and get to plotting some revenge for such subpar treatment.
'Honestly, how unheroic', he mentally tsks as he scurries out of the room. Only to immediately do a double take as he stumbles in on a particularly un-Santa-shaped person stuffing the stockings.
"Green?" Shadow asks, and sure enough, Green turns around and gives him a sleepy grin.
"Oh! Hey Shadow, mind helping me finish this up? I'm ready to get to bed." he asks as he grabs a handful of candy from one of the many half-empty packages Shadow now notices cluttering the coffee table.
"Finish, what exactly? Isn't that Santa's job?" Shadow takes a bewildered step forward as if getting a better look will make this all make sense.
"...You believe in Santa?" Green chuckles as he turns to actually face Shadow, looking like he's waiting for some sort of punch line.
"Believe in- SANTAS NOT REAL?!?" Shadow gapes, hoping for some sort of punch line. Green looks earnest though, and Shadow knows for a fact he has no poker face whatsoever. But maybe he's been working on it, Vio might've been coaching him even. Darkness knows that Vio is the only one of those four who can spin any sort of convincing lie. They've probably been at it for weeks, just to make Shadow look silly so they can all have a good laugh about it in the morning. Santa, not real? As if, who fills all the stockings and delivers gifts if not Santa? He resolutely does not think about the gifts peeking from under the tree, that weren't there before he went to bed, or the half-filled stockings he just saw Green stuffing. ‘Denial’ – a little voice that sounds like Vio whispers, reminding him of that uncomfortable talk about grief from all those months ago.
Thankfully Green interrupts that train of thought, "SHHH! You're gonna wake the whole house!" He looks more concerned about Shadow than that though. Shadow squashes down the niggling little voice that says he deserves to be concerned. Instead, he follows without a fuss as Green pushes him into a seat and steps away to grab something. Hardly a moment later he returns with his offering, a plate of Yule cookies. Specifically the burnt cookies. Shadow hesitates to grab one, but to be honest, had he not literally been involved in the incident he wouldn't immediately notice anything wrong with the treat. Red did a great job on the icing to compensate it seems. Sadly, as he takes a bite, he discovers the icing does little to help with the flavor of charred cookies. Green laughs at his disgusted expression. The audacity.
“It's actually really good if you pull off all the burnt bits.” Green demonstrates this as he finally breaks the silence. He eats his significantly smaller, but also significantly less burnt cookie before continuing. “Now, what's up? Why do you seem so upset?”
Shadow looks at him like he's an idiot, after all, he is an idiot.
“Don't give me that look!” Green chides with fake affront, “Surely you didn't actually believe in Santa, I was there when Vio told you about him last year, and he definitely clarified that Santa was not real.”
And yes, Green had been there. The three of them had been off buying gifts when Vio had given him the rundown on the holiday. Or more accurately, Vio had given him a long-winded lecture about the holiday and its history. Touching on a bazillion niche little details like the symbolism behind the decorations, and the significance of each tradition. Even going over the alleged formation of the holiday and how it tied in with the goddesses. But if anyone actually expected Shadow to retain any of what was said clearly they don't know him well enough.
Don’t be confused, Shadow is a fantastic listener, he's sat for hours listening to Vio go off on tangents, always throwing in the perfect responses when needed, or nodding along when Vio just needs to speak his thoughts aloud without external input. He also listens to Green and Red’s significantly shorter rants. (Blue prefers to talk to Red if he has the need. Shadow is thankful, he loves all of his idiots of course, but it would be weird to hear Blue talk about feelings .) But just because he listens does not mean he retains. Honestly, it's useful, to be able to let long-winded conversations flow in one ear and out the other.
Right now though, he curses his “ gift ”.
Green seems to be thinking along the same lines. “But you knew stuff about Yule after that? Did you just specifically not hear that part?”
“I asked Blue for the clip notes after. How was I supposed to know what was actually important out of that whole verbal brick he dropped?” Shadow paused, “Why, I don't understand? Why do you all act like he's real if he's not? Why do you perform this whole charade–”
“Red.”
“What?”
“We can't just tell Red, Santa isn't real! Can you imagine, he'd be heartbroken. So we all just pretend Santa's real while he's around.” Green clarifies.
“But, how? You and Blue are awful liars.” Shadow asks, still desperately searching for some crack in logic.
“I mean, everyone pretends Santa's real for kids, it's a lot easier having all the details of the ‘lie’ taught to you since you were little. The whole script is already written, no improv needed.” Green has the audacity to shrug.
“But Why? Why do you all lie to children about this, what could you possibly gain?” Shadow is going to strangle him.
“I don't know, it's just like that.” He grins abashedly.
Shadow bends over to bury his face into one of the tacky decorative pillows and screams .
Eventually, after regaining his composure, Shadow stands up. Gripping the pillow aggravated his forgotten burn, the thing that started this whole mess. Shadow holds that hand slightly closer to his chest, “I'm going back to bed” and then he turns around and goes back to bed. Vio can complain as much as he likes.
Vaguely he hears Green before shutting the door, “So I guess that's a no on helping with the stockings?”