Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first night of the server, they’d slept in sundry places, except for Etoiles and Baghera. The two of them stayed up with Pierre, talking with the others, in Etoiles’ mind keeping watch, while Antoine and Kameto slept on a floor in the favela. Pierre, meanwhile, had a long catnap while they started building, so he wasn’t the worst off.

Etoiles is not tired. There’s too much to do and think about. A guy in a pac-man shirt gives him diamond armor. There are mobs to fight. He’s a fighter!

None of them remember much about their lives before the island. None of the residents seem to think that’s odd. Etoiles isn’t bothered, he’s just delighted to find out that he’s good at something. He has to catch up, and to deal with the ward forced upon him. Whatever he had made of himself must be set aside for the time being.

At least he came with friends. Twice in the first day, he says something and catches Antoine staring, eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “What’s up?” he asks.

Antoine shrugs. He cracks a joke. His jokes are good.

By the end of the second day, Baghera looks tired, she’s pushing them to put down beds somewhere, please, it doesn’t matter, it’s night now, their egg’s asleep, there’s no reason for them to suffer too.

Etoiles is not tired. He helps gather wool because everyone else is tired, and he admits the argument for sleeping is good, but he’s not tired. He feels bad, the kind of slowness and thought-looping that it seems like waking might fix, but he has no real urge to go to bed either.

Once they’ve assembled five beds between the five of them, they stand in their tiny dirt hut and debate placement.

“Etoiles won’t sleep unless one of us holds him down,” Antoine announces to everyone. “So we may as well put at least two together.”

What? Etoiles thinks. Then he thinks some more and has not-quite-a-memory but some flash of oh, shit, he’s not wrong. He can’t sleep in unfamiliar places. Not without a kind of deep compression that blankets alone can’t muster. He’s never been able to. 

“Etoiles is a grown man,” Baghera objects playfully, as Etoiles collects himself. Did he remember the diabetes but forget the sleep disorder? That’s crazy! (He’s pretty sure that once he knows a place, and if it’s dark and quiet and such, he’ll manage, but he can’t have traveled alone much.)

(He likes Antoine. He trusts him. They were traveling together. Hmm.)

“I know!” Antoine is saying. “He is so bad at doing regular things like being asleep. You’d think he would have learned by now.”

“Hey!” Etoiles objects. He doesn’t have much to say other than that, but he is right here and he wants it noted.

“Poor guy,” Baghera shakes her head. “Are you volunteering, Antoine?”

“Well, I don’t mind.” He winks at Etoiles.

“Maybe we should put all the beds together like in Willy Wonka,” Kameto suggests.

Baghera nods. “What a good idea. Pierre and Antoine can be the grandpas.”

“They were all grandpas!” Pierre complains. “You little shit.”

Five beds in a row. It’s probably not a permanent arrangement, and it’s perhaps a little weird. They giggle while they set it up. But when they lay down, Antoine shuffles up to Etoiles and flops three-quarters over him, and Etoiles’ brain thinks FINALLY and goes quiet. He sleeps through that first night without issue.

Pierre is unstoppable. Every morning, he goes down to the floor of the slime chunk he’s pinpointed and teaches the residents to secrete insulin. After that he climbs back to the surface and builds for the rest of the day. He already has most of a miniaturized refinery put together for when the slimes matriculate. 

He apologizes to Etoiles, sadly, that it’ll take a couple more days than expected because of the shortage of natural blazes. “Blaze burners are the best way to make brass,” he says. “It will take longer to smelt than I thought. Can you hold on maybe four more days with whatever you have before I have a supply going?” 

“Nooo problem,” says Etoiles, who spawned in with a full stack and is honestly blown away that he had the luck to crash-land alongside a premier chemical engineer. “If I die, I die.”

Antoine elbows him, hard.

“...But I will not die.”

“Very good,” says Pierre. Upward and onward. 

Already, he’s papered the floor in designs for his next and best project, a dirt-production machine for Antoine. There’s a lot of possible designs. Some are more efficient, some are funner. He wanted to nail the pharmaceutical still, of course, but he can be creative with this one.

The rest of them are draped around their little house. They have scant furniture – beds (one of which Kameto is asleep in), the nice sofa that Baghera is laying on, and the crafting table covered with a square of carpet that Antoine is sitting cross-legged atop, which could generously be described as a chair and accurately be described as a metaphor for their existence on the island right now. And the four of them are enjoying amuse-gueule from a backpack of assorted foodstuffs that one of the eggs dropped off. (Bebou’s egg, Baghera is pretty sure, the one with the nice hat.) The backpack came with a whole swathe of produce, sweets, stuffed peppers, cheese and meats. Pomme had left the produce and eaten most of the pie, but she’s asleep now and the adults are enjoying the rest of the harvest, especially the assortment of beverages. They don’t have farms yet. They haven’t needed them. Everyone’s been so generous.

“Foolish was very friendly even when we invaded his build and demanded development rights in it,” Antoine points out, chewing down spears of roast asparagus centimeter-by-centimeter. “Very friendly. Isn’t he married, though?”

“Could be an open marriage,” Pierre notes, not looking up from his work. His wineglass is set out of his eyeshot but certainly not abandoned. “I have a feeling.”

“I think everyone except for the Brazillians is married by the government,” Baghera says. “But mostly they do seem, uh, not bound by that.”

“That’s true. I don’t think they’re necessarily marriages so much as partnerships. I think the specifics vary.”

“That’s a good way of putting it,” Baghera agrees.

“So who is Foolish married to?” Etoiles asks. He’s sitting on the floor like Pierre, and using a small toolset to adjust a piece of slime armor, forged from the rejects of Pierre’s training program. He’s never worked with slime plating before and the tools have a habit of bouncing off. But that’s a good sign, for armor.

“I thought it was one of the anime guys we haven’t seen in a while,” says Antoine. “But maybe it’s Bebou.”

“No, no, Bebou has his own kid.”

“Lot of single parents,” Pierre notes.

“Options, options!” Baghera sighs. “At least you have them. There’s only one other woman on this island and she dates nobody.”

Lying on the couch, Baghera holds a part-full wineglass precariously in one hand, and swirls it, even more precariously.

“Awww, no, Baghs,” says Antoine. “Are you sure? Maybe she only said that to the men.”

“No, no, I asked, it’s nobody at all. Good for her but very unfortunate for me.”

“You asked her?” Etoiles laughs.

“No! I asked Maxo.” Baghera pulls her knees to her chest, laughing. “Oh god, can you imagine. ‘Hello, I hear you are uninterested but maybe I’m different?’ That’s something Pierre would do.”

“Probably,” Pierre agrees amiably.

“Well, shame that you’re out of luck,” Antoine says.

“Ehh. It’s fine. I will have so many bros. And at least I can be up in everyone else’s business.”

“Maybe a dirigible will crash next month or something and it’ll be full of queer women,” Antoine suggests. “Just for you.”

“I can dream!”

“But they’ll all speak Turkish or something,” Etoiles adds.

“How dare you think that’ll stop me.” Baghera drains her glass. “I’ll learn, I’ll adapt, I’ll grow!”

Antoine rolls his eyes.

“Yeah! Whoo!” Etoiles pumps the air and cheers. “I believe in you, Baghera!”

“Thank you, Etoiles.”

Kameto leaves. They never see a death message. Either he’s left the server somehow or he’s still out there somewhere.

Etoiles helps haul machinery for Pierre, crawls in holes to adjust pieces when Pierre doesn’t feel like it. Baghera has a hundred plans and likes company. Antoine does too. He’ll tell Etoiles to come over and bring him resources or rub his shoulders at the end of the day, and Etoiles never says no to him.

Pierre and Baghera whisper to each other about them. They find Antoine lounging with his head in Etoiles’ lap, below the ledge where a grassy knoll meets an in-process terraforming project, as Etoiles explains something about enchantments.

Baghera is too polite to interrupt him but not polite enough to pretend to care. “Are you two married?” she asks, when he finishes a sentence.

“No,” Etoiles says, confused.

“Yes,” Antoine says, matter-of-fact.

Etoiles looks at him, wide-eyed, and then stares off at the horizon. Baghera claps her hands over her beak. This is better than she thought.

“Antoine,” Etoiles says, “Do you know something I don’t?”

“It will be four years next month. We have two children. I thought you were planning the anniversary? You're not?”

Baghera and Pierre snicker. If Etoiles relaxes at all upon knowing that it was a joke, it’s hard to tell. 

He does laugh, though. “I can’t be married to you. I am married to darkness. And the grind.”

“AND the grind?” Pierre asks, smirking. “Busy boy.”

“I'm so busy,” Etoiles agrees. 

Pomme scrawls a sign that reads <PAPA NO!!!!> but it goes ignored.

“Am I your sidepiece, then, Etoiles?” Antoine asks.

“Yes.” Etoiles strokes his cheek. He stretches his other arm out for Pomme. “Pomme! Do you know what the best armor is? I have a theory, I am cooking, do you want to help?”

Pomme bounces. She likes to be useful. She writes on a sign: <i could take notes !>

“Pomme! You are the best.” Etoiles beams. She settles beside him and starts picking out a good journal for the task.

“You are a more patient person than I am,” Antoine tells Pomme, compassionately. “This will come in handy all your life.”

Etoiles pats his brow. “Shut the fuck up.”

Pomme’s first totem is golden, clutched in her little hands. She holds it like a little doll. 

(She had cooed over the totem at first. It was shiny! It had a face and emerald eyes! 

“Be careful!” Etoiles had told her. “Sometimes these things can explode.”

“But they explode to protect you if you need it,” Baghera had reassured her. “It won’t hurt you.”

Pomme looked concerned. <I won’t let it break>, she’d written. < <3 i like it! :D>

“No no,” the three of them, Baghera and Etoiles and Pierre, had cut in. “If it breaks, we will get you another. It’s for keeping you safe.”

Pomme had frowned, but slipped the golden idol into her breast pocket anyhow.)

After a minute, she shifts the totem to her right hand, uses it to prop up her journal, and holds a feather quill with her other hand.

“You’re a lefty!” Pierre observes, as he stretches canvas over sticks for windmill blades. “I hadn’t noticed that before.” 

She’s let them look at her journals. The writing is good but a little smeary, and this explains it. Maybe Pierre can make a faster-drying ink for her.

Pomme looks up, nods, then stares at her hands, then at Pierre’s, noticing which hand is anchoring the material and which hand does the lashing. After a minute, she hops up to show Pierre a page of her book.

<That’s different, right?? I don’t remember learning to write>

“Ah,” says Pierre, “It’s a little uncommon but not so much. …I don’t remember learning how to write either, if that helps. I mean I think it took time and I went to school, but most of us did learn when we were very small, and it’s hard to remember much from that age, so that makes sense.”

Pomme frowns and closes the book, squeezing its spine in her hands.

“There’s not much more worth remembering from school anyhow,” Pierre adds. “So whether you went or didn’t, I don’t think you’re missing much. We’re all together here now.”

Pomme maybe looks vaguely reassured at that. She lets Pierre work, and when he’s got the whole blade finished, he wipes his brow and looks up to find another sign waiting. 

<I think that’s part of why I like to write everything down. to remember. it’s not impolite is it?>

Pierre reads it aloud. “Oh, not at all,” he answers. “No, it’s very Etoiles-like to do something else while you talk with someone, or like me for that matter – when I talk he pays attention and when neither of us talk it’s probably that we’re paying attention to something else, so it’s all fine. You go ahead, Pomme. Do you like to write too, on top of wanting to remember?”

Pomme nods.

“Well then, I like that you like it! Keep practicing. It’s a way of being an artist. Diarists are very important for having an account of history. So you can help all of us. Or you can just tell lies in there and that will be even funnier, especially if you don’t tell us.”

Pomme laughs at that, silently. 

<that is called FICTION and I will write it in DIFFERENT BOOKS than my DIARIES>

<I have STANDARDS>

“Ah, whatever you like, daughter. If you like I'll make you a paper farm after this one. Well… the XP farm first, that’s too useful to put off. But after that, I can do paper. You will never run out.”

Pomme sits up. <You’d do that? O:>

“Of course! Pomme, listen to me. All of your parents are good at different things. If you ask me to fight a big demon – well if I had to I certainly would, but just for fun I wouldn’t do it. But Etoiles would in a heartbeat. He’d be so glad you asked. Baghera will get you anything. And me, I like machines. I made a machine for Etoiles first because he really needed it but I’m making this machine now for Antoine because he’s lazy and I want to support him in that. You want paper? You will have paper. It’ll be good for villagers too… In fact, if you want a printing press, I’d just need to get cows, and maybe…”

<:O :O :O Thank you papa!! <3 <3 >

<Maybe mama can get the sugarcane for it?>

“Well, you’re welcome, dear. You should know – ” he leans in. “A sugarcane farm is really easy, too. That’s the easiest part. All of it is witchcraft to the others. But you shouldn’t tell anyone which things are easy or not. It’ll ruin my mystique.”

Pomme nods, kicking her legs. She salutes him, giggling.

Pierre salutes back. Pomme picks up her pen and starts writing in her book again. He grins at her. He probably would fight a demon for her, come to think of it, if she wanted it. She probably wouldn’t ask, but if she did, he wouldn’t have any other choice.

After the worst day on Quesadilla Island so far, the five of them stay together and take stock.

Etoiles is the best off. He had finally warped in for the third code attack, he’d killed ghosts and ghouls en masse and felt alive about it and is still vibrating in the aftermath. 

Pierre and Baghera had been close enough to the code to feel the crackling distorted-reality of its surface; they’d fought it, a little. Pierre described it as a “classically trained” swordsman, which raises more questions than it answers, but it at least wasn’t a god-tier classically trained swordsman.

Pomme had not died, but she’d blown through half a dozen totems in very short order. She is glittering with small gold sparks. They keep distracting her, as does everything else. She hugs tight to at least one of her parents at all times. If she squeezes one of them and closes her eyes, she can barely see the sparks, and she can pretend none of this happened. She’s not sure how much of this to write down. Maybe if this day isn’t recorded in her diaries, it’ll be forgotten completely. She thinks that might be alright.

Antoine had actually been downed. He’s not a fighter and had not lasted long. The moment after Fit hauled him back up, he stumbled to the NINHO, warped into the saferoom, tried to figure out the redstone, and then ignored it and grabbed the stasis pearl with his hands. Pomme exploded into them, legs pumping mid-sprint, and he pulled her from the water. Then they huddled together on the bed until the pandemonium quieted and the sky cleared. Of the four adults, he’d fought the least, but he looks the worst off. An unwelcome brush with death is rough for anyone.

Ask yourself: What do you do, in the aftermath of the near-assassination of a daughter? Assume her direct safety and comfort is assured, or as assured as it can be. In fact she’s drawing and listening to Otherside out of Pierre’s backpack speaker right now. What is the only thing you can do? Every action aside from one would feel like a cardinal sin right now; tired as you are, scared and angry and sad as you are, what’s left to do? 

Answer: You try to understand what happened, in painstaking detail. You’re raw and stupid with burnt-up adrenaline and perhaps you get irritated and fight with your friends about it, about the trivialities. But you try anyway, because you can’t let this happen again, and this is all you care about. Establishing a timeline. Who stood where. The exact mechanics of a camera and a redstone circuit that didn’t fire. A passing comment in the aftermath. Put it all on the table.

“I just don’t like the way Forever is acting,” Antoine confesses, finally, to the others. 

Baghera doesn’t like what he’s been saying up til now and she likes this even less. 

“What bugs me, I don’t know why he was changing the camera for the stasis right then,” says Pierre. “What I saw before was good, so why would you change it at that exact moment?”

“Yeah,” Antoine says. “And right before the second attack, it’s almost like he was distracting us – ”

“Antoine,” Baghera says, “The code probably waited until we were distracted the second time. Forever was trying to help.”

“Well, I don’t know that he was doing it on purpose, but he did go distracting us when we needed to fight.”

“It was not Forever. Look, I know him, it was not Forever.”

“What do you mean, you know him?” Antoine is deeply dubious of this line of reasoning. “You’ve hung out with him, Baghera. You don’t know him.”

“What does that mean?”

“Well, maybe Antoine’s a little dramatic, but I do wonder what all that with Richarlyson was,” Aypierre adds. “I don’t know what’s going on there, but Cellbit doesn’t think Forever’s a fit parent.”

Baghera sighs. “I don’t understand myself, alright? Forever says one thing but Cellbit says another. And they get the Federation involved – it’s a mess. I’m worried, alright? But today when the code came, Forever showed up and even Cellbit showed up too. What do you want if not that?”

“I want to know what they’re up to,” says Aypierre. 

Baghera sighs. She and Antoine frown at each other.

“Hmm, I don’t think we have a choice,” Etoiles pipes up. He’s been thinking, and he’s rocking on the balls of his feet. “I mean, that was a lot of enemies. Maybe we don’t know that Forever was telling the truth, but Pomme would have died without NINHO, so I think we have to trust him. She lived because everyone else came to the fight, and BadBoy killed the code with an iron golem, and we couldn’t have saved her on our own, so we don’t have a choice. We must trust them.”

Neither Baghera nor Antoine love that phrasing. Now they’re both frowning at Etoiles. (Which is, in Etoiles’ book, an improvement on frowning at each other.)

“Etoiles,” says Antoine, and he’s keeping himself civil but he’s frustrated. “There were other people there – Forever could have been putting on a show. And look, you could have killed the Code too. We don’t need Bebou.”

“Okay, but I wasn’t there, and Bebou was, and so was Forever and everyone else. So I think we need to trust them.”

God, and Etoiles doesn’t even seem unhappy about that.  

Worse, Antoine can’t argue with his reasoning.

It’s a very, very, very long day.

Hours later, still rattled, Antoine leaves the house in the last hour of any light and climbs up to the top of his towers to stew. Etoiles gives him half an hour of privacy and then grappling-hooks up the southwest tower after him.

“What are you doing here?” Antoine asks. If it was something urgent, Etoiles would have messaged him.

“What are the top of these going to look like?” Etoiles asks, ignoring him.

Antoine shrugs. “I want something in the center. I don’t know what yet.”

“More dirt,” Etoiles suggests.

“It’s not out of the question. …How is Pomme?”

“Still good. Pierre is looking after her. Baghera went to go – uh, to go discuss with some people.”

“...Right. Etoiles, do you think I’m being paranoid? Not about the code, I mean, I think I'm being the right amount of paranoid about that – about having to rely on the others.” He gestures all around them.

“Oh, I mean, what are they going to do? Well, they could hurt Pomme. But look, that’s what I mean, they are not going to. We saw that.”

“Etoiles, they might not hurt her, but Foolish and Forever have been at each other’s throats, Forever and Quackity did try to kill eggs once, Cellbit wants to kill the bear. They could hurt you. Don’t you think you matter?”

“No. If they can hurt me they deserve to.”

“Okay, okay, cut that out – ”

“Antoine, Antoine,” Etoiles says. “Do you think they will be able to hurt me?”

“...Ah.”

Etoiles laughs. Antoine doesn’t.

“So it’s that easy for you? You can’t be hurt so you don’t need to worry.”

“Yes,” Etoiles says. “Why would I worry for me? I mean, I worry for Pomme. And I worry for the other eggs, who cannot even die once. And for you all, I suppose, but you can come back, so it’s less bad.”

“Ah. You live a charmed life.”

“Not really. I do have a darkness.”

“Ah right. Sorry, I forgot.”

“It’s okay. I’m sorry for you, though. I could teach you how to fight.”

Antoine has a nagging sense that this offer has been made many times before, even beyond the limited horizons of his memory. “And how long do you think I would have to train before I could hold my own against the code?”

“...A long time. But still – ”

“Nahhhh,” says Antoine, waving an arm. “When danger calls I think I’ll run the other way.”

Etoiles nods, thoughtfully. “I see. Understandable. But that sounds like a shitty way to live, I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry for – don’t be sorry for me, aw, come on!”

“Why not? It's shitty. I hear you and Baghera, I get it, I might worry if I were you. But don’t worry. I am here for you. Here. Take this.” He holds out a leg of Antoine’s own baked chicken. 

Antoine sighs. He leans over and pulls a piece off the bone with his teeth, messily, out of Etoiles’ hand. “Thanks,” he deadpans, mouth full.

Privately, Etoiles observes that he is forced to trust Antoine exactly the same way they’re forced to trust the islanders. He has no interest in ever denying Antoine tools or armor or minerals or anything at all, because Antoine gets him to sleep, and without that, he would surely die. There’s no stress to it. Etoiles is secure in mutual debt with him.

He kisses Antoine’s cheek, then leans his head on his shoulder. “I miss Kameto,” he says after a while.

“I miss Kameto too.”

Meanwhile, Aypierre and Pomme look through spyglasses from the top of the northwest tower. Pomme has pointed her spyglass distinctly away from their initial targets, at some trees on the horizon, out of embarrassment.

“Aha,” says Pierre, “Public displays of affection. You see Pomme, although the kind of love people are interested in vary, nobody is truly immune to it – ”

Ever-diligent, Pomme checks to make sure there’s water below before she shoves Pierre off the edge of the tower.

Chapter Text

This is not a boring island. 

Cellbit, the loudmouth with the intense gaze who’d warned them the day of their arrival not to trust the Federation and then joined it, has apparently been kidnapped. Baghera wondered if he was actually working for them and this was perhaps, like, an onboarding session. 

All of Cellbit’s friends – the Brazilians and Roier and Jaiden – are very very concerned. (Forever was out of his mind with rage. But he’s made his apologies and the hot hot rage has been replaced by a steelier, chillier, different rage. Honestly, Baghera finds him very easy to trust based on this.) And that means something, but of course if Cellbit really had gone really gone to the Federation after causing all that ruckus about them, he wouldn’t want to admit it to his family.

Fortunately, for days now, Baghera has been out getting the lay of the social landscape. Cellbit’s enigmas are famous but there was an independent group of investigators, headed by Badboyhalo and Maximus, who predated him. They are more cautious and have more context, and they’re worried too. So she is forced to consider seriously that Cellbit might really be in trouble.

A day goes by and it’s hard to know how much closer they are. Baghera has called in Pierre, and Pierre thinks he can get into one of the protected buildings. He’s dropped his current work and is plotting with Mike and Pac to assemble a powerful drill. 

While they’re working, everyone else is yelling. Forever looks like he has a secret but doesn’t want to say it to a group – Baghera thinks he might tell her if she asks later, but she won’t press it. At some point in the night, Maximus and Badboyhalo slip away into a corner of the Favela. After ten minutes, she follows them to see what they’ll talk about. 

But it turns out – and Baghera is chagrined she didn’t expect this – they just want a break. They’re nice, though. They wave her over when they see her. Bebou pours her a couple fingers of rum.

“Are you holding up alright?” Maximus asks. “There’s a lot of shit going down.”

“Yeah, I had to take a second, it was getting loud – everyone’s so upset, and I mean, it makes sense, it makes sense. How are you doing?” She asks both of them.

Bad and Maxo look at each other. “Good,” says Bad.

“Good,” says Maxo. “I hope we get to blow something up.”

Bad nods in agreement.

“Something like… from the Federation?” Baghera asks.

“Yes," Maxo intones. "We’ve been here before. The fighting, the strategizing. But I think we might really be able to show them a lesson this time.”

“We know who the enemy is now,” says Bad, his voice bright and cheery despite what he’s saying. “Like, for sure. That’s new.”

“Has – hm. How do I say this? I’m just curious, I should be clear.”

“Go on,” says Maxo, obligingly. He sways a little as he leans in, Baghera realizes, he’s already rather deep in his cups – he must have started during the discussion earlier. “I believe you.”

“Has the Federation always been the enemy?”

“I mean, yes,” says Bebou, just as Maxo says, “Well, no.”

“Of course it is,” Bad argues. “Who else?”

Maxo hmms. “Well, parents were at fault sometimes, or it was chance, or – but it does come back to…”

“That’s fair,” says Bad. “But I sort of think that if they haven’t engineered everything, they let it happen?”

“Bad, you are so wise.” Maxo takes a drink in his honor.

Baghera nods thoughtfully. Maximus turns to her.

“You have to be careful around the Federation,” he tells her. He enunciates slowly: “They are very powerful.”

Baghera nods. “They screwed you over, didn’t they?” She knows about Trump, she knows a little about the broken computer he was attached to. She doesn’t know how much of them were lost by chance or bad judgment versus sinister meddling, but she assumes that he has some cause for personal beef.

Maximus covers his face and slowly, miserably nods. “Thank god I have SOFIA back. I – I don’t – The eggs – you don’t know what those first weeks were like. We barely met the eggs and we, we had nothing. But of course that’s no excuse. Trump, my beautiful sweet baby, Trump – ” He starts rifling through his things.

“I’ve seen pictures of him,” Baghera adds, in case that inspires Maxo not to bother searching through his entire inventory for photos. He isn’t dissuaded, though. “He seemed lovely. I really like his hat.”

She points at one, of an alligator biting Maximus, mid-strike. Trump’s name is embossed along the edge of the photo. Bad coos at it. Baghera joins in.

“He took this?” she asks. “Did he like animals?”

Maximus looks at the photo, and sniffles. “Not really. I mean, as much as any kid. He thought it was really funny when something attacked me, though.”

Baghera nods sympathetically. Pomme is fearful, as far as kids go, but she knows they come in all kinds.

“And here’s – ” Maxo finds another, just a photo of the same little egg in front of a little starter house. She can’t guess the context but it strikes a nerve and Maxo’s whole shoulders start to quiver.

Bad seems to recognize this one and his expression tightens. “Hey,” he says, patting Maxo’s back, “Hey, hey, you don’t have to talk about it.”

Maxo starts to cry.

“Oh no,” she and Bad say at the same time, and go in to soothe him, but Maxo pushes Bad away and shakes his head.

“Baghera,” Maxo says – a little garbled but slowly enough to be heard – “the Federation could have brought him back and they didn’t. I screwed up with Trump. I was the worst parent in the universe. He didn’t even last two weeks. I admit that. Sometimes I think I should let the alligators eat me up. But after he died, the, the Federation let me say goodbye. Do you hear me? They let me say goodbye.”

“I hear you,” says Baghera. “Like with Bobby?”

“ Just like with Bobby. I know, I know. You were there. It seemed nice, right? It seemed like a nice thing to do, to say goodbye to your kid?”

Baghera nods, slowly. “Yes, I guess it did.”

“Then – why didn’t they bring them back?”

“I don’t know,” says Baghera. “Why would they do it otherwise? Maybe they couldn’t bring him back for long. I think that’s what they said…”

Maxo shakes his head. “That doesn’t make sense. Listen. I’m telling you. There’s no way code should work like that. There’s no reason you’re more drawn to death than anyone else. There’s no rule or setting for having only one life. The Federation is killing them.”

“I – I don’t know.”

“Bagh – Baghera, please trust me.”

“Maximus, I can’t give you my trust when you don’t even have all the evidence yourself,” Baghera says, and then feels a little bad for saying it. “...But I am listening to you. I promise. I am thinking it all over. But isn’t… If it’s what you say, aren’t they not letting them come back at the worst? Not killing them. …I mean, it’s still awful, I just mean…”

“When did you first die on the island?”

“What?”

“When was your first death, when did you respawn for the first time? How long did it take?”

“...The first day.”

“If I trip and fall,” says Maxo, “And you shoot me with a gun, then you have killed me. You did not finish the job, no justice was performed. The two things are not the same.”

Baghera shuts up on that topic. She doesn’t have anything to say in response to that. Maximus wipes his eyes and grimly slams the rest of his drink.

“What do you think, Bebou?” Baghera asks. “About the federation being able to let the eggs come back and they don’t do it?”

“I’ve thought about it,” says Badboyhalo. “A lot. I think Max is probably right. They might be pulling a muffin on us.”

That was not what Baghera expected to hear. Firstly, because it’s a deeply weird sentence to hear in any situation, let alone regarding the death of children. 

Second, because she had thought Maxo was drunk and vitriolic, not making things up but – perhaps exaggerating. But Bad’s not tilted and seems curious, confident. The world expands a little. It’s colder and more frightening.

Bad, meanwhile, seems to be marinating something. He sits up. “I want to talk to Forever,” he says. He’s finished his glass but he’s not drunk, or at least, he doesn’t look it. He looks very serious again.

“I… will stay right here,” declares Maximus, who is heaped up on the table.

Bad looks at Maxo and his sharp gaze softens. “...Actually, first, do you want to help me get Max home first?”

Baghera considers herself rather fortunate to have such practical and compassionate people on her side.

Pierre and Baghera went out to go fuck up the Federation. They spent some days planning sedition and then end up breaking Cellbit out of prison.

It’s cool, to be honest. Even Antoine has to admit it’s really cool. He’s a little worried about Pomme, because Pierre and Baghera did their best to keep her and even her other parents out of it, but there’s still only person you’d take it out on if you really wanted to punish either of them. But all of the Brazilians were involved and Richarlyson hasn’t seen any blowback yet. 

And anyhow, being tortured and kidnapped and taken away is exactly the kind of thing that Antoine worries about. Saving someone from that is some real hero shit. 

Etoiles has been out grinding dungeons day and night. Everyone else has been too tired or distracted to stop him. Pierre has been recovering and is planning something big, bigger than all his machines thus far.

“I think he wants an industrial district,” Baghera speculates. “So he can expand and build really big and noisy stuff that looks like shit without offending our sensibilities.”

"I could build him some nice boxes to cover them with," Antoine muses. "I think that's within my skillset."

"Yeah, and I'm sure he'd love his machines covered in shit, aesthetically, but the lag."

"Oh, the lag, right."

They’re coming back from harvesting flax, sweaty arms full of bundles and scythes used for what scythes are supposed to be used for. They haven’t talked much since their fight, or since Baghera was off on her hero arc, but they’re adults and there’s work to be done. Thank god they've finished just before the full heat of the afternoon.

“Hey, about Forever,” Baghera says, out of the blue.

“Yeah?” says Antoine. He figures he owes her this.

“What you need to know about Forever,” says Baghera, “Is that he was devastated when Bobby died. He was so sad, sadder than you can believe. He built NINHO the day after. Pomme’s enderpearl chamber was the first one he built, before the other eggs, because he knew we would need the most help. So that is part of what makes me trust him.”

“...I’m sorry for what I’m about to ask, but how do you know he was so sad? We were all sad, it makes sense, a kid died.”

“Because I hung out with him and Bebou just after NINHO. Even then, he was thinking of Bobby. Badboyhalo and I hung out with him and it came up and he tried to hide it but he was devastated, he was a wreck, it was like his own child died.”

“...Okay.” Antoine sighs. He’s not even going to bring up the matter of Cellbit yet, though it seems Baghera still has her doubts there too. “Yeah, okay, thank you for telling me.”

“Yeaaah.” Baghera shrugs, making her backpack shift. “Well, you’re very private, I just want you to know what I know.”

They walk in silence for a while.

“And… how is Forever doing now?”

“He’s better.” Baghera sounds relieved but doesn’t smile. “Bobby was the last egg to die. We move on, I guess.”

“Shit, Baghs.”

“Yeah.”

“...Sorry I didn’t go with you for the rescue mission. It was the right thing to do. I’m glad you did that.”

“You didn’t know about it!”

“Well, yeah, but there was a reason for that, right? I get it.” 

“No, no, uhh, you – ah, how do I say this? You weren’t supposed to know. We wanted you and Etoiles to be able to take care of Pomme when we were doing it, and in case things went really south.”

“...Ohhh. That makes sense. …I’ll be honest, I’m not sure I would have gone anyway, it’s just – well, you were right.”

“'Baghera, you was right!’ I’m framing this.”

“All I’m saying is you made a good call! I don’t trust everyone, so if you were going to do that but needed to not tell someone – yeah. It makes sense.”

“Aw, the good moment is over. Balance has been restored.”

“Wait, no, I was complimenting you.”

“Antoine." Baghera stares at him. "Tell me you don’t really think I trust everyone.”

“Well, no. I’m being a troll, of course.”

“Of course. ...Pomme wasn’t too scared, was she?”

Speaking of Etoiles, they arrive back at the house when he already wasn’t asleep and still manage to wake him up. “Are you wearing your armor in bed?” Baghera asks, aghast.

“It’s nice,” Etoiles informs her.

“Take it off,” Antoine says, offended.

“Nooo.”

But Antoine simply won’t allow this kind of thing. He sits on the bed and starts pulling at the straps, although he doesn’t know 100% where all of them are, so eventually he pokes Etoiles under it until Etoiles magics it away, grumbling. “Well, I’m awake now,” he says blearily, sitting up. “Are you happy?”

“Absolutely not! You were up for days. Go back to sleep.”

“It’s daytime, though!”

“You should have thought of that before being up for days.”

“You treat him like an egg,” Baghera laughs.

“Well, it may seem funny... Because it is. It is really funny. But he is so bad at going to sleep. We must be kind to him. You know minmaxing?” Antoine starts to kick off his shoes. “ – You don’t mind, do you, if we talk in here? Duty calls.”

“Oh, not at all,” says Baghera.

“You want me to sleep while you have a conversation right here?” Etoiles complains.

“Don’t worry.” Atoine pats his head. He starts tucking the sheet around Etoiles, who feels rather dumb. “You’ll be out like a light. Baghera, do you mind giving me a hand?”

“What do you need?”

“Well, if you just sit by the bed we won’t need to talk so loud. But if you want to sit on him or whatever, like, I guess the goal is kind of to squish him, that’s even better.”

Baghera is quite amused by this. “You want me to sit on you, Etoiles?”

“If you like.” Etoiles yawns. “But what were you saying about minmaxing?”

“Not to you,” says Antoine, but continues anyway, to Baghera. “That’s right, he’s a minmaxer. He knows how to fight so good he never learned to sleep.” Antoine lies down and fully spoons Etoiles, wrapping around him like a koala. Etoiles blinks. His eyes unfocus. Yeah, okay, Antoine knows what he’s doing.

Baghera approaches curiously, surveys the situation. She sits on the edge of the bed, then scoots up to Etoiles’ chest and sits there, on bent knees so that her leg and the weight of her body presses into him. Her knee comes up to his collarbones. And she can see Antoine’s face pretty well from this angle, good for conversation. “Squish him, yeah? Like this?”

Antoine checks where she is, and checks Etoiles’ expression. “Perfect,” he declares.

It’s not instant, perhaps because Baghera and Antoine keep talking. Etoiles could not recount at swordpoint a single thing they said. But he drifts, vaguely conscious of his friends’ voices, their timbres, the way Baghera’s leg shifts slightly when she gestures, because of course it moves through his chest. 

“You trust him,” Baghera says.

“I trust him asleep.”

“Oh, I think you trust him pretty far when he’s awake too.”

“Mm, well, I suppose I do. Don’t you?”

“Well, of course. But I trust everyone.”

“I didn’t mean that.”

“Are you sure? You said it.” 

Daylight filters blearily through the curtains. Etoiles drops into a trance, and then from the trance, finally, into sleep.

Baghera stretches her wings outside of the confines of the French chunk more and more these days. Much of it is, in fact (as Antoine suspects), with Badboyhalo and Forever. Forever’s so relaxed now that he and Cellbit are on good terms again; it reminds her why she was so irritated by him and why she liked him so much in the first place. And Badboyhalo is who he always is, which is to say, great. He and Forever are a riot. She spends a whole day with them. Their kids get tired; Baghera sends Pomme off with Pierre.

“Do you need to go?” Forever asks, looking at the time. “It’s late, I, I would feel really bad if we kept you from your family...”

“They’ll last without me! I want to keep hanging out.”

Forever and Badboyhalo cheer, immediately. They really like her, Baghera thinks, amazed. They’ve let her in. She wants to get whatever joy she can out of it.

“This has been really nice,” she tells them, an hour later, to really make sure they know it. “I think I want to… to spend more time here, or like, not with them, even.”

“Yeah?” says Bad.

“Yeah, I mean, I like the others, they are my family I guess – I care for them – but they’re so shy, and they want to look out for themselves, and they’re not interested in codes, and… and I like you guys too, okay? I feel different around you. I don't know.”

“Awww, she likes us,” says Forever. 

“Awww," Bebou agrees.

Baghera feels very warm. “It’s a little tough because – well, the Theory stuff, it’s not, like, relaxing. And it spills over. But I’d rather do hard things sometimes than never. It means it’s worth doing. You know what I mean?”

“For sure,” says Bebou.

“...Yeah,” says Forever, softly. He spends just a moment staring at Bad's face in profile. Bad doesn’t notice, but Baghera does, and she rolls her eyes fondly. 

“What you were saying about feeling different, I get that,” says Bad. “Sometimes you need to be in new situations. Or like, around people other than the ones you're normally around. I think that's healthy.”

“Exactly. It’s like it lets you be different yourself.”

“But I like who you are now,” Forever objects.

“But that’s what I mean! You only know who I am around you.”

“Hmmm, I don’t know about that,” says Forever, tilting his head. “I think you must be just as funny, and smart, and thoughtful, and kind of a goof when you’re just around Pomme, or anyone else, too. I think that would be hard to hide. What do you think, Bad?”

“Well, I know what you mean, I think – but yeah, no, I think Baghera must always be the best.”

“Stop it!” says Baghera, flustered. "Why are you being nice to me?"

“What,” says Forever, grinning, “You don’t believe it?”

“You’re just – no – ” 

Forever sits up, affecting moral fortitude. “You want to silence me for speaking the truth?”

Baghera shoves Forever. Forever shoves back. Baghera shoves back, and shakes his shoulders. Forever makes comedic whiplash noises, and reaches up, to retaliate –

Bad nobly throws himself between them. “Guys! We were having a nice time, no fighting, no fighting.”

Baghera feels some unknown unhappy emotion flicker and she’s curious about it. It’s like, let us fight, Bebou! Maybe Bebou thinks he’s doing this out of chivalry. Or maybe he’s jealous. That’s better in some way, if it’s not just because she’s the odd one out, but still, not a lot better.

But she doesn’t so much mind extricating herself from Bebou either -

“Shakira Shakira,” Forever sings, unbothered. He goes for Bad instead, grabbing him around the ribs. Ah. Yes. There it is. Well. Baghera can't be surprised.

Bad flops against him. “I got you!” Forever triumphs.

“I mean, if this is what it takes,” says Bad, thinking fast, “for you to not fight Baghera – ”

That’s so transparently nothing that Baghera snorts. Also, she started it. That little discontent in her wiggles and grows, cold and a little bitter, even though she likes them, likes them both. She does not approve of this feeling. It’s irrational.

“Aw… Fine, I’ll take my punishment,” says Forever, and hugs Bad to him as he slumps down – making noises of protest but clearly not trying to escape. Forever kisses the hooded top of his head and he squeaks.

“Should I go?” Baghera asks. She says it lightly, humorous, watching them together and – well, she knows that Badboyhalo and Forever have a reputation. It’s endearing as anything and part of her is elated to be watching this – Badboyhalo lounging in Forever’s lap, grinning up at him. Are they hoping she’ll leave them to do, you know, couple things? It’s just – did they forget she was here?  Fuck.

“No!” both Bebou and Forever yell at once.

“What? Why?” says Forever, at the same time Bebou says “No, no, I’m sorry, we didn’t mean – ”

Forever scoots away so fast that Bebou’s head drops to the floor. “We can stop, if that’s, uh – ”

“Ow,” says Badboyhalo.

“Oh, no,” says Baghera, giggling a little, as the feeling twists inside her. “You don’t have to stop, I just mean – that wasn’t, ah, you know, a prelude to anything…?”

“I mean...” says Forever, and Bad says, “No! You should stay. We’ll stop doing that if you want, you’re more important anyhow – ”

“You don’t have to stop,” says Baghera, settling down again, smiling more freely now.

“You know, you can join us if you want, Baghera,” Forever tells her.

Baghera’s eyebrows shoot up.

“Why look so surprised? Nothing we haven’t done before.” Forever drags Bad back towards his lap, and Bad sputters but lets him. It’s true. They’ve cuddled before, her and Bad, her and Forever. It’s just nice to do sometimes, with people you like. But not, like, as the three of them. Should that make a difference? What’s changed? She can’t put her finger on it.

Forever tilts his head at his side; Bebou gives her luminous puppy-dog eyes. 

Baghera scoots close. She leans against Forever and puts her head on his shoulder. 

Forever coos at her. “Isn’t that nice?” he asks.

It is. It is nice. A minute later, Bebou’s ink-black hand reaches up and scratches the top of her head. Very gently, so light it almost tickles. “A little harder,” says Baghera.

Bebou obliges. He gets to the roots of the feathers. She shivers and hums. That is nice.

Here’s how they end up: Baghera nuzzling into Forever’s bare shoulder, Bad’s hands scratching all around her head, neck, trailing down her back, twitching when it tickles, humming when it’s good. She’s sensitive all over, she hasn’t been touched like this in a very long time. Meanwhile Bebou is part on-her, grinning up, and part on Forever, and they’re bantering, sedately, no shouts erupting. Sometimes they banter about her, but nothing so barbed it breaks the warm and fuzzy sensation running all through her. The two of them are slowing down too. Perhaps the warmth and fuzz is contagious.

Forever leans into her, cheek to cheek; she likes that too. “You want to kiss?” he asks, lowly. His voice sounds punch-drunk, fond, and just a little nervous.

“Hm!” Baghera considers this. “How?”

“How do you mean?” Forever laughs, and then reassesses. “Oh. Hm.”

“Well, you can kiss me,” says Baghera.

He does. He presses his lips to the edge of her beak, sweet, and looks up to her to see what she thinks.

She bites back a giggle. “Now I will kiss you back,” she tells him. Staring deeply into his eyes, she gently clamps his lips between the tips of her beak. 

Forever lasts a deranged moment before he pulls back and bursts out laughing, and so does Baghera. Bad, who had looked stricken and shocked before, explodes into roaring laughter too, loudest and hardest.

He slaps the floor. “What was that?” he cries.

“I don’t know! I don’t think I can kiss people.”

“You don’t know?” Forever asks. “Baghera, you never tried kissing someone before?”

“I have no idea!” She flops over Forever’s shoulder so neither of them can look at her. “I don’t remember! How would I know!”

“Oh! Well, you should have said something.”

“Like what? I didn’t want to ruin the moment!”

“Oh my goodness,” says Bad, whose brain is melting.

“Look,” says Baghera, “try, like – ” She sits up, pulls Forever’s head in, and presses the side of her face into his.

“Ooh, soft,” Forever says, appreciatively, nuzzling into her down. She feels the ridge of his eye, and her beak brushes his ear. His lips press into her face, near the hinge of her beak. If they did this a lot, she thinks, she'd probably be able tell when he was smiling. It changes something in the jaw, right? His hand has at some point gone to her side, and it’s slipping up her ribs.

“You can do more,” she tells him. “If you want.”

Forever pauses, and then his hand slides up to hold her breast. Baghera makes a pleased little noise and nips at his ear.

She takes a moment to look down, and sees the demon in her lap shocked, silent, fanged mouth ajar. It makes her giggle. She leans down and rubs up against his face too. Just for a moment, to see if he likes it.

He opens and closes his mouth a little. The only sound that makes it out is a soft, thoughtful “oh!” He wriggles and props himself up a little for a better angle, reaching up to caress the side of her face. He likes it, Baghera thinks, satisfied. Forever squeezes her. She giggles again.

Forever pulls her closer to him. With the other, he plays with Bad’s foot, hanging off his lap; it makes Bad squirm (adorable) and Forever laughs at it (twice adorable.) “I didn’t know you liked that kind of thing, Baghera,” says Bebou.

“I didn’t know either!” she admits.

“And what do you think now?” Forever asks.

“I think it’s nice!” Baghera sobers herself and sits up. “But you know – listen, we are serious investigators.”

“Right.” Bad and Forever both look slightly crestfallen but try to politely stuff it away.

“...So maybe we should try some more to be sure?”

Bad and Forever brighten instantly. No one person should have this much power. 

Baghera looks at them and laughs and laughs, until they break down and laugh with her.

It turns out that feeling out of your element can feel exactly as good as feeling at home.

“How’s the Ordo Theoritas going?” Antoine asks Baghera the next day.

“Oh, pretty good. We went investigating yesterday. We found the train tracks that the first batch, the English and Spanish, came in on. There’s obsidian on the far side. It looks like there was a nether portal once. Bad and Forever and I did some brainstorming in the evening.” 

“Mm. Interesting. …Bad had never gone that way before?”

“I suppose not.”

“Hmm.”

“...It was a long way to go, to be fair.”

“It took us less than two weeks to go back to the plane.”

“Yeah, but the plane was right in the wall.”

“Well, still, he’s been here for months before we were…”

“Antoine, be nice.”

“Listen, all I’m saying is it seems a little sloppy for an investigator. You’d do better.”

Baghera smiles thinly. She does not look nearly so pleased as he thinks she should be.

“Look," she says, "Antoine, you’re suspicious, okay? It makes sense. There’s weird shit going on. You have questions. So you don’t trust anyone and you don’t make friends and you isolate yourself. Okay. Fine. I’ve had questions too. I've had nothing but questions from from the first day. So I asked around and I got to know people, and I found out a bunch of them had questions too, so I made friends with them, and – and now I know a lot more."

“Baghs – ”

“Look, you’re not wrong to not trust people. I’ve been duped by some of it. Okay? I’m probably wrong about something even now. But I’ve gone and seen enough with my own eyes, and people show me things – I know so many more true things because of it than things I’m wrong about. You don’t have to believe what I believe, but my god Antoine, you should take me seriously.”

Antoine’s eyes widen. They stare at each other for a while.

“Shit, Baghs!”

Baghera smiles a little, suddenly self-conscious, and looks to the side. She shrugs. But she doesn’t back down.

“...I have friends,” Antoine insists, inanely.

Baghera smiles politely at him. “Do you maybe have three friends?”

Ouch. “I… I like Maximus.”

“Oh, good, so do I! But do you and him, like, hang out?”

“Well, I mean…”

“Antoine!”

“...Does Kameto count?”

“No.”

“Well, okay, Baghera! Okay, point taken. ...Your strategy is good."

"Thank you," says Baghera. She throws her arms up.

Antoine has the good grace not to try and step in it right away. After a minute, they both chuckle a little.

After another minute, Antoine says: "… I’m not trying to be unhappy. I’m not Etoiles about it.”

“Okay. Skill issue.”

“What the fuck!”

“I’m just saying. You could try harder to be happy too. Go looking for it. I don't know.”

“Baghera,” Antoine asks, “Are you going to start an advice business any time soon? I’m just asking.”

“There’s no market. There’s already a psychologist on the island.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes. He’s not very good, to be honest.”

“Ah. Best not look there, then.”

“No, I think not.”

Pierre has simple pleasures – he likes fast engines, funny pictures, sick beats, and men respawning in his bed. He collects them, even. This island’s easy. Even Antoine is known to indulge him. (Etoiles is not so interested in having sex with Pierre, and Pierre likes his space when he actually sleeps, and on top of everything else his bedroom is a little loud – so Etoiles is happy to help in his factories or with Pomme, but he warps back to the French chunk at the end of the day.)

Baghera seems more joyful these days. She seems busier, too, with plans and responsibilities. Pierre wonders what her strategy is.

Actually, on second thought, he doesn’t need to embarrass himself by asking. Her strategy is probably that she goes out and talks to people – she doesn’t just build things and wait for people to come asking to use them. That’s been working out pretty good for Pierre so far, but he’s already built most of the machines he’s allowed to. So maybe it's time to diversify. Maybe she can be his guide in this too.

“Baghera,” he says to her, one day as she peruses his log varieties, “I think I should get more friends other than just French and Swiss people. Do you have any suggestions for me?”

Baghera considers this, then remembers something and says “Oh!” and nods rapidly. “You should hang out with Maxo. He's my friend. You know Maximus?”

“I do. I was hoping maybe you’d hook me up with the good parties or something. ...But don’t get me wrong, I’m listening.”

“Well, Maxo’s lovely. I think he would love to hang with you more. He would love it. He would be elated.” Baghera glances about and lowers her voice. “...Although, as your friend, I should tell you that I think he mostly wants to, uh, you know, hang out with you so that you’ll give him things.”

Pierre considers that. "Well, I'm a generous man," he decides.

Baghera grins. “I thought you might be open to that.”

Go looking for happiness if you need to, Baghera had advised. Not that Antoine believes it’s that easy, but she seems to be doing something right.

He stands at the foot of vast towers of compost. He likes his walls, the scale of it, the nascent pond blooming with duckweed at the bottom. Maybe he does want to keep doing this. But it is missing something. He’s been pondering it for a while now.

“I,” he says to himself, willing his future into existence, “Am going to build a goddamn planet up there.”

The four of them settle down, more or less, except for how they don’t really, and things on the island never totally settle down. Whatever cursed thing Etoiles and Antoine have remains rather singular, but when Antoine's out, if it's Etoiles and Baghera up late at the house, sometimes she’ll sit on him or wedge up next to him and his entire body and mind settles and resigns itself to its fate. Antoine takes to rolling him in a linen sheet like a burrito and that’s even better. But then on top of that, Antoine hugs him or lays on him and – yeah. Somehow he gets enough sleep. That's his victory.

So there’s really no reason for him to rush on building his cave. He doesn’t rush, but he does build anyhow. He wants somewhere to brew potions en masse and keep his things and show off his collections. And he may as well add a bedroom at that point, too. Sometimes his social battery is so low just from a busy day that even tired and cut up he’d rather stay out all night than go home and deal with other people, even his best friends. And that’s no way for a warrior to keep himself in top shape. 

Antoine and Baghera and Pomme team up to declare that Etoiles can’t just sleep in a random sandstone hole, either. It must be a living space.

Finally the interior of Etoiles’ dungeon is finished enough that Antoine declares it habitable. Etoiles has placed a double bed, rather pre-emptively, in the hidden nook under the stairs. It’s not impossible to spawntrap – maybe he’ll do it better one day – but he doesn’t exactly have enemies coming to his house. (Yet! One day it'll happen. Hopefully soon.)

“My god,” says Antoine, appraising it like an auditor. “You even put in carpet!”

“I wanted a homey touch,” Etoiles explains. The beds are next to a crafting table and the furnaces. It was less of an afterthought than it looked like – he didn’t want to have to move it later – but he must admit it looks temporary. It isn’t. He wants his own house.

“Maybe I'll build you some furniture.”

“If you want.”

“Wait, watch this.” Antoine kneels and whips items out of his backpack – block of dirt, sapling, hunk of leaves. In short order he has speed-grafted a respectable decorative bush. He looks up at Etoiles.

Etoiles examines the plant, then looks at it in its surroundings. The dirt is ugly. A few trapdoors can fix that. The position isn’t in his way, though. It won’t drop leaves where he’ll sleep. It’s acceptable. “Very pretty, thank you,” he says gravely.

“And Pomme can make you some artwork too, I’m sure.”

“You know, I thought this build was nice enough as it is. I mean, okay, it’s a start, but look at the floor, it’s nice, I smelted all this quartz for the walls, look, here are my potions – ”

“You already showed me your potions. Look, Etoiles, it looks nice. It does look a little like you’re living in a luxury car store. But only a little, and it is, to be fair, a really nice luxury car store. I’m proud of you.”

“Oh god, I live in a car store. You’re right, I’m dumb, it’s a goofy build – ”

Etoiles’s doing it in jest, but Antoine shoves him anyhow, hard, to cut that off before it gets too far. Then he sits on the floor in the bedroom doorway, both so Etoiles can’t shove him back, and because Etoiles has reached the point in his evening routine that consists of emptying his inventory and honing tools and filling furnaces and various pointless chores. The man runs like clockwork.

“It looks cool, okay, man?” Antoine waits for Etoiles to wind himself down. “It took you long enough to build anything at all, anyhow. Were you too worried you’d miss me?”

“Pfft. I won’t miss you.”

“I worry you’ll miss me when I’m not here. You could have moved in with me. I offered you one of the Shit Towers.”

“Nah, I wanted my own place. Like – I don’t know. I don’t want to need someone always around, just to sleep or live somewhere.”

“Ahh, you want a divorce. I get it. You want to take another lover.”

“No! I don’t know. I’m married to darkness, so I must live in a cave. Even if it’s an open marriage.”

“I can’t believe I’m divorced now. This is terrible.”

“And hey,” Etoiles continues sorting chests, ignoring him, “okay, if I lived in the Shit Towers, and I did bring someone over, it would be weird – like, oh hey you are here in my bud’s house and then here is my bud, he is here too, is that okay?”

“You really want to date some of these weirdos?”

“Oh, like we are so normal.”

“They’re strangers.”

“They were strangers. I think we’ll be here for a while,” says Etoiles. Then, thinking, he frowns. “Yeah, okay, so what if I do?”

“Well, that’s fine, that’s fine, I’m just surprised.”

“I’m kind of a hot commodity. I don’t know if you heard – ”

“Oh, I hear! I hear, alright!”

Etoiles laughs. Having finished his tasks, he finally starts changing into pajamas. His visitor doesn’t bother looking away.

“You could keep your eye out too. I mean, who’s going to stop you? Our demanding tour schedule? Pierre? Me?” Etoiles bats his eyes.

The thing is, Etoiles does not remember much before the island. Antoine won’t say anything definitive, but Etoiles doesn’t think he does either.

Etoiles is not especially bothered by it. He doesn’t burn with the need for a concrete answer. To him, Antoine’s lie about them being touring DJs is as good as anything for filling in the gaps.

“Mm,” Antoine hums, dubious. “Maybe. I don’t think it’s likely. … You should do what you like, though.”

“Okay, do you hear yourself? That’s why it’d be weird if I just lived in your house.”

“Would that be that weird? Well, we’d put some more beds in, somewhere else, for guests. Or you bring your parade of gentlemen home and I’ll just hide in the shower. It’ll be normal.”

“Your towers are, like, a hundred blocks away. That’s basically what this is now. You don’t even have to hide in the shower.”

“Hmm,” says Antoine, mollified. “I guess that’s alright, then.”

Etoiles has finished changing and now he’s sitting on the edge of the bed. He looks a little lost. Endeared, Antoine kisses him. Then he pushes him down, arranges pillows, and then lies himself down on Etoiles’ satined chest. He listens to Etoiles sigh, low and relaxed. Like clockwork, the man operates.

Etoiles knows his brain is shutting off but there’s a thought he must grasp before he succumbs. “It’s okay if you miss me too, you know,” he tells Antoine. His words are slow and muddled. “It’s a hundred blocks. Maybe two hundred. You can just message me.”

There’s a pause, and then Antoine chuckles, just a couple times, moving little ripples through Etoiles’ ribs. “You’re such a romantic. Go to sleep.”

Fair enough. Etoiles goes.