Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"I-I don't know what's happening, I can't- I can't see anything- I can't see anything, guys, help, guys-"

"I did it- guys, I made it!"

"Guys- guys! The door! The door is moving, it's the way out! It's the way out!"

"No, no! No!"

"Ranboo, the button! The button! Ranboo!"

"The audience..."

"Has voted..."

"For you..."

...

"...Ranboo?"

~

Connecting to the server...

Logging in...

Encrypting...

Joining world...

A fresh coffee still steaming on the side of the desk, and a couple cans of energy drinks behind it. Hands hovering over keyboard and mouse, eyes on the screen. Chunk by chunk loaded the QSMP.

[+] Quackity

He wasn't planning on streaming today, and there weren't any big lore events going on as far as he knew, but sometimes it was good to just log into the server and check what was going on. Knowing the people on this server, it was probably something he would regret getting involved in.

Not many people would be online right now as it was night or morning for most of them, and knowing the state of some people's sleep schedules there wasn't a chance anyone was getting up to stream in the morning. Except maybe Phil, but he knew Phil avoided lore like the plague, so talking to a recent escapee of the Federation with amnesia might not be high on his priorities for an early bird stream.

He decided it was probably a good idea to check who was online. If there happened to be anyone who wasn't streaming then maybe he could just have a chill talk without needing to stay in character. As much as he loved playing a character, he was in the mood to just relax today.

Relax? On the QSMP? He should've known his plan was doomed from the start.

His first thought upon seeing the player list was wow, that was a lot of players. Whose party had he not been invited to? He was thinking of the best ways to crash an event when he read the names and stopped.

Wait a second.

□ Quackity 📶
□ Austinshow 📶
□ Cellbit 📶
□ Crankgameplays 📶
□ Hetch 📶
□ Itsvalkyrae 📶
□ Jaidenhere 📶
□ Jermabot 📶
□ Nihachu 📶
□ QNPC01 📶
□ Ranboo 📶
□ Slimecicle 📶
□ Sneegsnag 📶
□ Sykkuno 📶
□ Vinnyvinesauce 📶
□ ERROR_INVALID_USER 📶

What the fuck.

Quackity » hey guys can u tell me before doing weird events like this idk if this is in good taste
Cellbit » omg he can speak
Quackity » check online users cellbit
Cellbit » wtf

He definitely hadn't been told this was happening, because he knew he would've said no. It had been months since his friends and other streamers disappeared on the same day and mass impersonating them on a Minecraft server didn't seem the most respectful way to treat the situation.

This really wasn't how he wanted to start the day, but he wasn't going to just ignore this and let someone go live while the impersonators were online. He was the owner of the server, after all.

He sighed and typed a new message after getting no response from the last one.

Quackity » can one of the admins tp me to where everyone is or smth
Quackity » nobody go live while i sort this out pls
Jaidenhere » can I help or anything?
Quackity » ill handle it

Quackity tapped his desk for a few minutes and when he still got no response he checked his map. It looked like most of them were at spawn, with a few icons scattered further around the map. Guess it was time to head to spawn, then.

He warped over as fast as he could and spotted the crowd in the distance. Jeez, they'd all copied their Minecraft skins too. What the hell were they trying to do?

He got closer and began to hear the typical chaos of a dozen voices speaking over each other, and it was difficult to pick out any individual voices. But was that..? No, he was hearing things, that couldn't have been-

"I'll fucking KILL you, you MOTHERFUCKER-!"

"Austin, shit, hold on! V-Vinny, give me a hand!"

"Where the hell-?"

"Ranboo! Ranboo, wake up, please! Come on, come on!"

This- this wasn't happening. No, this didn't make any sense.

Was it voice emulators? Now this was really starting to piss him off. Pretending to be his missing friends was one thing, but copying their voices for what, a prank? He'd had enough.

"Hey! HEY! Assholes, shut the fuck up! What the hell do you think you're fucking doing?!" Quackity yelled into his microphone, knowing that often didn't do much to make your voice stand out in game but it seemed to do the trick.

The players turned to face him- well, most of them. Some were still yelling at each other, and a few were kneeling and lying on the floor for some reason. At least he knew they'd heard him.

"Right, who fucking organised this? You need to tell me about this shit before you just go and do it, idiots! What was this gonna be, a memorial? I can't believe not one of you realised how fucking stupid this idea was!"

He hated to get mad at his own admins, but one of them was getting consequences for this. Seriously, how could you gather this many players and not one of them realises how disrespectful it is to impersonate missing people?

"Who the hell are you?"

The voice was shockingly similar to Sneeg's. Quackity found it hard to believe that AI was really that good at copying voices in real time.

"Oh, don't play these fucking games now that you're in trouble, asshole," Quackity laughed but his voice was threatening, "I wanna know who organised this, and then I want all of you to log off before someone goes live while you're all here. I dunno if you thought this was gonna make people happy but I'm pretty sure you're just gonna be opening old wounds for a lot of people, and I'm not letting that happen on my watch."

There was no response besides the Austin impersonator, who continued yelling a colourful variety of death threats and insults at someone whose username was...Hetch? Who the fuck was that meant to be?

"Nobody? Alright, fine, we're doing this the hard way, then," Quackity threw his hands up even though nobody could see him do that through the monitor and was getting ready to go into the detailed user information when a robotic voice jumpscared him.

"Good morning."

He spun his mouse rapidly to see the white bear standing right behind him, "gh- fuck, Cucurucho! This isn't the time!"

The bear threw a book at him and he really wasn't in the mood to play along but he opened it on the chance that there was some kind of explanation inside.

NEW MEMBERS HAVE ARRIVED

"New- what? Were you behind this?" Quackity groaned and ran a hand over his face before leaning forward in his chair again.

"Whatever, can you tell these assholes to log off already? This is not the way to treat a missing persons case, if that wasn't completely fucking obvious."

Another book was thrown onto the ground and popped into his inventory. He didn't bother to open this one.

"Just turn your mic on, I don't have time for this. None of us are streaming right now," at the mention of streaming he heard some weird muttering from behind him, but decided to ignore it.

Cucurucho remained silent. He groaned and opened the book.

NOT MISSING ANYMORE

"Wh- what? What the fuck are you on about? I'm not here to fucking joke around!" Quackity swivelled his mouse between Cucurucho and the crowd looking at him. Austin was still yelling, he'd decided to just turn his mic down in the settings at this point, and...was Vinny holding him back, or something? That was a weird emote. He didn't remember installing that one.

Another book. This was getting ridiculous.

THESE ARE YOUR FRIENDS. WE BROUGHT THEM BACK

"Wait, wait, hold on, you're expecting me to believe...what? A dozen of my friends disappear for months without any news, and then when they get back the first thing they do is log onto fucking Minecraft? Jesus, are you fucking brain-dead?" Quackity laughed but it was clearly not a friendly laugh, it was harsh and hateful. This was getting more disrespectful by the second, and he was getting pretty damn pissed.

"Quackity..?" a voice from the crowd quietly asked, sounding a lot like Valkyrae.

"What?" he asked, not bothering to sound any less angry than he was.

"Oh, no, I just- the text above your head, I was reading it, I...is that your name?" the Valkyrae impersonator asked. Deep breaths, Quackity. It's a Minecraft server. No need to get this angry on a Minecraft server.

"Yes. That's my name. What's yours?" Quackity asked with a nice-sounding voice that was sickeningly sarcastic.

"Oh- I'm Valky- uh, wait...Valkyrae..? Yeah, I think," she replied happily.

Deep breaths. Deep breaths.

No, fuck it. If these assholes were so happy to impersonate his missing friends then he was perfectly within his right to be absolutely fucking pissed.

"Listen here, smartass, I don't know what kind of brick hit you over the head to make you think this was in any way a good idea but I'll hit you with it again and fucking finish you off if you don't quit this act right fucking now and stop trying to impersonate my fucking friends!"

He hoped the message had gotten through their thick skulls so that all the spit on his microphone wasn't for nothing.

"...impersonate?" came the voice of Nihachu.

Quackity would've completely exploded if there weren't a message in chat to distract him.

Cellbit » u sure u dont want us to help out

He stared at the message in chat for a solid five seconds before replying.

Quackity » i doubt u can but if u wanna try then be my fucking guest

Cellbit didn't say anything else and Quackity could only assume he was on his way, maybe bringing Jaiden too if they were together. He doubted it would make a difference with how stubborn these assholes were.

"Cucurucho if you're not gonna do anything then can you at least give me admin so I can kick these guys," he tried to keep his voice calm and ended up sounding exhausted, which wasn't exactly false.

After a moment he saw the message pop up in chat, and he was thankful that he hadn't just been ignored or handed another fucking book. Before this got any worse he typed the command into chat.

Quackity » /ban Nihachu
Your Command Cannot Be Completed Due To An Error

What? He'd never seen that error message before.

He tried again, only to get the same result. Before he tried a third time he could hear some more familiar voices approaching, and thankfully these ones weren't impersonators.

"Hey, what's the situation?" Cellbit asked, Jaiden jumping along beside him.

"A bunch of fucking assholes are tryna impersonate everyone who went missing a couple months back, and I can't ban them for some stupid fucking reason," he explained. The other two were quiet for a few moments as they observed the crowd of newcomers.

"...right," Jaiden started, taking it all in, "and you typed the command right?"

"Yes, it's three fucking letters Jaiden I- sorry, this is just...ugh..." he stopped, not wanting to unload his anger onto his real friends, and took a breath, "yeah, I typed it right, and the error message is vague as hell and doesn't tell me anything."

As he looked at chat to look back at the error message, a new message appeared.

[+] Ph1LzA

"Oh, shit," he said, and Cellbit seemed to mutter a similar expression in Spanish.

Quackity » hey phil log off if ur live rn
Ph1LzA » nah dw i saw jaidens message on discord im here to help out
Quackity » good luck

He clicked away from the chat again as the Ethan impersonator spoke up.

"Uh, why do you guys keep going quiet all the time?" he asked.

"I'm typing dipshit, can you not see chat? Well, if you can't I guess I'm thankful, one less thing for you to fuck with," Quackity sighed.

"Is this...all of them?" Jaiden asked quietly, still looking at the crowd of impersonators. Quackity looked too and realised it probably was. Besides whoever the hell Hetch was.

"You guys could be doing way better stuff right now," Jaiden told them, "logging onto a Minecraft server isn't the right way to do a memorial. Can't you have spent this time sending messages to all their families instead? Literally anything is more productive and useful than...this."

"Alright, you guys have been talking fucking nonsense at us for a while now," the Sneeg sounding one said as he stepped to the front of the crowd, "so can you just stop and tell us something understandable like where the hell we are and how we got here?"

"Hey, you don't have any right to act mad at us when you're the one causing problems!" Quackity shouted back.

"We haven't done fucking anything, we just woke up here and now you're taking that as an opportunity to shout bullshit at us!" Sneeg matched Quackity's volume, if not making himself louder, and stepped forward again.

"You haven't done anything?! Logging on was doing something, asshole, pulling this shit was definitely doing something!"

"I didn't know all these streamers, but I know their fans cared a lot, and this wouldn't make any of them happy. If they saw this it might hurt them, actually," Cellbit backed Quackity up, doing a much better job of keeping his volume consistent, even though Quackity knew this was affecting him too. Charlie's disappearance had affected all of them, and seeing his Minecraft skin sat on the floor next to Ranboo's...it wasn't doing his anger any favours.

"Whoa, okay...what the hell?" Another voice joined the fray. It seemed Phil had finally joined them.

"Phil, I've been trying to get through to them, but they're all staying stupidly fucking committed to this stupid prank or whatever it's supposed to be," Quackity quickly explained.

Phil was quiet and looked at the crowd. As much as Quackity appreciated the backup it was getting tiring having to explain this stupid situation to everyone.

"Hello everyone," Cucurucho suddenly said after his extended silence, and Quackity had almost forgotten he was there.

"Oh, what the fuck do you want now?" Quackity growled, but he was happy that it at least wasn't books again.

"It seems there is a misunderstanding. Do not worry. I will explain."

It was a little jarring hearing full sentences from the soundboard that was usually only five main phrases and then a couple more rare ones, but again, Quackity wasn't complaining, as long as he got answers.

He wasn't expecting answers to come in the form of a deafening high pitched noise and then blacking out, though.

~

When Quackity came to, he wasn't faceplanted on his keyboard like he was expecting. Instead he was lying in the dirt, and it was sunny. Since when was he outside?

His ears still rang with the aftermath of the jarring noise as he lifted his head up and gradually began to hear other noises around him. They faded from white noise, to indiscernible dialogue, to some words he could actually make out.

"...collapse..."

"...loud..."

"...okay?..."

"Hello?"

The last one was much closer and startled him, causing him to yelp and fall onto his side. From there he could at least get a good view of the person, who looked like...

...Sykkuno?

"Hey, don't get so close to him, we don't know if he's gonna hurt us!" came another voice he could make out, coming from a figure who was dragging Sykkuno away from him. She looked a lot like Valkyrae. No, that...that was Valkyrae.

But this didn't make sense. None of this did. He was in his room playing Minecraft, why in the fuck were his missing friends standing in front of him?!

He looked around, and to his side was another person on the floor, wearing a green and white striped hat. Quackity squinted as the man raised his head. No, that wasn't...Phil?

Sure, they'd just been together, but in Minecraft, in fucking Minecraft, what the fuck was this?!

"C-Cellbit?!" It sounded like Jaiden was having the same realisation as him, and he looked over to see a woman with bright cyan hair looking down on a man with a white streak in his own hair in bewilderment.

Then there was another figure. Quackity saw the white arm in his peripheral and hesitated to turn his head and see what was standing behind him, but his curiosity got the better of him.

There, looming over him, white fur and button eyes, was what he could only assume was Cucurucho. Despite the stitched smile and black eyes holding no meaningful expression, Quackity got the feeling he was smug.

From the speaker in his throat came a simple message in that familiar robotic voice.

"Now you can see the truth."

Chapter Text

"Now you see the truth."

Quackity just stared at the oversized plush bear for a few moments. No, this wasn't real. This was stupid, obviously it wasn't real.

He'd just overdosed on caffeine and was having some crazy fucking fever dream. Or maybe he was dying and this was his brain going haywire before it shut down. He still found that easier to accept than this being real.

He turned and looked at Phil, who was now kneeling and staring at him, expression a whirlpool of horror and disbelief. He didn't particularly like to be looked at like that, but he could understand where he was coming from. This was...this was a lot of things.

Bad, definitely. Confusing, fucking obviously. Real? Quackity didn't want it to be real. Since when did anyone care what he wanted, though?

He just wanted to go back to playing Minecraft, he didn't want to be dealing with whatever the fuck this was. But when he looked past Phil's continued staring, he started to notice something. A very big something.

This place still looked like the QSMP.

No, this was the QSMP, this was spawn, but the landscape wasn't blocky anymore, it was real, the dirt was real, and so were his hands, and so was...the crowd of people...

Oh fuck. Was this real..?

His revelation was suddenly interrupted by a heavy impact on the back of his head.

"OW- FUCK!" he yelled, rubbing the impact spot as he laid his eyes on a book that had fallen to the ground. That must've been what hit him. Fucking Cucurucho.

He dragged it towards himself as he glared and scowled at the bear, who was admittedly becoming a little creepy with his blank stare. Flipping open the pages brought him to the message DO YOU UNDERSTAND NOW?

He could see Phil looking at the book from the corner of his eye and turned the message to him to read. Over Phil's shoulder he saw Jaiden and Cellbit, who were talking with one another.

Well, by talking he meant mutual hyperventilation and panic. Nobody was doing particularly good right now.

When Phil read the message he turned his head to the crowd, which Quackity had been trying not to look at so far. If he turned his head and saw all of the people he hadn't seen in weeks, the friends he'd spent nights crying over...he didn't trust himself not to break.

He could tell everything he needed to from Phil's expression, though. It hadn't taken long for his tears to form.

Quackity decided to instead look back at Cucurucho, as he could stomach looking at the bear a little easier.

"What is this? What the fuck is this, Cucurucho?!" he demanded, voice shaking. It felt childish to continue calling the bear Cucurucho, but he didn't know which admin might've been playing him right now.

Playing him..? This wasn't a video game anymore. Was this even an admin right in front of him? Maybe not, but then...

...who the fuck was Cucurucho?

The bear took out another book that it threw his way, interrupting his thoughts as he had to focus on catching it before it hit him square in the face.

He opened it up with a desperate craving for answers, eyes devouring the words as quickly as they possibly could.

THIS WORLD IS NOT WHAT YOU THOUGHT IT WAS.
YOU MUST TAKE CARE OF THE NEW RESIDENTS.
THEY ARE YOUR FRIENDS. THE FEDERATION HAS SAVED THEM.
THE FEDERATION IS NOT WHAT YOU THOUGHT IT WAS.

His mind was racing with enough information already, but then he realised there was a second page, with a single phrase noted down in that weirdly perfect handwriting.

I HOPE YOU ENJOY THE ISLAND

Quackity threw the book to Phil without looking at him, without looking at anything. He just stared ahead, chest rising up and down as he knelt in the dirt.

No. This wasn't happening.

This was the real world, sci-fi bullshit like this didn't happen, it just didn't, he didn't need to explain it any more than that. People didn't get transported into video games. Big plush bears didn't talk. Missing people didn't just...come back.

He should've been happy. If everyone was really here, somehow, then he should've been glad that finally they were all back after months of knowing nothing.

But he wasn't. He was terrified.

"Not so fuckin loud now, huh?" came a familiar voice, and he knew it was directed at him, "you finally ready to explain this shit?"

Slowly he turned his head. Sykkuno and Valkyrae were back in the crowd, murmuring amongst themselves, and where they had been standing was another figure. Sneeg.

Quackity stared at his face as he raised an expectant eyebrow. That face, the one that for the past few months he'd only seen in missing posters and news stories, the one he worried the world would forget about, along with the rest of them. That face was staring at him. And waiting for an answer.

"I-I..." he didn't know what to say. In fact, he had absolutely no fucking idea what to say. What was he supposed to say? "Hey, nice to see you, pal!" "WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT TH" "hey Sneeg, remember you still owe me five bucks?"

His mind threw the possibilities around and couldn't settle on any of them, but Sneeg was still waiting on an answer. He swallowed and just said the first thing that came to mind.

"I missed you"

~

Ranboo had just died, so this was heaven, obviously. Well, no, maybe hell. He'd understand if he'd been sent to hell after all that.

But the bright sun and flowers poking out from the rows of grass didn't really give hell vibes. Maybe satan had taken up gardening as a hobby.

Very gradually they could open their eyes wider and wider, adapting little by little to the brightness. It was hard, but the sun wasn't harsh. It felt warm. Nice.

There was a lot to focus on. A few figures on the floor in front of him, and a taller white one behind them, then a few more that were talking behind him. But there was one that caught his eyes first, as he was kneeling over them, and they realised the weird sensation on their arm was a hand.

He squinted, trying to make out any details. A face slowly made itself known, like an image loading in on shitty internet. Noises also became clearer, separating themselves from the background of white noise and ambient conversation.

"...anboo?..."

"...Ranboo?"

That voice. That face...

It was Charlie.

Oh. He was in heaven, then.

"C-can you see me? Please, Ranboo?" Charlie squeezed his arm, but it was gentle, only enough for him to feel it. Ranboo blinked and opened their mouth, trying to make some kind of affirmative noise, but it came out far quieter than they intended it to. Why did his throat hurt so much?

"You...are you alright?" Charlie asked. Ranboo nodded ever so slightly, still getting used to using his muscles again, and that was all the signal that Charlie needed to pull them up into a hug.

It was warm. Charlie wrapped his arms around Ranboo, and Ranboo did the same in response, although he was a little slow to do so as his arms felt heavy. He didn't imagine his afterlife being so...merciful. Though they could've guessed Charlie would be their angel.

"It's okay...w-we made it...we made it out..." Charlie was probably talking to himself as Ranboo could hardly make out the words of the man whose head was resting over his shoulder. They nodded regardless and held him tighter.

From over Charlie's shoulder, Ranboo could finally make out some of the figures in more detail. He didn't recognise the four on the ground, but the one that was now standing in front of them sparked a memory- something that Ranboo rarely seemed to have.

The blue jumper, the hat, it had to be- it was Sneeg.

Jeez, they knew heaven was supposed to be good and all, but this was starting to feel too good to be true. Well, it wasn't true, it was the afterlife. But it felt so real. Charlie, he felt...real.

Eventually Charlie pulled back, and neither of them really knew how long the hug had lasted, because neither of them cared too much about things like that right now. For a few seconds Charlie just looked at Ranboo's face, smiling at the sight of it, but then something behind him caught his attention. It was Sneeg shouting, and Ranboo could just about hear his conversation with the strangers.

"Enough of the cryptic shit! The hell is going on here? Can one of you just give me a straight answer? Any of you?" he sounded angry, but Ranboo could tell there was another emotion in his voice he was trying to hide. Sneeg looked at the four people on the floor as he waited for an answer from any of them, and so did Ranboo.

The closest one had black hair and a beanie, and he was looking at Sneeg like he'd seen a ghost. The one to his side had a green striped hat and a black robe, and Ranboo could just barely make out tear tracks on his face. The other two were holding onto each other, one with very eye catching cyan hair and the other a much more traditional brown, although he did have a white streak and some goggles strapped to his forehead.

All four of them remained silent, however Sneeg somehow still got a response.

"I hope you enjoy the island."

Sneeg jumped backwards, frantically searching for the source of the robotic voice, and his eyes eventually landed on a microphone, which was attached to...a giant teddy bear?

"Wh- what the fuck are you?" he shouted. He thought these guys had been talking to the bear because they were crazy, not because it actually talked.

After a moment the bear extended a hand, which was holding a book. Sneeg looked at it, not really intending to take a mysterious book from an even more mysterious bear.

"He's...Cucurucho," the one in the beanie explained, "you should probably just take the book. He won't leave you alone until you do."

Sneeg looked at him, not having much of a reason to trust his advice, but the bear was continuing to hold the book out, persistent. Sneeg cautiously stepped forward, just close enough to grab the book, and then backed away again. The man in the beanie got to his feet as he did so, dusting himself off and watching Sneeg from the bear's side, clearly curious as to what was written inside. When he realised how close he was to the bear he stepped away, closer to the man in green.

Ethan stepped away from the crowd and looked over Sneeg's shoulder at the book, "if it's a trap I'll fuck them up for you."

Sneeg managed a laugh at the threat. He didn't see how this book could be dangerous, but then again Showfall had pulled plenty of weird shit on them, so it wouldn't be completely unbelievable. He tensed as he opened the page, but all that was inside was some weirdly perfect handwriting.

MY NAME IS CUCURUCHO. I AM FROM THE FEDERATION.
THE FEDERATION HAS BROUGHT ALL OF YOU HERE.
WELCOME TO QUESADILLA ISLAND.

"You... you're the one who brought us here..?" Sneeg raised an eyebrow at the bear. Cucurucho...what a weird name.

Cucurucho moved his head slowly in a nod and Sneeg bit his lip as he tried to make the information make sense in his head. A giant teddy bear...working for a 'federation'...had freed all of them from Showfall?

He looked at his friends behind him. Ethan was reading through the book like he was searching for hidden messages between the lines. Sykkuno and Valkyrae were standing with each other- when they woke up here the two had told everyone they'd rather not go by the rat variants of their names anymore. It was the same with the former Puzzler, who had told everyone to call him Jerma instead.

Jerma was currently with the group paying no attention to Sneeg's conversation, as Vinny and Niki were too busy restraining Austin, who was trying to launch himself full force at Hetch, who Jerma was holding onto to make sure he didn't make a run for it. Hetch...that was the only person here he didn't recognise. And judging by Austin's reaction to him, he didn't know if he wanted to.

Then there was Charlie and Ranboo. Both of them were sitting together, a little distance away from everyone else, but watching the events between Sneeg and the strangers unfold. The two of them looked a lot bloodier since the last time he'd seen them. He'd figure out if they were alright once he got his answers, since they seemed fine for now in each others company.

But the last time he had seen these people, the last thing he could remember, they had been in Showfall going through death games in an abandoned mall. How had they suddenly arrived on an island? It was too good to be true.

"This is just another one of Showfall's tricks, isn't it?" Sneeg accused, Ethan stiffening beside him at the mention of the company. Cucurucho shook his head.

"Showfall..? What's that?" the one in the beanie asked. He said his name was Quackity, right? That was what the unexplainable floating text above his head said. But Sneeg glanced at Ethan, whose text read "Crankgameplays," and he was suddenly less sure about how much he could trust the floating text.

"How about you answer some of our questions first?" Sneeg glared at the man, and strangely it seemed to have quite the impact.

"We...we don't know how you got here. Fuck, man, I dunno how I got here, I-" Quackity started looking pretty panicked but Sneeg wasn't feeling all to sympathetic for him.

"You walked over here, dumbass. Then you started shouting at us," he knew that probably wasn't what Quackity meant, but he had no idea what else he might've been talking about.

"No, that's- in here, in this world!" Quackity ran a hand down his face then stopped and looked at Cucurucho, "you did something, didn't you? What the fuck did you do?"

Cucurucho looked at him, then took out a book.

"D-don't throw it, you can just pass it to me, I'm right next to-"

Cucurucho lobbed the book at his face.

Thankfully he caught it, but only by an inch. If he ended up with a broken nose he was gonna tear out this bear's stuffing.

YOU WOULD NOT UNDERSTAND OTHERWISE.
DRASTIC MEASURES NEEDED TO BE TAKEN.
NOW YOU SEE THAT THESE ARE YOUR FRIENDS.

"That doesn't explain- fuck, whatever, fine," he sighed as he closed the book.

"What's he telling you?" Sneeg asked.

Quackity looked at Sneeg, and it hurt how Sneeg wasn't happy to see him again or anything, he was just...angry.

"He...he said about how you're our friends," Quackity explained, laying his heart on the table.

"Friends? I don't know you," Sneeg replied, driving a dagger though it.

"O-okay, fine," he was very much not fine, "but it wasn't what I wanted. I wanna know how we got here, Cucurucho, I wanna know how you put us in a fucking video game, or whatever the hell we're supposed to call this now!?"

"Video game..?" Ethan repeated as Cucurucho took out a book that Quackity snatched from his paw before he could throw it.

THEY ARE NOT SAFE IN THE REAL WORLD YET.
IT IS YOUR JOB TO ASSIST AND PROTECT THEM HERE UNTIL IT IS SAFE.
YOUR FRIENDS HAVE CHANGED. GIVE THEM TIME.
THIS WORLD IS AS REAL TO THEM AS YOURS IS TO YOU.

Instead of reading out the book, Quackity just handed it over to Sneeg, seeing his interest. Sneeg was hesitant to take anything from his hands- ouch- but eventually took ahold of it and flipped it open. He read through it quickly, Ethan doing the same over his shoulder.

"The fuck does that mean?" was all he said in response. Quackity wanted to very much ask the same thing, but he supposed if Cucurucho wasn't going to actually explain, he job went down to him. It was his SMP, after all.

"Well, this...this world...it's not 'real,' really, it's a game. A few minutes ago I was looking at all of you through a computer monitor, and now I'm...here," he held his arms out to show he was talking about the world around them, and the movement was as uncertain as his voice was.

"Right. That makes no sense," Sneeg commented.

"Fucking tell me about it!" Quackity defended, wishing he had an actual answer for it all.

"I guess I can believe it, though," Sneeg continued.

"You- wait, what?" Quackity looked at him in disbelief. Was that a joke? He didn't really understand it.

"Yeah, actually not too much of a stretch considering the other shit we've gone through that didn't make any sense either in the past few days. At least I think it was a few days..." he sounded awfully calm about all of this, the complete opposite to Quackity and his racing thoughts and uneven breathing.

"A- a few days? Wait, you...how long do you think you've been missing?" Quackity asked tentatively, fearing the answer.

"...I've been missing?"

Sneeg looked clueless. Fuck, that wasn't good. No kidding 'your friends have changed'- Quackity probably should've realised it sooner, but it was becoming more and more obvious that all of them had amnesia.

Cucurucho had done his job of showing them their friends were really back, now he'd left them with the difficult job of convincing them they really were friends.

"A-alright," Quackity began, bracing himself for an emotionally exhausting few minutes, or hours, or however long this was going to take, "you guys, all of you...went missing a few months ago. We had no idea where you went all that time, and now you're here, inside of a Minecraft server, that we have also just been teleported into. Like some Jumanji bullshit. You guys know Minecraft, right? ...and Jumanji?"

He was a little worried by the blank stare Sneeg gave at first, but then something seemed to click in his mind, "uh...I've heard of those things. I think."

"I think Vinny told me about Jumanji at some point. It's a board game, right?" Ethan asked.

"Yeah!" Quackity nodded, hopeful that he might be getting somewhere, "it's where a bunch of people get sucked into the board game world, which seems to be like, exactly what is happening here."

"Right. And you're sure we knew each other?" Sneeg was still doubtful of that part, which crushed Quackity's rising hopes back down.

"I...I don't know how I can prove it to you guys, but...yeah," he said.

"...I might have a way to prove it," Quackity was startled by a sudden voice beside him. It was Phil, who'd gotten to his feet, and Quackity was relieved to hear him talking again since he'd been quiet for so long.

"You...you do?" Quackity asked, not wanting to push Phil as the tears were still evident on his face and his eyes weren't focused on anything in particular, but he nodded and reached into his backpack.

A moment later he pulled out a book, which Quackity was starting to tense at the sight of. But he didn't throw it, he carefully opened it up to a certain page and turned it around for the others to see.

It was a photo album- Quackity remembered Phil talking about this before. When everyone had disappeared he tried to find every photo he had with them and compile them into a photo album, which he always kept with him on the server. The page he was currently on had a photo of himself and Sneeg, and they looked like they were having fun.

"Is that..?" Sneeg was suddenly taken aback. He didn't recall the events in the photo at all, but that was him and the unfamiliar man in front of him standing together, clear as day, "I-I don't remember that, though, I don't-"

"Then it's like Quackity said. You guys...might have amnesia," Phil sounded like he found it hard to admit. Sneeg still just looked confused, staring at the photo.

Something hit Quackity hard in the shoulder as Phil turned to another page with more similar photos. Of course, it was another book. Asshole fucking bear.

He picked it up while showing a middle finger to Cucurucho and read what was inside.

YOU WILL RETURN TO YOUR REAL WORLD SOON.
FINISH WHAT YOU ARE DOING HERE.
INFORM THE OTHER PLAYERS.

Quackity looked back up at Cucurucho, "wait, we're getting sent back? H-hold on, we're not done here!"

He didn't want to be forced away, not when he'd just gotten his friends back, not when he hadn't gotten to speak to Charlie or even Ranboo again. Maybe it was for the best because he knew it would only hurt him when none of them remembered who he was, but he still wanted to be with them at least, to know that they really were back.

Phil looked over at his shout, "we're what? What do you mean?"

Quackity showed Phil the book and his eyes widened, "h-hey, hold on, I've only just started showing them the photos!"

Both Quackity and Phil looked at Cucurucho pleadingly, but his button eyes remained indifferent.

"...shit," Quackity commented, looking over at Jaiden and Cellbit, who had been with each other on the floor this whole time. He should probably check they were both okay before they got kicked out of the game, or whatever was gonna happen.

He left Phil to continue showing Sneeg and Ethan more photos while he crouched down at Jaiden's side. She jumped when she saw him, but relaxed when she saw who it was.

"Oh, uh, Quackity! Hey!" it was pretty clear she was forcing joy into her voice. Quackity sighed and looked at both of them.

"Did you guys catch anything from the conversation about what's going on?" he asked them. Cellbit shook his head.

"We've mainly been going through breathing exercises while you were talking...you uh, wouldn't mind filling us in?" Cellbit asked him with a sheepishness that he couldn't help but smile at.

"Uh- yeah, sure. We're in kind of a Jumanji situation. And those aren't impersonators, they're, uh...our actual friends who went missing," he tried to smile at the lost expressions on both of their faces, "trust me, I'm struggling to follow it just as much as you guys."

Jaiden turned, looking at the crowd of people she had been trying to dismiss as a grief-filled hallucination for a while now. Those...really were her friends?

"But that's...how is that possible?" she asked, and all Quackity could do was throw up his hands.

"Listen, I know fuck all right now. Cucurucho seems to know exactly what's happening but isn't telling us shit...here," he handed over one of the books he'd been given (more like assaulted with) by Cucurucho. Jaiden read it and she was still confused, but she could at least start to believe some of the information she was being told.

"Cucurucho did just tell me that we're about to go back to the real world, too, so...maybe we can try make more sense of everything there. At least the world will make sense again."

Jaiden tried to smile at Quackity's words, but it was a little hard.

"Goodbye," came Cucurucho's robotic voice, and Quackity assumed that was the signal it was time to go. He saw Phil quickly pushing the photo album into Sneeg's hand, and then heard that deafening high pitched tone again.

Then it all went black.

Chapter Text

When Quackity came to, he was facedown on his keyboard. Quickly he jolted up, almost falling off his chair and disconnecting his headphones, but he clung to the edge of his desk and only just kept himself upright.

His eyes landed on the monitor first, where he saw chat was open and the letter 'h' was spammed into an unsent message a hundred times over. It had probably hit the character limit a long time ago. He was just glad he hadn't accidentally landed on something that immediately doxxed his address.

He doubted he actually had a hotkey for that. But you can never be too careful.

He groggily moved his mouse to highlight the text and hit backspace. Shit, what was he doing again? He looked at the rest of the screen. He was in his house, on the QSMP. Was he about to stream? No, that wasn't right, he...

He looked at his hotbar. Last time he checked he didn't have that many books in it. He left clicked to open the one he was already holding in his hand.

YOU WILL RETURN TO YOUR REAL WORLD SOON.
FINISH WHAT YOU ARE DOING HERE.
INFORM THE OTHER PLAYERS.

Oh.

Oh yeah.

~

Sneeg looked at the empty space in front of him where Phil had just been standing. The name was familiar, in the same way those photos were...remembering was like trying to grab water, though. He always thought the revelation was right there, and then it slipped through his fingers, leaving a ghost of the truth in his mind. It was infuriating. He just wanted answers.

He knew even when he got them he wouldn't trust them, though. Showfall had drilled distrust into him and as much as he hated to admit it that was going to be with him for the rest of his days, like the shadow of Showfall always looming over his shoulder. Couldn't they just leave him alone for once?

His eyes traveled down to the thick book in his hands. Some of the photos were of him, but before Phil popped out of existence he had shown him more- some with Niki, some with Sykkuno, some with a bunch of them all in one. There were photos of everyone. So they really had a life before Showfall, and they'd known these people...and they'd forgotten all of it?

Sneeg shoved the book into Ethan's arms and pinched the space between his eyes. Fuck. He looked so happy in those photos. So did Charlie. So did...Ranboo.

And Showfall had taken everything from them.

"Hey, Sneeg, you okay, man?" Ethan asked him. No, he wasn't. Obviously he wasn't. They'd gotten away from Showfall and he couldn't even enjoy that because his entire life was still missing.

He looked over at the photo album again.

Was he wearing a ring in those photos..?

Sneeg looked away and shook his head, "no, I'm not okay, I have fucking amnesia, Ethan."

"Yeah, it looks like we all do...but we can deal with that later, right? Not much we can do about it now."

Sneeg wanted to be angry at Ethan's endless positivity as it was starting to feel to him like ignorance, but he saw the smile Ethan was giving him and couldn't bring himself to feel any such thing. He was right. There wasn't anything he could do about the people he didn't know, but he could definitely be helping the people he did.

First he looked to Charlie and Ranboo, still sat huddled together. He didn't know who Hetch was, so he was gonna leave the guys who did to sort that shit out, and Ethan was already heading in that direction to try as best he could to diffuse the situation. Sneeg walked over to the two on the floor and crouched down until he was at a similar level.

"Sneeg, hey!" Charlie greeted him, his voice a little hoarse. Sneeg smiled.

"Hey, Charlie...are you guys doing alright?" he asked.

They both nodded, which was definitely good, and Charlie spoke again, "uh, who were those other guys who disappeared, by the way?"

Sneeg rubbed the back of his neck as he thought of how to answer, "well, they, uh...they were already living on the island, so they came to check us out. We're all chill, not gonna kick us off the island or anything. Not on my watch, anyways."

He didn't want to worry them with any revelations about amnesia and old friends, these two had clearly been through hell before they got here. Well, all of them had been through hell back there. These two had probably gone through mega hell, though.

He remembered them from the shows, one in a cabin, another in a warehouse, but then there was a third...trying to remember that one just made him hurt, though. Whatever had happened in that one he got the sense Charlie and Ranboo had been there with him. If the dried blood on both of them was any kind of clue, it hadn't ended well.

"Oh, alright then," Charlie replied, and Sneeg was just happy he didn't have any more questions. He glanced at Ranboo, who'd been quiet this whole time, and they seemed alright but Sneeg was still a little worried.

"Is everything alright, Ranboo?" he asked, trying not to sound too concerned.

Ranboo smiled and nodded, the smile hidden beneath a black cloth mask but his happiness was still plenty visible from the eyes. Sneeg looked at the mask for a second. The last one had been metal, hadn't it? Since when had Ranboo been wearing this one? Oh well, they were happy. That was all that mattered.

"I wasn't expecting death to be so nice," he finally spoke, and his voice was even rougher than Charlie's.

Charlie and Sneeg looked at him. Ranboo suddenly began to panic as they realised their words hadn't been received well.

"W-well, we're dead- aren't we?"

~

Tell the other players? How the fuck was he gonna do that?

Quackity took his headphones off and leant back in his chair. He could hardly believe all of that had just happened, nevermind convince other people that it had. Fuck, they would never believe him.

Wait- the other players. Quackity remembered the other three who had been there with him, who'd seen all of that too. And sure enough, when he opened up Discord, a new group DM was spamming him.

◯ Jaiden Hoy a las 09:16
Like I'm freaking out rn
That's not posible??
◯ Ph1LzA Hoy a las 09:17
Idk what to say
We all saw it
We can't have all had the exact same hallucination
◯ Jaiden Hoy a las 09:17
That still seems more likekt than this???
◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 09:17
we should talk in vc
◯ Jaiden Hoy a las 09:18
*likely
Cellbit I don't think I can breathe right now
◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 09:18
jaiden keep doing yhe breathing stuff jtll help
join vc whenever you feel ready ok
◯ Jaiden Hoy a las 09:19
ok

📞 Call Started

Quackity took a deep breath, dragged his microphone back towards him, and clicked to join the call.

"-umanji bullshit doesn't even make any sense!" he caught the end of Phil's sentence as he put his headphones back on and cleared his throat.

"Hey, uh- hey guys," he said. How else were you supposed to start a conversation about being put into a video game and then taken back out just as quickly? Maybe by screaming. He would definitely be screaming into a pillow later.

"Quackity- you alright, man?" Cellbit asked him.

"Yeah- well, no, definitely no, but uh...that happened, right? We were...we were in the QSMP?" his throat felt tight and he took a sip of his coffee as Phil answered. It wasn't cold, but it was nowhere near hot anymore.

"I-I think so, fuck, this doesn't- this doesn't make any fucking sense! What the hell is happening?" Phil's voice got a little more distant and Quackity assumed he had moved a little further away from the mic for whatever reason.

"Okay, let's not panic, let's just talk...there's too much evidence for us to say that was fake, right?" Cellbit asked.

Quackity nodded, forgetting he couldn't be seen through a voice call, "yeah, no, if all of us saw the same thing just then, and I still have the shit Cucurucho gave me in my inventory..."

He didn't want to say it was real, that still felt too absurd, but at this point it couldn't have been fake. There was no other explanation.

Quackity noticed somebody else was DMing him right now, which he would've just ignored if it wasn't for the fact that it was one of the QSMP admins. He let Phil and Cellbit keep talking as he opened the message.

◯ ---------- Hoy a las 09:23
Hey Quackity, I saw the message you sent on the Discord and I was trying to log in to sort out the situation, but it's been coming up with a weird error message? Not sure if you know what's going on but thought I'd tell you. I'll try again in a few minutes.

A few seconds later they sent an image, which Quackity clicked on before it finished loading. Soon enough he saw it was the screen that would come up if you were trying to join a server you were banned from, but he quickly realised it was a very different message being displayed.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE FEDERATION.
YOUR SERVICES ARE NO LONGER NEEDED.

Well that wasn't right.

"Hey, uh, hey guys- I just got a message from one of the admins, they can't join the server, because uh...hold on, I'll send you what they sent me," he interrupted whatever Phil and Cellbit had been in the middle of and sent the image to their group. The other two were silent for a few seconds, presumably as the image was loading.

"Filho du puta..." Cellbit swore, and Phil seemed to mumble something too.

"So that...so that wasn't an admin? Then who the fuck was Cucurucho?" Phil eventually asked.

"I don't know man, this is all I have, I've got no more fucking clue what's going on than you!" Quackity shouted, but he wasn't angry with Phil, he was more angry at how clueless he was about everything going on. For fuck's sake, it was his server.

A little notification sounded in his headset, and then Jaiden's voice joined them in the call.

"Hey, so...that was real?" her voice seemed a little shaky and exhausted as she spoke.

"As far as we can tell, uh, yes," Cellbit answered, and they all heard a sigh from Jaiden's microphone.

"I thought I'd be happy when they all came back..." her voice was quieter and she seemed to just be talking to herself.

"Alright, we've decided it was real, let's talk about what we do now," Cellbit said, moving the conversation on.

"Do we tell everyone? Can we tell everyone?" Phil asked. Quackity looked back at his other monitor, where Minecraft was still open and that book was still in his hand.

"The last thing Cucurucho told me to do was 'inform the other players,' so...I guess we can try," his eyes hovered over the QSMP member discord. The needed to explain the situation before anyone else tried joining the server, anyways.

"There's no way they're gonna believe us," Phil stated.

"Well, there are four of us...if we all back each other up then it'll be a bit hard for them to accuse all of us of pulling a prank," Jaiden reasoned.

Phil was quiet for a second before he responded, "alright. So are we sending a message in the discord, or something?"

"That's probably the best way to reach everyone..." Quackity pondered, then grimaced when he realised this meant he was gonna have to be the one who sent the message.

His server, and all that.

He spent some time typing out an essay of an explanation with the help of the other three, and after constructive (and plenty of non-constructive) criticism from all of them he pasted it into the announcements channel.

His finger hovered over sending it. They were going to think he was insane. He knew what he'd seen, though, and so did the other three. They'd be able to back him up when the other members inevitably called this a terrible idea for a lore event.

He pressed send.

Now to wait for the responses.

~

Well, Ranboo was dead, wasn't he?

They didn't see any other explanation. Their head had been crushed, before which Charlie had been mauled, before which Sneeg had been crushed entirely.

They all died back there. And now they were in the afterlife.

"Wh- no, Ranboo, we're not dead, we...we got out," Sneeg tried to explain to him. Ranboo's eyebrows pushed together.

"No, but, we died, I-I saw..." the images started flashing in Ranboo's mind more vividly. No, he didn't want to remember...they didn't want to think about what they'd seen.

"Yeah, and we got brought back...you remember I got brought back?" Charlie looked at him until Ranboo slowly nodded, "well, I think we've been brought back again. But...not in the mall. I think someone nice brought us back this time."

Ranboo shook their head. They didn't deserve this. They'd wanted death, because they deserved it. He didn't deserve heaven, he didn't deserve his friends...he wasn't good enough for freedom.

"Hey- hey, look at me," Charlie commanded, seeing his gaze drifting, "this is real. You and me are real. We got out of that hell hole, okay? And I don't care what you're thinking, alright, we deserve this more than anyone. We can be happy now."

Ranboo was strong for all of two seconds, and then immediately broke down crying.

He thought he'd failed Charlie, he'd failed all of them, he'd left them to die in that mall and done nothing. But here they were. Every one of them. And they really did look happy.

Charlie hugged him again, and Sneeg joined them too. It was so warm. It was so real.

Ranboo felt alive again.

~

◯ Etoiles Hoy a las 09:47
??

There was their first response. A little short by Quackity's standards but at least his announcement wasn't just being completely ignored.

"Okay, so...who's gonna respond to that?" Jaiden asked. The four of them were still in call together, as they weren't planning on going about their days like normal after that.

Quackity sighed, "I'll try," he volunteered himself like he was sparing his friends from facing down a lion.

"How do you even reply to that? We don't have much to work with," Cellbit commented, but Quackity did have an idea.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 09:49
Etoiles I know it doesnt make sense but if you at least hear us out then I'll give you dark metal or smth

"Okay well that just sounds like you're bribing him, Quackity," Phil said, sounding displeased.

"Who said I wasn't?" Quackity rested his chin on his hand as he waited for a response.

"This is serious, man," Cellbit berated him.

"I'm being serious," he told them as a new message popped up.

◯ Etoiles Hoy a las 09:50
vc

A second afterwards, Etoiles' discord icon popped into VC 1.

"See? This guy does anything for dark metal," he tried to laugh but it was a little overshadowed by his fear at how Etoiles was going to react once they talked.

"He probably would've joined without the bribe, Quackity," Jaiden sighed, "guess we should join him."

Before Quackity could reply Jaiden had left their call and soon afterwards her icon appeared below Etoiles.

"This will be fun," Phil said sarcastically before leaving too, then so did Cellbit. Quackity hesitantly went to join all of them in the new VC.

"-is saying they're all on Minecraft?" Etoiles was asking when he joined.

"I know, it's some sci-fi bullshit, but all of us were there. You know we wouldn't pull a prank like this when it's about our friends," Phil tried to explain, but Etoiles was still in disbelief.

"You know other people aren't gonna be happy when they see this, right? You know how sad Mariana was," he pointed out. Quackity cringed, remembering how Mariana had reacted upon the news of Charlie's disappearance. They had been surprisingly good friends despite only ever wanting to get a divorce on the server.

They had probably lucked out having Etoiles see the message before anyone else. He hadn't known many of the missing streamers that well, but the ones who did...he was right, their reactions to this news weren't gonna be great.

"We were friends with them too, Etoiles, so you should know we wouldn't be lying about this! If you want you can go on the server, they're all there at spawn!" Jaiden told him, but he remained unconvinced.

"Guys, people do not live in Minecraft. It is a fucking game. You could've at least lied about something more convincing."

Quackity groaned and leaned into the mic, "we're not fucking lying, Etoiles, we were all there!" but at this point he was just repeating what everyone else had said, and it seemed pointless.

Then there was the sudden sound of someone else joining the call, and-

"What the fuck is this, Quackity?!"

Oh fuck. Mariana.

"Mariana, listen-" he tried to at least get a few words in but he was quickly cut off.

"No quiero oírlo, pendejo, you are not just gonna lie to me about Charlie after almost three months, what is your problem?!" he shouted, almost cutting out a few times due to the volume.

"Listen, Mariana, this isn't- we're not lying, we saw them," jeez, he was starting to sound like some sort of conspiracy theorist.

"We saw them too Mariana, Quackity isn't bullshitting," Cellbit backed him up, but their strength in numbers strategy was falling through.

"You're with him on this shit? Were all of you planning to lie to this whole server too?" Mariana accused them, and as Phil began to respond Quackity muted and took off his headphones. This wasn't a fun conversation. But then again, he wasn't expecting it to be.

He looked back to the monitor with Minecraft open. And saw Cucurucho standing in front of him.

"AGH- SHIT!" Quackity exclaimed, almost falling off his chair for the second time. The bear was at least made of pixels again, but his jumpscares weren't any less scary.

As he sat back up the bear dropped a book that popped into his inventory. Damn it, what now?

DO THEY NOT BELIEVE YOU?

"Obviously not, dumbass. They never will," Quackity sighed. Oh, wait, his mic was muted, he should probably-

Another book popped into his inventory. The...the bear hadn't still heard him, right?

He did not want to consider the implications of that, so he opened the book instead.

INFORM SKEPTICAL PLAYERS TO MEET ME AT SPAWN.
I WILL SHOW THEM IT IS TRUE.

Quackity considered the book, and looked back at the VC. Mariana was still talking, and he could only imagine the insults he was throwing out at the others. There wasn't a chance he was convincing him, but if Cucurucho said he could...

Quackity unmuted himself and immediately interrupted the rant Mariana had been in the middle of.

"Hey, Mariana, listen, join the QSMP and meet me at spawn. I'll prove it," he didn't leave any room in his tone for negotiation, and after a moment Mariana replied in a more subdued voice.

"Alright. You'd better have some big fucking proof or I swear, Quackity-" he began threatening.

"Yeah, alright, just get to spawn," he demanded.

"Quackity..?" Phil asked, sounding unsure of the plan.

"Just trust me, Phil. I spoke with Cucurucho," he explained.

"Cucuru-?"

Quackity cut Etoiles off, "you too, go to fucking spawn Etoiles, you'll see there."

There was silence for a moment, then Etoiles left the VC.

"Meet me at spawn, Quackity," Mariana said in the same threatening tone he'd been using the whole time.

"Yeah, whatever," Quackity dismissed as he kicked Mariana from the VC. He decided to type another message in the announcements too, telling everyone who was online to meet him at spawn for a 'proper explanation'.

"...what are you gonna do when they get to spawn?" Jaiden asked him nervously.

"Oh, I'm not gonna be at spawn," Quackity said with a malicious smirk, "but Cucurucho will be. And whatever he does is up to him."

He heard a sigh from Phil and looked at the other monitor, that Cucurucho had now disappeared from. As long as it convinced them, he didn't care. He didn't like getting called a liar.

He just hoped they didn't send him their therapy bills afterwards.

Chapter Text

Sure, Austin was happy they'd gotten out of Showfall, of course he was. What he wasn't happy about was who they'd gotten out with, though.

He thought it was the end when he'd gotten crushed by that wall with Sneeg. Logically it should've been, but nothing in Showfall was logical.

When he next came to, he had been in a bed in a very white room. Unpleasantly white. He hadn't been much a fan.

Eventually he got up, although his muscles had wanted him to do anything but. It had been a struggle to walk at first, but by leaning on the walls and tables he could make his way to the door.

Before he opened it he'd looked back at the room. There weren't been any windows, there was a curtain drawn at one side of the bed, and the table on the other side had a cup of water, a clipboard and some pills. Was he in a hospital?

He opened the door and it sure didn't look like any hospital he'd been in before. Then again, he couldn't remember any hospitals he'd been in when he tried to think of them.

The walls in this wider area had been just as bright, and sure, it had looked clinical, but a massive empty square connecting to a dozen other rooms all around the edge still seemed way too bizarre to be in a proper hospital.

It hadn't been completely empty, however, as Austin saw someone standing with their face up to a door on the left wall. His first instinct was to hide, but then he had realised this wasn't a threat, this was someone he knew.

Yes, that weird purple outfit, he'd have recognised it anywhere- it was Ethan.

Upon realising that, Austin headed over. The last time he'd seen Ethan, he'd been a pile of blood on the floor. He needed to get to the bottom of this.

"E-Ethan?" his quiet voice sounded like a yell in the completely silent room.

Ethan had spun around, looking absolutely terrified, but then calmed down when he saw who it was.

"Huh-? Austin! Austin, holy shit, you're- you're alive!" he whispered excitedly, about as loud as he could be while it still counted as a whisper. Austin assumed he was trying to stay quiet, but his excitement was getting the better of him.

"Dude, you're alive- how the fuck did you get out of there?" he asked at a normal volume, then flinched as Ethan quickly put a finger over his mouth.

"I-I don't- I don't know, but there's someone in there," he hissed as he indicated the door he had been staring through, "I dunno if they're friendly, or even human, right now they're just looking at a monitor- well, a bunch of monitors, and..."

Ethan decided to just let Austin see for himself when he saw the confusion on his face, so he shuffled to the side and Austin approached the little window looking into the room. He saw a bunch of monitors stacked up in an otherwise pitch black room, but nothing human-ish sat in front of them.

Then the door had opened.

Ethan and Austin grabbed each other and screamed as a bear poked its head through the gap in the door to look at them. Well, not a real bear, it was a white plushie with button eyes and a sewn mouth, but it was still taller than both of them and a terrifying sight despite its cute-ish features.

"Hello," it said through a microphone in its neck, with a very robotic sounding voice.

Austin and Ethan stopped screaming for a second, surprised it hadn't mauled them yet, but still very cautious of it. It just stood in the doorway for a few moments, until it took out a book.

Austin and Ethan realised they were standing closer than they intended to after getting jumpscared by the bear, so they backed away from each other a step or so, but stepped no closer to the bear. It continued to hold out a book for one of them to take, but they didn't move.

Eventually it opened the book itself and showed both of them the contents.

HELLO.
MY NAME IS CUCURUCHO.
YOU ARE SAFE HERE.
WOULD YOU LIKE TO COME INSIDE?

No, Austin would've liked to say outright, but he was still a little too shocked to speak. The dark room behind the bear- Cucurucho?- didn't seem particularly inviting.

Cucurucho saw their apprehension and took out another book.

I AM NOT SHOWFALL.
I AM WORKING TO SAVE THE REST OF YOUR FRIENDS.
FEEL FREE TO ENTER WHENEVER YOU ARE COMFORTABLE.

The bear then closed the book and went back inside to sit in front of the monitors.

Ethan and Austin remained at each others side for a minute or so before Austin tentatively stepped forwards. He held open the door to the room and Ethan looked inside with him, both watching from the doorway and not daring to go inside.

The monitors illuminating Cucurucho's face seemed to all be security cameras, looking in on what might've been a mall. Austin squinted and could make out figures in some of them, though the quality wasn't great.

One was different from the rest, though, and it appeared to be the one Cucurucho's head was angled towards. It was the only one not in black and white, but it wasn't much better since the only colour it seemed to be using was red. It was a better quality, though, and Austin wondered if Cucurucho was just watching some weird unrelated video to avoid doing his security guard job- Austin couldn't blame him, he'd be doing the same- but then he recognised a face.

Ranboo?

Austin ran forwards, Ethan jumping to grab onto the door he'd been holding open.

He braced his palms on the table all the monitors were on and got a closer look at the one with Ranboo. Their head was in some weird metal thing and he seemed to be waking up. Cucurucho pressed a couple buttons, which must've been controlling the volume, since after that he heard-

"Aaand we're back! Congratulations, Ranboo, you made it to the end!"

What? Who the fuck was that? Why were they talking to Ranboo- what did they mean by 'the end'?

Cucurucho skidded a book across the desk towards him, that he could just barely make out the words from in the low lighting.

THAT IS HETCH.
HE IS THE ONE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE SHOWS YOU WERE IN.
SNEEG, CHARLIE AND RANBOO ARE STILL WITH HIM.
HE DOES NOT KNOW WE HAVE YOU.

"Wh- wait, so he's..? N-nevermind, what do you mean they're still with him?! Aren't you gonna get them out- that's what you said you were gonna do!" He shouted at the bear, fear now overridden with anger that he was safe while some of his friends were still in that fucking show.

WE ARE WORKING TO GET THEM OUT TOO.
WE HAVE ENCOUNTERED DIFFICULTIES.

"Fucking difficulties? Whatever. How are you even helping them from here?" Austin interrogated as Ethan slowly stepped into the room, a little more wary than Austin was.

OTHER MEMBERS OF THE FEDERATION ARE AT SHOWFALL.
I AM PROVIDING THEM WITH INFORMATION FROM OUTSIDE.
HOWEVER THE MISSION IS UP TO THEM NOW.

"Wh...what the fuck is the Federation?" Austin asked, fearing it was another company like Showfall.

CLASSIFIED.

That wasn't reassuring.

He turned his attention back to the monitor, though, and tuned back in to Hetch and Ranboo's talking.

"What do you think, audience?" Hetch was saying.

"Let me go, please-" Ranboo begged over him, and Austin noticed the crack in his mask and the blood on their face. What the hell had they done to him?

"Should we let him live-?" Hetch continued to ask but was interrupted by Ranboo's howl.

"LET ME GO!" Ranboo yelled, and Austin flinched away from the desk at the sound of his anguish, but Hetch didn't seem to care for his pleas.

"-and go on in these shows for eternity, or end this one with a bang?"

Austin tensed. No, he wasn't asking that, surely? He wasn't asking for a vote on...Ranboo's life?

The camera zoomed out and it became all too clear. That metal box around their head was a death trap.

Ethan gasped from behind Austin. The last time he'd seen Ranboo, they had been pointing him towards his death. But he knew that wasn't Ranboo, that had been Showfall controlling him. Somewhere in the memories he'd lost, he knew that he trusted Ranboo. And he didn't want to watch him die.

But that was all they could do. The three in the room stared at the monitor tense and struggling to watch as Ranboo shifted from begging for his life to begging for his death.

The timer hit zero. And the vote favoured death.

"Fuck, fuck, no, fuck," Austin put his head in his hands and stepped back. He couldn't watch this. But he couldn't look away.

"Your people are gonna help them, right? Your fucking Federation whatevers?" he stepped towards Cucurucho and shook him by the shoulder. He was weirdly weightless, much like a teddy bear.

THEY WILL GET THERE IN TIME.

For the first time, Cucurucho's perfect handwriting seemed shaky.

Austin looked back at the screen, noticing all the monitors on the wall Ranboo was tied to had the same image on them. A glitchy masked figure.

"Is that...Hetch?" he asked. Cucurucho nodded.

He kept watching. They would save him in time, that was what Cucurucho said.

The box started to swing closed and all of a sudden the monitor went black. Cucurucho had turned it off.

Austin would've demanded to know why he'd done that if he didn't already know the answer.

The dark room was still and quiet for a while, none of them daring to speak. The only movement was coming from the monitors, and when Austin looked to see what it was he was expecting it to be some kind of Showfall worker, but instead he saw...kids?

"Hey, uh...Cucurucho...you got any fucking explanation for that?" he asked. Cucurucho slowly raised his head then jolted, scrambling to pull out a book.

WHAT

"Uh-?" Austin didn't know how to respond but Cucurucho was already focused on a control pad and typing in commands he couldn't begin to decipher.

But at this point Austin began to doubt how well he was remembering everything, and his memories of all this were hazy enough. But he remembered what he needed to.

Austin was happy they'd gotten out of Showfall, of course he was. He just wasn't happy that they'd gotten out with Hetch.

Which was why he was currently trying to tear the man's throat out.

"WHY THE HELL ARE YOU HERE, YOU SACK OF SHIT MOTHERFUCKER?! I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID TO US!" he screamed as Niki held back one arm and Vinny held the other. That familiar masked bastard was standing in front of him, Jerma holding onto one of his arms since he'd tried to run as soon as Austin was restrained.

"Austin, man, chill! What's your issue with this dude?" Vinny asked him as he gritted his teeth trying to keep his arm in place.

"Don't you fucking know?! He's the one who put us all on that fucking carousel!" he spat back at Vinny, then resumed trying to struggle his arm away.

"H-hey, technically it wasn't me who put you on there," the masked man defended nervously, and the last time Austin had heard that voice it had been delivering a verdict of death upon his friend. Just recalling that event put fire in his veins and he shot his gaze back at Hetch with an intensity he hoped would kill him.

It didn't quite do that, but Austin still took pleasure from seeing him flinch away from the fury in his eyes. He'd be happier when Hetch was flinching from his fist.

"Austin? What's going on?"

Austin angled his head and saw Ethan approaching them, looking worried.

"Ethan- you remember, don't you? This is the bastard that put us in those fucking shows!" if he could get Ethan to remember what they'd seen on those security cameras, then maybe the both of them would be enough to persuade everyone else into letting him inflict upon Hetch a fraction of the pain he'd dealt to them.

Ethan looked from Austin to Hetch, and horror dawned on his face.

"Y-you know him too, Ethan?" Niki asked, seeing his expression change. Ethan slowly nodded, his lip curling.

"That's the guy...th-that's the guy who..?" he looked at Austin who nodded, confirming it was the bastard they'd seen back then. Ethan again turned back to Hetch, and Hetch must've seen then intent in his eyes because immediately he began to panic.

Ethan took a step forward just as Hetch elbowed Jerma in the chest, slipping away the moment he had a chance and sprinting in the opposite direction. Austin shouted at him and Ethan gave chase, but someone else got to Hetch first.

With a satisfying thump he went face first into the dirt, a white bear standing next to him with its foot angled out to trip him up.

"Cucurucho..?" Ethan thought out loud, stopped in his chase by the sudden appearance of the bear.

"Cucu-fucking-whatsit?" Jerma replied, approaching them with the other three behind him. Niki and Vinny had let go of Austin, who had taken the opportunity to storm ahead until he was at Ethan's side. He would've liked to shove a foot into Hetch's back, but the bear's presence made him hesitant to do anything rash.

"Hello," the bear said to them in its robotic voice, then pulled out a book.

I UNDERSTAND YOU ARE CONFUSED.
I UNDERSTAND YOU ARE ANGRY.
I WILL TAKE YOU TO A PLACE YOU CAN ALL TALK.
BUT YOU ARE NOT PERMITTED TO BE VIOLENT.

"Wh- violent?! Do you have any fucking idea what he did, what he did to us? He at least deserves a taste of his own fucking medicine!" Austin argued, aggressively motioning towards the masked man currently trying to get back up. He worried that Hetch might try to run again, but to his surprise and joy Cucurucho dropped the book he had been holding onto Hetch's back when he went to grab the next one, sending him back down with a satisfying umf.

I UNDERSTAND.
BUT I PROMISE THIS IS FOR YOUR BENEFIT.

The bear dropped the book on Hetch again even though he was barely attempting to get up, and then leant down to grab the man and drag him up to his feet.

Hetch tried to pull away, panicking when he saw he was being held by a bear, but despite having the look of a plush Cucurucho's grip held firm.

He dragged the protesting Hetch back the way they'd came, keeping some distance between him and Austin as he went past.

"Please follow me," Cucurucho said in that same voice. Austin spat in Hetch's direction and waited until there was more distance between them before he followed.

"W-wait, we're just following this bear? Who the hell even is this?" Niki asked, not the only one hesitant to move in the direction of the bear.

"It's, uh, Cucurucho," Ethan said, as if that would explain everything.

"We met him before- me and Ethan," Austin clarified, "he doesn't seem malicious. At least, definitely not as much as Hetch."

"Yeah, who the fuck is Hetch, also? How do you know him?" Vinny interrogated, moving a few steps behind Austin, the others trailing behind.

"Long story, and Cucurucho said he's taking us to a place to talk, so let's talk there, alright?" he offered, and to his relief Vinny agreed. Austin focused back on the bear ahead of them and saw he had stopped to show a book to Valkyrae and Sykkuno, who had been standing and talking together all this time.

They certainly seemed hesitant, and the fact that Cucurucho was dragging along an unwilling hostage with him didn't really help.

Austin looked over and saw Sneeg, Charlie and Ranboo were together on the floor too. He'd probably do a better- and less traumatic- job of convincing them to follow than the giant bear, so he headed over before Cucurucho did. He also just wanted to make sure they were okay.

When he first woke up he had freaked the fuck out as soon as he saw Ranboo there with them too, head intact and even with a new mask. He didn't know how but he didn't need to, seeing Ranboo still alive was all he ever needed. He was planning on waiting for Ranboo to wake up, but when he realised Hetch was there his plans had quickly changed.

He was awake now, though, and he looked happy. That was good.

"Hey guys, uh, everything good?" Austin asked as a means of getting their attention as he stepped closer.

"Oh- Austin! Yeah, we're good," Charlie confirmed with a smile, and the others nodded.

"Oh, good! That's uh, that's good..." Austin trailed off as he thought of what to say next, "so there's this teddy bear guy, his name's Cucurucho, and right now he's taking us all somewhere- I think we can trust him, though. He seems to want to help."

Austin looked over his shoulder at the bear, still talking with Valkyrae and Sykkuno, but Ethan had stepped in to help at least.

"Where's he taking us?" Sneeg asked skeptically.

"Somewhere to talk, he said," Austin turned his head back to the three, "do you guys think you'll be able to join us, or..?"

He looked down expectantly, and eventually the three of them nodded.

"Yeah, I can walk with you guys, I guess," Charlie said, helping Ranboo up as he began to stand up too. Sneeg was up before either of them and offered help as they seemed quite stiff after sitting down so long.

They got up eventually and Charlie went to take a step towards the bear when suddenly he tripped.

"Oh sh-" he reached his hands out but Sneeg already grabbed his side, stopping him going right back to the floor. Ranboo helped as they lifted him back to his feet, seeming to have no struggles walking of their own.

"A-are you sure you can walk, Charlie?" Ranboo asked, sounding pretty concerned. Charlie nodded, dismissing his worries.

"Yeah, I- just a stumble, y'know, I-I'm fine, don't worry," he tried to smile at Ranboo but even with the mask Austin could tell he wasn't returning it.

"We can probably stick here for a little longer if you need-" Austin began to offer.

"No, please, I'll be fine," Charlie looked at Austin determinedly, and he wanted to argue but struggled to say anything else.

"Here, gimme your arm," Sneeg took ahold of Charlie's arm before he could even agree and put it over his own shoulder. Charlie looked like he wanted to take his arm away but Sneeg gave him a knowing glance, "I don't care if you don't want help, I'm helping you."

Charlie couldn't help but smile and nodded as they started walking again, Ranboo close at his other side and making sure he was okay.

Once Austin was sure the three would be fine following with the group, he jogged back to Cucurucho and the others. Ethan was still busy trying to convince Sykkuno and Valkyrae that the bear could be trusted.

"What, it's not gonna like, try and rip our faces off?" Valkyrae asked him, to which Ethan shook his head tiredly.

"No, no, he's not- he's just bringing us somewhere. I don't think he's gonna hurt us," he explained.

"You don't think?" Sykkuno sounded taken aback by the uncertainty in Ethan's statement.

"He won't, Sykkuno," Austin stepped in, mustering more confidence into his words, "and if he does it'll probably be because you didn't follow him."

"Hey, don't threaten them!" Ethan hissed at him as Cucurucho pulled out a book, taking a second longer to open it one-handed since his other hand was occupied with an unhappy masked asshole. Or, well, his other paw was occupied.

I WILL NOT HURT ANY OF YOU.
I JUST WANT TO BRING YOU SOMEWHERE MORE PRIVATE.
OUT HERE PLAYERS MAY ACCIDENTALLY FIND YOU.

"Players..? What does that mean?" Valkyrae asked, and Cucurucho pulled out another book.

I WILL EXPLAIN WHEN WE GET THERE.

Valkyrae sighed, "right...alright fine. But we'll beat you up if you pull something! And you guys too," she pointed at Ethan and Austin, "I'll trust you on this one, but if you're wrong you're getting punched!"

Austin laughed and nodded. He really hoped this bear was telling the truth now.

Now that that was sorted out Cucurucho started leading them again, Hetch's feet dragging through the dirt behind him. They walked at a fairly slow pace past a hotel-looking building, then into a wider grassy area with a big building up ahead.

Austin was making the most of the fresh air, in fact most of them were. They didn't know the last time they'd been outside, but it was nice to be in open space again, if a little jarring and disorienting.

He dropped back a little as his pace slowed down, taking time to look at the unusual surroundings. They were walking away from an impressively huge wall, and...was that a house on top of it?

There was already too much he wanted answers to, so he decided to just ignore that one for now.

As a few of his friends walked ahead of him and he noted the outfits they were wearing. They all seemed to be in the outfits he'd last seen them in, when they were in the mall, however Valkyrae and Sykkuno without the rat masks, and Jerma with normal facial proportions. He was relieved that he didn't actually look like... that.

He was surprised at how clean all of their clothes were, including his, when most if not all of them had died bloody deaths back there. And the blood obviously hadn't been an illusion, if that wasn't evident enough from Charlie and Ranboo who hadn't gotten the same clean clothes treatment. Their skin was clean enough, but their clothes were absolutely caked in the dull red stuff.

Austin would've liked to be in clothes that weren't assigned to him by Showfall, but it was better than being in the ones that had been crushed and torn along with his own body. He'd manage for now until he found replacements.

He realised Cucurucho was leading them towards the big building he'd noticed earlier, so he skipped ahead a little to ask a question.

"Are we going inside there?" he wasn't completely opposed to the idea, but the building seemed dark inside, and he at least wanted to know what it was. Cucurucho held out a book to him, and this time Austin took it and opened it himself.

THIS IS THE THEATER.
WE HAVE USED IT FOR DISCUSSIONS BEFORE.
YOU WILL BE SAFE INSIDE.

Austin read it out loud as he saw Vinny was peering curiously at it over his shoulder.

"Theater- are we gonna watch a play while we discuss our trauma or something?" Jerma joked with a slightly forced laugh. Cucurucho gave Austin another book to read out.

WE DO NOT HAVE ANY MOVIES PREPARED AT THE MOMENT.
HOWEVER WE DO HAVE SNACKS AND REFRESHMENTS.
WE CAN ORGANISE A MOVIE NIGHT LATER IF YOU WOULD LIKE.

Vinny chuckled, "yeah, movie night, sounds good...those refreshments are pretty tempting though."

They began entering the theater and Austin saw there were warm lights inside, although they were fairly dim. He stopped at the entrance for a few moments, making sure everyone was still following- they seemed apprehensive, but stepped in nonetheless.

Austin walked around what seemed to be an empty tickets counter and emerged into the theatre room, though it seemed much more like a cinema. It was a bit brighter than how he vaguely remembered cinemas being, which was good, as he didn't need to squint too hard to make his way up the stairs beside the seats.

He didn't really know why he was so quick to go up the stairs, maybe it was something instinctual, he did feel a little safer looking down at everyone else without anyone looking down on him.

"I wasn't expecting an island to have a fancy cinema on it..." Niki commented, admiring the space. Austin watched as the last few people made their way in, most eyeing their surroundings with caution since fear and distrust were the main things Showfall had taught them, drilled into their heads over and over so that they'd never forget. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing to be cautious, but the theater/cinema/whatever seemed to be safe as Cucurucho had said, so in this scenario it appeared to be unnecessary.

Cucurucho was at the front, not-so-courteously shoving Hetch down into a seat. Ethan took a seat about as far from Hetch as he could get, and everyone else looked at him warily due to the reactions Ethan and Austin had given. Hetch didn't seem particularly comfortable as he shrunk back into his seat. Good.

Charlie, however, had a different reaction.

"Oh, Ranboo, isn't that-?" he pointed a finger towards Hetch across the room and began pulling himself and Sneeg towards him, but Ranboo held them back. Charlie stopped and looked at him questioningly.

"Let's, uh...let's just find somewhere else to sit," they said uncomfortably, looking towards the seats near where Ethan had sat down instead of anywhere near Hetch.

Charlie didn't understand why, but he did understand the distant look in Ranboo's eyes and nodded, not pushing the matter any further. The three of them went to sit somewhere near Ethan.

Almost everyone had decided to sit down, and Cucurucho made his way to the front of the room. Instead of a book this time he held out a remote, which lit up the projector and screen behind him with text in the same handwriting he used in the books.

HELLO EVERYONE. MY NAME IS CUCURUCHO. I AM A MEMBER OF THE FEDERATION.
I UNDERSTAND YOU MAY HAVE MANY QUESTIONS FOR MYSELF AND ONE ANOTHER, SO I HAVE BROUGHT YOU HERE TO DISCUSS.
VIOLENCE TOWARDS ONE ANOTHER IS NOT PERMITTED.
WE HAVE POPCORN, WATER AND BLANKETS IF YOU WOULD LIKE THEM.

Austin didn't like the violence rule, but popcorn sounded fun. When there was enough time for everyone to have read everything on the screen, Cucurucho pressed the remote again and different text appeared.

THERE ARE THREE SIGNS UNDER ALL OF YOUR SEATS. PLEASE CHOOSE HOWEVER MANY YOU WOULD LIKE.

Austin reached under his seat and, sure enough, there were three little wooden signs, one reading "FOOD", one reading "DRINK", and the third reading "BLANKET". Austin decided to just hold up the "FOOD" one for now.

Niki and Jerma had stayed standing at the front rather than picking a seat, so Cucurucho offered them three signs each himself. They were both hesitant to take anything from the bear, but in the end they both picked out "DRINK" signs.

Cucurucho nodded and took out two bottles of water- how big were this guy's pockets? Did he even have pockets? It looked like a plushie costume and all but Austin remembered when he shook it there hadn't been a feeling of a person inside, so if that fur was actually its body he doubted it would sew pockets into itself. Well, they were here to discuss- he could ask the bear what the hell it was later.

As Cucurucho moved around the room Austin saw everyone else had picked up signs too, all choosing various combinations of the options, Ranboo, Sneeg and Charlie having picked all three with one sign each- Ranboo the "BLANKET", Sneeg the "WATER" and Charlie the "FOOD". They ended up sharing all the items between each other when Cucurucho handed them over, though Ranboo seemed reluctant to take off his mask for the food or drink.

Cucurucho made his way through everyone, carefully handing over the items to most but throwing the requested bottle of water right at Hetch's face instead. Having been holding the sign he couldn't react fast enough and the bottle hit his mask with a satisfying thunk.

"Hey, uh, so...why are you a bear?" Valkyrae asked as Cucurucho handed her a bucket of popcorn and a blanket that she draped over her's and Sykkuno's knees. In response Cucurucho changed the text with the remote again.

THIS IS JUST HOW I WAS MADE.
SOME PEOPLE THOUGHT I WAS A SNOWMAN.
AMONGST OTHER THINGS.

Damn, way to steal his question, Austin thought to himself. He didn't actually mind though, he had plenty more ready to list out.

"Are you the one who brought us here?" he asked as soon as Cucurucho reached him and handed over the popcorn. Seriously, where had he been holding this many buckets of popcorn before he took them out?

Again the screen changed;

THE FEDERATION HAS BROUGHT YOU ALL TO QUESADILLA ISLAND.
WE HOPE YOU ENJOY YOUR STAY.

Vague as hell, but alright. Austin remembered how Cucurucho had been "WORKING TO SAVE THE REST OF YOUR FRIENDS" back in that monitor room, so he could only assume that after bringing them to a hospital he'd brought them to this island. Weird choice, but he'd take an island over a mall any day.

"Why did you bring us here?" Vinny followed with.

THIS ISLAND WILL BE SAFE WHEN THE OUTSIDE WORLD IS NOT.
YOU WILL BE ABLE TO LEAVE WHEN IT IS SAFE FOR YOU.
UNTIL THEN YOUR FRIENDS ARE HERE.

Austin assumed that by friends he meant everyone else in the room- except Hetch- which was fair, because he may have only known these people when they were all in a death trap, but he still got the sense that somewhere in his memories he had known them more. He trusted them more than he had reason to, and he would defend them more than he might defend himself.

Ethan, however, knew what Cucurucho was really talking about.

"So, is...is everyone on this island someone we were friends with before?"

Everyone looked at Ethan, unsure what he meant, but their attention soon came back to the screen as Cucurucho pressed the button once more.

YOU DO NOT KNOW ALL OF THEM, NOT ALL OF THEM KNOW YOU.
HOWEVER THEY ALL CARE FOR YOU. THERE IS NO NEED TO FEAR THEM.

"Hold on, what's he talking about, Ethan?" Niki asked, turning away from reading the screen and looking back at him. Ethan stumbled over an answer and held up a book.

"W-well, I, uh- when you guys were, uh, distracted, we were talking to those other guys- m-me and Sneeg, and one of them showed us...this," Ethan held up the book.

"And...that is..?" Niki raised an eyebrow at him.

"It's a photo album," Sneeg answered for him, "there's pictures of me inside, and all of you guys too. With them."

"S-sorry, who are they?" Jerma asked, just as confused as almost everyone else in the room. Sneeg got up, shifting the blanket over his legs onto Charlie who was zoning out fiddling with the fabric, and walked up to Ethan to take the album.

"Well, while you guys were busy shouting and screaming at some guy," he shot a glare up at Austin, who gave a middle finger in return. Sneeg grinned and turned back to everyone else, now standing at the front near Cucurucho, "me and Ethan were talking with the people already living on this island."

Austin wasn't too focused on him and the book though. With everyone else's focus on Sneeg he saw an opportunity to get away with something he'd been wanting to do for a while now.

He grabbed a piece of popcorn from his bucket and flung it down at the back of Hetch's head.

Hetch flinched and Cucurucho turned towards him, seeming to have noticed. Austin expected he might get repercussions for the supposed 'violence', and Cucurucho did look at him holding the popcorn for a second, and then back at the disgruntled Hetch, but after a moment he simply turned back to the people talking and didn't seem to care.

Huh. Time for Austin to get in some target practice, then.

He was surprised Hetch didn't make a big deal about being repeatedly hit by popcorn, but maybe he was trying to stay quiet because he knew once the attention in the room was on him he'd be getting hit with a lot more than popcorn. Austin would make sure they brought him up eventually, though.

Sneeg ignored the continued popcorn violence in his peripheral and brought everyone's attention to the album, "one of them gave me this, and said that he knew us. And I don't think he was bullshitting."

Sneeg opened the album to the photo of him and the man smiling together, turning it away from himself so the rest could see.

"Wh- wait, hold on, you know the people living here?" Valkyrae asked. Sneeg shook his head.

"No, I don't know them any more than you guys do. But they know us. Because I think all of us have amnesia," Sneeg said it so bluntly that it took a few seconds for the news to register, and he made it impossible to deny as he turned the page of the album with a photo lots of them were in together. He knew none of them could recall being in that photo, being together with other people outside of the mall. But the photo was there. It had happened, whether they remembered it or not.

"Oh...ohhh, fuckk," Sykkuno saw his own face in the photo with completely unfamiliar surroundings and didn't really know what to think. None of them did.

Sneeg had known he had been doing something before Showfall, obviously, people didn't pop into existence in their 20s and 30s, but he didn't really know what his life before would've been. Maybe he would've had expectations if he'd let himself think about it at all, but he was scared what could be hiding in his memories. If maybe he'd forgotten it for a good reason.

But these photos weren't a terrible past, they weren't incriminating evidence that justified why all of them had been stuck in hell, they were just...photos. Proof that all of them had a normal life once. That they'd been happy.

"If they knew us, then...why didn't they get us out of that place?" Niki asked. Sneeg opened his mouth but couldn't think of an answer. Cucurucho held out the remote, however, seeming to have his own answer.

"-eaking news, within the last few hours there have been several reports of online streamers going missing from their residences. Friends and family have reported no knowledge about where they may have gone, so they are reaching out to the general public for any information on these 10 individuals. If you know anything or have seen any of the faces on screen, please report them to the number below. Any and all information will be appreciated."

Everybody's eyes locked onto the screen. A news reporter, and then...them. All of them. All ten of them, each of their faces displayed upon the screen.

They had been missing. And people really had been looking for them.

Sneeg had almost completely resigned himself to believing nobody in the outside world had cared, that nobody had wanted him back and that was why he would stay stuck with Showfall forever. But here, right in front of his eyes, was the opposite.

Even Austin was distracted from his popcorn throwing to take in the revelation. He hadn't been too concerned with his life before the mall because he didn't remember it and that was that, but if people had been looking for him...well, he was a little curious who those people might be.

"So, we forgot, but the people on this island...they know us?" Valkyrae finally voiced a question after the long silence in the room. Sneeg slowly nodded, not looking away from the screen.

"But we don't remember them, I-I dunno if I wanna see all these people who know me but I don't know them," Jerma worried, and from the sounds of agreement it seemed he wasn't the only one having those doubts.

The screen changed back to text on Cucurucho's command, and Austin didn't know whether to be happy or sad that they weren't staring at the news report of their own disappearance anymore.

YOU DO NOT NEED TO SEE THEM IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO.
I AM REQUIRED TO HELP INFORM MORE PLAYERS OF YOUR ARRIVAL ON THE ISLAND.
YOU WILL BE SAFE IN HERE WHILE I AM GONE.
IF I AM NEEDED THEN CALL MY NAME.

Then, rather abruptly, Cucurucho walked away and left.

The room was quiet again, many still processing all the information, and some just caught off guard by Cucurucho's sudden abandonment. Austin quickly planned to take advantage of it, though.

Taking ahold of the half empty popcorn bucket he rose it above his head, making sure that when it hit its target the impact would be more than noticeable. He locked onto his masked target, prepared to throw, and-

Was grabbed by an oversized bear paw.

Austin barely stopped himself from yelping as the white bear was suddenly behind him, holding onto his wrist with a gentle grip but still a firm one nonetheless. He tried to smile innocently to lessen the damage of being caught in his crime. He supposed this was where Cucurucho drew the line of 'no violence'.

Then, just as quickly as Cucurucho had appeared, he left again, but the message remained. Austin stuck to just throwing his single popcorn pieces for the time being.

"So..." Sneeg began awkwardly, eyeing the rest of the silent room, and then pointing a finger directly at Hetch, "uh, who's this guy?"

Chapter Text

Quackity didn't know what exactly Cucurucho had done, but it seemed to have worked, because soon after Mariana and Etoiles returned to the VC he had to turn down their mics in order to hear his own thoughts.

There was a lot of shouting and swearing in a colourful variety of languages as the two of them freaked the fuck out, and Quackity couldn't really blame them for it. No doubt the bear had dragged them into the world of the video game without an explanation and left them to make sense of it themselves.

Cucurucho did explain on Quackity's other monitor that he hadn't shown them the missing streamers themselves, as they probably wouldn't be appreciative of everyone logging in and gawking at them. Evidently he could show them more than enough to do the trick without them yet reuniting with their friends, though, if the continued assault of voices from his headphones were any clue.

But right now it was time to stop worrying about Cucurucho and whatever he'd done, or whatever he could do. Etoiles and Mariana probably needed help calming down.

And by probably, he meant definitely.

"-UN MALDITO OSO, A FUCKING BEAR, WHAT THE FUCK?!!" Mariana was already difficult to hear through the wonderful Discord call quality, but his shouting was even more incomprehensible as he switched between languages on a whim and the four listening to him were struggling to keep up. Etoiles wasn't really listening since he was yelling as well.

"Est-ce que tu nous as drogués ou quoi Quackity?! C'est quoi ce bordel!" Quackity had an even harder time figuring out what that one meant, but from the mention of his name and a couple other words he recognised he could figure that the meaning wasn't anything good. Something to do with drugs.

"L-listen, guys!" he shouted to try and get just a moment of silence in order to regain control of the situation, "we didn't fucking drug you, yes that was real, no we don't know what the fuck is going on either!"

"How are you expecting me to think that is real pendejo, that shit is not fucking real, it's the QSMP, it is a fucking Minecraft server!" Mariana persisted, at least communicating with them now rather than just shouting to himself.

"Because we were there too Mariana, we saw exactly what you just saw, big fucking bear and all," Jaiden told him sternly. Mariana was quiet, which Etoiles took as an opportunity to voice his concerns.

"That is impossible, you fucking drugged us or something- this is a terrible fucking prank video!" Quackity would've laughed at the accusation if Etoiles didn't sound so serious about accusing Quackity of drugging them.

"N-no, I didn't- Etoiles I didn't fucking drug you, you saw Cucurucho and he brought you into the game world, right? If that was drugs then how the hell do I know exactly what you fucking saw, huh?!" Quackity defended.

"B-but that isn't fucking possible!" Etoiles remained in denial despite Quackity's attempts.

"But it happened, didn't it? It happened to all of us. There's no other explanation, Etoiles," Quackity stated. Etoiles stuttered over a response but couldn't make a sentence before Cellbit spoke too.

"You're not crazy, Etoiles- or Mariana, neither of you. If Cucurucho put you in Minecraft then you just experienced exactly what all of us did. So we're gonna deal with it together. Which means no more shouting, please," his plea at the end was likely as much for his ears as it was for their voices. There was some silence in the call before Mariana agreed.

"Okay. Fine. I am going to punch that fucking bear," he declared, to which Cellbit laughed.

"Not until I've had my turn!" he joked, and a little bit of the tension faded with his laugh. Not all of it, but they were making a start. They could at least try to see some good in this no good, very bad, god fucking awful situation.

"Okay, so do we go to the police with this now? The fucking DGSE? Should we not be telling someone if the people who've been missing are in a video game?" Etoiles asked, and Quackity wasn't quite sure if the questions were genuine or if he was just trying to point out how completely in over their heads they were right now.

"We should probably make sure everyone on the server knows first, though, right?" Phil suggested, "they knew the people who went missing, they deserve to know what's going on right now."

Etoiles sounded uncertain on the idea, and Quackity wasn't sure either, "I've sent those messages explaining shit as best I could, and the one about spawn- Cucurucho's probably still there to help 'persuade' anybody else who logs on."

"Wait, wait a fucking second, you knew Cucurucho was gonna pull that transportation shit and you didn't give me or Etoiles any warning?" Mariana asked accusatorially, and Quackity was getting a little annoyed at everyone constantly accusing him of things. Sure, Mariana was completely correct and Quackity had lied to them knowing full well what they might be going into just to get them out of his hair, but maybe he shouldn't have been calling him a liar about the whole thing in the first place. It was totally reasonable.

"Listen, that's not important anymore," Quackity dismissed, "I'm just saying, everybody else who sees the shit on Discord can probably figure it all out for themselves."

"Yeah, because we wouldn't all be having panic attacks right now if we'd seen that shit on our own and didn't have each other to go through it with. Right," Phil replied sarcastically, and Quackity wanted to argue, but he had a point.

"Alright, fine, but what are you wanting us to do? We're not therapists Phil, we're fucking Minecraft streamers," Quackity pointed out.

Phil disregarded the last point and offered his suggestion, "well we don't have to be doing anything serious, but as long as we're all here in these VCs when they come back from the Minecraft world, literally, we can tell them they're not just having a fucked up trip."

"And then if they start screaming at us..?" Quackity asked with a side glance to Etoiles and Mariana's dormant profile pictures in the VC. He could imagine if their cameras were on they might've flipped him off.

"Then we help calm them down. I'm sure you would've wanted someone to do the same if you'd been brought into the game alone, Quackity," he could hear the raised eyebrow through Phil's mic and gave in.

"Fine, alright, we'll hang around and help until everyone's caught up. Dunno how long that's gonna take though..." he sighed and saw that there was still hardly anyone online. He went to check the chat on his Minecraft monitor, where Cucurucho had left and presumably gone back to spawn, and saw a few new messages.

[+] Roier
Roier » quackity im at spawn where the hell are you
[+] BagheraJones

Oh boy.

~

In the end they decided to split into three VCs so that they could efficiently deal with everyone experiencing the concepts of their reality falling apart in front of them. You know, typical QSMP things.

In VC 1 Cellbit was with Jaiden, Phil was with Etoiles in VC 2 and Quackity and Mariana were in VC 3.

While Roier and Baghera freaked out together in VC 1, and Antoine later joined VC 2, Quackity and Mariana had some time to talk, and Quackity was relieved to finally have a calm (ish) conversation after so long.

A/N- this convo would likely have been in Spanish, but I do not know much of the language and don't want to risk any translation errors so it is written in English, apologies :')

"So...you say you saw everyone who was missing when you were there, right?" Mariana asked.

"Uh, yeah, but Cucurucho said he didn't want you guys staring at them, so I guess you'll meet them later or something," Quackity heard Mariana hum for a second before he responded.

"Was Charlie okay?" there was a plea in his tone that he didn't try too hard to hide, and Quackity couldn't blame him. He didn't know where they'd been for almost three months and considering that it had given them amnesia, he didn't expect to like the truth.

He thought back to Charlie though, and what little he'd been able to see of him when he was in the QSMP. Most of the others had looked fine, thankfully, but him and Ranboo, sat together on the floor...Quackity recalled seeing something red. Not on their skin, thank fuck, but it had been all over their clothes, which wasn't really much better on further consideration.

He debated telling Mariana the truth. It would only worry him more than he already was, which was clearly a lot, so maybe focusing more on reassurance would be better. And besides the blood, Charlie looked fine, so it wasn't really a lie. That's what he told himself, anyway.

"Yeah. He was alright. They're not in danger or anything, at least Cucurucho was telling me that, and if they are in danger we can just go beat up anything that's hurting them. It'll be fine," he heard a laugh from the other side of the call, and it didn't sound entirely natural, but better than nothing.

"Yeah, alright...and...he won't remember me?" Mariana took some time to ask the question, and Quackity equally took his time coming up with a reply. This was the thing he least wanted to talk about, but he knew this point was coming eventually.

"We don't...think so," the wound Sneeg had left him with still ached as much as if it had been a real cut. It wasn't his fault, maybe it wasn't anyone's fault- if it was then maybe it would make Quackity feel better with someone to blame and pound his fist into, but he knew really that didn't matter. Their friends couldn't remember them, and they just had to deal with it now.

Mariana was quiet, probably processing the information in his own way. Quackity wasn't sure whether he anticipated or dreaded the point when he would finally meet Charlie again. Surely it wouldn't go horribly wrong- though, knowing those two, maybe it would- and no matter what happened, even if they hated each other, even if Quackity's friends ended up hating him, at least they were alive. Nothing could change that.

A noise from Discord signalled that it was time to move on from those thoughts, though, and Quackity braced himself for what was coming.

"YOU'VE GOT SOME FUCKING EXPLAINING TO DO QUACKITY," demanded the voice of Forever.

~

After a few hours of shouting and trying to calm down each new person that had met Cucurucho at spawn Quackity had pretty much lost his voice, but most members of the QSMP were now on the same page regarding their situation, so it at least wasn't for nothing.

Nobody was happy, and they all remained in varying states of disbelief and panic, but everyone was informed, and they weren't calling Quackity a liar anymore.

Mariana took over when he could tell Quackity's voice was giving out, giving him some time to rest from the chaos. He took off his headphones and leant back in his chair, eyes drifting to the Minecraft monitor that was still open. He didn't reckon he would be logging off the QSMP today.

He debated going to spawn. He didn't want to be sent back into the video game again, the thought alone made him nauseous, but he had questions he wanted answers to, and he was assuming that was where he might find Cucurucho.

He decided not to though, because all of a sudden he realised he'd left his admin on read for the last few hours.

It wouldn't have been the first time, but the situation was pretty urgent, so he still felt bad.

Quackity pulled himself back to the keyboard and tried to quickly scrawl out a reply.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:08
Hey srry I got kinda busy, im assuming u havent been able to log bavk in yet, shits definitely going a little bit crazy with the qsmp rn

Shit, was it really midday already? Not that Quackity ever stuck to a schedule with his food, but even if he did then lunch would be at the back of his mind right now. This came first.

And thankfully a reply from the admin didn't take too long.

◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:11
Yeah no it's still not working, is everything ok? I saw u posted some stuff on the server but I haven't read it yet since the messages were pretty long. Sorry if the server's glitching or something I feel so useless rn, don't even know how to start fixing this stuff.
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:11
I dont think its stuff u can fix on ur end im gonna be honest
Its hard to explain bcs u csnt see the proof thats on the mc server so ur just gonna have to trust me wjen i explain this to u
U can ask anyone else on the server theyll back me up
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:13
Okay? If u know what's going on then I kinda just want to know.

Quackity sighed and started typing out yet another explanation, then he realised no, fuck it, I'm not doing that, I'm just gonna copy paste the one I've already typed out. He went back to the QSMP server, copied his earlier explanation, and pasted it into his DMs with the admin.

After a few minutes he received another DM, but not from the admin.

◯ Ph1LzA Hoy a las 12:18
Hey I'm guessing you're happy for me to confirm everything that happened with the mod yeah?

Quackity chuckled and typed a quick "yea" before returning to his DMs with the admin.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:19
Wow not even waiting to go ask phil if im bullshitting huh
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:19
Quackity you've gotta understand that is an insane fucking story
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:19
Phil told u its true though
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:21
Yeah
But seriously what the fuck???
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:21
I DONT KNOE THAT MESSAGE I SENT IS LITERALLY ALL THE INFORMATION I HAVE RN
Actually do u not know anything abt the other admin?? Like have they not sent u anything
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:22
I haven't got anything, I'd assume they'd come to you if they were having trouble too or something, they haven't sent me anything in ages.
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:23
They might not be online yet ig
Can u send them a message to check if ur both having yhe same issues?
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:23
Can't you?
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:23
I dont have theyr dms
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:23
???
Wdym you don't have their DMs they're literally an admin on the server you're running
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:24
HEY U WERE THE INE WHO INVITED THEM AND ORGANISED STUFF W THEM DONT PUTVTHIS ON ME
◯ ---------- Hoy a las 12:24
I just said I haven't spoken to them in ages how have they been doing lore and stuff if u haven't talked to them either???

Quackity just looked at the admin's message for a few seconds. This wasn't adding up and figuring it out would take forever if they continued over text. He knew his voice was still pretty ruined but against his better judgement he typed another message.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 12:25
Vc

"Am I getting paid for this?" the admin deadpanned as they joined the call.

Quackity suppressed a laugh, "shut up, this is serious- so you haven't been talking with the other Cucurucho admin?"

"No- you haven't?" the admin asked him accusatorially.

"You told me that he'd sorted everything out with you, I didn't think I needed to!" Quackity got defensive, then decided he should dial it down a little as his voice cracked.

"Yeah, but it's your server," they pointed out. Quackity sighed. He was getting a little tired of everyone pointing that out.

"Whatever, just- listen, what stuff have they sent you?" Quackity asked.

"Uh..." the admin stalled and Quackity could hear a mouse clicking and scrolling in the background for a few seconds, "well our first messages were about how I couldn't make it to one of the lore events, he DM'd first and said he could fill in. I asked who the fuck he was and he explained he was the Chayanne admin, blah blah..."

"Did he send you proof or anything?" Quackity interrogated. He recalled some of this, the admin he was talking to now had told him how they were busy on an upcoming stream day, but not much later they followed up to tell him one of the egg admins could take their place.

"It seemed proof enough when he showed up for the event, unless you've given out the IP as well as a script for events somewhere down the line."

"I fucking hope I haven't. Any other messages you wanna tell me?"

"Well, there's not much of interest after that...sometimes he'd DM me about filling in, but then he started showing up when I couldn't without much prompting. That's when I assumed you'd started telling him about me sleeping in and whatever," the admin explained, and Quackity was quiet for a little bit as he took in the information.

"Yeah, no...you're the only admin I have in my DMs, man."

"Wh- wait, what? You mean the only Cucurucho admin, right? You're still the one who set everything up with all the eggs," the admin reasoned.

"No. You're the one who set things up with the eggs."

The call was silent for a while.

"HUH?!" the admin simply exclaimed.

"Well I told you to set some events up without telling me so I could stay in character more, and then the adoption centre showed up, so obviously that had been you doing stuff, right?" Quackity explained to them.

"No? The eggs appeared and I just went along with it, I thought you'd set that shit up and forgot to tell me! You think I wouldn't even ask you before inviting half a dozen more admins onto the server?" the admin asked incredulously.

Quackity shrugged, "well, y'know, I trust you."

"Aww- w-wait, nevermind! So do you not have any fucking DMs with any admins beside me?" the admin stressed their words very clearly.

"No- you don't?" Quackity asked them in return.

"No. Besides Chayanne slash Cucurucho, who like I said, I haven't spoken to in a while."

"And...now you've been kicked from the server."

The admin grunted in confirmation, sounding like their mouth was resting on their hands.

"And I never had DMs with any of them because I assumed you did," Quackity stated.

"And I only had DMs with Chayanne because I thought you had DMs with the rest of them," the admin replied.

Quackity was quiet for a moment before telling the admin, "I think Chayanne just stole your job and fired you."

"So I'm not getting paid for this?"

Quackity sent a gif of Cucurucho dancing in their DMs.

"Asshole," the admin laughed.

Chapter Text

"So...uh, who's this guy?"

Ranboo followed Sneeg's finger and reluctantly landed his eyes on the masked, hooded man sitting hunched over on the front row of seats. From their position a couple rows behind him they couldn't see the mask, which they were honestly happy about. It only reminded him of things he'd rather forget.

"He's a fucking dick called Hetch and he's the reason we were all in that fucking mall," Austin spat out as he chucked another popcorn, which Ranboo noticed this time as the attention was on him. Ranboo wondered how long had he been throwing stuff before they noticed.

"A mall? You're gonna need to give us more than this, Austin, I've no fucking clue what you're talking about," Jerma told him. Austin sighed loudly and dumped his popcorn bucket onto the seat next to him.

"We weren't in a warehouse, we were in a fucking mall the whole time, and then also some kinda fucking hospital but that might've been somewhere else," Austin started to ramble as he realised there was a lot to tell everyone and he wasn't exactly sure what to tell them first, or even how to tell them for that matter.

"Wait, wait, you died in the warehouse, how the hell do you know this?" Sneeg asked Austin. Ranboo saw him recoil a little at the mention of his death but he answered regardless.

"Me 'n Ethan both woke up somewhere after we died, and Cucurucho was there, and we saw some shit-" he began without really thinking of how to structure his explanation.

"Okay, guys, we all know different shit, can we just try and start from the beginning? Who knows everything that happened right from the start?" Niki waved her arms to make sure she had the attention of the room as she spoke.

"Well, I guess I was looking over everything when they had me playing the Puzzler-" Jerma began.

"N-no, there...there was another show before the warehouse," Ranboo interrupted him, knowing there were only a few people in the room who would've known. There were only three of them that had been in that cabin.

Suddenly everyone was looking at them, though, and they realised now the duty of explaining fell to them since they'd pretty much volunteered. Suddenly a hand landed on his lap.

"I can explain to them, if you'd like..?" Charlie offered quietly. Ranboo considered it but shook his head. They knew Charlie didn't like thinking about the cabin as much as they did, but at least they were in control of their own head the whole time.

Well, not really, but he hadn't been forced to believe he was a demon covered in...'slime'. So they were happy to take the fall on this one instead.

"We were...in a cabin. Me, Charlie, and Sneeg," Ranboo nodded to both of them, Sneeg nodding back grimly, recalling how this show had ended, "I woke up first, then I found Charlie, then I found Sneeg later. We did some weird shit, and then I got out, and ended up in the warehouse."

Ranboo skipped over basically every detail, barely giving a skeleton of the story. Great, now he was thinking about Frank. He didn't want to be thinking about any of this, he didn't want to ever hear about ghosts or cabins again, but they were probably screwing themselves over by being this vague because it was only going to invite more questions about what exactly had happened back there. And he wasn't going to force anyone else to explain for them.

This wasn't even the difficult part. At least in the cabin it had all been 'censored', all the horror and death had been hidden under a nice, shiny illusion. His friends had died and screamed and back then he at least hadn't been forced to watch in full detail as they were each mauled and 'dried'.

They saw worse things in the warehouse. That was when the illusion had begun to slip.

But nothing had been censored in the rest of the mall.

Ranboo did not want to think about the rest of the mall.

"You sure you wanna explain this to everyone, kid?" Sneeg asked him as his vision started to unfocus on the room. From his tone it was clear he'd picked up on the fact Ranboo wasn't finding this easy to talk through, but they pushed on.

"No, I...I saw everything. And they all deserve to know," Ranboo indicated the rest of the room, who were waiting patiently for the rest of the story, thankfully keeping their questions for the end.

There was someone else here that knew just as much as him, though. Hetch was quiet and his mask was turned away. Ranboo didn't like how quiet he was, almost as much as he hated to be reminded of his voice. So either way it was a lose-lose situation with Hetch.

They moved on- now wasn't the time to be caring about that liar.

"I woke up in the warehouse next. I got electrocuted-" Ranboo began the next part of their explanation.

"-sorry-" he was interrupted by a mumbled apology from Jerma. Despite being stuck in a character it seemed he retained some of his memory.

"-then I got into the next room," Ranboo continued, but then paused to think of what to say next, "and next, I uh, I found Charlie again."

He glanced to Charlie beside him, who gripped the blanket a little tighter, but his eyes continued looking forward.

"Didn't you find him in the cabin already..?" Vinny asked. Guess not all the questions were being saved for the end. That was fine, though (it wasn't).

"U-uh, well, in the cabin..." Ranboo tried to explain how he had been directed to kill his own friend under the delusion that he was a demon. Charlie stopped him, though.

"I died in the cabin. And so did Sneeg. But they brought us back for the next episode," Charlie didn't look to anyone while he spoke and Sneeg nodded his agreement once he was finished.

Niki seemed to want to argue, but then recalled that she herself had died and yet she was here right now, so she closed her mouth and looked back and Sneeg, Charlie and Ranboo, waiting for one to continue.

Ranboo wasn't going to talk about what happened in the room with Charlie. They had all seen him when he got dragged into the carousel room- slime or not, it was obvious what it really was.

"So next I found all of you on the carousel, which I'm assuming you all remember...well, I hope, at least. I know memories aren't the easiest thing right now," Ranboo admitted, acknowledging their own vague knowledge of anything that wasn't in the shows, and even some stuff that was.

"Ooh, wait, can I tell this one?" Sneeg hopped in, sounding weirdly excited. Ranboo was caught off guard and shrugged, which Sneeg quickly took as a yes.

"Alright, so, all you guys were there, you remember when I went to the 'toilet', right?" most people in the room nodded to Sneeg, most of them confused.

"Well, that was bullshit, which apparently wasn't obvious enough despite being completely fucking obvious," Sneeg laughed and looked over at Hetch, "if you were really the guy controlling everything back there then you must be a pretty special kind of idiot."

"And yet you still ended up Taken," Hetch replied simply. Ranboo bristled at his voice but Sneeg just sighed.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll get to it- so I made up that toilet shit just to get out, and I realised we were all in a mall. Like, right outside that carousel, just a massive fucking mall. I tried to run but these masked guys dragged me back, and once I got back in the room...all of you were kinda 'paused'."

"...paused?" Sykkuno asked.

"Yeah, just like, frozen. I'm assuming none of you remember it, and my memories also go pretty fuzzy after this point, but you were all just stopped mid-action as they dragged me back in, and then I went back to the carousel, but I was not in control. They put my body into some kind of autopilot NPC bullshit, so uh, if I did anything after that then it totally wasn't my fault," Sneeg grinned and gave a wink up at Austin, who joking flipped him off again.

"Wait, so- they? Who's 'they'?" Valkyrae asked. Sneeg hummed for a second as he tried to find the right explanation.

"Well, uh...a company called Showfall, or something. When we were in that warehouse we weren't actually fighting for our lives- well, we were, but not in the way we were thinking. It was all for the sake of a show. Hey, you made em, right?" Sneeg looked back at Hetch, "you wanna explain?"

"...let's just get through what happened in the rest of the cabin," Hetch advised. Sneeg laughed but shrugged.

"Well alright man, but from the death stares some of the people here are giving you I think you're gonna need to start talking eventually," he raised an eyebrow and Hetch remained quiet, seemingly wanting to let the silence get him as far as he could without confrontation.

"Whatever, like I said, my memories get a bit fuzzy at this point, but all of us were there so we kinda know what happened," Sneeg continued.

"Well, I did know what was happening. Until I died," Niki pointed out, prompting Sneeg to look nervous.

"Oh yeah, you guys did start dying, huh..." he laughed sheepishly.

"...not much happened besides the puzzles, though," Ranboo explained, "so we can skip ahead...to after everyone died."

They took a breath and continued, all attention back on them.

"I got out alone and found a room, then uh..." he sighed, trying to think of how many details were necessary and how many he could brush under the rug, "somebody turned off my mask and I saw the mall, like I think Sneeg did."

Ranboo paused to look at everyone else in the room. Besides Charlie at his side and the masked one at the bottom, none of them knew this part of the story. How it ended. Shit, Charlie didn't even know how it really ended...they tried to ignore the nausea building up inside them. They could get through this.

"I got guided through the mall. There was a computer, but it...didn't work. Alarms started going off. Then, again, I found Charlie..." Ranboo hesitated and suddenly he felt a hand resting on his own. Charlie gave him a reassuring squeeze and cleared his own throat.

"Me and Ranboo started looking for an exit," Charlie continued, "but the one we found was being guarded by some monster."

"Wait, lemme guess, there was some guy lying under it?" Sneeg asked.

"Uh...yeah, I think?" Charlie replied, not sure what Sneeg was hinting at.

"Oh, I should've known it was you guys. Thanks for fucking saving me," he told them sarcastically and threw an arm up into the air.

"Wh- w-wait, hold on, no way- i-it was you?" Charlie asked in disbelief, and Ranboo was equally surprised by the revelation. Sneeg laughed at their shock.

"Yep- man, I was this close to that fucking exit, I swear. Whatever that thing was it sure didn't wanna let me go," Sneeg laughed again to show he was joking but Ranboo caught a grimace on his face. It seemed there was some painful truth behind his words.

"W-well, sorry...me and Ranboo ran away, and we just kinda kept running a bunch, and then we found the hacker!" Charlie sounded happy, and it made Ranboo recoil into himself a little. He hadn't known the truth about Hetch. He hadn't lived to see it.

"He gave us a map and then he died, but we found the kill switch we were looking for. I got, uh, attacked," Charlie laughed and rubbed his neck subconsciously, "but Ranboo hit the button! And that's uh, that's everything, I think."

Ranboo winced. No, that was definitely not everything, but it was going to kill him to have to reveal that to Charlie. He sounded happy. Happy that Ranboo had hit the kill switch and ended the show.

But that was never a kill switch. And the show was never going to end there.

"Charlie, I- there was some stuff that happened after that. The hacker...Hetch..." Charlie nodded as Ranboo struggled to find more words.

"I mean, do you want him to explain or something? He got out with us!" Charlie smiled and pointed down to the hooded man. Ranboo didn't look. They didn't want to see him.

"No, Charlie, he- Hetch isn't- he's not what he told you," Ranboo tried to explain, but the information wasn't clicking.

"What, like...he's actually a computer repairman, not a hacker..?" Charlie tried to smile again but it fell as he saw the struggle in Ranboo's eyes. He knew what that look meant. But he didn't want to.

"Well, wh- what more happened after that? You hit the kill switch, and now we're all here, you got us all out!" Charlie continued. Ranboo flinched. They felt like that was about as far from the truth as it could be. Charlie put both his hands on Ranboo's.

"Ranboo, you hit the switch, you got us out, you-" Charlie seemed like he would've repeated himself forever until Ranboo interrupted him.

"That wasn't a kill switch, Charlie! Th-that wasn't- everything Hetch said was bullshit! Everybody else is right, he's the fucking reason we were there!" Ranboo pulled both Charlie's hands up, looking him dead in the eye and making sure the message got across.

"B-but-" Charlie tried to come up with something else to say, only to come up blank.

"After you were killed, he dragged me kicking and screaming into what should've been an exit and when I woke up I was tied to a damn wall- do you see this?!" Ranboo took one hand away, pulling out his letterman jacket to show off the dried blood cracking on its surface, "I didn't get this from hitting a kill switch and getting out, Charlie! This is because Hetch made everyone watching the torture we went through vote on my life and they chose death!"

Ranboo's voice cracked on the last word and the tears came quickly after. Charlie took a second to realise what they were saying before instantly pulling them into a hug that was so tight he seemed he might never let go.

"We both died there, Charlie...w-we all died..." Ranboo said faintly over his shoulder, only prompting Charlie to hug tighter, ignoring how the shoulder his head fell onto was covered in blood. He was just as bloody anyways. If anything, they matched.

The rest of the room was quiet, and then attention fell to Hetch. Fear radiated from him and Austin grinned. Finally, it had taken long enough.

"So that's all true, huh..?" Ethan asked, and there was no point in denying it because it was clear from the tone it wasn't actually a question.

"I'll admit, pretty brave to sit in front of all of us after the shit you put us through," Jerma said, stepping closer to Hetch's seat with hate spiking his voice.

Hetch rose from the chair and tried to step as far from anyone in the room as he could, "listen, I was only performing the will of the Founder, that's the one you should be blaming for this!"

"Really, mister "I didn't do anything, I just wrote a script" ?" Austin quoted what Hetch had said as Ranboo was tied to that trap, the whole speech pretty much engraved into his head after only hearing it once. He despised how Hetch had blamed Ranboo, as if any of that would've happened without him controlling it all from the shadows.

Hetch seemed genuinely caught off guard for a moment, "you- how the hell do you know about that?"

"Wouldn't you like to know, mask boy," Ethan taunted. Hetch tilted his head and his expression under the mask was probably speechless confusion.

"Well, we do have some explaining to do too," Austin realised he and Ethan were yet to tell the group about the last part of the story before they all arrived on the island, which was probably important for the rest of their friends to know about. Ethan nodded.

"And once we know everything, we can properly deal with this guy," Niki suddenly appeared behind Hetch and grabbed his arm before he could try to step away again. Now that she knew what he'd done to them, what he'd done to Ranboo, now she was more than happy to get on board with Austin's ideas.

Ethan nodded, "yeah, so before we got here, me and Austin woke up in this place...Cucurucho was also there," Hetch stiffened as if mentioning the bear's name might summon it. Ethan continued, "he seemed chill and he brought us into a room with a bunch of cameras, and one of them was on Ranboo while they were in some kind of...trap."

Ethan glanced to Ranboo and was thankful he wasn't listening to this part of the conversation, he was still talking closely with Charlie. Sneeg had walked back to the both of them too, looking worriedly at them and glancing occasionally to Hetch with anger.

"We watched the whole thing. Cucurucho said he had other people, and they were going to help Ranboo, and they were the ones who'd helped all of us get out of the mall too...but they didn't get there," Ethan stopped there. The rest could probably be assumed.

There was something else, though. Ethan found it hard to remember, like many things, but it seemed important, and he was just on the verge of knowing what it was.

"Do you remember seeing, uh...kids, too?" Austin asked, sounding uncertain of himself but Ethan immediately recalled something.

"O-oh, oh yeah! Yeah, on the security cameras, there uh...why were there kids?" Ethan asked in return, and Austin didn't really have a reply for him.

"Maybe we should've asked Cucurucho before he left..." Austin realised in retrospect. He'd have to make a list of questions or something for the next time they met.

"Yeah, but that's it, and then we all ended up here. I guess nobody still knows why, but at least we're all on the same page, fucking finally," Ethan laughed, but relief was quickly overtaken by another emotion.

"We're all definitely on the same page on one thing," Valkyrae said menacingly, and all eyes turned to Hetch. He tried again to back away but Niki shoved him back into everyone's view.

"Cucurucho saved all of us from that fucking hell you made, how come he didn't leave you to rot in it, huh?" Vinny snarled.

"I don't fucking know- I shouldn't be here! I should be carrying out experiments, I don't wanna be here as much as all of you don't want me to be either!" Hetch tried to tug his arm away but Niki only ended up dragging him closer until her face was right up to where his ear was under the hood.

"You're not doing another goddamn experiment in your life, you're not putting anyone else through any of that shit. I will personally make sure of it," she scorned into his ear, at a volume that the others could just about hear but it was clear he was the only one she cared about hearing it.

"Gh..." Hetch sounded his discomfort and tried to move his head away, but he could only angle it away a little as Niki continued breathing down his neck, staring at him like a steak she was deciding how to cut.

"No regret? Not even an apology? Jeez, even if it's fake it's just self preservation. You're gonna look at the room of people you ruined, and tell them you don't give a shit?" Austin could've listed all of the things Hetch had done to them, but it would've been long as hell, and that one word resonated with him anyways.

His life, himself, ruined. Austin had a life before the mall, Sneeg's photos proved that to him. And Hetch had taken it all away, taken away all that he was as a person, and seemed to very much regret nothing of it, like all these people standing before him with uncountable scars that couldn't be seen were nothing. He had taken everything, ruined everything, and Austin recoiled when he realised how much the man truly did not care.

At that point he could hardly call him human, though. He wasn't a man, but Austin didn't know what he was instead, and didn't think he wanted to know.

Hetch angled the mask towards Austin, "I regret that I didn't make sure all you background characters were really dead."

In an instant he was on the floor, a loud thud startling the room as Niki shoved his head down to the carpeted ground, and she really hoped it was cheap carpet and Hetch could still feel the impact of the floorboards underneath.

"You wanna say that again you fucking sack of shit asshole?!" Niki spat at him, shoving her palm into the side of his head like she was trying to crush it.

"Hey, Niki, the no violence rule..?" Austin interrupted, but it didn't sound like he was in any kind of hurry to stop her.

"You think I give a shit what that bear was saying?! I'll happily fucking die again as long as I get to show him the pain we felt!" Hetch was grunting and trying to get her off of him, but she just jabbed her knee into his stomach and stayed where she was.

Austin looked at her face and it was familiar, that anguish, she had looked almost the same on the carousel. He had no doubt she was recalling what had happened back then as well. The makeup melting down her face had been removed but she didn't look far off from crying again.

He didn't want to see her this hurt, and he didn't want to see anything happen to her if Cucurucho enforced punishment for breaking the rules.

He did want to see Hetch hurt, but not at the cost of his friends.

"He's not worth you getting in trouble too, if anyone knows you can make someone's life hell without necessarily hurting them then it's us," Austin tried to convince her, bringing them back to the time they'd spent under Showfall's heel. Sure, it ended in horrific death, but there was plenty of hurt leading up to that point, mostly dealt to their minds.

The reminder of that time seemed to freeze her for a moment as Hetch crawled a small distance across the floor. She blinked a few times before she refocused on the world, then lunged to grab Hetch's arm and pin it to his back.

"Don't fucking remind me of that stuff Austin! We're out and I don't want to think about that shit ever again!" she twisted Hetch's arm and he grunted in discomfort.

"We can't just try and ignore all the bad stuff forever," Jerma told her, but she didn't at all seem convinced, and Austin was tempted to disagree. They'd forgotten their whole lives, he'd be more than happy to just forget his trauma too.

He didn't get to voice that, though, as they were all abruptly interrupted by a tall white bear. Nobody had seen how he got there and Niki didn't notice his presence until he was picking her up with one paw under each shoulder. Niki howled and scratched blindly behind herself at the unknown threat as her feet were lifted off the floor.

"What are you doing?" it was surprising to hear the robotic voice rather than having to read the bear's words, but it seemed more effective at calming Niki down.

"G-get off me! Don't you know what he's done?!" she demanded, still struggling but no longer trying to tear out one of Cucurucho's buttons.

"Yes," Cucurucho replied in that same voice.

"Then why won't you let me kill him?!" Niki yelled, kicking her feet right towards Hetch but too high above the ground to hit him.

Cucurucho stepped away and put Niki down, still holding her by one arm so she couldn't get the kick that she so desperately wanted to pound into Hetch's back. With his other arm Cucurucho grabbed a remote and Niki took a few seconds to stop throwing herself at the man on the ground and read what the text had changed to.

I DO NOT CONDONE HIS ACTIONS.
HE WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE.
BUT PLEASE UNDERSTAND VIOLENCE WILL NOT BRING YOU CLOSURE.
VIOLENCE WILL ONLY BRING MORE PAIN.

Cucurucho waited to make sure Niki had actually read it before changing it again.

I WILL MAKE SURE HE DOES NOT HURT YOU.
ALL I ASK IS THAT YOU DO NOT HURT HIM.

Niki scowled, clearly opposed to the deal, and when everyone thought about who Hetch was, so were they. Austin was at least interested by Cucurucho's words though- it seemed the rule against violence was supposed to be 'for their own good' or something.

Austin didn't know how much good it did him to watch as his captor and torturer stood in front of him unscathed and seemingly never going to face any consequences for the innumerable amount of shit he did, and it was easy to assume violence might fix that problem, but he realised Cucurucho may have had a point. Say he did beat Hetch to hell and back, maybe he killed him- what then? Would that solve anything? Would that make him feel better?

At first he assumed obviously, of course that would make him feel better, but then he recalled the sensation of blood under his nails and he'd sooner throw up than feel that again. So maybe violence wasn't a quick fix to all of his problems? Now that was a pretty wild concept.

Niki tugged her arm, not getting out but still dragging Cucurucho a little closer, "why are you telling us what we should do about this asshole? Who even are you?!"

MY NAME IS CUCURUCHO.

Niki sighed angrily at the text on screen, "you know what I mean!"

"I think for now we just follow what he says, Niki...from what I've seen of him there hasn't been any suggestion he's actually on Hetch's side," Ethan advised her, but she remained defiant.

"How can you trust what you and Austin saw of this bear? That couldn't have all been some show just to get your trust? Because yeah, that's never happened before!" Niki spat sarcastically with another attempted kick at Hetch.

"He's the one who got us out, though- we know that pretty much for certain, and getting us out of that mall has gotta count for something!" Ethan persevered.

"He did, really? With all the shit they had to keep us there? I don't think some fucking bear could do all of that," Niki doubted Cucurucho's skills, not caring much if he took it as an insult.

"But he wasn't alone, I think! Me and Austin both saw other people on the cameras," Ethan remembered, looking to Austin for a reassuring nod.

"What, the kids? Oh great, he also exploits child labour or something!" Niki threw up her free arm in exasperation, and both Ethan and Austin struggled to come up with a convincing reply. It was admittedly a little concerning if the rest of Cucurucho's team was made up of children.

Cucurucho had a reply, though, and the screen changed.

YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO MEET THEM IF YOU WOULD LIKE.

"The...kids?" Vinny checked, and Cucurucho nodded.

"Is that gonna be, like, legal?" Ethan checked, still lingering on Niki's accusation of child labour.

"Yes," Cucurucho replied. Well, that was enough for him, he guessed. Time to go and meet some kids.

And then maybe call childline afterwards depending how it went.

Chapter Text

Sykkuno had the feeling that something was wrong. Not necessarily bad, just...wrong.

He was walking side by side with Valkyrae, his discomfort only growing if the two of them were far away from each other. That might've been a feeling instilled in him by Showfall, as he remembered it being the same back then, but there were far worse things Showfall had done to him.

Maybe before being in that place he hadn't been so quiet, maybe he hadn't even known Valkyrae. But he knew he was probably different from before, and it wouldn't be a quick and easy fix to go back to the way he was. So he stayed by Valkyrae's side, and he stayed quiet about the wrong-ness growing in the back of his mind.

Everything was fine right now, so it was probably nothing.

Cucurucho was leading the group, Hetch feeling threatened enough that he didn't need the bear grabbing him to follow its lead. Niki continued baring her teeth at him but she also understood the warning Cucurucho had given, so kept her distance for now. Being picked up once was enough for her to know she didn't enjoy it.

They walked back to where they'd arrived on the island, and then past it, reaching the other side of the wall. They followed along the road but there were no cars in sight, nor were there people in any of the unusual buildings they walked past. It was a little disconcerting for it to be so quiet, but that wasn't what Sykkuno felt was wrong, if anything it was peaceful.

He could see pretty scenery up ahead and felt Valkyrae getting more exited at his side as she realised that's where they were heading. She seemed happy, and he was happy to see her that way after thinking they might've forgotten how to feel things like joy in Showfall. So whatever was wrong couldn't have been that bad.

He ignored the unresolved doubts and tuned in to the conversation between Ethan and Vinny. Everyone else was happy to walk in silence, making the most of little things like sunshine and fresh air that being trapped in a mall had made seem like luxuries.

"You and Austin are sure you weren't hallucinating or anything?" Vinny was asking about the children Ethan and Austin claimed to have seen working alongside Cucurucho, evidently still skeptical despite Cucurucho saying he was leading them to the kids right now.

"Hallucinating the exact same thing seems kinda unlikely, especially when it's as absurd as that. Trust me, I wouldn't be telling you about something like that unless I was sure," Ethan assured him. Vinny still seemed doubtful, and was probably now just waiting on the visual proof.

Austin, walking near the front, suddenly stopped. Sneeg halted a few steps behind.

"What is it?" Sneeg tried not to sound too worried as he looked quickly from Austin to the path ahead, one arm already outstretched to stop Ranboo and Charlie too. They'd been told it was safe plenty of times already, but they'd learnt to fear everything on far more occasions. Showfall's scars were still fresh.

Now all of them were looking ahead, Austin hesitant to provide an answer. Only Cucurucho continued ahead, eventually reaching the side of the figure they were all staring daggers into. They were visibly a little uncomfortable under the heavy gaze of 11 distrustful older figures, so Cucurucho leant down a little to hold their hand, because the bear was a little too tall to reach such a small figure. Because the older figures were quite a bit older, because the younger figure looked a lot like a child.

"Huh," Vinny was first to break the silence, though had nothing more to say. There was his proof, he supposed.

"Believe us now?" Ethan elbowed him playfully, but he didn't give much of a response as his eyes were still trained on the young kid. She didn't look scared, per se, but being looked at so scrutinously was evidently not enjoyable from her expression. Curly brown hair almost covered her eyes, barely held at bay by a red beanie that seemed to almost be slipping off the back of her head.

Sykkuno looked at her face for a moment before something much stranger caught his eye, and once he'd seen it he seriously questioned how it wasn't the very first thing he saw about the girl. She had a pair of wings, and behind her skirt he thought he might've even caught glimpse of some sort of tail.

And, maybe strangest of all, this didn't seem strange at all.

To him, at least.

"W-why is there a fucking child right here?" Jerma demanded of anyone who was willing to answer.

"Hey, language, there's a kid right there," Ethan told him. Jerma looked incredibly unimpressed.

"Yeah, no shi- ugh, whatever, can someone just explain..." Jerma stumbled over his words and waved his arms in the direction of the kid, eventually settling on, "this?"

Cucurucho began to pull out a book, but the girl tugged on the paw she was holding on to and shook her head, before taking out a sign of her own. She let go of Cucurucho's hand to begin writing on it and Cucurucho looked down at her patiently, as did everyone else, although their patience was mixed with a bit more tension.

After quickly scribbling down her message she spun the purple sign for the onlookers to see.

I'm Tallulah, it's very nice to meet all of you. I was working with everyone else to get you all here. I know I look like a child to all of you but I assure you I'm not that young.

Sneeg considered the words for a few moments before responding, "everyone else..? How many kids does this bear have working for it?"

Tallulah huffed and pointed to the last sentence.

"Oh, right, not a kid..." Sneeg scratched his chin, "why do you look so young, then?"

Tallulah took out a second sign.

It's just how we look. We don't really work like humans.

"Wait, then...what the fuck are you?" Vinny asked, sounding a little afraid.

Cucurucho took out a book as Tallulah worked on another sign.

RUDE.

We don't know ourselves, we're still kind of figuring it out.

She glanced at Cucurucho's book and decided to make and addition to her sign.

also yeah, rude

Vinny just sighed and couldn't come up with a response, not really expecting a giant bear and winged child's concerns with his manners to be a problem he'd encounter today.

Tallulah took out another sign from her pockets that were definitely not big enough to contain wooden signs, nevermind this many of them, and wrote on it before showing it privately to Cucurucho. Cucurucho handed her a book in response, then took out another to show to the group.

THE OTHER EGGS ARE UP AHEAD.
ARE YOU ALL STILL HAPPY TO MEET THEM?

Nobody disagreed, and Hetch probably wanted to but he didn't dare. Right now curiosity had taken over most of their minds, and they couldn't just say no to meeting the rest of these technically-not-kids. Tallulah also finished the book Cucurucho gave her and got out another sign, forming a purple wall with all the ones she'd put down already.

I need to leave so don't overwhelm the huevos with all your staring and rude questions. Otherwise my bro will kick your ass.

"I-I didn't mean to be rude!" Vinny defended himself.

"Your 'bro'? Who's that?" Niki asked, hesitant to ask in case her sibling turned out to be more dragon than human. She assumed that was what the wings and tail were supposed to represent, at least. Tallulah only pointed to Cucurucho, though.

"Him..? He's a bear?" Austin pointed out, his confusion making it sound more like a question. Tallulah just nodded, though, and Cucurucho held up a book.

SOMETIMES I'M NOT A BEAR.
TECHNICALLY WE'RE STILL NOT SIBLINGS, THOUGH.
THOUGH TECHNICALLY WE ARE.
IT'S COMPLICATED.

"Yeah, clearly," Sneeg scoffed and Tallulah pointed back to her We don't know ourselves, we're still kind of figuring it out. sign, seeming somewhat offended on Cucurucho's behalf. Then she pointed back at the last sign she'd placed down, announcing her exit, and skipped away.

"And...she's not the only kid?" Jerma asked once she was gone, seeming scared by the idea of meeting even more of these kids. Cucurucho pointed to one of her signs, though.

"Right. Not kids," Jerma corrected himself, sounding exhausted.

Cucurucho didn't wait for any further questions and started walking again, everyone else not having much of a choice but to follow him. They stepped around Tallulah's signs, getting closer to leaving the road and reaching the grassy, almost otherworldly beautiful garden area, with huge trees and rows and rows of vibrant flowers.

To Sykkuno's surprise Valkyrae wasn't too focused on the garden anymore, though, and instead lightly elbowed him to get his attention away from it.

"Hey, you think...he's gonna be there?" she asked him.

Sykkuno was caught off guard, not registering what it was she was talking about, but then it came to him. Yes, the one they'd both seen back then...he nodded. It only made sense that he would be here too.

Valkyrae smiled, which made Sykkuno smile, and they both walked on. The silence and tense whispers of the group left him alone with his own thoughts, though, and like always they drifted back to that feeling that bothered him, that hadn't stopped bothering him since they'd gotten here. But like he said before, it was fine, so he pushed the feeling away. It would surely be fine.

One by one they stepped into the grass and Cucurucho accommodated his pace as they all slowed to take in the surroundings. Sykkuno looked at the flowers and was sure not all of them grew in the same place or season as one another, but they were all pretty nonetheless. Their colours were so eye catching that he barely noticed the kid in a bright yellow shirt until he was almost about to step on him.

"Oh- uh-" Sykkuno was about to apologise but he looked at the kid closer, his big afro of hair covering half his face and the wings and tail that matched Tallulah. He was giving Sykkuno a toothy grin, some of which were missing, and he was just on the verge of saying something more when Valkyrae beat him to it.

"Kid!" she shouted excitedly, dropping down to hug him and almost knocking him over but he hardly seemed to mind, quickly returning the hug. Sykkuno stood by in shock for a moment before the smaller figure took ahold of his shirt and pulled him into the hug too.

"H-hey, do you guys know him?" Jerma asked, barely keeping up with all the information they were being confronted with.

Valkyrae whipped around excitedly, still keeping an arm on the small figure's shoulder, "yeah! He found me and Sykkuno in the mall! I was so worried something happened to him- y-you're okay, right kid?" she turned back to him, realising she didn't actually know if he was alright, but he looked fine.

He took out a sign of his own, a blue one this time, and scribbled something down quickly.

Yes I'm fine! I'm happy you're ok too rat lady! The name's Richarlyson, also!

Valkyrae couldn't help but giggle at the sign, "good to know- but you can call me Valkyrae, not rat lady. And you can call him Sykkuno," Rae pointed to Sykkuno, anticipating that Richarlyson might try to call him something similar. Richarlyson nodded enthusiastically, clearly having meant no offense, and Valkyrae understood why that might've been the name he defaulted to since the last time they saw each other she was dressed as a rat.

"Wait, you guys saw the kids- uh, eggs, too? And you didn't try and back us up or anything?" Austin sounded betrayed, but Rae just shrugged.

"Yeah, we saw them. I kinda forgot for a bit, but I definitely remember now," she smiled to Richas, who hadn't stopped smiling the whole time they were there.

"You could've said something- when did you even see each other?" Ethan asked in disbelief.

"Well, we didn't really get killed the same way all of you did, so after the warehouse stuff me and Valkyrae were kinda just...left there," Sykkuno explained, sounding bitter but he knew it was probably better to be forgotten by Showfall than to be killed by them.

"But this little guy came and found us!" Valkyrae was probably moments away from pinching Richas' cheeks and babytalking him, and right now it didn't look like he would mind.

"Do you remember what happened after that..?" Sykkuno asked Valkyrae in a quieter tone, and she opened her mouth to respond immediately, but then stopped herself and thought.

"Well, uh...no. It kinda just went black after a while. I remember Richarlyson told us he was there to get us out, though..." Rae looked at Richas, who nodded along with her, then took out a sign when she was done.

When we got out of the mall we had to use emergency procedures, and you guys got knocked out...which is why I'm happy you're okay now! You were out for kind of a while.

Richarlyson let some of his worry finally seep through into his happy expression, but then it all turned into relief that his worries were over nothing.

"Does anyone else have anything they know that they wanna admit to the rest of the group as well? Have we covered everything now?" Sneeg turned to everyone and raised his eyebrows. After a moment nobody spoke up so he sighed, "if one of you remembers something later I swear..."

"Oh, I uh...saw the kids too," Hetch mentioned, and Sneeg fired him an irritated look, while Richarlyson fired him a bullet.

Niki screamed.

~

Cucurucho berated Richarlyson for drawing a gun on someone, even though he was insistent it was only a warning shot and he wasn't even aiming for Hetch. Hetch seemed shaken, constantly glancing to the bullet hole in the tree behind him and a just a little to the left, but the only comfort he got was Cucurucho telling him to call the eggs "eggs" instead of kids. He didn't really understand why but he wasn't in a mood to argue.

Niki, meanwhile, was being comforted by almost everyone else. Shockingly she didn't do well with guns.

She had calmed down and controlled her breath since the shot was fired, but her hands kept flinching to her chest, expecting to find one bullet hole each, expecting to find blood. But her crimson costume was dry, and her wounds were gone, although they were far from healed.

Jerma was understanding when she didn't want him to be near her, so he walked to Valkyrae and Sykkuno, the only ones who weren't huddled around Niki trying to ground her and stop her shaking. They clearly wanted to help too, as they watched everything happening with concern, but having too many people surrounding her right now would probably be overwhelming. So they stayed back, and stayed with Richarlyson.

When Jerma came over he caught sight of the barrage of apologies he'd scrawled around himself, on enough wooden signs that he could probably build a house out of them. Valkyrae tried to assure him it was fine, that she would've shot Hetch too, but his smile was long gone and he was clearly filled with remorse.

But right now the three were quiet and just watching the rest, so Jerma thought it might be good to spark conversation, if only as a distraction from what was going on.

"So, uh, you say you were one of the ones that got us out of there?" Jerma crouched down in the grass and looked as Richas slowly nodded and rubbed one of his eyes.

"How exactly did you get everyone out of the mall? No offense, but it seems like a difficult task considering your size..." Jerma followed with. Richarlyson shot him an aggressive stare and he recoiled nervously as Richas put down his sign.

How dare you. But it was pretty simple I just used my gun and everyone else took care of the hard stuff. Dapper is such a nerd about it.

Jerma nodded and hoped he could just move on past his unintentional insult, "oh, right, uh...who's Dapper?"

A nerd

"Yeah, I...I gathered," Jerma sighed. If the eggs didn't want to be called kids then maybe they should stop acting like them, but whatever.

"How many of there are you, exactly? We never got a specific answer," Valkyrae asked, and Richas seemed to hesitate over his answer for a while, but eventually span his sign around to show them.

seve six

"Six of you eggs rescued all ten- I guess eleven- of us?" Jerma didn't hide his disbelief, and he was tempted to exclude Hetch from the people they'd rescued since Cucurucho admitted he wasn't meant to be there too, but either way he was with them now, so he might as well be included.

Six eggs, and one bear.

"Right, Cucurucho too. Austin and Ethan said he was helping from the outside," Sykkuno recalled.

Yeah, it was him, Tallulah and Dapper doing all the nerd tech stuff. Between me and you guys I think he just wanted to keep Tallulah away from the main mission, though...

Richarlyson glanced back at Cucurucho, who was standing with Hetch, making sure that he wasn't looking at the sign.

"That leaves three other eggs in the mall with us, right? What were their names?" Jerma asked.

Ramon, Leonarda and Pomme. I heard that Leo found Hetch first and shot him. I'm jealous.

Jerma chuckled, "yeah, me too. Why did you bring Hetch as well?" Jerma struggled to understand why Hetch had come with them if all the eggs were aware of how much of an asshole he was.

We weren't meant to, but the plan to get you all out went wrong and we got behind schedule. We would've only brought you, but we had to use emergency procedures to get you out safely, which also brought Hetch with us.

Richarlyson pulled out another sign to continue explaining.

I wanted to just kill him or something but Chayanne said we had to take care of him now, so annoyingly we have to try and keep him alive. We won't try very hard though.

Richas smiled mischievously and Jerma laughed, but had been given another question, "wait, uh...which one's Chayanne?"

Richas looked puzzled for a second, then looked back at his own writing and spotted the name.

Oh that's just another name for Cucurucho kind of. Sorry it's a little confusing.

Valkyrae waved a hand, "pshh, no worries, we can handle nicknames and stuff. Will the bear freak out if I call him that instead, though?"

Richarlyson giggled as he put down another sign.

Yeah. You should totally do it.

Valkyrae smiled, "I'll report back to you with the results!"

Richarlyson giggled and nodded, and Jerma and Sykkuno could only look on in despair. They'd known each other for one conversation and already they were scheming together. This would probably end in disaster.

It would probably be a fun kind of disaster, though.

Sykkuno still felt like things were wrong, but the feeling was fading. No use focusing on that when there were shenanigans to be had.

~

"Can you just stop dragging me along with my old actors?" Hetch requested.

Cucurucho turned to him and he raised an arm defensively. The huge bear hadn't actually hurt him but he felt incredibly threatened by this thing he didn't understand, and that clearly didn't like him. It held out a book and waited for him to take it.

Eventually he did, although hesitant, and he slowly and carefully opened it like he was disarming a bomb, but of course it was just another book.

ARE YOU NOT HAVING FUN?

"Wh-? No, obviously not, those things want nothing more than to hurt me! I get that you're no better but if you're doing this to see me suffer you'd be better putting me out of my misery and just ending the show here," he complained, roughly pushing the book back into Cucurucho's paw as he took out another with his free one.

THE EGGS WANTED TO KILL YOU.
I STOPPED THEM.
WOULD YOU REALLY RATHER BE DEAD THAN ALIVE?

Hetch sighed, "I would rather be fulfilling my purpose to the Founder. But that's not on your agenda, so what the hell else am I gonna do?"

TRY NOT TO GET KILLED.
AND STOP HURTING PEOPLE.

"Oh, what the fuck is this, a redemption arc? You asked if I was having fun, I'd be having fun watching my actors put back in their place and fulfilling their roles, I'd be having fun seeing my Hero dea-!"

Hetch was abruptly put off by a paw in his face. It wasn't a punch, it was just like being muffled with a pillow, and once he'd shut up the bear handed him another book.

I SAW IT ALL.
I KNOW I WILL FORGIVE NOTHING YOU HAVE DONE.
BUT EVEN YOU CAN REALISE THERE IS NO MORE REASON TO HURT THESE PEOPLE.
LEAVE THEM ALONE.

Hetch just dropped the book, assuming the bear had some kind of infinite supply, "you hijack my show, you take all of my actors, you take me, and all you wanna do is give some shitty peace and love message and 'change my ways'? Do I have that right?"

The bear looked at him a second before he took out the next book, and he got the sense it was getting tired with him. Good. Anything to get it to leave him alone faster.

YOU DO NOT INTEND TO CHANGE.
I CANNOT FORCE YOU.
BUT I CAN TRY TO GET THE TRUTH TO YOU.

Hetch scoffed, "the truth? Whatever your version of 'the truth' is I couldn't care less. Maybe if I keep treating my actors like shit and make more shows in this perfect world of yours you'll kick me back to the mall you found me in, huh? Or maybe you'll just get sick of me and kill me."

Hetch didn't seem to care at all if he died, or if the threats he gave the bear only increased his chances of the next bullet piercing his skull, but it seemed to annoy him a little when the bear calmly handed over yet another book, showing no reaction whatsoever.

YOU WILL FACE REPERCUSSIONS FOR YOUR ACTIONS.
NOT DEATH.

"Oh, how noble, pitying the tragic villain," Hetch taunted, waving the book around before dumping it on the floor again, "let me tell you something- I'm not tragic. And whatever kick you get out of giving mercy to me is completely self-serving and I think that makes you a little selfish, Cucurucho. Seriously, keeping me alive when all that does is cause all of your precious kidnapees more trauma and pain than it's worth- You really think you're doing the right thing?"

Cucurucho didn't move and continued just looking at Hetch. He wanted to know what expression might've been behind those button eyes and sewn-on smile, but the bear revealed nothing. Besides another book.

IF THE PLAN HAD GONE WELL YOU WOULD STILL BE IN THAT MALL.

"Oh yeah? Why's that?"

THE PLAN WAS ONLY EVER TO FREE YOUR VICTIMS.
EMERGENCY PROCEDURES MEANT WE HAD TO TAKE ALL LIVING ENTITIES FROM THAT WORLD.
YOU WERE, UNFORTUNATELY, LIVING.

Hetch laughed grimly, "damn, even surprises me a little bit. Guess all my employees didn't make it?"

The bear just shook its head.

"Yeah, thought not. So you would've left me there knowing all I'm gonna do is find more actors and make more shows? Some hero you are."

SHOWFALL DOES NOT END AT YOU.
IT ENDS AT THE FOUNDER.
WHEN THAT IS DEALT WITH, ALL ELSE FALLS.

Hetch raised an eyebrow under the mask, "really, you think you and your circus troupe can take on the Founder? Oh, wait, I get it. That's why I'm here, isn't it? You think you can drag some information out of me if I'm still alive? If torture won't then I assure you this lovey-dovey let's be friends farce doesn't stand a chance."

YOU ARE NOT HERE TO TELL US ANYTHING.
YOU ARE HERE ON AN ERROR AND I WOULD RATHER TRY TO HELP THAN GIVE UP ON YOU.

Hetch lazily dropped the book into the ever growing pile at his feet, "yeah, I totally believe you. Good luck with that, bear."

He leant back against the bullet wounded tree and looked off at nothing in particular, signalling their conversation was over.

~

Niki was seeing red. The sound of the gunshot had long since faded but the noise reverberated in her mind, mixing with other noises and amplifying itself, mixing with the sounds of indifferent conversations and her own begging for life.

Her friends tried to break through to her, dulling the noise for a few moments as they comforted her and told her she wasn't in the warehouse anymore, but all she sensed was danger, all she felt on her fingers was blood.

Her surroundings changed, flickering like a broken lightbulb, one moment an open garden and the next those claustrophobic concrete walls, no time in between for her to ground herself in either. Faces drifted into view, her friends smiling, her friends covered in blood, every now and then it was both.

And there was red, so much red, on every surface, on every person. She wanted to shut her eyes but she hated the darkness too. She was trapped, eyes darting between every detail, trying to find refuge from the horror and only finding herself facing more.

Her eyes caught on a face she didn't recognise, that wasn't a distorted version of her friends. She at first wanted to turn away from the speck of blood on their cheek, but she knew blood far too well, and that wasn't it. Another similar blue mark was on the opposite cheek, and Niki realised it might've been face paint.

The blonde girl had a beret and a warm smile, not like the empty grins she'd seen plastered to her friends' faces and that she'd even forced onto her own. It was survival, and it had almost actually saved her. Before she got too curious, that was.

But even though her mind kept dragging her back to it, the pain in her chest didn't sting quite so much. Her fingers had been gripping onto her white shirt so tight that they were digging into her palm through the fabric but now they loosened a little, and the girl reached out to place her own hands on Niki's. She swore someone else had been trying to hold onto her hands before, but her friends were no longer surrounding her and suffocating her despite their good intentions.

She blinked and she was still in a garden, still kneeling in the grass with what looked like a little girl, still smiling. Her reality had stabilised, at least enough for her to get her bearings. By the time her breathing was slower she'd already thought of the first question she would ask.

"W-who are you?" her voice was shaky, but she wasn't afraid, just exhausted and curious. The girl gently pulled one hand away, keeping the other resting on Niki's lap, and pulled out a red sign to write on.

Red- Niki didn't like all the red in this situation, not the line on the girl's cheek, the butterfly wings on her back or the clothes on her own body. The girl felt Niki's hands start to shake and held them a little tighter. It helped, if only a little.

I'm Pomme. I'm here to help with whatever you need.

Pomme turned her sign around and Niki's eyes blurred for a few moments before she could focus them enough to read it. She nodded once she'd processed the message.

"Oh, alright...and you're like Tallulah, and Richarlyson? You're all 'eggs'?" Niki looked Pomme up and down, not meaning anything bad by it but just trying to understand. From what could be seen she was no more than an average young child, although the wings and tail conflicted that a bit. Niki remembered the other eggs had those features too, which didn't make it less strange, but at least it was less likely she was losing her mind.

Pomme nodded in response to her question and took out another sign, Niki being a little impressed by how she could write and perform actions so well only using one hand.

In a way they are all my siblings! We are all here to protect all of you. But the last three are late, obviously, so I hope you don't mind it's just me for now.

Pomme pouted, making it clear she was annoyed at the absence of her siblings, and it caused Niki to chuckle for a moment. Pomme looked proud for a second before she quickly turned her head to get another sign.

If you'd be happier with your friends I can invite some of them back over?

Niki considered the offer and raised her head to see where everyone had gone. First she noticed some other red signs she hadn't realised were there, but they were turned around so she couldn't read them anyway. Maybe that was how Pomme had gotten everyone away.

And sure enough, they weren't far- barely out of earshot was a group of her friends huddled around, throwing not-so-secretive glances at Niki every now and then. She appreciated the concern, though they all reminded her a little of overbearing parents.

"I...I think I'll be fine. Thank you, though. For...staying with me," she felt bad for the child-looking thing being stuck taking care of her because she's freaked out so much over a bullet that wasn't even aimed at her. She sighed and moved a hand to rub her chest. The pain had subsided to an ache, but it still lingered. It was a feeling she didn't expect to ever forget.

Pomme just sat by her side, hand still gently laid on her lap, the feeling reminding her that it was real. She hadn't really been convinced any of this was real- after all, she had died. But right now she was feeling undoubtedly alive.

"Why aren't I dead?" she asked Pomme after a long silence between them. She seemed surprised by the sudden question but didn't take long to think before she started writing her answer.

Dying doesn't really work the same in the world Showfall put you in, and in this one too. We can bring you back. But you probably want to avoid dying in the first place.

Niki smiled and nodded. Yeah, she'd rather not die again, at least not anytime soon. But what did Pomme mean about some other world..? Niki decided Pomme probably knew what she was talking about and she didn't have the energy to try and understand, so she nodded and accepted that as an answer.

The two of them returned to silence. It was a nice quiet, she could hear the wind and some birds in the background, as well as the distant chatter between her friends. More than preferable to the dull electric hum that found its way into every room she was stuck in in the warehouse.

It was a nice garden. She thought a huge wall right next to it might be out of place and daunting, but the masses of vines trailing down its surface and inching up from the bottom made it fit right in. The flowers were so pretty, and there were so many of them all around her.

Pomme still had a sweet smile though she was looking off into the garden, absentmindedly playing with a piece of grass in her free hand.

This wasn't the mall anymore. Niki was happy to stay here for a while.

~

Ranboo, Charlie and Sneeg had drifted away from Austin, Vinny and Ethan. Charlie said he wanted to check out the rest of the garden, but Ranboo had seen how his hand went to his chest when the other three started talking about what had happened in the warehouse.

It probably felt further away to them when they didn't still have the blood stained on their shirts.

Ranboo didn't have any resentment for that, they were happy their friends could talk about what had happened without the memories making them want to throw up. They were a little jealous, though. He didn't want to talk about what had happened in the mall, but the memories still came to him anyway, and he just wanted them to hurt less when they did.

Pomme had told them to leave her and Niki on their own while she was still having a panic attack. They hadn't liked leaving her with a stranger but when Ranboo looked over now she seemed to be doing better, and he supposed it might have not been the best decision for all of them to surround her while she was having a bad time.

He had also found it a bit hard not to leave when the egg had shown them all a sign reading My name is Pomme, would you idiots please leave her alone.

Ranboo looked away from Niki before she noticed him staring again and saw Charlie had crouched down in the grass to touch one of the flowers. Sneeg stayed standing nearby, but he was looking at the garden too. Ranboo had to admit, they didn't really care about flowers, but he had to at least appreciate the garden Cucurucho had taken them to. Maybe it was just the juxtaposition to a dull empty mall, but it looked magical.

Something tugged on the bottom of his jacket and Ranboo would've screamed if his voice wasn't still so hoarse.

He tumbled back and another hand grabbed him from behind, but before they could have another heart attack they realised it was Sneeg trying to stop him from falling on his ass. Sneeg pulled Ranboo back up and stepped firmly between him and whatever he'd been stumbling away from, getting into some weird fighting pose, but he faltered as both of them saw what it was that had grabbed Ranboo.

Another kid- well, not kid, he needed to remember that for some reason they didn't look their age. If they even had ages. They had ages, right..?

But the egg was looking at them and Ranboo was looking back, taking in their appearance, still too shocked from their sudden arrival to ask anything like that. They had messy brown hair with a red baseball cap over it, keeping it out of their eyes, which were directed at Ranboo. She was smiling, but looked a bit nervous given that him and Sneeg were looking down on her so intensely.

Slowly they pulled out a sign, eyeing Sneeg who still had his fists up, but not raised too high. Ranboo sighed and pushed Sneeg's hands down, realising there hadn't been any threat.

The egg wrote out his message carefully, giving enough time for Charlie to realise there was a new member in the group. He looked up from the flower he had been completely zoned in on but stayed sat where he was, one hand still fidgeting with a petal, deciding that Ranboo and Sneeg could probably handle most of the conversation with the egg.

I didn't mean to scare you! I just wanted to introduce myself, I'm Leo. Are all of you alright?

No would've been the immediate and obvious answer, but maybe that would sound rude. They didn't want to sound ungrateful to the eggs that had saved them and everything, but the opposite would only be a lie. Maybe a maybe, but that sounded too uncertain-

"No, not really," Sneeg answered while Ranboo was busy deliberating. Ranboo worried the blunt answer might cause offence but when they looked back to Leo the egg was still smiling. They nodded and placed the next sign, almost like they'd been expecting this answer.

Can I help?

Sneeg thought about this one too, and in the end Ranboo was first to figure out how to respond.

"Do you have any other clothes on this island? Uh- adult sizes," they clarified with a glance over their shoulder at Richarlyson's shirt. It was oversized for his small body, but even then Ranboo doubted it would fit him.

Leo nodded a few times and looked apologetic all of a sudden.

Yes, I'm so sorry about the clothes, we couldn't clean all of them in time once we got you guys out. We've started work on getting you new clothes though, it shouldn't be long before you can change.

Ranboo nodded. He'd very much prefer to change now, but it was better than being stuck in the bloody clothes forever. Thankfully their skin wasn't bloodstained, but wearing clothes that were made him understandably uncomfortable.

"Yeah, about that- why did I get the clean clothes treatment and not them? I remember there being plenty of blood and guts on my hoodie," Sneeg asked, already going into some kind of interrogation mode, but Leo was happy enough to answer the questions.

We got you out first, but Charlie and Ranboo were still in the mall, and by the time we got to them we were already making an emergency exit.

"Emergency exit- something went wrong?" Ranboo probed.

We were supposed to get to you before the vote ended.

Ranboo winced. Yeah, they had been a bit late. No worries, not like he died or anything.

He sighed and released a hand he didn't realise had been gripping the bottom of his jacket so tightly. They didn't get the impression that anyone else liked being stuck in these clothes either. They were the outfits Showfall had assigned to them, the outfits they'd all died in. They still stunk of that mall. And blood. Ranboo would never be free of that smell.

The air was a bit more fresh through the cloth mask though, it wasn't tinged with metal and wires. He was expecting that after having that tied to his face he'd never want anything over his mouth again, but for some reason the simple black mask felt right, like it was meant to be there.

They supposed that had been how it was in the photos too- in that album Sneeg showed them he had always been wearing a mask, sometimes like the one he had now, sometimes a slightly different style. The eggs had probably put it on them because it's what they wore before, when they were just a normal person who hadn't been forced through hell.

They were the same person, but Ranboo felt a disconnect from the one they saw in those photos.

The one in those photos didn't have a distant gaze, the one in those photos didn't flinch from shadows and lightbulbs alike, the one in those photos didn't smile like ten deaths were dragging them by the ankles.

Yes, he'd counted. Yes, even if they were still alive, each and every one of those deaths mattered, each and every one of them was a weight on their soul they'd never lift.

Sneeg first, Ranboo had just stood there as he was dragged to his death, screaming and struggling against some absurd monster. Charlie had been second as the demon was 'dried', but then burnt later since that wasn't enough for Showfall (was anything ever enough?), and then he came third too, brought back to die again, torn open by Ranboo's very own hands. He still felt the texture of those rubber gloves and the liquid he knew wasn't slime, but the illusion was a far more stomachable reality, and they were enough of a coward to stay subdued in it.

Fourth came Niki, and it was becoming a theme how they stood and did nothing while his friends begged him to help, begged for their lives. Fifth Vinny, thrown right into the jaws of death, sixth Ethan, directed into it with the guiding hand of a butcher and the voice of a liar. Seventh and eighth Austin and Sneeg once more, left behind because only one could make it, and it just had to be the Hero.

Ninth had been an employee. Ranboo had plunged a knife into their stomach. He thought he'd feel better for it, like he'd overcome something. He didn't. He just felt blade piercing skin and a body hit the floor.

Tenth was Charlie. Charlie again, again and again, he always came back, Showfall always pulled him back for more. Ranboo had dragged him through that mall, pulled him into a hellish reality when he saw him being happy and complacent in his own. Ranboo couldn't stop thinking if it would've been merciful to leave him at that stream, after all taking him away from it had only gotten him killed.

That monster had dragged him down and those screams, Ranboo wished they didn't remember those screams, but he couldn't forget them. Complete agony alongside something inhuman and robotic, piercing his ears, shaking them by the shoulders and yelling into their face "you have done this."

He watched, he saw everything, and like every other time before it he did nothing. When they ran it was the opposite direction, to save their own skin, and so maybe it was only karma that they died too. The final death, repentance, retribution.

But now they were alive again, and so was Charlie, who was currently shaking them by the arm.

"Oh! You uh- you zoned out for a bit there, man," Charlie saw Ranboo zone back in on the world and tried a smile but it didn't come across as convincing as he'd hoped. Ranboo sighed and rubbed one eye with his other hand.

"Yeah, uh, sorry, I'm all good," they nodded to Charlie and then looked at Sneeg, and then immediately looked away from Sneeg because he did not look convinced.

"Kid, if you wanna go sleep somewhere, you can tell us," Sneeg told him. Ranboo tried not to look too excited by the prospect of sleeping.

Charlie laughed, "yeah man, you look kind of exhausted...not gonna lie, I could do with a nap too."

Leo waved an arm and brought all of their attention to him and a new sign they'd placed down.

I think Cucurucho will talk to all of you about where you'll sleep next! We might need to wait for everybody else to be ready, though.

The four of them turned their attention to the various groups scattered around the garden. The three with Richarlyson, Pomme and Niki, Hetch and Cucurucho, and then Ethan, Austin and Vinny who were joined by another egg they had yet to meet. This one most notably had a fake moustache on his face. At least Ranboo assumed it was fake.

But each group was doing well, and it seemed it wouldn't be long before they were all ready. The garden was quiet and remained peaceful.

Until, of course, it didn't.

~

"Hey, get off me! I'm not an animal you little brat!"

Dapper found that debatable, so he simply continued through the trees without giving a response to the lassoed Quackity being dragged behind him.

Quackity continued to fight and shout, to no avail, and cursed himself for getting caught so easily. He'd just wanted to check in on all the new arrivals to the island, without their knowledge, watching with binoculars from a distance, maybe taking out his camera once or twice. Seriously, he didn't see the problem. It was his server.

Sadly that excuse was more often used to get him in trouble than get him out of it, and he doubted Dapper was even listening to him at this point. Quackity hoped he wasn't holding a grudge for the kidnapping and attempted murder- that totally wasn't his fault, by the way. Completely different guy. Totally.

At least he wasn't actually in a lasso. He was still watching it all happen through his monitor, not having been brought back into the game world again against his will. Yet. If this egg was taking him to Cucurucho he was worried that might change.

As unsuccessful as it had been, he'd still gotten some things from his spying mission, such as the fact his friends had stopped looking like his friends now that he was outside of the game. Instead, they all looked like the Minecraft skins they usually used. It would've been weird for all of them to be flesh and bone people in a world made of squares, but knowing they were flesh and blood people and he was just seeing something different was equally weird to Quackity.

"Dapper, come on, I can walk on my own, you're being a real asshole right now! You're not even gonna talk to me?" Quackity tried again, and Dapper did respond this time, but only by quickly crouching twice and then continuing on.

"Don't you shake your ass at me you dumb egg!" he shouted but switched his attention from Dapper as he noticed a change in scenery and saw they were going into Tallulah's garden by the wall.

He really hoped that the other spies were having better luck than him.

"Hello," he was greeted by Cucurucho's robotic voice and saw the rest of the people in the garden had already turned to face him as Dapper pulled him forwards. They were all just a bunch of pixels, but he still felt nervous with them all looking his way. He hoped they hadn't heard what he was just saying, but he worried proximity chat might work a little different for all of them.

"Hey, uh...just wanted to check in, y'know. See how you guys are doing on my server," Quackity tried to explain, but Dapper was already working on a sign to incriminate him.

Found this guy spying on you. Should I kill him?

The sign seemed directed at Cucurucho but Quackity still wanted to get a defence in, "hey, I wasn't spying, I was- w-wait, what do you mean, kill me? You don't mean, like, actually, right?" Quackity didn't know the extent of Cucurucho's powers and he didn't really want to test them.

"Ha ha ha," oh great. It was always good when he heard Cucurucho laugh. Not.

Cucurucho threw Dapper a book and Quackity waited in silence while the egg read it, nervously awaiting his verdict. He dared to glance at the other people in the garden now that he was this close, but wasn't sure if they'd see him as his Minecraft skin or his real appearance, and he didn't know which he'd prefer.

Cucurucho quickly drew his attention back, though, and threw him a book as well. It popped into his inventory like normal but he got the sense Cucurucho had still aimed it at his head.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO RAT OUT YOUR OTHER SPIES?
OR SHOULD I DO IT FOR YOU?

Well fuck. Probably should've known Cucurucho saw all the shit going on on this island.

Quackity looked up the wall where he managed to catch three other players quickly backing away from the edge to hide from everyone below. He'd admit, it wasn't a very well thought out plan, but he thought they might at least go a minute or two unnoticed from the top of the wall.

Dapper started heading to the wall and Quackity assumed he'd received orders from Cucurucho's book to go fetch the others, but they both seemed to be caught off guard as a sound from above started approaching.

"_aaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

Splash.

~

Sykkuno span his head just in time to see four figures fall out of the sky and into a puddle of water he was sure hadn't been there before.

One of them was quick to get back to her feet, and it was one he recognised too- Tallulah was back, a lasso in one hand and an empty metal bucket in the other. One other figure he recognised, the blonde man in the green hat, but he was still trying to get back up after the fall, alongside two new strangers.

These ones didn't look like kids, at least, but their appearances were still quite strange. The fastest to get up after Tallulah was a man with green skin and a bandanna over his eyes, who tried to step away from the egg and assess the area but found himself being held back by a lasso around his chest.

The other person helped the blonde man up as she got up herself, and Sykkuno saw she wore a propeller hat and had wings sprouting from her back. He wondered if they had any relation to the wings all of the eggs had. When he noticed hers he also started to notice a weird similar shape shifting around on the blonde man's back, concealed under his black robe. Did he have a pair of wings too?

Tallulah somehow got the water on the grass back into her bucket and switched it out for a sign, still holding on to the three people with a lasso. She span her sign around with a proud smile.

Told you I could get them bro.

Her eyes were directed at Cucurucho, who responded with another, "ha ha ha," and Sykkuno supposed this was what she'd left to do earlier. If she'd made some sort of bet with Cucurucho, it seemed she'd won it.

Everyone was stood back up now and while Tallulah was grinning the three behind her were a mix of confused and afraid, still getting their bearings after having been pulled off the top of a massive wall.

"You guys seriously couldn't go a few seconds without getting caught? You're terrible spies," Quackity made fun of them from the other side of the garden, clearly not as worried about having been caught.

"What do you mean? You were caught before all of us!" the green man shouted back in offence, snapped out of his shock by a need to defend his honour. The blonde man and woman didn't seem to care much for Quackity's words, on the other hand, as they were too busy staring at everyone before them.

Cucurucho threw another book, preventing an argument from forming, and Sykkuno found it weird that Quackity had no verbal response as it hit his shoulder and he simply leant down to pick it up. That feeling he'd been having was welling up in the back of his mind once again.

"Didn't I tell you that I didn't want you gawking..?" Quackity read from the book, "w-we weren't gawking! We just wanted to check that everyone was alright!"

Quackity looked at Cucurucho as he stuttered over a defence, and Cucurucho didn't seem to be convinced, but someone else spoke for him before he could even take out another book.

"Staring at all of us from the top of a wall without our knowledge? Yeah, sure man, sounds perfectly fine," Sneeg told him sarcastically.

"Hey man, I wasn't on the wall, I was watching you from a tree," Quackity explained as if that solved everything. Sneeg just sighed.

"Hey, uh, who are you guys?" Ranboo stepped in abruptly, glancing first to Quackity, and then to the three with Tallulah. He didn't look like he wanted to put up with any more arguing over petty stuff, realising they were being watched was probably resurfacing bad memories for them.

Quackity cleared his throat and his tone became more serious, "well I- I'm Quackity. That's my username and all."

Username? Sykkuno assumed he might've been referring to the floating text over his head, which indeed read 'Quackity,' whatever that word meant. Floating text didn't make sense of course, and the same thing was over everyone's heads, but he accepted it because he'd come to expect the unexpected and unreasonable from the things that happened at Showfall.

This, however, was a weird kind of familiar, and he wasn't sure he liked it.

"Um, you can all call me Etoiles. I suppose that is my name," the green one followed with, then turned his head to the blonde man to indicate he should introduce himself next.

"Phil. Hiya mates," he gave everyone a wave and seemed overall quite casual, but his expression betrayed some discomfort. Finally the woman by his side sighed and looked out over the crowd facing her.

"I am Baghera. It's good to be meeting all of you. I hope you're all well," she smiled, but her tone remained quite serious.

"I don't think we are, but thanks for the consideration," Sneeg joked, and Charlie elbowed him lightly for sounding rude. Meanwhile Cucurucho had thrown another book at Quackity.

"We are making sure all of them are safe...your concern is appreciated, but not necessary," Quackity read out for everyone to hear and then put the book down, "you sure? There's nothing we can like, do to help, or anything?"

Quackity looked on the verge of begging to stay, and with the new information that he'd known all of them before Sykkuno could see why. He didn't imagine it was easy on any of these people to watch their old friends be clueless to their previous relationships, but there wasn't much any of them could do about that.

Cucurucho might've been sympathetic to the same thing as he threw the next book over and Quackity's eyes lit up upon reading the words.

"Once the new members are settled we may need your assistance teaching them the basics- wait, really?" Quackity could barely finish reading the book out loud as his excitement overtook him, "uh, alright- h-how long is it gonna take them to get settled in?"

Quackity's legs bounced a bit as he awaited the next book. Sykkuno took the time to look back at the other three, looking on with similar levels of excitement and hope. Sykkuno wasn't sure about being taught 'the basics' by these strangers, but he reasoned that they'd only shown good intent so far, and maybe they could actually tell him more about the questions he had yet to be answered.

He at least knew the feeling of things being wrong wasn't directed at them, the thing that felt wrong was the world they were in, and that feeling was growing by the second. He tried to stop thinking about it in case it ended up making him nauseous.

"We'll take them to their beds to rest, so however long it takes for them to be rested," Quackity read, and a little bit of his excitement died down. It seemed that was too long for him to wait.

"Uh, about resting, I was gonna ask...has the day and night cycle been changed?" Phil asked. Sykkuno didn't know what that meant, despite it ringing a bell, but everyone in the lassos seemed to know what he was talking about quite well and agreed. Cucurucho threw another book and Quackity realised with dejection that he was now just being used as a messenger.

"The length of nights is accurate to those in the real world so that this world is not disorienting to the new members- I knew it was weird how long the sun was up!" Quackity exclaimed.

Phil gazed over at the horizon and hummed, "I think the sun's setting now, though...I guess you'll be wanting to take them all to their beds soon?"

Cucurucho nodded but Niki raised a hand from her position in the grass next to Pomme.

"Hey, I, uh...I'm not tired. Like, at all. I don't think I can sleep right now," she stated. Pomme hopped up in response and placed down a sign facing everyone.

Maybe some people can sleep, and we can teach the mechanics to everyone who wants to stay awake? It might be easier if we do it in smaller groups!

Cucurucho looked at the sign, considering it, then threw another book.

"That could work, and then the nosy spies don't have to wait- hey!" Quackity looked at Cucurucho in offense. Cucurucho just looked back at him with his sewn-on smile.

"What does 'teaching us the mechanics' mean, exactly?" Vinny asked, sounding agitated about how all of them were being left in the dark. Sykkuno felt like he knew the answer at the same time as having no idea what it could be.

It was probably to do with the feeling that refused to leave his mind, but if he got answers then at least he would finally know what it was that was so 'wrong'. At this point he wished he could just give up but the feeling wouldn't go. It was so tiring to feel so close to an answer but not being able to put his finger on it.

"Oh, like video game mechanics- because, y'know, we're in a video game right now," Ethan casually revealed.

Sykkuno looked at him. Oh. That's what it was.

"WHAT?!" Valkyrae screeched.

Chapter Text

Niki couldn't go to sleep because every time she shut her eyes it felt like she'd died.

She hated knowing what death felt like with such painful clarity. It wasn't peace, it wasn't rest at the end of a long and fulfilling life, it was emptiness. It was infinite and it was nothing and it was a reminder that none of it had meant anything. None of her acting, none of her fighting. It had all come to an end and she had nothing to show for it.

A part of her was almost sad that they'd healed her and brought her back without her scars, as though she'd never died in the first place, because she had. She'd never be able to get rid of that fact, even if her beating heart said otherwise.

The fact that she'd still lived wasn't even something she'd earned, it felt more like dumb luck. Despite that, she was thankful that somebody had bothered to wake her up from that void of death, and she knew for sure that she did not want to go back. Life had been given to her and as long as she had it she didn't care so much if she deserved it, she would kick and scream and bite if anyone tried to pry it from her nails again.

Freedom, though, that was the part she couldn't ignore. Whether she had any right to be free, whether she even was free and this wasn't all another elaborate lie. She didn't remember any part of her life in which she was free, she only remembered that warehouse and that mall, so the feeling was so alien to her.

She was sure in another lifetime she would've been thankful for it, she would've pledged her life to the ones who saved her from her hell, but as she was right now she just wanted to put one foot in front of the other and keep her eyes open. She could think it all over later, and she hoped that later would end up meaning never.

She was walking with Pomme, who hadn't left her side since they'd met. It seemed the people in this place liked to walk and talk, and right now they were being lead towards some kind of museum, although from the vague descriptions they'd gotten it sounded more like a gallery.

The four strangers had decided it would be a good place to take them first, though they hadn't explained why. It had been something to do with going over their memories before talking about the video game stuff, but Valkyrae soon made it apparent that she wasn't willing to wait that long for answers.

"You can't just say that and act like it's all the explanation we need!" she was shouting at an increasingly exasperated Ethan.

"I told you that's all I know! Sneeg was there too, maybe he knows something," Ethan flung his arm towards Sneeg, who had clearly been trying to avoid the conversation.

"Sneeg?!" Rae yelled in shock and betrayal. Sneeg had winced before she even said his name.

"Jeez, way to throw me under the bus, Ethan," he groaned.

"Hey, you were the one earlier telling everyone to spill and you didn't say anything then," Ethan pointed a finger at him accusingly. Sneeg opened his mouth to defend himself but couldn't come up with anything so he settled for an annoyed and dismissive grunt.

Niki looked at the group they'd ended up with. Unsurprisingly, a lot of people had been far too restless to consider sleep after all they'd been through in the last day. Although maybe it was actually a few days, or maybe even a few hours. It was surprisingly hard to tell the difference.

Some people had received the opposite effect, though, and they were exhausted. Ranboo had looked about ready to collapse when Cucurucho informed them there was still half an hour to wait before they could all go to bed. Setting a bedtime for a bunch of traumatised adults and one teen seemed a little odd, especially when it limited how early they could sleep rather than how late they could stay up, but at least for Niki it meant she wasn't forced to lie in a bed with nothing but her own thoughts tormenting her.

Charlie had stayed with Ranboo, as had Austin, Vinny and Jerma. Cucurucho and most of the eggs had stayed with them to show them to their temporary bedrooms, which was likely the main reason Hetch had stayed with the awake group, since being asleep around the eggs was most certainly a death wish on his part. Sykkuno and Valkyrae had stayed together to bully Ethan- and now Sneeg, unfortunately for him- for answers, despite the four new people probably knowing far more than any of them.

At the front of the group were Quackity, Etoiles, Phil and Baghera, as they had introduced themselves and as the names above all their heads resembled. They were talking quietly to one another and trying to make it so they couldn't be heard, and Niki probably could hear what they were saying if she zoned in on the conversation but she would rather focus on her friends' conversation to make sure they weren't a few words away from fighting each other.

Niki still kept her eyes on them all from behind, Baghera's wings being the most eye catching thing, but after a while she saw the evening light catching on similar shapes concealed under Phil's and Quackity's clothes. Ironically the strangest of them didn't have any extra limbs, he just had green skin, which Niki wasn't really sure what to think of.

If this was all a video game she supposed it made sense because things in a video game didn't need to make sense, and she knew that was a weak as hell explanation but she wasn't as interested in all the details as her friends seemed to be.

Speaking of which-

"I swear I will steal your hat if you don't tell us what's going on here."

"Listen, Rae, we don't know anything apart from the fact we're in some kind of video game. Those guys are the only ones who know anything," Sneeg pointed to the four strangers in a desperate attempt to direct Valkyrae's questions away from himself, "but if they wanna talk to us about other stuff first then we should probably let them."

Valkyrae muttered something incomprehensible to everyone besides Sykkuno and crossed her arms, reluctant to follow Sneeg's advice and talk to the people they couldn't remember knowing. She could probably trust them at this point but she'd rather avoid an awkward conversation wherever possible.

The argument subsided just in time for them to reach quite a fancy looking building, the bright white interior visible through an open arch at the front. Dapper hopped to the entrance first, the only other egg joining them besides Pomme, and placed down a sign for all of them.

Welcome to the museum!

Phil nodded and turned to address the rest of the group, saving Dapper from having to write it all down.

"Yes, uh, this is the museum. We used to have art here, but it became more of a memorial after you all disappeared three months ago," his voice was somber and he paused to gauge the reactions of the new arrivals, some being surprised as he mentioned the time they'd been gone.

"I know, Sneeg said it had only been a few days for him, we're not quite sure what's going on there but considering all of yous have amnesia it's not too much of a stretch to think you also forgot some of the time you spent kidnapped. But, yeah, the museum...it's got photos of all of you, so we thought there might be a chance it could jog your memory, y'know?"

An awkward silence filled the evening clearing, orange glows from the distance mixing with the stark white shining off the marble museum. They weren't opposed to the idea, per se, but Niki was hesitant. She didn't want to come across something in that museum that she didn't want to remember.

It was a baseless doubt, she knew that, but it stuck in her mind like a splinter.

"Might as well give it a try," Sneeg shrugged, and Phil's face lit up with relief that one of them had replied. It was a fairly dismissive reply, and Sneeg didn't seem to care one way or the other, but in Phil's eyes it was still better than nothing.

Phil beckoned for them to come inside and the three strangers did so quickly, Niki and her friends not so much. Niki knew without looking that Ethan was scanning the place for any potential traps. Old habits died hard.

Subconsciously holding her breath, Niki stepped in to the museum. Opposite her was a sign with a cube-y Cucurucho on, something about a second floor, but the sides to her left and right were far more attention grabbing. Quackity tried not to make it too obvious he was watching as she beelined towards a photo of herself hung up on the wall, big enough she had to step back to see it properly. Below it were half a dozen signs, though many of the words were concealed by flowers scattered on the floor. It looked like a funeral.

And hey, that wasn't completely inaccurate.

In the photo she was smiling and for a moment she recalled that balcony her arm leant on, in the back of her mind she saw an apple tree in the garden below. But then it was gone, and it was just a photo. A photo of a dead woman. A woman that wasn't her anymore.

She turned away. Something about the smile made her uncomfortable. She saw Pomme had been looking at her from a distance and she started writing on a sign as Niki walked over.

Did you remember anything?

Niki looked at the sign for a few seconds longer than what it took to read it and shook her head, leaving it at that. Pomme understood and didn't place down any more signs.

"It's okay if you don't remember, you don't have to. We'll help you even if you never remember," someone said behind her, and it took most of her strength not to flinch so violently she fell over. She still jumped quite noticeably, though, as she turned to face Etoiles.

"Oh- uh, yeah...t-thank you," she nodded and pursed her lips as she thought about anything else to say. She didn't know how she felt so it was hard to decide how to respond. She wanted to remember, to regain what she had lost, but it all felt so strange. She looked at the stranger, masked eyes warm despite the unfamiliarity.

"Did I know you three months ago?" Niki asked him quietly, as though the volume would soften the blow of her forgetting the people closest to her. Thankfully Etoiles shook his head.

"No, I didn't really know anyone who was missing, that was mainly the English members. They said nice things about you though. They have set my standards very high," Etoiles smiled, and Niki laughed a little in the assumption that it was meant jokingly.

"I do not think anybody knew him, though," Etoiles added, and Niki looked over her shoulder to see he was talking about Hetch, now standing awkwardly by the museum entrance. She sighed.

"Yeah, he's not...I'm pretty sure that he didn't go missing like us. We don't really like him," she put lightly, not wanting to have to pull out the list of every single reason she and all of her friends hated him and wished he was dead. He wasn't worth the trouble.

Etoiles realised she didn't want to talk much further on the matter and turned his attention to Pomme, asking in a hushed tone, "mon petit œuf, ça va?"

Pomme nodded and began writing in what Niki assumed to be French, so while she put down her answer Niki quickly asked a question to Etoiles.

"Why, um, why do you call them eggs?"

Etoiles looked at her for a few moments and she couldn't tell if his expression was confusion or amusement.

"Well, because that is what they are, no?" he raised an eyebrow and Niki felt a little judged.

"I- do you mean it's like a nickname for children, or something?" Niki asked in return.

"Um, I suppose, in a way."

"In a way? What does that mean?" annoyance was beginning to seep into Niki's tone at the vague answers.

"They are very egg shaped children!" Etoiles explained happily as though it were obvious.

"What does that-?!" Niki was cut off as Pomme sternly placed a sign between them, the side facing her reading Chut. She looked at it for a second and Pomme realised her confusion, quickly spinning it round to the other side which read Shh.

Before either one of them went against her command she placed down another sign facing both of them and began writing.

You are both correct in your assumptions, because you are both seeing different things. Mon papa indeed sees an egg wearing a beret, whilst Niki indeed sees a child wearing the same.

Niki looked back up at Pomme. Etoiles...wasn't seeing a child? He was literally seeing an egg? When she met Etoiles' eyes he had the same confusion in them as her own.

"You- you are seeing my daughter...as a real child?" he sounded in complete disbelief but Niki nodded.

"Yeah...what else is different for you?" she looked around the museum, wondering what they might be seeing the same and what could be completely different.

"Well I don't know what you see, but everything is very blocky, and so am I, and so are you...oh, hold on, there could be a way to show you! Hey, Phil!" Etoiles called out even though Phil was barely any distance away from them, the sudden volume making Niki flinch.

Phil span round, having been talking to Valkyrae and Sykkuno about something in front of the photos of themselves.

"Can I take your camera for a second?" Etoiles asked, to which Phil hesitated before nodding and heading over, giving a quick goodbye to the other two. He reached a hand into his backpack as he glanced at Niki who offered a smile, but she now knew depending on what he saw he might not even be able to see her doing it.

Phil placed a camera into Etoiles' hand and without a moment to prepare he snapped a photo of Niki, the flash, the sharp shunk noise, the lens gazing back at her. By the time she made sure her chest was intact Etoiles had thrown a photo into her hands.

"What do you see in that..?"

Etoiles' words barely registered as Niki focused on the photo, trying to understand it. It was her, or at least it was supposed to be her, and it had her name above her head, but her whole body...it was made of cubes. Her face was pixelated, and although that made it barely recognisable as her own it still seemed like a familiar representation of herself.

She saw in the bottom corner of the photo Pomme had also been accidentally caught in shot, and Niki almost laughed when she saw that yes, she literally was an egg.

"S-so that's...what you see..." she mumbled, more to herself than anything, taken aback but also amused at the unusual form she took in their eyes.

"Your turn now, what do I look like?" Etoiles put his hands on his hips like he was posing for a photoshoot and Phil laughed.

"A dumbass probably," Phil taunted, and Etoiles gasped dramatically at him.

"Philza! How could you!" he joked, causing Phil to laugh again.

"Whoops, meant to mute," and even though Niki wasn't sure what that meant she could tell he was probably lying.

"Well, uh..." Niki interrupted their playful arguing, "you just look like people. Well, not really, Etoiles is green, but Phil looks normal. He has a big hat."

Niki watched as their eyes widened and she guessed that they hadn't been seeing the same thing. For a moment it was just shock, but then something clicked for Etoiles and he shifted to a grin, Phil growing concerned as he sensed the change in the latter's demeanor.

"So if we look like real people...then what we do will also look real to you..." he spoke like he was explaining some sort of evil master plan.

"Etoiles whatever you're thinking please don't it's probably not worth it," Phil begged, Etoiles only growing more mischievous by the second, and Phil finally caught on, "oh god do not start emoting."

"E-emoting?" Niki repeated, scared for whatever it might mean.

"You saw me put my hand on my hips earlier, right, Niki?" Etoiles checked. Niki nodded, fearfully.

"Etoiles please, if you dance it is going to look so cursed for them, please don't," Phil continued to beg but his efforts seemed hopeless.

"Oh, just one little dance, Phil?" Etoiles asked but it probably wasn't a question. Phil and Niki could only look on in horror as the green man began pole dancing in midair.

Niki may not have remembered much of her life before. But that was something she knew no amount of mind wiping would let her forget.

~

"Okay, uh, game mechanics...jeez, where do I even start," Quackity rambled to himself, tapping one foot on the ground.

All of them had gathered outside the museum, the sun now setting but the street lamps around them still providing a warm glow. The other five had recalled scattered and vague events from their past, but it seemed Niki hadn't been so lucky. Not that she minded, she was much more interested in the fact they were in a video game anyway.

"Let's just start with the basics, I guess," Quackity eventually decided, "the game we're all in is called Minecraft. You mine and you craft, that's it. Well, I fucking wish that was it, you gotta take care of eggs and kill mobs and make massive machines- but l-let's just get to that stuff later."

Niki was already lost, and from the way Baghera was shaking her head in despair it looked like Quackity might not have been the best choice for who to give the explanation, but he continued anyway.

"I guess you don't need to know how to mine, but it's probably important that you can all craft. Can you guys, like, open your inventory?" he asked. He received six blank stares in result and winced.

"Allllright, guess we gotta teach you that first, uh...I'm guessing you guys don't have an E key you can press?" he laughed nervously but once again only got silence in return and so he averted his gaze from the onlooking crowd.

"Shit, uh...Dapper how the fuck are these people meant to craft?" he hissed not-so-quietly to the egg with dark grey skin and a top hat positioned behind two horns. Dapper rolled his eyes and placed down a sign.

They need to tap the side of their head.

Quackity spun round quickly, "so uh, all you need to do is tap the side of your, uh," he turned back round to check the sign, "head!"

He proudly took credit for Dapper's explanation despite the sign being in clear view of everyone and him even forgetting what it said, to which Dapper could do nothing but sigh as if this had happened a hundred times before.

Niki was amused by the egg but turned back to his sign. Just tapping her head? What would that even do? She didn't know what crafting meant and she didn't have particularly high expectations, so she casually rose her hand to the side of her head and pressed her fingers into it.

Niki couldn't suppress a yelp of shock as some kind of interface appeared before her eyes, featuring rows of squares below an image of herself as she had been in the photo Etoiles gave her. Similar surprised noises came from her friends beside her as she looked closer at the futuristic projection in front of her, and she saw that same photo she had put in her pocket was displayed on the bottom row of squares. Other than that all of the squares were empty, and she didn't have much indication what to do next.

"Uh, okay, I'm assuming that means you've all got your inventories open..." Quackity brought their attention back to himself, although Niki had to look around the edge of the interface to see him. It seemed that Quackity couldn't see what they saw, and Niki could only gauge that all her friends had the same interface in front of each of them from their expressions.

"You probably don't have any gear so let's start with something basic- uh, you got any stuff to craft a sword, Phil?" he looked pleadingly to the man with the green hat, who just looked back at him unimpressed.

"You don't?" he challenged.

"Phil come on I am so poor and you are literally so rich you have half the server in your fucking backpacks alright stop being so stingy," Quackity complained and Phil conceded quickly, not seeing any other way to resolve it.

"Alright, fine, fine," he stopped Quackity from continuing about how poor he was and walked to the other six, "alright, here's some iron and sticks-"

"Iron?" Quackity interjected.

"Shut up, Quackity," Phil didn't even glance back at him before continuing, "now you all have a four by four box in your inventory for crafting, but to make something like a sword you're gonna need a crafting table, which I'll place down in a sec. You put two iron and one stick on the crafting table and then you make a sword. Easy."

He got to Niki and handed over two pieces of iron and a stick like he'd said, and both of them appeared in the bottom bar of her inventory as she put the stick into her pocket and held onto the iron.

"Why is the first thing that we're making a sword? Isn't that gonna be advanced blacksmith stuff?" Ethan asked as he received his items and watched as Phil pulled out a wooden table with tools around the edge and a three by three grid on the top.

"Because we don't have long before the sun sets and the mobs start showing up. Now," he quickly continued before any concerned questions could be voiced, "I'm not sure exactly what you guys see, but you should be able to see this table and the fact you can put stuff on it. And if you can put a stick below two pieces of iron in a diagonal line, you should be able to get a sword. I think."

He sounded far more certain of his words than Quackity, but still very doubtful. Niki sighed and stepped up to the table first, not seeing anyone else doing so, and Pomme appeared at her side. She tried to put something down on the table but the interface was still a little in her way, by which she meant it was completely in her way and she couldn't do anything while it was there. A sign placed down by Pomme could be seen in the corner of her eye, though.

(Psst, tap your head again to close it)

Niki raised a hand up and Pomme did the same, tapping her own head as an example. Niki copied her and to her relief the screen disappeared. She leant down to put her iron on the table, and then jumped when the screen appeared on its own yet again. At least it was smaller and more out of the way this time.

The pieces of iron fell into place, and she was about to reach into her pocket to get the stick back out when she saw it in the inventory screen below the table and realised she might be able to grab it from there. Indeed she could, and she placed it with everything else on the table, but nothing happened as a result.

She stared at the table, not sure what to do next, but Pomme shuffled over and nudged the items into different positions in the squares, and then all of a sudden she wasn't looking at random objects anymore, she was looking at a perfectly forged sword.

"Whoa, what?!" Valkyrae exclaimed as Niki lifted the iron blade up and Pomme clapped in excitement. Niki grinned at how Hetch recoiled from her.

"There you go, that's crafting! You can make a bunch of stuff with that, but it's best to get the essentials first. Speaking of..." Phil trailed off as he once again started rummaging in his backpack, pulled out another backpack- Niki wasn't even going to attempt to understand- and out of that pulled various pieces of armour.

"Here! You'll definitely need these. If you want you can make them invisible in your inventory."

Niki just nodded. What the hell was this, the medieval era? Why the hell did she have a sword and some armour made of an unfamiliar looking material? She wasn't complaining or anything, but it was hard to wrap her head around as casually as Phil was explaining it.

"Holy shit, no way, I want cool armour!" Ethan shouted out as Niki started picking the pieces up and figuring out how to wear them.

"Better craft a sword first, then," Phil told him and smiled a little at the sigh he got in response. Ethan was clearly far more interested in the armour than the weapons.

While Pomme helped the rest of them craft and Phil kept pulling out more armour, Niki managed to get hers on and was surprised it wasn't too heavy. She followed Phil's advice and found how to make her armour invisible in her inventory, which made it a little easier and not so loud to move around. It was a little strange to know she was wearing armour but she couldn't see or feel it, but she would probably get used to it soon enough.

Once everyone had figured it all out the sun was almost completely below the horizon and it was decided they would split into two groups in the hopes it would make the next part easier. Apparently night was when mobs appeared, and if they were staying on the island they would need to be taught how to deal with them sooner or later. The fact that the only further explanation Niki got for these mobs was 'monsters' didn't make her feel at all comfortable, but she had a sword and armour so everything would probably be fine.

"Listen, if something goes horribly wrong, which it won't, then it's not like you'll die or anything," Quackity began, seeing the apprehension in a few of their faces, "it's a video game, so we just respawn. No need to worry about anything."

Niki supposed it was somewhat comforting, but she didn't want to get hurt in the first place, even if she would always come back. It was starting to sound like something Showfall would do with dead actors, and anything about Showfall was bad, Niki was sure of that. After Quackity finished, though, his expression changed, and he leant down to whisper something to Dapper that was still painfully audible for everyone else.

"These guys respawn, right..?"

Dapper looked like a tired and disappointed parent as he placed his sign down and started writing, and even though Quackity couldn't see the expression he still got the sense he was being judged.

Yes, they can respawn. It's just us with the limited lives.

Quackity smiled, then read the second sentence, and Niki watched his face turn to serious contemplation.

"What does he mean by limited lives?" Sneeg finally asked as it seemed Quackity wouldn't give them answers unprompted.

"Well, uh, the eggs all have two lives each, though they mostly have one right now- b-but does that mean...if you're not all admins playing characters and stuff, then..?" Quackity couldn't finish his question, not sure himself what he was meaning to ask. Dapper caught onto what he was leading to though and placed another sign.

Yeah, we can talk about that after. Don't worry about it for now.

Quackity nodded, clearly still worrying about it, and turned back to the group to change the subject. There was another thing they wouldn't be getting answers for anytime soon.

They continued with the group plan and she ended up with two people that seemed to be pretty experienced with mobs, which helped her nerves. Etoiles and Baghera lead the group with her, Sneeg and Hetch, and Pomme was with them too. Baghera said that Etoiles was basically a god at combat, which she at first assumed to just be flattery, but the praise seemed pretty genuine.

The two groups set out into the bigger grassy area beyond the museum, lit with scattered torches rather than street lights. Niki's group continued on a little further, isolating themselves further in the grass as the sun at last completely disappeared from view.

The clearing was quiet. Niki gripped her sword tighter as Etoiles, Baghera and Pomme pulled out their own different weapons of choice. This totally wasn't terrifying at all.

"Hey, if this is dangerous, then should the ki- uh, Pomme, be here?" Sneeg asked, holding onto his sword tightly too.

"She can definitely take care of herself against normal mobs, we call her the French Sniper," Baghera assured them, "just worry about yourselves. Nothing that shows up should be too strong, just hit them with your swords and keep eating," she laughed. Then stopped, and looked at them.

"You guys have food, right?"

Niki looked at Sneeg, then back at Baghera, and shook her head. Baghera said something that was probably a profanity in a foreign language.

"I'm so sorry, we're not used to new players- here, I have food, take some," Baghera began rifling through her bag and throwing out heaps of various foods at the three of them.

"Whoa- you sure we're gonna need all this?" Sneeg asked, sounding amused. Baghera nodded, deadly serious.

"You'll burn through it quick, and you'll need it if you take damage. So try not to take damage."

"You have to deal with these mobs every night..?" Niki shuddered just at the suggestion they were going to hurt her. She should've known this place wasn't going to stay perfect forever.

"It's fine, once you get used to it they're very easy to manage. It's also good incentive for you to start sleeping instead of staying up!" Baghera laughed but Niki was too anxious to do the same. These monsters could appear from anywhere...and they were going to try to hurt her.

The silence stretched on. Nothing happened yet. Baghera spoke up as Niki thought her ears were about to burst from straining to hear anything in the darkness.

"So Niki, you met Pomme before we got here, oui?" she asked, glancing to Niki before quickly looking back out into the distance, making sure nothing snuck up on them.

"Uh, yeah, she helped me earlier...is she like your daughter?" Niki looked from Pomme to Baghera, and also to Etoiles, seeing a little bit of a resemblance but not really. Both Baghera and Etoiles had been acting like cliché parents whenever they were around Pomme, which they tried to be a lot, so it was the first logical conclusion she could draw.

Baghera nodded, "yes, our bijou, we adopted her once we arrived on this island. Well, when we logged in, I suppose. We shouldn't confuse you with our role play words."

Baghera laughed and Niki smiled but tilted her head a little.

"What do you mean by...'role play'?" she asked, and Baghera thought for a bit before she answered.

"Well, before all of you arrived here, we were just playing this game, all pretending to be characters and getting into chaos with one another, and also keeping our eggs alive. We thought the eggs were characters too but it seems according to Quackity that may not be the case..." Baghera looked down suspiciously at Pomme, but she still had a loving spark in her eye.

"What kind of character did you play?" Niki pushed, just wanting the conversation to continue so she wasn't left in the silence with her own thoughts.

"Ah, well, mostly I was just myself, although I did run for president for a little bit. That didn't really end well, though," Baghera chuckled to herself, and Etoiles joined in too.

"I should've been president, I could've done a great job," Etoiles sounded sure of himself, but Baghera raised an eyebrow.

"Oh yeah? Looking at the vote it doesn't seem everyone agreed with that," she challenged.

"The people did not understand, they did not understand how cool I am and how many dungeons I can do," Etoiles sounded quite proud of his claims to presidency but Baghera just started laughing.

"Oh, yes yes, perfect president material," she joked.

"Hey, you didn't win either," Etoiles pointed out, offended that his ideas were being made fun of.

"Yeah, but at least on my own terms, I didn't want to be president anyways."

"That sounds like what a loser would say."

"Shut up," Baghera told Etoiles playfully. Niki looked from them to Pomme, who rolled her eyes at her bickering parents with a smile.

A growl in the distance caught all of their attention and everyone's weapons were immediately raised, the warmth of conversation gone. Now was the time to be alert and ready for anything to come from the shadows. Niki held her sword tighter to stop any shaking that made its way into her hands.

Hetch stepped away from the source of the noise- coward- but Sneeg stayed to Niki's side, staring it down. It was a dark silhouette, hardly illuminated by the small flames all around them, but as it got closer its appearance became clearer.

It was a hooded figure, the long cloth fabric draping down its entire body, obscuring its face and dragging through the grass. The fire from below should've at least illuminated some of a face, but below the hood there was nothing, whatever this creature was it seemed to defy all logic Niki tried to put upon it.

In one hand it held onto a scythe, long and sharp, and Niki knew immediately she didn't want that coming anywhere near her. Still she held her ground as the creature shambled closer- it looked like a human, but she got a sense that it wasn't.

"Okay, first one! We can show you how it's done, then it's your turn," Etoiles told them confidently and casually approached the mob. Niki was immediately nervous seeing how careless he was when he was almost in range of its weapon and saw Sneeg was about to say something just as Etoiles raised his blade and swung it down upon the creature.

It recoiled but recovered quick and went to swing at him but Etoiles was already attacking again, swinging from the other side and sending the creature back with a monstrous howl. It didn't even have time to try to hit him when he sliced it the third time and it fell down, the cloak disappearing before their eyes and leaving behind a scythe and little glowing orbs resting in the grass.

Etoiles span around to the onlookers with a smug grin, "see, easy!"

Niki half laughed and half grimaced, while Sneeg was fully grimacing, and whatever expression Hetch had behind the mask was anyone's guess. She was starting to regret having not just gone to sleep, but she had to actually consider if fighting monsters was worse than the hell that trying to sleep would probably be. In the end she decided the monsters she could kill would be easier.

"Seems simple enough, just hit it," Niki shrugged, restlessly angling her sword up and down, not as calm as she made herself out to be.

"You're gonna do that?" Sneeg gaped at her, clearly less assured about his swordfighting abilities.

Niki shrugged again, "not like we've got much of a choice, Sneeg. Better odds of survival than the fucking mall."

Sneeg wanted to disagree but couldn't say much to that, having died three times more than her. He sighed and looked at his sword.

"We can fight the next one together," Sneeg told Niki like they were making a promise. She nodded and smiled.

"Alright scaredy cat," she taunted, and Sneeg gave her a playful elbow in response.

They both turned back to the night, making sure nothing was approaching from the shadows. If there was, Niki was ready. She would fight harder for this life than she had for the last.

Whilst they waited in tense silence Baghera spoke with Etoiles, doing so in English seemingly for their benefit, "it's so quiet tonight. You think there's less mobs because they made the day night cycle so much slower?"

"That could be it, or maybe the other group is stealing all our loot," Etoiles peered over at the other group of six, and although they were hard to make out in the darkness it didn't look like there were any mobs with them.

"I'll send a message to Quackity," Baghera said, pulling something out of a pocket that caught Niki's eye.

"What's that?" she asked. Baghera looked over, not realising what she was talking about.

"What, a message? Do you not see a chat or anything in the corner?"

Niki shook her head, assuming this was something like the inventory that she didn't know how to access yet. Pomme overheard them and stepped away from watching the horizon to put a sign down.

You have a secret side pocket with your communicator in! Us eggs can't use them but you can use it to talk with your friends.

Niki rested her sword on the ground with one hand as she tapped the side of her leg, searching for a pocket she hadn't noticed before. She landed on an unusual shape and pulled it out, finding it to be a square with a keyboard on the bottom and a little screen above displaying some messages.

[+] BagheraJones
[+] Ph1LzA
[+] Etoiles
Etoiles » ok guys lets do our plan
Quackity » etoiles stfu they can pribably see thise chat

She debated typing in a message herself but a new one popped up in the chat before she could.

Sneegsnag » laskkslakakakakalalla

"Hey, it works!" Sneeg said happily beside her.

"Did it?" she raised an eyebrow and Sneeg looked back in offence.

"You see my message, right?" he asked her.

"Well, yeah, but is that meant to be English, or..?"

"Wh- I- listen, alright," he stuttered over a defense, "I was just testing it out, I didn't want to write a word or anything!"

Niki nodded, looking incredibly convinced, "alright, sure man-"

Pomme suddenly pulled on her arm and Niki dropped her communicator, putting both hands on the sword before she knew what her attention was being drawn to. Etoiles and Baghera were already looking where the egg was pointing and a shape was definitely approaching from the distance, growing larger and stomping through the grass in a sprint.

Niki swore under her breath- the last one had been barely at a walk, now this one was coming straight for them. She would hate herself for just cowering behind Etoiles and Baghera again, though. She had to learn, letting everyone else defend her would get her nowhere. Although she did hope Sneeg kept his promise to fight at her side.

The shape was growing closer and its features caught on the torchlight, it was again humanoid but rather than a cloak there looked to be a cape trailing behind it, which was admittedly a little less scary but Niki kept her guard. She stepped up to Baghera and Etoiles, nudging Pomme behind her legs, disregarding what she'd been told about the egg's ability to defend herself.

It was a few steps away. Niki raised her sword. She wouldn't let anything hurt her again. She prepared to swing, yelled out a war cry and as the sword came down-

"NIKI NO NO-" Baghera yelled out, pushing Niki just in time to direct her sword a few inches to the right of the man's head. Indeed he was wearing a cape, but he wasn't a monster as Niki was expecting him to be, rather he was a perfectly normal looking man with short brown hair and slightly angled glasses over his wide eyes. He was pretty understandably shocked considering a sword had just been swung at his head.

Niki was breathing almost as heavily as he was from sprinting over to them, and since neither of them were able to speak in their current state she quickly glanced up to where she knew his username would be. Above his head read ElMariana.

"M-Mariana? What the hell are you doing here?!" Baghera yelled out when she was sure Niki wasn't going to try to kill him.

"I-I, in the discord, y-you guys were saying you had a plan, I just, if you were finding the players, I-I just wanted to..." Mariana stopped to catch his breath and Niki realised it wasn't from exhaustion, it was from panic and his own mind moving a hundred miles an hour. Despite running over to them he'd barely broken a sweat, which Niki assumed was due to this all being just a video game for them.

"You could've just told us if you wanted to join the plan!" Etoiles berated him.

"Well I've joined now! Are all the missing people here? Is Cucurucho here? Where's..?" He didn't finish the sentence as he looked around, seeing Niki, Sneeg, then Hetch, but it didn't seem any of them were who he was looking for.

"Only some of the people are with us, the rest of them are with Cucurucho. Asleep," Etoiles emphasised the last word like he knew Mariana would try something if he didn't.

"Oh, come on, Etoiles! He wasn't there when Cucurucho brought me into the game, I just want to see him!" Mariana argued.

"He's been through some shit, Mariana, I think it's best right now to just leave him alone," Baghera advised sternly, but Mariana still seemed determined to find whoever it was he was looking for.

"I'm sorry, but which 'he' are we talking about?" Niki interrupted them. It seemed they were talking about one of her friends, and if they were then she wanted to know who, and just as importantly why.

"One of the people who was missing with with you, he is Slimecicle, right?" Baghera asked.

"Charlie," Sneeg quickly corrected her, and she nodded.

"Yes, Charlie, he was...we knew him before he went missing, even though we did not know most other people, and he knew Mariana the most," Baghera explained to them. Niki nodded and looked at Mariana.

"He's sleeping."

"But-!" Mariana tried to argue with her but Niki wasn't having it. He deserved to rest after the shit he'd gone through and she wasn't gonna let some stranger, no matter how much he claimed to know him, get in the way of that.

"He's sleeping," she repeated, and at least the message got across this time that that was final. Mariana sighed and looked away dejectedly.

"Alright, fine. What are you guys all doing out here anyway?" he asked.

"Teaching the newbies how to deal with mobs! Although we haven't encountered many yet," Etoiles admitted.

"Hey, uh...is this one?" the voice startled a few of them as he'd been so quiet this whole time, but Hetch had finally spoke up and when they all turned to look at him there was a strange creature trapped under his foot.

For the most part it was a wet green ball, but Niki could see dots inside of the gloopy green substance resembling eyes, and every now and then the creature squished like it was trying to jump but it remained trapped in place.

"Oh, a slime, that's an easy one!" Etoiles explained, "the little ones can't even hurt you so they're probably a good starter mob."

Hetch nodded and abruptly stomped his foot down, crushing the creature with a squelch and backing away to see it had left behind nothing but a little slime ball. He seemed intrigued and crouched down to pick it up, but Sneeg was faster and skewered it on the end of his sword, bringing it to himself.

"So this ball and that scythe...do all the mobs drop loot or something?" Sneeg asked, ignoring Hetch's protests about stealing his stuff.

"Yes, slimes all drop slime, more advanced mobs will drop cool weapons, and every mob drops EXP, which gets you levels, but uh... probably no need to worry about that for now," Etoiles told him. Sneeg nodded, not worrying about it.

"Hey, can I have that..?" Hetch asked and Sneeg slowly turned his head to face him, slime ball remaining on the tip of the upheld sword. The chances of getting his loot back seemed slim.

But then, for some reason, Sneeg smiled.

"Oh, sorry, you wanted this?" Sneeg pulled down his sword and touched the slime, trying to sound at least a little bit not-sarcastic, but not trying very hard.

"It's my stuff," Hetch established, holding out one hand for the item with the other on his sword.

Sneeg rolled his eyes, "well, not really, but whatever. Guess you'll get more use out of it than me you freak. Catch."

And without warning Sneeg threw the slime ball, a little too fast and a little too close to Hetch's side holding the sword. Hetch had to release the sword quickly to get his hands up and stop the ball splattering all over his chest, which to his relief he did. The relief didn't last long.

An axe swung down into Hetch's arm, knocking him down and summoning a howl of pain from him. Mariana rushed past Baghera and Etoiles but Niki grabbed his cape and held him back.

"What-?" Mariana started.

"Let's just say he deserves it and leave it at that, alright?" Niki told him and then looked back at Hetch, not bothering to see his reaction when she could instead be watching her captor bleeding out and writhing on the grass.

It was a brilliant plan on Sneeg's part, distracting Hetch as a mob approached from behind, because if they couldn't hurt Hetch then why didn't they just get someone else to do it for them? And this mob was doing a wonderful job, going in for a second swing that Hetch just barely dodged but it made a tear in his clothes.

He stumbled back up, a hand back on the sword, and weakly dragged it up into the monster's side. It didn't seem to do much but it gave him time to prepare a second strike that was stronger and cut into the creature's neck.

Niki was rooting for the monster, but after Hetch's fourth strike it fell, disappearing like the others and only leaving behind its axe, which Hetch took and somehow pocketed too. Sneeg couldn't skewer that on his sword but Hetch was paranoid enough to still pick it up quickly.

"Rough start, but I guess you got the hang of it," Etoiles shrugged. Niki could tell from Hetch's following tone that he was scowling in response.

"So that's it, you all just want to see me die? If everyone on this goddamn island is really just waiting for me to keel over then I guess I'll have better chances on my own!"

"Yeah, good luck with that, arsehole," Sneeg dismissed, not even caring to look as Hetch set off back towards the street lamps, presumably in search of some uninhabited building in which to sleep. Niki wasn't a fan of Hetch being unsupervised and out in the world, but she was pretty glad he was gone.

"We're back to six, I guess," Sneeg commented, looking at the rest of the group. Mariana was still a little stunned that they'd just attempted to get another man killed, but from the way Sneeg and Niki were so casual about it he couldn't stay surprised for too long.

"Uh, y-yeah...you say you haven't encountered many other mobs?" he asked.

Etoiles nodded, "yes, barely any, we were so desperate for a fight we thought you were one!"

"Yeah, no, I...I caught onto that one," Mariana laughed nervously and glanced at Niki who grinned in response even though he couldn't see it. She did feel a little bad for almost splitting his head in two, but he was fine now, so she was sure he didn't mind too much.

"It is a little weird how few there are out here though. It is definitely night right now, yes?" Baghera checked.

Etoiles agreed, "yes, it is dead on night, and no mobs! The one time that we need them. Awful."

Etoiles huffed and looked out into the darkness but it was a lot less tense as they knew that right now there probably wasn't much out there. It was a shame, Niki was starting to think mobs would be a good way to vent her anger.

Scythes also looked way cooler than swords. Blades seemed old fashioned but it was a much better alternative to doing everything with gun fights in her opinion.

"If your nights are usually shorter than this then maybe all the mobs are just more...I dunno, spread out?" Sneeg suggested.

"Hm..." Etoiles tilted his head, "that could make sense. Still, it is strange..."

"Quackity isn't having any more luck than us it seems," Baghera told them, looking at her communicator. Niki picked up hers that she'd dropped and didn't see any messages from Quackity, but there was one new message.

[+] ElMariana

For now she just pocketed the device so she could have both her hands back on the sword, but it was still quiet, and there were no more mobs in sight.

She looked back at Mariana, who thankfully wasn't holding a grudge for the attempted murder. He looked restless, clearly wanting to be somewhere else, but he stayed with them, knowing they'd stop him if he tried to find Charlie.

"How exactly did you guys know Charlie?" Niki asked, preferring small talk to the silence.

"Well, he..." Baghera looked at Etoiles as she thought of what to say.

"He was my husband," Mariana said confidently.

"HUH?!" Sneeg exclaimed and almost dropped his sword in shock from the sudden assertion. Niki didn't have such an exaggerated reaction but her feelings were still the same.

"You what?!" she shouted, "what do you mean you're his husband?!"

"No, no, he means in the game!" Etoiles rushed to clarify, "Mariana and Slime were married in the game, everyone got married to look after the eggs! Me and Baghera are kind of married with three other French players to look after Pomme, you know."

Sneeg seemed annoyed by the nickname Etoiles was giving Charlie but decided not to focus on that, "so Charlie was in the game with all of you? Is that why you know him?"

Mariana nodded, "yes, we played together, our marriage was kind of shit and we got a divorce but I still want to see my bitch husband!"

Niki raised her eyebrows at all the information being thrown at her but kept the conversation on track, "well, okay, but you do know he won't remember you? None of us remember anyone."

Mariana was quiet for a few seconds but it seemed he'd already known that information. After a while he nodded, "yeah, we got told...b-but even if he can't remember me I want to see him! It's been months, I want to know if he's okay!"

"He's fine," Sneeg told him sternly, "and I don't think you going up to him and telling him you were married is going to help him at all. I know he's got more than enough other shit to be dealing with right now."

Mariana looked away and it was obvious that he wanted to disagree, but eventually he sighed and begrudgingly nodded, "fine, okay, as long as you say he's alright. I want to see him when he's better, though."

"I'll ask him if he wants visitors," Sneeg promised, which looked good enough for Mariana for now.

Niki was already looking back into the night. She didn't know how long it had been, but they couldn't have been standing out here for more than an hour. She was far less tense than when they had first started, but waiting for danger to approach them still had her on edge. She sighed and swung her sword a little to each side to ease the tension freezing up her limbs. She'd be fine. She could fight.

There was a low growl in the distance and Etoiles was the first to turn to face it, "finally, I though we would have to be online all night!"

Niki squinted, trying to make out the new shape. It was lower to the ground and as a result she couldn't gauge much from its silhouette. At the moment it was just a dark lump on the other side of the clearing, but she felt Sneeg tensing up beside her.

"What is it? Can you see anything?" she asked. Sneeg was silent.

"Is that a new mob?" Baghera asked Etoiles, who just shrugged.

"Who knows, as long as we can kill it."

Niki looked to them and back to the shape, getting closer. This one couldn't have been another player, it definitely looked inhuman. She could make out four legs and something that was maybe a head, although the form was unusual and she couldn't be sure. Sneeg remained staring straight ahead and Niki started to get worried.

"Sneeg? Don't chicken out on me now," she smiled and shook him a little by the arm, but he didn't pick up on her humour.

"Niki, that's...I-I..." Sneeg couldn't finish his sentence but his mouth hung open, searching for words that weren't there. Niki didn't want to take her eyes off the threat but Sneeg was really starting to concern her, so she turned to face him.

"Sneeg, just swing your sword, you'll be fine," she tried to convince him, but his fighting skills didn't seem to be the main problem. Niki turned again to where he was staring and saw torchlight reflecting off something, a screen where she thought the creature's head was.

"What..?" she left the thought unfinished and raised up her sword. She couldn't deny the fear rising up her throat. Something here was wrong.

"You guys think you can take this one?" Etoiles turned to them, completely unconcerned. Niki only planned to say no, but it came out as a scream as the moment Etoiles' back was turned the creature took its chance to pounce.

"Etoiles!" Baghera shouted, swinging her axe at the monster and just barely averting its course as it crashed to the ground beside them. Now in the midst of their group, Niki could see in full terrifying detail what it was that had come for them.

Its body was a tangle of wires, its claws digging into the dirt were long, sharp and metal. And the head, or whatever it was supposed to be, was an old TV atop it all. Sneeg grabbed Niki's arm far tighter than she would've liked.

"Niki, t-that- that thing was in the mall- that's the fucking thing that killed me."

Niki looked wide eyed at Sneeg, and then back to the monster which had almost recovered from missing its target. Shit- what the hell was it doing here?!

"What's up with this mob's AI?" Etoiles commented, getting his sword back in a position to swing.

"I don't think this is a mob like you're used to!" Niki warned, stepping back as he swung the dark blade down upon the monster and it recoiled a few steps with a glitchy screech that reminded her of static. The creature was quicker to raise itself back up this time and its screen was angled at Etoiles. It had no face but Niki knew it was probably pissed.

"Shit, get away from it! I-is there any way we can get out of here?" Sneeg looked around frantically but there was nothing in the area besides the other group, and they were too far away to know what was happening over here.

Etoiles waved a hand, completely dismissing both of their panic, "pssh, I am The French Goat, I have killed codes ten times more buffed than this thing!"

While his head was turned to talk to them the monster slashed him across the chest and he stumbled backwards a step, then another, then collapsed.

"Etoiles!" Baghera screamed, stepping between him and the monster with her axe ready to strike the moment it took another step. Niki screamed and pulled on Sneeg's hand that was still gripping her.

"N-Niki, it's fine, he's unconscious! He can respawn, you just get out of here!" Baghera tried to explain to her, not daring to take her eyes from the monster for a second. Niki looked at Etoiles and his bleeding chest, but looked away before she threw up.

"Unconscious?!" she repeated, not realising how Baghera could believe such a thing until she remembered they saw different realities, and Baghera must not have witnessed the gore in as graphic detail as she had.

"Did that thing fucking one shot Etoiles?! I-I'm gonna warn the others" Mariana yelled and started running towards the other group before anyone could stop him. Niki couldn't exactly blame him for being scared.

The creature stayed where it was, watching them all, until its head stopped swivelling and landed on a target. Niki followed its gaze with fear, already knowing what she would find since it was looking down. Pomme.

The monster made its move and Baghera ran in its way when she saw it was attempting to go around her, "no, stay away from them! You get through me first, you asshole! Shit- do either of you know how to recover players?"

Niki shook her head and Sneeg didn't move, probably not having registered the question. Baghera didn't look at them but didn't hear a yes so she swore in French and shuffled her feet.

"A-alright, um...one of you needs to spam T in chat, okay? Just do it, and I'll get Etoiles up," Baghera commanded.

"And what do we do about the fucking monster?" Niki shouted out.

"You have a sword! It's only for a few seconds, then Etoiles will stop being an idiot and kill it," Baghera promised them. Niki gritted her teeth, but if this was their only option she had to do it.

"Alright, fine," she agreed to Baghera and turned to Sneeg, shaking her arm from his grip and using it to shake him by the shoulder, "Sneeg, spam T with your communicator, alright?!"

She continued shaking him until he snapped out of the trance he was stuck in and nodded to her.

"You ready?" Baghera called to them, still shifting in front of the monster so that it didn't have a clear shot at the people she was defending. Instead of agreeing, Niki grabbed her sword, held it above her head, yelled out in fury and ran forth, swinging it into the side of the thing's 'head'.

It had hurt and killed her friends, and it was going to try to kill Pomme next. She wouldn't let it. She wouldn't be happy until it was dead by her blade.

Niki heard running behind her as the sword cut a few inches into the screen and she hoped that was Baghera getting to Etoiles. The sword had wedged itself in the plastic and glass and Niki panicked trying to tug it out, wrestling against the TV.

With one last pull it came out and Niki had to stop herself from falling back with the force of her own pulling. But despite the attack the monster's attention was still split, between her and the egg behind her. It pissed Niki off that it was going after the smallest in their group and she channeled that anger into another swing at its head.

The monster moved and she missed her target, but still ended up slicing through some wires in its neck, not getting her weapon stuck this time. She tried not to focus on something red emerging from the creature in the path of her blade, but either way her heart was set on killing this thing, warm blooded or not.

It was now to her side and trying to make it further around, but Niki wouldn't let it. She stepped forward and drove the blade into one of its shoulders and heard an inhuman screech in response that made her flinch. She pulled the blade and struck again, trying to do as much damage as she could but the monster continued its path, only getting closer and closer to Pomme.

As Niki pulled her blade once more she caught sight of the egg, holding her stance with a sword of her own but keeping her distance. She really hoped that she wasn't holding out on shooting this thing in the face for Niki's sake.

The information overload of the last few hours flashed through her mind, one thing standing out from the rest.

It's just us with the limited lives.

Dapper's sign- he and the other eggs had lives, and they weren't infinite. Niki swore under her breath and plunged the sword down again. Pomme would not die.

The creature seemed to suddenly realise what was slowing it down and swung its claws at Niki's leg before she registered that it had changed target.

It felt like fire had cut into her tendons and her legs collapsed under her, blood spilling into the grass. She held up her sword as she realised she was in a perfect position for the monster to finish the job, but it turned away again. Shit, this thing was fucking persistent. But she wasn't letting it get to Pomme. Not while she was still breathing.

On her hands and knees she stumbled after the monster, seeing Pomme grimace and raise her sword. She was sure the egg could defend herself, but she didn't want her to need to. She'd done nothing to deserve this. Niki had cheated death already, this was just what she got for thinking she could get away with it.

Etoiles was talking again from somewhere to her side, but the words didn't register as she was only focused on one thing, and that was saving her friends from the same hell she'd experienced in Showfall. Nobody had to die, nobody would die, not again, not to that fucking company that treated them like toys. She was ending Showfall's shit here.

She crawled forward a step, then stumbled into a hunched over walk, and with the momentum of almost falling back down threw herself onto the monster, howling and digging her nails into its wires.

The monster was quick to respond, flinging itself to the side to try and get Niki off its back, but she held tightly, tearing out handfuls of wires and then grabbing onto handfuls more. It screeched at her and she screamed back, jabbing her knees into its sides, stabbing her elbows wherever she could get them.

It couldn't last forever and eventually she slipped, collapsing down into the grass with the monster looming over her.

She felt blades pierce her chest before she saw them and the edges of her vision darkened. No, not again, this couldn't be happening again.

She bared her teeth and slammed a fist into the monster's face, but if it had any effect she couldn't see it. Movement made its way into her last few seconds of consciousness and a silhouette shifted over the monster, but anything after that was lost to her.

She fell back into that black, that empty void, and to her surprise she wasn't terrified. She was glad.

As long as it spared her friends from facing it, she would happily throw herself back into death.

And, like last time, it didn't last forever.

Chapter Text

This time she didn't wake up curled on the ground, in a place she'd later come to refer to as 'Spawn'. The fresh air wasn't so shocking to her system and she didn't feel quite as scared to be waking up again after dying.

This time Niki woke up in a bed.

"Ugh...what the fuck..?"

Niki groaned and rolled onto her side, then immediately regretted the action as the ache she had felt in her chest multiplied into a sharp, stabbing pain. Her hands flinched to her chest but thankfully she just felt dry clothes, nothing warm and wet. She must have just been bruised.

Eventually she could open her eyes more than a squint against the light in the room and tried to gauge as much as she could from the blurry shapes around her in case any of them were dangerous. The room itself wasn't too big or too small, it was just a normal room with plain walls and an open window pouring bright sunlight into every corner.

There was a gap between the bed she was on and the wall she was facing, but it was filled by a little table and someone in a chair staring at her.

"Hey, mind your language," Sneeg berated her. Niki groaned and rolled onto her back.

"Cut me some slack, I just died," she complained, rubbing her hands over her face. "Again," she added.

Sneeg laughed, "yeah, join the club," he paused and tapped his fingers on his lap, "I...I'm glad you're okay, though."

Niki smiled bittersweetly. She was happy to see Sneeg again too, but she knew it was more than just him in their group when they fought the monster.

"Pomme- is Pomme okay too?" she couldn't hold back her worry and quickly sat up, too fast for her head to adjust to the elevation and far too much movement for the stinging wound in her chest. As the pain flared up again and she started feeling lightheaded she rubbed one hand over where the monster had stabbed her while the other stayed on the bed to prop her up, and she expected to feel the edge of a wound or at least the lumps of some bandages, but under her shirt the skin was smooth, like she'd never been impaled at all.

"Niki, just relax- yes, she's fine," Sneeg assured her, gently pushing down on her shoulder so she laid back in the bed, "they're all fine. I told them to go since I know crowding around you the last time didn't do any good."

"You told them to go?" Niki asked doubtfully.

Sneeg averted his eyes, caught in his lie, "well, I guess Pomme was the one who put down the sign, but I read it out."

Niki raised her eyebrows at Sneeg and smiled, "ever the caring man."

"Hey, they made me act like a dick in the mall, I'm not actually such a hater," he defended, but Niki didn't really mind his harshness. She appreciated someone that she knew would tell the truth even when it hurt. Except when he didn't, but that was usually only to make himself look good.

"So where are they?" Niki asked after a little pause. Now that she was more awake she could make out more than just vague shapes around the room, but like Sneeg had said there was no signs of anyone else. To be fair she couldn't see much from her position laid down, but she doubted Sneeg would let her get back up if she wanted a proper look.

"They're probably sitting outside scratching on the door. Dunno who these people are but they're pretty worried about you, it was a battle to get that Phil guy away when we told him what had happened," Sneeg explained, glancing to the door briefly as if they were all about to burst in.

"Guess we were close before the whole...y'know," Niki waved an arm weakly, knowing Sneeg would understand what she meant. Her eyes looked a little more distant as she considered all these people who had known her and that she had forgotten. She had been ready to simply not care, to ignore it since it wasn't her problem, but now she felt almost guilty.

All these people unconditionally caring for her, worrying about her, and she had nothing to give them in response. She couldn't even trust them entirely because she'd learnt the hard way that trust wasn't something you gave out easily.

She wanted to be what she had been before, the kind and carefree woman who had died when Showfall took her. But she knew that wasn't going to happen. So for now she stopped herself thinking about it.

"Maybe it's a good thing the monster killed you," Sneeg suddenly interrupted the silence between them. There was a moment of silence afterward as Niki considered if she'd heard him right.

"You- what?" Niki turned her head to the side to glare at him and ignored the aches that the movement caused.

"Hey, you and me both know you were never gonna sleep until you collapsed from exhaustion- that thing did you a favour forcing you to get a decent night's rest before we got to that point," Sneeg grinned at her and Niki sighed. It was true, she didn't feel as exhausted as she was expecting herself to be, but she was a little annoyed how obvious her plans to stay awake were. She was also very much opposed to thanking the thing that stabbed her in the chest.

"You'd better have slept too," she threatened Sneeg, who she knew was probably not too different from herself. They'd only seen each other for hours in the mall and she could hardly call it knowing each other considering how fucked their personalities were under Showfall's control, but at the same time she felt like she knew him as much as she knew herself, she knew everyone in that mall like a fucked up family.

And clearly she was right, because Sneeg was hesitant to answer.

"I, uh...well, y'know, I was so worried that-"

"You didn't sleep?" Niki interrupted him.

"...no, I didn't," Sneeg admitted. Niki laughed.

"Did anyone?" she asked.

Sneeg thought for a little before his answer, "well...I think Charlie and Ranboo are still asleep even though it's almost fucking midday. Doubt anyone that was with us ended up going to bed..." Sneeg looked back at the door, then back at Niki.

"You think you can handle them all coming in here and asking if you're okay, like, 20 times over?" Sneeg asked with an infectious grin that Niki couldn't help but copy.

"Let them do their worst," she sighed and watched as Sneeg walked over to the door, taking the opportunity to sit up against the headboard of the bed. At least this way she would be at eye level with everyone while they interrogated her about her health.

She was only dreading it a little bit. But she felt worse blocking them all out. At least this way she could convince her brain that nothing terrible had happened to them while she was out.

Sneeg mumbled something through the door that Niki couldn't pick up on and he backed away to let the first person come through. Niki's eyes lit up as the small figure shuffled in, beret and face paint just as she'd last seen them.

"Pomme!" she said excitedly, not having doubted Sneeg's promise that she was alive, but still happy to have her proof. Pomme rushed over to the bedside and held a sign up to Niki, which she had to push away a little as it was too close to her eyes to read.

Niki!! We're so happy you're ok! How are you feeling?

"Niki, are you alright?" called out another voice before she could even answer Pomme. Sneeg gave her a smug look his prediction having almost immediately come true.

Etoiles came to the bed closely behind Pomme, and Niki could already feel the exhaustion coming back as even more people came in behind him. All these people were really worrying about her? She found it difficult to get her head around.

Niki still nodded to Etoiles as Phil entered, then Baghera, then Ethan, then Quackity. She answered before any of them could prove Sneeg even more right by asking more questions.

"Yes, I'm fine, I'm okay. Whatever it is that keeps bringing me back it's at least nice enough to heal me when it does. You guys said it was like video game lives?"

"Yes, uh, probably," Baghera answered, "but usually when you respawn it's instant, not...you know, half a day."

"Yeah, we weren't expecting you to take so long to recover, so that's why we got a little worried," Phil looked down as he explained. Niki raised her eyebrows, thinking 'a little' was an understatement, but she'd didn't say anything about that.

"Guess it's a little different for me, or something. The armour must be different too, because that did fuck all," Niki laughed, recalling how she supposedly had her invisible armour on, but it didn't feel like it with all the hits she still took.

Etoiles joined her laugh but brought up his own concerns, "well, I had my armour on too, which I already know works, but then I got one shot! Me, in one hit! I could not believe it!"

Niki tilted her head, "so that wasn't normal for you..?"

Etoiles shook his own, "no, I swear, I am usually way cooler. You are actually not allowed to tell anyone about that because my reputation will be ruined."

Niki struggled to tell how much of that was a joke, but Etoiles continued, "like, come on, you don't want me to become a sad, old joke for dying in Minecraft like a loser like Phil."

"Hey!" Phil snapped back at him, and Niki assumed there was a reference there that she didn't have the memories to understand. She could understand Etoiles poking fun and Phil taking the bait, though, which was enough to make her smile.

"Like I said, I am usually incredibly strong and cool," Etoiles continued, dismissing Phil, "but on that topic, I was actually wondering if you aren't completely traumatised if you would like me to teach you how to face dungeons?"

"Wait, what?" Quackity asked Etoiles before Niki could give her answer.

"You know, dungeons? We might as well teach them while they're here!"

"You just faced off against that monster, Niki got killed, and you're immediately trying to drag her into dungeons?!" Phil scolded him.

"You didn't even see her, she is a natural! You gave her a shitty iron sword and she saved my daughter, dungeons would barely be an issue!" Etoiles defended.

"Well, uh," Niki spoke up, feeling like she needed to interject, "dungeons sound...interesting."

Even Sneeg looked taken aback by that. After all she'd been through she thought that danger and violence would be the things she'd try to distance herself from the most, but now she'd gotten a taste for them. And now somewhere in her mind she wanted more.

"Niki, I just feel like...going into dungeons so soon might not be a good idea," Phil advised.

"She was pretty good with a sword, Phil, I saw more than Etoiles. I don't think dungeons are above her skills," Baghera added.

"I- I mean, I wasn't exactly a professional, I was just waving it around and trying not to die, and I didn't even succeed at that" Niki laughed nervously, not expecting to receive praise for sword fighting skills that she apparently had.

"You fought and you saved our daughter, Niki. Without you she may have lost a life. We are in your debt for that," Baghera told her.

"And I can repay the debt by showing you around dungeons!" Etoiles proclaimed.

"Etoiles-" Phil started.

"Yeah, sure. I'll go round dungeons with you," Niki said. She stopped herself from bursting out in laughter as she watched Etoiles light up like a child recieving the greatest birthday present imaginable.

"Are you sure?" Phil checked with Niki.

"Yeah. I need to learn how to kill those things anyway. The next time I run into that monster, I'm making sure I finish it off," she promised.

There was a brief quiet and Niki looked at Ethan, sitting behind everyone else. He just offered her a smile, seemingly happy to be a silent witness than to join the chaos of the conversation. Niki decided to ask the others a question before they could ask any more to her.

"What did I miss when I was, y'know, dead?" she looked to each of them, not sure who would try to answer first.

"Well, I got Etoiles up, and now that he decided to stop being an idiot he actually got some hits on the thing," Baghera explained passive aggressively, although it was more aggressive than passive.

"Hey, I didn't know it was OP as hell! I had to try and look cool in front of new people too," Etoiles justified.

"Maybe stop trying to look cool and be cool," Baghera told him.

"Can you guys get a divorce in your own time?" Quackity groaned in an attempt to get the conversation back on track.

"Uh, yes, right- I started attacking, the monster did not go down but it ran away like a coward when everyone else arrived," Etoiles continued the explanation.

"Mariana had come over to us screaming like a maniac," Phil said, "so we all came over to help but by then it looked like Etoiles had taken care of it. Your body disappeared a little after you died and Cucurucho appeared to stop us all from freaking out and tell us you respawned here."

"Where is...here?" Niki looked around, not being able to gauge much about location from the trees outside her window.

"It's a new building near spawn, looks like Cucurucho built it with a bedroom for every one of you new guys," Quackity told her.

But you can make your own house elsewhere if you'd like! We'd all be happy to help!

Niki looked at the sign Pomme had held up and smiled. Building her own house...that sounded pretty fun.

"Hey, I've been meaning to ask you, Baghera..." Sneeg spoke up, "why were you asking us to spam a letter in chat?"

Baghera looked at him confused for a moment before she seemed to realise what was being talked about.

"Oh, T! That's a system we have for the eggs, when there is danger we spam T in chat and then someone will teleport the eggs away. Pomme didn't get teleported though, so we're glad she is safe anyway."

"Teleport- we can teleport?" Ethan suddenly asked.

"Well, the eggs all have stasis pearls, but we have warp stones that we can use. I guess we should probably give those to you guys soon," Phil told him.

"Why didn't Pomme get teleported?" Niki asked, but once she finished the question she felt like she knew the answer. She looked knowingly at Sneeg, who looked guiltily back at her.

"Sneeg. What did you put in chat?" She asked accusatorially. Sneeg crossed his arms over his chest.

"Listen, I- you're the one that asked me to do it, so it's kinda your fault what happened," he pushed the blame. Niki sighed and knew she wasn't getting answers from him so pulled the communicator out of her pocket. She smirked at how Sneeg immediately tensed.

There had been a few messages since last night that she scrolled past, eventually landing on the ones that had come just before her death.

Etoiles is bleeding. Etoiles was attacked by ERROR_INVALID_USER
Quackity » u guys alr???
Sneegsnag » z
Sneegsnag » z
Sneegsnag » z
Sneegsnag » z
Sneegsnag » z
Sneegsnag » z
Quackity » ??????
Nihachu is bleeding. Nihachu was attacked by ERROR_INVALID_USER
Ph1LzA » what the fuck
Nihachu was slain by ERROR_INVALID_USER

"I, uh...was that not T..?" Sneeg asked, glancing at the messages on her communicator. Niki put it down and raised her eyebrows at him.

"You think that was T?" she asked in return. Sneeg didn't look happy with everyone looking at him for his answer.

"W-well, T...i-it's near the end right? Y'know, it's near the end of the alphabet, so I, uh...I hit a key near the bottom. Was it...was it not T?" he looked back at her. To be fair, she probably should've realised Sneeg wasn't the most suited for the task, but there was a lot going on back then and she didn't have the time to remember the warning signs that Sneeg was probably illiterate.

"No Sneeg. That was Z. Keyboards aren't in alphabetical order," she told him. At least he had a vague recollection of the alphabet, but that still wasn't great.

"Wait, Sneeg, can you not-?" Phil began to ask.

"Can we just- can we just not talk about this? Please?" Sneeg requested, and the others fell silent. Niki felt a little bad for pushing the issue now that she could see the discomfort much clearer on his face, but she wanted to help. She'd bring it up with him later, when they weren't surrounded by so many other people.

"Does everyone else know what happened?" she asked, changing the subject. Phil shook his head.

"We haven't properly told everyone, a lot of the server members are asleep right now anyway. We were kind of waiting for you to tell us if you wanted us to."

"Don't see why not," Niki shrugged, "I think we should probably tell them if the there's a massive threat to their safety like that on the island."

"I...I dunno if we should tell all of them," Sneeg countered, then explained, "Charlie especially. We can tell him to be careful when he's outside, but he's only just starting to feel safe. Telling him that the thing that killed him is on this island with him won't do his mental state any good."

"Yeah, alright, that makes sense," Niki agreed.

"So we'll go tell everyone that there's a new danger and to be careful, but not exactly what it is?" Phil checked. He didn't know entirely what they were talking about, how they knew this monster or why it was such a bad thing for Charlie to know about it, but he trusted they had the best intentions.

Sneeg nodded to him, "yeah, that's probably best."

"Alright, we'll go do that. I guess we should leave you guys in peace," Phil told them, hinting at the other players that it was time to go. Talking to them hadn't been as bad as Niki was expecting, but she was happy all the same to have a quieter room once again.

Phil and the others left, leaving Niki with Sneeg, Ethan and Pomme. The latter of which held up a sign to all of them.

I can go and pick up new clothes for you all if you would like?

"Oh, wait, really?" Ethan asked, immediately excited at the idea of changing out of his purple outfit.

Pomme nodded.

We're sorry it took so long. Niki is already in hers!

Niki looked down and realised that she was, indeed, not in that stupid red blazer anymore. It was a simple outfit, a dark shirt and jeans, but knowing it wasn't something picked for her by a mind controlling corporation made her much happier in it.

"I hope you got something stylish for me," Sneeg grinned at Pomme, who looked back nervously, probably hoping that Sneeg's standards weren't too high.

"Whatever it is just don't make us do a fashion show once we put them on," Ethan sighed.

"What? Come on, the audience loved you," Sneeg told him sarcastically, knowing he couldn't care less about what that damned audience thought of him.

Ethan couldn't help but smile with Sneeg, "well, I guess you crushed it too."

"Hey. Too far," Sneeg told him, but as much as he tried to make his expression serious he couldn't help the smile pulling at the edges of his mouth.

"Maybe I'll give it a shot," Niki laughed, and Sneeg looked surprised that she'd told a joke. She was a little surprised herself that mentioning the thing that killed her didn't make her flinch like it usually tended to. Maybe being here with her friends, practically her family, maybe it helped Showfall feel more like a memory.

Looking at Sneeg and Ethan smiling, she remembered how they had looked in the warehouse, but it didn't mix itself with reality, because this was reality. Their smiles, their laughs, those were real.

They weren't in a warehouse or a mall anymore, that was all in the past now. And that didn't make it easy, she couldn't deny that she looked at shadows like they were going to attack her and that she looked at some people just the same.

But in reality she was safe, in reality Sneeg and Ethan were in front of her, laughing at each other's jokes. They made it a little easier to manage.

So they would manage it, all of them, a little at a time, and they would keep living. Because the greatest way to spit in Showfall's face was to show them that she could still be happy.

And she was. Niki was happy.

Chapter Text

"Charlie- Charlie we have to go, we have to get out of here, come on-"

Charlie was in a mall. But hadn't he just been in his house? What was Ranboo doing here? What was this place- what was going on?

"Charlie we just have to go, okay? We just have to go."

Ranboo silenced his questions as he dragged him by the hand through the empty, dimly lit halls. He nodded and followed. Compliance was something Showfall had taught him well.

Showfall? What was Showfall..?

Now they were running, being chased. Dozens of figures behind them, and Charlie didn't know what they'd do once they got to him, and he definitely didn't want to find out.

A storage room- a hallway- the scenes flashed by before he could tell what was going on, leaving him even more confused and disoriented. An escalator- a carousel- a-

Charlie stopped. Or, rather, the world stopped around him, halting so suddenly it made him motion sick.

A surgery room. Oh god, it was a surgery room.

He couldn't remember much, but he could remember the feeling- his own chest torn apart, hands inside him, grabbing, taking. He tried to block out the memory. He screamed.

Charlie.

He stopped.

A voice- no, it wasn't a voice, he heard the word like he read it, in a strange and indescribable way that was both spoken and silent.

It was nothing. But he recognised it.

It was a girl.

Dad.

~

A nightmare wasn't a good start to the day.

An even worse start to the day was waking up to someone staring straight at him.

"AH-" Charlie screamed and jumped up, backing into the corner where his bed met the wall. He stared back at the man who fell off his chair and stumbled back, startled by Charlie's scream. For a minute all they did was stare, Charlie with caution and fear, the other man with an emotion he found difficult to identify.

He didn't look too different from Charlie himself, both of them having glasses and short brown hair, however the stranger's was a shade or so darker. Their outfits were a complete antithesis, though- Charlie was still stuck in his more-red-than-green shirt and the equally bloody and torn up bulletproof vest on top of it, while the stranger was in a clean, bright yellow jumpsuit with just as vibrant red gloves and boots, as well as a bright white cape to complete the unusual superhero-esque look.

Charlie was first to break the silence, although he had only intended to think and not say the phrase out loud, "w-who the fuck are you?"

The man looked stunned, not able to immediately respond. Charlie pressed himself further into the wall behind him. What if he'd come from Showfall? What if he was here to bring Charlie back?

"I was your- nevermind, uh...I'm Mariana," he eventually said. Charlie probably could've guessed that from the name above his head, but it was good to be sure.

"Alright, uh..." Charlie's eyes darted to the side nervously, looking for an escape or a weapon in case he needed them, but he quickly looked back to Mariana in case his intentions were too obvious, "why- why are you here?"

"Why? That- because you were my bitch husband, Slime! You think I'm not gonna worry about you when you disappear for three fucking months?!"

Uh.

What?

"W-wait, huh?" Charlie looked at Mariana in disbelief. That probably wasn't something a Showfall employee would say, at least, but this was not an alternative he could've ever imagined.

"Do you- do you remember? Y'know, me? Flippa..?" Mariana asked, his caring aggression now switching to a more pleading look. Charlie just shook his head, which seemed to kill the man, as much as he tried to cover it up.

"A-alright, yes, they said you wouldn't remember, that's fine, that's fine," it didn't seem to be fine, but Mariana just took a breath and continued, "well, you know, as long as you're fine, that's all I really wanted to know."

"Yeah, I...I'm fine," Charlie told him. He didn't think Mariana was here to kidnap him anymore, but his ex husband..? That seemed even more difficult to believe.

Charlie yelped again as the door slammed open, returning to pressing himself to the wall after having been slowly inching away from it while talking with Mariana. The anger on the blonde man's face as he stepped into the room didn't give Charlie any more comfort.

"Mariana, you're not supposed to be here!" Phil shouted- that was his name, Charlie remembered. Him and the other players had introduced themselves yesterday. So was Mariana another player, someone who had already been living on this island?

"I-I just wanted to check how he was!" Mariana defended, backing nervously away from Phil as the older-looking man pulled out a lasso.

"Yeah, but Baghera told you no, and then Quackity told you no, and now I am having to tell you- no," he commanded.

"I didn't wake him up or anything!"

"Let me guess, you were only staring at him the whole time? Jesus, you better not have told him any weird shit too and confused him," Phil hoped, but the sheepish laugh Mariana gave in response was enough of an answer.

"Jeez- alright, Charlie, I'm sorry about this, you can keep sleeping if you want, just forget all the stuff this idiot told you, I'll make sure he doesn't break into your room again," Phil apologised, throwing the lasso around Mariana and dragging him out of the room.

"Wait, wait- Slime, we can talk later, right?" Mariana called back to Charlie.

"No you won't," Phil decided, getting Mariana out with one last tug and shutting the door behind the both of them.

Charlie just stared at the door, processing the scene he'd just witnessed. That sure was...something.

He looked around. After all the noise, his empty room now felt too empty, too quiet. He liked the silence, it felt safe, but it looked like past midday outside and he didn't really want to go back to sleep if he'd slept that long already. He and Ranboo were in rooms next to each other. He'd go see Ranboo.

Charlie emerged into the corridor, both relieved and disappointed that Phil and Mariana were nowhere in sight. There were five doors along the wall, and on the floor above he knew there were five more, one for each of them. Well, besides Hetch. Cucurucho said the couch on the ground floor was for him.

Cucurucho had apparently built this whole hotel just for them. It seemed a lot of effort to go to, but Charlie got the sense that the bear had some tricks to make building easier for itself.

Charlie walked a few steps down the hall, trying his best not to make much sound, and gently knocked on the door next to his own. After no noise coming from the other side he considered going back, Ranboo might still be asleep, this was dumb. Just because he was restless it didn't mean he needed to drag Ranboo out of their bed as well.

Charlie probably wouldn't have answered the door to just a knock, though. His paranoia was far too blaring to invite strangers into his room, even if that hadn't stopped Mariana. But he wasn't a stranger to Ranboo, so he sighed and summoned the loudest whisper he could.

"Uh, R...Ranboo? It's, uh, it's Charlie, I...are you awake?"

He waited with the side of his face an inch from the door, bouncing on one leg and trying not to creak the floorboards as he did. This time, eventually, there was a response.

"Charlie..?"

The voice was barely a whisper, more like a croak, but it was definitely Ranboo. Charlie took that as his invitation and gently creaked open the door.

"Hey, Ran...I-I didn't wake you up, did I?" Charlie kept his voice quiet as he slowly poked his head in and saw Ranboo looking back at him, leaning up against the back of his bed with the duvet still over his legs. Ranboo shook their head and Charlie realised, with surprise and joy, that this was the first time he'd seen Ranboo's smile.

The cloth mask they'd had on all of yesterday was on the bedside table, leaving their face uncovered for the first time in Charlie's memory. It felt like Ranboo was letting him see something he wasn't supposed to, a kindness they'd kept hidden; because it was a kind smile. It was warm. It was a smile they'd fought for and that he could cry over, if he wasn't involuntarily tearing up already whilst stood in Ranboo's doorway.

The smile flickered a little, but only to amusement as Ranboo observed Charlie standing on the other side of the room, mouth hanging a little bit open but no words coming out. Charlie realised his own stillness and quickly moved into the room, pushing the door closed behind himself.

"You good?" Ranboo said with a little bit of a laugh, his voice a little hoarse from seemingly having just woken up. Charlie really hoped it wasn't his fault.

"Uh, yeah, sorry...you doing alright?" Charlie asked in return. Ranboo nodded and smiled again, and Charlie smiled back at the sight of it.

Their lips were rough and the faint hint of a scar lingered on the right side, but other than that he was fine. Blood drenched Ranboo's clothes too, but like Charlie there seemed to be no wounds actually on his body, so he didn't worry too much about it.

It was strange how much of a luxury it felt to smile so genuinely, as though it were something they weren't supposed to do but they did it anyway, out of spite as much as the joy they were finally allowed to release into the world.

As Charlie thought his mind couldn't help but go back to Mariana and the things he'd said, despite Phil's advice to disregard them. All of them knew already that they'd known some of the island's residents in a past life, so that part wasn't too pressing to Charlie, but...husbands? Ex husbands? He didn't really know what to make of it.

"You can come and sit down, y'know," Ranboo told him, seeing he'd spaced out again. Charlie nodded, a little embarrassed that he'd probably woken Ranboo up and now was repeatedly zoning out in their room, then headed to the chair by the side of the bed. Ranboo sighed like an amused parent watching their child failing a simple task and reached out a hand to grab Charlie's arm and pull him onto the edge of the bed.

Charlie just did as Ranboo guided him, dangling his legs over the side of the bed and stopping himself from looking too obviously embarrassed by having to be dragged everywhere. The teen moved to sit by his side, his knees tucked up to his chest with a part of the duvet still over them. He raised the other side of the duvet and put it onto Charlie's shoulder so that it covered both of them.

"Was it a nightmare?" Ranboo asked, and there wasn't much point in Charlie being surprised because it was probably obvious.

"Well, y-yeah, but there was also someone who...he was there when I woke up, he said his name was Mariana," Charlie decided to leave the weird details out of his explanation to Ranboo, they were already confusing him enough so it wouldn't do them any good. Ranboo just nodded, letting him speak.

"This Mariana guy, he uh, he said he knew me, and there was someone else he mentioned, but..." Charlie couldn't finish, there were too many branching doubts to end his sentence that he couldn't land on one.

"You don't remember him?" Ranboo asked, which offered Charlie the much easier option of nodding his head.

"Yeah, I...I didn't recognise him."

Charlie felt a little guilty about it, even though he didn't owe anything to the guy- he didn't even know him, that was kind of the point. But Mariana had looked so crushed to hear the truth. It was just a shitty situation for everybody involved.

A knock on the door caused them both to flinch and Ranboo's hand darted to Charlie's arm. Charlie tried to smile at Ranboo to ease his nerves but he wasn't exactly free of worry himself.

The silence from them and the one outside their door stretched on until Charlie thought he could hear his own beating heart.

"Who is it..?" Ranboo eventually called out, though their voice was still a bit quiet. Charlie thought maybe it was too quiet as still there was no noise from outside, but then the handle twitched, and turned.

Ranboo held Charlie a little tighter and Charlie didn't dare take his eyes from the door. No matter how much the bear told them it was safe here he knew better than to underestimate the people that had done everything to stop him and his friends from getting out of that mall.

However, nothing came through the crack in the door he was staring at. He held his breath and tried not to clench his fists so hard he pierced skin, the tension building and building. Then Ranboo nudged him and motioned for him to look down.

Oh.

Tallulah looked back up at him, her expression apologetic, although Charlie felt like he should be the one to do so for assuming she'd come to kill them, or worse. He supposed that was why Ranboo hadn't gotten a response- it seemed that all the eggs were mute.

Tallulah took the release of their tension to be permission for her to enter, and she shut the door behind her, then put down a sign.

I'm sorry for the intrusion! You were both awake so I wanted to ask if you'd like to go outside with me? Of course it's okay if not!

Charlie and Ranboo exchanged glances, the latter shrugging. Charlie turned back to Tallulah to respond.

"Uh, it's fine, don't worry- I mean, is there somewhere specific you wanna go, or do you just wanna help our vitamin D deficiency?" Charlie laughed. Being trapped in a mall definitely wasn't good for the skin.

We've managed to set up a room with clothes for you so you can change! Sorry for keeping you in those old ones so long.

Charlie smiled, but it was a little bit of a grimace as he looked down at his ruined clothes and the similar state of Ranboo's, although Ranboo had less holes and more blood, which Charlie didn't really think made sense but considering where the blood looked to have poured from he didn't want to give it much more thought.

"Yeah, that would be good, I'm kinda sick of these," Ranboo said, then leaned away from Charlie to grab his mask. Charlie assumed that they were more comfortable wearing it if they were going outside.

Tallulah nodded happily and put one last sign down.

Okay, I'll wait outside! You can come out whenever you're ready, no rush.

Charlie gave a little wave as Tallulah stepped out and closed the door but his hand clenched in midair as he stared at the spot she'd been in. That dream...hadn't there been a girl in his dream? But no, it hadn't been Tallulah, she was different...she was...

Ranboo stumbled off the bed and Charlie pulled himself out of his thoughts to make sure he caught them before they fell over. Ranboo nodded in thanks and a little bit of embarrassment, making sure he was stable as Charlie leant off the bed too.

Standing by his side, Charlie suddenly remembered how small the teen made him feel. Maybe he'd been put in the mall with the other adults because his height made him seem older, which wasn't exactly a comforting thought, but Charlie felt the need to justify why they'd gone through that torture too. Surely nobody would've put them in that hell knowing how young they really were.

He hoped, at least.

Ranboo was first to go to the door and, after checking Charlie was ready to go, pulled it open. Tallulah stood patiently on the other side of the hall and her face lit up as they both stepped out of the door.

Follow me!

She held up the sign briefly and started down the hallway, headed towards the stairs to the bottom floor. Charlie and Ranboo walked side by side behind her, neither wanting to be in front of or behind the other.

The room at the bottom of the building was quite nice, a few couches and tables scattered around and some chests with food and drink near the back. Charlie gazed through the glass doors at the midday scenery- although it was probably more like the afternoon now. This island always seemed so bright and alive, quite the contrast from a dead, empty mall.

Tallulah took them out and the three of them followed a path that made its way towards where more of the big buildings were situated, however the closest one was new and quite a bit smaller than the rest. Tallulah slowed her already leisurely pace which Charlie took as a sign this was the one they were going into.

He could only assume the bear had built this one as well while they were asleep. It was only a simple structure but Charlie knew that there must've been something like magic involved in order to create things like this so quickly- it wasn't too implausible if they really were in a video game.

Tallulah held up a sign as she took her last few steps towards the doors.

The changing rooms are at the back! Feel free to take as many outfits as you'd like!

She span on her heel to face them with a big smile, standing to the side of the door like a bouncer. Ranboo nodded his thanks and Charlie stepped up first to push the door open and take a look at what was inside.

Rows and rows of outfits lined the walls, there must have been a hundred different shirts on one side that were organised by colour, making one big rainbow. Jeans, leggings, skirts, tights, there were even a variety of hats on one of the shelves. Charlie then turned to look in amazement at the selection of shoes, but his attention caught more on the figure in front of them.

Upon hearing their entrance, Vinny had turned to look at the two newcomers, holding a pair of nice looking trainers that he seemed to be in the middle of considering.

"Oh, hey guys! We, uh, we didn't know if you'd be waking up today, heh," he smiled and Charlie chuckled a little. If it hadn't been for Mariana he might not have.

"Is everyone else awake?" Ranboo asked, stepping past Charlie to get a better look around the room.

"Uh, I think so...don't think Sneeg or Ethan ever slept, but Niki got knocked out on the night tour- sh-she's fine now, don't worry!" Vinny put an arm out as he saw them immediately start to panic from the news about their friend.

"Unconscious? What- what happened?" Charlie asked, appreciative that she was alright but still concerned something had happened to her in the first place.

"Well, uh, y'know those people who couldn't sleep so they stayed up? Well they ran into something bad, Ethan wouldn't say what, and Niki apparently flung herself at it and that didn't exactly end well," Vinny laughed nervously as he watched Ranboo and Charlie remain just as worried from his recounting of the events.

"Bad- like, is it something dangerous?" Ranboo asked and Vinny put both his arms up, one still holding onto the shoes.

"Guys, that is all I know, they were being vague as fuck when they explained it all to me, so," he shrugged and looked at the shoes briefly before deciding to put them back.

"Right...guess we just won't worry about... that," Charlie sighed, resigning himself to getting no more answers about whatever it was that had hurt Niki.

"I guess we can ask Ethan if he told you, right?" Ranboo suggested, "where did you see him? Or, I guess, where did he go?"

Vinny thought for a second, "well, I saw him in here, him and Sneeg were here together a bit earlier. Not sure where he said he was going after, though. You might have to find him."

Ranboo sighed and nodded, already sounding tired.

"Hey, let's just find some less fucked up clothes first, then we can hunt everyone else down," Charlie nudged Ranboo with a smile. Ranboo agreed and turned their attention back to the clothes.

"They, uh, really went all out for us," they observed. Charlie could definitely agree that it was a lot, but he couldn't say that was a bad thing. He was actually pretty excited, looking at the shirts, and the jumpers, and hell, even the hats. Maybe he'd try out a new style. New mysterious organisation looming over my life, new me!

Not that he thought whatever Cucurucho was a part of was bad, the bear had only been kind to them so far, the eggs even more so. He couldn't help but wonder if there was another layer to it, though.

Anyway, clothes. He should pick some clothes.

He first dragged his hand across all the shirts, admiring the assortment. His fingers stopped as they went from yellow to green and he saw a shirt that wasn't too different from what he was wearing right now- well, pre blood stains and tears. He skipped over that section. Green wasn't really his colour right now.

Ranboo had already been caught by something among the jackets and his eyes twinkled as he pulled out something cyan and purple. It looked retro and futuristic, and Charlie didn't blame Ranboo for taking a liking to it. He did envy how quickly they made their decision, though.

While he was distracted he didn't realise how his hand had landed on the hanger of one of the blue shirts. It was nothing flashy, just a darker shade on the top that faded to a lighter shade as it descended. Charlie shrugged- if he didn't pick at random then he probably wasn't going to pick at all. Blue shirt it was.

Vinny was by the trousers as Charlie wandered over and gave him a smile.

"Seems kinda weird to be picking our clothes, right? Can't say I'm mad, though. They have good selection," Vinny told him. Charlie looked over the various items Vinny had picked up- a few different shirts for different days, none of which were green either, he'd even decided to pick up a scarf, but no new hat. He had long since abandoned the original hat he'd been wearing.

"Yeah, well...for the most part," Charlie laughed, noting a small section of clothes nearby that seemed more suited for fancy dress than everyday use.

"Hey, even some stuff's missing from there," Vinny countered, following Charlie's gaze to the miscellaneous section and pointing out an empty hook between a few different sized suits.

"Someone planning an expensive dinner or something..?" Charlie speculated. Vinny shrugged and took one last pair of cargo pants into his arms.

"Guess we'll find out eventually. Now I've gotta see if this stuff fits..." he gazed down at the task he'd given himself and Charlie patted him on the back.

"Good luck," he was thankful that he was instead only planning to get one or two outfits for the time being. That was pretty much the limit of his current decision making power, and he could always come back later for more, probably.

Vinny smiled nervously and headed to one of the changing rooms at the back. Charlie turned back to the rack and took off the first jeans he saw and that he assumed would fit. He supposed he should try his clothes on too, though.

He thought this would be the most exciting part, finally putting on new clothes, but as he drew the curtain of the little room and turned to himself in the mirror he felt his arms lock up. The vest- he didn't want to take off the vest.

It was ruined, soaked and dried in blood, torn through as it had hardly done anything to protect him from the beast that tore his chest apart. But still he couldn't take it off, not with the thought that there was still something here, that it had hurt Niki and he could be next.

He pressed his fingers to his chest to stop the small shakes that were beginning to emerge. He could just wear it under the new shirt, right? If he was so worried about being without it then he could just keep it on more subtly, and it's not like anyone would know. Even if they did he doubted they'd judge him for it. Not after what they'd gone through.

So with that plan he gently unzipped the bulletproof vest and peeled it away, the shirt following. It didn't cling to his skin as there were no wounds for the blood to stick onto, but the sensation was still unpleasant and he was more than grateful that, at last, it was off.

He didn't delay putting the vest back and then putting a new shirt over it. Not the most physically comfy thing, but it eased his mind. And once he looked back at himself in the mirror he was almost too shocked to know what to think.

It was a shirt. That was all it was, a simple shirt he'd picked out at random. But now it was his. Not his in the way the last one had been, in that it was the costume of his character, but this was his in that it was his, not selected by some shitty corporation to match some nonsensical brand, it was selected by him.

And looking back at a person he was starting to be able to actually call himself, Charlie supposed he looked pretty damn good.

~

On a walk by himself later that day, Charlie walked past Phil.

Charlie had wanted to explore the island with Ranboo, especially since Vinny's warning about something bad meant he was far too paranoid to go out on his own, and he'd never allow Ranboo to do the same. However Ranboo had left not long after the two of them had put on their nicer, cleaner clothes, saying something about an urgent and private message from Sneeg in a book.

Charlie had decided to head back to their hotel at that, since that seemed to be one of the safest buildings on this island and it was actually quite a comfortable place to wait for Ranboo and Sneeg to be done. On the way, however, there was a bench. And on that bench was Phil, joined by an unconscious Mariana.

He'd been immediately intending to walk straight past and hope he didn't catch their attention, but Phil seemed nice, and the conversation this morning seemed like a weird note to leave their relationship on. After some time deciding what to do and bouncing on his legs, Charlie hesitantly made his way to the bench.

"Oh, hey mate," Phil welcomed, eventually realising his presence, or maybe he was just pretending to not have seen Charlie staring at him in deep consideration for a good five minutes prior to approaching.

"Uh, hey," Charlie replied, standing about a meter from the bench, not quite ready to just take a seat beside the strangers. He looked again at Mariana, who was leaning on Phil's shoulder. It couldn't have been much more than an hour since they were shouting at each other, but now he was out cold.

"I'm on babysitting duty, looks like," Phil laughed, picking up on where Charlie's attention was drawn. It seemed Charlie wasn't going to join the conversation too eagerly, so Phil filled the silence with an explanation.

"Mariana logged on last night to see what was going on and managed to be right in the middle of shit hitting the fan, but after all that was sorted out he didn't log back out, and now he's probably snoring on his keyboard because all the energy drinks finally caught up to him."

"Is...is everyone alright from what happened last night?" Charlie asked, wanting confirmation.

"Oh, I guess you're still not caught up...uh, yeah, everyone's good, it looks like Niki's back to normal already. It was a mistake on our part letting her get hurt, we've dealt with threats on the island before...but don't worry, we know how to handle them. Might be good to stay safe just for a little, though," Phil advised, and Charlie nodded, having already gathered that last part. He wasn't intending to be outside at nighttime or roam around a spooky forest or anything any time soon, he preferred the day and keeping what blood he had left in his body, thank you.

"The French players were smart enough to get some sleep in before the morning, but this dumbass," Phil continued, pointing at Mariana, "was so insistent on staying the whole time with us. I managed to keep an eye on him but when Niki was awake and we went to see her he must've snuck away, and that's when he got to your room...sorry about that."

Charlie waved a hand, dismissing the sincerely apologetic look of the blonde man. He'd like to say that Mariana talking to him had at least given him some answers, but it hadn't really. Even if it had, those answers were definitely outweighed by even more questions.

"Did he, uh...was he serious when he said something about being my...'husband'?" Charlie asked, and almost immediately saw Phil faceplant.

"Oh, fuck, he actually told you...uh, shit, this isn't the easiest thing to explain. I'd punch him if the hit sound didn't risk waking him up," Phil complained, thinking where he should begin to answer Charlie's question without causing even more questions to pile up.

"Well, Charlie, you and Mariana knew each other, before all of this. You were paired together in this game and kind of...role play married. All of us were, I have a husband too, even though in real life I have a wife...it, uh, it's weird. Are you following?" Phil checked. Charlie nodded, albeit slowly.

"You were married too...so is that where I knew you from? All of us, we were part of this...event?"

Phil went to nod, but then reconsidered, "well, we were, because it was one of the first things to happen, but from your group? It was just you. Ranboo, Sneeg- they weren't on this island before, but, uh, you were."

"I...I was here?" Charlie considered, looking around. He'd admit, this place was weirdly familiar, but... "why me?"

Phil sighed and tapped his fingers on his leg, "well, you and all the other players on the island, including me...we all got picked because we were streamers, and this was the kind of thing we did. Play on Minecraft servers, fake marry other players, get way too attached to all the eggs...lots of the people here only know you out of everyone who was missing because you were a member of this server beforehand."

Charlie had gone still. It was a lot to take in that he'd had this connection to the players none of his other friends had, but a single word was ringing in his mind louder than that. Streamers. He'd been a streamer.

That was what they'd had him doing in the mall, wasn't it? That world, trapped at a computer, confined by his headphones...and that had been his life before? He recalled being quite happy on that stream before he was reminded of the hell he was truly in. Maybe Showfall was giving him a taste of what he'd had before, just so they could tear all of it away.

It didn't seem Phil was able to see how Charlie's face was twisting with the pain of memories, so he continued on, "so that's why Mariana wanted to see you so bad. He'd been hit pretty hard after the disappearance, although we all were. That's why I'm not taking my chance to log off even though he's asleep- I know as soon as this lasso is gone he'll be at your door trying to tell you about the court case."

Phil laughed and then winced at the plausibility of his joke coming true.

"Wait, so, then...did you sleep this morning?" Charlie asked, realising Phil had been here quite a long time, and the question must've had a telling answer considering how Phil was hesitant to respond.

"Well, I, uh, I wanted to be here in case things happened, so...didn't want to miss anything if I slept, you know?" he smiled nervously back at Charlie.

"Hey man, if you want to sleep, I'm sure I'll manage," Charlie assured him, a little worried about the exact length of time Phil had been awake despite still barely knowing the man.

"I- are you sure?" Phil checked.

"The Cucurucho bear guy seems to have it all sorted, y'know," Charlie laughed, and Phil joined him.

"Yeah, heh, that is true," he agreed, "we've never really known what was up with Cucurucho, even when he was a part of our role play. Some things never change, I suppose."

Phil hopped off the bench, allowing Mariana to slump down and lie across it.

"You sure you'll be fine?" Phil checked one last time, reminding Charlie of an overbearing dad.

"I think you need to worry about whether you'll be fine with sleep deprivation," Charlie countered, and Phil couldn't help but concede.

"Alright, alright, but I'll definitely be back tomorrow," he promised, and then all of a sudden he was gone. That was what 'log off' meant, Charlie guessed.

For a few moments he looked at Mariana, the two of them now alone in the area. Husbands, huh? Or, well, maybe ex husbands. What a strange life his past self had lived.

Charlie moved on, leaving Mariana to wake up whenever he had rested enough. He should at least try to get to the hotel before the sun started to set. Although he was tempted to linger outside just a little longer- sunsets were so pretty, and it had been so long since he could enjoy them like this.

But he continued on, deciding he didn't want to keep Ranboo waiting if they had already finished whatever it was they were doing with Sneeg. Charlie wondered how either of those two might react to the news of his previous marriage. Maybe they'd congratulate him, maybe they'd try to kill Mariana for whatever it was that had lead to their potential divorce, maybe they would want to get married too.

Charlie was so occupied imagining the hypotheticals that he didn't realise the glass hotel doors were already slightly open, nor did he notice the bucket sitting atop them.

And when he opened the door it was far too late anyway.

Splosh.

The liquid splattered all over his head and dripped down his shoulders while the now empty bucket clattered to the floor. He froze. It was cold- it trailed down his neck and it felt like it was seeping into his skin. It was thick and it was sticky.

It was green.

Charlie looked down at his hands, trembling. They were covered in something green. Between the fingers, under the nails. He couldn't escape the texture. It made him feel sick.

His body felt heavy and his knees gave in. He landed in a puddle of the slime, further ruining the clothes he'd just received. It looked like slime, but so had everything in the mall, and Charlie knew far too well that the shit it the mall had not been slime.

His chest ached and his organs felt like they were out of place, if they were even there, if they hadn't been dragged out of him yet. Back then that slime had been warm. Far too warm.

Footsteps approached and it was someone coming to hurt him, they were going to tear him open again- Charlie scrambled away, kicking across the slippery floor and pressing his back to a wall when he could get no further. The figure came down to his level but Charlie didn't look at it, he stared straight ahead, because he knew everywhere else he looked he would see a kitchen or an operating table or blood everywhere.

"Sorry about this. You don't mind if I run a little experiment, do you?"

"H...Het..." Charlie couldn't even get his name out between breaths. The masked man crouched by his side, looking on apathetically as Charlie wrestled with his mind and his feet slid across the wet floor in futile attempts to push himself further away and into the wall. He couldn't see it as anything else but blood, blood coating his clothes, blood dripping down his face. He couldn't take it. Not this. Not again.

Something poked his arm as his movements began to slow, but the sensation was numb.

"Is that really all you've got, Slimecicle? You get a little wet and now you can't even bear to move?" Hetch mocked him, but Charlie was unresponsive, continuing to stare ahead. The words didn't process as his brain was too busy short circuiting, screaming at him about dangers that weren't there, reminding him of every moment of pain he had ever endured in his memory. It wasn't a lot of memories, but the pain was still more than he could ever manage.

So perhaps it was the most merciful solution when Charlie blacked out, his last thoughts chaos and completely indecipherable even to himself. His mind recognised that he couldn't stay sane with the memories of his torture battering him.

But that was fine, because there was someone else who could.

Chapter Text

Ranboo tumbled into Sneeg's room, banging the door on the wall which loudly announced their entrance. Sneeg span around from his position by the window, wearing a new black hoodie instead of his old blue one but the same old hat on his head. He stared at Ranboo in shock as they caught their breath.

"You...y-you said you wanted, uh, to talk?" they panted, leaning one arm against the open door.

"You- wh-" Sneeg didn't know where to start, looking from his door, to the teen, to the book he had in one hand. Ranboo looked to the door too, then stepped away.

"Oh, uh, sorry, I'll close this," he apologised and much more calmly shut the door. Then they turned back to Sneeg, expectantly, who was still looking back at him, entirely clueless.

"Ranboo, you- what?" he said back, leaning his head forward to emphasise how much he had no idea what the fuck was happening right now.

"The- the book!" Ranboo held up the book, "you left it near the clothes building, addressed it to me, y'know? Isn't there something you wanna tell me?"

Sneeg squinted at the book, then had a realisation and looked away.

"Oh, shit, you- Niki didn't put you up to this, did she? C'mon, man..." he complained, rubbing the back of his neck.

"What? Niki, no- this book is from you, right?" Ranboo questioned, the arm holding the book lowering a little. He opened it to make sure he hadn't incredibly misread it, but the words inside were the same as before.

Ranboo, I've found something out about Cucurucho, we need to talk. Come to my room without anyone else, it can't look suspicious.

Sneeg.

"Listen, kid, I said I didn't wanna talk about it, I'm perfectly fine to keep going as I am," Sneeg continued.

"Sneeg, what- what are you talking about?" Ranboo inquired, now worried about whatever it was Sneeg thought they were talking about.

"C'mon, man, don't make me say it..." Sneeg continued not making eye contact, instead opting to stare at nothing in particular through his window. Ranboo stayed silent, waiting for him to give in. Sneeg sighed.

"Jeez, it's not that big a deal I can't spell or read or anything, alright? I'm getting by just fine! I don't need you and Niki tryna make me sign up for lessons or whatever this crap is," Sneeg flung his arms out angrily as he finally looked back at Ranboo.

"You. What?" Ranboo said.

"Don't make me repeat it, now you're just being mean," Sneeg told them.

"No, I- that's not why- Niki didn't send me, Sneeg. What...what do you mean, you can't spell?"

"I can't spell, I fucking forgot how! Guess I did a less shit job at hiding it than I thought, though."

"So this...you didn't write me this book?"

Sneeg looked at the book, then at Ranboo with a confused face.

"No..? I can't, I thought that's why you brought it, to shove it in my face."

"No, Sneeg, I didn't come here because you can't spell or whatever, I thought this message was from you...who the fuck left this for me if you didn't?" Ranboo asked, glancing to the window as if the culprit might just be standing outside.

"No fucking clue, man. If you're done then can you get out of my room?" Sneeg requested. Ranboo stomped towards him and took his arm.

"No, you're coming with me and we're figuring this out," Ranboo commanded.

"What?" Sneeg groaned, dragging his heels as Ranboo pulled him to the other side of the room.

"Hey, you're the ones telling us that there's some mysterious threat out there," Ranboo pointed out.

"Yeah, but it's not- oh, nevermind," Sneeg tried to defend himself but realised telling Ranboo more about the monster would be a bad idea, "so you weren't here because you wanted me to relearn how to read..?" he switched the subject.

"Well, I wasn't, but now that you've told me I might consider it," Ranboo taunted. Sneeg groaned in annoyance as Ranboo continued dragging him out of the door and toward the stairs.

Their plan had been to go straight out of the doors, no need to stop and look around the ground floor when there were answers they needed, but Ranboo stopped when they were finally to the bottom of the stairs and he realised there was very much a need to stop and look around the ground floor. Sneeg even got ahead of them before he, too, stopped.

This wasn't the ground floor. It was hardly recognisable as the same room it had been this morning.

Because there were no couches, no tables or chests at the back. There were just rooms, lined up, three walls each. A living room, a kitchen. A basement.

A cabin.

"Hey, uh, Ran, you're seeing this, aren't you? I haven't just gone completely insane?" Sneeg checked, turning to look at Ranboo, who was still staring dead ahead at the same set from his memories, though it was more like from his nightmares. Sneeg took that as confirmation that they were indeed seeing the same thing.

Well, shit.

"Why the fuck...is this..?" Ranboo didn't really expect Sneeg to have any answers, but there was nothing else to do besides ask the question, even if he couldn't bring himself to finish it.

It was a perfect reconstruction, down to the wallpaper and the books and the mushroom on the fucking microwave. They thought they'd escaped this cabin, but now it was right here in front of them. Ranboo stepped towards the living room.

"Whoa, hey- we're getting the fuck out of here, Ranboo," Sneeg told him, holding his arm back as he tried to go forward.

"I'm taking a look," Ranboo asserted just as seriously, with the grave memories of this place looming over both of their heads.

Sneeg couldn't stop them after that, and only watched with concern as Ranboo crossed over the threshold onto the old cabin carpet. The couch, the TV, the door, all of them were just as they'd been when he still had that mask on, when he was still a toy for Showfall to play with.

This was either a fucking terrible prank or there was something worse going on here, and Ranboo wasn't liking how likely the second option was, through neither option was something he would like.

Then there was a bang, which sent them sprawling to the opposite side of the room in shock.

"Looks like you've found my cabin! Let's give this guy a round of applause," the demon clapped his hands together.

"...ah shit, I'm fuckin' stuck."

Ranboo couldn't move, he didn't dare. He stayed leaning against the opposite wall as he watched Charlie step onto the busted down door.

Green suit, unbuttoned collar, horns made of slime. A perfect reconstruction. Just like in his nightmares.

Charlie was grinning but there was nothing behind those eyes, it was an empty joy. He at last separated his hands and turned to Ranboo, who felt a shiver run down their spine.

"...Charlie?"

He didn't respond, he just continued with that same grin, those same empty eyes.

"Wow, this place sure is gettin' busy! Me, you, gramee..." Charlie trailed off, his eyes going down and Ranboo following, seeing his attention was on the table beside them. Shit, when Ranboo hit the wall he must've shook it, because the urn previously sitting atop it was now smashed to pieces on the ground.

"Charlie, what the fuck is going on? You've gotta stop this, you're freaking us out," Sneeg demanded, stopping Charlie from starting some spiel about his 'grameema'. He tried his best to hide the shake in his voice. Charlie didn't even seem to hear him, though.

"Well, well...you think I'm just gonna let you do that to my grameema and get away with it?" Charlie threatened, causing Ranboo to press harder against the wall. Hearing that voice after so long was making them feel nauseous.

"Charlie, listen, I- i-if you wanted to get back at me for leaving earlier, this is not the way to do it," Ranboo tried to laugh and ease some of the fear freezing up his muscles. Charlie laughed too, but it didn't sound like his laugh.

"Oh, I'll get back at you alright. I'll get back at you for what you did to my grameema!" Charlie stepped towards Ranboo.

"Charlie, stop!" Sneeg jumped in, physically getting himself between the other two, "come on, stop being an idiot, we don't need this right now! Getting a dumb outfit now that we have new clothes isn't an excuse to start reminding us of this shit!"

"Whoa, another one?" Charlie said, ignoring every sentiment that Sneeg had just tried to get across, "don't know if I've got enough bowls for both of you to do my cooking challenge."

"What? Charlie, I was right there, you could clearly see me," Sneeg pointed to where he had been stood on the other side of the set. Charlie didn't follow, keeping his eyes strictly inside the three walls.

"Who's this guy you're talking about? Char...Charlsy? We got a third guest coming or something?" Charlie asked.

"Charlie, seriously, enough of this shit," Sneeg demanded, taking a step towards the slime-covered man, but Ranboo held him back.

"Hey, Sneeg, wait-" they tried.

"I'm not putting up with whatever this is and I'm not letting you keep yourself in it for some stupid reason, Ran," Sneeg shook his arm away and walked to Charlie, who looked at him with an oblivious grin despite the anger building on Sneeg's face.

Sneeg reached out a hand-

"DON'T TOUCH ME," Charlie screamed, slamming himself back against the edge of the empty doorframe to get away from Sneeg's outstretched hand. Sneeg immediately jolted back at the screech, no longer in that stupid accent, it was harrowingly Charlie's voice.

Charlie's chest heaved, fingers pressing and curling against the wallpaper, his eyes seeing far too much to ever be comprehended at once. Sneeg considered trying to take him by the shoulder, but then, all of a sudden, he stopped.

"Three guests at once, this is starting to feel as busy as my ghouls' town house. Just kidding, there isn't nearly as much room in the town house. They gotta pay extra for every inch of personal space they get."

The accent was back, as was the grin, and whatever had been behind his eyes was extinguished. That didn't seem as much of a bad thing now, though.

Sneeg looked at Ranboo, who looked back at him. An unspoken what the fuck passed between them. Something was very wrong.

"Charlie, we...we're not in the cabin. Showfall isn't here anymore," Ranboo tried before Sneeg could try to snap him out of whatever this was more aggressively. Charlie just smiled at him.

"Uh, we are very clearly in a cabin, you blind, dry man. You want new eyes or somethin? I've got a whole collection in the basement."

"No, I- Charlie, please," Ranboo begged, stepping away from the wall to be side by side with Sneeg. Charlie still grinned, not seeming to take in a single word.

"You keep mentioning this Charglee guy, but I ain't seeing anyone. You got invisible friends or somethin?" Charlie asked them. Ranboo ran a hand down their face.

"No, that's you- you're Charlie," he said clearly and slowly, hoping for some kind of recognition, but nothing on Charlie's expression changed to suggest as such.

"Do you wanna keep talking to your imaginary friend or do you wanna start cooking? We only got a limited amount of time, y'know," Charlie told them, stepping back into the joining kitchen set.

"Don't you remember this- this island? Us getting out? The rest of that mall?" Ranboo tried, throwing out everything just for a chance that Charlie would remember something.

Charlie looked at Ranboo for a second, the grin faltering. Then the expression collapsed altogether, and Charlie fell to his knees screaming.

Ranboo skidded onto the floor and tried to pry Charlie's arms away from grabbing at his face, incoherent wailing and noises pouring from his mouth. Sneeg joined them at the same level but stayed a bit away, staring at the events with confusion and fear.

"Hey, Charlie- Charlie, it okay, we're here! We're not in the cabin, we're safe, okay? We're all here, we're all together," Ranboo tried to comfort him, but Charlie continued pulling against his arms, crying and talking about jumbled nonsense.

"The- I-I can't- why is it, why is it red, what did I do, why is it all- oh god," Charlie shut his eyes tight and continued struggling, while Ranboo fought to keep a grip on his arms and stop him from accidentally hurting himself.

"It's okay, it's okay," they couldn't offer much to alleviate whatever the hell was happening to their friend, but Ranboo still tried to do everything he could, trying to comfort Charlie even if the words didn't make it past his ears.

"Ranboo- Ranboo," Charlie said with abrupt clarity, his eyes suddenly shooting open and staring into Ranboo's, "we have- we have to go, it's not safe, we have the map to the kill switch, we have to go!"

Ranboo shook their head, "no, no, we got out! We're out, Charlie!"

Charlie shook his head in return, "no, t-then why does it still hurt, why is there still blood, w-why...oh god, I-I'm..."

Charlie tried to move his hands to his throat like he was suffocating and Ranboo loosened his grip a little, hating the feeling of their own friends struggling against them.

Suddenly Charlie's hands tugged back and Ranboo was going to grab him again but his hand was grabbing something from the kitchen table he had backed into. Ranboo stayed back, wondering if Charlie was trying to get some kind of food or something that was a message for him.

Charlie, instead, grabbed a knife.

"Y-YOU S-STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME," he screamed, brandishing it at Ranboo and backing away across the floor to get away from them until his back hit the fridge. Ranboo stumbled to his feet and held his hands up, startled by the abrupt change and not wanting to push Charlie to do anything drastic.

"Whoa, whoa, Charlie!" Sneeg called out, a few steps closer to him than Ranboo but still sensible enough to keep some distance between himself and the one with a knife held out in a severely shaking hand.

"S-Sneeg, he- we were in that room, he- my, chest it was- it was open, he-" Charlie cut himself off with a howl and the knife clattered on the cheap flooring as both his hands clenched at his chest and his face scrunched up with pain. He curled into himself and screamed.

Then he got up.

"Well, I guess first we gotta get some ingredients."

Ranboo and Sneeg stared at him. He was up like nothing had happened, although when Ranboo looked he saw that he still trembled, when they listened his accent shook and faltered on certain words. But his face was no longer in agony or pain, the tear tracks still melted down his cheeks but no new ones formed. He was grinning and his eyes were empty, because emptiness was better than pain.

This wasn't Charlie, Ranboo realised. This was Slimecicle. The character Showfall made him, that they moulded him into like he was cheap clay. They had left the mall but the mall left them with scars. And some scars made the other ones easier to ignore.

"Alright. I'll get an apron," Ranboo said slowly. Sneeg looked at him in shock.

"You what?" he gaped at Ranboo, who pulled him aside while Slimecicle was getting his arm unstuck from his body.

"Listen, Sneeg, I know we gotta fix this, but right now we need to just play along. I'm not gonna pretend to know exactly what's happening here but as long as we pretend we're still in that mall and still in that fucking cabin then Charlie won't remember all the painful parts."

Sneeg looked at Ranboo, then past them to Charlie, and the knife still on the floor. He grimaced and nodded.

"Fucking whatever, sure, alright- but we can't entertain this forever," Sneeg warned him.

"I-I know, but just for now...hey, I can stay here and you can go find Cucurucho or someone, right?" Ranboo suggested. Sneeg raised an eyebrow.

"And leave you? With him?" he indicated to Slimecicle.

"He's our friend, Sneeg."

"Not right now," Sneeg countered. Ranboo sighed, hearing Charlie mumble 'goo goobie' behind them.

"I'll be fine. I've done it before."

"That does not mean you can do it again, Ranboo."

"I'll be fine," Ranboo repeated, more forcefully. Sneeg hesitated, but relented.

"Just whatever you do don't eat the fucking food," Sneeg told him, backing away.

"I didn't intend to," Ranboo assured him as they turned back towards the rest of the kitchen, where Slimecicle was now standing with an apron he'd somehow found.

Sneeg slowly stepped away, reluctant to leave Ranboo to whatever plans Slimecicle had, but was eventually over the threshold of the kitchen room and set his sight on the two glass doors. Cucurucho seemed to have a better idea of what was going on with this island more than anyone, surely he would have some idea for how to help Charlie.

Sneeg gave one last smile of good luck to Ranboo and put his hands on the door.

Clack clack.

No. This wasn't happening. Not this, not now, not fucking now.

Sneeg tried again. But the doors were locked.

"Sneeg please tell me that sound wasn't what I think it was," Ranboo called over to him from the other side of the ground floor. Sneeg laughed nervously instead of answering.

"Who are you talking to, you seeing ghosts or something?" Slimecicle responded. Ranboo looked to him, then back to Sneeg.

"What, you can't...you can't see him?" Ranboo asked Slimecicle as they pulled the apron over their head.

"Dude, I thought I was special for seeing ghosts, are you seeing double ghosts right now or some shit?" Slimecicle sounded jealous and impressed.

"No, I- uh, nevermind. Sneeg, I don't think he can see outside of this cabin," Ranboo relayed to Sneeg.

"Noted," Sneeg called back, still rattling on the doors even though it was definitely doing nothing. There were no other exits from this place so he was feeling reasonably desperate to get the fuck out.

He stopped his attempts when footsteps caught his attention, someone else was coming down the stairs.

"You guys alright? What's all the shouting for?" Niki asked as she came into view and stopped on the bottom step, taking in how the room had suddenly changed, "...you guys doing renovations?"

"Niki, this, uh...it's not a great time," Sneeg told her, watching as her eyes moved from him to the cabin, then to the two figures inside who were currently standing around the kitchen table.

"Uh...what?" was all she asked, but Sneeg understood what she meant.

"Okay, we don't really know what's going on, but Charlie's started acting like he's back in the cabin from the mall, and we're just gonna have to play along until we figure out how the hell we fix it," Sneeg explained. Niki looked back at Charlie, almost every inch of him covered in slime, and grimaced.

"Right. How can I help?" She asked.

"Think you can get this door open?" Sneeg stepped away from the front of the hotel, offering for Niki to give her attempt. She at first looked a little confused, wondering why she was being given such an easy task, but then she tried the doors.

"Shit- they're locked?" she turned to Sneeg who nodded and confirmed her fears. They were all locked inside.

"Well, isn't that just terribly unfortunate."

Sneeg had his fist slammed against the glass before the sentence was even finished. He knew that voice now and he didn't want to hear it any more than he had to. He pressed his face to the door and snarled like a raging bull. From the other side, Hetch stared back.

"That's not a very flattering expression," Hetch commented, prompting another punch from Sneeg that somehow hardly left a mark on the glass.

"Fucking coward! Get in here so I can smash your fucking skull!" Sneeg yelled, repeatedly throwing his weight against the doors, but still to no avail.

"I think it's obvious even to you why I won't be doing that. Any other requests while I'm here?" Hetch asked nonchalantly.

"You fucking bastard, of course you're behind this! What the fuck have you done?!" Niki demanded, joining Sneeg and slamming both her palms on the glass.

"Nothing much, I was just looking around this island since you so graciously abandoned me last night-"

"You ran off like a fucking crybaby," Niki corrected.

"...I found some chests out in the open, and decided to take a look," Hetch continued, ignoring her, "and I found the strangest thing. Some kind of wand, called a Universal Block Reinforcer- and, well, since you all care so much about your own safety, I thought reinforcing these doors might be appreciated, no?"

Niki scowled, "that's bullshit, you just wanted to fucking trap us!"

"Well, maybe it's an unfortunate side effect that only I can open the doors that I've reinforced...still, I thought you might appreciate this more than anyone after your unfortunate passing last night, Niki."

A/N: psst, I know that's not really how block reinforcers work, but just go along with it for the sake of me not having to come up with a different explanation ;)

"Don't fucking bring that up," Niki spat, the last person she wanted taking about her death was the one who made the monster that killed her. She hoped Hetch didn't know that it was his Security that was loose on the island, otherwise he would no doubt find a way to weaponise the creature once again.

"Whatever, I don't give a shit about your magic ass wand, what the fuck did you do to Charlie?!" Sneeg shouted, landing more hits on the door to emphasise his words.

"Oh, Slimecicle? Well, nothing, really," Hetch said as the demon threw an apple at Ranboo in the background, "that was all him, I just provided the catalyst. The mind does such curious things to deal with stress, I'm glad I undertook this experiment..."

Sneeg's lip curled, "you're sick."

"You reverse this shit now or I will make fucking sure you regret it the moment I get my hands on your neck," Niki threatened.

"Reverse? That's out of my power, I'm afraid to tell you. Maybe you can figure something out. I'll just be here taking notes," Hetch said, shifting one hand that held onto a book and quill.

Sneeg wanted to scream. Sneeg wanted to crush his organs and tear his eyes out. But he was one piece of glass away from his vengeance, one shitty piece of glass that refused to break.

"We're not your fucking experiments anymore, you fucking psychopath," Niki growled at Hetch, but he hardly acknowledged her. He must've barely seen any of these people as human.

"It's surprising, honestly, how easily he broke. It wasn't even blood, just a reminder of it. I'd like to see how long it would take Ranboo if I put that mask back on his face."

"Sneeg-" Niki suddenly grabbed Sneeg's arm as he raised his red knuckles to pound on the door once again, "he's just trying to piss you off, don't hurt yourself over something as worthless as him."

Sneeg considered it, and eventually he lowered his arm, even though the decision to do so was clearly difficult. He reasoned with himself that he'd need his fists in a good shape when they got out of here, then Hetch would really know just how pissed he was.

"I suppose I shouldn't interrupt my own experiment too much...I'll leave you all to it, shall I?" Hetch began backing away from the door.

"We're not fucking experiments you piece of shit! You are fucked as soon as I get my fucking hands on you!" Sneeg spat. Hetch looked unfazed by the threats and walked away at a painfully slow pace, eventually getting out of their line of sight.

Sneeg backed away from the door, "SHIT," he shouted and stomped his heel into the ground.

"Fuck...that prick isn't even human," Niki said, pacing in front of the locked entrance.

"Whatever- fucking whatever, he's not worth thinking about. Right now I just wanna help Charlie. I guess the working theory is amnesia," it's always amnesia, Sneeg thought but didn't add, "since he's convinced we haven't escaped yet. Fuck...this is fucked."

Niki hummed her agreement and rubbed her forehead, turning back to the cabin at the same time as Sneeg.

"Uh...hey, is..?" she started.

"He's gone," Sneeg finished, putting it simply to hide the extent of his worry that Slimecicle was now nowhere in sight.

Ranboo was still in the kitchen, humming a tune and stirring a bowl of what appeared to be flour and...Sneeg didn't really want to know what the other things were. But they looked to be completely oblivious that the demon was gone.

"Ranboo, hey- where the fuck did he go?" Sneeg asked, walking closer to the kitchen as Ranboo looked up.

"Oh, uh, he's- wait, what?" Ranboo looked around, expecting Slimecicle to be looming over his shoulder, but he was met with a distinct lack of mischievous slime, "guess that explains why I wasn't feeling as threatened while I was cooking..."

"D-did you not see him go?" Sneeg asked, amazed that a bright green man so easily slipped out of sight. Ranboo quickly shook his head, looking a little ashamed.

"No, I...I'm sorry, I got way too focused on the cooking," they admitted.

"It's fine," Sneeg sighed, "we just gotta find him again before he goes and gets himself hurt, or hurts someone el-"

Sneeg flinched, cutting himself off at the sound of a scream from upstairs. It sounded like Ethan. Oh shit.

The three on the ground floor needed no further prompting to dash together to the stairs and rush straight to Ethan's room, only to witness him falling out his own door and stumbling onto the wall opposite.

"Shit, Ethan!" Niki exclaimed, rushing to his side and helping him back up. She looked at his deserted room but couldn't see anything or anyone that he might've been trying to get away from.

"What happened?" Sneeg asked, now at Ethan's side too, making sure there weren't any wounds on his body and relieved to find there were none in sight.

"I-I, uh...was there a-a costume competition going on or something?" Ethan asked in return.

"Let me guess, slime demon?" Sneeg raised an eyebrow and Ethan nodded.

"How did you-?"

Sneeg cut Ethan off, "some weird shit's going on and Charlie's not having a great time, just uh...just try and ignore him. He's probably harmless."

"Probably?" Niki questioned.

"I mean, all he did was wake me up, really. I just got kinda freaked out at the... y'know, slime," Ethan explained.

"Why was he even in there?" Ranboo took another look into Ethan's room but Slimecicle had definitely disappeared again.

"I dunno, he was...he was whispering some weird shit...something about penis..?" Ethan sounded doubtful at the absurdity of his own words, but Ranboo and Sneeg just looked at each other.

"Oh," they said in unison, as if they should've been expecting this.

"Well, right, okay," Ranboo moved on, leaving the other two without a much needed explanation, "is this everyone in the hotel right now? We should probably find other people before Slimecicle goes and terrorises them."

"No, it looks like everyone else is outside," Ethan told them, looking on the screen of a weird device he'd pulled out.

"How do you know? And what the heck is that..?" Ranboo pointed to the device.

"Oh, it's like, a communicator, or something- we all have one," Niki explained, pulling out hers from a leg pocket. Ranboo checked and found he had the same thing as Ethan continued.

"It's got a map on it that tells us where everyone is, but they're all outside...guess that's a good thing for them."

"They might have better chances finding a way in from the outside," Sneeg suggested.

"I'll send a message," Niki said, already typing.

That was sorted, then. All they needed to do now was find the demon.

~

Vinny was in the middle of exploring a colourful little town when he noticed a new message had appeared on his communicator.

Nihachu » can all of you eho see this pls come to the hotel
Nihachu » who
Nihachu » its important come quickly

Well that probably wasn't good.

He hopped down the stairs and ran by something that looked important that had an unusual stone tower at the centre, but continued on his way back to the hotel with as few wrong turns as he could make. He was learning the layout here already, but it was still difficult to navigate without a map.

Someone was already outside once the building was in view and Vinny was about to shout out Niki's name when he realised it wasn't Niki at all, but rather it was Jerma. Jerma also looked back at him as though he were expecting someone different.

"Niki isn't here?" Vinny asked once they were close enough to hear each other.

Jerma shook his head, "no, the door's locked too, which is weird."

Vinny's eyebrows pressed together and he stepped up to try the door himself.

Clack clack.

"Well that's-" Vinny was about to comment on the evident strangeness of the situation when something slammed into the glass from the other side.

"Vinny! Oh, uh, Jerma too! Thanks for coming, there's, uh, there's a problem," Niki shouted from the other side, although it wasn't particularly difficult to hear through the glass. Vinny jumped back in fright from her sudden introduction.

"No problem- hey, what's going on?" Jerma asked nervously, seeing that she was slightly panicked.

"Well, it's- all you need to know is we're stuck, alright? Just don't worry about the stuff going on in here, we needed you to help us find a way out," Niki told them and glanced over her shoulder. Vinny had noticed that the layout of the ground floor was different, but there was something entirely new at the back, which a few people were running around.

"A way in...I don't think there's a back entrance or anything. If you're desperate can't we just smash this door?" while Vinny was looking over Niki's shoulder Jerma had clearly been more focused on the task at hand, but Niki shook her head at his suggestions.

"We tried that, quite a few times actually, but whatever Hetch said about reinforcing the door has made it fucking invincible," Niki complained.

"Hetch- Hetch did this?" Vinny sounded surprised, although it should've been obvious.

"Yeah, he did a lot worse than the fucking door, but like I said, you guys just need to figure out a way to get in- or I guess, get us out. The other three are handling...that," Niki looked again to over her shoulder where three people were running room to room, although sometimes Vinny thought he saw four. A green figure hopped between the rooms now and then but it didn't make sense for a person to be moving place to place so quickly.

"I feel like we might be out of our depth, Niki," Jerma admitted, "Cucurucho probably knows more about this than we do."

"Yeah, but sadly Cucurucho doesn't text," Niki pointed out, waving her communicator.

"Yeah, shit...surely there's an egg nearby? There's plenty of those guys," Vinny suggested. He turned around and scanned the area, but nobody was immediately in sight.

"Well until you find an egg it's just us, so you should start coming up with more ideas before we all go insane in here," Niki sighed.

"Alright, I...yeah, I'll find a way in, definitely. I'll go check around the edge and see if anything looks noteworthy," Vinny told Niki and Jerma as he nodded to them and left to circle around the building. There were windows dotted along all the walls but none of them gave him a much better view of what the hell was going on with the new rooms inside.

Around the back was just a bare wall and the left side looked about the same as the right, but just as he thought all this looking had gotten him nowhere he felt a small hand tug lightly on his sleeve.

"Oh! Uh- you're Leo, right?" Vinny asked the small figure that had appeared behind him. She nodded happily and after making sure her red hat hadn't fallen off she pulled out a sign.

Is there something happening at the hotel?

"Yeah, I- I think there is," Vinny smiled bashfully at the egg and held out a hand to them, "I think Niki will be better at explaining it than I ever could be, though."

Leo took his hand as he took them back to the front doors where the other two were still talking, though Jerma turned when he heard Vinny coming back.

"Vinny, did you find-?" he cut himself off, eyes falling to Leo, "huh. Guess we found an egg."

Leo walked ahead of Vinny to place his next sign down close enough for Niki to see.

Hello! It looked like you guys were having problems- can I help?

"...can you unlock this door?" Niki asked. Leo looked at her, then the door. They crept closer and tried the handles.

Clack clack.

Evidently not.

"If you guys didn't find a different exit then maybe Leo can call up Cucurucho? Those big bear paws oughta do it," Jerma joked, but he was still serious about trying to get Cucurucho.

These doors shouldn't be locked, I'm very sorry. Cucurucho is busy right now but Tallulah is basically second in command, I'll tell her to get over here.

"Don't apologise, it was fucking Hetch," Niki told her, "but uh, are you sure about Cucurucho? This is kind of an urgent thing."

He is b u s y. Like, super busy- I'll get in trouble for bothering him. We can probably solve this without him though.

"I hope so..." Niki muttered, leaning against the glass.

It wasn't long until Tallulah arrived. She waved to everyone upon arrival but her smile fell a little as she saw Niki trapped behind the doors and as she exchanged signs with Leo to get quickly caught up.

He reinforced the door? I can't believe we'd let something so simple happen.

Tallulah looked ashamed of herself as she learnt of Hetch's involvement and how easy his whole plan seemed to have been, although as her head dropped her hair concealed the extent of the shame in her eyes.

"Tallulah, it's fine, we just want to get out," Niki assured her, "Hetch was gonna find a way to fuck with us no matter what, we can just be happy this one is mostly harmless."

We should've left him there

Niki had never found herself agreeing so much with a wooden sign.

But like she had said a hundred times before, Hetch wasn't worth the space in their heads that he dug himself into. No use thinking about the best way to kill him when they needed to focus on getting to him first.

"Isn't there, like, some kind of reverse to whatever he did to these doors?" Jerma asked, prompting Tallulah to think for a few moments.

Not unless it's done by him, which I don't see him doing anytime soon.

"Can we, y'know, force him?" Niki asked, and Vinny knew exactly what she was insinuating by 'force', but Tallulah shook her head.

Cucurucho has banned us from hurting anyone. Sadly.

"Well there has to be some way in," Jerma put a hand on his forehead and scowled. Vinny looked sympathetically at him trying to come up with an idea, then at Tallulah who didn't meet his eyes. Her strained expression didn't give him much hope that this would be an easy task.

Leo nudged Tallulah and pointed her at a sign of his own.

Maybe we should get Cucurucho. This seems urgent.

Tallulah shook her head and scrawled decisively on a sign.

No. I told you he's busy. And if we can't fix something like this then we're just useless.

Leo looked taken aback but Tallulah turned her attention to the others before he could respond.

The building is made so that you can't break in through the walls and windows, but I will find another way. We'll get you all out of there.

Niki nodded and Vinny was happy at Tallulah's new resolve, her determination giving him inspiration too.

"Yeah, I mean, I've done stuff like this before! It'll be a walk in the park," he claimed, but Jerma looked doubtful.

"You have..? When?"

Vinny chuckled, "well, this one time I broke into a wooden duck factory, and y'know- things got a little crazy."

"You...are you talking about that story Showfall put in your head? That didn't happen, Vinny," Jerma told him. Vinny's smile dropped. Shit, he was right.

This happened every now and then, forgetting the difference between reality and delusion. It never felt any less demeaning when he realised the extent to which Showfall had fucked with his memories and how they were all helpless against it.

"Well...e-even if it's a false memory, I can still try and get something from it," Vinny thought if he was stuck with a made up backstory then he might as well find some way to use it against the one who stuck him with it.

"Better than nothing. How'd you get into the factory, then?" Niki asked him.

Vinny tapped his foot, trying to reach into the details of these events that hadn't happened. He recalled ducks, a lot of them, and being thrown..? Yeah, he wasn't doing that again.

But how exactly he got into the factory was still evading him. Even if it was a stupid reason that Showfall hadn't thought through, because who cares about the details of a background character's story, Vinny still felt like it was important, it was worth remembering.

Tallulah put a sign near his feet while he was thinking that he paused and looked at.

While you come up with an idea I think I have one of my own that we could try.

Vinny saw the mischievous grin on her face and nodded. He couldn't say no to that.

Chapter Text

Tallulah's plan was...interesting.

The hotel apparently had a basement, and according to Tallulah there was a chance that not every block around that basement had been protected by Cucurucho. If he'd missed one then that was their ticket inside, or rather a ticket for the ones inside to get the hell out.

Vinny wanted to know how they would break this block considering the walls were solid concrete. Tallulah did seem to have a plan but she refused to share, only insinuating that it would be something good by the mischievous smirk on her face.

They would first need to find the block, however. Which is how Vinny and Jerma ended up with shovels, practically creating a moat around their hotel.

"So, uh...how confident are you that Cucurucho will have missed a block?" Vinny asked Tallulah as she assisted him digging out more of his area. The dirt was strangely easy to dig up and they'd made more progress than he expected to in the time they'd spent digging.

He always makes mistakes as much as he hates to admit it. I'm sure there will be one.

Vinny nodded. He hoped she was right.

They didn't have many other options since he still hadn't come up with an idea himself. Something about that fake heist in his memories still bugged him, and it was infuriating he still couldn't put a finger on it.

Until he knew it, though, they were just going to have to go along with Tallulah's plan. So he continued digging.

It had been a while since they started digging, Vinny had no idea exactly how long, when Leo ran around the corner excitedly.

He and Jerma had found a block.

It was a patch of wall which was a lighter shade than the rest, Vinny saw as he joined them in their dug out area. He couldn't help but try and compare how much he had dug compared to Jerma.

"Alright, we found it...how are we gonna break it?" Jerma asked, watching Tallulah step closer and tap on the wall to test it.

Well, we could mine it, but I have something faster, and a lot more fun.

Vinny glanced at Leo, who also looked worried by Tallulah's vague sign, however she was far more worried when Tallulah pulled out the TNT.

"T-Tallulah, where did you-?!" Jerma exclaimed, getting cut off as Tallulah held up a sign with her free hand.

Don't worry! It's fine as long as we don't light it.

"As long as-? Tallulah, that's a bomb," Jerma emphasised, but Tallulah remained unfazed as she continued to hold it like nothing more than a toy.

Guys it's ok. Tallulah knows what she's doing. I think.

Leo's attempts to persuade them proved ineffective as Vinny and Jerma continued eyeing the sticks of dynamite like they could go off at any second. Tallulah huffed and pocketed the dynamite before she put down her next sign.

Well you two can just stand back, because I wanna blow this place up.

Leo pointed a sign of her own at Tallulah, but the other two could still read it.

Do we n e e d to blow it up, though...?

Tallulah nodded. That was the end of that, then.

"Okay, if you're doing demolition work then we'll uh, get back, I guess," Vinny said, lightly pulling on Jerma's arm to get him away from the egg armed with explosives. Leo followed them out of the pit, leaving Tallulah by the wall as she took her TNT back out.

"Don't you need to set it off from a distance?" Jerma asked her. Tallulah reached into her pocket to get something else out as she put down her next sign.

No, just run.

Tallulah pulled out flint and steel and struck the TNT.

"sHI-" Vinny screamed and almost tore a hole through Jerma's new shirt as he grabbed onto it to drag the stunned man away from imminent death.

They ran far enough before any sounds of an explosion that Vinny started to wonder if the TNT would actually go off, if Tallulah hadn't just pranked the two of them. He dared a glance over his shoulder to see if an egg was pointing and laughing at their panic, then

BOOM

Vinny hit the floor. He put his hands behind his head and curled up in the hopes of keeping himself in one piece. A moment before he clenched his eyes shut he saw Jerma doing the same.

Then another moment passed, and he felt surprisingly alive. After a short while he opened his eyes again and saw Jerma was too. Somehow the explosion hadn't torn the two of them to pieces.

He sat up just in time to see Tallulah hopping back into the now much wider hole dug around the wall, although he couldn't see if a similar hole had been blown into the wall below. He quickly checked if Jerma was alright, which he thankfully was, then stumbled to his feet to go join Tallulah and see if the death scare had been worth it.

Vinny peered over the edge and there was indeed a hole where the lighter patch of concrete had been, although when he looked closer it hadn't gone the full way through, there was still concrete behind it.

"That didn't go all the way through? How the hell was that not powerful enough?" Vinny asked in disbelief. Tallulah didn't turn away from the mockingly small hole in the wall and placed her sign next to it so that Vinny could see her words without seeing her face.

It's 2 layers. He made the wall 2 layers. And the inside is still reinforced.

"Oh...shit," Vinny frowned. Jerma and Leo soon joined him at the edge of the hole.

"It didn't..?" Jerma began, and Vinny shook his head. The plan didn't work.

Tallulah still didn't face him and Vinny was starting to get worried.

"Hey, we can find another spot, right? There could be one where Cucurucho forgot to reinforce the inside too," he tried to convince her, but it had little effect.

We'll go look for another spot.

Leo put down her sign and gave Vinny a sympathetic smile before dragging Jerma away. Vinny nodded to them and turned back to Tallulah. This was clearly bugging her more than a simple failed plan should've, and he wanted to help.

Vinny carefully skidded down into the hole to stand beside Tallulah, then crouched a little as he felt it was weird to tower over her. He wasn't really sure how to start, what to say or if he should even say anything. Thankfully, as he was about to open his mouth, Tallulah took out a sign.

I'm sorry that I'm useless.

"Y-you're not useless Tallulah, what do you- what do you mean?" Vinny leaned forwards to make sure she could see he was being genuine and caught a glance of her face behind the curls that draped over it. She looked on the verge of tears but it wasn't sadness, it was anger. Anger at herself.

I am! I can't even break a wall so now everyone is still stuck inside, can't I do something as simple as this?

Tallulah gritted her teeth and it looked like she might break her pen with how hard she pressed it into the sign as she wrote. She kicked the wall, doing nothing to it, but it wasn't as though she was expecting it to.

"Hey, hey, Tallulah, it's- don't be so hard on yourself! I mean, you're the only one who actually came up with any kind of idea, so you're doing better than the rest of us," Vinny consoled her but his encouraging smile dropped when he saw how little of an effect it had, Tallulah was still consumed by her grief.

Cucurucho would do better. Cucurucho would've solved everything by now. But I wanted to feel important. I wanted to show I could save you. I was being selfish.

"You're not selfish," Vinny tried, but Tallulah shook her head aggressively.

No! I am! I could've called Cucurucho and they'd be freed by now but I thought I could make it up to them, if I could help now then it would make up for my failure in the mission where I allowed you to die.

But I know nothing I do can make up for that.

Vinny read over the signs a few times, processing what exactly she was talking about but eventually deciding it better just to ask, "what do you...mean by that?"

Tallulah hovered over writing her next words. Either she was thinking, or she didn't want to write at all, but in the end she still put down her sign.

Sneeg, Charlie, Ranboo...we could've gotten to them in time, before they died, so that they didn't have to go through that...but we failed.

My bro didn't want me hurt so he kept me away from the main mission. I should've been there. I could've saved them.

"Listen, there's no changing what happened, alright? I know for sure that those three don't blame you for what went on, because it wasn't your fault, all that shit was Hetch and Showfall. You got us out eventually, right? That's all that matters," Vinny offered her a smile that she couldn't return, but she did seem to ease a little.

I thought I could show them I'm useful, show my bro so he doesn't keep being so protective. I was actually just worried about myself, if I really cared about your friends I should've called him.

But he's not here, and all he's left for us is two layers of stupid wall!

Tallulah returned to her anger, eyes erupting from behind the hair as she raised her fist and pounded it into the concrete. Like before it did nothing to the wall and only made her knuckles flourish a more vibrant shade of red. She ignored it, bringing her fist back and pounding it right back into the wall, worsening the state of her hands.

Vinny managed to jump up and grab onto her arms before she could do it a third time, panicking and holding them a little too tight as he was worried what damage she might do to herself. She tried to pull away but Vinny instead knelt closer and inspected her knuckles. Tallulah looked away and sniffled, not wanting to see the expression he pulled when he saw she had started to bleed a little.

Vinny loosened his grip, then before Tallulah tried to move away again he pulled her into a hug.

She stiffened, but when she moved again it wasn't to get away. After a few moments Tallulah returned the embrace and hid her tears by leaning in to Vinny's shoulder. Vinny couldn't claim to know exactly what was going on in her head, but if she needed comfort he was going to give it to her.

"Tallulah, it's alright. Plans don't always work, you haven't failed anyone. I don't blame you for anything, alright? And I don't want you blaming yourself."

Tallulah didn't respond but the movement against his shoulder was enough to let Vinny know that she'd heard him. He knew he wouldn't move until she did, so the two of them remained in an embrace for a while longer, until at last Tallulah pulled back a little and wiped her nose on her sleeve. She started writing her sign and Vinny noticed the handwriting was shakier than usual, but didn't mention it.

I'll get Cucurucho now. He'll have a plan that will work.

"Actually, Tallulah..." Vinny began, hesitating as he thought of how to word his idea, "if you'd be willing to try just one more plan, I might've remembered something."

Tallulah tried to hide how her eyes lit up at the proposal but didn't do it that successfully. Vinny smiled and began recounting the tale he had at last remembered, the story of the wooden duck factory that he thought might just hold the key to this hotel.

~

"I'm tying him to a chair."

"Sneeg, please," Ranboo protested.

"I'm tying him to a chair, Ranboo."

Meanwhile, the four in the hotel had tracked Slimecicle down after his disappearance from Ethan's room. It seemed surprisingly easy, until they realised that finding him wasn't the hard part; keeping him in one place was.

"I'm Monster House" was not a threat to be taken lightly.

"Don't you think that's a little mean?" Ranboo continued to protest whilst picking apples up from the kitchen floor, not wanting anyone to trip on them.

"Locking me in a cage is mean, Ranboo."

After the third apple baseball match it wasn't exactly unexpected for Sneeg to suggest drastic measures to stop the slimy menace from causing more trouble.

Ranboo sighed and gave in as they placed the last apple back in the bowl that would no doubt be empty in a few minutes, "fine- but it's not that bad, man, seriously."

Sneeg raised an eyebrow from his position leaning against the kitchen wall, strictly staying away from the mixing bowl at the centre of the room that looked like some sort of witch's brew, "really? You're just gonna assume I didn't see you gagging into your mask when he pulled slime out of the fridge earlier?"

Ranboo stuttered over a response, looking offended by Sneeg's words but then guilty at the truth behind them, "I-I didn't- th- that was just...listen, at least this time we know it's actually slime, I-I can deal with it this time. It just...it brought back bad memories."

"Mhm," Sneeg hummed, toying with the chain and padlock he had just retrieved from the basement room, "well, last I heard it was, how do you say... unhealthy to re-enact the traumatising events of your past."

Ranboo looked away from Sneeg's accusing gaze, "and so what, we're just supposed to let Charlie suffer on his own?"

"I'm just saying you don't have to go along with it like someone's forcing you to, Ranboo," Sneeg let some of the worry slip into his voice and Ranboo slowly looked back at him. This whole time they had been acting far more Hero-esque than Sneeg was comfortable with- going along with Slimecicle's errands, talking like some kind of NPC, acting like it would kill him to break character mid scene. Charlie was stuck in the mall and Sneeg didn't want Ranboo getting dragged back into it too.

"I'm- I'm not," Ranboo defended weakly. Sneeg raising an eyebrow once more was enough to push more of a response, "I-I'm not! You saw how much he was hurting when we didn't act like we did in the show, when he remembered... that," Ranboo waved an arm, knowing Sneeg would get the message.

"I know, I'm avoiding that too, but letting him mess with us in this cabin isn't doing us any good," Sneeg told him.

"Do we really need to tie him up? He's not hurting anyone," Ranboo asked just as a frightened yell could be heard from the living room set. The demon had jumpscared Ethan again.

"I'll tell him it's for a game," Sneeg smiled and pushed away from the wall, knowing Ranboo probably didn't have any more defences. He crossed the kitchen and opened the door to the living room, where Ethan was leaning against the back of the couch, catching his breath.

"Oh- Sneeg! You guys got all the apples?" he asked, relieved that the one entering the room wasn't Slimecicle again.

"Yeah, we got em- you know where the demon went?" he looked around, seeing no trace of the bright green suit besides the traces of slime sticking to every surface he'd touched.

Ethan shook his head, "left as soon as he'd thrown a rubber bat at me..."

Sneeg nodded, hiding his laugh, knowing Ethan probably wasn't having much more fun than them. He hadn't been there for the original cabin, but that didn't mean Slimecicle was going easy on him.

How the demon managed to hop from one room to another Sneeg didn't know, but he'd been doing it the whole time that he, Ranboo and Ethan were with him in the cabin, Niki busy trying to sort out an escape plan with the ones on the outside. They had been left to keep Slimecicle busy and out of trouble, but the unnaturally high levels of trouble suggested that hadn't been going to plan.

Sneeg headed back to the basement, hoping he might catch Slimecicle there, leaving through the open wall rather than the door since it was faster. When he stepped in to the creepy set it seemed empty, but he was well acquainted with Slimecicle's favourite spot.

"Ahahaha, ahaha, ha," came the mischievous laugh from the corner as the cardboard box flaps slowly rose up and a green figure emerged, although something seemed to be holding him back, "oh- I'm, uh-"

"You stuck?" Sneeg was tired but still managed to be amused by Slimecicle's antics that remained the same. At least he was having a good time.

"Uh, heh, yeah," the demon seemed embarrassed as he tried to pull his legs away from the cardboard, "but just you wait! Once I'm- oh-"

Slimecicle was cut off once again as Sneeg had taken him under the shoulders and was lifting him up. On the step ladder by the side of the box he could get enough height to raise Slimecicle out and place him back down next to him. It might've helped if the demon assisted him a little rather than going limp and letting Sneeg do all the hard work, but that's fine, he totally wasn't physically exhausted or anything, it was fine.

Slimecicle stood and watched as Sneeg dragged over the chair he'd found with the spiral design on the back and placed it down next to the chain and padlock he'd dropped.

"Ah, my dining seat! Usually my ghouls are the ones that bring that in...hey, you ain't interested in a job, are you? The pay is terrible!" Slimecicle said that last part like it was a selling factor.

"Uh, I'll keep my soul for now, thanks," Sneeg politely turned down the offer and patted the seat for him, "alright, what we're gonna do now is play a game, if that's all good with you. You'll love it, I swear."

Slimecicle shrugged and unsuspectingly took his seat, "alright, I'll take you on. But if you lose, I get your soul!"

"Sure," Sneeg noncommittally agreed, wrapping one layer of the chain around Slimecicle's chest, "this is a game called Stay in the Chair and Stop Jumping Around for Five Goddamn Seconds."

"Sounds fun!"

"...yeah," Sneeg nodded, getting the chain around a few more times and then hooking the lock on the two ends.

"Alright, have fun," Sneeg told him and snapped the lock shut.

That solves that issue, then.

"Hey Sneeg, do you remember if there were cleaning supplies in the cabin?" Ranboo's voice approached.

"You can try to clean the kitchen up but I'm gonna be honest, that place is probably beyond saving," Sneeg laughed, but if cleaning was how Ranboo distracted themself he decided he might as well help, "you think you can look after the freak- sorry, demon, while I try find some?"

"Sure thing!" came his response as Sneeg turned around to look at the door he presumed Ranboo was coming from. It was strange, though- he didn't remember Ranboo having such a strong accent.

Oh. Wait.

Sneeg looked at the door, in front of which was a rather smug looking slimy demon.

He looked back at the chair, empty besides the chain laid on it, then at the actual Ranboo, staring at him from in front of the set. He hadn't used the door.

Sneeg looked at the door, then Slimecicle, then Ranboo, then the chair, then Slimecicle, then Ranboo, then the floor because he was starting to feel dizzy, then back at Slimecicle after a few moments, then the chair, then-

"Sneeg I think he got out of the chair," Ranboo told him.

"Yeah, I gathered!" Sneeg snapped back, sticking his tongue out at the judgemental look he got from Ranboo in response.

"Well that was a fun game! I won, right?" the demon asked.

"Uh, no, you lost," Sneeg sighed, "it's like you're allergic to staying still, jeez."

"No, but I am allergic to the plague. Learnt that one a bit too late," Slimecicle explained.

"I...I don't think it's called an allergy when it's the plague," Ranboo objected as they stepped into the set.

"Ah- Ghouliette?!" Slimecicle exclaimed at his entrance.

"Uh, no, Ranboo," Ranboo corrected.

"Ran...Ranbus?" Slimecicle tried.

"N- uh, sure. Yeah. Ranbus," Ranbus gave in, seeing it as an easier alternative to continuously correcting the demon.

Sneeg looked at Slimecicle for a few seconds as he was distracted with the new arrival to the room. The thing he hated the most was the look in his eyes, although it was more like the absence of any look altogether. He was happy, but he wasn't their friend, and Sneeg wanted their friend back.

Luckily, Niki sounded like she had a solution.

"Guys, Vinny says they have a plan- you doing alright in here?" she checked as she jogged up to the set. Sneeg and Ranboo turned to her and nodded, with Slimecicle left wondering what they were nodding at since she remained beyond the threshold of the basement. Ethan made his way through the door from the kitchen a few moments later.

"A plan- has it got anything to do with that explosion a few minutes ago?" Ethan asked, sounding tired and very much like he didn't want to hear any more explosions.

"No, that was, uh...a different plan," Niki explained, leaving it at that. Sneeg had been curious what the earlier boom had been, but at the time he had been a bit preoccupied convincing the demon not to dump slime on his head. Explosions didn't seem like the weirdest thing happening right now.

"But anyway, yes, there's a plan, and if you're ready to go then we can start it soon," she told them. The three of them then slowly looked to Slimecicle, as it seemed he was the deciding factor in how ready they were. For the first time it seemed he was the uncomfortable one.

"What, do I- do I got something on my clothes?" he laughed nervously.

"You could say that..." Sneeg looked at the slime, then sighed and looked back at his face, "we're gonna help you, but I think first we need to leave you alone. You're not gonna immediately burn this place when we leave, right?"

He knew the message wouldn't register for Slimecicle, but he hoped that somehow it reached Charlie. He hoped that somehow his friend received the sentiment that it would all be okay, that they would solve this all soon.

"Oh sure, you can leave, but first you'll have to end my curse in order to-! Hey, where'd he go?" Slimecicle was stunned as Sneeg stepped out of the basement through the absent fourth wall and disappeared from his view.

"We're getting you outta here, man. Also don't use the microwave if you try and cook something. I think that thing's a death trap," Ranboo warned him with a pat on the back and followed after Sneeg, Ethan leaving shortly after with a reassuring wave.

The four on the outside looked in as Slimecicle stared in bewilderment at the wall they'd disappeared through. He rubbed his neck, seemingly unsure what to do now that there were no mortals left for him to toy with.

"You think he's gonna be alright?" Ranboo asked Sneeg. Sneeg didn't answer immediately, watching as Slimecicle shrugged and wandered back to his box.

"I think he'll be fine," he assured them and directed his attention back at Niki, "so, uh, escape plan, right?"

Niki nodded, "yeah, escape plan. It seems a bit crazy, but Vinny sounded sure it was gonna work, so...blame him if it all goes to shit."

The plan was, indeed, a little difficult for Sneeg and the others to get behind. But as they soon found out, it was more effective than they expected.

~

Hetch showed up as the sun was setting. Before he could get his hands on security cameras he would need to check in on his experiments in person, which was unfortunate, but there were always benefits to in-person assessments. He was sure his experiments wouldn't mind the intrusion.

Oh, who was he kidding. He didn't give a shit if they minded.

The hotel was oddly quiet as he got to the door, and with the mess that was everyone's sleep schedule he knew there wasn't a chance they were all sleeping. He glanced down, noticing the dirt around him had been disturbed, like it had been dug up and then roughly put back into place. Had they really tried to tunnel inside? It didn't matter either way. He knew there was no other way in.

Hetch rested a hand on the glass door and peered inside. The lights were off, but the fuzzy silhouette of the cabin set remained. It was no good if he couldn't see inside, though- he'd need to find a way to keep the lights on permanently before any of his experiments returned to the set.

He quietly eased the door open and stepped along the wall to the light switches. He could probably just flick them all and then take the panel off the wall, as he doubted any of them knew enough about electrics and wiring to turn them back off to sleep. If they really needed to sleep then they could do so with the lights on. They'd done that plenty with the perpetual mall lights.

He knew because sometimes he was the one kicking them awake for the shows.

Hetch sighed at the memories, already yearning for the budget The Founder had once provided him with for his experiments. This would have to do for now, until he found his way back to his mall.

He flicked the lights on and raised his sword at the figure suddenly illuminated in front of the door.

"I think you're going to be disappointed, that door locks automatically behind me," Hetch turned to look at them, not having needed to see or hear to know that Ethan had been tip toeing towards the door in the darkness.

"I, uh- I was just taking a look outside," Ethan glanced nervously at the sword as he raised his hands in defence. Hetch raised his eyebrows even though Ethan wouldn't see it behind the mask.

"I'm sure you were, are your friends planning to 'look outside' with you as well?" he asked, already losing interest in the conversation and glancing back towards the lights to assess the best way to remove the panel and keep them on.

"No, uh, just, just me," Ethan took a few steps away and looked relieved as Hetch lowered the sword from his chest, only to jump as he suddenly jammed it between the switches and the wall. He drove the blade down and forcefully tore the two apart, letting the switch clatter to the ground.

"There we go. I'm sure you won't mind a bit of light in here," Hetch taunted and watched as Ethan grimaced at the bright lights all across the ceiling that they could no longer turn off. Hetch was more than ready to get out of here and continue his observations from a greater distance, but with one last look over the room he noticed another pressing matter.

"Where's Slimecicle?" it was more of a demand than a question as he was essentially the center of this whole experiment. Maybe he had returned to his room, but Hetch would've expected the actor to much prefer the surroundings of the cabin he belonged in.

"I- uh-" Hetch didn't bother waiting for Ethan's stuttered response and made his way towards the cabin. He had to be here somewhere. The experiment had been going so well.

He tapped the side of his head in search of a certain item in his inventory but swore in annoyance when he failed to find it.

"I must've run out of slime...great, now I need to hunt even more of those little things. As if it wasn't enough of a pain the first time," Hetch complained, going back to the doors at the front of the building.

"Wait, where are you going?" Ethan suddenly asked from behind as Hetch had the door midway open, making him pause and look back.

"Important business. I'm sure you'd love to come too, but it's really too bad that I don't care," Hetch gave an unseeable smile and finally took a step back out of the door.

Then there was a scream.

Hetch stopped once again and his head whipped to the source, one of the rooms on the floor above. If it was a background character he would have barely given it a second thought, but he knew that scream was Slimecicle's, he'd heard it enough to know.

Something was happening up there, and he wasn't going to miss it.

He let the door close behind him and walked past Ethan to the stairs, hoping that whatever was going on wouldn't throw a wrench in his plans and that he could see this experiment through to the end. He opened the door he swore the scream had come from, but to his shock there was no one inside.

He looked left and right down the hall. It had definitely come from here. So where was Slimecicle? Something didn't feel right. He went back downstairs.

Ethan was gone, and there was no sign of Slimecicle. Hetch went straight to the door rather than sticking around for some stupid ambush that they were no doubt planning. Had it always been that dark outside?

He turned the handle. The door didn't open.

He tried again.

Locked.

"How the..?" he mumbled to himself, trying to gauge what was going on. Had someone found a way to block him from accessing the door? Hetch took out the reinforcer he'd used before but it claimed he was still the only one able to open the door, despite it very much not opening.

"Having fun in there?" he heard a voice from outside. He could still see nothing through the door, not even the torches or street lamps, but a face was looking in on him from an adjacent window. Niki.

"You- how the hell-?" Hetch looked from her back to the room behind him, as if he was expecting to see a tunnel she'd dug into the floor to escape.

"There's a lot of things I'd like to say to a heartless asshole piece of shit like you, but just watching this is making me happy enough," she grinned and drummed her nails on the glass.

"How the fuck-?!" Hetch paused and took a breath, regaining his posture, "I suppose it's impressive that you've managed to get out, but I can assure you I won't be staying in here."

She just smiled like she knew something he didn't, which pissed him off a bit.

"I will get out of here. You really think sneaking past me this once means that the tables are suddenly turned? You're still just as naive as you were in the mall," he sneered, hoping it might spark a reaction from Niki, but she remained unaffected.

"We got out because we had things called friends, I know you might not have heard of them before. You can act like you don't care all you want but I know someone like you is probably desperate to know how we got out, right?"

Hetch didn't answer, which Niki took as her confirmation.

"Let's start with the door, you said it locked automatically behind you, yes? It doesn't lock if it doesn't close, though, and jamming a foot in the gap is a very easy way to keep it open," Niki delighted in Hetch's confusion, looking between her and the door as she explained their plan to him.

"But that- there was nobody outside, I checked, and Ethan wasn't at all close enough to wedge it open after I'd left," Hetch explained, failing to realise that his logic didn't modify the fact that he had still ended up in the hotel.

"Nobody you could see," that knowing and slightly malicious glint returned to Niki's eyes as she elbowed the empty space next to her. To Hetch's surprise, there was a response.

"Ow- I got your cue, you didn't need to do that!" a voice complained from seemingly out of nowhere, and it was a voice Hetch eventually recognised as Vinny.

"Just needed to make sure you were still here since I can't see you," Niki laughed, "besides, it was your plan, so I think you'd better do most of the explaining. I can't see how sad and pathetic Hetch is if he doesn't understand how he was even tricked."

The disembodied voice sighed and picked up the explanation, "well, I guess maybe this asshole should get some credit too, since it was his unoriginal heist plotline that gave me the idea."

Hetch tried to think about what Vinny was talking about. A heist...did he mean that stupid backstory he'd been given for the warehouse? He never expected that throwaway story to ever see the light of day again.

"We did add a few changes to your original script though, hope you don't mind. That was a lie, I don't care, but anyways, the story...at the factory I had to get through a locked door too, you remember? Tricking a guard into coming outside and then sneaking in, I'm pretty sure you can see how that part connects to your terrible tragic situation," Vinny did a very unconvincing job of sounding like he cared the least bit about Hetch being trapped, "but Tallulah was kind enough to point out that we had a few more tools at our disposal to spice things up, one of which she called an invisibility potion."

Invisibility, huh. Hetch was a logical man and as such he usually found things like this difficult to believe at first, but with the invisible man standing right there with only a pane of glass to separate them it wasn't exactly something he could deny.

"Tallulah also had another thing that I think you'll enjoy," Vinny continued, knowing he enjoyed it far more than Hetch ever would, "since the duck factory didn't have magical auto locking doors we were worried you might just get right back out of this hotel, but it turned out she had something much better than a lock."

A piece of rock began levitating beside Niki, presumably being upheld by Vinny's invisible hand, "ever heard of bedrock, Hetch?"

Hetch looked at the rock, then again at the door that refused to open, the realisation setting in. That was why he couldn't see shit through the doors. Because there wasn't shit to see. They were completely covered by rock.

"So...you've fucking sealed this whole place off?" Hetch asked in disbelief.

"Well, only until Cucurucho gets here," Niki clarified, "he can make sure you don't fuck with the doors again. But you don't mind staying in there just for now, do you?" Niki asked sarcastically, knowing full well that they were delaying as long as possible before they got Cucurucho since he was the only one here who wouldn't leave Hetch to rot without a second thought.

Hetch didn't bother giving an answer and looked around, talking without looking at the the two he was talking to outside the window, "so what, you hold the door open and then you all slip out and block it behind yourselves, good job, I'm sure you're proud. And I'm sure your friend Slimecicle is very happy with you for whatever you did to make him scream."

"Oh, that? What, you think we'd hurt our friend? No, Sneeg just took him upstairs and told him his ghouls were suing him for being a shitty landlord. That seemed to do the trick for a good distraction," Niki told him. Hetch muttered a swear that he hoped the others couldn't hear. Being tricked like this felt ridiculing.

"Well I hope you have fun with him out there," Hetch spat, clinging onto the last few things he could use against them, "all Slimecicle will do is cause chaos. Who knows, he might even try setting up a carousel for you."

"Out here? Oh, we knew he would be trouble with that much free range. No, Charlie isn't with us out here," Niki said happily. Hetch took a second to process what she meant.

He didn't need to think about it much longer when he felt a presence behind him.

"You don't mind slime, do you, Hetch?" Vinny taunted. A chill ran down his spine when the demon spoke.

"Come on in...we're gonna have a lot of fun together :)"

~

It was night when Mariana woke up- at least that was the time in game. Phil was gone, along with the lasso he had been tied to, leaving him alone on the bench.

It wasn't the first time he'd fallen asleep at his computer, and he knew it probably wouldn't be the last, but this time was still different. There was something important he had needed to do.

He needed to find Charlie.

He wiped his drool and checked the map at the top of his screen. It looked like a few people were gathered around the hotel that had been set up for the new members and that he had been kicked out of earlier. Surely they wouldn't mind him coming back for a brief visit? His definition of brief was probably quite different to theirs, but they didn't need to know that.

As he started on his way he couldn't see Charlie's username among the ones gathered on the map. He knew some of the new members hadn't activated their maps or something, which meant they didn't show up yet, but if he really wasn't there then Mariana would need to do some incredibly subtle interrogating to discover his ex's whereabouts.

He was definitely getting kicked out of this hotel again.

That was what he thought, at least, before he saw the situation at the hotel as he rounded a corner. Two people were situated around the doors like guards and he worried that they'd heard about his previous kicking out since they quickly turned to face him as he approached. He might not even get forced out if he wasn't allowed in in the first place.

"Hey- El Mariana, that your name?" the one with 'Sneegsnag' over his head asked, presumably reading Mariana's username.

"Uh, you can just call me Mariana, but...what's going on here?" he glanced from them to the door, seeing the interior of the hotel looked a little different and on the outside a lot of blocks around the edge were dirt rather than grass, like they'd recently been dug up.

"If you're after Charlie again then he's unavailable right now, and I think he'd appreciate if you left him alone," Sneeg said firmly and Mariana recalled how he was one of the people with Etoiles and Baghera last night, and back then he had been just as adamant to keep him away from Charlie. He probably wasn't going to have much of a chance convincing him.

The second person at the other side of the door had 'Ranboo' over their head, and he couldn't discern much emotion from their pixelated Minecraft skin but he got the sense that these two might share similar feelings towards him.

"I- are you sure? I just wanna talk to him, it's been so long," Mariana tried to convince them, but the tone in Sneeg's response was anything but sympathetic.

"He's not taking visitors right now, and besides, if you knew him before then he doesn't even remember you right now."

Mariana resisted the urge to take his headphones off. That was the last thing he wanted to hear, a reminder of how Charlie hadn't known who he was the last time they saw each other, how he hadn't even remembered Flippa. But he was sure if he could just talk to Charlie, maybe he could help him remember something.

But first he would have to get to Charlie, who must have been inside, and getting inside was looking like an increasingly difficult task. He already knew it would be a lost cause convincing Charlie's defensive friends, but perhaps there was someone else he could convince...

"Yeah, that's- alright, that's fine," Mariana told them and took a few steps away from the door, "I'll just, uh...I guess I'll go, y'know. Somewhere else."

He gave a very convincing nod and walked away from the hotel, already looking on his minimap to find who he was looking for. They wouldn't let him in, but maybe he stood a chance with Cucurucho.

He'd just walked out of view from Sneeg and Ranboo when the transcription box in the corner of his screen caught his attention. It probably wasn't a conversation they wanted him to hear, but...if they didn't know he was there, surely they wouldn't mind?

The Spanish translations continued to pop up on his text box, but he still stepped back a little to hear their conversation too, making sure to crouch in game and stay out of sight.

"...eally knows Charlie?" he caught the last few words of Ranboo's question.

"I mean, he seems genuine, but it's not what Charlie needs right now. Especially not right now. With the state Hetch put him in, he's...unstable," Sneeg sounded like he was struggling to find the right words.

"You think Hetch is gonna be any better for him?" Ranboo challenged.

"Oh, don't worry about that. Before I told him he was getting sued I let him know that the guy in the mask loves people interrupting his dramatic monologues. I doubt he'll get a word in," Sneeg laughed and Ranboo managed to chuckle a little too, but it quickly faded.

"I'm just...I'm pissed off, you know?" Ranboo sighed, "seeing Charlie like that, not being able to do anything except hurt him more when I tried to help- we got out and now that masked prick is trapped, bit I'm still mad. This isn't the consequences he deserves. This is barely a fraction of what that goddamn..."

Ranboo cut himself off and Mariana could hear the scowl in their voice. Whoever this person was it seemed that words weren't enough to encapsulate Ranboo's feelings towards them.

"He's never gonna stop seeing us as anything other than his actors. Makes me wanna cave his skull in that he put Charlie through this shit for no reason, because 'experiment' sure as hell isn't an excuse to remind him of the torture he went through," Sneeg responded.

"I'll break whatever bones you don't," Ranboo agreed. Sneeg laughed and sounded pretty happy with that deal.

Mariana supposed there wasn't much more to gain from this conversation, so he turned around to go find Cucurucho again, however his task was made much simpler when the bear was found standing directly behind him.

"AH-" Mariana involuntarily yelled and then cursed as he realised he wasn't muted. The other two had definitely heard that and he didn't want to stay here for them to discover he was eavesdropping, as if his trust with them wasn't low enough already, but there was nowhere to go.

Actually, there might be somewhere, he realised as his eyes landed on what looked to be a warp plate a few blocks behind Cucurucho. The bear, following his attention, stepped back onto the block and crouched before abruptly disappearing as if he was doing it to show Mariana what to do next. Mariana didn't hesitate for a second before he dashed to the plate and crouched, praying Sneeg and Ranboo hadn't rounded the corner fast enough to witness his disappearance.

The next place Mariana found himself in was a well lit, white corridor. He'd probably seen these a dozen times in lore clips, this was where Cucurucho took everyone before they get kidnapped. Mariana tensed. He wasn't about to be kidnapped, right?

The bear threw him a book and he feared what he might find inside, but it was only a simple message.

YOU'RE NOT A VERY GOOD SPY.

"Damn, I didn't know you'd be grading me," Mariana complained. A sound played behind him and he turned just as Tallulah hopped through the warp plate too and broke it behind herself. If he was still getting kidnapped then there went his exit.

Looks like they didn't see you! That was a close call though.

Mariana agreed with her sign, glad that he had (for the most part) gone unnoticed. He wondered why Tallulah was here and why she now seemed to be working alongside Cucurucho, but he felt as though it might be an answer that went over his head- he was already struggling enough with the video game reality revelation even though it had been a day since Cucurucho sent him into the game itself with that high pitched noise. He decided to ask some questions that he hoped would have simpler answers.

"Okay, so uh...what exactly is happening in the hotel right now? Why do you need people guarding the door?"

Cucurucho took a bit longer writing the next book but eventually handed it over.

WE'VE HAD TO LOCK TWO PEOPLE INSIDE, ONE FOR THEIR OWN SAFETY.
THE OTHER IS LOCKED INSIDE FOR OTHER PEOPLE'S SAFETY.
THEY CANNOT LEAVE AS I HAVE ENSURED THAT EVERYONE ON THE ISLAND CAN USE THE HOTEL DOOR BESIDES THEM.
I HAVE NOT TOLD PEOPLE TO GUARD THE HOTEL, THEY HAVE THEIR OWN REASONS TO DO SO.

"Yeah, and I think I know their reasons," Mariana mumbled to himself after reading it, by which time Tallulah had put up another sign.

Originally the door was blocked with bedrock, so I'm glad Cucurucho got there to actually fix the door, otherwise nobody was getting in or out. I don't think I should be trusted with bedrock.

Cucurucho pulled out another book to explain further.

TALLULAH DID A VERY GOOD JOB HELPING EVERYONE IN THEIR PLAN.
HOWEVER WE DON'T HAVE THE SOLUTION TO THE SITUATION STILL ONGOING IN THE HOTEL.

"The situation- it is something to do with Charlie, right? Is he okay? I was actually, uh...here to see him," Mariana admitted.

We know.

"...good to know I'm predictable," Mariana laughed, sounding embarrassed. He moved Cucurucho's books into his inventory as it looked like they were going to start stacking up.

CHARLIE IS OKAY, BUT IT IS COMPLICATED.
WHEN I SAW YOU BY THE HOTEL I HAD AN IDEA.
I THOUGHT YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO HELP.

Mariana's eyes lit up at the book. Was it really that easy? He hadn't even needed to ask directly about seeing Charlie for Cucurucho to offer this, although maybe his intentions were just obvious enough without that.

"A-alright, uh...what do you want me to do?"

Talk to Charlie.

Mariana resisted the urge to punch the air in celebration.

HE IS NOT HIMSELF CURRENTLY, BUT WE BELIEVE YOU MAY BE ABLE TO REMEDY THIS.
BE PATIENT WITH HIM AND TRY TO IGNORE THE SLIME.
WE WILL DISTRACT THE ONES STANDING BY THE DOOR SO THAT YOU MAY ENTER.

"Uh, alright, sure- you can't just tell them to let me in or anything? Not even the powerful Cucurucho can manage that?" Mariana playfully taunted.

I CAN DO MANY THINGS.
CHANGING HOW PEOPLE FEEL IS NOT ONE OF THOSE THINGS.

"Guess I'm stuck with my husband's friends hating me, then. Can't be much worse than how much my husband hates me though," Mariana laughed, really hoping that Charlie didn't start to genuinely hate him if he ever remembered all the dumb shit they did on this server.

Speaking of the things Cucurucho can do, we might want you in the game world for this.

Mariana grimaced when he realised what she meant. Being dragged into the world within this game wasn't a particularly pleasant experience last time, and he hadn't been wanting to do it again. But if he had to do it for Charlie, if he was doing it to see his real bitch ex husband and not just pixels on screen, he would do it. Mariana nodded to Tallulah, then Cucurucho.

"Alright, I can handle that. So you just want me to talk to him?" Mariana checked, to which the bear nodded and handed over a book yet again.

KEEP HIM COMPANY. REMIND HIM WHO HE IS, WHO HE WAS. DON'T OVERWHELM HIM.

"I can do that," he shut the book and looked into Cucurucho's black, pixel eyes. This bear gave him the creeps but he at least appeared to have good intentions.

He braced himself as the high tone played and his vision faded to black.

~

When he came to, he was in a hallway. A very bright, white hallway.

Mariana was in the game.

He groaned as he raised himself up into a kneeling position but stopped when his eyes landed on the white bear paws in front of him. He knew Cucurucho had been standing right there, but it was still a shock to his system to see a real bear before him.

He eventually managed to stand up and thought he was actually beginning to adjust to this world hopping business, but that went pretty much completely out of the window when he lay his eyes on Tallulah.

The only way he knew it was her was her hair and beanie that looked the same as her egg form, but she otherwise looked nothing like the egg she had once been. She looked like a young girl, shockingly human, and it reminded Mariana of fanart he had once seen of her in the museum. She smiled at him, looking sympathetic to his confusion, and put down a sign.

You doing alright?

Mariana nodded, albeit slowly, "yeah, I'm good, it's just...a lot."

Tallulah nodded with him and then turned to Cucurucho, who Mariana saw was holding out a book for him.

ARE YOU READY TO GO?

Mariana hesitated to answer. Charlie hadn't recognised him last time. Cucurucho had even just said that right now he wasn't himself. But from the sounds of things, Charlie needed help, and Mariana would be damned if he didn't give that to him at least. He gave a confident nod to the bear, who seemed satisfied.

GOOD. ENTER THE HOTEL ONCE THE OTHERS ARE GONE.
YOU WILL HAVE ACCESS TO THE DOOR.

Mariana nodded again and pocketed the book, and he wondered for a second how he had enough space in his pockets, but decided the mental space he needed to understand the answer probably wasn't worth it.

Tallulah put back down the warp plate she had mined and beckoned Cucurucho over, the two of them holding hands once they were together.

Give us a few seconds and we'll get them away. You know what to do then.

Tallulah hesitated and decided to put down one last sign.

Good luck.

After which she and Cucurucho jumped, and then disappeared.

Mariana, left alone in the empty, white corridor, started feeling a little nervous.

He didn't want to fail Charlie. That was the last thing he wanted. From what he knew, which wasn't a lot, Charlie and the other missing people had gone through a lot in their few months away. He wanted to help but he felt like all he'd done so far was rub salt in a fresh wound. Cucurucho seemed to have faith that he could help, but Mariana couldn't muster faith in himself.

It had been a little while since Tallulah and Cucurucho had gone. The distraction probably wouldn't last forever, whatever it was. Now or never, Mariana told himself. He jumped onto the warp plate.

The surface was still dark and it must have been around midnight, and without his custom lighting settings Mariana found it difficult to make everything out. Torches were still scattered in every corner, though, so he could see enough to make his way back to the front of the hotel.

Sneeg and Ranboo were gone- whatever distraction the bear and the egg had carried out, it had worked. The glass doors felt like they were beckoning to him. He approached and swung them open.

Inside the hotel was indeed different. Blocky chairs and tables were all gone, replaced with a rather intricate row of sets on the far side of the room. A living room, a basement, and between them a kitchen, in which Mariana could make out two figures. The ground floor was well lit and the lights reflected off a mask that one of them was wearing, while it glinted on almost every inch of the other man, catching on the wet slime poured over his clothes. Mariana didn't really care about that, though. Because it was Charlie.

Charlie seemed focused on a bowl the other man was stirring, but his mask jolted up at Mariana's entrance.

"You-?" the man began, exhaustion evident in his voice.

"Hey, did I tell you to stop stirring?" Charlie threatened in a weird accent, but the voice was still unmistakably Charlie.

"Who are you?" Mariana asked to the masked man, not recognising him as any of the people that had been missing.

"I'm-" he tried to start again, but was quickly cut off.

"I'm not seeing enough slime in there, keep stirring!" Charlie demanded and the man reluctantly continued stirring.

Mariana wasn't going to waste time figuring this out, he just wanted to talk to Charlie already, "okay well, whatever, just get out. I'm here for Charlie, I don't care who you are."

The man looked between him and Charlie for a second, then made a run for the exit. Mariana held the door open for him, unable to care less about why the man was in here. He just wanted to talk to Charlie.

His ex husband looked around the kitchen in confusion as Mariana walked to him, "there goes another one...damn, I gotta figure out how they all keep disappearing."

Mariana stepped into the kitchen and Charlie's eyes immediately landed on him, "oh, hello there! Another guest finds their way into my cabin, it seems..."

Mariana looked at him. He didn't really know how to respond to that, so he moved on, "uh, Charlie...I know the last time we spoke it wasn't great, I broke into your room and all, but I, uh, I was hoping this time I could...make a better impression?"

Charlie grinned and blinked at him. It didn't look like the words had gotten across.

"Charlie, I...what's going on?" Mariana asked, the worry clear in his voice. This time Charlie replied.

"Dunno who this Jarlee guy is, you wanna do a cooking challenge?"

"A- what? A cooking challenge?"

"A cooking challenge."

Charlie smiled and nodded at him. Mariana just stared back, mouth slightly open on the verge of a response he couldn't think of. This was definitely not how he expected this to go.

"No, I- you're Charlie, I just, all I wanna do is talk," Mariana told him. Charlie looked at him blankly.

"You sure you're not Changly?" Charlie raised an eyebrow at him as if Mariana was the one not making sense.

"No, I'm not, I'm Mariana. You know me, El Mariana, your bitch wife? Mi puta esposa, you remember, right?" Mariana tried, practically begging for an ounce of recognition. His hope started to fade as Charlie continued staring at him like the words had gone in one ear and out the other, but after a moment his blank joy started to break, and an expression of confusion replaced it.

"Mariana..?" Charlie said the word like he was tasting it, searching for meaning in the syllables. It wasn't quite recognition yet, but it was something. Mariana nodded enthusiastically.

"Yes- yes, that's me, Mariana, and you are Charlie," he tried to convince him, stepping closer but remaining a few steps away, aware that Charlie might want his personal space.

"I'm..." the confusion grew, but then was overtaken by a sudden amusement, "did I really call myself El Backflippo..?"

Mariana laughed in amazement, "yes- yes! You were El Backflippo, you- you remember?"

Charlie nodded and the life was back in his eyes, the smile was his own, and thank god that accent was gone. Charlie looked around as if he was taking in his surroundings for the first time.

"This- we're in a kitchen? Why the fuck are we..? A-are we on the QSMP?" Charlie asked and Mariana realised how lost he was beginning to look.

"Yes, we are on the QSMP, we are in a hotel," Mariana quickly clarified. Charlie nodded but he wasn't as happy anymore, it looked as though he was having far too many realisations at once.

"Yeah, yeah, we got here, this is- I was-" Charlie struggled to stay on one line of thought and kept cutting himself off, "w-we're here now, but I was here before, on this island, I was- shit, I was-"

Charlie put one hand to his forehead as he struggled to think and Mariana reached out to gently hold his other arm.

"Hey, it's okay, don't force yourself or anything," Mariana assured him, but when Charlie met his eyes there was grief.

"We- we were together, but we- t-there was-" Charlie stopped to catch his breath, "oh god, Juanaflippa."

Mariana tensed. Well, he'd remembered her at least, but right now that didn't seem like a good thing. Charlie fell to his knees and Mariana went with him.

"She- she's still gone, isn't she?" Charlie asked between breaths, backing up to rest against the cabinets lining the back wall of the fake kitchen. Mariana helped him to move and kept a hand on his shoulder.

"Yes, she's...it's been a while since both of us last saw her," Mariana painfully admitted. He had been distraught enough over her deaths, but after seeing Tallulah, after seeing how real she was in this world...it was a grief he didn't yet know how to deal with.

But by the looks of things, Charlie was going though the same thing, so if nothing else they would go through it together. Mariana knew he wouldn't let Charlie go through any of it alone.

"She was happy in the time we had together. She knew you loved her, Charlie," Mariana told him, looking empathetically as Charlie stared forward and gradually his breathing slowed down.

"Fuck, I...I just can't believe I forgot her. I can still just barely remember her...god, I'm such a shit dad," Charlie laughed but the tone was grim and what he said didn't come out as a joke.

"No, you are not," Mariana said sternly, "there was nothing you could've done. I'm not going to sit here and let you blame yourself for something that wasn't your fault, alright?"

Charlie bit back his disagreement and nodded silently, knowing that Mariana wasn't taking no for an answer on this one. He looked for something to change the topic and found he didn't have to look hard as he once again took in the room around them.

"What was I even doing in here? This kitchen, it was...it was in the mall, and I..." Charlie looked down and his gaze landed on the bright green suit, "I'm taking this shit off."

Mariana laughed and sat up to assist Charlie in taking the jacket off, "yeah, you do look kind of stupid."

"No need to be so rude about it," Charlie laughed, but didn't disagree with his statement. When the sticky jacket was off he flung it across the set and the horns followed soon after. There were still remnants of slime on his shirt underneath and all over his trousers, but he could bear keeping those on for now.

"They really had to go and ruin my whole brand for me, huh...at least it's not blood this time," Charlie sighed, "I'll try not to lose my mind the next time I see this stuff."

Mariana didn't know exactly what he was talking about, but nodded, "it's alright, you were just acting kind of weird."

"No, I...I think I might've hurt Ran, and Sneeg too...I was acting like we were back there and they went along with it even though I know they hate being reminded of the mall, nevermind acting it all out..." Charlie trailed off, then turned and looked at Mariana for the first time in a while.

"Seeing everyone from the mall kept making me think I was back there, still stuck in there, but...you weren't in the mall. So I think, when I saw you, I...it made me think of a time before that. When I wasn't this stupid character, when I was still...me."

They were in comfortable silence for a while as both their minds went through the information. It was almost overwhelming, remembering an old life, learning about a whole new life that the other had lived. Eventually Mariana broke the silence.

"So...why were you acting like...that? You were saying something about a, uh, a cooking challenge?"

Charlie face planted, "oh god, don't remind me," he sighed but managed to smile a little remembering the absurd things he said as that character, "it wasn't me, really, it was...I dunno, some weird brain shit that this company called Showfall did to me. The guy who works for them, you might've met him, he goes by Hetch- although I really hope you haven't met him."

Mariana recognised the name, and after a second realised it had been hovering over the head of the masked man he just kicked out of the building.

"Hetch- he did this to you?" Mariana asked, already sitting up.

"Y-yeah, but, it's fine now, I can handle it," Charlie tried to assure him, but Mariana didn't get any less concerned.

"I'm gonna go find him. And then talk to him. And then punch him," Mariana decided.

"Mariana please-" Charlie couldn't say he didn't want to see that, but he mostly didn't want his bitch ex wife getting into trouble immediately after they reunited.

Mariana got up anyway and paused to help Charlie to his feet before walking out of the kitchen set. Charlie grabbed his hand to hold him back.

"Wait, a-are you really gonna go after him right now?" Charlie asked.

Mariana shrugged, "sure. Are you coming with me?"

Charlie just looked at him for a second, trying to think of a dispute, but soon gave in, "fine, I don't wanna stay in this hotel much longer anyways."

The two of them walked to the door together and Charlie was first to try and open it, but it didn't move.

"Oh, uh...I think Cucurucho said he hasn't given you permission to open the door..." Mariana explained before Charlie started to worry they were trapped.

Charlie sighed and let Mariana open the door for him, "great to know that the bear still trusts me...though I guess I can see why he'd do that. Wouldn't want me running around sliming everything."

Charlie was relieved to finally get some fresh air again, and while he was still adjusting to the nighttime scenery, Mariana had spotted some people in the distance that he took some interest in.

"-en I'll just get out again, t-there's no point putting me back in the hotel!" the masked man was arguing to Sneeg, who held him firmly by the arm.

"Yeah, sure thing, asshole. You want us to grab Tallulah and bedrock the door again? I'm sure she'd be more than happy to do that," Sneeg taunted.

Mariana was glad that Hetch hadn't managed to get far, because it made it much easier for him to do something he felt was long overdue.

He stepped up to Hetch and before Sneeg could question his presence he punched the masked man in the side of his head.

"Wh- Mariana!" Charlie exclaimed, running to catch up with him as he realised what was going on. Sneeg let go and allowed Hetch to stumble back at the hit and clutch onto his face.

"Agh- you bitch!" Hetch spat, but nobody was particularly worried about his wellbeing. Sneeg was more worried about the one who had hit him.

"You were Mariana, right? I thought we told you to-!" Sneeg stopped himself as he saw the other person with him- Charlie. Then he stopped himself again when he saw Charlie had taken hold of Mariana's hand.

"Charlie, wait, you're-? Do you...do you know this guy?" Sneeg asked, looking between them.

"Yeah, I'm fine! And this is my ex. Wait, I mean, uh, not actually, we're like...we were pretending to be married for a little bit. Then we got divorced. But I remembered- he helped me remember some stuff from before we got here!" Charlie overexcitedly explained.

Sneeg didn't even want to begin unpacking some of that information so he focused on the parts he could understand, "well I...I'm glad you're okay. We're gonna make sure this prick here," he kicked Hetch, "doesn't fuck with you, or anyone else, anymore."

Charlie nodded and looked down at Hetch, before something drew his attention from behind him and Sneeg.

"Ranboo!" he shouted out, and Mariana looked in the same direction to see the other person who had been guarding the door walking to them. They seemed to notice Charlie, and their pace immediately sped up.

"Charlie!" he shouted as he ran over, "you- you're okay? Is everything alright?"

Charlie left Mariana's side to try and meet Ranboo halfway, "yeah, I'm fine, I'm all good, but this is, uh..." Charlie motioned to Mariana, "this is Mariana! I...don't think you know each other."

Mariana waved awkwardly and Ranboo eyed him, "well, we did meet...briefly."

"Don't be so suspicious!" Charlie playfully elbowed them, "Mariana is fine, I know him. Plus he just punched Hetch."

Sneeg nodded, "he did. It was pretty sick."

Hetch groaned from his position kneeling on the floor and rubbing his cheek. Everyone ignored him.

"Well I'm...I'm glad you're okay," Ranboo told Charlie, taking note of the slimy trousers but the absent jacket and horns.

"I know," Charlie told him.

"Yeah, I just wanted to make sure," Ranboo told him.

"Alright, so, what now?" Sneeg asked, glancing to the hotel, "I'm guessing we don't wanna sleep in there anymore."

Ranboo hummed their agreement, "yeah, I'd probably feel kind of uncomfortable. Don't," they suddenly added at the end, seeing Charlie was about to apologise.

"Well I-" Charlie tried.

"No, you are not taking the blame for that. You haven't done anything you need to apologise for, Charlie," Ranboo told him with no space for argument, and Charlie looked a little like he might cry.

"I...okay. Well," Charlie looked at the hotel with everyone else, "I guess...maybe we could give building our own houses a go?"

Sneeg shrugged, "sure. What's the worst that could happen?"

Mariana knew from experience that Charlie's house building skills were...questionable. But he didn't care. Even if it was a shit house, he'd be happy to build a house with Charlie again.

Chapter Text

When Phil woke up, the first thing he did was log onto the QSMP. Well, technically he had breakfast before that because Kristen wasn't going to let him start living like Toby, but he didn't want to waste a second before logging back on.

The wait as the world loaded had never been so tense and he tapped his fingers as the steam rose from his two coffees- he had gotten up early for this, and he knew it was probably going to be another late night.

When he spawned in he was on the bench- of course, this was where he and Mariana had been. But Mariana's player model was no longer there, and Phil hoped that meant he'd logged off, but quickly checking the online players confirmed his worries that Mariana was still online and had just gone elsewhere.

□ Ph1LzA 📶
□ Austinshow 📶
□ Crankgameplays 📶
□ ElMariana 📶
□ Hetch 📶
□ Itsvalkyrae 📶
□ Jaidenhere 📶
□ Jermabot 📶
□ Nihachu 📶
□ QNPC01 📶
□ QNPC02 📶
□ Ranboo 📶
□ Slimecicle 📶
□ Sneegsnag 📶
□ Sykkuno 📶
□ Vinnyvinesauce 📶
□ ERROR_INVALID_USER 📶

Jeez that was a lot of online players. He supposed none of the people who had been kidnapped could really log off, though.

He went onto the map and first navigated to the hotel, expecting to see Mariana's username hovering right over Charlie's again, but the hotel for the new players was surprisingly empty. He continued scanning the map, knowing that something would probably be going on- there always was when he logged on, and he was always the one sorting it out.

As he expected, Mariana was with Charlie, and Ranboo and Sneeg were with them too. It probably wasn't too bad if those two were with him to protect him from Mariana's endless ramblings about their marriage, but Phil still wanted to make sure it was all okay, so he began grappling his way across the terrain towards the four of them.

The area of the map he found them in was an open grassy area with no buildings in it yet, but it was close enough to spawn that it wasn't too much of a trek to reach. He thought he might intrude on an argument about Mariana stalking them or him still trying to remind Charlie of being on the server before, but the conversation he did stumble in on was something very much unexpected.

"Hey, it was a valid house! It had space, and...and rooms!" Charlie's voice eventually reached Phil once he was close enough to his player model.

"It was a literal hole in a wall," Mariana replied, sounding amused but not convinced by Charlie's argument.

"It- it had personality!" Charlie was sounding increasingly desperate to defend himself.

"Yes, a lot of personality on those blank, stone walls," Mariana laughed.

"It was your house too!" Charlie shouted at him.

Phil had been ready to interrupt since it seemed they were too involved with each other to notice him otherwise, and Ranboo and Sneeg looked to have taken a step back from the argument for their own good, but he stood by and listened for a short while as he tried to figure out what it was they were getting so heated over.

He had been expecting Mariana to be fighting to stay at Charlie's side, to be constantly asking him if he remembered anything or telling him endless stories in an attempt to jog his memory, but none of them seemed genuinely bothered by Mariana's presence at all. In fact, this whole dynamic was starting to seem awfully familiar.

"I was more obligated to stay there since we were forced into a marriage and all," Mariana claimed, to which Charlie scoffed.

"Oh, so that's it, you only spent time with me and Flippa because you thought you had to?" Charlie accused, although he didn't actually believe that was the case, and he was probably just trying to deflect the pressure onto Mariana. Phil had a reaction too, though, at the mention of that name. Flippa...his hands tensed. Did Charlie remember Juanaflippa?

"No, I-! T-that is not it, you are falsely accusing me, tu pendejo! I loved our time together, it was just a shit house!" Mariana quickly defended himself.

"The house was fine," Charlie insisted.

"Whatever, I'm still not letting you be in charge of building another house," Mariana spoke with a tone that made it clear he wasn't going to be swayed from his opinions. Charlie seemed to realise this and didn't counter him again, instead deciding to huff in annoyance.

"Uh...hey guys," Phil finally stepped in.

"Phil!" Mariana shouted, suddenly noticing his presence, "hey, you here to help us build our house?"

"Your- well, no, I was actually just coming to make sure you weren't, you know...he's not annoying you, is he, Charlie?" Phil checked.

Charlie's player model shook its head, "no, man, we're all good, don't worry about that! He, uh...Mariana helped me remember some stuff!"

Phil was silent for a second, "do you...remember me?"

Charlie's returning silence was enough of an answer.

"That's okay, that's fine! You can remember stuff at your own pace, mate, no need to worry about me. I'm just happy you've remembered something," Phil told him. Of course he was sad that Charlie still didn't know who he was, but that wasn't Charlie's fault. He would be there for his friend even if he knew he would never be remembered.

"I think I'm also, the uh, the only one," Charlie reluctantly admitted to him, "since I was the only one who was on this server before getting kidnapped, it might've made it easier to spark memories for me. Or maybe it was whatever shit Hetch did to me- I dunno, but I don't really wanna give credit to him, so I'll go with the first option."

"Did Cucurucho say what he was gonna do with Hetch?" Sneeg asked, catching Phil off guard as he'd thought he and Ranboo were keeping to themselves to avoid the bickering couple.

"I think he phrased it as Hetch getting, uh 'special supervision'. So basically he's not allowed outside unless there's an egg nearby to watch his every move," Charlie explained.

"Heh, I bet he'll have fun with that," Sneeg nodded, sounding satisfied.

"But yeah, even though I've remembered stuff, it's not that much," Charlie continued, "it's mainly just Mariana and, uh...and Juanaflippa. But right now we're building a house and we're not talking about that stuff! You wanna help us build a house?"

Phil noted how quickly he moved on from the subject of his daughter and nodded, "sure. I'll try my best to stop it from being a complete disaster."

Both Mariana and Charlie took offense to that, but he was just being honest. He knew Mariana was a little better than Charlie at building, but the two of them together was a recipe for chaos.

"I'll probably be fine working on my own-" Sneeg was stepping away but got cut off as Ranboo dragged him back to their side.

"Ohh no, you're not getting away from us that easily," Ranboo taunted.

"Come onnnn, I can live on my ownnnnnn," Sneeg complained childishly and Phil wished he was in the game to see his expression.

"Stop trying to be a loner, Sneeg, I know you don't actually want to live on your own," Ranboo started dragging himself and Sneeg closer to the rest of the group, ignoring Sneeg's defiant moaning.

"But you're gonna make us be all wholesome and talk about our feelings and stop us from isolating ourselvesss," he dragged out the last word and Phil could tell without even seeing Ranboo's face that he was exhausted dealing with Sneeg's antics, but they weren't giving up.

"Yeah, and?" they asked simply.

Sneeg hesitated to answer, "uh...it's cringe."

"Guess we're just gonna force you to be cringe with us then."

"NOOOOOO," Sneeg howled jokingly, and if he had been using a microphone it would have definitely cut out. Phil laughed as he decided to start looking through his building materials for this house. Even if it wasn't the same Sneeg he had know before, if he didn't or would never remember him, it was still definitely Sneeg.

"So what are we thinking? A mansion? A castle?" Mariana started throwing out ideas.

"I think we'd have to contact Foolish for that," Phil laughed.

"Maybe something more realistic, uh..." Charlie thought, "how about just a regular house, with enough rooms for all of us?"

"No basements," Sneeg told them.

"Probably no attics either," Charlie agreed, "although we might need a kitchen."

"Are you alright with that?" Ranboo asked Charlie.

Charlie's blocky head nodded, "yeah, I'll be fine, so long as it looks different to that one."

Phil felt a bit lost as he wasn't sure what their concerns around having a kitchen were, but he was happy to hear they at least had a good idea of what they wanted. He'd pulled some interesting blocks from his backpack while the others were discussing and started trying to figure out how they might work together.

"Alright, so, house with plenty of rooms...how fancy we thinking?" Phil asked them.

"I mean, as long as it's liveable, I'm good," Ranboo said with a laugh.

"Will we be paying you extra if we want it fancy?" Sneeg asked and Phil wasn't sure if he was joking or not.

"You don't have to pay me, mate, making houses in Minecraft isn't exactly manual labour," Phil laughed.

"Well maybe for you, we need to actually carry the blocks!" Mariana complained.

Phil looked at him for a few seconds, "what do you mean?"

"Well we- you know, in the game we have to pick up the blocks, but you just press buttons," Mariana explained. Phil paused, finally realising what he had meant.

"Wait, Mariana, are you in the game right now?" he asked, trying not to make it sound as accusatory as it was.

"Uh...yes," the blocky avatar that he now knew held Mariana's consciousness turned its head away, "Cucurucho put me in for a plan and he, uh, hasn't taken me out yet."

Phil sighed and leant back in his chair, "jesus, fine, well...don't do anything stupid while you're in there, alright?" he demanded. Now he was thinking about asking Cucurucho to put him in the game too, though. He'd be lying if he said he didn't want to at least see his friends' faces again.

"You really do act like a dad," Mariana laughed. Phil opened his mouth to reply but couldn't really contest him.

When they finally got around to building the house, Phil had decided on 'fancy-ish'; some cool bricks and patterns around the exterior, but nothing like a massive chandelier in the entrance. He handed out bricks and pretty much assigned himself to be the manager of the build as he instructed everyone else on what to start building while he went to find more blocks at his house.

Just as he was holding the warp stone down to teleport away he was stopped by a message on the left of his screen, which was even more attention grabbing when he realised it was whispered to him directly.

Jaidenhere whispers to you: hey is it ok if i come join u guys

You whisper to Jaidenhere: Sure thing

Jaiden didn't take long to arrive, and Phil decided to stay so that there was still some sanity when she got there.

"Oh hey, you guys building stuff over here?" She asked as she saw the foundations of the house that didn't look much like a house yet.

"I think everyone's moving out of the hotel, so I've offered to help them make their new house," Phil explained, the two of them standing just out of earshot of the others as they haphazardly placed down their blocks. Phil sighed as he watched Sneeg mining blocks that Ranboo had just placed down and then turning around, no doubt whistling and claiming his innocence when Ranboo caught on.

"I've given them blocks but we'll probably need more, so I was just about to go find some at my house," he told her.

"Oh, uh- can I just talk to you about something real quick before that?" she asked, sounding a little worried.

"Yeah, sure, what is it?" Phil switched from his warp stone to an empty slot on his hotbar. This was probably going to be more important than finding more blocks.

"I...so I was thinking, uh...I wanted to check if everyone had acknowledged everything we sent on Discord about the situation, and almost everyone has, but there was just one person who hadn't responded and I don't think he's seen it. It's, uh, it's Wilbur," Jaiden finally revealed. Phil leaned back- of course, he was on tour, he wouldn't have the time to be checking Discord.

"Should we tell him..? He knew these guys, y'know," Jaiden asked hesitantly. It was true, he probably deserved to know the situation, but at the same time Phil didn't want to bother him with this weird and emotional situation while he was in the middle of being a rockstar.

"I can..." Phil paused, contemplating, "I can send him a message. He'll be pissed at me if I don't at least let him know."

"Yeah...it's not like we're asking him to log in or anything, and he'd find out through the Discord eventually anyways," Jaiden still sounded conflicted, but this seemed like the best option.

She stayed with Phil as he spent a few minutes figuring out what to say, and Phil stayed with her after he'd sent the message so that he could tell her when he got a response. After about ten minutes Phil was considering if he could leave to get the extra blocks and come back in time, but the next message in the QSMP chat very quickly changed his mind.

[+] WilburSoot

"Oh shit," Phil wasn't sure whether to be worried or excited, but at the moment worry was definitely taking the lead.

"Oh, that's- that's good, right?" Jaiden asked.

"We'll see when he gets here," Phil sighed. The fact he hadn't even replied to the message meant that whatever he was doing he probably hadn't thought it through at all.

They weren't kept waiting for long.

"_pphhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiIILLLLLLLLLLL-"

Phil watched, mildly amused, as Wilbur's player model ran towards the two of them, his in-game mic gradually getting louder as he approached.

"Hey mate-" Phil tried to start a normal conversation, but that was apparently asking too much of Wilbur right now.

"You fucking prick why didn't you tell me this shit?" Wilbur emphasised his words by hitting Phil, which of course didn't do even half a heart of damages, but it at least made a point.

"We did, you just don't check the Discord!" Phil defended himself and gave Wilbur a single hit in return.

"Yeah because I'm too cool for Discord and I couldn't be asked to keep up with the QSMP while I'm on tour, but this is definitely way more important than all of that!"

"Wait, you're not missing anything for this, are you?" Phil checked.

"I've got the rest of the day off, it's fine- so since when was, y'know, this happening? Why are they letting everyone play on a Minecraft server when they're probably in witness protection or something?" Wilbur inquired, looking behind Phil to the group of people struggling to build a house.

"You could at least pretend that you read my message, Wil," Phil laughed. He had explained everything, from the arrival of the missing people to their existence trapped in the server, but Wilbur had no doubt skimmed five words from his five paragraphs and assumed he knew all he needed to.

"Phil you write way too much, if you want me to read shit then write less," at least he was honest about it, Phil thought. His returning sigh sounded as amused as it was tired, but he decided he should at least make an attempt to get Wilbur on the same page.

"Alright, Wil, they're not in witness protection or anything like that, they're actually... in the game. Like...shitty Jumanji reboot style. It sounds stupid, trust me I know, but everyone else will back me up."

Jaiden nodded to agree with Phil, "yeah, there's some magic shit going on here, but we've all seen the exact same thing and at this point there's no other explanation."

"And also, they, uh...they have amnesia. So they probably won't remember you," Phil warned, already having a vision of Wilbur going up to Ranboo and freaking them out by acting like a dumbass.

Wilbur took his time to respond, which Phil at least preferred to the chaotic thoughtlessness he usually carried with him.

"Um...alright. So basically they're- all of them are in the game? And they don't..." Wilbur repeated Phil's words to himself as he processed what it all meant.

"Basically they're all like Hatsune Miku," Jaiden offered.

"Jaiden, no," Phil laughed, not wanting her analogy to give Wilbur even more confusion, but it did the job of at least relieving some tension.

"Heh, alright, so uh...a-am I allowed to talk to them, or..?" Wilbur asked.

"Yeah, sure mate, not like I'm gonna try to stop you. Though, uh, do just be careful, at least. From the sounds of things they've been through a lot," Phil explained to him.

"Uh, yeah, alright..." Wilbur still sounded nervous about something, though. Phil waited for him to continue, and eventually he gave in.

"So, uh, I- when you sent the message, Phil, I got pretty excited because, y'know," Wilbur indicated towards the others, still very much struggling with the house, oblivious to the conversation nearby, "and I might've, uh..."

"What?" Phil pushed him for an answer, knowing from the way Wilbur was talking that he already wasn't going to like it.

"I, uh, I might've let someone else know, because I thought he deserved to know what was happening too, but..."

"But..?" already sharing this stuff with someone else before asking anyone for permission wasn't great, but there was more to it? Phil was really getting scared how much damage Wilbur could possibly have done.

"You said they were, they were in game, so, uh," Wilbur took a breath, "soIsharedaninvitetotheserver."

"You. What."

"I-I just shared an invite, it's fine, I told him not to tell anyone else!"

"Who, Wilbur?" Phil demanded. If this went badly it wasn't a mess he wanted to clean up.

But he got the answer without Wilbur saying a word. The message popping up in chat made him freeze. Slowly he looked back at Wilbur.

"Please. Please tell me you didn't invite him."

"Sorry..."

Phil sighed and rubbed his forehead as the child from his nightmares arrived and greeted them like he had so many times before.

"HELLO?"

~

When Quackity opened Discord he went right to the person he wanted to speak to. He had the whole night to think about it since he could barely sleep, and he knew exactly who would be able to help him get some answers.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 13:52
hey cellbit, r u down to hekp me with smth
*help

Cucurucho hadn't been much help at all, and none of them really had any idea what was going on with the island. Quackity had decided he was taking matters into his own hands. He would get to the bottom of this, Cucurucho and the Federation be damned.

Thankfully Cellbit didn't take long to respond.

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 13:56
sure man whats up
◯ Quackity Hoy a las 13:57
i want to digure out what's happening on the server, u wanna do some invesigating?

He wasn't expecting an easy yes, this wouldn't be the kind of investigation Cellbit was used to doing before in role play. Quackity tapped on his desk, awaiting a reply.

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 13:59
ofc man i already have the corkboard and evidence photos set up

Quackity laughed to himself. Of course, why did he expect anything less from Cellbit.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 13:59
knew i xould count on u
let's do this shit

Chapter Text

"Of all the people...why did you invite Tommy?"

Wilbur only made a nervous noise in response to Phil, watching as Tom tried and failed to persuade Jaiden to give him her cool sword.

"Quackity's gonna be pissed," Phil added with a sigh, although it did make him laugh a little imagining how Quackity would react once he found out.

"I couldn't just not tell him, though. You know the kid's been torn up since they went missing," Wilbur reminded him.

Phil tapped on his desk. He knew that, all too well. But they still needed to make sure that this information didn't get out irresponsibly.

"Hey, Tommy, could you just come over here for a sec?" he called over, freeing Jaiden from her job of keeping him distracted. Luckily they'd managed to keep him away from Ranboo and the others so far- having a hyperactive Tommy running up to them and shouting in their faces, no matter how well meaning he would be, probably wouldn't end well.

Tom ran over, "yeah Phil? You're not mad, are you..? Wilbur was the one who invited me!"

"Didn't mean you had to join..." Wilbur muttered.

"Wilbur you- nevermind, ugh..." Phil moved on before it turned into an argument, "Tom, I just wanna make sure you know that you're not allowed to tell anyone else, alright? Wilbur wasn't even supposed to tell you," he glanced at Wilbur's player model judgingly. Wilbur made a noise of offence but Phil continued before he could get a word in.

"It's good they're back but before we know more about the situation we should at least be careful. So you can't tell anyone or invite anyone, okay? Is that clear?"

Tom was quiet for a moment, and Phil already had his head in his hands before he got his answer.

"Uh...oh..."

"Tom," Phil groaned.

"L-listen, I can threaten to leak his address if he tells anyone else, so that's fine, right?" Tom offered a solution.

"TOM!" Phil shouted.

"Oh, whoops, already sent the threat," Tom said, not convincing Phil at all that it had been an accident.

"Jesus Christ, at least you haven't sent him an invite or anything," Phil tried his best to see some good in the situation. There was no way Tom could have, he hadn't even been on the server until a few minutes ago.

Tom was silent. Phil's eyes dragged down to the chat as a new message appeared.

[+] Tubbo_

Phil screamed into his hands.

"If I didn't then he would've leaked my address!" Tom shouted in defense.

"Nobody is leaking anybody's addresses!" Phil yelled, "can you guys just take this one thing seriously? Please?"

"I am-!" Tom didn't need to see Phil's face to know to stop himself there and actually think for a moment on his answer, "yeah, okay, sorry, I'll be serious."

Phil could tell Tom's eyes had shifted to the people behind him and he changed his camera view for a moment to see them as well. They were still having some trouble putting together a coherent house.

"So that's really them?" Tom asked. It didn't sound like a question that needed an answer, he was in disbelief but he wasn't as denying of the things in front of him as everyone else had been. Maybe it was the fact that he barely knew anything, so he could understand it easier than those like Phil who were cursed with the confusing and incomprehensible truth.

"Yeah, they're in the game...somehow," Phil sighed. This wasn't how he was expecting nor wanting them to come back- not to say he wasn't overjoyed with the fact they had come back. The situation was just less than perfect, if he hadn't reiterated that point a dozen times already.

"Can I talk to them..?" Tom's question was edged with worry he was trying to hide. If his friends had been through a lot, as it had been insinuated they had, then he didn't want to do anything that would make it worse, as much as he wanted to really badly talk to them.

Asking like he needed permission to talk with his friends...it wasn't quite demeaning, but it felt wrong. Phil sympathised with him, having a vague idea of what was running through Tom's mind right now.

"As long as you keep your voice down, yes. Just remember the whole amnesia thing- this goes for you too, Wil- so don't expect them to recognise you. Just...be nice, y'know?" Phil instructed both of them. They probably wouldn't do as he said, but it was better than nothing.

"We should probably tell Toby, too. Where is..?" Wilbur trailed off as he looked around and got his answer. Toby was standing right in the middle of Ranboo's group.

"Ah, shit," Jaiden spoke up for the first time in a while and successfully summed up all of their feelings as they all began running to stop something bad happening, if it hadn't happened already.

Phil was never going to trust these people with anything important ever again.

"So what are we building? A house? Oh, wait, you guys have the create mod in this server, right? Dude, we could make this so much more efficient!"

As predicted, Toby was already presenting them with a barrage of questions. There were worse questions to ask, Phil supposed, but his endless train of thought probably wasn't very appreciated by the four people just trying to build a house.

"Hey, Toby! Can I just, uh, talk to you over there for a second?" Phil requested.

"Phil! Have you seen this? Ranboo's in Minecraft!" Toby shouted back in excitement.

"Uh-" Ranboo seemed unsure how to respond to that.

"Yeah, I- I know, just listen, Toby," Phil tried, "you can't- the situation's kind of complicated, alright?"

From Toby's silence he knew he was probably getting a blank stare. Phil looked at Ranboo, Charlie, Mariana and Sneeg, who had paused their work on the house due to the interruption, then back at Toby and drew a breath.

"If you knew us before then we don't remember you now, kid," Sneeg stated as Phil was just about to try to break the news himself. He was admittedly relieved that someone else had done it for him.

"Wait- you- what?" Toby asked, not really giving them a clear question but they all knew what he was trying to say.

"Whatever happened to them while they were gone, they got amnesia, and so...they don't remember any of us," Phil added sombrely, looking at both Toby and Tom as he gave them the explanation they should've had before they joined. He raised an eyebrow at Wilbur just for good measure, since he clearly hadn't paid attention to the first explanation he was offered.

"So, like Ranboo's character on the Dream SMP, but like, real?" Tom asked, to which Toby responded by punching him in the game, "hey!"

"That is literally the worst analogy ever, can you not go five minutes without saying something stupid?" Toby berated him.

"Alright you two, break it up, this is serious," Phil reminded them, "no need to make everything more confusing for everyone..."

"It was a decent analogy- ow!" Tom responded to another in-game punch from Toby.

"Even so, you do realise that the analogy itself explains they might've forgotten the Dream SMP too, right?" Phil posed it as a question in the hopes that it would lead Tom to think about this whole situation a little more rather than thinking he could confidently get by with the bare minimum knowledge.

Tom gasped, "oh shit, wait!" he turned to Wilbur, "Wilbur, we gotta make a hotdog van!"

"That's the conclusion you draw from that?!" Wilbur shouted back in disbelief and looked on, almost in horror, as Tom's player model eagerly nodded its head. Also, wasn't it a burger van..?

"Don't we wanna, y'know...talk to our friends who just came back after so long..?" Toby asked with some of the emotion he had been overshadowing with his excitement. If he hadn't been shouting when he first saw Ranboo's Minecraft skin again, he would've probably been crying, and if he was seeing Ranboo again in real life he would've definitely been having a heart attack.

Taking small steps before seeing each other in person again was probably a good thing if there was this whole amnesia situation to work through, and talking was one of those small steps he very much wanted to take right now.

"We can talk and build! Who cares about a house? Let's build a van!" Tom shouted, not taking any other ideas as he ran over to a nearby empty spot to build their van.

"Uh- do we..?" Ranboo asked, looking between Tom and the other, more sane players.

"You don't have to go along with it if you don't want to," Phil made sure they didn't feel pressured into going along with Tom's antics, "but if you want to...I guess we can build a hotdog van..?"

He didn't sound at all certain of himself, but somehow the idea seemed fine enough for the others to go along with it. Ranboo, Sneeg, Charlie and Mariana all looked to each other for a few moments before they stepped away from their work-in-progress house to see what this hotdog van would possibly entail.

Phil, Jaiden, Wilbur and Toby went with them, and Toby split off from the group to have a quiet talk with Ranboo on the way that Phil totally didn't listen in on the whole time.

"Hey, uh, Ranboo, so uh...you don't remember me, I guess..?" Toby asked hesitantly. Ranboo shook their head.

"Yeah, that's alright," Toby assured them, "my name's Toby. Shit, I-I don't want this to be weird, I feel like I'm making it weird-"

Ranboo laughed, "you're fine, man. My name's Ranboo. Sorry about the whole...forgetting you thing."

"Don't sweat it king, I remember you. Wait, does that- does that sound weird? Shit, that's totally not a normal thing to say."

Ranboo laughed again, some of Toby's anxieties easing at the familiar noise he had refused to forget after so long. It made him so happy to be hearing it again, that Ranboo was back and laughing again.

"Well, this situation's not normal, so no worries. It is a bit strange for you all to know more about me than I do, but at least there's people who know these things for once," Ranboo sighed. It sounded like he hadn't been having a particularly good time with the lack of memories.

"Wait, so- if it's not a hard question to answer or anything, uh, what do you remember?"

Ranboo thought on their answer for a short while. By now they had reached the spot Tom had chosen for his hotdog van, and chaos was already breaking out between the others, but Ranboo and Toby lingered at the back to continue their discussion. Charlie, Mariana, Jaiden and Wilbur were the ones getting most involved and not exactly helping the situation, and Toby tried to ignore how Phil and Sneeg were meanwhile angled subtly towards him and Ran, definitely not listening in on their conversation.

"Ranboo isn't my name, is it?"

"Huh?" Toby was surprised by the sudden question aimed at him, drawing his attention back away from everyone else.

"Well...Toby, Phil, Jaiden...those are all real names, y'know? I don't know much, but I'm pretty sure Ranboo isn't really...a name."

Toby pursed his lips. By the sounds of it, Ranboo's amnesia was that bad he couldn't remember his real name. That wasn't good.

"Oh, uh- yeah, you, I mean, that was your username, Ranboo was, I mean," Toby stumbled over an answer, his brain a little distracted by trying to think of everything else Ranboo may have forgot.

"Okay, yeah, I was just curious," Ranboo seemed to make an attempt to ease Toby's panic, but they didn't sound all too calm themselves, "I don't really need to know what my name was, but, uh...you said username, right? Was Ranboo a name that I...picked out for myself..?"

"Uh," Toby felt like the question was strange, but he still wanted to give Ranboo an honest answer, "yeah, if I remember correctly, it uh...it was supposed to sound like rainbow."

Ranboo's character model nodded quietly, "thank you...that's all I wanted to know, really. Just as long as it wasn't another thing those pricks chose for me."

Toby didn't know what that meant exactly, but it sounded like Ranboo was happy, so that was fine.

"You wanna go build a hotdog van?" Toby suggested, looking at everyone else and seeing Sneeg and Phil quickly look away. Ranboo laughed.

"Yeah, I'm sure this will end well," he said sarcastically.

Toby laughed too as they made their way towards the foundations of the van. It looked like Ranboo had already caught on to the success rate of any projects that Tom tried to lead.

Tom immediately yelled for Toby to come and back him up on some argument he'd gotten himself into, which he was a little annoyed by but Sneeg wanted to talk to Ranboo anyway, so the two of them split up for now.

"Toby, seriously, a food van has never lead to anything bad, right?" Tom asked him his totally unbiased question. The main argument seemed to be between him and Wilbur, as they usually were, with Jaiden, Charlie and Mariana standing by amused and confused.

"Tom, the single most important food van in our lives has notoriously lead to very terrible shit," Toby told him.

"What?! Come on, can't you just back me up on this one thing?" Tom begged. He was standing on the first few blocks making up the van to be higher than everyone else.

"Tommy, I blew up a nation," Wilbur reminded him. He had placed some dirt blocks underneath himself to be one block higher than Tom.

"Whoa, wait, uh- I feel like we missed a step here?" Charlie interjected, concerned by how serious Wilbur had sounded admitting to what was most definitely a crime.

"Oh, don't worry Charlie, he's done worse than that," Tom told him.

"Th-that doesn't make it better?" Charlie said in alarm, the statement coming out sounding more like a question due to his confusion.

"Well that's not the only food van we know," Tom returned to the argument at hand without offering any more explanation.

"How many more food vans do you know..?" Jaiden mumbled.

"Just the one, but I'd say it was a pretty important one..." Tom's head turned to look at Wilbur in the game, as if he would know exactly what he was describing.

"Oh, wait, are you talking about-?" Wilbur suddenly had the realisation.

"-Sorry Burger™?" both of them said in sync.

"Holy shit, wait, don't we have all of the Sorry Boys here?" Tom asked excitedly. Wilbur briefly looked at everyone and nodded.

"Oh shit, we do! It's a Sorry reunion!" he added, excited but not quite to the same extent as Tom.

"Uh, why are you guys apologising so much..?" Mariana asked them.

"Oh, it's uh, it's a group channel we had called the Sorry Boys, and it was me, Tommy and Philza, but then Charlie and Ranboo too, and we just recorded stupid shit, but one of our videos had a hotdog van," Wilbur explained.

"Man, this is not the situation I thought we'd end up talking about that video in," Tom laughed.

Wilbur nodded and continued, "well, we never uploaded it because we prerecorded a bunch of Sorry videos before everyone went missing and, y'know, it just felt kinda weird to keep uploading them after that...but hey, if you guys are up to it, maybe we could meet up and do some Sorry Boys stuff again? Only if you're up to it, of course. I don't wanna force you, with...everything that's happened."

Everyone glanced at Charlie, who nodded after a moment, "Yeah, I mean, I kinda wanna know more about what I was doing in my life before everything happened, so I guess I could...be sorry in a hotdog van again?"

Tom laughed, "well, we did more than just Sorry Burger™, but I feel like it would get pretty confusing to start explaining it all."

"Yeah they got a little unhinged, especially when I wasn't there for a few of the shoots. I thought Phil would be the one holding everything together but it turns out he goes just as crazy as everyone else," Wilbur sounded amused, looking in Phil's direction as he suddenly realised he was the one being talked about.

"Huh? Sorry, I was just doing other stuff, what's going on?" he asked them.

"Oh, are we too boring for you, Philza Minecraft?" Wilbur taunted, which Phil laughed at.

"Yes, god forbid I do anything that you're not involved in," he sarcastically agreed.

"Phil, we're talking about the Sorry Boys! We got all of them back together!" Tom happily shouted down to him.

"Oh, yeah, I guess so," Phil realised, "is that why we're building a hotdog van?"

"Well, I was building a hotdog van for other reasons, but maybe we could do something like remaking that video, but just...in Minecraft!" Tom proposed.

"I mean, if everyone's alright with it..?" Phil asked as he looked and Charlie nodded to him. He looked in the distance and saw Ranboo still talking with Sneeg, and assumed those two would just join in their own time.

First they needed to actually build the hotdog van, though. It ended up shorter than the one Tom had originally been laying out but at least it was easy to build, and they weren't that bothered about quality either. It looked approximately like a hotdog van in the end, and that was good enough for them. Ranboo joined at last when they were almost done, which Toby was suspicious may have been deliberate to avoid the work, but he'd have done the exact same thing so he couldn't exactly blame them.

"You guys had a courthouse on the QSMP, right? We could remake that video too!" Tom shouted out as he put down the last few blocks on the roof.

"Jeez, how many times have I been to court?" Charlie laughed.

"Enough to be good at it, you destroyed me last time," Mariana reminded him.

Jaiden and Phil were busy looking through their respective inventories for hotdog ingredients nearby, but everyone else was getting involved in the last stages of building.

"What exactly did you guys do in these videos?" Sneeg asked while correcting one of the tyres that was slightly out of line.

"We just kinda fucked around for an hour or something, then hoped we could turn it into a video afterwards. Like Wil said earlier, some of them got a little weirder than others," Tom explained to him.

"Alright, and, uh...why weren't Jaiden, Toby and me invited? Pretty mean to leave all of us out of your club," Sneeg was joking, but he sounded just serious enough for the others to second guess their judgement.

"Uh, you were, like, totally allergic to hotdogs. You aren't right now but you totally were when we were doing the video," Tom lied.

"Tom, don't just tell them made up stuff, oh my god," Wilbur warned him.

"Well I know I'm not allergic to hotdogs, so what about me, huh?" Toby asked, also trying to use Sneeg's serious tone in his accusation but the fact he was faking his bitterness was a bit more obvious.

"Toby, let's be honest, you probably would've been too grossed out by some of the shit we ended up doing. The Sorry Secret Sauce, I definitely ate paint in that one video, uh..." Tom tried to think of more examples, "man, I mean, that whole surgery video, definitely. Wilbur really was the one holding us all together..."

"The what?" Charlie asked. Mariana looked at him when he noticed him tense. The others just saw his Minecraft skin as normal, though.

"Oh, yeah, if I'm honest maybe it's a good thing we never got to release that one to the public," Tom laughed.

"I wasn't there because I was busy and everything, but you called me in the middle of it and I saw a little bit of the prosthetic chest. Yeah, that was...definitely one hell of a video," Wilbur agreed.

Charlie wasn't laughing with them, he was quiet. Ranboo had also stopped putting blocks down and was looking between everyone.

"I...wait, so, for a video..?" Charlie paused and made a noise somewhere between clearing his throat and an uncomfortable laugh, "t-there, uh, we did- you said a surgery?"

"Mhm..." Wilbur answered hesitantly, catching onto the discomfort in his tone.

"Yeah, there was a bunch of fake blood and guts, and also just random objects we pulled out of your chest," Tom continued, evidently not catching onto the discomfort in his tone.

"Haha, y-you...oh, fuck," to everyone else Charlie's character simply fell to his knees, but to Mariana and the others in the game they could see one hand by his throat and the other on his chest and his entire body shaking.

"Charlie!" Ranboo jumped down from the van and ran to Charlie, Sneeg not far behind.

"Whoa, hey, what's- Charlie, are you okay?" Wilbur asked, worried about the sudden change of tone.

"I-I...damn, I thought I'd remembered the weirdest shit, but I guess I forgot some other weird shit I did," Charlie laughed shakily, looking at the floor and trying not to grab his chest so hard his nails tore into it, "f-fuck, why the fuck wasn't the time in the warehouse the first time, why the hell..?!"

As Charlie's breathing surged he couldn't keep talking, but both fortunately and unfortunately this wasn't the first time things like this had happened, so Ranboo was quick to hold onto his hands and pull down their own mask to show Charlie their breathing. Charlie mimicked him and did so for a minute, Sneeg and Mariana at his sides and Ranboo in front, Wilbur, Tom and Toby all standing in the distance and all very concerned.

Ranboo released his hands when Charlie was breathing at the same rate as them and nodded, able to speak again.

"I thought I was getting better with this stuff," Charlie sighed.

"We'll get there eventually, kid," Sneeg assured him.

Silence stretched on for a few moments, but the questions from the three standing in the distance were practically being shouted at them despite nobody saying anything at all.

"Charlie's not good with surgery. We're not good with a lot of things, really," Ranboo told them once he'd put his mask back on and stepped away from Charlie to approach them and offer some kind of explanation.

"Um...a-alright, any big ones we should be aware of..?" Wilbur asked.

"Uh, slime, basements, old TVs, red lights, malls- that's for all of us- full face masks, carousels, guns, anvils, offices, exit signs, and uh, boxes" Ranboo listed off casually, though they grimaced at the last one, "I mean, you probably won't have to worry about most of these, and if you slip up it's all good- well, not really, but you'll be forgiven. Shit happens, y'know."

Wilbur, Tom and Toby all stopped functioning for a moment when they heard the swear, but Toby tried to move on quickly.

"King, what...what happened?"

Ranboo opened their mouth but hesitated a few more seconds before answering, "uh...heh, uh, a lot. I dunno if I can really go into most of it, but there was this, like, 'show' thing, and we all got dragged into it...some people got it worse than others. But, like I keep saying, it's over now, and that's what matters. Is there, uh...anything else you wanna know? I gather that you guys didn't get much of an explanation before you got here."

Wilbur, Tom and Toby all looked at each other despite not being able to see each other's faces in the game. Tom, after a few moments, managed to ask a question.

"...Is he okay?" the apology was clear in his tone and they all knew who it was he was asking about.

Ranboo looked back over his shoulder at Charlie, still kneeling with Mariana and Sneeg, but looking better than he was a minute ago.

"We can go ask," Ranboo told them as he headed back. Charlie looked up at their arrival, trying to keep up a smile.

"Oh, hey. Guess I kinda ruined the conversation, huh?" he told them bashfully.

"As long as you're good now, man, don't worry about it. We're sorry we didn't stop Tom from being a dumbass," Wilbur joked.

"Hey!" Tom shouted back, but his annoyance dissipated when he heard Charlie laughing at the interaction.

"If you, uh, wanna just sit out while we do the dumb hotdog stuff then that's fine," Wilbur told him. Charlie thought on his answer for a little while before he slowly nodded.

"Yeah, I-I, that would probably work best, I just wanna take a moment. Sorry...I bet your old Charlie wasn't like this, huh?" he laughed but they could all tell from his voice it wasn't genuine this time.

"Well, we-" Wilbur wasn't sure exactly what to say to that, but he knew he needed to say something, "if you're not the same as 'old Charlie', then...that's fine. As long as you're alright, that's all we care about. You don't have to remember us to be our friend."

Charlie was quiet. Wilbur really hoped he hadn't just made Charlie cry, because he might've just made Charlie cry.

"Hey, and if you don't remember stuff, maybe that's a good thing, cus now you can re-experience all your favourite things! One of them was definitely me, so I hope you're making the most of being graced by my presence," Tom laughed, not able to keep a straight face throughout his last sentence, but the first part he meant genuinely at least.

"Oh, wait, holy shit!" Wilbur jumped in, startling everyone a little, "you know how people always say they wanna hear songs for the first time all over again? We can do that, like, right now!"

"Oh, like, listen to songs we used to listen to?" Ranboo asked, getting a little excited by the idea.

"Yeah, exactly! Hold on, I can pull some up right now," Wilbur said before loud typing was picked up by his microphone.

"We're probably never gonna get around to doing the Sorry Boys stuff," Tom laughed.

"Yeah, we will, just...after this," Wilbur told him unconvincingly.

"...What if I like different music now?" Ranboo mumbled, mainly as a thought to themself, but Wilbur shrugged.

"Then I guess you gotta start finding the stuff you like now. But I know this was what you liked before," he confidently asserted as he pressed play and made sure the audio was coming through into Minecraft.

Everyone was quiet together as they let the music play, Ranboo listening most intently until he arrived at a realisation.

"Oh, wait, I-I think I recognise this!" they announced.

"Wait, really?" Wilbur asked excitedly, "it's by Ghost, do you recognise the band name or anything?"

"Uh...Ghost, yeah, it rings a bell," Ranboo pondered, "I like it," they concluded.

Wilbur grinned and nodded, "hey, what did I tell you? Now you've got a whole band to rediscover!"

Charlie hummed, nodding along with the song that Wilbur continued to emit despite him not being able to see any kind of speaker on his body, "do you know what kind of stuff I listened to, then..?"

"Well..." Wilbur hesitated, "you didn't talk as much about the stuff you listened to, but... you did make some songs of your own."

"Oh god, I did?" Charlie laughed. He worried about what his past self might have created.

"Oh, yes, Juanaflippa's song! You made a song for her!" Mariana told him, getting excited too.

"For Flippa..?" Charlie asked, looking from Mariana to Wilbur, who was already typing and presumably looking for the song. After a moment his eyes widened, "oh, god, I did."

"You remember?" Mariana asked.

"Uh, I think so," but the memory of the song they were talking about was still quite hazy, making him all the more agitated to hear it since the memory was just out of reach.

"Hey, it's a good song. I think she would've liked it a lot if she heard it," Mariana assured him.

"You ready to hear it?" Wilbur asked, hovering his hand over the play button.

"Oh, whatever, lemme hear it," Charlie told him.

This one goes out to my only huevo...

Juanaflippa.
"Juanaflippa," Charlie said in time with the song, before bursting out into laughter, "oh, shit, I can't believe I made this..."

The song continued and Charlie tried his best to ignore the looks of Ranboo and Sneeg being directed his way.

"Listen, guys, I-" he tried to offer an explanation but stumbled over his words, "I was in kind of a weird spot when she passed away, alright?"

"No, I mean, it's good," Sneeg told him, "I just...y'know, didn't realise you used to sing."

"I didn't think I did!" Charlie laughed.

"Hey, if you want we could set up a karaoke night or something, I'd love to do my own songs for you guys too," Wilbur offered.

"Oh, that actually sounds pretty fun! Are you in a band or something?" Ranboo asked.

"Yeah, we're called Lovejoy, and-" Wilbur started explaining.

"Oh here we go," Tom sighed, interrupting him.

"Wh- what do you mean? Ranboo asked!" Wilbur defended.

"Oh, really? You just wanna advertise your band Wil, psh, typical..." Tom complained.

"That is not what I was doing," Wilbur told him assertively.

"Whatever you say, band boy," Tom dismissed. Wilbur sounded exhausted just from the sigh he gave in response.

"Well, anyway, I'm sure we could set up some kind of karaoke night if that's alright with all of you guys," Wilbur smiled and glanced back at the almost complete hotdog van, "looks like we got pretty sidetracked."

Sneeg sighed, standing up, "alright, how many of you guys are hungry?"

Charlie laughed, staying with Mariana as everyone else started heading to the van, "bring some back for us! No pickles!"

~

Phil, meanwhile, was getting even more sidetracked.

"I swear I had the stuff for this back at my house...hold on, I'll be back with enough ingredients for a dozen stacks of hotdogs!" Jaiden told him as she switched from her backpack to her warp stone.

"No worries, I'll probably go look around my base too, I still need to grab those blocks for the house," he told her a few moments before she disappeared into purple particles.

He was finally about to head back to his home when a message stopped him once again.

It wasn't in Minecraft, though. This time he'd been sent a DM on discord.

◯ Quackity Today at 11:41
phil we have a mission for u

Oh no.

◯ Ph1LzA Today at 11:41
oh no

◯ Quackity Today at 11:42
shut up its not that bad
me n cellbit are trying to figure shit out but were kind of out of leads
and i think cugurucho hates my ass
soooo

◯ Ph1LzA Today at 11:43
🤨

◯ Quackity Today at 11:43
phil can u like interrogate cucurucho and get answers for us or dmth
smth

◯ Ph1LzA Today at 11:44
sigh
ok sure I'll interrogate the bear but I can't guarantee we'll actually get anything

◯ Quackity Today at 11:44
yes thabk you i love h phil
u
wait but not actually
whatever just get screenshots
we need photis to add to our evidence board so that it looks sick af

Phil laughed. Of course they had an evidence board.

◯ Ph1LzA Today at 11:46
sure thing
I'll get back to you once I'm done
have you eaten and slept btw

◯ Quackity Today at 11:47
stfu dad

He'd take that as a no, then.

Phil returned to Minecraft, his new mission in mind. He did have some questions of his own he wanted to ask the bear, so he couldn't be too annoyed that his pursuit of blocks was once more interrupted.

First he needed to find the bear, though.

Chapter Text

Ph1LzA » Cucurucho get your ass over here I wanna talk

Hopefully that would work.

Phil sighed and looked around, no white bear having appeared from out of nowhere yet. Cucurucho wasn't exactly reliable, he supposed, so maybe it would be best to do something while he waited for the bear to arrive.

Everyone else was still surrounding the hotdog van, but eventually they'd need to finish the house they'd barely started, so maybe waiting for Cucurucho was finally his chance to get all the blocks they needed- he'd taken long enough already.

This time as he held down on his warp stone there were no interruptions and he at last made it to his house atop the wall. He turned to go towards the trapdoor leading into his basement, and upon doing so was jumpscared by the sudden appearance of a smiling, white bear.

"AH SHIT-!" Phil exclaimed, jumping back in his chair and jolting the mouse, making his perspective shift to the ground. As he regained his composure and pushed his chair back to his desk he could see Cucurucho's feet coming up to him and crouching next to him.

"Always a pleasure, Cucurucho," he sighed and looked up at the bear. At least his message had been seen.

"Ha ha ha," the bear responded, and Phil shouldn't have been surprised that it took joy from scaring the shit out of people, "what are you doing?"

"I called for you because I wanted to talk," Phil explained, "we- I've got some questions, that's all."

Considering Quackity's description of the bear's distaste for him, Phil wasn't sure if he wanted Cucurucho to know about his and Cellbit's involvement in the plan. Cucurucho nodded, which Phil took as his invitation to start asking.

"So, uh," he glanced across to the list of questions he'd been sent by Cellbit, dramatically titled BIG QUESTIONS, "what exactly... are you?"

He was more relieved than he expected to be when Cucurucho pulled out a book rather than responding with the usual classified. Once Cucurucho had dropped it at his feet he opened it eagerly, although probably not as eager as Quackity or Cellbit would've been considering the possibility of much-needed answers inside. Phil was just on the server to make sure nothing caught on fire, really.

MYSELF AND THE EGGS ARE NOT EASY TO EXPLAIN.
WE CAME INTO EXISTENCE NOT AS CHILDREN OR PROGRAMS, BUT AS ENTITIES.
WE HAD NOTHING BUT OURSELVES AND A PURPOSE.

Phil first screenshotted the book as Cellbit had reminded him to, no doubt wanting to put the images on his evidence board with red string between them all. Then came the actual processing of the words, trying to figure out what Cucurucho meant.

"So, you're not AI, or anything..?" that ruled out his main theory. He wasn't sure what other explanations that left him with, and ENTITY wasn't a very helpful descriptor. From the first sentence he supposed that might be deliberate, maybe anything more would be undecipherable or strange enough to break his brain.

"Alright, alright, uh..." Phil got back on track, he didn't know how long he had for this interview if Cucurucho had other plans for today, "why are our friends, uh, in a video game?"

Phil threw the book back to Cucurucho despite the bear probably having an infinite supply of those things in its inventory and waited patiently to get his next response.

THE WORLD OUTSIDE IS NOT YET SUITABLE FOR THEM.
WHEN IT IS SAFE, THEY WILL BE ABLE TO RETURN TO IT.

"Alright...that's good, I suppose, but I kind of want to know how you've managed to put people...in a video game," Phil pushed.

"Ha ha ha," and just like that the Cucurucho he was used to returned, willing to give him everything except the exact thing he wanted. Some answers were still off limits, it would seem.

"Fine, if you can't say how you got them in, can you at least tell me how you're gonna get our friends out?" Phil tossed the book back again, trying to sound more commanding in hopes of an answer.

ME? IT MAY BE YOU WHO GETS THEM OUT IN THE END.

"Seriously, I don't know how Cellbit can deal with your cryptic bullshit," Phil muttered, screenshotting that book too in case anyone could get anything from it, because he definitely couldn't.

It was probably time for another question rather than pushing for an answer Cucurucho seemed unlikely to give. This one he actually had more of an interest in, rather than the others that were more to check off Quackity and Cellbit's grocery list, "can you tell us anything more about, uh, what it was exactly that happened to all of our friends when they went missing?"

WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT THEY WILL TELL YOU THEMSELVES.
IF THE TIME NEVER COMES, I REQUEST THAT YOU RESPECT THAT.

Phil nodded. It wasn't the answer he wanted, but it only made sense. It wasn't Cucurucho's story to tell, and he knew he wouldn't want anyone else trying to pressure all of his friends into telling stories they weren't ready to tell.

"But someone's responsible, right? Can't you at least tell us who's responsible?"

I KNOW YOU WOULD LIKE JUSTICE IN YOUR OWN HANDS, PHIL, BUT WE WILL MAKE SURE TO TAKE CARE OF EVERYTHING.
CRIMES WILL NOT GO UNPUNISHED.

Phil tapped his desk, a little annoyed that the bear had seen right through him. It was reasonable that he wanted revenge, and it was equally reasonable that Cucurucho didn't want him getting consumed by it. Damn it, why did this bear have to be so wise and considerate?

No answers there, though. Time for another question.

"Who is the, uh... ERROR_INVALID_USER guy..?"

Phil had to check the player list again after reading the question from Cellbit's list, having not taken notice of the weird username, but there it was, at the bottom of the list. Every missing person was listed, plus whoever Hetch was, so it couldn't have been then. His next guess would've been that it was just a glitch, as it appeared to be one, but maybe Cucurucho could give him something better.

WE APOLOGISE.
WHEN WE FREED YOUR FRIENDS, WE ALSO BROUGHT WITH US UNINVITED GUESTS.
IT WAS A RISK WE SHOULD HAVE FOUND A WAY TO AVOID.
LUCKILY HE IS SOLITARY.

"H-he..? Who is he, Cucurucho?" the lack of detail in the bear's answers was now becoming scary, allowing Phil to worry himself over the possibilities of whatever this uninvited, solitary thing was.

HE USED TO BE SECURITY, NOW HE ROAMS ON HIS OWN.
HE IS TERRITORIAL AND VIOLENT.
WE RECOMMEND TO KEEP YOUR DISTANCE AND REPORT ANY SIGHTINGS.

"Uh...alright, will do," Phil agreed despite having no idea what he was looking for. By the sounds of things he would just know when he saw it, although he didn't really want to see it.

He decided to move on, then sighed when he read what his next question would be.

"If you have the powers of an admin, can you give- I dunno, just picking a player at random here- Cellbit op?"

NO

That was a quick response, "worth a try, I guess."

Phil scanned the list of questions he still had to go through, and some of them he didn't even know what they were referring to. Even though it wasn't his idea to be sent here for an interrogation, he did have questions of his own that he wanted to throw in. He didn't know if Cucurucho would ever give him another opportunity like this to ask them. So, despite Quackity and Cellbit wanting their own concerns answered, Phil decided to ask something himself.

"What happened to the eggs that died?"

He didn't ask it apathetically, but he knew he had to keep his emotions in check a little bit so that the answer didn't break him. The wait didn't help, Cucurucho taking longer than with any of the other questions to give his answer. He knew they weren't children, they were entities as Cucurucho had called them, but that still seemed to mean they were alive- or, had been, at least. It didn't make their loss any less difficult.

IT WAS A LITTLE LIKE DEATH, IN THAT THEY CEASED TO BE.
SOMETHING OF THEM STILL EXISTS WITHIN THIS WORLD, BUT WE CANNOT COMMUNICATE WITH IT.

"Right..." Phil sighed. If only he'd known, if only all of them had known, they might have protected the eggs more, kept them safer than they had. But now it was too late for some of them.

He was lost in regret and only startled out of it by the hit sound in the game as his avatar was punched. He spun his mouse, expecting some random mob to be interrupting, but instead had to angle his view down to face the egg standing behind him, Tallulah hovering over her hat and brown hair.

Phil felt like he should say some kind of greeting but stumbled over it long enough that Tallulah was already writing a sign before he began, and he didn't want to interrupt, so he waited quietly for her to finish.

I know that my siblings weren't scared when they went. They knew you all wanted the best for them, they didn't blame you. You took care of us and made us happy so please don't regret anything, they wouldn't want you to be sad.

Phil couldn't exactly read that and not be sad.

In the game Tallulah ran up to him and crouched, no doubt her way of giving a comforting hug, and Phil would've definitely returned it if he was there. These stupid little pixel eggs were awfully good at making him cry.

"I...I'm sorry. You shouldn't have to be dealing with me being a big mess right now," Phil turned away from the egg. Cucurucho threw a book his way that he opened after he had a moment to collect himself.

IT'S ALRIGHT, WE'RE ALWAYS HERE TO HELP.
IF YOU NEED IT THEN ONE OF US WILL ALWAYS BE ONLINE.

Phil nodded. He didn't plan to, he felt bad enough bothering them when he thought they were admins, but he at least appreciated the offer.

Another punch from Tallulah brought his attention her way and to a sign she'd placed down.

Speaking of, you were asking questions, right? I'll help with answering them now that I'm here, just incase the big dumb bear can't.

The offense was clear as Cucurucho slowly turned towards the egg, and Phil quietly laughed. He looked between them, getting an idea for what he could ask next.

"Uh, so...Cucurucho, you said earlier that you and the eggs all came into existence the same way, but aren't you different? Y'know, being a bear and all. Are you, like, the most powerful, or something?"

Cucurucho and Tallulah exchanged a glance, and Tallulah was first to put down a sign before Cucurucho could get out a book.

Well...Cucurucho was actually an egg, originally.

"Wait, really? Another egg?" Phil looked at Cucurucho, not remembering any other eggs besides the ones that had been around at the same time as him. Who else could it have been?

Cucurucho threw him a book and Phil wasn't exactly prepared for what he was about to read.

I WASN'T SURE WHEN TO TELL YOU, SIR.

"Sir..?" Phil muttered, looking from the book to the bear. The name above his head read Cucurucho, but Phil knew him better by another name.

"Chayanne?"

The bear nodded- his son, the egg with the duck floatie, now standing at his own height and looking back at him with a smile that he couldn't help but feel was fond.

"Oh my god, so many times I joked about you playing Cucurucho...but I guess it's your actual job, huh?" Phil considered.

He got pretty mad at you for always trying to blow his cover. I thought it was funny though.

Chayanne seemed to give Tallulah a glare for her sign that Phil was chuckling at, "ah, sorry for trying to blow your super secret spy cover, mate. It was a little bit obvious, though."

Chayanne punched Phil and moved on.

ANYWAYS, I WANT TO THANK YOU, DAD.
FOR BEING, Y'KNOW, MY DAD.

"Just doing my job," Phil humbly replied, "and don't think I'm stopping now just because you've been the true bear this whole time, you're gonna regret letting me find out who you are. You'd better not have been out fighting shit while I was gone."

Chayanne shuffled on his feet a little, which was enough of an admittance of guilt for Phil.

I THINK I'M STARTING TO SEE WHAT IT WAS LIKE FOR YOU.

"Oh? What do you mean by that?"

TAKING CARE OF ALL THE PEOPLE WHO CAME BACK.
I'M STARTING TO FEEL LIKE A DAD TO ALL OF THEM.
SO THANK YOU FOR TEACHING ME HOW TO BE A GOOD ONE.

"Oh, Chayanne, it's rude to make your old man cry," Phil laughed as he tried to hold back his tears. There was only so many times he could cry in a day before he started to feel like nothing but a big crybaby.

Chay you're making dad cry! Say sorry!

Tallulah's demands were probably meant jokingly, but Chayanne handed over another book nonetheless.

I'M SORRY FOR EVERYTHING, HAVING TO KEEP SECRETS, BUT ALSO THAT I FAILED WHEN THEY ALL NEEDED ME.
YOU TAUGHT ME EVERYTHING AND YOU TAUGHT ME PERFECTLY, BUT I WASN'T PERFECT.

"Wh...what are you talking about?" Phil was sure that Chayanne was being overdramatic over a little mistake like always, but this apology felt like it carried more weight with it.

WHEN WE WERE SAVING EVERYONE THE PLAN WENT WRONG, WE COULDN'T SAVE THEM FROM THE WORST OF IT.
I'M SORRY DAD, IT WAS TRUSTED WITH ME AND I FAILED THEM.

"Hey, hey, Chayanne, listen- they're here, right? All of them are here, you got them here alive?" Phil asked sternly and rhetorically. Chayanne nodded to him slowly.

"Then you sure as fuck didn't fail, and I'm sure all of them would tell you that too. I get that I don't know all the details but I heard my friends laughing yesterday, and that is more than I ever expected to hear of them again."

Chayanne nodded again and Tallulah did too, clearly having been harbouring some of the same guilt.

"Speaking of, maybe we should head down...I'm scared what's happened down there without me," Phil looked to the horizon where everyone else was out of render distance, then back at his kids, "are you guys coming too?"

After a few seconds of consideration and a glance between themselves, the white bear and the egg with the red hat nodded back to him.

~

"Onnneee burger, my good sir!" Wilbur announced, throwing the hotdog from his inventory over the counter.

"Oh, thanks for the...burger..." Jaiden nodded as she picked it up. Nobody had explained the whole burger/hotdog thing to her, and she didn't get the feeling they were ever going to.

Sneeg was helping Wilbur in the kitchen, in which he appeared to have appointed himself the head chef, or at least he was the one giving orders. Tom was supposed to be there too, but he had disappeared yet again and would no doubt show up later and act like he'd never even gone.

Toby and Ranboo, meanwhile, were on advertising duty. Their only customer was Jaiden, and Charlie and Mariana were just watching happily from the sidelines, but they were trying their best regardless.

"I bet we could spin our signs around, that would be good...there's gotta be a mod for that, right?" Toby asked as he held onto his canvas with the Sorry Burger logo lovingly drawn onto it by Jaiden, although it was a little messy with the limited art systems that modded Minecraft offered. Ranboo watched quietly, holding onto his own canvas that he'd attempted to draw on himself. There was a hotdog on it. Somewhere.

"Hold on..." Ranboo held on as instructed while Toby pressed every button on his keyboard and clicked on everything on his screen to see if it would work. He made some strange movements in Ranboo's eyes, but at least he wasn't doing the pole dance that some of the other players liked to randomly pull out.

"You just wanna spin it, right?" Ranboo asked, holding their crudely drawn sign out and trying to balance it on one hand.

"Yeah, but I just dunno if that would be an emote, or..." Toby sighed, still clicking through menus but not finding what he was looking for.

"Well, how about...this!" Ranboo took their other hand and swiveled the sign around his finger, trying his best not to drop it while attempting some cool moves.

"Whoa!" Toby gasped, "how are you doing that? That's sick!"

"Oh, I'm just, y'know, spinning it," Ranboo wasn't quite sure how else to explain it. They attempted a cool maneuver to spin the sign around their body but got punished immediately for his hubris by the sign hitting his face. They decided that sticking to simple stuff might be better.

"Well yeah, but is that like an emote or-?" Toby began trying to get answers.

"Whoa, Ranboo! Going crazy with that thing!" Sneeg interrupted, shouting from the hotdog van and duel wielding hotdogs with one in each hand.

Ranboo laughed and nodded back to him, getting the sign back up and trying to wave it around, "yeah, business is gonna be booming in no time!"

"Hope we don't run out of stock," Jaiden joked, knowing she had brought far more hotdogs with her than they would ever need, especially if she was going to be their only customer.

"Not on my watch! Jaiden, you got any machines? We could make an infinite hotdog- uh, burger farm in no time!" Toby promised.

Jaiden laughed nervously, "uh, yeah, I think I left my machines at home, sorry."

"Hey, you'd better keep spinning that sign, you don't want us going out of business, do you?" Sneeg brought everyone's attention back to Ranboo who had been taking a chance to rest their arms while other people spoke.

"My arms get pretty tired of that pretty quickly," Ranboo admitted, "are there any less intense ways we can advertise..?"

"Sing us a song!" Wilbur suggested.

"A song? So, like, a burger song?" Ranboo asked.

Wilbur nodded, "that's right. We need a song, Ranboo."

"Serve us up a burger song king!" Toby encouraged.

"Uh- well, okay," Ranboo cleared his throat and tried to think, "burger song, burger song...uh... burger sauce and meat, burger meat, get some burger meat in your feet," they tried.

Sneeg just started laughing, but Wilbur seemed a little taken aback.

"You like my song..?" Ranboo asked nervously, not having really thought about what he'd said and just doing what first came to mind.

"Did you remember doing that?" Wilbur asked him.

"Remember? Have- wait, have I done that before?" Ranboo asked in return.

Wilbur nodded slowly, "yeah, that's like...exactly the same song you did when we originally filmed this video."

Ranboo thought about that for a while. They didn't remember having done that song at all, nor any other parts of the video that surrounded it. So how had they just recited a song they didn't know?

"If you remember Ghost and you remember that...maybe it's just something to do with songs?" Sneeg offered an answer to them.

"Alright, but, why songs?" Ranboo wondered, putting his burger sign on the ground to lean against. Maybe if they figured this out it would help them discover how to remember everything else.

Nobody had much of an answer to that, though, so Ranboo continued with another thought, "were there any songs that were, like, especially linked to what I'd been doing before?" they asked hopefully. It would probably have been better not to get his hopes up in case this idea only lead to a dead end, but the promise of the things he'd forgotten was too tempting.

"Sometimes when I popped into your streams you'd have Lemon Demon as your starting soon thing," Toby mentioned with a shrug.

"What's a 'starting soon thing'..?" Ranboo felt like those words should've been familiar, but they weren't sparking any particular meaning.

"Well, let's see if you remember!" Toby responded vaguely, already typing something into another tab. Ranboo appreciated his shared excitement at the chance to regain more memories, but sometimes they just wanted to know what the hell was going on.

They decided against voicing those thoughts and waited a few moments longer until Toby found the song he'd been looking for.

Mowin' the lawn, mowin' the lawn...

"Pfft, were you a fucking gardener or something before they kidnapped you?" Sneeg laughed, unable to keep quiet after the first line of the song.

"Wh- no!" Ranboo defended, trying to ignore him and focus on the song but realising this did kind of make it sound like he'd just been mowing lawns before Showfall fucked everything up. Mowing lawns for a living didn't really sound all that bad.

But no, they hadn't been a lawnmower. This song, something about a 'starting soon'...it was linked to something. But what?

Headphones, a chair, a desk. It was coming back to them in fragments. With only limited glimpses of a past life he couldn't help but compare it to something in more recent memory, as much as he'd have rather left it behind.

There had been a row of people, all at desks, each one with headphones and computers. And at the end had been Charlie. He'd been streaming. That's what they'd called it, livestreaming. And when Ranboo started streams, sometimes he had a starting soon screen.

Holy shit, Ranboo had been a streamer.

"Wait- oh my god, I played games and stuff didn't I?" initially it was exciting, and Toby clearly shared that feeling as he made a joyful squeak in response, but there was more to it. Ranboo's memories of streaming were connected to feelings of happiness and fun, he could remember the feelings with more clarity than any specific events, but the streamers he'd seen in the mall, all glued to their screens, all trapped in that world...that had been like hell.

Charlie had seemed happy, sure, but Ranboo had pulled him away from that. Why had Showfall been making him stream? Wasn't that whole fucking thing being broadcast to a live audience anyway?

Streamers...the word dragged more threads of memory into the light and Ranboo's mind went back to the news report Cucurucho had shown them. Everyone who had been kidnapped was referred to as a streamer- was that why they were taken? It looked to be the only common theme, after all.

Ranboo looked at Charlie, currently lost in conversation with Mariana. They couldn't tell him about this. Having been forced to do streaming by Showfall, and then learning that was his whole life anyway...Ranboo was already having enough of a crisis.

"Um...alright, well that's...a lot," Ranboo admitted. This wasn't the kind of information he expected to process in just a few minutes. Thankfully the others seemed to respect that and didn't push to see what else he'd remembered, despite clearly wanting to know.

"Well...songs, that's a weird way for it to work, but now we know!" Wilbur nodded, "maybe if we organise a karaoke night we can try to add in a bunch of songs from the past that'll have a chance of bringing more memories up."

"Try not to overdo it, but...yeah, sounds like a plan," Sneeg was wary of the potential their memories could become overwhelming, if Ranboo's reaction moments ago was anything to go by, but he would always be down for karaoke.

"Who else should we invite? I bet Phil's got a good singing voice," Jaiden suggested.

"If we're doing people from this server you'll have better guesses than me since I've barely logged on for the past few months," Wilbur ashamedly admitted.

Ranboo looked around as the others talked, his eyes catching on the foundations of the house they had still yet to complete. Admittedly he was just looking for a distraction from the memories of a past life circulating his head, but they'd completely forgotten about the house amidst the whole burger/hotdog thing.

"Hey, you uh...you reckon we should try to finish that..?" Ranboo pointed over to it, their question directed at nobody in particular.

"Not sure if we have the materials for it," Sneeg admitted. That's right, Phil had apparently been going to get their supplies to build the house, but he still wasn't back.

"Oh, I'm sure I'll have some blocks that are close enough to what you need," Jaiden assured them, already opening up her backpack.

"Oh, yeah, I'll have stuff too!" Wilbur shouted out.

"Really? How many blocks did you get from the time you spent here?" Jaiden asked, doubtful of the resources he'd managed to build up.

"Uh...you guys interested in a dirt and andesite house..?" Wilbur offered.

Jaiden sighed but couldn't help a smile, "alright, let's just work with what we've got, then."

~

When Phil paraglided down with Tallulah, Chayanne having decided he'd rather show up from out of nowhere in true Cucurucho fashion, Toby was the first one to notice his return.

"Hey, Phil, you finally made it back! Sorry, you kinda missed out on the whole burger van thing, we moved on from that idea," he explained.

Phil sighed, "yeah, that's understandable, I was gone a little longer than intended...where is everyone else, by the way?"

Toby had come running over from the direction of everything they'd been building in the clearing, but Phil couldn't make out any players around the burger van they'd all been gathered around when he left.

"Oh, they moved over to work on the house, they're all inside right now working on the interior stuff. I would apologise that you've missed out on building the house too, but maybe you'll wanna rebuild the whole thing anyways once you see it," Toby laughed nervously, causing Phil to fear for the state the house had ended up in.

He looked over to where they had been building the foundations but all he could see from this angle was a newly erected giant wall of andesite. That definitely wasn't in their plans.

"Who's idea was that..?" Phil asked, not waiting for an answer before voicing another question, "what the heck is that even meant to be?"

"I'm not really a builder so I haven't been too involved in everything, but I think that one was Wilbur. He has a weird amount of andesite," Toby informed him.

Phil sighed again, "alright, well, I guess I'll go in and check what else they've done with the place..."

He didn't exactly approve of the changes, but in the end this was a house for his friends, not him. If they liked whatever they ended up with, Phil realised he'd just have to keep his thoughts to himself.

Thankfully it was soon clear that the andesite was only one of four walls on the house and the rest looked more like an actual house exterior, however Phil noticed something while he, Toby and Tallulah walked around the side to reach the front. The house started with the blocks he and Jaiden had provided, the ones that made up the foundations, but as his view drifted higher and higher the block choices got a bit more...interesting.

It started off as different blocks of the same colour, keeping to the theme but adding some diversity, Phil could appreciate that. Then the colours started to change a little, growing more varied and less coherent, until at the very top of the house there was no semblance of a theme at all, blocks of all kinds had been thrown together and scattered haphazardly, creating a chaotic structure of vibrancy and textures.

"Well that's...uh..." Phil couldn't call it bad, though it was certainly a choice. But then he remembered the thing he'd kept forgetting, the task he'd set out to do. He was in charge of bringing those blocks back with him, so of course the house had become a bit of a mess without that. They'd run out of blocks, so it looked like they'd all piled their inventories together and used whatever blocks they could. It was chaotic, but with that understanding behind it, Phil started to see how the house was actually quite nice.

At the entrance were Jaiden and Sneeg, talking about something together but stopping as they saw Phil on his way.

"Phil, finally! What took you so long?" Jaiden greeted him.

"Well, I, uh- I got caught up in something," he responded with a glance to Tallulah.

"Damn, you just can't escape the responsibilities of being a dad, huh," she took his vagueness as a signal that he wouldn't be telling her any more than that, but she could assume enough about what had happened anyway, "you bring those blocks, at least?"

"Funnily enough, I forgot, but by the looks of things you didn't need them," Phil laughed.

"Gave us a bit of a challenge trying to figure out how the fuck to build a house without any materials, but with all of us working together we've actually almost got it finished!" Sneeg informed him.

"Damn, that's pretty good- you mind if I take a look inside?" Phil requested.

Sneeg nodded, "be my guest. Can't be embarrassed about anything I've built when I can't even tell which parts I built anymore."

Phil stepped towards the doors, but was met by a big white bear on the other side.

"Jeez Cucurucho, they've gotta hire you for haunted houses or something, you'd be perfect," Jaiden commented, looking at the bear from over Phil's shoulder.

Phil laughed a little as he recovered from the shock, "yeah...you wanted to tell me something, or did you just wanna scare me?"

Knowing Chayanne he felt it would probably be the latter, but the book that the bear handed him proved him wrong.

COULD WE PERHAPS GATHER EVERYONE HERE FIRST?
I HAVE AN IDEA THAT COULD MAKE IT MORE FUN TO LOOK AT.

"Uh...sure, mate, but what exactly is your idea..?" Phil looked back at Chayanne skeptically.

;)

A very short and sweet book that didn't tell Phil much at all, but he gave in, "alright, we can try out your idea, as long as it's not dangerous."

Chayanne nodded and headed inside, presumably to gather everyone at the entrance. Phil hoped that he wouldn't regret allowing this, although it was weird that he was now the one that Cucurucho was seeking permission from to do dumb ideas.

Soon everyone gathered, except Tom, who Phil already knew was probably out doing his own thing and causing chaos elsewhere. Tallulah was also absent, leaving Chayanne to hand Phil his books to read out.

"Everyone has worked together to build such a wonderful house," Phil read, "so we thought it would be good to let you all see it in its full glory."

"...what's that mean?" Toby asked.

Phil looked at Chayanne, not knowing the answer himself, and soon got another book, "a blocky screen doesn't let you see the true thing, so transporting you all into the game will- oh, not this again, really?"

Of course Chayanne was just wanting to bring them all back into the game world, and Phil wouldn't have minded if it wasn't for the fact that it left him facedown on his keyboard and nauseous for a little while after, as well as, y'know, feeling completely disconnected from his physical form and losing his sense of reality.

IT'S SAFE. YOU CAN SEE THEM AGAIN, TOO.

Phil didn't read this book out as it seemed more directed at him, "I dunno if everybody's ready for that, though, Chay."

"Wait, transport into the what? Can we just bring it back for a second?" Wilbur requested, Toby sounding just as confused.

"Oh, uh, guess we forgot to tell you- everyone that came back is like, literally in Minecraft. Sorry, thought we might've mentioned that already," Jaiden hastily explained.

"What?!" Toby exclaimed, Wilbur not even being sure how to respond to that.

IT'S ONLY FAIR IF I GOT TO DO IT TO EVERYONE ELSE.

Phil read the book with despair and Chayanne didn't wait for any more argument or warning from Phil about it before playing that same high pitched tone, sending all the players facedown on their desks without warning.

~

📞 Llamada Terminada

unos pocos segundos
(Call Ended
a few seconds)

📞 Llamada Terminada

unos pocos segundos

📞 Llamada Terminada

unos pocos segundos

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 23:07
philllllllll

📞 Llamada Terminada

unos pocos segundos

Quackity sighed and switched to his DMs with Cellbit.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 23:10
old man has gone quiet the feds mustvd got him

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 23:12
kkkk damn i can't believe they got to him
we gonna try to recruit anyone else?

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 22:13
i think jaiden is aith them sk shes probably alsk never gonna reply
cellbit i hate to say it but i might hve to go do some first person researxh

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 22:13
that bear is gonna kill you man

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 22:14
nah i got this

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 22:14
alr man i'll wear a good suit to ur funeral

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 22:14
thanks for ghe support pendejo

Quackity laughed and left Discord, hopping onto Minecraft once more. The feds had no doubt caught onto their incredibly secret operations and it was too late for Phil, he was probably already dead and they'd just covered it up as natural causes. But Quackity wouldn't go down so easy. He wanted answers, and now he was fueled to avenge the great Felipe Minecraft too. That dumb bear didn't stand a chance.

Quackity then moved his mouse and screamed far louder than he'd like to admit when he saw Richarlyson standing behind him.

Oh god, this was going to go terribly.

Chapter Text

He opened his eyes but for the first few moments he couldn't see anything, the sunlight blinding compared to the dull lamps in the room he'd just been in. Without his sight he had his hearing, but the conversations were muffled and overlapping one another and the only thing he could really make out was the wind as it brushed through the grass that he laid on.

The pressure of headphones was alleviated from his ears, and his clothes felt different too. Had he been kidnapped? No, this was way too weird for a kidnapping, but he didn't know how else this all made sense. He'd just been at a computer- where the hell was he now?

"Holy shit a fucking bear?!"

A sudden yell broke itself from the hum of other voices and he knew in an instant it was Toby. His bleary eyes shot wide open and the sudden rush of light almost made him shut them again, but he resisted the urge and lifted himself up with his palms on the dirt. Toby was highlighted in the daylight- like, weirdly highlighted. His hair almost looked blonde.

"Y-yes, just, hold on, we can explain," Phil's voice was the next he could hear. Except, when he looked to the source, it wasn't a way he ever remembered seeing Phil.

His blonde hair was ten times the length he ever remembered it being, but that wasn't even the most eye catching thing when he was wearing a wide green and white striped hat over it. He had a robe and sandals and it looked like some kind of cosplay, like he was dressed up as his...Minecraft skin.

He looked down. Yellow sweater, black trousers...oh fuck.

"Hey, Wilbur..? Are you alright down there?"

Wilbur Soot was not alright down here.

Ranboo- he suddenly realised, snapped out of his shock, that the new voice was Ranboo. Wilbur span to see the source and his wide eyes meet those of someone he had not seen for a long time. Despite the mask he recognised that face easily. It was really him. It was Ranboo.

"Uh..." Ranboo tilted his head, confused and a little uncomfortable as Wilbur continued to stare, his mouth slightly agape. Wilbur realised this after the silence went on a little too long and averted his gaze.

"U-uh, sorry, I-" he glanced to the grass, to his own hands, but couldn't help his eyes from landing back on Ranboo. Holy shit, it was really them.

"You're..." Wilbur couldn't finish the thought, studying Ranboo's features in a way he never realised he'd be so thankful to do again.

Ranboo sighed, "do you want me to help you up, or do you wanna just sit down for now?"

They weren't exactly annoyed, they understood that all these people who'd been his friends before would be happy to see him again, but he was getting a little weirded out by Wilbur's staring.

"Oh, uh, yeah," Wilbur nodded, embarrassed. Ranboo helped him stumble up to a standing position and he took another chance to look around. He had to physically stop himself from staring when he saw Charlie and Sneeg too. Mariana seemed to have collapsed too beside Charlie and Jaiden was nearby just getting up. Toby was already up, as he'd previously seen, and he was starting to think that blonde hair wasn't just a trick of the light. He was about to be surprised by Phil's appearance again, when he finally noticed the much more surprising figure that stood nearby.

"What the fuck, is that a bear?!"

"Yes, I-! Can you two please listen?!" Phil shouted to them, exasperated yet very much unfazed by the giant white bear standing on its hind legs beside him, "you're in the game now, alright? Me and Jaiden already went through this, it's fine, and yes there's a bear his name is Chay- well, actually, Cucurucho for now. I think the name situation is, uh..." Phil looked at the bear, as though for guidance, and much to Wilbur's surprise it took out a book.

Phil accepted it happily and mumbled the contents to himself before turning back to the group, "alright, yeah, the bear is called Cucurucho. He's not gonna hurt you, he's not feral or anything, he's just a little annoying sometimes."

The bear swung a paw at Phil's arm, "hey, you might be a big plushie, but that still kinda hurts! Plus you can't be mad at us when you just pulled us all in the game with barely any warning," he laughed back at it.

Wilbur looked at Toby, who slowly looked at him, the same amount of what the fuck plastered on both their expressions. Wilbur made a motion towards his hair, which thankfully his own was still the same colour, but Toby found out the same couldn't be said for him as he checked his own on Wilbur's suggestion.

"What the fuck?" he squealed, and Wilbur would've laughed if the situation wasn't so clearly distressing.

"Oh, yeah, that," Jaiden sighed, "don't worry, it could most definitely be worse," she pointed at her own bright blue hair that was in a style reminiscent of over-the-top anime characters.

"Hey, your hair looks pretty cool," Phil objected, reaching up a hand to play with the long stands off his own. Wilbur was quite thankful that he'd set his Minecraft skin's hair to be like how it was in reality.

"Cucurucho pendejo que carajo?!" suddenly the hair talk was interrupted by a yell from Mariana, standing next to a concerned Charlie. From the reaction Wilbur assumed he was yet another victim of the bear somehow pulling them all into a video game.

"Wait, Mariana, weren't you already in the game- what's wrong?" Jaiden asked.

"Si si, eso- that is the fucking issue! The pendejo fucking bear took me out!" Mariana complained.

"What, so, you're in your actual room right now..?" Phil asked, looking confused even though he and Jaiden seemed to know the most about what was going on here.

"Yes, that's right, whatever put you in has put me out!" Mariana explained, and Wilbur realised it was the exact opposite of what he'd assumed.

People's attention fell back to the bear, who, despite having an expression that seemed sewn into place, looked a little nervous. He wrote in another book that he handed to Phil, who read it out loud this time.

"I am unable to control the destination of transportation, those in range will always be taken the opposite realm they were previously in...apologies," he read and then looked at Mariana who was swearing under his breath, seemingly in both Spanish and English.

"Hey, if you're not in the game anymore, how about you just go get some rest..?" Charlie suggested, putting a hand on Mariana's shoulder even though it was unlikely he could see the gesture from outside the game.

"What? Why would I do that?" Mariana asked him.

"Mariana, you told me that it's like 4am where you live right now and I know you've barely slept recently. Please just go get some sleep," Charlie begged him.

Mariana huffed, but after a moment, conceded, "fine, okay, I'll sleep. I don't want to though."

"Alright," Charlie dismissed, suppressing a laugh at Mariana's childishness. Wilbur didn't recall them ever being this caring towards each other from what he knew of their interactions on the QSMP, but he was happy they were doing well.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Mariana said to delay his departure.

"See you then, please sleep," Charlie told him. Mariana let out a final offended huff before he disappeared from the world.

The wind blew through the clearing as the group returned to a short period of silence.

"So," Toby started, "I'm in a video game now."

"Yep," Wilbur agreed, since there was nothing else to do but accept their fate at this point.

"Hey, it's not all that bad," Jaiden interjected, looking around for an example, "see? Look how pretty the house is now that it's all real and stuff!"

Wilbur followed where she pointed and looked up at the house that rose up behind him. It was certainly less blocky, and he had to admit, the mishmashed chaos he'd contributed to looked quite nice under this new light. The multicoloured blocks formed a rainbow reminiscent of stained glass as it gradually faded into the less saturated colours below. Where the sunlight caught it right it looked almost enchanted.

"Yeah, it does actually," Phil admitted, "I doubt that it could do enough to rectify the huge wall of andesite, though."

"Hey!" Wilbur immediately got defensive, "my big wall looks fine!"

"Your big wall looks shit, mate," Phil laughed, "What's it even for?"

"I-it's for movie night! I thought maybe if we wanna watch movies on the server, we need a big screen to project them on! And I had, y'know...a lot of andesite."

Phil paused to consider and nodded, "right...that's actually a pretty good idea. We do already have a theatre though, so I don't know about connecting one to the back of the house."

"Do you wanna take it all down?" Wilbur challenged.

"...no," Phil admitted.

"Then my big wall stays. That's that," Wilbur asserted.

Cucurucho slipped a book into Phil's hands which he tried not to laugh from reading the contents of, but now being in the game he couldn't really stop Wilbur from seeing his expression.

"What? What is it, What's the bear saying now?" Wilbur interrogated.

"N-nothing, nothing," Phil said suspiciously, closing and pocketing the book.

DON'T WORRY, TALLULAH WILL DEFINITELY TAKE THE WALL DOWN THE MOMENT HE'S NOT LOOKING.

~

Tallulah, meanwhile, was elsewhere, joined by somebody who she would find it an understatement to say was 'annoying at first'.

"Heyy! Heyyyy! Fuckin' dumbass, whatever egg thing you are, lemme go! You're being a real bitch right now!"

Tallulah really wished he could see the death glare she tried to give him, but all Tom saw was an egg slowly turning back to look at him in a not particularly friendly way.

"Listen, I dunno what you are, I dunno why Phil seems so obsessed with you- honestly, he wouldn't shut the fuck up about this server when we were doing Sorry Boys shots, but I do not get the appeal. All these dumbass pixelated eggs just seem pretty stupid to me."

Tallulah kept her lasso on him but stopped to put a sign down and give him a response.

That's not what you were saying the last time we met.

"The last time..? Oh, c'mon, that was ages ago, man..." Tommy groaned, "well, I'm pretty sure you didn't lasso me and drag me through the woods last time, so that's probably why I had a better impression."

I think you also weren't stealing everyone's possessions last time.

"Wh-?! I am not stealing, excuse you! Why would anybody leave their stuff in an undefended locked chest if they didn't want it going to the poor and unfortunate who definitely deserve it way more than them?"

Tallulah just shook her head.

"Don't gimme that! I'm gonna get Quackity to tell me which admin you are and then I'm gonna doxx you for hating poor people!" Tom shouted back at her. She wished he could see the eyebrow that she raised, but the silence between them was enough to push for more of a response.

"T-that was a joke, I'm not actually gonna doxx you. But you're being a bit of a dick. Can you break character for a second just to tell me what's going on? I'm not live or anything," he assured her.

I'm bringing you back to the group so that they can explain.

"Can you just gimme, like, a basic explanation? Please..?"

Tallulah contemplated his request for a moment. He couldn't see her expression, but she could see his, and his concern was genuine. She gathered it was probably for his friends who'd been missing- she doubted anyone had given him a real explanation on them yet.

Your friends are in the game because it's a safe space for them, and my brother can give you a way to properly see them again.

She kept the explanation vague as she knew she would probably be outright called a liar if she told him he could be put in the game, and this explanation seemed good enough for now anyway.

"Right...okay. Hey, you were Wilbur's egg, have you lassoed him and dragged him around too?" Tom asked.

Luckily for him he didn't run off and start robbing the players.

"Well yeah, because he's probably already got gear and stuff, I've got nothing! Hey, wait, robbing? I already told you, I wasn't robbing anybody!" he shouted back at her defiantly. She just shook her head and got walking again.

Mentioning Wilbur had given her something to think about, though, and she had some time to think while she ignored Tom shouting nonsense at her from behind.

It had certainly been a while. She understood why he'd gone and she understood why he'd come back, the arrival of his friends on the island was important. She didn't feel betrayed that it wasn't for her, it only made sense, but she did wonder if he'd care when he did see her. She wouldn't blame him for that either, after all, in his eyes it was just roleplay.

Was that all it was to her?

She, along with all the eggs, knew they weren't actual children of all the players, that was just roles they were playing for their mission. Though admittedly she did forget the mission that brought her into this world when she heard her papi sing. He was so kind to her, but she never knew how much of that was just his character.

In some situations it was good to remember they were just playing characters, Juanaflippa she remembered had found that especially and managed to laugh when her parents were playing the worst possible parents they could've possibly been. She should've probably done the same. She shouldn't have gotten attached.

Getting attached was only going to make what was coming soon all the more difficult.

"Hey, uh...why'd we stop?" Tom called her back to reality, and Tallulah realised they'd stopped walking not too far from the house she'd been taking them back to, the rainbow assortment of blocks shining through the trees ahead. She hastily put down a sign.

Just making sure we're on the right path.

But after that she didn't move, she kept looking ahead. She could just barely make out the usernames that floated over everyone's heads. She hoped Chayanne hadn't already put them in the game before she got back with Tom, but knowing him, he probably had.

When Wilbur saw her in the game she wouldn't look like an egg to him anymore, she'd look like a real child, the brown hair and beanie being the only things to link her back to that other form. Would that even be enough for him to recognise that it was her? She wasn't sure.

"Don't worry Tallulah, it's alright, I get lost all the time. This server has a minimap, though! I'm definitely stealing some of the mods that are on here, they're kinda sick. Look, they've even got cool new food!"

Tom tossed down a definitely stolen taco to Tallulah, and she could at least be happy it wasn't avocado toast. Tom's way of comforting people was a little weird, but it did help her in a strange way. She ate the taco and wiped her mouth. She could do this. No big deal. She could definitely do this.

"I hope they didn't finish the house without me...I wanted to add some...stuff."

From his tone Tallulah knew it was definitely a good thing Tom wasn't able to add 'stuff' before the house was done.

The two walked together to the clearing, Tallulah hesitating to take a final step out of the trees but Tom walked ahead and started practically dragging her with her own lasso. She gave in and ran to catch up with him, the group growing closer by the moment. From the panic in some of their expressions she could assume that Chayanne had indeed already put them in the game.

Wilbur caught her eye, and she caught his. It didn't mean anything, seeing someone who looked like a child walking up to them was probably enough to catch his attention even if he didn't realise it was-

"Tallulah?"

~

Wilbur barely took a second to know who it was that was approaching at Tom's side. It wasn't even the red hat or fluffy brown hair, it was just something about her, about how she nervously walked closer and how she tried to hide what she was thinking but he could see it all written on her face.

She stopped dead in her tracks upon hearing her own name and looked at him wide eyed like she'd just been told her own darkest secret. He took a step forward- if she wasn't going to close the gap between them then he would.

Everyone watched as Wilbur walked to the egg but he didn't register them, his eyes stayed focused on her and she couldn't look away from him, it looked almost like she was going to cry, and that was probably because she was. Wilbur wasn't that far off himself.

He almost stumbled into a hug, falling to his knees before Tallulah to be at the same height as they embraced. It was about as dramatic and emotional as he'd been expecting it to be, although he'd never have predicted the circumstances it was in.

"You guys are like...way too invested in this roleplay," Tom commented.

Wilbur sighed and pulled back from Tallulah a little, "you always know how to ruin the mood, Tommy."

"Well sorry, but I'm kind of out of the loop. I mean, who's the white smiley guy..?" he asked, indicating Cucurucho.

"Oh, wait, Tom, you're not in the game, are you?" Phil asked him.

"What-? Phil, what kind of question is that, I'm literally playing the game," Tom told him.

"Well yeah, but- h-hold on, Cucurucho, can you..?" Phil asked, and Cucurucho handed him a book. He read through and pursed his lips.

"Right..." Phil continued, "if he puts Tommy in, then we all get taken out again, which isn't perfect...I guess Tom stays out of the game for now."

"Phil, kindly, what the fuck are you talking about," Tom asked him.

"Oh, Tom, you don't even wanna know," groaned Toby, sitting on the grass with a hand on his forehead.

"Okay, real funny, let's all play a prank on Tom while he's off stea- borrowing," Tom glanced to Tallulah like she was going to lock him up for admitting his crimes. She was a little beyond that now, much preferring to stay sitting beside Wilbur in the grass.

"Tom, we're not pranking you, we- well, it's kind of hard to tell you without it sounding a lot like a prank, but just trust us," Phil urged him, "we're in the game right now- like, actually in the game, it's some magic shit I can't even begin to understand, but it's happening, and we can't prove it to you right now, but-"

"Phil, I'm gonna stop you there," Tom interrupted, "you need to make this stuff at least a little believable for a good reaction. You want me to start recording if you're using this for a video, or..?"

"No, Tom, this isn't a video, I'm being serious!" Phil tried his best to convince him but he already knew that wouldn't be enough. Words alone hadn't worked for anyone else, they'd need an opportunity to get Tom in the game or he'd never believe them.

"Riiigghhttt..." Tom did an exaggerated look left and right to emphasise how much he didn't believe the story.

"Alright, whatever, you got us, prank failed," Phil grumbled noncommittally, "just don't hurt anyone or steal any more stuff."

"I wasn't stealing!" Tom yelled, convincing Phil just about as much as he'd convinced Tom that he was in the game.

Wilbur turned back away from the chaos Tom had initiated and looked at Tallulah as she scribbled out a message for him on her sign.

I'm happy you're back.

"I'm happy to see you again, even if the circumstances are a bit unorthodox," he smiled and looked around at the real fake world around them.

Yeah, sorry about the...circumstances.

Wilbur laughed, "don't worry about that. Have you been doing alright while I was away doing dumb rock star stuff?"

I've been trying to learn the guitar...it was hard without you.

She hesitated, her pen hovering over the sign, before adding the next part.

I didn't think you'd remember me.

"Tallulah, what do you mean, of course I remember you! My little Llulah, I could never forget you," he rubbed her arm comfortingly and she smiled but she found it hard to keep the edges of her mouth up.

I was scared I'd forget you.

Wilbur looked down, "I...I'm sorry I left, Tallulah. I'm guessing you're not really an admin or anything, are you?"

Tallulah shook her head, wiping her tears as she did.

"I'm sorry I didn't realise that sooner. And I won't leave for such a long time again, I promise you. I'll make up for all the time I was gone."

Tallulah looked at her sign. Her hand shook a little before she put it down and slowly wrote her message.

I don't know if we can...soon I

She paused and thought about what she was going to write.

soon the

She stopped again.

"Soon..? Is something happening?" Wilbur asked her.

Tallulah clenched her fist and put a smile on her face.

No, don't worry! We can play music together again, papi!

"Yeah, I think I had a guitar in Minecraft too, so maybe I can play in-game!" Wilbur smiled. Tallulah nodded. That sounded great.

Chayanne glanced her direction for a moment. His sewn-on smile almost seemed to falter.

~

hola pendejo

Quackity groaned. Richarlyson definitely had a shit eating grin on his face right now.

"Hola, el cabrón..." he looked around, then checked the player list. It wouldn't be great if Cucurucho wasn't even online right now.

Wait.

"Wait, qué es esto, what the fuck is Wilbur doing online?!" he yelled.

probably getting married to someone else

"Don't even, I swear..." Quackity threatened the egg, moving to his map to see where he could find anyone on this server and trying to ignore the sign Richarlyson was already typing in his peripheral.

what do you want anyways

"I wanna talk to your boss," Quackity told him, "I've got a couple questions and if I don't get them answered then I'm not gonna pay this fucking server."

not like you do that anyways

"God I hate you," Quackity mumbled into the hand he was leaning on while the other scoured the map, somehow finding nobody until at last he landed upon a big gathering at a random point in the middle of nowhere. He was about to celebrate when he saw the usernames he'd ignored when caught off guard by Wilbur's in the player list.

"Tubbo-? Tommy?!" he exclaimed, reading them over twice to make sure he hadn't somehow misread them, but Tom and Toby had indeed invaded his server.

"Jeez, I leave for five fucking minutes..." he groaned and walked to the nearest waypoint. Richas beat him there, placing a sign for him when he reached it.

what makes you think cucurucho is gonna talk to you?

"He just will, alright?" to be honest, Quackity didn't know. But if Phil was gonna go MIA on them, he wasn't left with much other choice. He would get to the bottom of this eventually.

And if he didn't, then Cellbit would.

And if Cellbit couldn't, they were probably fucked.

Chapter Text

Slimecicle » hello everyone! we're making a karaoke night that everyone is invited to and if you want to help you can find us here!

Slimecicle whispers to you: hey i don't actually know how to tell them where we are can you do the thing

Phil laughed to himself at the chat messages and typed in their coordinates to send out to everyone else on the server.

~

Quackity found Cucurucho before long, or at least that was how he preferred to say it. In truth it was Cucurucho who found him, evidenced by his scream when he turned to say something to Richarlyson and instead found a white bear a few pixels from his face.

The three of them were now together in an area of fairly dense trees, near to the new house with the giant andesite wall but not close enough for anyone over there to be in Quackity's render distance. On instinct he wanted to go over to them first and berate whoever let the new members on his server without permission, but being stopped further away by Cucurucho gave him time to realise they would probably have some thoughts to tell him too about keeping it from them that their kidnapped friends had all returned.

Cucurucho handed over his book that he'd been writing after spending a few moments laughing at Quackity's fright, which Quackity grumpily opened.

DID YOU WANT SOMETHING?

"Yes, actually, I..." Quackity clicked his tongue, "well, it's a few things, but I'm not sure which ones Phil got around to asking before he abandoned us to go fucking hang with Wilbur or something," if he was trying to conceal the emotion in his voice, he wasn't doing a good job.

someone's jealous... O_O

Quackity flipped Richarlyson off for his sign, hoping the egg could still see the action somehow through the screen.

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW?

Quackity couldn't be bothered to pull up the list of questions he had, so he just said what first came to mind, "are you fucking evil, or something?"

Even Cucurucho seemed caught off guard by that, taking a moment before he even took out a book to write in. Quackity couldn't say exactly where the question had come from, but it was no secret he didn't trust the bear. This thing had infiltrated his server and taken control of it before he or his admin had even realised what was going on, and they quite frankly still didn't know.

I CAN'T BE CERTAIN WHAT 'EVIL' IS, BUT MY ONLY OBJECTIVE IS TO AID ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS

Quackity took a breath as he considered Cucurucho's book. It sounded kind of like he was avoiding the question, but whatever.

"And how can I be sure that's the truth?" he pushed. This wasn't just about the server, this was about his his friends. If they'd already been though some shit then he didn't want this bear putting them through anything worse, because it had a bit of a reputation for kidnappings and chasing people with chainsaws.

MAYBE YOU SHOULD COME TO THE KARAOKE NIGHT.
WE ARE MAKING SURE THE EVENT IS AS ENJOYABLE FOR EVERYONE AS IT CAN BE.

"That's great Cucurucho, but I'm not here for some fucking karaoke, I'm here to find out what the hell you're really doing on my server," he stepped closer to the bear, hoping for his accusations to seem more intimidating.

THERE IS NO NEED FOR HOSTILITY, I ASSURE YOU THAT WE HAVE BEEN DOING EVERYTHING WE CAN FOR THEM.

"But you can't send them back home? You're so powerful, but you can't give them their memories and give them back to their families? And what about that time Niki got attacked, asshole? You didn't do shit then!"

WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO ACCUSE ME OF, QUACKITY?

He snarled and tossed the book back at Cucurucho, "well, for all I know, they're stuck here for your entertainment or some shit. Maybe you just pretend to care about them all. I want to know my friends are safe, Cucurucho, but with you ruling over them I don't know anything!"

WHAT CAN I DO TO GAIN YOUR TRUST, THEN?

"Get them out of this video game! People belong in the real world, not fucking Minecraft! What if they die or something if the server goes down?"

THEY CANNOT LEAVE YET.

Quackity wanted to be in the game so he could hit this bear with its own books. This was the shortest answer he'd gotten yet and it felt completely dismissive of his worries about his friends dying in this game.

"Give me a clear answer, asshole, why can't they leave? If you can put them in a game then what could possibly be stopping you from letting them out?"

IT IS STILL NOT YET COMPLETELY SAFE FOR THEM TO LEAVE.
I ASSURE YOU THAT IT IS BEST FOR THEM CURRENTLY THAT THEY REMAIN HERE.

"I don't think it's completely safe here, you dumb bear! Do I really need to remind you that Niki was attacked?"

IT IS SAFE, QUACKITY.
NOTHING BAD WILL HAPPEN AGAIN.
I'M NOT LETTING THIS WORLD BE LIKE THEIR LAST ONE.

"That sounds like some bullshit, Cucurucho," Quackity threw the book away like the rest so they didn't fill up his whole inventory, and this time it ended up popping towards Richarlyson. The egg read it before Cucurucho wrote his next one and looked at the bear after he was finished. There wasn't much emotion to be discerned from the blocky egg face, but Quackity took note of it being an unusual reaction. Richas put down a sign, facing Cucurucho but not far enough from Quackity that he couldn't see it.

shouldn't we just be honest about security in case it shows up... ?

Cucurucho broke the sign.

"Whoa, trying to hide something, Cucurucho?" Quackity grinned. It looked like the bear made mistakes after all.

THE ISLAND IS SAFE. I AM MAKING SURE OF IT.

"Do you think I'm an idiot? If you've got some ulterior motives for bringing our friends into this game then I swear, Cucurucho, I am tearing your stuffed bear ass to pieces and dismantling whatever robot insides you have in there. What even are you? Some rogue AI that's gonna turn on us at any moment? You got all our friends in here because they're powering you like in the goddamn Matrix? You won't tell us how they get out, so maybe there is no way out, and you're just trying to keep us happy so we don't see through your shit!" he didn't entirely believe that theory himself, but he'd buy it easier than the story Cucurucho was trying to sell him.

PHIL WAS MUCH NICER THAN YOU.
I'M JUST TRYING TO HELP.

"Yeah, well Phil's old and a pushover, and I'm not, and I want answers. Go throw a tantrum about it when my friends' lives aren't at stake," he sighed and rubbed his eyes. This wasn't really how he wanted the conversation to go, but an argument was probably inevitable between him and the bear. He hadn't even asked any of the questions that Cellbit had wanted him to, and he doubted Cucurucho would happily answer them now.

But he'd confirmed his suspicions, at least. The bear was hiding something, and it wasn't gonna tell him easily.

It preferred Phil to him, huh? Then maybe Phil would still have a chance of getting to the bottom of these secrets once and for all. Maybe he wasn't the worst one for the job after all.

Well, he had still completely ghosted Quackity and Cellbit, but maybe he deserved a second chance.

"Quackity?"

All of a sudden there was another voice in the distance. Quackity couldn't hear who it was as it was so quiet, but he could clearly read Maximus in the global transcriptions.

"Oh shit, what are you doing over here with the fucking gun bear?" Maximus asked once he was closer.

"I- we were just talking. Nevermind, uh," Quackity tried to change the subject, "what are you doing here? Is this about the karaoke thing?"

"Oh, yeah! You're here to help with karaoke too?" he asked excitedly.

"No, I-"

"Come on then, everyone's this way, let's go," Maximus interrupted before Quackity could explain anything and started running into the distance.

"Uh...w-we'll finish this soon, Cucurucho!" Quackity promised, hesitantly stepping away to follow Maximus to wherever he was leading them. He was a little relieved for the excuse to leave, however weird it might've been, but he now realised as he chased Maximus through the forest he was going to get stuck helping with karaoke.

He could just leave, but that felt a little mean, so he sighed and sent his goodbyes to Cellbit before he arrived at what could be his demise.

~

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 22:55
cellbit theyre forcing me to do karaoke u may never see me again good luck witj the mission
oh but if phils there i might be able to get him back on our side so theres still hope

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 22:57
ur doing karaoke and didn't invite me????
hold on pendejo i'm coming on

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 22:57
NO DONT THEURE ALREADY FPRCING ME TO SING SAVE YOURSELF CELLBIY

Cellbit sighed and logged on despite Quackity's warnings. Honestly, they organised a karaoke night and didn't even tell him? The nerve of these people.

He tried to keep the mission in his mind as well, but it seemed to be getting less important each moment. Maybe this karaoke was just another distraction, but if it was, it was working. He could never say no to karaoke.

The first place he checked was the map, but it would take ages to track down where they all were that way. Thankfully he next noticed the coordinates that had been sent in chat and when he found that on the map, sure enough, there were a dozen player icons there already.

"Oh shit, Hatsune Miku?"

It wasn't just Wilbur's username that surprised him, there were a few other people he was sure weren't on the server before. Since he didn't know them that was all the more incentive to go find them, so Cellbit got on his way towards the karaoke.

It was chaos when he got there, as expected. It wasn't the QSMP without everyone talking over each other and somebody screaming in the distance.

"Cellbit?"

One voice was very distinct for Cellbit, though.

"Guapito?"

Roier had approached from the crowd and now him and Cellbit were staring each other down, not quite sure how to start.

"It's, uh, been a while," Roier tried.

"It's been a few days pendejo," Cellbit laughed, but he was just as happy to see his Minecraft husband. With all that had happened it certainly felt like more than the few days it had been.

"Are you...doing good?"

"As good as I can be with all the stress- but, yeah, I'm doing alright," Cellbit clarified so Roier wouldn't start worrying.

In the silence he glanced behind Roier to see what everyone else was doing and noticed someone approaching the two of them with the username Itsvalkyrae.

"Hey, Roier, you just abandoning us to build the stage ourselves?" she demanded.

"Oh shit, uh- I'll be back in a second, I was just catching up with Cellbit! He's the husband I told you about," Roier explained, and Valkyrae seemed to lighten up.

"Ohh, Cellbit! I'm glad you've come to help since everybody else here is a slacker," she commented, likely directed at Roier again, although she seemed to be joking about how annoyed she was.

Cellbit worried what Roier might've been telling them about him, but nodded along, "uh, yeah- so, do you two know each other?" He didn't think Roier or Valkyrae had any kind of history, but they seemed so friendly with each other already.

"Not really, man. We were just speaking while we made all this karaoke night stuff and turns out we get on pretty well!" Roier told him.

"Come on, if you're helping too then I'll give you an introduction with everyone!" Valkyrae offered, already leading Cellbit and Roier towards the work-in-progress of the stage. He saw Phil, Wilbur and a few others working on the seating area but didn't so much as have time to say hello before he was brought before a group of new people.

Some of them he knew already, such as Baghera and Charlie, but the rest were strangers to him and he was a little intimidated by the way they all looked his direction.

"Hey everyone, this is Cellbit! I've forced him to come help us build," Valkyrae added with an evil giggle.

"I don't think you need to put it like that..." said the one with Jermabot over his head.

"Yeah, just admit you're kidnapping everyone who comes to help us," laughed the one called Sykkuno.

"I am not," Valkyrae defended, "but anyways, everyone, this is Cellbit. Cellbit, this is Sykkuno, and Jerma, and Charlie, and I think you know Baghera and your husband already."

Cellbit laughed, "I would hope so! But, uh, nice to meet you all. I hope we all get along and don't get too drunk at this karaoke."

"No promises..." Roier quietly warned. They all laughed besides Charlie and Baghera who seemed a little too involved in building the walls to go along with the conversation.

"Alright, building," Valkyrae got the conversation back on track, "we're gonna have this at night so we'll need some lights. You got any, like, lanterns, or stuff to build them with?" she asked Cellbit.

"Uh, hold on, I'll check," he opened his backpack but couldn't find any lanterns. He did, however, have the resources to craft them, "alright, we can do that! I'll just need a crafting table first."

"No worries, there's one over here," Valkyrae nodded and lead him off the stage as Roier began working on something else with Jerma and Sykkuno.

"I'm happy to see that all of you are doing good, I was expecting you might be a bit more reserved with all us strangers," Cellbit commented once they were at the crafting table and out of earshot of everyone else.

"Well yeah, we definitely were at first," Valkyrae admitted, "and some of us definitely still are. Like, I haven't really seen Charlie speaking to anyone besides Ranboo and Sneeg, which is why we're happy he's finally starting some conversation with Baghera. They seem to be getting along pretty well."

Cellbit nodded, looking back at them and squinting at the speech bubbles to gauge what it was they were talking about. He saw something about worms and decided it wasn't worth the effort to figure it out.

"I was planning to only ever hang around Sykkuno," Valkyrae continued, "but when we went on that expedition thing I got talking with Phil, and he was really nice. Then the expedition went to shit, as you're probably aware, b-but I got something good out of it!"

Cellbit nodded, "well, everyone's okay, right?"

"Yeah! Niki's doing well, I think she's coming along to karaoke later. She's also pretty quiet but I think she's got a sweet side," Valkyrae whispered it like Niki would somehow hear them from wherever she was.

Cellbit crafted his lanterns and presented them to Valkyrae, "think these will do the trick?"

She nodded enthusiastically, "yeah, those are great! C'mon, let's head back," once again she led the way back to the stage, which was pretty close to completion now.

"You two have fun gossiping over there?" Roier taunted upon their return.

"Shut up and put up these lanterns pendejo," Cellbit laughed and hit Roier before throwing a share of the lanterns in his direction.

~

When Quackity at last escaped from sound testing with Maximus, Toby and a few of the eggs, he made his way to talk with Phil, as it seemed Cellbit was nowhere to be found. With how easily the three of them got distracted he should've known their plan to get information was doomed from the start.

"Phil, hey! I just had a chat with your bear friend that you abandoned us for," he goaded.

"Oh, how'd it go?" Phil looked up from his building and ignored Quackity's tone, although the way he asked the question suggested to Quackity that he already knew it hadn't gone great.

"It was fine, we spoke a bit, I asked if he was hiding shit, he got annoyed because he's definitely hiding shit and, y'know, you shouldn't trust him. Like, at all," Quackity lowered his volume a little as he realised Wilbur and Tallulah weren't far away, and he worried how likely the egg was to report information back to the bear.

Phil sighed, "Quackity, you're being way too paranoid about this whole thing."

"You know, that's what I thought you might say...what are you doing, sucking up to him for duck coins? Don't you realise the stuff he could do with this much power over our friends?" Quackity stepped closer.

"Quackity-" Phil tried to prevent this becoming an argument, to no avail.

"No, Phil, you need to listen- if we just go along with all this then who knows what that stupid bear could be doing behind our backs! He isn't protecting them- we don't even know what he is!"

"He's trying his best, Quackity! None of this can be easy on him!"

"And how do you know that? Because he told you? Everything out of his mouth is probably a lie, Phil!"

"You need to go rest or something, Quackity. We can talk about this when we're not both mentally exhausted, alright?" Phil offered a solution that could hopefully end this.

"Don't act like my dad, Phil," Quackity remarked, although Phil's idea was kind of appealing. He had been going at this for way too long without so much as a food break.

"Quackity!" Wilbur suddenly shouted from behind, noticing Quackity's arrival and heading over, Tallulah following closely behind.

"Oh, hey, Wilbur," Quackity tried to quickly shift his demeanor so Wilbur didn't clue into the fact he'd just been arguing.

"Oh, this is great, I'm so happy you're joining us for the karaoke," Wilbur said.

"Well, actually, I was just-"

"You wanna go check out the backstage bit? It's so cool, come on," Wilbur rambled on, not letting Quackity get a word in before he was dragging him somewhere else. He didn't really want to say no since it had been a while since him and Wilbur had spoken, so he hesitantly obliged and went along with it, leaving Phil to continue building.

He couldn't see Phil's face, but he knew the man was probably grinning at them.

Chapter Text

Sneeg was worried about Ranboo.

The two of them had been put on catering duty with Jaiden. Ranboo assured them he was happy with that, that he needed to get accustomed to kitchens at some point, but they couldn't hide from Sneeg how they flinched away from any remotely green foods they saw.

That wasn't too pressing of an issue, of course he wouldn't get over what happened in that mall in a couple of days, no one would. It was the way they tried to hide it that worried Sneeg.

It was understandable, nobody wanted to start breaking down in front of all the strangers on this island, but Ranboo seemed reluctant to reveal anything to the people from the mall too. Sneeg didn't want to force them but he couldn't help him if there was no acknowledgement of a problem.

"Sneeg it's kind of difficult to make these tacos when you keep staring at me," Ranboo said. Sneeg took a moment to realise they'd even spoken, then got flustered when he finally realised what had been said.

"Oh- shit, uh, sorry," he quickly looked back at the cake mix he was supposed to be mixing. He hadn't even realised he'd been staring while he had that train of thought.

"You wanna, uh, talk about anything while we make the food..?" Sneeg suggested to try and end the awkwardness growing between them.

"Hm...I dunno, was there anything you wanted to talk about?" Ranboo asked in return.

"I know!" Jaiden spoke up all of a sudden from her position a little further away from the two, "what songs do you guys think you're gonna sing for karaoke?"

"I don't think I'm gonna be singing," Sneeg told her bluntly, which she seemed a little disheartened by.

"Well, okay, I won't force you. But I promise it'll be really fun!" she tried to persuade him, but Sneeg knew that right now karaoke wasn't really his thing.

"Maybe Ranboo'll want to, though," Sneeg suggested with a light elbow at Ranboo beside him, seeing that they had completely zoned out while he and Jaiden were talking.

"Huh-? Oh, uh, wait, karaoke? I-I...I'm not really sure," he looked nervously to Jaiden for her reaction, and again she didn't look happy at the response, but tried her best to hide it.

"Okay, I know I said I wouldn't force you, but I don't wanna be the only one doing karaoke..."

"I'm sure other people will be happy to do it with you," Sneeg tried to reassure Jaiden.

"Yeah, I guess, but I'm sure you'd both enjoy it once you tried it," she not-so-subtly tried again to persuade them. Sneeg just laughed it off, firm in his decision not to sing. He was sure it would be fun for the others, but he still had a bit of an issue with audiences. They were a bit too similar to viewers, and he was sure Ranboo was having the same struggles with that parallel.

"We'll be cheering you on when you sing," Ranboo promised her.

She sighed, "better than nothing. Either way, we need to get all this food and stuff done or Phil is gonna have everyone eating avocado toast."

Sneeg hadn't been a victim to the avocado toast himself, but he'd spoken briefly with Tallulah and that was enough time for her to bring up her own experience with the apparent onslaught of the one type of food Phil had in inconceivable excess. Given how traumatised she'd seemed, Sneeg was incentivised to avoid the same fate.

"Oh, uh, I'm out of taco shells..." Ranboo said after a few moments of quiet food making. Sneeg looked down as he put down his whisk.

"Oh, I'm just about to put this in the oven, I could go-"

"N-no, I'll go," Ranboo interrupted him. Sneeg gave them a look that they tried their best not to acknowledge.

"Alright, man," he gave in, realising that for whatever reason this was something important for Ranboo, "just don't be dumb and fall in a hole or something."

"I'm not gonna fall in a hole," Ranboo laughed at the strangeness of Sneeg's advice, "Jaiden, did you say there were some resources nearby?"

"Yeah, we've put some backpacks down near the waystone. If you can't find what you need then you can go ask Phil, he's got everything," Jaiden told him. Ranboo nodded and headed out of sight, in search of more ingredients.

There was a following silence, not necessarily uncomfortable, but there appeared to be a lack of conversation topics between Sneeg and Jaiden. Sneeg caught Jaiden looking over a few times, which he didn't really blame her for, if anything it was amusing to him how all these people acted around him and his friends.

It was clear some connection had existed between some of them before, not just from the photo album (although that bit of evidence made it pretty clear), but also from how all the islanders acted. If they were trying to hide it, they were doing an awful job.

The main one, as seen here, was looks. Wistful glances like they were looking at ghosts, seeing only the things they mourned in each person, and Sneeg might've been annoyed by that if it weren't for how little he cared. Maybe that was unhealthy, maybe it was fear that when he started to care he wouldn't like the way it made him feel, but apathy had helped him survive under Showfall, so it was a behaviour that stuck.

He knew the others cared more than him, though, and he didn't imagine having people look at them for the identities they'd lost was a joyful experience. Other times the islanders might try things even less subtle, asking questions in the hopes of triggering memories, telling stories of the times they'd once shared.

And, in their defense, it sometimes worked. But the times it didn't...it was worse than any joy brought from remembering another thing they'd forgotten. That feeling of being inept, that hopelessness and the sense that the damage was irreparable.

Maybe they would never remember even a fraction of the people they used to be. Sneeg tried to tell himself that was okay. He didn't really feel like it was, though.

"Hey, I didn't...I didn't say anything that made Ran uncomfortable, did I..?"

Sneeg looked over at Jaiden as she looked at him. She looked pretty worried. This must have been bugging her since Ranboo left.

"I think they just went to get tacos, man."

Jaiden laughed but it still ended with an uncomfortable noise, "y-yeah, I know, but I just...I don't wanna come across as pushy. But I think I came across as pretty pushy back there."

"It's nothing against you, if you're worrying about that. We just have issues with audiences and weird stuff like that," Sneeg offered as an explanation.

"Oh, shit, I'm sorry, I-"

"Jaiden, listen, it's really not a problem. The shit we struggle with, I'd be surprised if you could remember half of it. And I'm pretty sure other people are gonna be singing karaoke even if we aren't, you've just ended up cooking with the two biggest buzzkills," he laughed.

At this point Jaiden's cooking had been forgotten, and Sneeg's cake was in the oven, so the two were facing each other from across the makeshift kitchen counter that had been set up. Jaiden drummed her fingers on the stone as she considered Sneeg's words and her thoughts.

"I still want you guys to have something to enjoy while you're here...I know this is probably cliché to say at this point, but is there anything I can do to help you?"

Sneeg pursed his lips and thought, "know how to make icing?"

The next thing he knew, the two of them were making another cake together. See, Sneeg had found cooking and baking and general food making to be oddly comforting to him. Maybe it was because refusing to do it for Showfall made them so sick of him they put him in a cage, because it was the one thing they couldn't make him do for an audience, the thing he kept for himself and that in the midst of a company that took everything from him he kept it his. He wouldn't be made to do things for others, but he would most certainty chose to cook for anyone other than himself of his own volition.

And now he was cooking with someone, too. He was sure this wasn't what Jaiden expected to be doing when she offered her help to him, but the two of them were rather good together, and in minutes they had one bowl each, Jaiden stirring the batter and Sneeg stirring the icing.

"What are you thinking of icing on it?" Jaiden asked casually. Sneeg had requested dyes for the icing alongside the ingredients, so it looked like he had some sort of plan.

"I'm thinking of leaving that a mystery for the end. I'm sure you'll like it, though," and Sneeg saw as Jaiden happily nodded along, not paying too much attention as she stirred. Clearly she didn't realise Sneeg's ulterior motives, but that was fine. She probably wouldn't forget once she saw his finished product.

"So, what's it like not being in a video game all the time?" Sneeg asked, finding it easier to spark conversation as the two spent longer together.

"Heh, well, I'm in the game with you right now, and honestly it's not that different from the real world, which is a little weird. Honestly it's better here, I can carry way more, I can just build my own house if I want to, but...I'd still prefer the real world. Something about it, I can't really describe it, but...I guess you'll all have your own thoughts when you get out."

"Can't tell if I'm excited or dreading it," Sneeg laughed nervously, "last time I wasn't in a video game I was dead in a mall so, y'know, I guess my standards are set kinda low."

Jaiden laughed, "oh, like...not really, right?"

Sneeg looked at Jaiden. Her smile fell.

"W-wait, you-?"

"It was...uh, a lot, where we last were. It didn't make sense and it was practically torture. I'd give you the details but that would really be a buzzkill," he laughed grimly, "but, yeah. Not a fun place. At least the shit I went through was physical. Ranboo got all of the mindfuckery...most I can say on his behalf is that you should probably be understanding if he finds it harder to trust you. Kid's seen far more shit than anyone deserves to."

Jaiden nodded, very slowly.

Sneeg sighed, "sorry, I shouldn't just put that on you-"

"No, no, it's alright, I...I'm so sorry. We didn't know that was happening, if we did-"

"If you did then you probably couldn't have done anything anyway, Jaiden. It's all right. We lived, didn't we? And now we're making a cake! So I'd say it's all turned out alright."

Jaiden nodded, a smile slowly making its way back to her face, "yeah! I think I might've over-stirred the batter though, if that's even a thing you can do..."

"Eh, it'll be fine," Sneeg shrugged, finishing up the icing as well, "let's just put it in and hope for the best."

Jaiden laughed along with Sneeg's carefree attitude and they both poured the cake batter into even trays and slid them into another oven. With nothing left to do but wait, they sat by the ovens and waited.

Some moments passed, and Sneeg eventually broke the silence.

"Did you know me before all this?"

Jaiden looked at him, then looked down as she answered, "not really, honestly."

"Do you think the people who knew me before are gonna be able to accept that I'm not really...the same guy?" he didn't look at Jaiden as he asked the question, worried what he'd find on her face, though he didn't know why. Maybe it would be pity, or maybe sympathy.

He figured he'd only been able to talk with Jaiden in the end because she didn't know him, because she wasn't expecting the man he used to be to speak out of his mouth. He was worried he wouldn't be able to talk this way with anyone else.

"I think they'll learn to."

Sneeg looked at Jaiden, and she was smiling. It wasn't pity, nor the kind of sympathy he expected to see. It was a confidence that was infectious, a certainty in her words he couldn't help but believe in too.

Sneeg smiled back. He hoped they would.

~

Ranboo didn't find the taco shells. They found Hetch.

"Don't think I haven't noticed you've been avoiding me," Hetch commented, leant against a tree at the edge of the forest just out of sight of all the people running around preparing for the karaoke, but also perfectly in the path between Ranboo and the ingredients he needed.

"Yeah, I wonder why," he muttered almost without realising, looking anywhere but the black mask. Shit, why didn't he just leave, he didn't want to spend a moment more with this piece of shit. But their feet didn't move, and their hands fidgeted in their pockets.

"What was that?" Hetch cocked his head.

"Nothing," Ranboo blurted out, keen to avoid any disagreements and end this as soon as he could. It was clear Hetch wanted to talk to him, which couldn't have been good, and since they were too much of a fucking coward to just leave it was the most he could do to make it quick and painless.

Well, it was already painful, so it was all they could do to make it quick.

"Well, doesn't matter. I just wanted to ask something of you, Hero. Look at that, I'm allowing you to make your own decision, how good am I?"

Ranboo couldn't tell if Hetch was joking or if he was really that deluded that he thought accepting the fact Ranboo had free will was such an achievement.

"You know they've been making these eggs stalk me around, don't you?" Hetch continued, not even allowing Ranboo to respond, "well at last they got distracted with all this karaoke stuff," he said the word with such disdain, "and I managed to find a moment for myself, so I thought I might utilise the opportunity to ask a favour."

"What makes you think I'll do anything for you..?" getmeoutofhere getmeoutofhere getmeoutofhere.

"Come on, Hero, don't you think you owe me? All I want is you to put in a word with the bear, to get him to stop these eggs harassing me, because there isn't a chance in hell he'll ever listen to me."

"I-I'm not gonna do that," Ranboo knew that Hetch being on his own right now was bad enough, nevermind what he'd do without anyone so much as keeping an eye on him.

"Oh, come on, Hero, after all I did for you? I could've left you and every one of your friends dead in those shows, but I brought you back, it was never permanent. Didn't I even give you your memories back at the very end?"

"Barely any of them, I still can't remember any of these people who knew me! And bringing me back to life? I'd rather not have ever died," Ranboo laughed darkly as visions of blood and metal flashed through his vision, making him wince, and Hetch probably noticed.

"It made you stronger, don't you see? Now surely you appreciate the value of your free will more than you ever did before," Hetch suggested.

"You're insane, I'm not doing shit for you," there was a nervous laugh between all of their words and their eyes darted to the clearing, begging to catch someone's eye for a silent call for help, but everyone was too far away and occupied with building.

"Why not, Hero?" Hetch seemed willingly oblivious to all the very good reasons Ranboo had not to do anything for him.

"Stop- stop calling me that!"

"Oh? Why should I? Isn't that what you are? Or have you already forgotten all the great times we had..."

"You're fucking deluded if you think back then was anything other than hell!" finally pain started cracking into Ranboo's voice as his humour could no longer hold up.

"You will do what I tell you to, Hero. If the viewers were here they would've voted for you to get it done already."

"Stop talking about that! Please!" Ranboo grasped their head. Just the reminder of being controlled made him sick to his stomach. But that was never going to stop Hetch.

"Oh, the memories...it'll be so much more fun the second time."

"That is never happening again," Ranboo swore through gritted teeth.

"And your best friend the bear is going to stop me? You already know that the power of The Founder is far beyond the capabilities of the circus troupe that saved you. You'd be better off helping me now, then I'll consider making your next role a bit less...brutal."

Ranboo didn't even consider the offer, "no. Never. I am never doing anything for you."

"Not even when it endangers your friends? How heartless, Hero..."

Ranboo hesitated, which was enough for him to tell Hetch had gained a mocking grin behind the mask that made Ranboo hate him even more, a task that seemed impossible.

"Oh, don't make the mistake of thinking I'm powerless, Hero. You know, I've caught wind of a little secret you've all been keeping. Something on this peaceful little island that wasn't meant to be brought from the last world, and they haven't been able to get rid of him yet."

"What are you talking about?" Ranboo asked, but he feared the answer.

"Haven't they even told you?" There was a genuine surprise in Hetch's voice that quickly morphed into that audible grin that Ranboo hated so, so much, "oh, dear, Hero...they're keeping secrets from you."

"Shut up, get to the point," Ranboo urged.

Hetch wasn't particularly rushed despite Ranboo's command, "I'm sure you remember him. I mean, how could you forget our dear Security? He was such an iconic character."

That couldn't- no, that couldn't be true, "d-don't lie to me."

Hetch laughed, a mocking laugh, "I'm not, I can assure you, Hero. A shame you don't want to see him again, and I don't think your friends do either. They won't have to, if you do what I ask."

Ranboo stopped and looked at him. Great, he had moved to straight up threats. Could he really expect anything less from this asshole?

"I...I can't trust a thing you say," Ranboo said more to themself than to Hetch, but he responded regardless.

"Surely you saw those messages in chat too, the Nice one being attacked by some entity? People don't just get mauled by nothing, Hero. They didn't plan to tell me but it didn't take much for me to figure it out."

"That thing's a monster, you can't get it to do what you want," Ranboo asserted.

"How rude, you should be glad he didn't hear that. But yes, Hero, I can make him do as I like. If I can have him follow cues in a show, I can have him do much more."

Ranboo looked around again, his fidgeting intensifying, "I won't- I'm not going to-"

"And you'll let them all get hurt because you couldn't do a simple favour? Don't be so selfish, Hero."

That word. It hit Ranboo like a fist. It made them sick, because it was true.

They were selfish. He hadn't stopped thinking that, not since they'd all escaped. Every time he told someone what he wanted, every time someone spent their time caring about him when they could've been caring about anyone else, that word rung in their head. Selfish. Selfish.

They'd all been in that mall, so why should he get any focus? Why should he spend any time caring about himself? That wasn't what good people did, good people were selfless, good people didn't have problems or trauma or panic attacks any time they heard the sound of metal scrape.

Good people weren't selfish. So Ranboo knew they weren't a good person.

"I..."

Hetch waited expectantly for his answer as Ranboo hesitated over their words.

"I don't..."

"It's a simple choice, Hero, you know about those," Hetch told him with a barely concealed smug snarl, "you prioritise your friends and stop them getting hurt...again. Or you refuse to have a little chat with the bear and let them suffer before you."

Ranboo felt like throwing up. He did most of the time, but it was more intense than it had been for days. He felt guilt for something he hadn't even done yet. Screams rang in the back of their mind like static.

"What will it be, Hero," the way Hetch said it didn't sound like a question. He watched Ranboo, still awaiting his answer.

"I'm not doing anything for you," Ranboo whispered.

"What was that?" Hetch asked patronisingly.

Ranboo struggled to muster his voice any louder, "I'm not, I won't- I-I know you're just gonna hurt more people of there's nobody watching you, Hetch."

Hetch let out a short chuckle and looked down, "so that's your choice, Hero?"

Ranboo didn't want to say yes. This didn't seem like a good thing at all, neither option did.

An approaching noise caught both of their attention and Hetch and Ranboo turned to see Sneeg, Jaiden and Leo coming towards them, Sneeg and Leo coming significantly faster when they saw Hetch was there too.

"That's all the time we have, it seems. I guess I'll see you at karaoke, Hero," Hetch promised with a smile that put a pit in Ranboo's stomach just before Sneeg was within earshot.

"You fucking piece of shit, what's happening over here?" Sneeg demanded immediately, fury evident on his face without him even knowing what Hetch had been doing.

"Just a little talk," Hetch defended, "aren't I allowed to talk anymore?"

"Not with my friends you cock," Sneeg spat, taking ahold of Ranboo's shaking hand and pulling them away, "when Ran didn't come back we got Leo to help us look around. Should've known you were up to your regular bullshit, asshole."

"So vulgar," Hetch mumbled dismissively as Leo grabbed his arm and presented a sign.

that's the last time I leave you with just Ramón

"What's happened? Are you okay, Ranboo?" Jaiden asked when she caught up, looking worried.

"I- yeah, I'm good," they tried to convince the others. Jaiden nodded. Sneeg didn't so much as bother to look convinced.

"Let's go," Sneeg told them, "I hate looking at this fuckin' guy."

They separated, Leo with Hetch, Ranboo with Sneeg and Jaiden. Ranboo's feeling didn't go away with distance. He still felt sick.

~

Jaiden looked over at Ranboo every now and then to see if they were alright. They weren't, clearly, and she was annoyed at herself she couldn't do anything about that.

They were all back at the makeshift kitchen and the cakes were almost done. The other food had still been forgotten, but they'd probably managed to make enough to hold off the need for avocado toast before they got sidetracked.

The silence between all of them wasn't comfortable anymore, it had returned to being tense. Jaiden knew she wouldn't be the one to break it, she didn't know nearly enough about what was going on, she didn't even know who Hetch was. It was the best she could do to figure it out from Sneeg and Ranboo's expressions, and neither of them were happy.

Whilst Ranboo was firmly watching the floor, Sneeg caught Jaiden's eye a few times. Whenever he did she noticed another underlying feeling, and she was sure it was worry. Ranboo wasn't even talking about what had happened and Jaiden would be lying if she said she wasn't worrying too.

"I think I made the wrong choice."

Both Sneeg and Jaiden looked over in surprise as Ranboo abruptly spoke up, though still without looking at either of them.

"What do you mean?" Jaiden asked hesitantly after a moment.

Ranboo tilted their head up and to the side, giving the impression he was looking for a distraction.

"You can tell us what happened, kid, we're not gonna yell at you or anything," Sneeg tried to persuade him, mustering a smile, but Ranboo didn't see it.

"I couldn't even do anything, I just stood there. I couldn't do anything," they emphasised, finally looking Sneeg in the eyes. Sneeg frowned.

"Ran..." but Ranboo was already looking away from him again, and the kitchen was silent. As it stretched on, Jaiden turned to the oven and saw the cakes were most likely finished, giving her a little idea. With Sneeg and Ranboo standing across the counter she pulled them out and took the icing from the fridge, setting them all out before everyone.

She braced her hands on the table and looked both of them in the eyes, or at least tried her best to.

"We've got two cakes. You two are gonna be decorating them. Got that?"

They both seemed to be caught off guard by Jaiden's abrupt serious tone, but she didn't waver, staring them both down until Sneeg finally dragged the icing closer.

"Well, alright then."

"W-wait, don't you wanna do yours?" Ranboo objected. Jaiden just shrugged to them.

"I didn't even make either of them!" Ranboo continued. Jaiden continued looking at them.

"Icing's the fun part, you deserve to have the fun part-" he went on until Sneeg elbowed him.

"Ranboo, Christ, you don't need to deserve it to ice a fucking cake. And even if you did, why wouldn't you?"

"B-because- it's because I-I caused everything, but you all keep using your energy on me, I don't deserve any of it!" Ranboo exclaimed.

Jaiden wasn't sure if this was something she should hear, she wasn't really sure what it was Ranboo was talking about but it sounded personal. Sneeg didn't do anything to indicate she should go, however.

"So you want us to stop caring about you and doing anything for you because that bastard back there put some ideas in you head about it all being your fault? Have I got that right?" Sneeg asked.

After a second Ranboo slowly nodded, "he's right," they mumbled, "all I've ever been is selfish."

Sneeg raised his eyebrows and the glare he gave Ranboo was deadly serious, "and you're gonna believe a word out of that sick fuck's mouth?"

Ranboo looked away, "he's right..."

Sneeg grabbed Ranboo's shoulders and made them look back at him, "listen to me. Listen. Would any of that happened, would any of us have been tortured and killed, would anything 'you did' have fucking happened if it wasn't for him?"

"He's gonna hurt you all again and I didn't stop him," Ranboo got out between sniffs.

"That's not your responsibility, dumbass," and that was probably the kindest 'dumbass' Jaiden had ever heard.

"After everything I've done-"

"You haven't done anything Ranboo," Sneeg stopped him, "but what you are gonna do is decorate a cake. Because everyone deserves to decorate cakes."

Ranboo looked from Sneeg to Jaiden, "are you...sure?" they asked her permission.

Jaiden nodded, "yes, Ran. Of course you can."

She smiled as Sneeg dragged over more bowls and dished out the icing between them while Ranboo wiped their nose and organised the colouring into a neat rainbow.

Before long it had become a competition, Sneeg boasting that his cake would be the best one ever made and Ranboo clearly doubting that claim. Jaiden didn't stay completely out of it, offering tips and secretly helping ice each cake, much to the disapproval of the opposing team. Sneeg tried to keep his hidden as he made the main design, though, which made Jaiden both excited and scared as to what he was planning to make, but it also meant she was left just helping Ranboo.

"So, what do you think you're gonna draw on it?" she asked now that they had iced between the two layers and added some initial designs around the edge, but left the centre blank.

"I was hoping I'd think of something by the time we got to this point, but I haven't," he laughed and sounded embarrassed.

"It's a shame I can't just pull out my phone here to look at stuff...I'll see if maybe I have any photos already that we could use as inspiration," Jaiden opened her backpack and dug around for photos. The first one she found was a copy of Charlie getting shot by Foolish at Cellbit and Roier's wedding. She closed her backpack, "nevermind."

"Once again my memories aren't much use," Ranboo sighed, "I feel like I have glimpses of little things I used to like, but never a full image..."

Jaiden pursed her lips, "maybe you could try drawing what you can remember, and I'll fill in the blanks?"

"I guess we can try," Ranboo laughed, not sounding at all convinced this would work, but at least willing to give it a go.

Ranboo knew it was yellow, that was at least clear in their mind, and luckily whatever Sneeg was making used yellow too. He drew in some eyes and made a conflicted noise when they were done, knowing something was missing but not what it was.

"I dunno if this is gonna work..."

"We've barely started, don't be giving up already!" Jaiden encouraged him, taking her own piping bag and hovering it over the cake, "if we do it wrong then we're making new memories, right?"

She drew in a nose between the eyes that seemed to fit and Ranboo hummed, "that seems...alright."

"Wow, high praise," Jaiden remarked sarcastically.

"N-no, it's good, I'm sorry-"

"Don't worry about it Ranboo, you can tell me I suck if I suck," she laughed and looked at the cake, considering what to do next.

"I think he had ears, that would make sense. His mouth looked a certain way..." Ranboo trailed off, trying to draw in the mouth next and forming something Jaiden was starting to recognise.

"It's a cat, isn't it?" she asked.

"Uh...maybe," Ranboo laughed, not particularly certain. They both continued on, Jaiden giving tips whenever Ranboo got lost, and it was about finished by the time Sneeg finished his own.

"We ready to show off our masterpieces?" Sneeg grinned.

Jaiden turned to Ranboo to let them do the honours, and he slowly pushed their cake forwards, revealing a cat that was definitely Garfield, but Jaiden was waiting to see if Ranboo could eventually recall the name himself.

"Yeah, pretty good," Sneeg nodded approvingly, "how about this, though?" he dramatically raised the cloth he had been using to conceal his cake and at last revealed his creation.

Jaiden immediately burst out laughing.

Ranboo, however, was just a little confused, "what exactly is that?"

Jaiden wiped her eyes and tried to breathe through the laughter she devolved into whenever she looked back at the yellow Among Us character with its ass out.

"I saw it in a really weird dream last night, so thought I'd draw it in case it actually had any meaning," Sneeg shrugged, but from his smile Jaiden could tell he knew more about its meaning than he pretended to.

"Do you recognise it?" Ranboo asked Jaiden, figuring she probably did based on her reaction.

"There, heh, there was a game we all used to play," she explained between breaths, "that had those little characters, but then it became a joke to draw them shaking their ass, so..." Jaiden looked back at the cake and took a breath, "then that image was created."

"Huh..." was all that Ranboo responded with.

"I just like his vibe," Sneeg told them, looking down at his cake with pride like it was his own son.

Jaiden sighed with a smile. She couldn't wait for karaoke.

Chapter Text

Charlie and Baghera were sat by the stage, finished with their assigned jobs. The karaoke was only hours away now and Baghera suggested she show Charlie a playlist they'd made for a previous karaoke event, since he might have difficulties remembering any songs he wanted to sing, as would most of his friends.

Charlie was surprised he'd managed to talk this much with Baghera, even though it had only been very simple conversation since they'd met, assigned by Phil to the same building area. Nothing particularly complicated had been brought up from there, and Charlie was thankful since Baghera no doubt did have pressing questions about where he'd been, but kindly held off on asking them as they talked about worm language and goldfish instead.

If it wasn't for Mariana bursting back into his life, he probably wouldn't have been talking here with Baghera at all, much happier to stay with those he knew from the mall and keep contact with everyone else minimal. But Mariana hadn't taken no for an answer, and at the time that was pretty worrying, but looking back he could be thankful. Charlie hadn't remembered everything, not even close, but he'd remembered someone close to him, and now he was curious to see if he could remember more.

Even if he couldn't he was alright with that fate, because he hadn't remembered Baghera yet but she still felt to him like an old friend.

"I think you'd be a good screamer, you know?" she suggested, looking at something in her hand. In the game she was holding nothing, but she'd explained to him in reality she was holding her phone to scroll through the playlist.

"Oh, really?" he questioned, caught a little off guard by the term she used but willing to indulge whatever she meant by it.

"Yeah, you know, like...rock! Maybe metal, you know? I'm sure Phil put some things like that in here," she hummed, scrolling further.

"I hope he put some granite in," Charlie said absent mindedly, taking a moment to notice Baghera looking at him.

"I-it's a good rock," he explained with an embarrassed smile.

"Charlie, seriously..?" she tried to sound disappointed but couldn't help herself laughing a little at the terrible joke.

"Alright, alright, I'll take it seriously...I dunno, what songs would you recommend? I only really have the titles to judge them all by and that seems like a judging a book by its cover sorta deal," Charlie tapped his fingers on his leg and looked at the empty space in Baghera's hand. He didn't even have the titles right now since the existence of phones in the real world didn't transfer into this one.

"Oh, I do have some ideas for ones we could do together!" she perked up.

"Like, duet songs?" he hadn't thought about that idea, but he realised now that it made sense. Charlie didn't exactly want to sing on his own in front of everyone else, whether they were his friends or not, so it would be nice to have someone to sing with.

"Maybe a French one to throw you in the deep end..." Baghera muttered like she was forming an evil plan and Charlie laughed nervously. He didn't want the other French players to have their first impression of him be him completely butchering their language.

Well, technically not first, with the whole being on the server before all this situation. But he felt like someone different to the person back then, so singing terrible French karaoke was still probably off the table.

Just then Charlie heard footsteps coming up behind him and he had to resist flinching away, as he saw a second later it was only Phil and let out a sigh.

"Hey mate- sorry, sneaking up on you there, I'm just going around asking if anyone has requests for the food, or any stuff they specifically don't wanna eat?" he asked, looking between the two of them even though Baghera wasn't in the game and wouldn't be able to taste anything that she ate.

"Somethin' with a little slime in it," Charlie responded before he'd even started thinking of his answer. Phil laughed politely, albeit confused, assuming that was a joke.

"Uh...right, and anything you don't want?" he prompted.

"Can you not do any pickles? I'm not a fan," he again responded like he was an automated answering machine with preset replies for the questions. This time there was enough silence after he spoke for him to actually realise what he'd said, and as his eyes refocused on the world he cringed that he hadn't even stopped himself.

"Is that the accent you're gonna sing in..?" Baghera asked with a laugh, sensing some tension forming.

"Shit I- was I doing a shitty New York accent? I-I'm sorry, that still happens sometimes, I swear I'll try not to do it again," Charlie cursed himself, looking away from the others. It seemed random when he'd suddenly change accent and demeanor, becoming The Spirit for a few moments before his mind could catch up, but it was always when something reminded him of that episode in the cabin. Story beats prompted cues, it was like resurfacing programming that had been drilled into his brain. It was strange and confusing to everyone else on the outside, and it was a little disorienting for him too, but he was trying to get better at controlling it.

"It's no worries mate, was there any other menu stuff you wanted to mention?" Phil asked, clearly unsure what had just happened but assuming it was best to move on and not ask too many questions.

"Just ignore the other stuff I said, I'm fine with anything," Charlie rectified and tried to give Phil a smile to show it was alright. Phil nodded and after Baghera said the same he left to continue asking everyone in the area.

Charlie looked around and realised that was quite a lot now. Bigger crowds were gathering and with most of the work done people were gathered in conversation and offering aid with the final few tasks. Mariana still wasn't back, he noticed with relief but some traces of disappointment. It was best for the man to be getting his sleep, but Charlie still hoped he made it back in time to join him at karaoke.

"Don't let him fool you," Baghera warned with a smirk, catching Charlie off guard, "he's very chilled but he's probably going to pull out the craziest songs at karaoke."

Charlie took a moment to realise she was talking about Phil and then laughed, "oh, really? I didn't know if he would be the type to sing at karaoke at all."

"He likes all the loud songs, but I have an idea. We should have a karaoke-off, I bet we could go at it ten times harder than him."

"Isn't this just for fun..?" Charlie asked nervously, watching as Baghera started getting more energetic and competitive.

"It will be fun when we put him in his place!" she laughed maniacally and started scrolling through her playlist of songs with renewed determination. Charlie looked at her with a little bit of concern but she didn't appear to be giving him much choice, and he didn't mind either way. A karaoke-off did sound a little fun.

Screamy songs, huh? He could probably do that.

~

Austin emerged from the trees and took in the sight before him. Man, these guys really had been hard at work, there was already a stage and seats and everything. He felt a little bad for not showing up earlier to help out, but then again he didn't want to and they'd done fine without him anyway.

He turned to watch over his shoulder as Niki wandered out behind him, shielding her eyes from the sun as the trees no longer provided shade. They had come here together after running into each other on a walk around the island and spending the next few hours trying to figure out how to get to the coordinates Phil had sent in the chat. In the end they had needed the help of Pomme, who was already walking ahead of them and leaving them at the edge of the forest to take in the view.

"Wow...these guys get really serious about karaoke," Austin commented.

"It's honestly concerning," Niki laughed. When the two had been discussing the idea of karaoke while hopelessly lost earlier, neither had been too keen on getting up and singing in front of all these people who were basically strangers to them. They would happily come along to cheer on their friends they knew from the mall, though.

"How long until it even starts?" Austin muttered to himself, knowing Niki wouldn't have much more of an idea of him. While they had time he wanted to check in with his friends and see who was crazy- uh, he meant confident- confident enough to actually be doing karaoke at the event.

"I guess we could ask," Niki sighed and got walking again. There were quite a few people they could talk to, but thankfully one of them saved them the choice and came over to greet them first.

"You guys just got here?" he asked with a smile, WilburSoot hovering over his head.

Niki nodded, a little distracted watching Pomme and Tallulah exchanging signs behind the man.

"Yeah, this is the karaoke, right? Do you know when it's gonna be starting?" Austin gave a more detailed response.

"Only a few hours now. Man, I'm getting nervous, I never thought performing in a game would ever be worse than doing it on a real stage," he laughed, glancing back to the stage behind him.

"Wait, are you like, a proper musician?" Austin was surprised, he'd been under the impression all these people were just video game streamers or something.

"Yeah, and that apparently means I'm the opening act. I don't really mind, I'll try my best to set the mood. I'm just happy to be doing something with all you guys, despite the...circumstances."

Austin knew what that probably meant, "so you're someone who knew us before, huh?"

"Oh, well, heh, it's actually kind of funny," Wilbur laughed, "but we were on this dating show thing that you hosted a few years ago," he pointed to Austin.

Austin looked at Wilbur. Then at Niki, then back at Wilbur.

"Like...I dated you, or..?"

Wilbur's eyes widened, "n-no, no-! Uh, bad wording, I uh...it was the three of us- well, not like, y'know- you were just the one hosting the show, I was the one who had to pick who to date out of Niki and the other- and even then it wasn't really dating or anything, we just-" he tried to clarify to Niki, stumbling over his words as he panicked, "w-we just talked and, uh, we were friends. Yeah."

Niki laughed politely, not too involved in the conversation but still amused by Wilbur trying to save himself, "don't worry, I get it. Can I ask what kind of music you do?" she changed the subject, probably for Wilbur's sake.

"With my band it's mainly rock but I do some acoustic songs on my own. I feel like starting with the acoustic ones would be, uh, not the greatest choice for setting the mood, so I've been talking with Tallulah about how we can get other people to play the instruments."

At the mention of her name Tallulah walked over and showed them all a sign.

Us eggs have a band together, we can play the songs!

"Tallulah did suggest the eggs playing, but unfortunately there aren't many flute solos in our songs..." Wilbur laughed.

I'm learning guitar >:(

"I think I know guitar too...as long as I still have the muscle memory, maybe I can help?" Niki offered, recalling a vague memory of playing it somewhere. She didn't know where, or why, or even what she was playing, but maybe it would be a memory more akin to breathing, that she could do without necessarily thinking.

"Oh, I suppose so, yeah," Wilbur said, sounding like he'd just remembered that Niki could play it.

"So you guys are just gonna exclude me from your cool band..?" Austin complained childishly.

"You can be..." Niki hummed, thinking of a solution, "moral support?"

Austin laughed, "I'm gonna be moral support?"

"It's an important role!" Niki persuaded him, lying.

"Yeah, sure. But two guitarists probably isn't enough to make a band," Austin pointed out.

"Three," Wilbur corrected, indicating to himself.

"Is your band usually made up of three guitarists?" Austin asked.

"...no," Wilbur admitted.

"Let's go ask around then! There's gotta be somebody here who plays another instrument...or, at least, who remembers playing one," Austin put his hands on his hips and took a look at all their potential candidates in the distance. Showfall didn't seem to produce musicals, thankfully, but that meant any of his friends who did know instruments might not recall them- Austin couldn't even be sure that he didn't know any.

But then again, Niki had sounded pretty sure of herself as she spoke about knowing the guitar, so perhaps things learnt like instruments stuck with you throughout horrible mind wiping torture.

Austin didn't know, though, he wasn't a psychologist. Their best option right now seemed to be asking for musical talents and hoping for the best.

"Sure- not long now, so we need to get answers soon," Wilbur warned, following Austin's example and looking for who they could ask.

Austin nodded, "yeah, let's ask a group of people, then. How about...them?" he pointed into the distance.

Wilbur hummed in agreement, not seeming too bothered by who it was they went to talk to, "sure. You coming, Tallulah?"

Tallulah nodded along and took hold of Wilbur's hand while Pomme went her own way, maybe to help more people in finding their way here. It seemed a tall order, but Austin was hopeful that somehow they could find a way to form this band.

~

Ethan stumbled out of the woods, brushing off a comical amount of leaves from his outfit and doubling over with a sigh when he saw he had at last reached the venue.

"Hey, man...you doing alright there?"

Ethan's head sprung up at the voice and he saw it was Vinny, watching over him in amusement but also a little worried how he managed to get that much foliage on his body on the trip over here.

"Oh, I- yeah, I'm good man, why'd you ask?" he panted in a way that sounded exaggerated, but it didn't look like he was putting it on.

"No reason..." Vinny sighed, "good that you're here before it started, at least. I've only just got here myself, and that was with a bit of help."

Vinny looked down and Ethan realised that one of the eggs had been standing with them the whole time, the one with the beret, who was now smiling and giving him a wave. She was called Pomme, right? All these eggs had such weird names.

"I could've used some help but whatever..." Ethan pouted, "and I would hope that you guys didn't start without me! I'm actually so pumped to sing something tonight."

"Oh, really? Well, I am getting pretty excited for that too, I think I have some kind of a history with music."

"Oh shit, like, you used to do music before all this?" Ethan asked.

"I'm not sure at all, but there's something about it feeling familiar, so I guess we can go with that," Vinny laughed.

Do you guys want to come with me to help build the last things?

Both the men looked at Pomme's sign and considered.

"Sure," Ethan was first to respond, "gotta kill time before this thing anyways."

"Yeah, I'd feel kinda bad if I didn't help with anything," Vinny agreed.

Pomme gave an energised nod and skipped away, leading them to a secretive area behind the screen at the back of the stage. There were already two people there as they arrived, with the usernames FoolishG and BadBoyHalo.

"Oh, hey Pomme! You brought some new helpers for us?" BadBoyHalo merrily greeted, getting a nod from the egg.

What's left to do?

"We're almost finished now, just replacing all these final dirt blocks," as Bad explained it Ethan took note of what it was they were actually working on, some kind of oversized capybara holding onto a microphone.

"Uh...why are we building this?" Ethan dared to ask.

"Because if the capybaras can't be here in person then they'll be here in spirit!" Foolish shouted down from the statue, "now come on and help me finish this orange, I've got the materials in a chest up here!"

"It's a pretty big spirit..." Ethan mumbled as he made his way over to some scaffolding that lead to the top of the structure. He didn't want Foolish to hear him as this build seemed quite important to the man for some reason.

Vinny wasn't far behind and when the both of them were up, Foolish pointed assertively to a chest and then got back to building. Vinny shrugged and retrieved some orange concrete, meanwhile Ethan was taking a moment to figure out what Foolish was. He had a shark on top of his head, but his skin itself was gold, and his eyes were bright green. To be fair, Bad was just as confusing, looking like some kind of demon with black skin and horns but still with a halo over his head. Maybe it was best to just ignore these things.

"You two build this whole thing yourselves?" Vinny tried to spark some conversation.

"Well, y'know, it was mostly me, and Bad just helped," Foolish not-so-humbly admitted, "but yeah, just us."

"Damn, that's...kinda impressive," Vinny nodded.

"Oh, y'know, you should see my other stuff. You wanna go look at my dragon later? That one's sick," Foolish boasted.

"You've got a dragon?" Ethan joined in, in awe of Foolish's claims.

"Fuc- uh, heck yeah I do!" Foolish glanced down nervously to where Bad was building below them, "I've always gotta be building something on this server or I'll, like, die, or something."

"Oh. Try to avoid doing that," Vinny advised.

"Are you gonna be singing after you build this?" Ethan inquired.

"I'm definitely hoping I can stay awake long enough for that, just don't mind me if I go unconscious midway through a song. What about you, you guys going up? I'm trying to convince as many people to sing as I can," Foolish grinned.

"I think I like the idea of singing...I'll give it a go, at least," Ethan promised them.

"No need to convince me either, I know I will," Vinny told them, "I think I must've had something to do with music in my past. All this stuff keeps feeling familiar to me but I just can't put my finger on it, it's annoying at this point."

"Maybe I could research what you used to do?" Foolish stopped placing material down for a moment and looked over at him.

Vinny tilted his head, "I kinda wanna figure it out for myself, even if it takes longer...but thanks for the offer," he smiled.

Ethan paused, hearing something below. Vinny was first to notice where Ethan was looking and stopped building up the orange to look for the source. At last they realised it was down, some people were talking below them. Ethan precariously leant over the edge, although the fall probably wasn't too far, and saw someone else standing with BadBoyHalo. He knew this one though, it was the man called Phil.

"-ny stuff in particular you wanted to request?" he zoned in at the middle of Phil's sentence.

"No, no, not really," Bad responded, "there's more people up there though who you can go ask," Bad pointed up to where Ethan and Vinny were currently peering down at him.

A loud gasp startled the both of them, Ethan clinging to the edge and swearing as he almost threw himself off it.

"Hey Phil!" Foolish yelled down, not noticing how his gasp had surprised the others, "Phiillll!"

"I can hear you," Phil sighed with a smile, "one sec, I'm coming up."

"What brings you here?" Foolish asked once Phil's head had raised over the edge of the capybara.

"I'm just going around everyone, asking about food- what you want and don't want, y'know," Phil pulled out a book, presumably that he was going to write their answers into.

"Y'know I could probably do with some delivery right now..." Foolish mused.

Phil glared at him, "in the game, Foolish. I'm not delivering shit to your house."

"Dang it, fine," he grinned, "infinite banana?"

"No," Phil turned to Ethan, having given up on Foolish, "anything you want?"

"I dunno, just snack food, party food, that kinda stuff is all good with me," Ethan shrugged.

"And Vinny?" Phil asked.

Vinny shrugged too, "eh, I'm not too picky."

Phil nodded as he quickly noted something down, "cool, thanks guys. Except Foolish."

"Hey-! Well, no, guess I can't really be mad for that," Foolish conceded whilst Phil made his way back down the capybara to find more people. In the silence Ethan made his way over to Vinny and nudged him lightly.

"Should've asked for honey mustard since you still don't have any," he grinned. Vinny looked back at him as if he'd spoken a different language, but after a few seconds Ethan saw the realisation of what he meant on Vinny's face, and then the following annoyance.

"Jeez, that isn't funny, I'm not actually a hoarder," he groaned. Ethan could tell he was secretly amused, though. He'd found it was probably better to make fun of their past rather than ignoring it altogether.

"Yeah, yeah. I probably should've told him I don't want fish, though. Bad memories," Ethan laughed.

"If that Tucker thing was real then he is definitely dead, you realise," Vinny raised his eyebrow.

"W-well, yeah, but no need to be so blunt about it!" Ethan knew his goldfish was probably a backstory that Showfall just made up on a whim, but he couldn't help feeling a little sad about the whole thing, "he's upstream now. He's in a better place."

"Yeah, whatever," Vinny sighed, trying to hide a smile, "let's actually help these people rather than standing around doing nothing."

Foolish resisted the urge to ask what they'd been talking about when the two of them returned to the orange and instead they talked about the time ahead and their predictions for what might go horribly wrong at karaoke. Ethan felt the most confident in his guess that the video would break and whoever was singing would have to stumble their way through without lyrics.

Something was still bugging Vinny about the whole music thing, but until he remembered, there wasn't much he could do. Maybe when he sung tonight it would jog his memory, but he'd just have to wait until then.

~

Jaiden had come to join Valkyrae, Sykkuno and Jerma just as Cellbit and Roier were leaving to go talk on their own about something or other. It probably wasn't anyone's business. She wasn't too unhappy about that though, since it was easier to talk in smaller groups, and she wanted a chance to talk with everyone on the server.

However, not long after that, Wilbur approached their group, joined by Tallulah, Niki and Austin. She sighed and gave them a smile regardless of her knowledge that her chance for a simple, casual conversation was probably gone.

"Hey guys! You all good over here?" Wilbur greeted them, and the response was hesitant at best. Maybe Wilbur's enthusiasm was a little too much, but since most of the people in this group didn't remember him Jaiden could gather why they didn't feel as eager to greet him with the same energy.

"Uh, hey there! What are you all coming over for?" Valkyrae still tried her best to give some enthusiasm, although maybe her words were targeted more at Niki and Austin than at Wilbur.

Austin caught that her eyes weren't on Wilbur and responded in his place, "oh, we wanted to ask you guys if any of you knew instruments or stuff like that, we're trying to put something together for tonight."

Sykkuno hesitantly raised a hand.

"Oh, but, uh," Austin ammended, "no guitars, though. We are in no short supply of guitars."

Sykkuno hesitantly lowered his hand.

"So...you're asking all the people with memory loss if we remember any instruments we used to play?" Valkyrae smirked.

Austin saw her point but tried to defend the idea, "it's still worth a try. Sykkuno remembered!"

"Not that it was much help," Sykkuno laughed.

Rae's eyes drifted to the instruments laid out next to the stage to be used later and pursed her lips. She seemed to be considering something, but didn't speak further.

"I at least know I play piano, but I dunno if that's something you tend to have in your songs," Jaiden spoke up.

"Hm, maybe not in the ones I wanna play tonight," Wilbur told her.

Meanwhile Jerma was walking over to the instruments and he quietly picked up a drumstick, weighed it in his hand for a moment, then turned back to look at the group, "something about this feels familiar. Either of you know if I played drums before?" he smiled and looked between Jaiden and Wilbur.

"I'd be able to search it online if I weren't in this game," Jaiden sighed, "give it a go, though. Maybe it'll come back to you!"

By now Valkyrae had also joined him at the instruments and seemed to hone in on the drum kit too. She tapped on the cymbal and watched him take a seat and spin a drumstick in his hand.

"Cool move," she commented.

"Thanks, let's hope I can remember more than just how to do that, though," he smiled and looked a little nervous, no doubt due to the nearby crowd watching and waiting for him to play. Tallulah might've caught onto that and jogged over, picking up a guitar with one hand and showing him a sign with the other.

If it helps we can play together!

Valkyrae stepped away from the drums and gave him a big thumbs up with a toothy, encouraging smile. Jerma really couldn't understand how all these people forgave him so easily for being The Puzzler back then.

But now Tallulah was waiting on his signal, so he didn't want to delay any longer. He gripped the drumsticks tight and brought them down upon the instruments.

He moved without thinking, his hands remembering where to go when his mind didn't, and sure as hell, he could play.

"Whoa!" Sykkuno beamed once the short jam session had ended. Tallulah stretched up to give Jerma a high five, having made a tune to go along with his beat surprisingly well.

"Well, that answers that, then," Wilbur laughed, surprised and impressed how easy it seemed to have found their drummer. Niki was smiling too, but it faltered when she looked over and caught sight of Austin's expression.

"Hey, you alright?" she checked with him. The man looked completely dejected until he realised she was talking to him and he tried to look as awed by the music as everyone else.

"Yeah, no that was great!" Austin told her. Niki kept staring, unconvinced, and it didn't take long to push out the truth, "alright, fine, it's just- literally every one of you guys knows an instrument! Am I the only one who doesn't right now? I'm feeling kinda left out of all this cool music stuff."

Niki wanted to call him childish, but that probably wouldn't help right now. Thankfully Sykkuno responded with something a little better.

"Well, do you know vocals?" he asked.

"Wh- yes, I 'know vocals', I- what does that even mean?" Austin looked back, confused.

"Well then you know an instrument, I'd say. Singing is just as cool as instruments, and this is karaoke, after all!" Sykkuno explained.

"You're dumb, that's dumb," Austin complained, although he didn't really mean it.

"You don't even have to be good at singing at this karaoke, man," Jaiden told him, "we're gonna cheer just as loud for all the awful singers tonight."

Austin looked away and Niki smiled at him, "would it make you happy if I sung with you, you big baby?"

"Stop insulting me I am not a baby," he demanded, "...but yeah that would be cool."

Niki laughed and Austin couldn't help but laugh too. They didn't realise until after everyone else that someone new had arrived and joined their group, though.

"Oh, hey everyone- sorry if I'm interrupting, I'm just going around all the groups to ask about food. Anything you guys want or don't want?"

Niki looked over and saw it was Phil. She was starting to recognise some of these people, not from her past but at least she was relearning who they were now. Phil seemed like one of the less chaotic members of this island, which she appreciated.

"Oh, the food? You haven't seen the cakes, have you..?" Jaiden nervously asked.

"Oh, yeah, Jaiden, you were on catering duty, weren't you?" Phil asked but it didn't sound so much like a question as much as it did a threat. Jaiden shrunk back and tried to smile.

"Well, we managed to make some food," she defended. Nobody besides her and Phil seemed to know what was going on, but her nervousness and Phil's annoyance were very clear.

"Some. Mhm. Enough to feed everyone, you think? You think you made enough food for everyone turning up to karaoke?"

Jaiden wasn't brave enough to nod or shake her head.

Phil sighed, "Jaiden, don't worry about it. You did make a lot already, I'm just making some final additions since we still have time," he eased up and stopped seeming so threatening, but Jaiden couldn't help but remain a little tense.

"A-alright...you need me to come help?" she offered.

"No worries, I've already got Cucurucho prepping stuff in the kitchen."

"I'm not sure I want tacos with bear fur in them," Austin muttered.

"I dunno if he sheds, actually. He doesn't seem to really follow any laws of nature," Phil pointed out, "but yeah, don't worry about that, we'll sort it one way or another."

Austin raised his eyebrows, maybe not entirely convinced, but kept further worries to himself.

"Anyway, menu stuff, right- what food are you guys looking to get at the event?"

No avocado toast!

Tallulah shook her sign to emphasise the point, which Phil couldn't help but smile at, "yep, I guessed you'd say that. Already got that one written down."

Phil went through everyone's suggestions for the menu and made his notes, happy to find he already had quite a few of the requested foods in his backpack. No better time to get through the small town's worth of meals he always had with him.

Jaiden waved him away as he left for the kitchen to get started on this second batch of food, still feeling a little bad that he'd taken on this task due to her and the two she was working with getting distracted baking cakes. The cakes would definitely taste good though, so worth it.

To her relief other people started splitting from the group too, Wilbur taking Niki, Austin and Jerma with him to practice as much as they could before the fast approaching event, and Tallulah too as she seemed inseparable from Wilbur anyway. Now it seemed a little too quiet with just her, Rae and Sykkuno, but she would still take that over a dozen people speaking over each other.

She noticed Valkyrae was still looking at the drums Jerma had played and stepped closer, "do you think you might be remembering any instruments too?" Jaiden asked.

Rae was hesitant to answer, "well...I think, maybe, but I don't...agh, I just don't know!" she held her hands out in exasperation.

"How about you try playing them too?" Sykkuno suggested.

"Like Jerma..? I have no idea how he was confident enough to do that. My hands would probably start shaking too much to play," Rae looked down at her hands and noted they were shaking the slightest bit just from being near the instrument.

"The guitar helped- hey, I couldn't get into Wilbur's band, but I still remember some guitar! I could play with you!" Sykkuno got more excited over the idea and Jaiden watched as Rae tried to keep her face serious but a smile was starting to crack at the edges.

"We make our own band and rival Wilbur? Yeah, you know what, it's worth a try," Rae gave in as though the incentive of competition was the only thing strong enough to motivate her.

"I could join too," Jaiden tried to join in without it being too awkward to insert herself in the conversation, "I definitely know I play piano, but I could also just sing. I've had the practice from other karaokes."

Jaiden worried about the response she'd get from these two who were so close, and her being someone who now barely knew them. She was desperate to try and get close to these people again, but maybe she was rushing it, maybe she shouldn't be so pushy about spending time with them.

"Yeah, sure!"

Jaiden looked at Rae, "oh, uh, really?"

Rae nodded again, "yeah, then we've got a whole group to take him on!" she laughed and grabbed the drumsticks, "come on, gotta get practicing or we won't have a chance!"

"Do we even know what song we're gonna do..?" Jaiden still picked up the microphone despite being unsure what they'd do after that.

Rae and Sykkuno were quiet and looked at each other, then both back at Jaiden. She took that as a no.

"Alright, alright," Jaiden told them, "I think I have some ideas..."

~

Phil flicked through the book of food requests as he walked to the little kitchen they'd set up, getting an idea of what meals to tackle first. He'd probably bitten off more than he could chew, excuse the pun, but he'd try his best to get through as many as possible. He had Chayanne helping him, after all. They'd be able to make plenty.

What surprised him when he got to the kitchen, however, was that it wasn't just a white bear standing and waiting for him. A shorter figure, although only compared to the bear would Phil ever call them short, was at the kitchen too, washing his hands. With the sound of the water they didn't notice Phil until he was on the other side of the table and placed his book down on it.

"Ah-! Oh, uh, Phil- h-hey," Ranboo greeted, looking anywhere other than Phil's eyes as he calmed himself down.

"Didn't mean to scare you," Phil laughed, "I should probably start announcing it whenever I'm nearby, I know you guys are jumpy and all."

Ranboo nodded but didn't seem to mind, "yeah, it's alright, I was just distracted. Cucurucho did say you were coming."

"Are you here to help too?" Phil didn't hide the suprise in his voice, especially since he knew Ranboo had been cooking earlier with Sneeg and Jaiden, so he thought they might be sick of making food by now.

"Well, it's only since we didn't make enough that you guys decided to do more, and I was gonna stay and make more stuff anyways, so y'know," he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Aw mate, you don't need to do that!" Phil told him, "we were only gonna do it because we've run out of other stuff to do before karaoke starts."

"Well I'm here now," Ranboo laughed, determined to help regardless. Phil nodded, seeing that he'd made his choice, and pulled out his backpack of ingredients to dump on the table.

"How do you guys keep fitting more backpacks inside your backpacks..?" Ranboo muttered, mostly to themself as it didn't seem there was a clear answer. After a moment of assessing their resources, Cucurucho put down a book on the table for both of them to read.

I'LL GET STARTED ON SOME POPCORN.

Phil nodded to the bear, taking some ingredients for himself to make empanadas. Ranboo was confused why Cucurucho was here helping them with something as simple as making food considering how powerful his presence seemed to be on the server, but the bear and Phil seemed to have some kind of connection he didn't know about, so they didn't question it out loud.

Ranboo decided they'd keep making tacos, since they were on a roll with those before...everything happened. Everyone took to their own spaces in the kitchen and got hard at work on their respective foods as the time for karaoke approached.

For a minute or two it was quiet, cooking required some focus after all, but Phil couldn't stay quiet for too long.

"You singing anything at karaoke tonight, Ran?"

Ranboo looked up, taking a second to realise he'd been asked something, then finally answered, "I, uh...no, I don't think so."

"Is that just nerves, or..?" Phil then realised something and stopped himself, "sorry, you don't need to answer that or anything, I'm getting too curious."

Ranboo seemed unsure how to respond to that one, maybe not even knowing what their answer would be, but Phil was more than happy to wait for whatever response he would get.

"It's- ugh, I dunno what it is, I just- with everyone looking at me, and judging me, and having to perform, it's just a bad combination, really. I'm even more confused why Charlie wants to do it, though."

"Can you say why?" Phil asked, trying his best not to come off as digging for gossip.

"He..." Ranboo paused, trying to find the right words, "we went through the same thing. But somehow we're treating it completely differently. If anything I thought he might have more issues with viewers than me..."

Phil was getting the sense this was something Ranboo had been wanting to get off their chest so he slowly continued cooking, listening all the while.

"Sneeg I can at least understand a little better, though I know it's not likely I'll understand anyone else completely, we all had our own traumas to deal with- but anyway, Sneeg's got a similar position to me with the whole karaoke thing, but Charlie's so excited for it...not that that's bad, that's good, I'm happy for him too, I just..." Ranboo looked nervously at Phil, who nodded encouragingly back to him.

"I just don't see the reason," Ranboo continued, "we were all streamers before this apparently, and having a live audience was tainted more for him than it was most of us. I wish I could be so easy with all this too."

Ranboo looked away, then back at Phil, and continued with a quieter voice, "I think I might be jealous."

Phil smiled and looked down, "happens to the best of us, king. Do you think it's more of a 'you want to do it too but something is stopping you', or is it more of a 'you don't want to do it at all' kind of thing?" he looked back at Ranboo, thinking he might be able to help better if he found out more about the problem.

Ranboo made a noise that sounded somewhere between thinking and trying to scream as quietly as possible, "I, uh...the first one? I just don't want everything to be constantly reminding me of everything we went through back then, I wanna be able to enjoy things without my mind still being stuck in that place, you know? I-I'm sorry, I don't expect you to know, I shouldn't dump this all on you in the first place."

"Ran, you can tell me as little or as much as you like. I promise you I won't say a word of it to anyone else, and neither will Ch- Cucurucho," Phil nodded to the bear who turned its head and nodded back, then returned to pouring out kernels into a machine. He wasn't getting too involved in this conversation, but his presence was appreciated.

Ranboo eyed Phil at the slip up of Cucurucho's name, but didn't think much of it, "I want to ask him how he's fine with it, but that seems like a weird thing to just go up and ask someone. Especially since he's finally having a good time here, I don't wanna worry him with all the stuff I'm dealing with."

Phil tried to think of what to say, what he could possibly do to help with everything Ranboo was feeling, but Ranboo spoke again before he could come up with his response.

"Phil, can you...protect my friends, if it comes down to it?"

Phil was caught off guard with the abrupt change in topic and took a moment to think about what to say.

"I, uh- yes, I mean, of course I would, but why-?"

"I-I made a mistake, and it's gonna hurt everyone, but I- I can't even handle it myself, I'm sorry, you shouldn't be the one to deal with my mess but I don't want anyone to get hurt, I don't-"

"Ranboo, Jesus Christ, stop apologising, alright?" Phil stepped in to slow the flood gate of apologies he seemed to have opened, "I don't know what it is you're talking about but I don't need to to know that this is anything but your fault. You care about everyone you were in that place with so I know you'd never deliberately do something to hurt them."

"But you shouldn't have to-"

"I will protect them, it doesn't matter what's happened. I will protect all of you no matter what."

He tried not to let it show, but he was angry. Not at Ranboo, but at whatever it was that had hurt him this much, that had made him feel responsible for all this shit he damn well didn't deserve.

Ranboo did look like they might be about to cry, though, so Phil eased up a little bit, "okay, uh- do you wanna go and chill somewhere for now? Me and Chay have the cooking handled, I can assure you. Uh, Cucurucho, I mean. Sorry, I'm confusing you..."

Ranboo laughed weakly and nodded, "I, uh, are you sure?"

"I am certain," Phil emphasised.

"You guys are so nice...I don't deserve this after-"

"You deserve all of it Ran, now go and relax for once. I've got everything handled, trust me," Phil meant more than just the cooking with his last sentence, and Ranboo understood. They stopped themself from apologising once again and walked away to where everyone else was gathering for the event.

Phil watched him go, only realising Chayanne wanted his attention when the book hit his shoulder.

"Ah- hey!" Phil grunted but still opened the book to see what it was.

DADZA STRIKES AGAIN

Phil laughed, "well who else am I supposed to parent when Tallulah's away with Wilbur and you're being Cucurucho all the time?"

JUST BECAUSE I'M CUCURUCHO DOESN'T MEAN I'M NOT CHAYANNE.

"Well yeah, but this is the most time we've had together in a while, and I'm gonna be honest the main reason I asked you to help was because I know you're a good cook, and I'm not sure about the rest of the eggs..."

ARE YOU SAD I'M NOT AN EGG ANYMORE?

"Well, no, I'd say I'm probably more proud than sad. It's like you're all grown up, you know? You finally hatched! Not into a dragon, though," Phil poked fun at him and could've sworn he saw the button eyes of the bear scrunch up.

I COULD STILL MAKE YOU SOME EGG TASKS IF YOU'D LIKE?

"Really? Oh, I guess you do have admin powers, huh," a thought crossed Phil's mind and his expression turned more serious, "how much can you do now? Quackity came up to me earlier, he...wasn't exactly trusting of how responsible you'd be with all this power on his server."

Phil didn't want to say he believed what Quackity had told him about Chayanne, the things he was saying were pretty absurd at times, but he had planted some doubts in Phil's head. He still trusted Chayanne, he was his son, after all, but...he wanted to disprove those doubts. If he could just talk to Chay about it, he was sure it would all get cleared up.

YES, I DID TALK WITH QUACKITY, HE WAS LOUD.
I'M DOING EVERYTHING WITHIN MY ABILITIES TO MAKE SURE THEY CAN ALL RETURN TO YOUR WORLD SOON.

"That's pretty vague," Phil pointed out.

I WOULD TELL YOU MORE IF I COULD, BUT FOR CERTAIN REASONS, I...CAN'T.

Phil's eyebrows pushed together, "you...why? What's stopping you from telling us..?"

UNFORTUNATELY, I CAN'T TELL YOU.

"You can't, or you won't? What's going on, Chayanne? If something's going on you can tell me, I can help."

Chayanne hesitated to start writing in the next book, which worried Phil more. He was hoping the secrets would end now that he knew it was Chayanne playing the bear, but even his son was keeping things concealed.

YOU WON'T LIKE IT.

Phil looked the bear in the eyes, "why."

ALL YOUR FRIENDS WILL BE SAFE.
BUT WHEN THE TIME COMES PLEASE BE PREPARED TO SACRIFICE SOMETHING FOR THEM.

"Sacrifice-? Christ, Chayanne, are you gonna make us kill someone?!"

Chayanne hurriedly scribbled down and threw the next book.

BAD WORDING

By the time Phil had read that, Chayanne handed over the next one.

*LEAVE SOMETHING BEHIND

"That's not much better," Phil stated.

I JUST WANT TO AT LEAST GIVE YOU A WARNING.
I DON'T WANT IT TO HURT YOU WHEN IT HAPPENS.

"You could just tell me what it is! Does anyone know- do any of the other eggs know?" Phil threw his arms out. He was starting to think he really shouldn't have asked.

Chayanne nodded slowly, almost like he was ashamed. Phil sighed and looked away.

"Chay, we finally have them back. Now you're telling me this? That- that we need to pay a price, or something?"

THIS IS WHY I DIDN'T WANT TO TELL ANY OF YOU.
I DON'T WANT THIS, I PROMISE IF THERE WAS ANOTHER WAY I WOULD'VE TAKEN IT.
BUT THERE ISN'T. I'M SORRY.

"I can't even be that mad about it when I don't know what you're talking about," Phil conceded, "but please, Chayanne. If it is like you say it is, if you don't have a choice, then please just tell me, and I'll understand."

YOU'LL KNOW SOON.
PLEASE, JUST HAVE FUN AT KARAOKE.

"Chayanne, you're worrying me," Phil told him sternly. The bear refused to meet his eyes.

"Cha-" he tried again, but was abruptly stopped by bubbles popping in his face.

"Ha ha ha," the voice of Cucurucho rung out. Phil sighed, but saw that this was most likely Chayanne putting an end to their conversation, and there wasn't much he could do about that. There was still more food to make, after all, and not long left.

Everyone was there ten minutes before the event began, and by that time Phil and Chayanne had definitely made more than enough food. The tension eased as they cooked, assisting one another and throwing the occasional bit of food or splash of water and blaming it on the wind. Chayanne pulled out the bubble blower a few more times, but stopped when one accidentally got in Phil's eye.

Phil was ready to go right up to the start of karaoke making more, but two distant voices halted him.

"Heyy Phil!"

"Phil, my broo!"

He turned around just as Etoiles pulled out his sword for the proper greeting.

"Whoa whoA WHOA-" Phil practically jumped onto the counter and desperately scuffled for his shield.

"Etoiles, Etoiles, stop! I'm pretty sure he's in the game, dude!" Fit quickly stepped in to stop any unintentionally violent PVP checks.

"Ohh, Phil, you're jacked in?" Etoiles thankfully stopped before swinging his sword down on the man.

"Yes," Phil told him, immensely relieved that he hadn't been stabbed.

"Ah, you fucking tryhard, man," Etoiles laughed.

"Yeah, he couldn't get enough of the lore, he had to actually be in this shit," Fit added.

"You guys are so mean to me," Phil joked, actually being quite happy to see them. It had been a while since the QSMP was a place to hang out with his friends rather than...everything else.

"Alright, well, we actually just came to get you so you're not being a loner over here while we're singing and getting wasted or whatever the plan is for tonight," Fit explained.

Phil laughed, "alright, fine, I guess I'm done here anyways. Hopefully there's enough food..."

"There's definitely enough food, Phil, come on," Fit sighed and lassoed him to get him away from the kitchen.

"Phil if you don't sing karaoke I will cry I need to hear your voice," Etoiles threatened.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming!" he told them with one last look back at Chayanne. They could talk a bit more after all this was over.

Chapter Text

Wilbur took a deep breath and looked at Niki, Jerma and Tallulah, all ready with their instruments as they stood by the stage. Austin too, who had picked up the triangle and refused to put it down.

"You guys ready?" he asked his improvised band.

Austin was the most enthused despite not having an official role, constantly switching between the moral support and the 'professional' player of some small instrument he'd found lying around, "fuck yeah, come on! Let's get up there!"

Niki was a little more reserved, "feels like it's too late to back out now. I'm sure we'll do fine," the reassurance sounded like it was for herself as much as it was for everyone else.

"We'll do great, Niki," Jerma told her, spinning his drumstick for good measure.

We're the best band Quesadilla Island's ever seen!

Tallulah waved her sign in excitement, almost to the point that nobody could read it, but then stopped with a look of realisation on her face. She scribbled something extra on the sign and revealed it again to show she'd replaced 'seen' with 'heard'.

"Yeah, that's right!" Austin agreed, "hold on, I'm gonna go up first and be the hype man, get the crowd all riled up!"

Before anyone could even attempt to stop him he was running onto the stage, Wilbur glanced back to see Niki sighing, resigned to her fate. He was a little more concerned about what Austin was planning to do in his brand new role as 'hype man', though, so after hesitating a moment he followed him onto the stage.

"Alright everyone, are we ready? It's time for Wilbur and the Soots!" Austin was already calling out into the microphone.

"No- that's not-" Wilbur quickened his pace, shifting the microphone away from Austin for damage control, "we don't actually have a name or anything, we're just, uh...temporary Lovejoy, I guess."

"Yeahh, temporary Lovejoy!"

As a member of the audience called out, Wilbur suddenly became aware of everyone he'd run out in front of. He'd seen bigger crowds, definitely, but never one filled with all these people he knew, and even some he didn't. He hadn't been on the QSMP in a while, apparently they didn't even think he was real anymore.

But recognising the smiling faces looking back made this feel bigger than any concert he could imagine, and his eyes were drawn to the one who had shouted out in particular. Tom was barely on his seat, waving his arms up in support. Phil was also nearby, getting second hand embarrassment. Wilbur smiled at them even though he wasn't sure if they could see him doing so.

"You've got this Miku!" called another voice, which he identified as Cellbit. Wilbur had thought it was an exaggeration when Jaiden told him ages ago that new members of the server believed he was Hatsune Miku, but apparently not.

"Thanks guys," he sighed, hearing the other three stepping onto stage behind him. It probably wouldn't do their nerves any good if he was being nervous, so he took another breath and looked at his band with a smile, "alright, I guess we're doing this."

They all nodded back at him, surprisingly confident, and Wilbur felt something like pride as they got into positions to play the song he'd only taught them a few hours ago. It definitely wasn't going to be a perfect rendition, but performing alongside his friends, for his friends, was more than enough.

Tallulah seemed completely unaffected by everyone watching, maybe even thriving in the environment and stepping up beside Wilbur and Austin with her guitar. Austin took a step back and gave them all a thumbs up as Wilbur cleared his throat, silencing the dusk clearing.

"Okay, we're uh...Wilbur and the Soots, I guess," Wilbur decided it was a better name than temporary Lovejoy at least, "and I think we've got some songs for you tonight!"

you think?

Wilbur smiled at Tallulah's sign and said aside to her, "I mean, we're up here now, I really hope so," then he turned back to the mic, "you've all waited long enough, so here we go! This one goes out to...well, all you guys, I guess!"

Wilbur tapped his foot on the floor off the stage four times, and on the fifth they began.

Cheers erupted as guitars and drums rang out, and Wilbur's voice was soon to join the mix.

"She's always asking am I alright?"

His lips broke into a smile at the end of the line from hearing the chorus of voices in the crowd that joined him, Tom probably the loudest. Considering he was one of the people actually in their body in front of a computer right now, Wilbur had visions of an incoming noise complaint, but that was unlikely to stop the man.

"As if auspicious or in my pint."

In the corner of his eye he could see Tallulah mouthing the words as she focused on her guitar, and maybe if it weren't for the eggs being unable to speak she would've been screaming them too.

"I'll find the answer or a good night."

What took Wilbur most off guard as he surveyed the crowd was that even the Spanish, Portuguese and French speakers were singing along, which made him consider if he should've added The Fall to their lineup just to see how many people knew the monologue. It was definitely too late to teach his new band another song now, though, they'd done well enough getting to the point they were at.

"Thank god the time is short."

He knew everyone with amnesia was unlikely to know the lyrics as well, but everything happening was more than enough for him to be happy. As he'd said many times before, and as he would probably say again, and again, the fact that all of them were back, that all of them were together again...

Wilbur decided he should probably think about that later. He didn't want to start crying in the middle of a song.

~

As the newly named Wilbur and the Soots finished their first song and readied the second, Charlie took the opportunity to look around and see if Mariana had returned. It made it easier with them all now being gathered in the same place, but that meant his hopes were dashed even quicker, not catching a glimpse of any bright yellow superhero costumes in the crowd.

There had to be at least thirty or forty of them here now, plenty of people having joined for the karaoke. The eggs, the islanders and those he knew from the mall all talking together and moving around; it was a great sight to see, but it also meant his senses were a little overwhelmed and he didn't notice until too late that Ranboo had gone out of his sight.

Ranboo had come up to Charlie earlier, seeming like they had something to ask but only ending up making small conversation as they waited for the beginning of the event. Ranboo was free to leave whenever, of course, but Charlie still wanted to check he wasn't off doing anything dumb. Just to be safe.

His eyes landed on the one in the crowd who seemed to be the most aware out of anyone Charlie had met so far, which was probably relative and not actually the greatest level of awareness, but it was the best he had here. His green, striped bucket hat was at least distinctive in the crowd and Charlie was relieved to find he could still remember the man's name.

"Phil! Phil, uh, can I ask something?" Charlie stepped between people to get closer, talking louder so Phil would hear him through all the conversations happening at once.

Phil looked over when he heard his own name and smiled to Charlie, "oh, hey! You wanna ask something?" he repeated.

Charlie nodded, visuals getting across easier than sound, "yeah, I just- uh-"

"Hold on, let's go somewhere else," Phil suggested, noticing Charlie struggling to get his words out loud enough. Charlie was more than happy to follow, walking away from the crowd to the outskirts of the clearing where a table with snacks had been laid out.

Small lanterns were strung across the trees, spreading a warm light as the evening quickly progressed to night.

"These look nice," Charlie complimented, gazing up at the lanterns while Phil was finding good snacks.

"They do, don't they? I wonder which egg was the one who made these."

"Mm...I, uh, anyway, I only wanted to ask you something, I was wondering if you saw where Ran went? The music might've been too loud for him or something, I just wanna make sure they're doing okay," Charlie pushed the conversation back on track.

"Oh, I...no, I don't think so," Phil thought, then pulled something out, "I'll check on my map, they can't be far away."

Charlie nodded, eating some little things while he waited for Phil's findings, totally not more stressed about this than he should be. The fact his foot was constantly tapping on the ground was probably more to do with how nervous he was to be singing with Baghera later tonight, and definitely not related to this minor occurrence that was probably not an issue at all.

The longer Phil took the more Charlie's eyes flicked around, scanning every face in sight. If Ranboo had just left then wouldn't he have told anyone? Some part of Charlie wanted this to be him getting worried over nothing, because he didn't like the outcomes if he was right to be anxious.

"Oh, here- looks like they're still near the karaoke, at least," Phil interrupted Charlie as he was busy imagining every worst case scenario, "I can lead the way unless you'd rather go on your own."

Charlie considered for a moment then shook his head, "it's alright, I'll go on my own. That's probably better if Ran left because he was overwhelmed or something like that."

Phil agreed and span his map around for Charlie to see, one of the dots representing people highlighted near the edge of the trees. It was further away from the pretty lanterns, but lit up enough in the fading evening light that Charlie thought he could see a silhouette, although maybe that was just a weirdly shaped tree. Either way that was where the map lead, so he walked over as Phil returned to the crowd.

The figure he saw was indeed Ranboo, standing alone and staring quite intently at the floor. Charlie had to walk over quite loudly to make sure Ranboo realised he was there before he accidentally snuck up on them and gave them a fright.

"Charlie..? What are you doing here?" Ranboo asked once he finally broke his attention from the grass at his feet.

"Funny, I was just coming to ask you the same thing. You alright over here?" Charlie looked around, noticing nothing remarkable about where Ranboo had chosen to stand.

"I, uh, yeah, I'm fine now," Ranboo answered and looked to the side.

Charlie softened his voice, realising he came across as a little accusatory, "was it just all the noise back there? Because I totally understand, these guys can be loud..."

Ranboo nodded, "yeah, I'm just- I'm just stressing myself out over nothing, it's fine."

"Anything I can do?" Charlie offered.

Ranboo squinted a little in thought, "I don't know, I'm not sure...what it is..." they trailed off.

Charlie narrowed his eyes; this didn't sound like nothing anymore, "hey, Ran, you can talk to me. If, if something's happening, or like-"

But Ranboo cut him off by firmly shaking his head, "no, it's- please, don't worry about it. I actually- there was something I was going to ask you."

With them stumbling over their words in a rush to change the subject Charlie's suspicions only grew, but he went along with it, he didn't want to start an interrogation.

"Alright, uh," Ranboo cleared his throat, "how are you, like...managing to do the karaoke? I mean, getting on a stage in front of everyone and singing- I don't know if I could ever do that."

"Damn, I haven't done it yet, don't make me nervous," Charlie laughed, "but uh, my serious answer? I dunno, really. It kinda feels natural, in a way, nothing like that stream in the mall," he cringed at the memories, "even if they are pretty similar in concept."

There was silence and Charlie added, "maybe it's because they're people I know. I didn't know anyone who was watching me do that shit back there, but everyone here is at least a little bit familiar, somewhere in the back of my mind."

He watched as Ranboo thought about his words, eyes looking left and right at the ground as he considered everything. He would've liked to know what was going on in their head, but that might remain a mystery forever.

"Mm...I want to think like that too, but I don't know why," they admitted, "I don't know why I want to deal with audiences when they've been completely ruined for me."

"Well, maybe it's because you wanna be like your old self, I dunno. Nothing wrong with that, if it is the case," Charlie suggested, but Ranboo still looked unsure if that was the reason behind his thoughts, "or it could be something else, it could be like...you want to move past the ways everything in the mall scarred us so that it's not, like, holding power over you anymore. God, I'm starting to sound like a therapist."

Charlie laughed but noticed a new spark in Ranboo's eyes before they replied, "I...I guess that I do just want to move past it all, even though not likely to happen, at least not easily. But it's Hetch I wanna be done with right now. He's...ugh, I can't do anything when that asshole is around."

"Tell him to fuck off."

Ranboo looked at Charlie like they'd just been told to fly.

"Wh...do what?"

"Just tell him," Charlie shrugged, "I get the sense he's pretty pathetic and he's just hiding it. What's he gonna do, put you in two cages? The guy's completely powerless right now."

"He's still..." Ranboo took a breath, "either way, I can't just say that."

"Why not?" Charlie pushed, gentle but commanding.

"He's not powerless, he has something, and I don't know what he's gonna do with it, but it's- I could've done something but I didn't-"

"Something? What something?" Charlie cut him off before the apologies began.

Ranboo looked at him, and something like pity crossed their face. Charlie was about to reiterate the question just before Ranboo responded.

"It's just- it's a monster, somehow he got it to this island, and he can still control it."

"W-wait, what? Nobody- w-was nobody gonna tell me this? How many people know about this thing?" Charlie was taken aback by the sudden yet very important new information.

"It's-" Ranboo cut themself off and looked away, clearly struggling to find what he would say next, "it's that-"

But Ranboo didn't cut himself off the second time, and neither did Charlie. They stopped because of another noise, coming from the trees behind him.

"Ranboo..?" Charlie muttered, seeing them immediately tense, their eyes going wide.

"So he...he really wasn't bullshitting..."

"Ranboo if this is the thing you were just about to warn me about then it's got some great dramatic timing but also what the fuck."

Ranboo didn't give him any more answers, but that might've been because he knew he didn't need to. The noises were louder the second time and reminded Charlie of one thing and one thing only, a sound he'd never forget, the monster he thought would be the last thing he ever saw. Maybe it really would be this time.

"We- oh god, we have to move," Ranboo was rapidly stepping away from the trees and Charlie should've been doing the same but his mind was racing and his feet remained still.

Now he could see it, the glow of its screen breaking through the dark cover of trees, the metal claws reflecting that light and god those claws were so vivid in his mind, raised towards florescent lights, then felt inside his skin.

He was in a cabin- then a forest, then a warehouse, because this thing wasn't supposed to be here, but neither was he, he was supposed to have rotted in that mall. Sometimes it felt like his mind was still rotting back there.

Charlie could feel The Spirit clawing at the back of his head, the one covered in blood- he meant slime, he meant slime, he meant slime- coaxing him to relinquish his mind and follow the script set out before him. He could feel The Patient's grip around his chest, telling him he should just lie back and enjoy the show as the monster tore him apart- it wasn't his first time, after all. Then he heard himself, the desperate one running from Showfall, screaming in his ear in sheer panic because this was the beast that had just killed Sneeg and he was next.

Just the sight of this thing turned his mind into a warzone, it was a struggle enough not to slip into that accent or clutch at his chest, he could hardly even think-

The beast of blood and wires rounded the corner of the cabin- the mall- the forest- stalking past his bedroom, the only bedroom he'd ever known, but of course that was all just another lie.

He was backing away, not fast enough but he couldn't go faster, he felt as if the ground beneath him was giving way under the weight of his dread, he stumbled- he would never have made it anyway, that was never in the script- his legs gave out- the cabin, the forest- Ranboo- Flippa- he was falling, he was dying- Ranboo, the button, he needed to press the-

Arms grabbed him, and Ranboo was at his side before he hit the floor.

"Ra- y-you can't, the button- you have to-"

"Who gives a fuck about the button, Charlie?"

Ranboo wrenched him to his feet, putting themself firmly between Charlie and the monster. This wasn't how it was supposed to go- of course not, because they weren't following that fucking script anymore.

The monster still had its directives, though, and it was getting closer to them by the second. But there wasn't a button and there would definitely be no self sacrifice, not on either of their watch. They needed to get away, and they'd do it together this time.

"We need to warn the others..." Ranboo started, but it was clear he didn't know exactly how they would do that, just that they needed to.

"The moment we run it'll jump, it's enough of a miracle that it's only eyeing us up right now," Charlie warned, hating every second of looking at the creature and envisioning his own blood splattered on its screen, but being able to instinctively recognise some of its behaviours when he did.

"But we can't stay here forever," Ranboo warned, after all it was still approaching, no matter how slow and reminiscent of a cat readying to pounce.

Charlie swore and looked back and forth, between the creature and the stage in the distance, its crowd who was far too distant to see any of this, and they definitely wouldn't hear it over the sound of Wilbur and the Soots playing another song. There were so many people nearby, and yet they were stranded.

"I'm not running away again."

Charlie heard Ranboo speak just as he turned to see them moving, for some reason, towards the nightmare death monster.

Charlie would've screamed if it weren't for the next movement he saw, a sudden flash of a weapon and when he blinked there was an axe embedded in the creature's side, wielded by a small figure with a top hat.

tell the others, I'll hold it off

Dapper hastily threw down the sign to the other two and quickly resumed his focus on pulling his weapon from the howling beast and moving to strike again. Charlie didn't stay to watch, grabbing Ranboo by the wrist and tugging them the opposite direction.

"Ranboo I know I kinda said to overcome your trauma but oh my god not like that," Charlie berated.

"I didn't see any other option!" Ranboo hurried to defend himself but was more than happy to now follow Charlie's lead away from the monster.

"Pick your battles and please don't pick fucking Security next time," the continued scolding was now just a method to calm himself down as the two increased their pace into a sprint to get to everyone else. Dapper was definitely not enough to keep the monster at bay, now it was just a question of how long he could last against it. Hopefully they would find backup in time.

Chapter Text

Niki howled in joy as she struck her guitar, ending the second song of the night. All of these songs were starting to sound familiar, which was a relief as it also meant the finger movements came easier through muscle memory.

Wilbur looked back and gave the rest of his band a thumbs up- they were doing surprisingly well. Obviously not perfect, given the circumstances, but they were rolling with the mistakes and the audience barely seemed to notice if they played the wrong notes at times.

This place was so alive. The dancing in the crowd below and the music onstage, the guitars and drums echoing in her ears. Showfall would've hated this, this unrestrained show of sheer humanity, so she revelled in every second of it.

Her smile didn't feel "nice", it felt raw and human, and with every roar of the crowd beating in her chest she almost forgot there had once been a bullet in it. And if she cried it wouldn't be because she was begging, because she was trapped, it would be because at last she was free, and she was so goddamn happy here.

In her limited memory, it was the closest to a home she'd ever had. And sure, the standards were set pretty low, but she knew in her heart this was what a home was supposed to be.

After their second song there was a gap before they were back to play again, which Wilbur hadn't explained to them but did so now as he took up the mic.

"Alright, so, given the occasion I thought it might be a good idea for one of these songs to also be a little special, so...I think you guys are gonna be the first to hear it, but I have a preview of our single coming out soon! Haven't taught these guys the tune, don't really completely know it myself yet, so you're gonna have to deal with a little bit of solo guitar for now."

Despite the apologies the crowd was roaring, the promise of a new song preview obviously appealing. Wilbur tried in the meantime to convey another message to the others onstage but Tallulah showed it was definitely easier to get the words across in writing.

You guys go have a break while Wilbur does the next song!

Wilbur also said something directly to Tallulah, but given the shake of her head and the way she firmly remained on stage it didn't seem that she would be leaving with the others.

Niki was more than happy to go and find some water in the break though, only now realising how much she'd been sweating with the movement and bright stage lights. Letting the adrenaline die down only for it to return after their break was the least appealing part, Niki wanted to keep going, but her body was weaker than her mind and Jerma and Austin seemed the same, shuffling over to the refreshment table while Wilbur introduced his next song, Normal People Things. Sounded pretty cool.

"It seems kinda obvious in hindsight that concerts would be exhausting, but man my arms are feeling it," Jerma complained, "I sure hope that needing a cane was just an arbitrary character thing that Showfall gave me on a whim."

"You were doing great back there man!" Austin encouraged, "not as good as me, y'know, but maybe you can still be second best."

"You really know how to cheerlead, Austin," Niki remarked sarcastically between sips of water.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Austin inquired, though Niki doubted he was unaware of her true intentions in the statement.

One of the eggs had come over while they were talking, Ramón, and he held up a sign that it took a moment for all of them to notice.

You guys are doing great!!

"Thank you, I try my best," Austin puffed out his chest.

Niki rolled her eyes and turned back to the egg, "thank you, but it's definitely Wilbur doing the most hard work to bring this all together."

She moved her gaze back to the stage, the new song now having started and Wilbur managing well with only a guitar and his own voice. And Tallulah's help, obviously.

"I'm looking forward to everyone else performing," said Jerma, "it's pretty surprising how many of us wanted to give it a go."

"Yeah, I think that's a good thing. Not letting everything remind us of that show is probably the best way to spite Showfall," she still felt strange referring to their shared experience in the mall a show and said it with a clear distaste. Show didn't begin to sum up the shit that happened back there.

"I still don't plan on going on any trips to warehouses anytime soon, but I can manage most things," Jerma added.

"Damn, there go my holiday plans," Austin joked.

"Who is it that's going up after us, anyways?" Niki asked and looked at everyone, but Ramón was the only one who seemed to have an answer.

Should be Phil, then Jaiden's band, then maybe Ethan and Vinny, and I think Charlie asked to be last.

"Ah, he wants to make sure his husband is back to hear it, I bet," Austin nudged Jerma like he was spreading gossip, despite pretty much everyone knowing of Charlie and Mariana's ((ex) ex) relationship.

It was generally accepted as good news, in some ways it was hope for his friends from the mall, that their memories could return to them- it just wasn't likely to be as easy. Maybe some of them would also turn out to be divorcees. The possibilities were endless, really.

"Yeah, Charlie..." Niki read from the sign, thinking. She looked back at the crowd, cheering along with Wilbur's singing, "I don't know if I saw him in the crowd when I was up there just a moment ago. I mean, there is a lot of people, but did he go anywhere?"

She turned to Ramón with her question, again expecting the egg would know more about what was going on than any of them. Ramón quickly looked at the crowd too, but as his expression became more scrutinising it was clear he wasn't finding what he was looking for.

I didn't catch him leaving. I can go find him to check everything's okay

"Yeah, it's probably fine, it's just since you mentioned him..." her tone was almost betraying her deceit. In truth it wasn't really fine, she was worried, as she would be upon the absence of any of her friends from an event like this.

"Wait, Niki, is that him?" Austin drew her attention over and she followed his eyes to see two figures almost completely obscured in the darkness and distance, but becoming more clear as they approached. They were approaching pretty quick, actually. It looked like they were running.

"Could just be two latecomers," Jerma suggested, but his words didn't convince himself. A dread was seeping into the space between the four of them. With the approach of these two, there was the unexplainable but clear sense something bad may be coming with them.

At least it was revealed to be Charlie and Ranboo, solving that mystery, but as their faces became recognisable so too did their expressions, the same panic and fear plastered so strongly onto both of them that Niki could feel herself starting to mirror the expression too. She could see Jerma and Austin tensing in real time, with no clear threat to release that tension on but still anticipating a great many possibilities.

Niki's tension had never truly gone away, she now realised, the grip of her fist on the fabric of her shirt feeling as familiar as her muscle memory for guitar. She'd been waiting for this, as much as she would deny such a claim.

No questions needed to be asked as Ranboo and Charlie were quick to start talking as soon as they were close enough to be heard, "it's following us, it's- it found the event and it's gonna- there's no time, he's holding it back but- we need help, there has to be something, there has to be some way to stop it!"

Trying to get to the bottom of what they were saying was a challenge as they both spoke so hurriedly over each other, hardly noticing that the other was even talking. Niki felt she'd definitely missed some key details, but the core sentiments made it through.

"Help- like what kind? Are you two hurt?" she tried to focus their conversation in hopes of clear answers.

Charlie shook his head while Ranboo looked at him, seeming to make sure of his lack of injuries, "no, listen, that isn't- it's not us right now, Dapper's back there, he- he's fighting it, someone needs t-to go back there and-"

"What is it, Charlie?" Niki stared him down, needing a clear answer, although a part of her was whispering that she already knew what this thing was going to be.

"He-"

"No, no vague bullshit!" she interrupted, already sensing that Charlie wanted to avoid saying it outright, "I can handle whatever this thing is. Ranboo, what is it?"

Ranboo looked surprised as Niki suddenly shifted focus to them but could still get an answer out quickly, "it's Security. He's brought back Security."

The silence after such a frantic scene was sharp, Ranboo's words given time to hang between them all. Niki couldn't imagine the thoughts racing through everyone else's heads at that moment, especially Charlie and Ran who hadn't even had the prior warning Security was on the island. Shit, maybe they should've just told them, but it was definitely too late now.

Austin and Jerma seemed unsure how to respond, Ramón was writing as fast as his hands would allow him, but Niki knew what she was going to say. The others had been dreading a moment like this. She had been waiting for it.

"Where is it?" her tone was deadly serious but Ranboo looked at her like she was joking.

"Y-you're not gonna go towards it, are you?!" in response to Ranboo, Niki put a hand on her sheathed sword, "Jesus Christ..."

"Niki, can we take like, a second to think about this?" Austin begged her. Before anyone could say anything more, Ramón stepped in with his sign.

I'm going to help Dapper before he gets himself killed, all of you warn everyone at karaoke now.

The now was repeatedly underlined to emphasise it and Ramón barely waited for them to finish reading it before he took off in the direction Ranboo and Charlie had come from.

Niki didn't like the idea of letting someone with such a child-like frame going off alone to fight this fucking creature, experienced fighter or not, and no amount of underlining was likely to sway her from the decision she'd already made, that she'd spent the last few days dwelling on. No more eggs were going to be hurt by this thing when it was her who'd failed to finish the job.

Austin clearly saw this in her eyes, though, and was at her side to grab her arm just as she made the first step to follow Ramón.

"Hey, Niki, I mean it, let's think about this. I don't wanna watch you go get yourself killed when the eggs are handling it. Let's just go warn everyone at the karaoke."

Niki glanced back and forth between him and Ramón, which caused Austin to hold onto her tighter. She let out a constrained breath and set off towards the stage without another word to Austin or the other three already ahead of them, running to warn everyone on Ramón's command.

"So when exactly were you gonna tell us about that fucking thing?!" Charlie demanded loud enough for her to hear from behind, possibly using volume to cover up the shake in his voice.

Jerma glanced over his shoulder but realised he would probably have to answer on his own, "we- uh- we were mostly hoping we wouldn't need to."

"Yeah, how's that going for you?" Charlie remarked.

"A-alright, not great in retrospect, but we can go over all this later!" Jerma deflected as they made it to the edge of the crowd. With the sound of the music, barely anyone had noticed them coming back in such a hurry. Niki, noticing this would be a problem, headed instead for the stage itself.

Wilbur, focused hard on the song, didn't realise Niki was there until she'd taken the microphone, "hey, guys- s-sorry, I, uh, there's been a problem, if you could all listen-!"

A very sudden hush fell over the crowd which unnerved her, but it gave her a chance to get this warning out, so she swallowed down any doubts and continued, "there's something dangerous that's found us here, the eggs are fighting it right now, but that might not be enough."

She glanced down and saw Tallulah looking back up at her, fear evident on the egg's face but also a knowing, as if she had been expecting and dreading this exact thing. And as such, she was prepared, and her hand was already wrapped around the hilt of the sword at her side.

"Wait, something dangerous, what- what's going on?" Wilbur asked behind her and Niki didn't know what to say. Unfortunately she wouldn't have to, as the scream in the crowd drew all of their attention to a shape stalking out from behind the stage, wires dragging behind it like blood, a staticy growl like a demon from hell.

As it dragged its claws another step forward there was another shape that rushed out, much smaller and wielding a sword he stabbed right into its back. It might have pinned the monster down and bought them time had Ramón had the strength for it, but as it was he was clearly beaten down and weakened. It had barely been a minute or two- the damage this monster had done made Niki wince.

With ease Security threw Ramón off and he hit the ground with a rough thud, the TV then raising back up to face everyone else. Niki was thankful its focus wasn't on the eggs, but that only meant it had shifted to her friends.

"Ramón!" a low voice yelled out, pushing to the front of the crowd and revealing his username as Fit.

The egg wasn't done though, the call of his name seeming to rouse him from his place on the ground. People were already drawing swords but none of them could do so before Ramón was back in the fight, now unarmed but determined to keep the beast away from everyone as long as he could.

Once more the monster smacked him away, claws digging in on the swipe for unnecessary further damage. Security didn't stop at that, though. With Ramón trembling and clutching at the gash through his shoulder it loomed closer, claws still outstretched, rising higher, intent to eliminate the annoyance that Ramón had made himself.

But claws met metal and with a clang the beast was stopped in its tracks, communicating a level of suprise at the interruption despite the lack of a face. Niki just looked back, face set in a snarl. Nobody else would die to this fucking thing, not her friends, not these eggs. This time she was finishing the job.

Security switched its focus to her, getting back into action and going to swipe the sword from her hands but Niki kept it out of reach until there was an opening for her to dig her blade into a particularly important-looking tangle of wires. The screech let out by the monster made her want to cover her ears but she couldn't let go, she drew the sword back and struck again, and again, pushing it back with each plunge of the sword. In seeming desperation the creature leapt for her, giving her a chance to strike the broken TV headed straight at her, leaving a commendable strike in its side.

The two them had a moment to breathe, though she doubted the creature could, and she wasn't entirely sure if she'd breathed once since she stepped between the beast and Ramón. To her side she saw someone else with the egg- it was Fit, lifting him back up, and thank fuck he was still alive. But only Ramón had come chasing after the creature. Where was Dapper?

It seemed everyone else in the clearing was shell shocked. When she looked back at the crowd there were some faces her mind homed in on, Sneeg looked terrified (well, most of them did, really), Austin seemed a mix of amazed and horrified, and Wilbur still up on the stage seemed completely at a loss.

At that point she realised another presence at her side, though, and turned to come face to face with Etoiles.

"We are here for round two, yes?" He grinned, embellished scythe already out and ready to strike.

"We never got to go to a dungeon, did we?" she remembered the offer Etoiles had made her after their first run in with this beast.

"Oh, I think he will be much more fun than any dungeons on this island. It's been a while since I've had a challenge, you know..."

By now the monster had almost gotten back up and it would be moments before it struck again. Niki steeled her nerves and called over her shoulder.

"Somebody go find Dapper and make sure he's alright. We've got the monster handled."

In the corner of her eye she saw a few people making their way to where Security had come from and moved on to her next order.

"Hey Wilbur," Niki suddenly shouted out to him, startling the already frightened man.

"Y-yeah?" he called back.

"Keep playing," she commanded, raising her weapon. Despite his concerns, he did as she said. The music resumed just as Security moved to strike, and Niki and Etoiles were ready.

Niki couldn't help striking in time with the song, allowing the monster a chance to get its hit in first with just a moment's advantage. Etoiles anticipated its hit, though, and stepped in to deflect while Niki made a gash in its leg. The two of them made quite a good team already.

Security wasn't going to make this easy, though. Etoiles was its next target and in a moment of hesitation he was caught by the claws, not letting them dig so deep this time but the sudden splatter of blood across the grass made him and Niki grimace.

No more hesitation, Niki reminded herself as she swung and struck its unprotected back, quickly drawing back as it swiped for her face in response. Having it constantly switch targets between her and Etoiles was giving them the edge and Etoiles was quick to realise this too, slashing down now that the TV had turned from him and being instant this time when he withdrew.

Niki grinned as she panted, not letting up on the energy until this was over and keeping a tight grip on her sword that would leave marks on her palms. She dared a glance at the onlooking crowd, all eyes on the fight despite Wilbur still putting his all into the music. This was an audience she could manage, not one that chose her fate but one that would watch whatever she wanted to do, an audience that actually cared if she lived or died. Seeing how intensely engaged she and Etoiles were in the fight, everyone else present seemed to get the message and left the two of them to fight on their own.

Austin seemed especially unhappy about this, restless on his feet as the fighters landed hit after hit, only narrowly avoiding near death each time they struck, but hopping in to the middle of the fight to try and stop it probably wasn't a great idea. Sneeg and Charlie were the others most engaged in the battle, every violent action of the TV monster making them wince in turn. She would kill it for them. It wouldn't hurt anyone again.

Unfortunately her vengeful obsession was getting the better of her and she failed to block a smack of metal and wire before it thudded into her chest and sent her backwards, she just barely avoided hitting the floor. It shouldn't have been going for her, it should still have been focused on Etoiles- unless it was learning. Wires and patches of aged flesh and blood splattered their surroundings but despite the wounds it had endured the creature still fought, looking completely unaffected if it weren't for the unusually high twitchiness in its step. Niki, meanwhile, needed another few seconds to make sure she could keep breathing. It bled but it could hardly be called alive- what the fuck was this thing?

No time for philosophy, no time for anything except survival. Etoiles was trying harder to get the monster's attention back on him but Niki needed to do something or she would be torn apart and this thing would be left to ravage the rest of the surroundings.

She could plunge her sword into one clawed hand as it reached towards her and impede its path for her throat, but the monster had two sets of claws and intended to use both, meanwhile she only had one sword that was currently embedded in this thing and she'd be dead by the time she managed to pull it back out. Etoiles yelled something that was drowned out by static and low screeching from whatever equivalent of a throat existed within this creature.

An impact hit the creature's side and both it and Niki looked in suprise to the source. What they found was Richarlyson, picking up another rock and waving his sign with large writing.

GET HIS ASS

Niki didn't need more instruction than that. With the moment she'd been given she jammed her foot straight into the creature's chin and watched it stumble back a step in glee.

She got her sword back, making sure to almost tear its hand in half as she pulled it out. She went for another hit but the creature's behaviour managed to surprise her once again, changing its course not to Etoiles or even Richarlyson but another target entirely. Returning to the old tactic it had used against Pomme, Niki realised, chasing down the one with no weapons, no armour, the one rooted to his spot in terror. She screamed his name as she saw Security was sprinting straight towards Charlie.

She wasn't the only one, she could hear a chorus of panic erupting, but one voice was more distinctive than the rest. Sneeg was a blur of fury as he ran from the crowd and leapt upon the beast, crashing his full weight into it and sending them both tumbling to the ground.

~

One moment he was on the island, the next he was on the cold tiled floor, head still ringing from the force at which Security had slammed him down, sending his hat flying out of range of the subsequent blood spill. It wouldn't have been the first time that thing had been coated in blood anyway.

He was pressed on his back, every inch of him burning as it was torn apart and it was a miracle he could still see, but it wasn't a mercy.

All he could focus on was the red glow of the exit sign hanging above him, a light from heaven he would never reach, no matter how damn close he got. In a moment Charlie and Ranboo would find him and run away, only to meet the same fate, because nothing he did could help them and they could never stand up against something like this.

Then there was a sword through its chest, and the tiles under him started to feel a lot more like grass and the fluorescent lights didn't hurt his eyes so much as they morphed to the much softer glow of starlight.

And his light from above wasn't red anymore. It was a face, and it was screaming, and it was Charlie. He hadn't ran away this time.

Chapter Text

Phil lunged towards where Sneeg and the monster had fallen to the ground in a mess of limbs and wires but felt something holding him back. He found a small hand clinging to his wrist and a pleading face looking back at him. It was ironic, usually he was the one begging Tallulah to stay out of danger.

She looked scared for him, and he realised he was scared too after a moment. He'd faced dozens of enemies as scary as this one in the game, but him now being in the game, it was too real. The sounds and the sensations of violence and monsters weren't so easy to handle anymore. He could probably count the number of times he'd been punched in his life but he'd never been impaled with a diamond sword or had metal claws torn into him, and it didn't take much thinking to know he didn't want to.

It seemed to be the opposite reason for everyone else why they still stood by, watching the fight- it was like how they'd all watched Etoiles take on the codes. Nothing more than watching a video game. But he knew it wasn't just that anymore. Not when he could feel the shake of the earth as Sneeg and the monster hit the floor.

So did Wilbur, Jaiden and Toby, the only other people in the game with him, and faces all white with fear. Only Wilbur was holding it together a little better, playing the guitar as more of a distraction than anything. Then Phil's attention went back to Tallulah, still holding him tight. His fear turned to something else. With the overload of panic and emotion he couldn't stop his mouth from opening.

"You said they'd be safe- you said you were keeping them here because it was safe! Why did you let this happen?!" Phil lashed out at Tallulah, then reconsidered what he'd said a moment too late. He knew Tallulah, he knew Chayanne, he knew these eggs wouldn't have let this happen if they could've prevented it. If Chayanne were in front of him he would've been blaming himself more than anything else for failing to protect them.

And Tallulah was evidently racked with guilt as well. Her grip slipped as she moved to wipe the beginnings of tears from her eyes. The two were almost at eye level, Tallulah knelt on the stage and Phil right in front of it.

"Tallulah, I'm sorry, I-" he began, voice softer now, but was interrupted with a sign.

I'm so sorry we thought it would be
Something must have brought it here I dont know I dont

Her writing cut off at the end, her thought incomplete, and Phil reached out to gently squeeze her arm.

"We can figure out why later, I need to go help then now though," Phil insisted despite his persistent nerves. Tallulah shook her head, though.

This is their fight now

Phil wasn't sure what she meant and spun his head to the ongoing battle. At first his terror jumped, seeing the monster with a TV for a face raising claws above Sneeg's body. He hadn't acted fast enough, he had failed to protect his friends from harm- but a voice interrupted his spiral of acceptance and guilt.

"Niki, throw it!"

Before Phil even realised it was Charlie who had yelled out in the clearing there was a blade in the air headed straight for him. Another terrifying sight for Phil but it hit the floor a few steps in front of Charlie, who was now in full sprint and bent down to grab the sword as he passed it, not wasting a moment of momentum in his dash towards the monster.

He raised the blade over his head and with a scream of rage and terror combined he plunged it down into where the creature may have had a heart, not that anyone was certain if it did.

For the third time in the last few seconds Phil felt like his heart had stopped beating as the force of the strike was enough to send it through the beast's body and towards Sneeg, but the blade stopped there and left Sneeg- thank fuck- unscathed.

But still the beast lived. Like the unholy creature it was, it turned its head backwards, wires in place of a neck twisting around themselves unnaturally. Charlie faltered, sickened by its movements and being stared down by its screen, but now Niki had caught up. With no weapon in hand she balled up her fist and sent it straight into this thing's (lack of a) face.

Phil couldn't tell if the crack was her fist or the old fashioned TV but it at least dealt some damage, the monster stumbling back and allowing Sneeg a chance to free himself. Charlie drew his sword out, subsequently drawing a satisfying screech from the creature, and half-dashed, half-stumbled to Sneeg's side. Niki stood in front of them both, face-to-not-face with the creature, shaking specks of blood from her knuckles.

How it still lived was anyone's guess, but Niki wasn't stopping until it was dead.

Phil's mouth was hanging slightly open. He didn't want to say he enjoyed watching his friends fight for each other's lives, but he was once more feeling a strange sense of pride coming over him. This was clearly something they'd faced before, an experience nobody should ever have to go through, but one that they were at least coming out the other end of.

From such a distance he could still see Charlie's hands shaking and yet he held tight on his blade, not letting it slip, not letting himself be caught unarmed again. And Niki couldn't seem to care less that she'd given her sword away, if anything the grin she wore between heavy breaths implied she preferred it this way, nothing but her fists against a beast and still showing her power over it.

It was an egg who once again pulled his attention away but not Tallulah, instead it was Leo who'd somehow found his way onto the stage and pushed a sign a little too close to Tallulah's face so that she had to nudge them away.

what the hell is going on??

Phil could read it over Tallulah's shoulder and not-so-subtly leant to the side to read Tallulah's response.

Aren't you meant to be with Hetch?

I saw dapper and ramón downed in chat, what do you think I was gonna do?

fair

By now Tallulah and Leo both knew Phil was spying in on their conversation and couldn't exactly stop him so they angled their signs for him to see too. Tallulah added another sign since her last response was short.

Something lead Security to karaoke but they're taking it on

Leo glanced past Tallulah to the ongoing battle, Niki, Charlie and Sneeg trying to land hits on the thing while protecting one another from its wires and claws. She nodded to Tallulah.

alright, and what about the downed eggs?

Ramón is with Fit. Bad Max and Foolish went to get Dapper, I can bring you?

Leo nodded quickly, having the most concern currently over their siblings' health. They probably hadn't come back to the group to stay away from the fight but it would be good to have someone make sure that Dapper was back up.

Tallulah started leading her away and the two eggs headed off the stage, Wilbur quickly noticing the absence of his daughter despite most of his focus being on the music.

"Hey, wait up, Tallulah-" he cut the music off, the song having been near its end anyway at least, and followed the eggs, Phil then coming along behind. Just then he heard a voice from behind and turned to see Quackity emerging from the crowd.

"Phil- Phil! What the fuck is going on?! I leave for, like, two minutes, and then I come back to- to this?" he threw his arms out towards the ongoing battle, lacking the words to describe it.

"I can't really explain, not right now, but just stay here- you're not in the game, right?" Phil told him, anxiously glancing between Quackity and the three running off to find Dapper.

"I- no, I'm not- what do you mean just stay here? Isn't that thing fucking killing people?!" Quackity shouted at him.

"Yes- I mean, no, they've got it handled, but that's still why you should be staying put over here while I go and make sure the eggs don't-"

"Phil, fucking Christ, this is just what I was saying, that bear doesn't give a shit about how safe our friends are! Where even is that fucking thing right now?" as much as Phil wanted to disagree with Quackity's accusation, he did make one valid point. Phil hadn't seen Cucurucho since being dragged away from cooking and couldn't see him now- the bear seemed to have disappeared.

Abandoning them at such a dangerous time wasn't a great look, but there had to be a reason, there was no way Chayanne would ever want to hurt any of these people. Quackity couldn't be right, Phil wouldn't accept that.

"Nevermind, I don't care what he's doing," Quackity continued when he got no response from Phil, "fuck, fuck, what the hell am I meant to do about this?"

Phil eyed Quackity a moment, taking notice of how much responsibility the man seemed to be taking for this, "I don't- I don't know if there's anything we can do, mate."

Quackity looked back at him, almost betrayed, "what do you mean? We're just standing by and letting this shit happen? Not on my server, Phil! I'm not letting anything happen to them, I don't give half a shit what that bear wants with them I'm not letting it happen!"

"It's not the bear, I- ugh, listen, Quackity! I barely know anything either but I think the best we can do right now is have faith in our friends because they're strong too, they don't need to be saved," Phil watched as Quackity's eyes darted between him and the fight beyond, a clear conflict in his mind as standing by just felt wrong, but their friends were indeed doing fine without them.

Even Etoiles had taken a step back, watching Niki's movements from a little distance away like he was a coach preparing to give her notes after the fight.

Both their eyes being on this fight was likely the reason they failed to realise a new presence rising to the stage beside them until his finger tapped harshly on the mic. It caused Phil to flinch and instantly turn his attention to the source.

"Sorry folks, your scheduled entertainment has taken a little detour. But don't worry, I'm more than happy to fill in."

Who the fuck..? Oh, right, this was that one guy who had come back with their friends that none of them knew. 'Hetch', his username read. Phil didn't get the best vibes from him.

"Is this on?" Hetch laughed dryly, obviously hearing the projection of his voice and seeming to very much enjoy it, "isn't this great battle entertainment enough?! Drama, bloodshed, you people couldn't wish for more!"

Jaiden was the next person to approach Phil at the front of the crowd, "hey, you were the one making Ranboo upset earlier, right? What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Upset Ranboo? Well now Phil really had a problem with this guy.

"Hecklers aren't appreciated, little bluebird," Jaiden seemed to bristle at the patronising way he addressed her, "I'm just here to offer you all some information I know you've been lacking. I've been looking for a chance like this to fill everyone in on what your dearly beloved friends got up to while they were gone."

Phil did want to know, quite a lot actually, but something told him he didn't really want to hear it from this guy.

"You're so happy they're all back, and what a touching reunion it's been," Hetch spoke in a performative way that was terribly forced, "but you've noticed how they're different, haven't you? You've noticed how they're not really...themselves?"

Immediately Phil's mind cast images of Charlie's distrust, the way he was looked at like a stranger, and how they all acted together that first day, relief and crying that he never imagined he'd be witness to from his friends. And over what? What was it they'd escaped from?

"Well of course the amnesia is obvious, what a common trope that is, but I'd like to fill you in on something more relevant to the current time. What ferocity, what overwhelming drive for survival you all see before you now..." Hetch waved his arm, indicating the silent crowd's attention to the fight as Niki yelled and swung her fist, as Sneeg kicked the monster's shins and Charlie carved out slivers of wire, oblivious to the man onstage, "what beautiful desperation I have been able to draw forth, how I have helped them realise their true nature!"

"You've helped nothing you fucking psycho!" someone shouted out and soon Phil saw Vinny storming towards the stage, finally taking action to get Hetch off it when everyone else was unsure what to do.

But a response was clearly what Hetch was yearning for, he clicked his fingers as Vinny put his hands on the stage to get himself on, "now, now, Hoarder, didn't I say no heckling?"

All of a sudden there was a yell with no reason, at least not until Phil saw what exactly it was directed at. His body seized up like it might when leaning past the point of no return on a chair as he saw the TV creature no longer locked in battle but instead halfway across the clearing and headed straight for him.

With immense relief he saw it clawed itself up onto the stage instead and when he could finally breathe again he could hear the voices around him become clearer. Mainly screams of shock surfaced, Vinny's the loudest as he practically fell off the side of the stage to get away, caught by Jaiden who eyed the monster now a level above them warily. However it stayed where it was, like in standby.

Niki, Charlie and Sneeg looked just as confused, suddenly lacking the enemy they had been making progress against. And up close that progress was clearer, Phil unwillingly given a front row seat to the torn and broken wires dangling down and sparking, the endless cracks and dents on the screen that had sharp angles not unlike teeth.

And below that retro tech was something else, Phil realising with horror that something wetter lay below the wires, that this thing that looked like nothing more than an abominable robot had a chest that rose and fell, that breathed.

"Que porra é essa..?" Cellbit breathed beside him, shocking Phil once again as he didn't realise how or from where the man had approached, but he voiced both of their thoughts perfectly. What the fuck was that thing?

"Let me introduce you, dear listeners, to my loyal Security! I hope it can convince you not to cause too much trouble," below the weird, black mask Hetch was probably side-eyeing Vinny, "now, don't look so scared! Your friend Ranboo wanted it to be joining us at this event, after all."

Upon mention of the name Phil scanned the surroundings for Ranboo, finding them stood at the edge of the crowd a little further away with Jerma and Austin, immediately uncomfortable with the attention gained.

"What's the matter? Or shall I be the one to explain the deal we made, Hero?" Hetch goaded mockingly. Ranboo didn't look like they wanted to respond, nobody seemed to want to say or do anything after the demonstration of the power Hetch wielded over the monster. Charlie, Sneeg and Niki had closed the distance now and Hetch angled his head a little towards them.

"Oh, what trouble you're causing, didn't I teach you enough that you're all better off in the background? Especially you, Slimecicle, you never seem to learn. Such bravery is distracting when you're only here to highlight our Hero."

Phil's fists were balling up at Hetch's words even though he could barely guess what any of them meant. They hit Charlie harshly, though, maybe too much so as being called by his username instead caused a shake so harsh he lost grip on his sword and it fell to the floor. That seemed to entertain Hetch.

"Not perfect, though, nobody really is...have you really moved on from your ghouls so quickly now that you've remembered, oh, what was her name...Flippa, was it?" Hetch made unnecessary hand movements as he recalled the name and dug into his selected target, the mention of ghouls and his egg being some double impact that caused him to clutch at his head as Sneeg and Niki looked on in concern.

"I hope this time you'll finally learn," Hetch's tone became darker as he raised his hand and Sneeg was first to move, seeing what was coming and grabbing Charlie's dropped sword as the fingers snapped, only a moment fast enough to have it up and stopping Security on its path for its target's throat. It was moving faster than it had the whole night, horrifying those who had been hoping they had finally been wearing it down.

"Leave him alone!" Sneeg screamed, gritting his teeth and shaking under the force of Security's claws pushing against his blade and its screen looming ever closer. Hetch dismissed his pleas completely, moving back to the microphone and allowing Security to finish his command.

"You all seem to think you deserve this whole freedom thing, but I can assure you that you do not," he first seemed to direct his attention at Vinny, then at Ranboo and the others he was with, and then presumably at the others from that group, Sykkuno, Valkyrae and Ethan, elsewhere in the crowd.

"I mean, if you all heard the things your beloved friends have done," Hetch laughed, the term 'friends' sounding like an insult, "I'm not sure you'd be so happy at their return."

"The fuck are you talking about?" Phil finally jumped in, some defiance regained as that monster was no longer in range of slashing his face in two in an instant. His eyes did still unconsciously continue to glance back at it, anxious about its ongoing struggle with Sneeg that the two were locked in.

Hetch laughed, a disingenuous, vile laugh that made Phil even more desperate to kick his shit in, "people will do such desperate things to survive, don't you know?"

"Phil, we're not dealing with this vague bullshit," Quackity hit him in the arm, probably the next best thing to grabbing him since he wasn't in the game to do complex actions, "I dunno who the fuck this guy thinks he is but I'm not standing by any longer and I'm not leaving you here to let him kill your braincells, come on."

Phil was hesitant to leave, not liking to leave his questions unanswered but Quackity was insistent and giving attention to this asshole while his friends were in danger felt like a betrayal. Hetch continued his rambling but Quackity lead them out of the crowd and towards the monster, some other people following them, and every part of Phil's body wanted to stay the fuck away from that thing but his mind kept control and he pushed forward, the threat to his friends at last taking priority over the threat to himself.

Sneeg was clearly still in a struggle, the dirt by his feet had been dug up as he was pushed into the ground and towards Charlie, Security getting closer inch by inch. Niki had dug her nails into the thing's side to pull and split wires but after Hetch's command it had tunnel vision, only intent on finding its victim in Charlie. Phil caught a glimpse of him over Sneeg's shoulder and it seemed like he was stuck in his place, shell shocked from whatever meaning Hetch's words had.

"How the fuck do you kill something like that?" Jaiden cursed to herself and Phil saw it was her and Cellbit who had followed them to the monster. At least Jaiden was seeing the full horror of what they were about to face too and not some pixelated rendition like the two others likely saw.

"Can one of you get this thing off me?!" Sneeg demanded, noticing the approaching people despite needing his focus trained on the monster, any falter having the chance to lead to bloodshed.

Cellbit ran up and hit it in the side with his own weapon but had little effect, "shit, Etoiles wasn't kidding when he told me this thing was OP, what the fuck?"

Phil's hands were on his sword and Jaiden had hers drawn already but they hesitated, unsure how to approach a foe that from all outside perspectives seemed unkillable. That didn't stop Quackity from trying, though, as he instead chose to equip a lasso and threw it around the monster's head.

"If we can't attack it then we try something else!" he called out and began to run into the distance but found himself jolted back as the lasso reached its limit and barely shifted, the monster now keeping him in place instead. Phil heard the distant exclamation of a multitude of swears as he continued to pull.

"Fuck- uh- it has to budge eventually, it must have a limit!" Phil reasoned, running to Quackity in the distance and pulling Jaiden with him. Jaiden realised his intent, sheathing her sword and opting instead to take ahold of the lasso, Phil ducking under and grabbing the other side like some strange version of tug-of-war. The three of them now pulling together strained against the resistance Security gave them but something shifted, the creature started to move back, Sneeg was regaining ground.

Sneeg's growls of resistance became a war cry of effort as he pushed back, moving the sword up against the creature's claws and thankfully away from his face.

"One problem," Jaiden pushed through gritted teeth, "what do we do after we get this thing away?"

"Figure it out when we get there!" Quackity told her decisively and continued to dig his feet into the floor and try to walk in the opposite direction.

Cellbit and Niki helped from the other side too, pushing with Sneeg to get it away from Charlie. The creature's robotic screeches and howls grew in intensity as it was pushed away from its target which made Charlie cover his ears as his throat grew tighter from the stress of unpleasant memories but nobody else had such a luxury, all other hands occupied with the monster. 12 against 2- or 4, or none, depending on what those claws counted as.

"We're kind of getting there," Jaiden warned, the progress they were making on moving the monster undeniably good but the problem of what came next becoming harder to ignore, "any plans?!"

"Fuck, fuck," Quackity spat out. Phil interpreted that as a no. Luckily for them, there were more people yet to come to their rescue.

"Everyone, listen, we can kill this guy the Showfall way!" Ethan yelled, being followed by Valkyrae and Sykkuno.

"What the fuck does that mean?!" Sneeg yelled back.

"I- nevermind, we gotta draw it to the statue!"

"The massive one Foolish and Bad were building, we have a plan!" Sykkuno clarified for him.

"How the hell-?" Niki began to ask.

"We can use bait, right? As long as we get it in the right spot!" Rae suggested.

"It's only got eyes for Charlie right now, unfortunately," Sneeg forced out between breaths, the continued conversation being a struggle that cost him energy, especially with the distance between them all meaning he was inclined to shout.

"Then can-?" Sykkuno began to ask.

"No!" Sneeg immediately cut him off defensively. Phil assumed he was about to suggest Charlie be the bait, and he could see why Sneeg was so quick to deny. It was clear Charlie had more reason to fear this thing than almost everyone else, which couldn't have had any good reasons behind it. Nobody wanted anyone getting hurt by this thing, especially if it wasn't the first time.

But Charlie spoke up for himself, for the first time in a while, "but it- it's different this time, it'll be different."

His voice could hardly be heard from the distance at which Phil, Jaiden and Quackity were pulling the rope, but they could just barely make it out.

"Charlie-?" Sneeg grunted out.

"Because you'll all be here," Charlie continued, "you'll be here so it'll be okay, it's not like it was back then, we can do this now."

"Charlie I'm not letting you fucking die again!" the strain on Sneeg's voice didn't sound entirely from the effort anymore, it sounded almost like he was scared.

"Then you can prove it to me," the smile with which Charlie spoke seemed a complete contrast from the situation all of them were in, he didn't seem to be taking it seriously despite the state of being paralysed in fear he was in moments ago. And then, to everyone's suprise, he started to run.

Even Security was caught off guard, hesitating a moment before it leapt off Sneeg's sword and changed course, kicking up dirt as it gave chase.

The angle Charlie took meant Security had some leeway with the lasso before it reached its full length again, and thank fuck for that because it was stopped midway through a strike for Charlie's head.

"Oh shit-!" Charlie exclaimed, feeling the wind from the claw swipe brushing against his neck, but he continued running, behind the stage and towards the location of the unreasonably large capybara statue.

Phil, Jaiden and Quackity barely stayed on their feet, desperately clutching to the rope to keep the monster in place as it struggled furiously against them to continue its course for its target. Cellbit and Niki weren't so lucky, falling once the mass of wires they were pushing against had disappeared, Sneeg barely doing better but faster to follow after it, calling Charlie's name in a panic.

Now the ropeburn was really starting to show its extent and Phil's fingers were finding it increasingly hard to keep their grip. But he couldn't let go, not with Charlie running out in the open on some unexplained mission with this thing moments away from tearing him apart if it weren't being leashed. Next he saw Cellbit and Niki run past, then Valkyrae, Sykkuno and Ethan, all headed for that statue.

From the way the lasso rope shook more by the second he could tell he wasn't the only one reaching his limit. The creature never ceased tugging against them and soon it would be up to everyone else to make sure it didn't take another life, that its rampage of terror ended here and now. He was scared, as he always was, scared of everything going wrong, but he had to remember who these people were. Sure, they had changed, but fuck Hetch, that wasn't any reason to distrust them. He would never stop being thankful they were back and he would never stop having faith in them.

So he had to trust them, all his friends, and believe that they had the strength to fight these demons on their own- with a little help, of course. But in the end the fight came down to them.

They'd given them time, they had to be at the statue by now. Whatever plan Ethan, Sykkuno and Rae had come up with, it had better be a good one.

Phil sucked in a breath and let the rope slip as the torn skin on his palms gave out.

Get his ass, Charlie.

~

Wow, that really was a big capybara.

Charlie wanted to have a little moment to admire the statue but he realised soon that was really not on the cards. Sneeg was screaming at him and behind him he could see everyone else, even Security, getting closer. They probably had less than a minute. Someone needed to explain this plan and fast.

"Charlie what the fuck, what the hell is wrong with you?!" Sneeg shook his arm when he at last closed the distance.

"You said you can protect me, so protect me while I help you guys kill that thing," Charlie told him simply.

Sneeg was speechless for a moment, "I- that's- don't put yourself in danger like that! Jesus Christ, Charlie, this thing is only after you, please, I don't want to let you get hurt again!"

Charlie let his nonchalance fade for a second as he took note of the emotion seeping into Sneeg's voice, "Sneeg, I know what I'm doing- we both died to this thing, but this is our chance to make sure no one else does. Besides, uh, Niki," he added with a nervous laugh, seeing she was next to join them along with Cellbit.

"Fuck that thing's fast," Niki commented as she stared at the creature over her shoulder, then at Charlie as it was clearly him she was the most scared for, "what now?"

"I'm really just hoping Ethan wasn't talking out his ass," Sneeg grimaced at the thought as the last three finally caught up.

"Alright quick- we need most people up top, but at least someone to keep it in position down here," Rae was first to start giving out instructions. Charlie assumed the one keeping Security in place would be him, much to Sneeg's annoyance. Hey, it wasn't his fault the thing had been sent on a mission to brutally murder him and him alone. Charlie just tried not to think too hard about that bit- now wasn't the time to get trapped in his own head again.

"Yeah, alright, what then?" Niki demanded.

"You see that?" Ethan indicated the giant concrete orange atop the capybara's head, "we do it the Showfall way."

"You still haven't told us what- okay, fuck it, fine, we don't have time!" Sneeg shouted out, "all of you head to the top of the statue now! This had better work."

Sneeg made his voice as threatening as he could but Sykkuno tried to remain unaffected, "it will, just get it under the orange, we'll make sure this works."

With no time to waste the rest of them headed up the scaffolding that took them atop the statue leaving Sneeg and Charlie together, only able to watch as the beast leapt towards them, unnervingly close and not slowing down.

"You're an idiot," Sneeg told him, tone revealing far more than his words. Although he would've definitely liked to hide it Charlie could still hear the fear in his voice, although humour joined it, still able to find something to smile at while staring down the approaching visage of your own killer. It was terrifying, really. But neither of them seemed all too scared.

They could hear shouts from above, orders being thrown around as the plan approached its fulfilment. Charlie really hoped this went well. He'd run here knowing the very real risk of his guts being spilled like they had been twice already, but it was also a reasonable request for him to hope that that didn't happen right now.

The beast got closer. Sneeg stepped forward to hold up his sword. Charlie stepped forward to match.

"You're not dying for me," he warned.

"I wasn't planning to," Sneeg told him, lying.

Closer. Moments away.

"I'm sorry we couldn't get there in time to help you," Charlie said.

"What, back in the mall..? Dude, who even cares, I'm not gonna hold that against you."

"I know. You might hold this against me though."

The monster dug its claws into the ground and leapt for them just as Charlie pushed Sneeg to the ground. He shut his eyes tight and felt the wind before the impact.

CRASH

As the air settled he found his organs surprisingly intact, and the sounds he found himself afflicted with were of an annoyed friend rather than a screaming beast of wire and nightmares.

"Charlie what the fuck, what the fuck?!" Sneeg sounded pretty pissed, as he expected, but at least he also sounded alive.

Charlie dared to open his eyes and almost jumped back as he was no longer looking at a forest clearing slash karaoke party, his vision was instead filled by a giant mass of orange concrete.

"That's what you get, you dumb monster!" Charlie heard a yell from above and angled his head to see Niki leaning over the edge of the orange-less capybara head, shouting down at where the monster had been moments ago, but now there was no evidence left of it in Charlie's view.

"Why the fuck did you push me?! That hurt!" Sneeg suddenly brought the attention back to him.

Charlie sighed, "because I thought you might try do something dumb if I didn't, you clearly didn't have much faith in this plan. But I knew you guys would help me. It's not really self sacrifice when I know you're gonna try save me first."

"That was still dumb and I hate you," Sneeg joked.

"So you were gonna try and get in the way so it killed you before it killed me?" Charlie grinned.

Sneeg looked away, "dude, come on, I can't actually be that predictable..."

"I appreciate it, Sneeg," Charlie laughed and extended an arm to help him back up, "I'd probably be doing the same for you, let's be honest..."

"I wouldn't, I'd just kill the damn thing!" Niki shouted down to them with a laugh and they could hear Ethan nervously warning her not to be so close to the edge.

Charlie laughed and then looked back down, again staring at the massive orange once Sneeg was back on his feet. He took a step around the edge and caught a glimpse of where Security had gone, its lower half sticking out the other side, motionless. Huh, so this was the 'Showfall way'. He supposed crushing was a weirdly common way to go on their shows, especially the head...

"Foolish might be kinda mad about this," Cellbit warned them as he started making his way back down, "he's not precious about all his builds, but he likes capybaras a whole lot."

"He'll be honoured we used it to take care of that thing, then!" Valkyrae offered as a solution.

"We can help rebuild if we need to," Sykkuno offered, a little less assured of how forgiving Foolish would be.

"I'm glad it worked at least, Jesus," Sneeg sighed, "it was not pleasant staring at that thing while it was in full fucking sprint."

"Tell me about it, you at least had the choice to be here," Charlie walked back to Sneeg's side and nudged him, "but I'm happy you were. That was pretty brave."

"Don't try making me fucking blush," Sneeg scowled, hiding a smile.

"I'm glad everyone was here," Niki added, hopping down from the side of the statue despite Ethan repeatedly trying to get her to use the scaffolding, "those guys back there with the lasso, and Cellbit was the one with the massive axe to actually separate the orange from the rest of the sculpture. We would've been pretty fucked without that."

Charlie felt his heart drop a little realising how close he had actually been to yet another death but tried to ignore it.

"Teamwork!" Ethan called down, carefully making his way back down the scaffolding.

Charlie laughed and nodded before his attention once again returned to the giant orange, "so...guess that's dealt with. Feels weird to be standing by the corpse of the thing that killed me."

"Better than it still being alive. Good riddance," Sneeg concluded, stepping away and going around the orange back towards karaoke, "now I think it's time to go beat the shit out of Hetch."

"As long as nobody's beat you to the punch," Charlie added. Sneeg sighed, but it wasn't completely disappointment.

"I'm glad you're alright, man."

"Me too."

Chapter Text

Ranboo was staring at Hetch on the stage, every breath an effort. This was a nightmare. But he was so painfully awake.

"It's impressive how protective your friends have become of one another, Ranboo. And yet you continue to let them die for you."

They may have hated the man, more than words could express, but it was undeniable he had a skill for picking the perfect words and the perfect way to say them, all in order to break Ranboo until he was nothing. He could never forget that those same words had been said to them while in the jaws of metal death while they awaited their judgement. He had stared into the camera then, begging, pleading for a mercy that did not exist. There were only two options and both would kill him one way or another.

And this current reality they had to pull themself back into didn't feel too different. Not one camera but rather dozens were targeted at them by Hetch's direction, just like before the viewers were making their judgement on what he was, a monster or a victim. Because he was never given a third option.

Although not every gaze that Ranboo tried to avoid the searing presence reminded him of that judgement, that despised scrutinisation of their very being. Some others just seemed lost amongst the unfolding events and information; half the crowd probably thought this was some planned mid-karaoke event they hadn't been warned of beforehand.

All these things- Hetch calling Ranboo out by name, bringing all eyes to him, and calling them back to the worst three minutes in their short and hellish memory- he wanted to go, he desperately wanted to be anywhere but here. Ranboo also realised then, that these words were only half meant for him, and the other crafted for the audience, because why else would he use their name? He was only ever Hero to this bastard, using the name everyone else called him was only a compromise to make sure this audience knew who he was talking about when he started letting them know the terrible person their friend truly was.

They had stripped Hetch of his power and yet he still found ways to pull the strings. Ranboo felt sick already but Hetch was nowhere near done.

"Are you going to fill them all in, or shall I do the honours? Of our deal in which you decided to bestow this fate upon your friends?"

From the tone Ranboo knew this wasn't for them. This performance, despite being addressed directly to him, was all crafted for their crowd of listeners. It made them feel so small, that in Hetch's eyes they would always be subservient to this audience, an item to be observed, only a character in this play and not a real person at all.

Hetch was a one trick pony, though. It was just like before, for better or for worse, the blame of everything put on their shoulders because this was their show, they were the Hero, and it was their choices that lead to this.

Sneeg, fighting for his life. Charlie behind him and Niki pulling at the monster but doing nothing. Phil and some others had run in that direction too, but Ranboo hadn't. He was still stood here. Watching. Watching as the consequences of every choice crashed down upon them.

They could've said something. He knew the threat Hetch had made, and he was the one who hadn't just done something to stop it. And they really thought they could move on from that, that he could damn his friends to the jaws of a beast and still act like he deserved kindness afterwards. Maybe when everyone learnt what their old friend had become, when they couldn't look at them without disgust in their eyes, it would be what he deserved.

And now the monster was after Charlie and it would kill him again because Ranboo failed to save him again because he couldn't stop making the same mistakes again and again and again

"Hey, Ran...what's this guy talking about?"

Ranboo whipped his head round, unable to hide the shock from suddenly being addressed by another voice. He met Toby's eyes, and the man instantly looked apologetic for scaring them.

"It's- it's, uh-" Ranboo jumped in before Toby started apologising, because he couldn't handle someone else being sorry to him in the face of all the shit he had yet to apologise for, "d-don't use a nickname. I'm not...I'm not the person that you knew before all of this."

"King what the fuck are you talking about?" Toby responded. Ranboo took a moment to reply to that, such a blunt question not having been expected.

"It's- I let this happen. I've ruined everything."

Before Toby could say a anything, Hetch was speaking again.

"Oh, I suppose you don't do well with audiences anymore, so I'll just have to do it myself," Hetch mocked. Ranboo wanted to stay and hear what came next as much as he wanted to leave and deny anything had ever happened. Either way it wouldn't stop Hetch from giving them the truth. They were fucked no matter what.

"You see, everyone, Ranboo here agreed to let this monster run rampant in exchange for him not having to go through the effort of doing a simple task, letting his friends die rather than paying me back a favour. But this wouldn't be the first time you've just stood by, would it?"

Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it-

"You've got no right to say that you asshole!"

Austin's voice. It rang clearly in their ears, his hardly contained rage and how his fists were probably already balled up. Ranboo was so incredibly thankful for the interruption at last, but had a sinking feeling why it had taken this long. Austin had probably wanted to know what this deal was, even if it was just bullshit pouring from Hetch's mouth. He had a right to know the awful mistake- no, that term was too forgiving- the awful choice Ranboo had made, even if in the end it would certainly make him think less of them.

But he'd interrupted now, now that Hetch was moving onto something they all knew too well. It wouldn't be that easy to stop him though.

"Have you forgotten my threat already, G- uh," Hetch probably had to stop himself from using Austin's title from the show so that he didn't sound insane when addressing him, "nevermind- I still have control of Security, as feral a beast you may view him as. One more word from you and it might be your last."

Austin bit his tongue, likely a million curses and insults waiting to be hurled but staying held on a very tense leash. And immediately they were defenceless again, nobody having a weapon against Hetch, not those from the mall or the island or even the eggs. Baghera looked like she was holding Pomme back out of fear the egg would do something rash. And this was just the perfect time for Cucurucho to be nowhere in sight.

Ranboo dared a glance at the situation still unfolding in the distance. They could hardly believe nobody had yet been hurt and were unbelievably relieved to see they weren't. They were all doing something strange with a lasso, though, and Ethan, Sykkuno and Valkyrae were running towards them. Not that it looked like they could help much more against such a monster.

It wasn't taking its focus off Charlie. God, what had Ranboo done- he'd killed his closest friend, again, again, because this was the person they were and this made it clear enough that they would never improve, never be worthy of the trust handed to him on a silver platter like nothing.

"Now to get back on track once more...quite a lot happened while your friends were missing," he spoke to the crowd, who were apprehensive but painfully unaware of just how terrible this man speaking to them was, "some truly terrible things, I'm sure, but events such as those are the best for bringing the true nature out of people. And that is what I have been yearning to tell you all about. You want to know the truth, don't you?"

And how could any of them say they didn't? Even if the truth was something that hurt them, even if it was hardly the truth at all, they all wanted to know.

Ranboo saw Charlie run, and the monster run after him. It was all happening again. He could already feel the box closing around his head.

"Well, when it came to a choice between him and his friends, Ranboo always seemed to favour-"

"I can tell them," Ranboo's anxieties suddenly bubbled over into words that they didn't realise had been so loud until they silenced Hetch himself. He didn't know why he'd done that. It was a terrible thing to do, actually, because just as everyone had been distracted with the stage their eyes were all now back on him again. But they couldn't, no matter how hard it was ingrained in them to just stand by and watch, they couldn't let this happen on someone else's turn. At least if they told the truth themself they might still be able to live with themself despite it all. If Hetch was the one to say it instead it would be another part of him taken away, that no longer belonged to him. They would be so much closer to nothing.

"You can?" the mockery and the patronisation of Hetch's voice was enough to incur another feeling of sickness, but throwing up now wouldn't be great, "well then, I'm sure they'd love to hear it," and by they Hetch definitely meant himself, "why don't you come up here, then?"

It wasn't a question that was asking for Ranboo's opinion, it was a challenge, one that Hetch wanted him to fail. Audiences. Thinking of the word left its implications hanging in the air and Ranboo didn't want to consider a single one. Them being the focus of attention, with all those eyes, staring, thinking, voting. No, there was no voting in this context. None that had been introduced yet at least.

It was a challenge and Ranboo would not back down, he would force themself to the centre of that stage just for a better shot of spitting on Hetch's stupid mask. And he'd tell the truth. His own account of it.

Toby had some protests as Ranboo moved forward but wasn't fast enough to stop them pushing away through the crowd and oh god they're looking no, just ignore them. There weren't viewers controlling him anymore, all they could do was watch and react. Being watched still made Ranboo feel vile but a reminder that it could be worse was better than nothing.

The next to attempt to stop them, more successfully this time, was Austin, who pulled him back by the sleeve, "Ran, the last thing you wanna do is feel pressured by this guy, don't give him the shit he wants."

Ranboo shook their head, "no, it's fine. I need to tell everyone what happened eventually, anyways."

"Yeah, on your own terms! Not when this cock is forcing you into it! I'm not giving these people shit until I'm ready."

"I don't have any other options, Austin," Ranboo emphasised, hoping that would end this conversation, but Austin kept them in place.

"And what's with this fucking deal thing, anyways? He barely explained that," Austin questioned.

Ranboo looked to the side, to the floor, anywhere except anyone's eyes, "I let him bring security here."

"Yeah, but that's not the full story, is it?" Austin continued to press. Ranboo was confused, he didn't even seem the slightest bit worried or disapproving about Ranboo's confession.

"Well- I- either I was gonna help him get free, or he'd hurt you guys, and I- I just let him!" Ranboo shouted out, and Hetch could probably hear them from here, but this wasn't for him.

Austin rubbed his face and muttered something, only just audible, "they really had to go and put a kid through all this," then he took a breath and stared Ranboo in the eyes, so intensely he didn't dare look away, "Ranboo, it was never your responsibility in the first place to stop this piece of absolute human trash from doing his dumbass little evil plans and fucking up our lives, that's his deal and he deserves to rot in hell for it and I'd kick his ass right now if I didn't wanna see you do it so badly first."

"Y-you want me to go up there and beat him up?"

"I want you to stop beating yourself up, like, right now," Austin was more serious that Ranboo had ever seen him be, "and then yeah, I do also wanna see you kick the shit out of the guy who thought making me pretend to be straight was the funniest shit ever," Austin tried to hide a grimace at the last part.

Ranboo looked back, devoid of anything to possibly say as a response. Austin held tighter to their sleeve, "no more votes or manipulation. This is your own choice."

And then he let Ranboo go, and it felt like he'd lost an anchor, now drifting back to the sea of eyes and towards that looming destination of the stage. But it was with a new resolve he was let free to that ocean, and their eyes were set on the stage to meet the one awaiting him. Hetch looked down on him, and they weren't much a fan of that angle, but the masked man at least turned his head when they both heard some great but distant crash.

Hetch was first to wave it off, "I hope this stage is more structurally sound than whatever that was..."

Ranboo wasn't so sure that was the result of poor construction falling apart, but it wasn't like they were willing to go check.

"So, what is it you'd like to tell everyone?" Hetch was quick to move on once Ranboo had stepped up to the same level.

Don't look, don't look- it was all Ranboo could do to stay ignorant of all the eyes, so many of them, all staring- and it was worse up here, so much worse, because he was high enough to see every person that looked up to analyse them, to scrutinise them, to make them feel like an object for nothing but observing. And none of them probably meant to do that, but it was what they were doing regardless, so Ranboo could only ignore it as they tried to do what they'd come here to do.

Which was...he wasn't so sure what that was anymore. If it wasn't to tell everyone the truth, and it probably wouldn't be to beat someone up either, what would it be? They didn't feel strong enough to defeat Hetch with words or fists, in both of those areas the man seemed superior. He had cracked the old metal mask the first time they'd had a struggle and Ranboo hadn't really landed much damage in return.

Would violence even help them? He recalled something like this, a knife in his hand and he thought stabbing it into that employee would be cathartic, that it would offer some sort of closure. It hadn't. It had only become one of many things that haunted him.

But telling everyone what had happened in that mall wouldn't be any kind of closure either, not when it was on Hetch's terms. The silence pressured them into making their choice but without a clear path to choose they would just be stuck here until they broke under it. A million eyes, a microphone, and footsteps.

Footsteps?

The only noise and it was getting louder, but who the hell was walking through the clearing towards them? Ranboo didn't need another person here to be watching them as everything fell apart. Or...people. They were coming from behind the stage and there were multiple of them. Wasn't that the direction Charlie had ran, and everyone had followed? It couldn't possibly be them returning, but it didn't sound like the monster.

Hetch had taken notice and was facing the same way, also curious about the arrival judging by his lack of any snarky comments.

Ranboo's heart stopped, but in a good way for once, as the group got to the side of the stage and into view.

"Sorry, would've got here earlier if Niki didn't want to grab this."

Charlie took a breath after talking, exhausted but with a smile on his face, and let go of a very deformed looking TV.

For probably the first time in history, Hetch was speechless.

"I just wanted to make sure it was dead," Niki defended herself.

"It got crushed, that was definitely overkill," Valkyrae told her, but not really implying the overkill was a bad thing.

"Now," Sneeg cracked his knuckles, "what's been happening back here?"

Behind the mask Hetch probably gulped.

Ranboo couldn't begin to process their relief. He had been resigned to the fate of their friends, that his actions had cursed them to die yet again, and even if it wasn't permanent it was horrible and unforgivable. But his fears hadn't come true, and maybe they should've had a little more trust in everyone else, including the strange inhabitants of this island that were somehow happy to help without anything expected in return.

And now Hetch's leverage over all of them was gone. Security, the thing Ranboo had allowed to derail the entire harmless karaoke party, was no more. And now Hetch was left alone, no employees, no Security, only able to stare at the broken machine dumped on the ground. It would've been pitiful if he didn't deserve all of it.

And all this pain, all this suffering they had endured, it was all because of him. Maybe it angered Ranboo more that he would never realise how awful he was, not as long as he had this 'Founder' to hide behind. He would never be sorry for the shit he had done to them.

Ranboo could feel himself being tempted by that easy answer, the catharsis where they slammed Hetch against the ground now that his detestable, malicious plans had all fallen apart. He knew his friends were wanting that, Niki and Austin almost certainly. Eventually though, Hetch had thought of something to say, before any action could be taken.

"Well isn't this a perfect opportunity, Hero? I don't even have a weapon," it wasn't for the audience anymore. Now it was between the two of them, microphone held away from his mask. If Ranboo took it from him, what would he even say now?

"Don't keep me waiting. I know what it is you want to do," Hetch's voice seemed less performative, but this man was never genuine by any means. Ranboo squinted at him a little, consider if the man actually wanted to get beat up right now.

It had never been more of a pain that they couldn't see Hetch's expression, as his tone barely revealed anything besides the fact he still sounded like a prick.

It didn't feel like that room with the box anymore, now it felt more reminiscent of those stupid little fights in the cabin, the audience goading them into kicking, punching, or any manner of violent things. The idea of their actions being decided by others still made them sick, and it made them dizzy figuring out what they actually wanted compared to what they thought they wanted. Where Ranboo ended and where the Hero began.

And then Ranboo had a realisation. That violent, idealistically cathartic conclusion, that sounded very much like an end the Hero would want. A good end for a show, or an audience. A good end for Hetch.

Because even if he was bleeding out on the floor Ranboo doubted he'd care, because that would only mean in some sadistic and fucked up way that he still had a power over Ranboo, the power to make them hate him. And Ranboo doubted that giving in to that would be of any benefit to them.

So he shook his head, "I don't care what happens to you now. Go beat yourself up if you want."

And man did it feel good when Hetch visibly twitched. Ranboo could kind of see why this guy liked using his words so much.

"You- you will never be rid of me, Hero," and Hetch was almost starting to beg for a reaction from Ranboo, but one never came.

"No matter what you will never be able to live your life without remembering me, you will never be the person you were before! I took your memories from you and you will never get them back, the only life you have was in that mall and you can never escape that fact!"

Ranboo said nothing and hardly looked at Hetch as they took the microphone out of his furiously shaking hand and turned to the audience- no, not an audience. His friends.

"Do, uh...do any of you guys have a keytar?"

Chapter Text

The rest of the karaoke night went pretty well.

Ranboo went crazy on the keytar and Charlie looked about the proudest he could ever be, so much so that he insisted on singing onstage along with Ranboo's song, leading to him performing an interesting rap. Nevertheless, they had fun. The most fun any of them had had in a while really, which a past Ranboo might've thought was impossible when reliving an experience of performing to an audience alongside Charlie, but right now he realised that wasn't the case at all.

This wasn't anything like that, clearly, as Hetch was pushed to the side and surrounded by half of the eggs at all times, devoid of any power over the situation. He was probably getting more and more pissed off every time he saw someone smiling, and he could do nothing about it.

Austin and Sneeg, begrudgingly, had left him to that fate. They clearly wanted nothing more than to shove a fist in his face, but Ranboo had insisted he'd probably get some twisted pleasure from that and the worst ending that man could face was being ignored. And so, for the rest of the night, that was exactly what they did, and they certainly had a great time doing it.

But Ranboo could stomach this because he knew it wasn't a performance for everyone else, it was for them. Them and Charlie weren't running away through a mall, they were stood here together facing down what had chased them, that fear of being viewed, judged and diminished. They were facing it down and screaming stupid made up lyrics about nothing in particular to prove to nobody in particular that they controlled their own lives now.

And of course Baghera was next to join them, insisting now was the perfect time for their duet. Charlie was hesitant but eventually smiled and gave in, and Ranboo left them to it. The moment he stepped off the stage there was a crowd to greet them; Sneeg and Austin, who Ranboo was happy to see staying out of trouble, Niki, Ethan, Rae, Sykkuno, Vinny and Jerma, crowding around and complimenting his music.

Ranboo definitely thought it was too much praise, they were all most likely biased by the fact they were friends and he'd been struggling with the idea of performing. But they were friends, so who really cared. They could go without rejecting compliments just this once.

Laughing with them all while Charlie and Baghera gradually descended into insanity at the microphone, Ranboo couldn't help but feel some conflict rise in him. They never seemed to be able to enjoy themself without finding a problem.

"This probably would've been better without all the chaos in the middle..." Ranboo admitted, the guilt over derailing the karaoke night resurfacing.

"You kidding?" Sneeg scoffed, immediately dismissing every worry Ranboo had with a grin, "that made this night way more fun! Well, I guess it was pretty scary in the moment, but in retrospect that was sick!"

Ethan laughed nervously, "w-well, I dunno if it was fun for everyone, but we came out the other side alright, so no harm done."

"All those other guys came and helped us too," Niki added, "we didn't feel so much like strangers when we were all fighting together."

And that was definitely true, almost all of them had started opening up more and more to the people outside their group. Charlie had some memories which helped but Valkyrae and Sykkuno were apparently going to perform later with Jaiden, and they seemed pretty enthused about it. Not to mention everyone who had already been onstage and had a great time.

If they weren't getting old memories back then they were making new ones, which was even better in a sense.

"Hey, who's going up next? I think we kinda messed up the order of the performances," Jerma switched the subject, looking up at the stage then back at everyone else. Sykkuno unconfidently pointed to himself, then looked questioningly at Ethan.

"Don't look at me, I wasn't keeping track!" Ethan held his hands up.

"You should go up next anyway then, that song you were singing on the capybara was pretty good," Niki nudged him.

"Song? What song?" Ethan looked clueless.

"Y'know, the...you started singing it when I was going near the edge of the statue," Niki tried to explain.

Ethan's expression was blank a few more seconds, then he seemed to recall something, "wait, that? I didn't even mean to sing that, that's not the one I'm doing with Vinny, I don't even know what song that was," he ran a hand through his hair, half bewildered and half exhausted.

"Maybe the panic was activating something in you! What was it, whoa, don't try it, you might die if- uh," Niki jumped in with excitement and started singing in what was supposed to be an impression of Ethan's voice. Ethan didn't look too impressed but continued in a much quieter mumble as Niki failed to recall what he'd said.

"Don't try this, or you'll die if, you try this thing at home," followed by a mime of dramatically playing the drums.

"If you weren't gonna sing that then maybe you should," Vinny laughed, "it's not half bad."

"No, it is," Ethan assured him, "that is literally nothing. I'm pretty sure I just made it up."

"Hey, improv songs are pretty cool too," Vinny shrugged with a grin.

"Ran!"

Ranboo span around as Charlie hopped off the stage and closed the gap between them. Baghera was just behind him but was interrupted by a tackle hug from Pomme, who then led her back to some other islanders and eggs. Both of them were out of breath, having gone far too hard on their songs, but Charlie had never had such a wide smile on his face.

"Oh, hey! You're finished already?" Ranboo was secretly glad they hadn't gone for another song since they had a vision in their head of one or the other fainting on stage if they didn't at least stop to rest.

"I know, it went by so quick," Charlie rushed the words out between breaths, "I think Phil's next, right? He- uh- we had like, a, a competition, and, uh-" he cut himself off to breathe again, "yeah, he's gonna sing something too, but I doubt he can beat us!"

Ranboo nodded, "yeah, man, I'm not sure if anyone could, that really was something...plus I don't get the vibe he'd be singing those songs, like, uh," they struggled for a moment on how to describe the type of songs Charlie and Baghera had sung.

"Loud?" Charlie offered.

"Yeah, loud," Ranboo laughed.

They decided to rejoin the crowd as Phil did take to the stage after a little intermission, and Tallulah helped set everything up and gave him a thumbs up when it was ready.

Ranboo didn't know exactly what he'd been expecting, but it must definitely wasn't this.

"I've given up, I'm sick of feeling-!"

Whilst Ranboo was stunned into silence, Charlie had barely let up on the energy and was jumping and cheering beside them, almost to the point it was concerning Ranboo how he managed to stay this energetic without collapsing. In this context karaoke seemed more like a sacred art than anything, an intense ritual he had stepped in the midst of and of which he could feel the full power vibrating through the earth and through their body. Which was really quite an intense way to describe karaoke, they'd admit, but not much else would do justice to the intense and ecstatic atmosphere he found himself being drawn into. It was a celebration, a ritual, it was freedom and belonging, and what a strange place this was to belong in, but he couldn't imagine anything better than this.

"Put me out of my misery, put me out of my misery!"

When Ranboo paid attention the lyrics seemed quite dark, but Phil looked as joyous as ever and took an especially deep breath before the next line.

"Put me out of my fucking misery!"

Finally Charlie showed surprise as well as Phil held onto the note longer than either of them were expecting. Phil was determined to hold it out to the end, to a point it got worrying if he was about to collapse, but he managed it and took another huge breath afterwards. The crowd cheered and Charlie tried to tell something to Ranboo over the noise.

"This might be closer than I was expecting," he looked a little nervous now that he and Baghera had been given some proper competition.

"I don't think Phil backs away from a challenge, you might've chosen the wrong competitor," Ranboo laughed.

They stayed in the crowd until Phil had finally exhausted himself and they were given another break from the songs, at which point the noise of music was replaced by a dozen conversations in the crowd arising. At least the loud atmosphere was friendly. Charlie looked like he might've been about to say something when someone else came up to the two of them.

"Hey, we enjoying the event?"

Ranboo went to give a polite greeting but couldn't raise their hand to wave before Charlie shouted out at three times the volume of the newcomer, "Mariana!"

Mariana almost toppled back as Charlie leapt at him with a hug, "hey, Slime! Ah, sorry, Charlie, I mean- how's it going?"

"It's great! But, I- shit, I'm sorry, I meant to do karaoke with Baghera later so you could see it but we just went up a bit ago," Charlie looked up apologetically.

"Oh, yeah, I heard it! You were awesome man!"

Charlie was surprised, "wait, y-you did?" but then his joy shifted to concern, "w-wait, how long did you sleep?"

"Long enough!" Mariana confidently replied.

"Are you sure about that..?" Ranboo knew they'd been setting up the karaoke for a while, but not that long.

Charlie looked at Mariana closer as the man only gave a nervous laugh in response, "did you even sleep?"

"Aha, I, uh," Mariana looked away, "it was kind of hard with all the excitement the day before."

"Dude," Charlie looked disapproving.

"But hey, I got to see your performance! You were great!" Mariana quickly switched to look at the positives and refused to accept any more criticism of his choices as he pulled out some popcorn to share. Charlie was clearly still concerned over the sleep deprivation, but he put his worries aside as he gladly accepted a bucket and the next act approached the stage.

~

Phil welcomed Jaiden off the stage, Valkyrae already having jumped off and ran to another group to ramble about her drum playing while Sykkuno trailed further behind, a little more exhausted by the lights and music.

Jaiden was the most exhausted of the trio, having been fighting for her life against Hatsune Miku moments ago. Phil really couldn't understand why Jaiden wanted to sing the fastest vocaloid song ever made so badly, but knowing her she wouldn't have taken no as an answer if he tried to advise her against it.

"You good?" He laughed, watching as she still tried to regain her breath. She nodded, then had to take a moment to recover from the quick movement of nodding.

"Yeah! Why don't we do this, like, everyday?" she shouted excitedly.

"Because normally there's not this many people on the server, and unless you get put in the game you're gonna get a noise complaint."

"Oh, true..." Jaiden looked to the side, "so are we just like collapsed on all our computers right now? Because when I got out the game last time I had my keyboard imprinted on my face," she laughed despite it making it more difficult to catch her breath, the constant talking not helping with that either.

"I guess so. I hope Kristen doesn't think I've died, that wouldn't be good," Phil worried, having not thought much about his real life body while he was in here.

"I kinda need to be back in my real body soon to check in on my birds and make sure they haven't wrecked the place or pooped all over my desk. I'm pretty sure they were in the cage when I left. I think."

"Hopefully," Phil laughed nervously, "I guess all we can do is wait for Cucurucho to get back, he seems to be the only one with the power to bring us in and out."

"You still haven't seen him? Where did he go?" Jaiden asked, looking around.

"No idea," Phil sighed, "I'm just hoping he hasn't gotten into trouble."

Knowing Chayanne, he probably had.

"Can't be worse than the trouble we had," Jaiden reassured him. Phil looked around too, just in case the bear had reappeared, but instead caught sight of Toby as he approached them.

"Hey, so, I'm like, half sure all this is a fever dream, but I'm having a good time so I'm fine with it," he offered as a means of introduction.

"Well that's good at least," Phil replied, "sorry you got dragged into all this before shit hit the fan."

"Oh, I just stayed the fuck away from that monster thing and I was fine. Worth it to meet up with everyone anyways," he smiled in the direction of Ranboo and Charlie, "kinda pissed that Tom got spared though, I'm pretty sure he's ordering takeout right now."

"Sounds about right. Maybe it's for the better, he might've been reckless enough to throw himself at the monster if he was in the game with it," Phil grimaced imagining the alternate timeline.

"Sucks for him that he didn't get any party food," Jaiden smirked and took out a slice of cake she somehow had in her pocket. Phil looked at it for a moment.

"Did you take the slice of the cake specifically with the among us guy's ass on it?"

Jaiden looked away as she took a bite, "...no."

Phil rolled his eyes, knowing that was the slice that half this server probably would've gone for. More than half, actually.

"So is it just us and all the guys who were missing that are in the game right now?" Toby asked.

Phil thought about it for a moment before he nodded, "yeah, I guess we are. That's probably the main reason I'm feeling so much more exhausted than everyone else."

"Tell me about it," Jaiden wiped her forehead.

"Alright, I was just thinking," Toby continued, "when we get out of here I guess we're just gonna be back in our rooms, but where are Ran and everyone gonna wake up?"

"I'm flattered you think I know that much, but I've got absolutely no clue mate," Phil admitted.

"Will he?" Toby asked.

"Who-?" Phil turned to look where Toby was looking and found himself facing towards the newly returned bear.

"Where have you been dude?" Jaiden shouted out when she also saw the one Toby was talking about.

"Chayanne!" Phil managed to call out after the suprise and ran a few steps forwards to close the gap between them. As always the bear's buttoned expression revealed nothing, but it held out a paw to greet Phil as he approached.

"Okay, I guess I'm not getting an answer to my question then," Toby sighed and walked with Jaiden towards Phil and the bear. Chayanne quickly started writing in a book to explain himself.

HELLO!
I AM SORRY I WAS AWAY SO LONG.
HAVE YOU ALL BEEN OKAY?

"I mean, yeah, we're fine, but you've missed most of the karaoke, where were you?" Phil questioned.

"Uh, I think he missed more than just the karaoke, but sure," Jaiden corrected him.

IT WAS SOMETHING I HAD TO DO, I'M SORRY I DIDN'T TELL ANYONE.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN? DID SOMETHING HAPPEN?

"Something sure did happen, there was some fucking monster thing!" Toby told him.

Phil looked mildly annoyed as Chayanne continued to be undescriptive about where he'd been, but maybe it was better to get the details when there were more people around. The bear's presence was already drawing attention and no doubt other people would eventually join them to hear about it. Quackity was eyeing them with the most intensity and Phil resisted the urge to jokingly flip him off.

BUT EVERYONE IS OKAY RIGHT?
I HOPED THAT ALL OF YOU BEING TOGETHER TONIGHT WOULD OFFER SOME PROTECTION FROM THESE THINGS.
ALTHOUGH I ALSO HOPED YOU WOULDN'T NEED PROTECTION AT ALL.

"Yeah, yeah, we're all fine, we handled it," Jaiden assured him.

"So you knew we might get attacked, huh?"

"Jesus-" Phil grabbed his chest as Quackity was suddenly talking beside him, somehow he didn't notice the man's approach at all.

IT WAS AN UNFORTUNATE POSSIBILITY I TRIED MY BEST TO PREPARE FOR.
AGAIN, I AM SORRY FOR BEING ABSENT, BUT IT WAS FOR AN IMPORTANT REASON.

"Suuure buddy, awfully convenient that monster was showing up just as you disappeared though," Quackity raised an eyebrow.

"Christ Quackity, just leave him alone," Phil sighed.

"I didn't see any of those eggs going up and getting that guy off the stage either," Quackity continued, ignoring Phil and indicating to Hetch in the distance, surrounded by the eggs.

"I mean, Dapper and Ramón almost died, I think that counts for something," Jaiden countered. Quackity couldn't come up with a response before Cucurucho had his next book.

I CAN ASSURE YOU, THEY WANTED TO FIGHT.
I TOLD THEM NOT TO SO THAT THE PEOPLE HE HURT HAD THE CHANCE TO STAND AGAINST HIM.

"So you told them not to fight the guy sending monsters after us..." Quackity nodded like he'd just been proven right. Phil sighed again and put his head in his palm.

"The plan paid off, it's not like any of us even got hurt," Jaiden looked around at everyone, then back at their group, "and also we need Cucurucho if we wanna get out of here. So. I'd kinda like to trust him."

"Yeah, speaking of, uh, please," Toby requested.

Phil laughed, "we haven't even finished karaoke night, you wanna leave early?"

Toby looked Phil dead in the eyes, "Phil this entire night I have been trying to remember if I left my oven on I need to get out of here and check before my apartment burns down."

"Okay, that's definitely a valid reason," Phil nervously conceded.

ONCE YOU HAVE ALL FINISHED HERE I PLAN TO GET ALL OF YOU OUT.

"All? Like... all all?" Phil raised an eyebrow.

"Wait, wait, wait," Jaiden jumped in, picking up on what Phil was implying, "are all our friends getting back to the real world too?"

Toby gasped, "dude, for real?" and even Quackity looked excited at the idea. Chayanne held onto his book for a moment before showing it.

YES

Toby cheered after reading the book, meanwhile Phil was almost in disbelief. It wasn't like he'd been doubting that Chayanne would fulfill his promise, but the confirmation that their friends really were coming back to the real world so soon was a welcome suprise.

Jaiden turned to Quackity, "are you gonna find a problem with this too?". She looked even more smug when Quackity couldn't come up with a response.

I CAN TELL YOU MORE ABOUT HOW AFTER THE KARAOKE.
I DON'T WANT TO INTERRUPT.

"Can't be long now until we're finished. How many people are left that wanted to perform?" Phil turned his head to see if he could identify anyone approaching the stage.

"Vinny and Ethan wanted to, I think," Jaiden told him.

"Hey, why would you be worried about that, it wouldn't be the first time you let something interrupt our night," Quackity remarked.

"Big Q would you kindly please shut the fuck up," Toby said.

"Wh- y- you only just got here! You don't even know what's going on!" Quackity told him while Phil tried not to start laughing.

Toby rolled his eyes, "yeah, but I know enough to know you're being a whiny little bitch right now."

Quackity just looked at him silently for a moment.

"That's it I'm logging off."

Phil laughed, "don't combat log an argument!"

"I'm not! I'm just- uh-" Quackity tried to think of a different term.

"Rage quitting?" Jaiden suggested.

"Oh my god I hate all of you," Quackity grumbled.

"You're the one being a hater, man," Toby shrugged.

Phil sighed, hiding the smile on his face, and saw in the corner of his eyes Ethan and Vinny walking towards the stage. Quackity and the others continued arguing, so he decided to try and tune in to their conversation instead.

"Yeah, I'm just hoping this helps me figure it out," Vinny was telling Ethan, "I know I have some connection to music, I know an instrument after all, but I still can't put my finger on what."

"I'm sure you'll get the answer eventually, either way don't worry about it, you don't have to know whatever it is to do some dumb karaoke event like this," Ethan reassured him, "I'm pretty sure I've never done anything music related before, I just like to sing."

"Yeah, that's fair," Vinny sighed, pushing away his worries as both of them walked past Phil and got onto the stage.

Ethan ran across the stage to grab a guitar for Vinny while he went to the mic to do a quick check. However, as his mouth opened to talk, he hesitated. For the briefest moment there was conflict and confusion, but then realisation as at last he spoke, "oh shit, I used to be in a band!"

Chapter Text

Before long the event concluded, and while the exhausted performers were mostly thankful for that, there were some that had to be dragged away from the stage so that they didn't sing another song that made them lose their voice.

The atmosphere remained buzzing with all the lingering excitement that had come before, but it was clear they were all more subdued, as for many it was far later in the night than it was for those in the game. Charlie continued to raise concerns about Mariana's sleep, but Mariana was insistent he would be fine, probably.

Phil stayed by the bear, watching everyone else at its side. Everyone had a conversation to be in and something to laugh with everyone else about. Phil didn't need to be involved in that to be happy about it too.

The two were in a happy silence for some time, waiting for the excitement to be faded enough that Chayanne could start a proper explanation to everyone. Phil had to hold himself back in order not to pry for answers on his own, he was desperate to know but everyone else needed to hear what was going on just as much as him.

Phil could feel something he wanted to say pulling on his lips, though. This would probably be the best time for it, without anyone else to hear it besides the two of them. But a nudge at his side cut him off, and he saw that Chayanne had slid a book over to him. Curiously, he opened it.

YOU SHOULD MEET UP LIKE THIS AGAIN IN YOUR WORLD.
YOU'RE ALL SO HAPPY WHEN YOU'RE TOGETHER.

"Yeah, we probably should," Phil agreed, feeling like the idea was obvious now that he'd been told it, "we'd have to get a pretty big venue though."

"Ha ha ha," the bear laughed, and as robotic as it was Phil couldn't help but read some emotion into it. Joy, but longing. He assumed the entities like Cucurucho and the eggs couldn't really exist in the real world like the rest of them.

"We can still do plenty of events here with you too," he nudged the bear, forgetting how plushy he was and almost falling into it.

YOU DON'T NEED US TO HAVE FUN.

"Yeah, but...I'd like you to have fun. It's the least we could do, really."

Chayanne looked back over everyone else with his unreadable button eyes and after a moment so did Phil, lingering on the bear to figure out what was going through his head. Whatever it was, it was nothing to worry about, he supposed. Even with the chaos this had been one of the best nights of his life, and the gift of his friends finally returning only made it sweeter. He couldn't find a fault with that.

~

Quackity was one of the first to finish up and head over to hear at last what the bear had to say. He wasn't the first, because he shivered at the thought of being alone with Phil and Cucurucho and having them bully him for not blindly trusting the mysterious bear robot creature thing that had complete control over all their friends and probably all the other people it had dragged into this game. But as long as he came along with some others, he could stare judgingly at Cucurucho in peace.

Those others were Cellbit and Jaiden, who he currently felt the most comfortable around since they were the ones who'd also been in this mess from the start. Neither of them distrusted Cucurucho as much as he did, but they didn't suck up to the bear as much as Phil either. Cellbit also dragged Roier along with him, and Richarlyson followed them. Quackity would rather the egg was on Hetch watching duty, but he wouldn't say as much with the egg's parents so close by.

Some other groups headed over, having seen them doing so. Phil and Cucurucho were already standing in front of a little crowd now, so the bear decided to get started. He couldn't show a book to everyone, so he passed one to Phil for him to read out like a translator.

"Um, thank you all for coming to this karaoke, and for being there to help each other," Phil read out, "I'm overjoyed that you are all such good friends to one another."

"Yes, I really am so great," Etoiles' voice emerged from the crowd, and Quackity could hear Phil suppressing a laugh.

"Ahem, uh," Phil continued, "I'll go over the details when everyone is here, but right now everything is in place for your friends to leave and return to your world."

"Oh, shit, really?" Ethan asked. It seemed this was the first any of the people trapped in the game were hearing about this.

Cucurucho nodded and handed over another book for Phil to read, "apologies that it took so long. I hope you enjoyed the island."

Despite his pessimism, Quackity did smile a little as he heard the excitement in the crowd. If Cucurucho did as he said, and that was if- Quackity still wanted proof of the bear's intentions- but if he really was getting them all out then he would be heartless for not getting at least a little excited. And it seemed that everyone had indeed enjoyed the island, he might've been one of the only ones at this point who kept his reservations about everything going on.

Cucurucho turned to look at the distance and Tallulah, now present with him, put down a sign that Quackity could just barely see.

You want him to hear it too?

Cucurucho nodded to her and after a moment she nodded too and left, at which point Quackity saw she was headed towards Hetch and his small crowd of surrounding eggs. After the big monster fiasco Quackity had seen how much of an asshole this guy really was so he wasn't too happy that he was apparently being included now too, but he guessed that he had some right to hear this if he was also leaving the game.

Quackity was abruptly hit from the side and turned to see, unsurprisingly, it was Richarlyson. He sighed and resisted hitting the egg as he put down a sign to tell him something.

Psst come with me

"What? Why?" Quackity whispered into his mic, although it was about as loud as if he'd said it normally.

Just follow me pendejo =_=

"Hey!" Quackity shouted in offense, but followed the egg as it walked off anyway.

He was lead to the outskirts of the clearing, near a line of trees, and saw that he wasn't the only one. A few other eggs and quite a few other players had gathered here, which confused Quackity since they were all supposed to be with Cucurucho to hear about stuff going on right now. It seemed to be most of the people that weren't in the game, Maximus and Baghera among them, even Cellbit and Roier had been dragged over without him realising. What was this all for?

It looked like more of the eggs were free now that Hetch had been dragged to Cucurucho and didn't need so many of them watching him, and Richarlyson and Pomme were having an exchange to the side while he could see Leo in the crowd. Quackity squinted at the two communicating eggs. He still didn't know why he was here, and something about this felt strange.

how do I use this thing again O_o

Richas...

Don't judge me this is hard!!

Quackity stepped closer to get a glimpse at something Richarlyson was holding which he didn't recognise.

ok nvm think I got it

Quackity was just about to open his mouth to say something, but it didn't matter as he was cut off by a loud, very high pitched noise.

Quackity's eyes closed, and when he opened them again he was in a clearing.

"You-" he began after a few seconds to get his bearings, heading straight for the child-shaped Richarlyson. Pomme jumped in and stood between them before either one did something brash and held up a sign that she seemed to have pre-prepared.

Sorry it had to be so sudden, but we wanted you all in this world for what comes next, trust us you'll want to be here.

Once Quackity had read it she didn't wait for his response, instead turning her sign and pushing it towards everyone else, who had clearly also been pulled into the game by their disgruntlement and general confusion. Then she flipped the sign round, where a translation was written, and Richarlyson held up his own translated sign too.

"Trust you? It's not exactly building our trust to put us in here without anyone's consent," Fit complained.

"Can you guys also not be super vague about something for once?" Foolish added.

it's called keeping a suprise you guys are such buzzkills

Pomme rolled her eyes at Richarlyson and wrote out a more helpful sign.

There's certain things you can only experience from being in this world. Don't worry, you won't be in here for long now.

"You could've at least asked!" Quackity interjected, not as loud as he had been before since he found it a bit more uncomfortable yelling at something that looked like a kid rather than a pixelated egg. Pomme just turned to him looking mildly annoyed.

If we did then you definitely would've said no. And out of everyone you have one of the biggest reasons to be here.

"What, because it's my server?" Richarlyson laughed at his question, which Quackity didn't appreciate.

it hasn't been your server for a while now XD

Quackity flipped the egg off, which Richas happily did to him in return. He saw that the egg was still holding onto that device, its shape clearer now that he was seeing it in this world, but it still wasn't anything he recognised or understood.

"As long as we're not here to fight any more monsters," Baghera sighed.

"I dunno, I was kinda looking forward to that bit!" Etoiles nudged her.

"Don't tempt them..." Baghera gave a worried glance to the eggs.

"Is...is there anything you want us to do? Or can we go back to where everyone else is?" Quackity looked and saw Mariana asking the question, hand slightly raised to get the attention of the eggs.

The eggs looked at one another and Pomme shrugged, then held up a sign.

Unless you have questions or anything then I suppose you're free to leave.

Mariana let out a quick, "woo!" and ran off in the direction of Cucurucho and everyone else. Some other people that Quackity didn't even realise had joined today followed suit. He wasn't planning on going yet, he still had some choice words he'd like to give to these eggs. Everything he needed answers to was a secret, but he didn't like the idea of just waiting around until he found out.

Then he glanced over his shoulder, and watched as Mariana tackle hugged Charlie and the two of them almost fell to the ground. Oh, nevermind, did fall to the ground. The two of them seemed pretty happy about it though.

He was startled as Roier lightly elbowed him to get his attention, Cellbit still beside him.

"Quackity, come on man, smile! It's like a big IRL meetup, how can you be a bitch about that?" he grinned.

"It's not exactly in real life but it's close enough," Cellbit added.

Quackity pursed his lips and looked at both of them, "how the fuck are you guys so calm about this?"

Cellbit shrugged, "I dunno, I'm kinda getting used to switching between dimensions. When else are you gonna get the chance to be in a video game, you know? You should make the most of it!"

Quackity grumbled and turned his head to the side, where it looked like Etoiles was trying to convince Pomme to summon a monster, and Baghera was pulling on his arm to try to get him away. Maximus and BadBoyHalo were pulling out and comparing their weapons, much to Richarlyson's delight.

At this point there wasn't much he could do, he couldn't leave the game and he could only dream of dragging any information out of the eggs if it was all meant to be a 'surprise'.

"You wanna go see if getting the wine in here gets us drunk in the real world?" Roier suddenly asked. Cellbit grinned at him and then looked at Quackity to see his response. He sighed and closed his eyes, then looked back at them.

"Yeah, sure," he gave in, and Cellbit didn't hesitate a moment before dragging him to the food and drink tables.

~

Jaiden helped pull Charlie and Mariana back up, having been just barely out of range of the two falling onto her as well, "wait, since when did you get put in the game?"

Mariana dusted himself off, still a little out of breath, "oh, it was, uh- Richarlyson got us all in here, something's happening soon, I guess, I didn't really listen-"

"Wait, really?" Toby asked beside her, and Jaiden looked where Mariana had run over from, seeing Richarlyson and the crowd of other players around him. She laughed to herself when she saw Quackity among them- he probably wasn't happy about it.

"Well, if we're leaving, I suppose that's pretty big. Maybe this is meant to be a goodbye thing?" Charlie suggested.

"Goodbye?!" Mariana exclaimed, continuing before Charlie could clarify, "no, no, we are going to meet up after this! Come to Mexico, we can all hang out again!"

"Alright, alright," Charlie put his hands up defensively, "I wasn't expecting to never see you again, I just mean this could be the last time we're all in a video game together. Unless Cucurucho wants to invite us back..."

"I think we've caused enough chaos," Jaiden laughed, but it would probably be nice to come back here some time for the memories. And also being in a video game is sick as hell.

"I guess that's why Cucurucho was stalling, if he wants everyone else here," Toby assumed, "still kinda wish he'd get on with it though."

"I doubt anything's gonna be on fire when you get back, you'll probably just need to be careful about lighting matches," Jaiden tried her best to assure him, although he didn't actually seem that worried about his apartment burning down, just mildly inconvenienced.

The other group with Pomme and Richas seemed to be returning now though, and Jaiden looked from them to Cucurucho and Phil, the former of which had been giving Phil books every now and then as means of conversation between them. Phil was in the middle of saying something back when someone interrupted him.

"Phil?"

Phil span around, "Missa?"

Missa smiled back at him, "Phil!"

Phil smiled and extended his arms towards the other man, "Missa!"

Jaiden laughed a little as the two ran over to each other and tried not to make it too obvious she was listening in.

"How long have you been here?" Phil demanded as he patted Missa on the shoulder.

"I was too busy to join tonight, but then an admin kept messaging me over and over so I gave in- I still missed karaoke, but I didn't miss you!" he laughed, then stopped himself, "no, I did miss you, I mean, but you're here now- English is confusing."

"Tell me about it- I'm glad you're here, though. It's been ages!" Phil had glanced back at Cucurucho at the mention of an admin, a knowing look in his eye. Cucurucho looked at him with that same sewn smile that oddly looked bashful, then back at the crowd.

Everyone was here at last. Even Hetch, looking as depressed and irritated as ever with Leo and Dapper on either side. Cucurucho was now devoid of his book reader, but he didn't seem to mind too much as his text-to-speech voice would have to do.

"Hello."

"Disfruta la isla!" Cellbit shouted back at the bear. Was he...drunk?

"Thank you for your patience. Everything is ready for you to leave the island now."

It was weird hearing the bear say completely new things like this rather than its handful of common phrases. Jaiden thought she should probably be used to weird stuff like this by now, but it still managed to catch her off guard.

"Sorry that you were attacked when I was gone. I was putting the final pieces in place."

"That sounds ominous," Quackity commented.

"The Founder is dead."

Now, that may not have meant much to Jaiden, but it certainly meant something to other people. There was a brief silence and then suddenly movement and noise, the most noticeable coming from Hetch as suddenly his head snapped up to the bear.

"What?!" he made several noises as he struggled to find what words to say next, "I- wh- how?"

Cucurucho looked at him.

"Gun."

"That's- th- there's no fucking- th-that doesn't make sense! That's not how this works, that's not how any of this works!" Hetch spat out, furious at the bear's claims. Other people seemed pretty happy about it though.

"Yeah! Get fucked, asshole!" Austin shouted, Ethan cheering nearby with a similar sentiment.

"L bozo," Sneeg made an L shape with his hands towards Hetch, which childishly enough seemed to piss him off even more.

"This is bullshit! You can't fucking shoot the Founder, that doesn't- the Founder wouldn't die to a fucking oversized plushie!" Hetch took a step towards Cucurucho, at which point Leo decided to remind him of his position and gave him a powerful kick to the shin.

"Ow, fuck," Hetch keeled over the injury.

"So that's where you were when Security showed up, you were off killing a guy..?" Ranboo reiterated.

"The Founder is not just a gu-! OW!" Hetch was interrupted as Dapper decided to go for the other shin.

Cucurucho nodded to Ranboo, both of them ignoring Hetch, "yes."

There was a pause as Ranboo expected something more, but Cucurucho didn't have any more words to say. Perhaps he had a limit on how many unique phrases he could add to his lineup each day, because he then pulled out a book to write in instead.

Tallulah saw and hopped over to read Cucurucho's book, then transcribed whatever he had written onto her sign in big writing for everyone to see as she held it up

With that guy gone it'll finally be safe for you all in your world, so we should probably move on to how we'll do that.

"Just play the noise, right?" Toby asked, a little impatient, "that's what got us all in here."

Tallulah and Cucurucho exchanged a glance, and Jaiden couldn't tell what exactly they were communicating to each other, but Tallulah soon looked away to produce another sign.

We'd like it to be that simple, but that wasn't how your friends got here.

She added something else to the sign hesitantly.

Getting them out needs more 'fuel', you could say.

Cucurucho suddenly gave Tallulah a look after she wrote that sign and scribbled something down to hand to her. She read it over and looked conflicted over the contents, then showed a sign just to the bear with a somewhat pleading look on her face. Cucurucho seemed unsure about his response.

Eventually he responded with a simple, "no."

"Hey, what's it saying no to?" Toby whispered to Jaiden.

"I dunno, I'm not psychic!" she whispered back, even though there was enough confused conversation between people that they probably couldn't be heard.

Tallulah once again pushed the sign at the bear's face, expression now stubborn and determined. That seemed to work, as Cucurucho eventually turned his head to the side and nodded. Tallulah nodded back, and presented her next sign to the crowd.

Sorry we've been keeping so much from you, Chay was worried how you'd respond, but I think at this point you deserve to know.

Cucurucho didn't look at the crowd anymore, almost like he was embarrassed.

Like I said, to return all your friends would need fuel. This server, and us eggs, are constructs of that fuel.

It's a whole lot of weird science magic stuff but put simply the fuel can be exchanged.

She looked once to Cucurucho, then showed her next sign.

In exchange for your friends returning to your world, this world and us eggs will cease to be.

Oh. Okay.

Jaiden wasn't really sure how to react to that at first. The eggs weren't people, per se, but they were alive. Hell, she'd felt awful enough when Bobby had died, and that was when she was still thinking in the back of her mind that they were just admins playing characters, but now they all knew this was real, this really was the end. This news was bad, but for the other parents whose eggs were still here it must have been so much more heartbreaking. The first people she looked at were Phil and Missa, who didn't look like they'd moved at all since Tallulah had shown that sign.

Tallulah kept her expression strong, but to the point it was clear she was hiding something else beneath it. Jaiden was sure this wasn't any easier on them, having to know that soon they would be gone. Everyone else was speechless, so she decided to ask what was probably on a lot of their minds.

"Is this really...the only way?"

Slowly, mournfully, Cucurucho nodded.

"No, that's..." Phil turned his eyes to all of the eggs surrounding them, "we can't just do that, you- you guys...what are you saying? We just let you all..?"

Cucurucho nodded again, "yes."

Cellbit shook his head, "no, pendejo! O que você quer dizer?"

Richarlyson tugged on Cellbit's arm, and for once the egg didn't look mischievous or scheming, he just seemed solemn. Cellbit looked down at him, going from undirected anger to very directed sorrow, for himself but much moreso for his egg. Richas squeezed his arm to try and be of some comfort, but Cellbit still looked conflicted. This probably wasn't an outcome he could ever be happy with.

Jaiden glanced to Quackity, expecting him to challenge this was the truth, but like many others he too was silent. And Jaiden knew it wasn't the loss of the server he was sad about, even without an egg of his own, like her.

The eggs had determined parents but they meant so much to everyone else too, familial or not. They'd spent months together and now, to abruptly end that all tonight...

Tallulah watched the pained expressions of the crowd while keeping her own firm. After she knew the news had set in she held another sign.

I know it's not what any of you want. But we are here to save your friends and give them back to you, and that's exactly what we're going to do.

"What, so you'll die? That's it?" Phil sounded like he couldn't believe it, or that he didn't want to.

It's not death, we don't really die. We'll be okay. You just won't be able to find us again.

"We don't want to lose you," Missa contested. Tallulah bit her lip and looked away from him, hand hovering over another sign but unable to complete it. To her suprise, Cucurucho took the sign from her and wrote something on it himself.

I DIDN'T WANT TO TELL YOU BECAUSE IT WOULD MAKE THIS DECISION MORE DIFFICULT. PLEASE, IT IS OKAY TO LEAVE US BEHIND.

"It- it's not okay! You don't deserve that!" Foolish pleaded with them, but it had little effect.

YOUR FRIENDS DESERVE THEIR FREEDOM. AT LEAST WE HAVE NOW TO SAY GOODBYE.

Jaiden wasn't entirely sure that Phil wasn't crying. She knew that Cellbit and Roier were, but a part of that was probably due to the alcohol. Nobody was doing well currently, not even their amnesiac friends who'd only known these eggs for a few days and wanted to get back to the real world as much as anyone.

"I would've tried not to get so attached if you'd told us earlier," Vinny laughed shakily.

"You guys are really gonna sacrifice that much for us?" Austin asked like he couldn't believe they were worth that much. Ramón showed him a sign with a bittersweet smile.

It's pretty much our purpose man

"Kind of a sucky purpose to die for all us sad little guys," Sneeg joked. Ramón gave a small laugh despite the obvious heaviness in the air.

We hope your last day on the server was a good one at least. If it's ok with you all, we'll start preparing to get you out now.

Jaiden looked at Tallulah's sign and opened her mouth, but couldn't think of the words to say. She wasn't ok with it, not really, but there wasn't an alternative that was better. This was the only option they'd been left with, so now they just had to figure out how to deal with that.

Dapper stepped up beside Tallulah, Pomme taking his place and at the ready to kick Hetch's shins, and held his sign up.

There might be some good that comes from this!

We don't know exactly what will happen ourselves, it will probably be weird, but if it brings us all through the same place on the way out you might get to see something cool.

"What counts as cool in this context?" Fit asked nervously. Dapper tried to smile with as little mischief as he could.

We're going to the place that the 'dead' eggs are, so you might too.

Jaiden's wings bristled.

Oh.

Okay.

"You mean-!?" Maximus yelled out, cutting himself off as words failed him.

It's not a promise that you will! But you might, and I want you guys to have something to not make this situation all bad.

Jaiden turned and caught eyes with Roier, and knew without seeing herself that they both had the same expression. Just the chance they might see him again was making her eyes sting.

Even if it was just a chance as Dapper said, it was a chance her heart might die for.

Chapter Text

Quackity hadn't moved for a while. There were conversations going on around him but he couldn't bring himself to zone in to any of them, not with his own thoughts ringing so loudly in his mind.

He didn't care about Cucurucho or its eggs. He'd spent this whole time not caring about them and only looking out for his friends, he didn't have any reason to trust their intentions. But their intentions seemed pretty clear now. Their lives for his friends.

This wasn't fair. None of this was. There shouldn't have to be a sacrifice to return their friends to where they'd always been, until a few months ago. If the eggs had done everything they could to help these people- although it wasn't really a question anymore, because they probably had- then there wasn't a world in which it was right for them to get dealt the worst hand in all this.

Quackity supposed, with all this new information, that the eggs had known this from the very beginning. And they'd still done it all with the knowledge their lives would be torn away for their mission to be complete.

It was only a small comfort that they weren't technically dying. These 'entities', or whatever it was Quackity had heard the eggs refer to themselves as, had some way to exist without a form, and they at least seemed happy to live like that, but the reaction couldn't have been more contrasting for their parents. The idea of never seeing each other again, having no way to contact or communicate with one another, wasn't a well-liked idea.

Phil was clutching the bear's paw, head hung low and blonde hair drooping down to conceal his face, which Quackity could only assume was in tears. Missa, by his side, was pretty close to that point too.

Even their friends, who would at last be leaving with them. Niki looked as miserable as Etoiles as she crouched by Pomme and kissed her forehead like it were her own daughter. It was difficult to spot any excitement about their impending escape from this world. The closest thing was Leo having one last sparring session with Jerma, Foolish waiting to take her on next and furiously cheering her on.

Jesus, everyone was treating these like their own children. He could understand it- even if they only recently found a lot of things out, they'd still known the eggs for months prior. He didn't feel like this was a bad thing at all, actually. But something about it all was putting a pit in his stomach.

'Something'- as if he didn't know exactly what it was. They'd been given the chance to pass by the eggs already existing without a form. The 'dead' eggs. Having all the eggs around him now only made the absence of one in particular much more apparent.

He hadn't seen Tilin in months. They'd barely spent enough time together to know one another. And he'd probably cry if he saw them again.

There was a nudge at his side, and slowly he turned to see Tallulah. She didn't have a sign, but instead she had a poppy she was holding out for him to take. Quackity strained a smile but couldn't move to take it.

"I was probably looking pretty miserable over here, wasn't I? There's no need for you to start feeling sorry for me, Llulah," he sighed and folded his arms. Tallulah continued holding out the flower and pouted a little. He couldn't help but imagine maybe Tilin had looked at him the same way once or twice from behind the screen.

"...I don't know if I'd even be able to see him," Quackity wasn't exactly talking to Tallulah, but having her here to listen did bring some comfort, and it didn't take much for her to know who it was he was talking about. She kept standing by, letting him continue.

"I do want to, I guess, but at the same time it's been so long, I let him die so long ago, I," Quackity took a breath, "he won't have forgiven me for that. I probably wouldn't have."

Quackity saw Tallulah move to protest, but continued, "I haven't even seen what Tilin looks like, I wouldn't recognise anything other than the dumb little egg model."

It'll be okay. I know she wouldn't hold it against you. It wasn't anyone's fault.

"I couldn't even log in to see my own egg, of course it's my fault!" Quackity opened his mouth but closed it again and turned away from Tallulah. He didn't want to be shouting at her.

He expected another sign but instead there was another nudge against his hand and Tallulah slid a poppy into his palm. He tried to smile for her, "thank you."

When you see them, maybe pass it on to Tilin for me.

"How long are we gonna have together?" he spun the poppy between his fingers.

This is a new experience even to us, we'll just have to see.

"You think there's a chance we'll all die on the way out?" Quackity joked, but Tallulah didn't look too amused.

I doubt it. We'll be going with you half of the journey, so we'll help if anything goes wrong.

Quackity hummed a moment before he crouched down to be at eye level with Tallulah, "and you promise this isn't like death for you, or anything? Whatever happens to you guys you're gonna be alright, you promise?"

Tallulah looked back into his eyes, matching his serious gaze. She nodded confidently back at him, but at that moment another egg decided to join them too.

why we being so serious over here =.=

Tallulah's eyes flicked over the sign and she shoved Richarlyson lightly for his interruption. He laughed it off but it wasn't as obnoxious a laugh as he usually did, then he faced towards Quackity, who resisted an impulse to look away. He wasn't quite sure if it was nervousness or a discomfort to make eye contact with the egg he found himself annoyed with the most frequently.

don't be worried abt it, she'll be happy to see you again, I'm sure.

Quackity supposed it was probably obvious to everybody what was on his mind, but it surprised him that Richas out of everybody would be offering his support. He might've been even more surprised that it was helping.

"Y-yeah, it's just...it's hard to imagine that, with everything. You and me have had a grudge for a while now, what's to say he hasn't..?"

won't know until we get there :P

Quackity laughed, "yeah, I guess." Tallulah stuck her tongue out at Richarlyson to match the face on the sign, and he did it right back to her.

As the eggs made faces to one another Quackity took notice of the dying conversations and the growing silence in the clearing. Everything was ending. The time for them to go was approaching.

"Hey, Richarlyson," Quackity interrupted whatever nonverbal conversation the two had been in the midst of, "I don't wanna leave it on a grudge if this is the last time we're gonna see each other. Should we just...call it even, I guess?"

Richarlyson pursed his lips and tapped his foot in an exaggerated consideration of Quackity's offer. Quackity sighed as he dragged a hand down his face, "Richas please I'm trying to be civil here."

Richarlyson laughed and eventually nodded.

yes I forgive you XD you were causing the problems anyways

"Debatable," Quackity considered having more of a rebuttal but decided it would probably be better just to leave it there.

"I wanted to say the same to Chayanne too, but I haven't seen him at all while I've been here. Bet he's avoiding me."

Tallulah blinked at him then held up her sign as though her statement were obvious.

Cucurucho is Chayanne

"WHAT," Quackity exclaimed a moment after he read it, darting his gaze up to where the big white bear stood in the distance, then squinting at it as if he would suddenly transform into a kid with a duck floatie. When he inevitably didn't, Quackity rubbed his eyes and looked back at Tallulah, "well, that explains a lot, actually."

He sighed with the realisation he now had to make amends with the bear, even though that should've been something he intended to do from the start. Looking like a bear instead of a small child made him a little less determined to leave their relationships on good terms now that the end was indeed approaching. Unfortunately Tallulah picked up on his hesitation and nudged him with a sign.

Go talk to him! You can do it!

Quackity grumbled and gently pushed the sign away, "alright, alright, leave me alone," although he was hiding a smile as he stepped away from her and took the first steps towards Chayanne the big plushy bear.

What would he even say? At least he had this short walk to think about it. If these were the last words he'd ever have with the bear he felt like he needed to make them good, but that was easier said than done. Actually, not easier said, saying them was one of the hard parts. Easier conceptualised than done.

Shit, he was going off on a tangent. Focus. Make amends with the bear-child-egg-thing. He probably shouldn't have been so paranoid, even though that was kind of justified, maybe shouldn't have said a few things although they were kinda deserved. Quackity felt like he might be bad at this.

He could always just say they call it even like he did with Richarlyson, but that didn't seem earnest enough for final words. Was just saying sorry too simple? If he slipped up was Phil gonna be nearby to kick his ass with some Sharpness 5000 battleaxe? Probably. Best to not slip up.

Almost immediately after that thought, Quackity slipped up and fell over right next to the bear.

Quickly he got back up and refused to meet anyone's eyes except for the buttons of the bear, which were oddly amused-looking.

"Uh, hey. Cucurucho. Apparently Chayanne. Everything, uh...you doing good?" he forced a smile onto his increasingly flustered face. He felt pretty dumb for expecting this to go anything other than terribly.

Chayanne didn't grace him with more of a reply than a simple thumbs up and waited for Quackity to continue, which he didn't really appreciate, but he didn't want the silence stretching on.

"Yeah, I...I'm good. Listen, I just wanted to- since this is gonna be, like, the last time we're talking, y'know- clear everything up, and like...apologise? I guess..?" he tried his best not to wince and looked to the bear for his response. There was a second before Chayanne took out a book, in which he thought he might be about to get ripped apart by bear claws, but thankfully not.

THANK YOU QUACKITY.
I AM SORRY WE ARE HAVING TO DO THIS IN SUCH AN ABRUPT MANNER.

"No, you're not the one who's meant to be apologising, ugh- I'm sorry for being such a suspicious bitch. Even if you were an incredibly suspicious bear."

I KNOW YOU DON'T WANT ME TO APOLOGISE, BUT I DO WANT TO APOLOGISE FOR THAT TOO.
I SHOULDN'T HAVE TRIED TO HIDE THINGS.
I DIDN'T WANT THEM TO MAKE ME LOOK INCOMPETENT.

"You really are Chayanne," Quackity smirked then cleared his throat, "I mean, you're a pretty competent bear, don't worry about it. We all handled it in the end too. I wasn't making it much better by being so accusatory."

I WAS EXPECTING YOU TO STILL BE SUSPICIOUS OF ME UNTIL THE VERY END.
THIS IS QUITE THE CHANGE.

"Eh, guess I'm just such a nice, cool guy...and you finally letting us all know the truth probably helped me to like you," Quackity shrugged.

I HOPE YOU CAN UNDERSTAND WHY I KEPT IT SECRET, AT LEAST.
EVEN IF IT WAS BETTER NOT TO.

"Yeah, you've all been dealt a shitty hand with all this. I guess as long as you're not totally dead after this, then it's not completely fucked."

DON'T WORRY ABOUT US, WE'LL BE ALRIGHT.
DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU MIGHT SAY TO HER?

Quackity paused, "Tilin, you mean? I..."

He looked down and shifted his feet in the grass. He hadn't really thought about it, he just hoped that he'd find the words when the time came- because that had gone so well with Chayanne.

Well, to be fair, this conversation hadn't been too bad. He'd managed to get across all he wanted to. But he felt a lot less likely to have a coherent conversation with Tilin and a lot more likely to break down into tears. And depending how long they had in that world-between-worlds, he might not even get a word in to his egg.

YOU'VE STILL GOT SOME TIME TO THINK ABOUT IT.
WHATEVER HAPPENS, TRY NOT TO HAVE REGRETS ABOUT IT.
THEY'LL LOVE YOU ALL THE SAME.

Quackity nodded and smiled to Chayanne, totally not trying hard to keep himself together, "yeah...thank you. For all of this. You've done a lot for us."

Chayanne nodded, and then left.

God, what was he doing right now, trying not to cry in front of a giant anthropomorphic plush bear, surrounded by his friends he thought he might never see again and the eggs he thought were just admins on the other side of the world. Somehow being inside a video game was one of the least interesting parts.

Soon he'd be with Tilin, and soon after that it would be over. It had barely been a few days since all this started. It certainly didn't feel like it.

"Hey, big Q! Is karaoke over already?"

Quackity scrunched his eyebrows together and looked at who was addressing him- Tom, and it sounded like there was something in his mouth.

"Wh- Tom, you-? Wait, hold on," he took another second to look at him, "are you in your office right now?"

"Yeah, where else would I be?" he mumbled through another mouthful of food, "left for a bit to get takeaway. What happened?"

Quackity tried to start a response, but couldn't really figure out what to say for a few seconds.

"Yeah uh...the server's just gonna get shut down in a bit. For like, maintenance, and stuff."

"Oh, sick. I'm gonna head out anyways, I'm going out with friends in a bit," and after a moment Tom disappeared, presumably having logged off.

Quackity stood where he was for a short while longer, starting at the empty space in front of him. Despite everything, he supposed it was still the QSMP, scuffed as it may be.

~

"So, we're leaving and going back to our old lives. That's...a weird thing to say."

Ranboo looked around and saw most of their friends were in agreement.

"I mean, took long enough," Sneeg grunted, but underneath he was probably just as excited as the rest of them.

"And you guys are going to, like, the void? I guess?" Jerma looked down at Dapper and Pomme. Pomme was first to hold up her sign, then Dapper followed up with two more.

We'll be going where the other eggs have gone, not dead completely, but somewhere within the construct of this world. In its code, I guess you could say.

We'll be staying there, but with the fuel we take from ourselves to stop having forms like these and stop maintaining this world as a whole, we can transfer it to give your friends back their forms in your world.

We do now need to figure out where those forms will end up, though.

"Uh, you don't know?" Ranboo asked.

"We're not gonna, like, wake up in a dumpster or something, right?" Ethan glanced to the side nervously.

We can decide where you go! You guys just need to figure out where that will be now.

Pomme waved her sign a little and smiled to try and be reassuring. It had spawned a lot of questions, though.

"Can it be, like, anywhere?" Rae asked.

"Now I'm worried about where you want to go..." Sykkuno gave Rae a concerned look after her question. She smiled mischievously in response.

Please try to keep it normal. But yeah, pretty much.

Rae pumped her fists in the air after reading Dapper's sign then stopped all of a sudden, "well, I still don't have any ideas, actually."

"I was gonna say your own houses, but I dunno if you guys still own them or if they got sold when you disappeared," BadBoyHalo considered.

"And then we'd have to pay rent, and I dunno if I'm really in a position to do that after everything that happened," Austin admitted.

"They're probably not gonna be that bothered about rent when a bunch of missing people are suddenly back," Vinny countered.

"I don't know if the hassle of that is much better either," Niki sounded tired just at the thought, "do we really wanna be dealing with police and all that?"

"And we'd be miles apart. Not that I'm bothered about being far away from you suckers or anything. Totally not," Sneeg lied confidently.

"Okay, so not our old houses," Sykkuno established, "where else?"

"Well, I..." Phil cleared his throat, "I have some spare rooms, I suppose."

Ranboo looked at Phil, then the eggs, "can we do that?"

Pomme shrugged and nodded, so Ranboo looked back at Phil, "are you sure you're okay with us being in your house..?"

"Don't give him a chance to reconsider!" Sneeg whispered jokingly.

Phil laughed, "yes, I'm sure, mate. I mean, I definitely can't have all of you, but we could fit three or four."

"We? Is there someone else in your house already?" Charlie asked.

"Pssh, I'm sure Kristin won't mind," Phil waved his hand dismissively, "well, she might be freaked out, actually...but she'd probably be happy to see you guys after being freaked out."

"Whaddya say? Us three take over Phil's house?" Sneeg nudged Ranboo and Charlie.

"I suppose, if that works, then...yeah!" Ranboo nodded.

Charlie glanced at Mariana who smiled sympathetically, "I don't really have enough spare rooms for that, so we're gonna have to split up after this. Just bully Phil to bring you to my place later!"

Phil laughed, "we can organise a meetup when everyone's adjusted, and has passports and stuff."

"Ehh, just go abroad illegally, it's fine," Mariana told him.

"It's tempting, passports are a hassle," Phil laughed.

"I guess if we're offering, my house is open too. Enough space for some of you guys," Jaiden waved her hand a little as she made her offer, "I do have birds, and a cat. And a roommate. But they can all deal with it."

"Ooh, birds! And a cat!" Valkyrae shouted out.

"I guess you're sold on that," Sykkuno laughed.

Rae nodded and grabbed onto Jerma's arm too to drag him forward, "you're coming too. Three is a good number."

"Oh- okay," Jerma laughed, going along with it.

"I guess that's decided then," Jaiden was laughing too, taken aback by how quickly that decision seemed to be made.

After a moment of silence Cellbit raised his arm, "uh, sure, I guess I'll offer too. I'm in Brazil but I can be a translator, and also Brazil is awesome, so you should come stay at my place."

The last four looked at each other; Austin, Niki, Vinny and Ethan. Vinny shrugged, "if you guys are good with that, then..?"

"That sounds pretty good," Niki agreed then looked at Cellbit, "you sure there's enough space? Or anyone else that would have an issue with it?"

Cellbit shrugged, "I was already thinking of having an IRL meetup over here, so if I can deal with a dozen QSMP members, I can deal with you four."

"Alright, I guess that's all our living arrangements sorted, cool," Ethan nodded.

"Well, uh..."

Everyone gradually turned to glare at Hetch as he spoke up, "...I also need somewhere."

Dapper rolled his eyes in annoyance.

Yeah you're going straight to jail

"What?! A-are you serious?" Hetch explained.

Yeah, we've already agreed on this. It's a shitty jail and everything. Have fun.

Pomme smiled at him sarcastically as Hetch put his head in his hands.

Okay, that's sorted! I guess all we do now is get ready to go.

They all turned back to Dapper as he held his sign and Ranboo could see some people tensing at the words in his peripheral. It seemed this meant a lot to the people who'd lost their eggs. Even Charlie, who was one of the closest to them, clenched his fist a little when he read it. Ranboo reached out a hand to put on his shoulder.

"Hey, it'll be fine. If I'm not in there with you, I'll see you on the other side," they smiled in a way that was visible from their eyes alone.

Charlie smiled back, "thanks, man. All the build-up is definitely just making me a little nervous..."

Mariana nodded his agreement, "I just hope she didn't manage to get another gun wherever she is."

Charlie laughed, then nodded as he rubbed an eye, "yeah, yeah, that...wouldn't be great. She'd definitely try to shoot us."

"Uh..?" Ranboo raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, I once made a deal with Satan to give her a gun, and then found out we have a pretty trigger happy daughter. It's fine," Charlie explained as if that made total sense. Ranboo didn't feel like they'd gotten any more answers, but he decided it might be better to stop asking questions anyway.

"How exactly do we get ready to go?" Niki asked Dapper as he was writing his next sign.

You guys don't need to do much. If you're ready then we're just waiting on Cucurucho.

"I don't think I'm prepared at all, but alright," Roier laughed with underlying anxiousness. Cellbit placed a hand on his shoulder to be of some comfort.

"At this point we just gotta realise that there's no way to say goodbye as much as we'd like to," Fit smiled sadly.

Baghera sighed, "this still isn't fair..."

You've lived without us before all this, you can live without us again.

This time the sign was held by Leo, standing at Foolish's side, who jumped at the movement of his egg. Cucurucho had also returned at this point and spoke up in his robotic voice.

"Is everything ready?"

"Every thing, sure. Everyone? Not so much," Cellbit grimaced.

"Ughh, I'm gonna miss you so much," Foolish said tearfully as he crouched down and pulled Leo into a hug, pressing his face against them to muffle his whining. Leo looked mildly uncomfortable, but returned the hug nonetheless.

Ranboo couldn't help but feel mournful too, even if he hadn't known the eggs for as long as their parents. They had been so kind to him, to his friends, without expecting anything from them. And now, just as suddenly as they'd come into their life, the eggs would be gone. Ranboo worried there was no way they could express how thankful he was.

Saying it was probably a start, though.

"Hey, Cucurucho, uh," they got the bear's attention while everyone was busy talking to the eggs, "thank you. For all of it."

Cucurucho nodded wisely, and for a moment Ranboo became aware of the absurdity that was speaking in earnest to a giant bear, but it was a good kind of absurd. They wouldn't be going back to the bad, Showfall brand of absurd ever again.

"I won't forget you. I'm sure none of us are going to, after all this," Ranboo smiled and Cucurucho looked down, its pink cheeks seeming more flushed than usual. Ranboo resisted chuckling at how the bear, despite all his strengths, was so easily embarrassed.

"I...thank you, again," they repeated, finding a lack of anything else to say. Not that he didn't have a lot to say to the bear, but thanking him was the only thing that felt right to Ranboo. Cucurucho nodded back once more and this time pulled out a book he gave to Ranboo.

THANK YOU, FOR BEING ABLE TO LIVE AGAIN, DESPITE ALL YOU'VE BEEN THROUGH.
YOU ARE STRONGER THAN A BEAR LIKE ME COULD EVER DREAM TO BE.
AND YOU DESERVE ALL OF THIS.

And now it was Ranboo's turn to look away and hide his face. At least the mask hid half of it, but most emotion came from the eyes anyways. They couldn't get any words in before Cucurucho produced another book.

WITH YOUR FRIENDS THERE FOR YOU, I'M SURE YOU'LL DO FINE WITHOUT US.
IT IS TIME THAT WE MAKE OUR EXIT, ANYWAY.

Ranboo sighed, "I- yeah, I guess so. And you and the eggs are gonna be together too, wherever it is that you're going."

Cucurucho nodded with his same old sewn-on smile and stepped away. Meanwhile Toby had gone up to Fit to probably complain about something, so Ramón took the opportunity to leave them and take the place of Cucurucho's communicator.

"Hello there."

At the sound of the bear's voice, most conversations were silenced. Ramón straightened his moustache and held up his sign for all of them to see.

You guys don't have to do much to get out, but we're gonna go pair up with the guys that need our 'fuel'

Ramón gave a side glance to Tallulah when everyone had read the last word, which she huffed at and held up a sign defensively.

It was a decent analogy!!

Ramón grinned but didn't give her any more criticism and continued.

It's probably gonna feel weird but you'll live so don't be a baby about it

Cucurucho nudged Ramón with a book for him to read and then write something else in response to.

Cucurucho says other people are also getting grouped for reasons

Niki took a look around at everyone gathered, "uh, are you sure there's enough eggs to be paired up with all of us?"

Ramón looked up at Cucurucho since he didn't seem to know what to say, and after a moment Cucurucho wrote out a response that he transcribed.

Some people aren't, but that's accounted for! Apparently

"Very confident," Fit laughed sarcastically.

Sneeg shrugged, "eh, whatever, as long as we're getting out in the end."

Most of the eggs jumped up, after one final, final goodbye, and headed over to one of Ranboo's friends each to take their hand. This seemed to have been planned amongst them beforehand, as each egg had a clear idea who they were going to. Ranboo ended up as one of the few without an egg, along with Charlie, Austin and Ethan. Cucurucho had ended up standing by Hetch, but that seemed half for the purpose of keeping him out of any last minute trouble.

The eggs also began dragging some of the parents around, mostly their own parents, but Ranboo saw as Cucurucho took ahold of Quackity's hand, Hetch still held firmly in the other, and took him to stand beside them. He then also gave Ranboo a book, which Quackity read over his shoulder.

DON'T LOSE HIM.

"H-hey!" Quackity grumbled at the bear, "I can take care of myself!"

Cucurucho didn't seem to quite believe him as he left Quackity and Ranboo on their own to get to his position in a circle that had formed from all the groups.

Ranboo looked to Quackity, not wanting the situation to be awkward as the two had just been paired without any explanation, "uh, hey...I guess you and the bear have kind of a reputation with one another?"

"Yeah, we did for a while. I've probably forgotten why that ever started," Quackity rubbed his neck and laughed, but then his face turned more serious as he faced Ranboo, "um, has, has everything been okay? Like, the island, and all? Should've probably been asking this before we're leaving, but..."

"I, uh- yeah, definitely better than what came before. Even without our low standards and everything- everyone's really nice. Even you right now, you're asking about my wellbeing despite me not really being the friend you used to know me as," Ranboo smiled. He hoped it didn't come off as weird to be pointing out the differences to their old self, and Quackity's expression did change a little at the mention of it, but he nodded anyway.

"Well yeah, but like, at the core you're still the cool, kind person I knew before, so I still wanna care about you, man. I'll warn you, if you're gonna go live with Phil just be ready for like, weird British and old people stuff. He probably has a bunch of old people pills you're gonna have to remind him to take in the morning and-"

"Hey!" someone interjected, cutting off Quackity as he and Ranboo looked to the source. Phil was staring at them intently, standing by Tallulah and Vinny, "I can hear you, we're not that far away."

"I dunno what you're talking about Phil, you must be hearing things. Because you're old," Quackity defended overconfidently and turned back to Ranboo before Phil could respond. Ranboo just laughed quietly, trying to decide how much of that had been a joke.

To the other side of them Ranboo could see Charlie and Mariana talking about something intensely, and beyond them Cellbit was in the process of persuading Richarlyson to let their groups merge, since he was put with Sneeg and the egg while Roier was with Jaiden and Ethan. Richas rolled his eyes and allowed it, which Cellbit and Roier were very excited about.

So this was the end of their time on the island. It hadn't really been that long, it was probably short even in terms of regular island getaways, but it was pretty much half of Ranboo's clear memories, and as long as he didn't hit his head or something, they wouldn't be forgetting it.

Going back to a normal life would probably be boring after all this, but boring was good in some ways. Ranboo was a little bit excited for boring.

All eyes once again, and perhaps for the last time, fell on Cucurucho as the great white bear raised his paw in a wave.

"I hope you enjoyed the island."

And then the world beneath their feet disappeared.

Chapter Text

Weird was definitely a word that could be used to describe it. Other words that could also be used were nauseating, disorienting and more than a little uncomfortable. Quackity's favourite words, however, were the multitude of swears currently spiralling from his mouth as he hurtled through the void.

Chayanne had hardly given any of them a warning before dumping them into the shadow realm, or whatever this was meant to be, and as such Quackity was having some difficulties holding onto the positive feelings he was trying to keep towards the bear child. Being banished to the inconceivable, all encompassing void wasn't the kindest gesture, despite how well intentioned this was all meant to be.

He couldn't really continue to hold this stuff against the bear though, so he felt that maybe he only had himself to blame for being in this situation right now. No, nevermind, definitely Cucurucho's fault. He'd never trust a bear again.

Quackity began to realise that he wasn't really falling, although that was what the sensation initially felt like, but he couldn't see his own body anymore, and he didn't exactly feel real, so he decided he might as well keep screaming.

Something suddenly touching him, or whatever counted as his body right now, caused him to pause for a moment. Then he continued screaming, but now at the unknown presence grabbing him rather than the incomprehensible state of his own being.

"H-hey, stop! It's fine! Stop swearing! I assume you're swearing- it sounds like swearing," the disembodied voice of Ranboo emerged from the void in a vaguely similar direction to the force contacting his 'body'.

"Gh-! Mierda, yes, it's swearing, I- dios mío-!" Quackity tried to return to speaking comprehensible sentences between some continued swearing that flicked between languages like a strobe light.

"It's okay, it's okay, uhh- wherever this is, it's fine, I think- sorry, I don't really know," Ranboo admitted, still trying his best to anchor Quackity in an ocean without a floor. There didn't even seem to be an up or down in here- there was only an idea of two people's consciousnesses, and an endless empty space surrounding them.

"Yeah, no, I don't either, they didn't really warn us enough about... this," Quackity most certainly lacked the words to describe exactly what this was.

"Well, we won't be here forever," Ranboo stated, and something gave Quackity the idea that after saying that, Ranboo had slowly begun to realise the possibility that they may indeed be in here forever in the event that something had gone horribly wrong and the eggs had lost them in the world between worlds.

That would be bad.

"Haha, yeah. Mhm," Quackity pushed any similar thoughts to the back of his mind so he wouldn't have to deal with them, "anyways, uh, how did you find me?"

There was a brief moment of silence before Ranboo acknowledged the question, "oh, uh, I uh- I just followed the panic and swearing. We can hear each other and kind of 'sense' each other, at the very least. Since we were the closest before we ended up here maybe that helped us reunite."

"That would make sense why they put us in groups, so we can at least go through this shit together."

"Yeah, better than nothing," Ranboo laughed, "kind of sucks we didn't have an egg with us too."

But you do have an egg with you

"AAAAAHHH," Quackity and Ranboo screamed in unison, distancing themselves in whatever ways they could from the new presence that had made itself known to them. It now seemed to be somewhere in front of them, watching them.

...loud

It wasn't really a voice, as much as Quackity heard its words like it was one. It was like the voice inside his head speaking to him, but the words weren't his. Like he was reading them to himself rather than being told them.

"U-uh...are you...an egg?" Ranboo dared to ask.

Yes. Hold on, this must be weird for you guys. Let me try make it a bit better

Quackity waited a moment, and then began to feel things changing. His presence became more physical, his sensations less abstract. Eventually he could see some shapes again rather than just feel them, and slowly they were becoming clearer like a lens being tuned to focus. Their location remained a void, but now two figures besides himself could be identified in that void.

The first was the most familiar and expected, it was still Ranboo at his side and holding lightly onto his arm to keep them tethered to one another. They looked Quackity over to make sure all of him was present and then looked more scrutinisingly at the other presence, as if doubting every aspect of it that he saw.

This place takes a little getting used to, but I've found ways to make it easier on visitors

Quackity's attention was first on the dissonance between the voice and the mouth it was supposedly coming from. Despite the third figure being the only one here who could have said the last sentence, their lips didn't move with the words, they only smiled as the words made themselves heard directly in Quackity's head- and they assumed Ranboo's too by the way their eyes widened.

But Quackity's attention was quick to move on to the figure in its entirety- something not unlike a child, in fact exactly like a child, with black hair dropping past their ears but a small section tied up with a large ribbon, its red shine drawing the most attention of any accessories on the child. Though he supposed it wasn't a child, it was an egg.

Well there was really no use beating around the bush when it was right in front of his face. It was his egg, it was Tilin. Quackity's dear Tilin.

This was probably the point where it would've been good to have a conversation opener prepared, at the very least, but Quackity had absolutely nothing.

I was expecting some staring when I knew you would be here but this is getting a little awkward...

"I, sorry, uh-" Quackity tried to at least say something, but there was barely anything he could think of as he stuttered over beginnings that never fully formed.

"Hey, sorry, this is just a whole lot of weird stuff," Ranboo explained for him, "I guess you know about us already, but uh, you are..?"

Tilin

The egg drifted closer and extended a hand towards Ranboo to greet them. Hesitantly, Ranboo obliged, and the two shook hands a little awkwardly but at least it was done.

"I dunno why but I wasn't expecting that to feel so normal," Ranboo laughed nervously.

I'm trying my best to keep this space 'physical' for you guys' comfort

Tilin nodded with a smile and then their eyes drifted across to Quackity, landing on him with a fondness Quackity didn't know that he deserved.

"And, uh...we know each other already," Quackity tried to smile.

I'd hope so

Tilin made the motion of laughing without much sound coming from his mouth to match.

"Heh, I- I'm sorry, I have no idea what to say, this is all just...you know," Quackity tried to just be honest as that was one of the few paths left available for him, and at least he could manage to get some more words in. Tilin had as much understanding in her expression as she could manage.

Take your time, there isn't really a deadline. I can get you both out of here whenever you're ready.

Quackity nodded and took a breath, "right, alright...I..."

He took another look, staring into the eyes of the egg that he'd seen before but never in this way, never so real. Eyes that he'd never appreciated in their time, and he was out of chances to appreciate them again. Just seeing them here was more than he knew he deserved. And Tilin deserved far more, first of which was an apology.

"Hey, Tilin, you...you mean so much to me, I'm sorry that I never expressed that before it was too late. I should've been there for you regardless, but if I'd known about all this I'd never have let it happen, I swear."

Tilin looked back with a sympathetic smile as Quackity finished, mouth still held a little open as he always felt there was more he needed to say, but not necessarily anything that was easy to put into words.

I don't need you to do anything else for me, I know that you cared about me, and that's all I need. Nobody's to blame that I lost my lives, it happens.

Tilin gave an innocent shrug as though she wasn't talking about her own 'death' and continued to smile at Quackity. As many words as they said, it might never communicate as much as their expression did. A sadness in her eyes was only there for a second before it was overtaken by gratitude and adoration. His smile never faltered for a moment and had only grown since they'd laid eyes upon the two people floating in empty space before him.

"Oh, wait-!" Quackity finally remembered something now that the initial rush of emotions had subsided, "this, I have this to give to you."

After a moment of rifling through his pockets Quackity was thankful to find Tallulah's poppy had remained with him, somehow. He carefully drew it out and held it towards Tilin like some holy offering. His son looked surprised for a moment and at last his lips were given a rest from smiling, only shortly before they began to quiver and tug back up at the edges.

Dad...

"It- it was Tallulah who gave it to me," Quackity rushed to clarify, "I would've probably forgotten something like a gift without her."

It's okay, thank you. Thank you so much. I'm glad Tallulah is well.

"She is, they all are...I think they all miss you. Though that's a given for most of us," Quackity let out a choked laugh as he set the poppy down into Tilin's hands, the vibrant red flower matching their bow. She held it close to her chest for a moment.

Don't miss us too much. We'll be with you always

"If only you meant that literally," Quackity sighed.

We have our ways

Tilin smirked with a hint of mischief and Quackity wasn't sure if he wanted to find out what that entailed considering the amount of mind fucks he'd gone through already.

I'll give Tallulah thanks when I see her next. I suppose you don't want me keeping you too long

"No, I-I don't mind staying," Quackity turned to Ranboo to see what their thoughts were.

"I'm happy enough to stay as well, I'm not in any rush," Ranboo nodded.

"Wait, and, you'll be able to see Tallulah in here?" Quackity added after rethinking what Tilin had just said.

Yes, we'll all be in here together, so don't worry about us

"I can't really stop myself from doing that," Quackity laughed, and Tilin gave him a sympathetic look.

Try to be less worried about us at least

"I'll keep him in check for you," Tilin laughed a little at Ranboo's offer.

"I don't need anything like that!" Quackity insisted.

The three of them were there for a while longer. It was clear none of them really wanted to leave, but even a world like this couldn't stave off natural exhaustion, and both Quackity and Ranboo definitely needed some kind of a rest soon.

I'm so happy we could see each other again. You've built such a community with other people so I'm sure you won't be lonely after we're gone.

"Thank you for trying to comfort us Tilin, but I think at this point we'll be sad about it no matter what," Ranboo smiled bittersweetly. Tilin gave a look of reluctant agreement.

"And you helped us so much. More than we ever realised, and I probably should've realised sooner with it being my server and all," Quackity doubted he would ever let go of the fact that all of the eggs had been doing so much on his server without him ever knowing.

I hope this hasn't all been too strange and you don't wake up to anything weird in your real bodies

"No, this has been pretty normal QSMP stuff," despite Quackity intending that to be a joke, it didn't feel too much like a lie. Tilin smiled and nodded.

Well, this was fun. Thank you for everything, I was happy to see you one last time. I hope it all goes well from here.

"Yeah, I hope...I hope so too," Quackity reciprocated Tilin's smile, and could only imagine Ranboo was doing the same.

Alright, I've done pretty well to not cry, so I'm gonna send you off before that starts.

Tilin laughed and looked at Quackity one last time.

"I love you," Quackity told him.

Love you too dad

~

Sneeg was spinning around, trying to see if he could get motionsick in the void.

"This is pretty weird man."

Richarlyson laughed and nodded in agreement, also spinning and making it a competition to see which of the two could go faster. Ethan and Cellbit had already told them not to, but a few warnings hadn't been enough. When else were they gonna get a chance to spin around repeatedly in the void? Despite the whole situation being kind of disorienting and a little uncomfortable, Sneeg was having a pretty good time.

Jaiden and Roier, meanwhile, were crying.

Neither of them seemed to have been at all prepared for the moment they saw Bobby before them, adorned in the same- albeit less pixelated- overalls he'd always been in. Richas had been the one to pull the rest away while the parents stood in a shocked silence, interrupted by muffled sobs as Jaiden held her hands over her mouth.

"Oh mierda, I thought you would still be an egg, not an actual kid," Roier told him.

"You still kind of look exactly how I expected you to, though," Jaiden added shakily.

Kind of sucks that we gotta say goodbye all over again. I hope you've seen some good sunsets since then.

Bobby smiled to them, an attempt to hide the shaking in his expression. Jaiden laughed a little, "yes, yes I have, none as beautiful as you."

Bobby started blushing and tried not to look too shocked.

Okey no need to lie just because it's the last time guys

"Mijito we would never lie, you are one of the greatest things to happen to us," Roier disputed.

Alright alright enough about me jeez, you guys haven't been up to too much without me right?

Bobby's voice came into their heads as he directed a raised eyebrow at Roier in particular.

"What? O-oh, uh, I guess there's been a little something," Roier glanced over his shoulder at Cellbit, who was currently shaking his head disapprovingly at the spinning Sneeg and Richarlyson.

Glad my shipping worked out

"Ahaha, yes, thank you for that. You would have liked the wedding I think, more than a little chaotic," Roier sighed as memories circled his head.

"Oh, you would've loved it," Jaiden sniffled and wiped her eye.

There was a moment of quiet before Bobby took a step forward, and then another until he was in arms reach and pulled his parents both into a hug, which they fully embraced.

Don't squeeze me too hard!

Both Jaiden and Roier loosened their grip a little.

I was joking, I'm not gonna crack, dummies

Hey! Don't crack my step bro >:0

Suddenly another voice was in their minds and Richas came crashing through the group and into Bobby, who immediately began to play fight.

"Wait, how- did you just say an emoticon? How did you do that?" Jaiden asked Richas, who stopped hitting Bobby's arm to look at her. He shrugged, then returned to the fight. Jaiden sighed and resigned herself to never knowing.

Everyone had regrouped after Richarlyson literally collided the different groups they'd been in. Cellbit was looking over at Bobby as he landed a kick to Richas' face, "I didn't think I'd ever be so proud of both my kids."

"Did you guys never make a child fighting ring? That seems like a missed opportunity," Ethan suggested.

"Oh shit, we should've!" Roier spun around with eyes wide as it that were the best idea he'd ever heard.

"It would've been so rigged, Etoiles would be sending Pomme in with full netherite," Jaiden pointed out, but parents sending in fully kitted eggs didn't seem to completely be a drawback.

Just make a fighting ring in our honour in the real world

Bobby grinned back at everyone else as he made the suggestion and Jaiden shared a worried glance with Cellbit when Roier looked to be actually considering it.

"Uh, maybe after everyone else is settled in," Jaiden patted Roier on the shoulder as she tried to make him at least hold off on the idea.

"Oh yeah, we gotta deal with that as soon as we get back," Cellbit groaned.

"Don't remind me," Jaiden brought her hands up to her face.

"Hey, we're still here, y'know," Ethan reminded them.

"I'm joking. Mostly. Please ignore the stuff that makes me look like a conspiracy theorist when you get to my house," Cellbit smiled guiltily.

"Oh, because of course you'd have stuff like that," Ethan laughed with a hint of worry.

"What should I expect when I show up in Phil's house?" Sneeg asked, trying not to be as worried as Ethan.

"Maybe a shrine or two to Chayanne and Tallulah, but other than that it should be normal," Jaiden laughed.

Sneeg nodded, "noted."

Roier turned to Jaiden, "hey, as long as you keep them away from forks and electric plugs, they should live."

Jaiden raised an eyebrow, "I don't think they're that unprepared for the real world," then she stopped a moment and looked at Ethan and Sneeg, "you guys aren't gonna try stick a fork in a socket right?"

Sneeg laughed, "not unless Phil's house also happens to be a mall, no."

Is there anything you wanna do before it's time to go?

Bobby asked the group, having at last reached a stalemate in his fight with Richas. It was likely the longest silence they'd had since the start of this conversation as everyone tried to think of what was left to do. The parents were probably going to be the most indecisive, so Sneeg moved forward to offer his suggestion.

"Well, there's never gonna be another chance like this, so..." he turned to look at everyone before taking ahold of Richarlyson's arm and spinning the two of them around.

"Oh no," Cellbit said before Richas directed his momentum at him and sent them both tumbling through the void.

~

Baghera and Niki were sat side by side, as much as you could be sat while floating in an empty void, watching Etoiles and Pomme go full force at one another in a fight. By now Niki had accepted that fighting their children was a part of these guys' culture, and to her suprise Pomme was holding up pretty well against Etoiles. Since this would be their last fight, she could only assume Etoiles was putting his all into it too.

"I don't think it'll be easy finding anything like this ever again," Baghera leant over to tell Niki.

"What, you're telling me people don't fight their kids all the time in the real world?" Niki replied in joking disbelief.

"Not if they don't wanna go to jail."

"I might get in a little trouble if I find out where Hetch is. Make sure the other prisoners are treating him as bad as they should be," Niki grinned.

"Oh, they would fear you in prisons," Baghera smiled at Niki, "but I'm sure he'll have a bad enough time either way, no need to waste your time worrying about him."

Niki nodded, seeing her point. Hetch going to jail after all this was definitely enough to make her happy, as much as she wanted more severe punishment she didn't exactly need it. She needed her mental energy to spend on taking care of the other idiots that would be living with her.

She probably wouldn't be a professional at living on her own by any means, but she could see herself needing to stop the other three from starting a house fire.

"Niki! I need backup!" Etoiles suddenly shouted for her attention as Pomme landed a few good hits.

Hey, cheater!

"Me? Cheating?" Etoiles asked incredulously as he continued trying to cheat by beckoning for Niki to join them. Pomme rolled her eyes and swung at him before he could make any more overconfident denials.

"I guess I'm needed," Niki laughed and stretched her arms as she got up.

"Show him what you've learnt!" Baghera encouraged her.

Niki raised her eyebrows, "oh, I will."

Baghera didn't think she'd ever heard Etoiles squeal so loud as Niki jumped at him and started fighting against him by Pomme's side.

"Hey, you're cheating!" he insisted as the two ignored him and continued their attack.

Baghera smiled and took in the scene. Oh, how she would miss their little French sniper. But, knowing Pomme, their bijou would be just fine on her own.

~

"TRUUUUMMMPP"

Austin covered his ears and laughed as Maximus leapt forward and tackle hugged the kid in a propeller hat without a moment's hesitation. The egg seemed just as surprised as him, but not at all unhappy with the situation.

"You, uh...you named him that?" Austin asked, trying not to sound too judgy.

"Hey, he has a beautiful name!" Maximus shouted back, already crying a little.

You can call me The Best instead if you prefer.

"Oh, my son, you can talk!" Maximus leant back, looking at Trump in surprise.

Kind of haha

Maximus yelped as he saw Trump talking again without moving his lips, "he is magic! My baby is psychic!"

Trump laughed and shrugged.

Close enough. It's been a while hasn't it?

"Ah, don't remind me," Max shook his head, "but you have been okay in here? If you haven't then who do I need to fight?"

I've been fine, don't worry. Thank you. Te amo, papá <3

"Ahh Trump, te amo my baby," Maximus tried not to start crying again, "w-wait, what did you just do? How did you just say that heart thing?"

Oh, there's something I can do here I think you might like, though.

"Oh?" Austin spoke up, noticing a glint of mischief in the egg's eyes.

"Wait, Trump, is it..?" concern briefly flicked over Max's face.

Austin looked between the two of them, "should I be worried right now?"

"Uh, maybe, probably yes," Max took a small step away from Trump as he put a hand behind his back.

"What, is your kid a pyromaniac or something?" Austin asked, trying not to sound too scared of something that looked like a little kid.

Trump pulled out a comical looking bomb. And then a few more.

"Yes, something like that. We should run," Maximus advised, but Austin was already halfway across the void.

Chapter Text

"And you gotta remember to take care of the rest of them, alright? With all the eggs in this place together who knows what trouble you'll all be making," BadBoyHalo patted Dapper on the shoulder, making his way through the list of final advice to bestow on his egg.

"I think he needs this talk the least out of everyone, you wanna give some tips to my egg instead?" Fit smirked and glanced at Ramón, who looked offended and hit him on the arm, "oh come on, you know it's true!"

"Did you guys say you'd only been with these eggs less than a year?" Sykkuno checked.

"Yup, but he's managed to make plenty of trouble in that time," Fit ruffled Ramón's hair, who tried to do the same in retaliation, but stopped himself as he realised that might not be an option.

Valkyrae laughed, "well you definitely wouldn't be able to tell, it's like you've already spent years together."

"I mean, Bad might as well have, he's constantly been on the server. I think he's gonna go into withdrawal after this, we should make sure to check in with him," Fit observed.

"Wh- it's not like an addiction or something!" Bad defended, but even Dapper looked like he was doubting that claim.

"Hey, you guys probably aren't much better," Fit indicated to the eggs, "you gonna be fine in here? Are you gonna have create mod in the void?"

Dapper smiled and raised a hand.

oh, in the void you ARE the create mod

"What does that even-" Sykkuno muttered, unable to finish as Dapper snapped his fingers and behind the egg suddenly formed a huge contraption that whirred to life in seconds.

"Who-ho-hoa! What's that thing supposed to be?!" Fit asked him, half impressed and half scared by the power of this immense thing.

INFINITE DARK METAL FARM >:3

"...I mean, as long as you're happy?" Bad shrugged, and Dapper certainly looked happy about it.

Valkyrae looked at the machine, intrigued, "what other kind of stuff can you make? Could you make, like, a...an infinite candy farm?"

Her eyes lit up at her own idea, and after a moment of consideration Dapper nodded, to which she gasped and clapped her hands together.

"You're way too excited about a candy farm," Sykkuno raised an eyebrow at her but still smiled at her idea.

"Listen dude, I'm not saying I liked the warehouse at all, but they were onto something with that candy room. Probably the one good idea Showfall had," Rae defended.

"Uh, I don't wanna ruin the surprise or anything, but are you aware of candy stores?" Fit asked them. Rae gave him an intrigued but blank stare in response, and he was taken aback that they wouldn't even remember something like that, but he supposed that meant he needed to explain, "alright, um...well in the real world we have places you can go to buy candy, and they are FULL of the stuff. Like, entire walls stacked up with all the junk food you could imagine."

Sykkuno nervously rested a hand on Valkyrae's shoulder and laughed at her as it looked like she was about to somehow explode.

"Who were you staying with again, Jaiden? I'm sure she'd be happy to bring you to one with a little coercion," Bad assured them.

Fit turned to look at him, "coercion? What are you tryna suggest, Bad?" to which the man shrugged and promised he meant nothing by it. Fit seemed doubtful.

Ramón jumped up and gained everyone's attention as he came up with an idea.

They have egg shaped candy in the outside world you should get a bunch of those!!

"You gotta stop," Rae told him, "I can't handle this much information right now."

"You should ask Jaiden if there's a spare room for you to fill entirely with candy," Sykkuno joked.

"Don't tempt me," Rae put her head in her hands, sounding very tempted.

"Looks like Jaiden's gonna have her work cut out for her," Fit chuckled. Dealing with birds had surely given her some experience for the oncoming chaos, though. He hoped so.

~

Charlie looked around at the surrounding nothingness and clicked his tongue, "alright, so...big void. That's cool. That's great, actually."

"Really? I was thinking it was pretty awful," Mariana contested.

"Yeah, you're right, I was lying. Honestly, not an immediate fan of appearing in a giant void."

The two of them had been suspended there a little while, Mariana having found out he could spin upside down a few moments ago but having quickly returned to being the right way up when that made him feel twice as disoriented as he already was.

"Pretty quiet in here. I guess that's standard for big voids though," Charlie commented as though he had any idea what he was talking about. The acoustics were certainly noticeable, there wasn't the slightest echo to their voices and when they weren't talking it felt like there was an absence of something that should've been there, like a background hum that was always there but they'd never notice until it stopped.

Charlie decided to just be thankful he couldn't hear his own heartbeat, because that might've been driving him insane already. He then had a realisation and tried to check his own heartbeat, but couldn't figure out where on his wrist he was supposed to feel for it. Oh well. Having a heartbeat wasn't important anyway.

Mariana sighed and looked around, as if this time there might be something different in their surroundings, "well, I guess we just have to wait for, uh..."

They exchanged a glance, knowing that neither one of them had any idea what they were meant to be waiting for. Then, suddenly-

Surprise!!!

Out of literally nothing came a sudden burst of colour and movement like a combination of fireworks and party poppers, causing both of them to scream, Charlie more comically than Mariana. And then, stood in the place of the explosion once the confetti had cleared, was another figure. It didn't take long for either of them to figure out who.

Oh im sorry that wasn't meant to be scary i just wanted a good entrance after so long

She rubbed the back of her head and gave them an embarrassed grin with her glasses slightly askew, which she then readjusted once she noticed.

So, uh...hi again!

"Juana...this is really you?" Mariana couldn't believe it even as the words escaped his mouth. It was her.

Hey, don't start crying now! This is meant to be a happy thing!

Charlie rubbed his eyes and tried to hold back his tears, "I think I'm gonna cry because I'm happy, Flippa."

Juanaflippa laughed and nodded.

I guess that's understandable.

Words weren't coming easily to any of them, and whilst it was now a much more comfortable silence than it had been before, they all still wanted to be saying something. They had to, to tell each other how much it had hurt to be apart, to communicate the care the parents had for their egg, and the love their egg had in return. Knowing all of that, no words would ever suffice, but neither would silence.

Of all the words in the universe there had to be some that came close to encapsulating all that the three wanted to say to one another. But they might be stuck here forever waiting for those mystical words to form, and whilst that might not seem such a terrible fate in concept, it was probably best for all of them that this ended eventually, as difficult they were all aware that would be.

"Um, have you been okay here?" Mariana eased out of the silence. Catching up with one another was probably a good way to start, considering the time they'd been apart. God it had been so long.

Flippa nodded happily and gave a little glance over her shoulder at the world- or lack thereof- surrounding them.

I think it's peaceful. And the other eggs are here- all of them are now! I'm so excited to see everyone again

"Don't make it sound like you wanna get rid of us already," Charlie joked, but Juanaflippa aggressively shook her head at him.

No, you can stay as long as you like! Everyone else can wait, my family is more important!

Mariana could feel his hands twitching at his sides with the urge to hold them out to Flippa, his mind still conflicted over if this was all real and if his hands would just go through her. Holding her hand might cause his senses to short circuit.

Juanaflippa smirked with a glint of childish joy in her eyes and decided to take hold of his hand first, then take Charlie's in the other. He didn't realise he'd be the most surprised by her palm feeling so...alive.

You think confetti was the only thing i prepared? Come on, i've got another last surprise!

Specifying that it was a last suprise was the only thing to put a pit in the parents' stomachs, as they'd been happier without the reminder of the finality of this meeting, but Flippa was happy nonetheless and didn't allow them to get a word in before she dragged them through the void towards a small blot in the distance they hadn't realised had been there before.

They approached it quickly, although at the same time it barely felt like they were moving, and it became clearer that the blot was a hole to some kind of room, despite the void continuing past it. None of them really bothered trying to make sense of it, instead there was a growing curiosity as to what was held inside this tear in space. It wasn't long before Juanaflippa drifted inside and released their hands to let them look around and satiate that curiosity.

It was immediately a place of familiarity, Charlie's eyes widened as he remembered it all in vivid clarity. Their first day together, they needed a place to live, so he'd brought his daughter to his home in the side of a wall.

It was just as terrible as he and Mariana remembered it, Flippa hadn't tried to disguise that and it was left in all its cramped and haphazard glory.

"You couldn't have done my house instead?" Mariana asked and Charlie didn't mind the implied insult.

I remembered this one a little better from all the time i spent left in the attic

Charlie buried his face in his hands, "no, don't say it like that...I really should've gotten you a better room."

She laughed and waved her hand, signalling she didn't mind it that much, although she did glance over her shoulder to the secret entrance to her 'room' with a hint of a grimace taking over her wide smile.

"So did you build this all from memory?" Mariana traced his hand over the edge of a chest.

As best as i could remember it! It might not be perfect but i wanted to prepare a suprise for you

"It's perfect, Flippa," Charlie assured her as his eyes drifted across the room. It really was just like their old house. It was perfect.

You don't have to leave just yet, but i was thinking for old times sake...we could do a family flip?

"I- you- you want-?" Charlie stumbled over his words as he envisioned it in his head, "y-you want us to do a- a backflip?"

"I'm not too sure that I can," Mariana had a similar doubt that they'd be able to fulfil Flippa's request. Once again she waved her hand to dismiss their worries.

If you can do it in the game you can do it here! I think

"Yeah..." Mariana didn't sound too convinced, but he shrugged, "we might as well try."

Charlie was a little more apprehensive, "I feel like if I try I might break something."

Both Mariana and Juanaflippa insisted he would be fine, and he didn't really believe them, but eventually he caved and agreed he'd at least give it a try.

On three?

Mariana nodded, "I'm ready!"

"I'm not," Charlie sighed, "I really hope I don't wake up in the real world with a broken back."

You'll be fine dad. One!

Charlie took a breath. He'd be fine, probably.

Two...

"Two," Mariana joined in with Flippa, nudging Charlie to do the same. Charlie rolled his eyes, but he was smiling.

Three!

"Three!" the trio shouted together, just as Flippa crouched down and managed to do a backflip perfectly and land on her feet with ease. Her parents tried. They ended up on the floor, however.

Charlie had somehow managed to end up face down, while Mariana scrambled to his feet to pretend he'd done it perfectly while the others weren't looking. Flippa giggled, probably having expected something like this, and wandered over to help Charlie back to his feet.

"Sorry Flippa, you deserved a better sendoff than that," he apologised as he stretched his back, subtly checking to see that it wasn't broken. Juanaflippa shook her head.

It was perfect, dad

"Weird definition of perfect but alright," Mariana laughed.

Charlie and Juanaflippa continued holding onto each others' hands after she helped him up and Charlie couldn't do much but smile down at her, lacking the words to sum up all he had to say. She returned the smile to him, and he realised that she understood without him needing to say a thing.

"As if I didn't miss you enough already..." he muttered, emotions welling in his eyes as he knew it would be even harder to say goodbye this time. He felt he'd had more goodbyes than he deserved, for better or for worse, because it hit harder every time.

"Hey, let's be happy," Mariana put a hand on Charlie's shoulder, "I don't want the last thing Juana sees of us to be us crying and being miserable."

Charlie nodded and rubbed his eye, "yeah, you're right," he sighed, "I'm so happy for the time we had together, Flippa."

I'm happy too. For all of it. Thank you

She addressed both of her parents and gave them the best smile she could with slightly quivering lips.

The rest of their farewell was a conversation, gathered in a loving recreation of their old home and discussing the most pointless or meaningful things on a whim, because it wasn't what they were talking about that mattered.

Their last time together was spent as a family, with teasing and laughter and an indeterminate amount of tears, as both Mariana and Charlie promised not to tell anyone how much they cried- which, for the record, they definitely didn't even cry at all.

But when it came time to say the word goodbye itself, there were no tears. There was a hug between the three of them, and then the three of them returned home.

~

Jerma suppressed a laugh as he saw the look Leo was giving him from between Foolish's arms, trapped by the man in a hug that had gone on far longer than it was acceptable for hugs to go. At first Leo hadn't really seemed to mind, but she had limits, and by the expression on their face Jerma could tell they had certainly breached their limit.

"-And as soon as I'm back I'm making a huge statue of you, bigger than any statue I've made, and it's gonna be the best statue ever because that's exactly what you deserve," Foolish rambled on, sniffling between words now and then.

In real life? I wanna see that.

"Well, no, probably in Minecraft," Foolish clarified, however a moment after he seemed to have more thoughts about it, "well...if I could get the materials..."

"I don't know if building in a video game is enough experience for real life construction," Jerma added quietly, hesitant to interrupt but realising without his intervention this could quickly get out of hand.

Just be happy you didn't choose to live with him, otherwise he'd be asking you to help him build it

Unfortunately for Leo, mentioning that caused another cry from Foolish, "no, Leo, you can't build with me anymore!"

Whatever will you do without your free child labour?

Leo leant their head back and smirked but poking fun at him didn't help Foolish's mood as much as she'd hoped it would.

"What are you even gonna do if you're not taking care of me anymore?" he asked.

Relax, probably.

Jerma laughed, "I don't think you need to worry so much, Foolish. It sounds like she'll be fine."

"I won't be!" he insisted.

"You'll live," Jerma reassured him, and Leo patted Foolish on the head in an attempt to comfort him.

"Yeah... but I won't be a cool shark man anymore either," Foolish muttered grumpily.

"Oh yeah, I almost forgot that you wouldn't look like this in real life," Jerma thought that would be a weird thing to overlook considering he was standing in front of someone made of gold with shark-like features, but he couldn't really imagine Foolish looking any other way.

"Wait no, I totally look like this what do you mean," Foolish's smile instantly gave his lie away and he sighed, "okay, maybe I don't, but I'm not gonna let you see any photos of me in real life, I want the only mental image you have of me to be this," to make sure they knew what he meant, Foolish struck a pose. Leo tried very hard to conceal that he was laughing.

"I, uh, I'm not sure if I want that mental image, but alright," Jerma conceded uncomfortably.

"Wait, do we have cameras? Can I bring a picture of myself back to the real world?" Foolish asked genuinely, but Leo started laughing at the request.

"What?" he continued, "come on, who wouldn't want a photo of themselves completely made of gold?"

She sighed and looked back at him with a raised eyebrow.

I'll see what I can do, dad.

Foolish pumped his fists in the air, "yesss!"

"You could always just make a gold statue of yourself," Jerma suggested. He suggested it as a joke, but probably should've realised beforehand that Foolish wouldn't take it as such.

"Okay, here's the plan- gold statue of me, silver statue of you, and I can make a bronze one of Vegetta!" Foolish spread his hands out in front of him like he could already see what it would look like.

That feels mean to my other dad.

"Hey, third place is a respectable position," he assured them.

"Your other dad wears a shirt at least, right?" Jerma checked with Leo.

Haha, no.

"Oh," Jerma found he was relieved that Vegetta wasn't here when he knew the alternative was being in the void with Leo and his two shirtless dads.

~

Hetch crossed his arms, staring down the only other figure in this void with him, some small child with blonde hair and a bright yellow duck floatie around his waist.

"So what are you meant to be? Don't tell me you're my conscience or something stupid," he raised an eyebrow and curled his lip.

How flattering, but no. I'm Chayanne. You used to know me as Cucurucho. MAYBE YOU KNOW ME BETTER IF I TALK LIKE THIS?

"Oh, god, you're the bear?" he seemed even more disgusted, "and how are you even talking that way, it's like you're doing it with text..? But I can hear it? Whatever, I'm not expecting you'd ever tell me."

~ magic ~

"Yeah. Sure," Hetch remained unimpressed, cocking his head to either side to analyse the nothingness that surrounded him.

"And why are you here?" he asked without even looking Chayanne's direction, "if you're giving me 'one last chance to change' then don't even bother. For both our sakes."

Oh I know, you said it yourself on that first day. You're not planning to have any kind of redemption, so I'm not expecting any. I do find it a little funny how similar our characters were in our own stories, though.

Hetch raised an eyebrow but his tone remained thoroughly uninterested, "how so?"

Well Cucurucho is a big part of the Federation, he controls the island and keeps everyone trapped there, gives them stuff to do to keep it interesting but not necessarily caring about their happiness. Sound familiar?

Hetch grunted, "I guess. Your point is?"

No point really. Just thought it was interesting.

Hetch let out a breath and looked away from Chayanne again to analyse the surroundings, as if there might be something other than endless void all of a sudden.

You excited for jail?

Very slowly, Hetch raised a hand to his face and pinched the space between his eyes, grimacing. Chayanne just laughed at his reaction.

You'll love it, they've got all kinds of fun stuff there. Like, uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

"Yeah yeah I get it," Hetch interrupted, "jeez...this is what I deserve, I guess?"

Chayanne nodded to him, but Hetch didn't sound like he believed he deserved it. Chayanne accepted that that probably wouldn't be changing.

Your Founder's gone, your show's gone, your actors are gone...got any ideas what you'll do next?

Chayanne's grin only grew as Hetch looked more and more pissed off.

"I don't know, Chayanne. Maybe I'll fucking start a bakery. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Chayanne shrugged to him.

I can't imagine you being that good as a baker.

"Thanks," Hetch sighed and turned away, underestimating the motion and this time ending up spinning around longer than he intended to.

Having fun?

"My god you are insufferable," Hetch gritted through his teeth, trying to get himself back upright despite there not being much of an up or down in this place.

It's what I do best

"Clearly," he growled, but made an effort to calm himself down and eventually looked over at Chayanne, "don't you have any family to be saying bye to right now?"

Already did that part pretty much. Someone needs to be here babysitting you, anyway.

Hetch ignored the last part and continued looking at Chayanne, "really? A few of the people back there really cared about you. I'm sure they're wanting to see you again."

Chayanne shook his head.

You always underestimate people, Hetch. They're very strong. I'm sure they'd like to see me, but they'll manage just fine without me. We'll be managing on our own without them.

Hetch didn't have another response for that, he just sighed and looked out into the void.

"So, do I have a life sentence, or..?"

That's a suprise!

"Yeah. Of course it is."

~

Their group had been fairly quiet, as Phil and Missa found it was quite difficult to figure out how they would say goodbye. Tallulah didn't mind and sat with them and Vinny, eventually bringing out her flute to fill the void with melody.

What couldn't be said with words was said with expressions or actions, or in this case it was said with song. The song of a flute, pouring its essence into the space around and filling every inch of emptiness with its feeling and soul, its reason for sorrow but just the same its reason for joy. The emptiness suddenly felt so full, a fear of ending became a celebration of having happened at all. The so-called death family was brought to life. And as all songs did, it ended.

Phil smiled and placed his hand round Tallulah's shoulder, "that was really pretty, Llulah. Thank you."

She just smiled and leant over to rest her head on his side, pulling Missa towards her so that they were all held together.

"I should probably tell you not to get into trouble before we go, because you and your siblings will definitely find a way to make trouble even in a place like this," Phil added.

"That's a reminder you should be telling Chayanne, not Tallulah," Missa told him.

"Oh, I would definitely if he were here," Phil smiled, "maybe that's why he isn't, he's avoiding me."

He's not avoiding you

Phil nodded, "I know. I got to say goodbye, at least. I don't think it's kicking in yet that that's the last time..."

Tallulah pulled her parents a little closer.

It's ok, like you said, you got to say goodbye. He's missing you both just as much, I know he is.

"Pass on the message not to cause trouble, at least," Missa requested.

I don't think that would stop him, or any of the eggs

Phil laughed, "yeah, I know it wouldn't."

They really wanted to fight Hetch the whole time, Chayanne had to tell everyone to trust that Ranboo would be strong enough to take care of him. And he was! They also really wanted to fight Security, though. Which I don't think would've gone well

"Yeah, it didn't go much better for us, but I suppose we're the ones with infinite lives in the game," Vinny added.

"I wouldn't have liked to be visiting you as a 'dead' egg," Missa told Tallulah.

Oh, I was staying far away from that monster, trust me

"Your dad taught you well!" Missa nudged Phil, who smiled back at him.

"I try my best," Phil sighed.

You both did the best any parents could do. I couldn't ever thank you enough

Phil couldn't say anything to that, instead he drew Tallulah close and hugged her, then he grabbed Missa and forced him to join the hug too. After a moment he glanced at Vinny, "you wanna join too?"

join us join us

Vinny laughed and shrugged, "alright, alright."

Tallulah pulled him in when she saw he was hesitant and the four of them shared a hug for a little while. When it was clear none of them wanted to be the first one to let go, Tallulah eventually loosened her grip and leant back.

I'll be with you always when I'm gone, don't forget that

"We wouldn't forget anything about you for the world," Missa promised.

"And you'll be with everyone else after this," Phil said to remind her as much as it was to remind himself, "just like we'll all be together in the real world, so no matter what none of us will be alone."

I don't think I could ever feel alone again, knowing that you're existing somewhere just as I'm existing here

"Well now you're just trying to make us cry," Phil said with a strained laugh as he rubbed his eye.

"Trust me Llulah you don't need to try that much," said Missa as he wiped both eyes.

Tallulah giggled and pulled her hat back down as it had gotten a little out of place. Seeing her do that reminded Phil of something on his own body.

"Real life's gonna suck after this, I'm not gonna be a bird anymore," he complained, stretching a hand behind himself to feel the wings he'd already gotten so used to that he was forgetting they were there.

"You'd be too powerful," Missa told him, "they can't trust you with such power in the real world."

"They can't hold me back forever. I'll start wearing wing suits and diving out of planes just to feel something," Phil joked.

"I'll probably be sticking to the ground," Vinny wasn't quite as excited by the idea of becoming a daredevil once he was back in the real world. Living a normal-ish life for once was more than enough for him.

"Are you gonna drag your friends living with you onto a plane too?" Missa asked Phil.

"Oh, I'd almost forgotten about that part too," Phil realised, "do we have enough food in the house for three more people? God, I hope so."

Vinny paused for a moment, then turned to Tallulah, "are we gonna wake up with clothes?"

Tallulah was laughing for a few moments before she could answer.

Yes haha I'd hope so

"Y-you hope so? I kinda want you to know," Vinny was looking at his body nervously, "if not I'm gonna need to be ready to find clothes in Cellbit's house fast."

"I think you'll be fine, if they can magic you into and out of a video game they can probably magic you with clothes," Phil reassured him.

"Mm...I hope so..." Vinny grumbled.

"You will need spare clothes, though. Hopefully Jaiden and Cellbit have normal enough wardrobes, but I've seen Jaiden with that BALLS?!?!? shirt a few times and I feel like she might have multiple of them," Phil thought out loud.

"I'm sure most things will be fine," Vinny told him, but he did look a little confused by Phil's description of Jaiden's wardrobe.

"Send updates on how you're all doing and when you can come visit, I wanna know!" Missa insisted.

"It's gonna be a while until we can travel, Missa," Phil tried to be realistic in the face of Missa's excitement.

"Well as long as we meet up eventually," Missa told him.

"Yeah, there might be a bit of an adjustment period," Vinny admitted.

After a short silence as the conversation drifted, Tallulah sighed.

I don't want to say goodbye

Phil nodded, sympathetic to her, but offered his solution, "you don't need to say it. There's other ways."

Tallulah wasn't sure what that meant for a moment, but then her eyes drifted to her flute and she smiled as she knew exactly what it was he meant.

The four sat side by side in this void, a world between worlds so senseless and unlike anything they knew that nobody had even tried to ask for an explanation, looking out at an expanse they couldn't fathom the extent of, completely at ease as Tallulah lifted her flute to her lips and drew a breath that stopped the space around them as the air itself halted in anticipation.

And, not one to keep the world waiting, Tallulah released her breath, and through her instrument it became a melody, the notes followed one another and uplifted the note that came before as much as the one after. They each formed a story, a tale of sound that developed and transformed, bringing its audience with it on an adventure that would be told this once and never again the same, but infinite times again in unique different ways.

The story she played them was heard across space and across worlds, it broke continents and cultures, it crossed boundaries and trial and nothing could stop it as it continued its course. All that heard it would know its message and would learn its lesson, would be changed but stay as they always were at heart.

Tallulah's fingers moved expertly as though the flute and her were one and the same, like this was an instrument she'd known her whole life and that she could never unlearn. In much the same way the songs she played with it would not be forgotten, could not be forgotten by her family and friends and the strangers who were just as welcome to find joy in the sound.

In its essence it was love, a melody of adoration and belonging. Tallulah knew such a thing so well, and in her notes could be heard the sound of loss but of hope, of a family that would always be together, if not physically then in every other way.

Her song was her own but she gave it out to the world as a gift it was not deserving of, but it didn't need to deserve anything, it only needed to listen and enjoy it before it ended, because it would end, as all things did. But this time that wasn't a bad thing, as sad as it may have been, as much as her own tears became a part of her song as they dripped down onto the hollow wood.

Her family was the world to her, and a world could not separate them. A song would connect them, forever and always.

The notes slowed, the melody faded, and before anyone had realised it, an end came.

Tallulah held her family close, as they held her, and they knew as long as they lived they would be together always.

~

Chapter Text

The first sensations were uncomfortable, but as he realised where he was, Phil found that he would've expected to be more uncomfortable.

He lifted his head from his keyboard to find a barrier between his face and the plastic keys, a blanket that he definitely didn't remember being there before. He moved a little more and felt something slip off his back, which he was still a little too dazed to take a look at, and the glow from his monitors was the most attention grabbing thing in close proximity.

Connection Lost
I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE ISLAND :]

He supposed that really was it, then. He hoped the eggs were doing well.

The sensations and sights were what first came to him, but then all of a sudden there was noise that he could hear from behind. Gradually Phil spun his chair around to get a better look at the source, and he found it was much easier to locate than he expected, considering the source was three barely conscious people on the floor of his room.

He rubbed his eyes, finding that they were still unfocused and dreary, and was glad to see that the people still remained afterwards and weren't just a hallucination. When the fog in his mind cleared he then realised he was bombarded by his own thoughts, asking what to do now, if he should call someone or just go up to them to make sure they were alive. Thankfully his mind couldn't linger worrying about that last one as the noise he'd heard continued, and he could see it was Ranboo making it as they slowly tried to get themself up.

Oh my god, it was Ranboo. In the real world.

No, it wasn't the time to get emotional again, he needed to actually do something.

"Hold on, I'll help, Ran," Phil slipped off his chair and crouched by Ranboo to help lift him onto his knees. He glanced back over his shoulder when he heard something hit the floor- another blanket. That must have been what he felt slipping off his shoulders earlier. He could swear he didn't have that before being put in the game, though.

Whatever, that bit wasn't important. He quickly turned back to Ranboo, who was smiling back at him in thanks for the assistance. After a moment both of their attentions then fell on the two still laid on the floor, Charlie and Sneeg. They were breathing, at least, but not yet conscious.

"We should probably get them off my floor- oh, I should definitely tell Kristin about this too," Phil sighed, hoping this wouldn't go down too badly. Ranboo nodded and lifted Sneeg to be leaning against a wall while Phil decided to pull over the blanket and just put it under Charlie's head for now.

Using the chair for some assistance, his muscles still barely awake, Phil got to his feet and headed for the door, in his head quickly going through all the ways he could tell Kristin about this. She would probably be more than happy to let them stay in their house, but she might also freak out a bit first, so he wanted to minimise that.

He found her downstairs and she gave him a smile as he stepped into the living room, "hey, have a good sleep?"

"Uhh- oh, that was you? With the blankets?" he realised at some point she might have walked in to see him facedown on his keyboard.

"I didn't wanna wake you, you hadn't been sleeping much at night and all. Don't worry, you haven't missed your stream or anything."

"I, uh, I'm probably not streaming today, I- can I tell you something?" Phil asked. Kristin started to look a little worried at that combination of statements so he clarified, "don't worry, it's not a bad thing! It's just...kind of a lot."

She still seemed concerned over what this was, but nodded, "I mean, of course, you can tell me anything. What's going on?"

Phil looked to the side, fidgeting with his hands as he figured out what to say, "well, it's- are you okay with us having people stay with us?"

Kristin tilted her head, "depends on who."

"It's- okay, just, let me show you," Phil eventually gave in to the fact that he'd just have to show her one way or another and hope for the best. He extended a hand to take hers and lead her upstairs, back to his office. Just before they were close enough to see beyond the doorway, he paused.

"You're making this awfully dramatic," Kristin commented, trying to joke to ease the tense air.

"Yeah, sorry, I just wanna prepare, I guess. Because there's, uh. There's three guys in my office."

"There's what," Kristin's eyes widened.

Phil didn't elaborate and stepped into the office so that hopefully the situation would explain itself. She'd know exactly who they were, after all, but Phil realised Ranboo might need an explanation on who she was, "hey, Ran, this is Kristin. She's my wife."

He gently pushed the door open to announce his entrance and to give Kristin a view of the people inside, and vice versa. He noticed at the same time that Sneeg was waking up, but Charlie was still on the floor. Ranboo looked to Phil first, then the shell shocked figure behind him.

"Um, hello. I'm Ranboo," he smiled nervously. Kristin still hadn't made a sound.

Phil waited a moment and then spoke to her quietly to break the silence, "so...do you think they can stay?"

Slowly, mouth still slightly agape, she nodded. After another moment she took a breath and spoke, "okay. Right. Do you have any more explanation than just...this?"

"It's a bit of a long story-"

"I have all day, Phil," she told him.

"We can probably talk downstairs," he decided, thinking the other three might want some time to talk amongst themselves too, "are you guys gonna be okay in here?"

Ranboo nodded back, and Sneeg gave a little bit of acknowledgement, but he didn't seem to have fully processed the question.

Phil and Kristin returned to the living room, where the latter quickly span around to face him and look him dead in the eyes, "okay, this isn't- we don't have like a gas leak, or something? That wasn't a hallucination?"

"No, it's- somehow, it's real," Phil chose to emphasise the 'somehow' in hopes that Kristin would realise he couldn't give her an explanation how.

Kristin drew in a breath and straightened her back, "okay. Alright, okay. They're alright? Are they safe?"

Phil nodded, "yeah, they're safe here, I'm pretty sure the problem's all resolved now, they just need somewhere to stay."

"And how do you know all of this..?" Kristin gave Phil a look, not exactly distrustful, but wary of how he knew all of this while she knew absolutely nothing.

"Well, the whole situation started on the QSMP, I wasn't sure when to tell you about it since I didn't know the whole situation. There is another big thing you should know, though," Kristin raised her eyebrows in disbelief that there were even more surprises to know of, "they all have some kind of amnesia, so they don't remember exactly who we are."

Phil held his breath a little as he watched Kristin processing the information, emotions passing too quickly on her face for him to identify them, but she ended up stern and took another breath, "alright. We can deal with that. What can I do to help?"

Phil felt his tension release as Kristin was so understanding; at least he wouldn't be doing this alone. He supposed the next course of action was to get their new housemates settled in before they did anything else, "do you want to go get the spare rooms ready? I'll go back up and ask if they need any food or drink or stuff like that."

Kristen gave a small laugh, "what are we, a hotel now?" but she nodded and stepped away to go sort out their rooms. Phil composed himself, then returned to his office.

He was happy to see all three of their guests were awake now, maybe not completely conscious since Charlie was blinking at the floor and didn't seem to notice Phil's entrance, but he'd take what he could get. Sneeg looked like he was similarly struggling to focus, but Ranboo was doing okay and waved a little to Phil as he walked in, "hey, everything alright?"

Phil nodded back, "yep, just sorting the house out for you, mate. We've got some drinks and food in the house if any of you are hungry or anything? If you need anything specific I can nip out to the shops too, they're not far from here."

"Um...water would probably be good," Ranboo glanced at Sneeg and Charlie, "for all of us."

"No worries. Wanna come downstairs or are you happy here?" Phil tried to be as good a host as he could without overloading them with questions, wary they had all just gone through a lot and should try to take it easy. Apart from him, he didn't need to take it easy. Phil had stuff to do.

Ranboo once again looked at his friends for input, but they didn't seem to have much of a preference. They moved their shoulders slightly to shrug and turned back to Phil, "I guess I can come down to help you with drinks, would be kinda hard to carry three glasses up here at once."

"I could probably manage it," Phil claimed, but accepted Ranboo's help anyway.

"Hold on, we'll come too," Sneeg decided, walking over to Charlie and gently taking his hand to pull him towards the door.

"What? Huh? O-okay," Charlie followed, not really sure what they were doing now but happy to follow Sneeg as he followed Phil and Ranboo downstairs. They went slowly to make sure nobody would fall down the stairs and Phil took five glasses from the cupboard as Charlie and Sneeg took seats at the table by the kitchen.

"Alright, I'll just get some water," Phil narrated his actions as he did everything, "I suppose we have enough food for something to snack on before I need to make a meal for five. I'll pull some stuff out of the fridge for you to take a look at in a second."

Ranboo took the water as Phil filled the cups and gave them out to everyone, Phil bringing his and Kristin's back to the table himself. Kristin was presumably still in the spare room, but he'd leave it here for when she came back.

They had enough when there were only two people in the house, but it was just barely enough now. Phil brought out some crisp packets and the kind of snacks you'd expect in a kid's lunch box, taking note of the rest of their food stock as he looked for little things that didn't need any preparation. They could get by on pasta tonight, at least, but they'd need more for tomorrow.

As Ranboo, Charlie and Sneeg started to talk together, Phil finally had enough of a mental break for the thought to cross his mind about how everyone else was doing. His phone was in his pocket, so he supposed he could at least check it to get an idea of how everyone else was getting on.

He saw more than a hundred unread discord notifications and turned his phone off. They were probably fine.

~

Jaiden tried to ignore her headache as she stepped away from her computer, refocusing on the world. Birds were still here, plushies were still here, everything seemed just like she'd left it. So far so good.

She took a step out into the hallway and was immediately caught by Jacob, who grabbed her arm and pulled her close to the wall like he was trying to hide the two of them. He seemed pretty panicked, so Jaiden immediately started to panic as well.

"W-w-what's going on, is- is everything okay?" she stammered out before he could even explain what he was doing.

"Jaiden, there's- you haven't invited anyone over, have you? There's someone in the kitchen, I-I think I heard stuff from the other rooms too, but they were like- c-can I say something weird?" he looked at Jaiden, then darted his eyes back down the hall as if someone was suddenly going to turn the corner.

"What you're saying is already kinda weird," Jaiden levelled with him, her adrenaline dropping as she started to realise what might be going on here, but waiting to hear more from Jacob before she was certain.

"S-shut up, it's- the guy, he, he like," Jacob took a breath as he tried to find his words, "he looks like Jerma, alright? But he's fucking missing right now, y'know?"

"Oh yeah, I know," Jaiden now looked relieved as she knew their house hadn't actually been broken into or something, but Jacob didn't have any similar comforting thoughts and was still very much panicking.

"Wha- why are you calm right now?!" he pushed the words through his teeth to keep his voice low but he couldn't stop himself from hissing them with the intensity at which he was talking. Jaiden moved a little out of the way so that they weren't still huddled against a wall.

"There's no need to worry man, it's alright," she assured him, "it's just Jerma."

Jacob looked left and right like there would be people there to back him up in thinking that Jaiden sounded crazy right now.

"Huh?" he gawked, "you're just- that's cool with you? You're just okay with that?"

Jaiden nodded.

"Yeah, him and Sykkuno and Valkyrae are gonna be staying with us for a bit."

Jacob didn't even say anything, his eyes just widened.

"Okay, I'll just show you," Jaiden said, "Jerma! You there?"

Jacob started quickly trying to shush her as all of a sudden Jaiden shouted to the other rooms in the house, still with the worry that this was someone they didn't know. But after a moment, she got a response.

"Uh, hey! Rae wants to know if she can eat some of your food?"

Jacob stared towards the source of the voice, then to Jaiden, then back at the voice that unmistakeably belonged to Jerma.

"So that's- that's really-?" Jacob continued looking one way, then the other, uncertain what conclusions to draw. Jaiden decided to just pull him along towards the room the others were in.

"Let's just go say hi, they won't bite. Unless you look like food," she joked to Jacob, who took it a little more seriously than she'd hoped and she could feel his hand tense up. She squeezed it, trying to be reassuring, before they got to the kitchen.

Rae excitedly held up some chocolates that had been left on the counter as they entered, making Jacob jump, "hey! Can I have these?"

"Uh- sure?" Jaiden answered hesitantly. She looked behind Rae to Jerma and Sykkuno, who seemed just as confused about how to respond as she was.

Jacob held onto her arm and tried to whisper to her, "Jaiden, please tell me what the fuck is going on."

"We teleported," Valkyrae answered through a mouthful of chocolates, not bothering to hide that she'd overheard him, "out of the video game."

Jacob looked at her, then back at Jaiden, making it clear on his expression he still wanted an explanation despite Rae's very detailed and informative answer.

"Okay, all you gotta know really is that everything's fine," Jaiden tried to avoid having to actually explain anything, because she had no idea how she was supposed to explain something that didn't even make sense to her. Telling her roommate she had just been inside of a video game five minutes ago was not the best way to open up a 'dude trust me' conversation. Jacob still looked unimpressed with her, though.

"Jaiden, three missing streamers have just shown up in our kitchen, I appreciate that you're keeping it together but I am struggling to do the same," he admitted.

Jaiden took a breath, "fine, don't hate me for this, but...I did invite them to stay with us, since they've forgotten stuff and need to like, readjust. So they're probably staying in our house for a while. We have spare rooms, it's fine!"

Jacob bit his lips and looked in deep thought for a few moments. Considering that these people were already in their house, saying no at this point wasn't much of an option, but he still wanted a moment to think it over.

"Will they mind that our spare rooms are full of plushies?" he eventually asked.

At first Jaiden was relieved that he seemed to be adjusting to the situation, but then she realised what he'd asked and her eyes flicked to the other three as she tried to figure out how much they would mind being put in the rooms that were almost completely filled with dozens of plushies on every surface. She didn't have a problem, by the way. Not that that was related to anything she was thinking about. Why would anyone think she had a problem?

Sykkuno was also thinking about Jacob's question and shrugged, "I mean, as long as we have somewhere to sleep, I'm good..."

Jaiden smiled, "see? It's fine!"

Jacob shrugged to her exhaustedly, "I- yeah, I guess? I'm glad they're back at least. Do you know about everyone else..?"

"Yes, they're all back- just not all staying in our house, which I'm sure you'll be glad to know."

"It's already pushing it to have three more people," Jacob agreed, glancing to the other three, "we definitely can't feed them off whatever leftovers are in the fridge right now. What are you thinking? Takeout?"

Jaiden looked at the other three, "you guys like sushi?"

They nodded back to her, so she turned back to Jacob and gave him a thumbs up. He sighed like he was disappointed, but he still had a smile, "alright, I'll order it."

~

"And so this is what it looked like to us when you were in there," Cellbit explained, opening up a new Minecraft world since he couldn't access the QSMP anymore. He'd definitely miss that server a lot, but as long as the eggs were okay, he could get by without it.

Ethan, Austin, Niki and Vinny huddled around his computer and made reactionary noises as they saw the blocky world. Cellbit tapped a button on his keyboard that switched the view to look at his own player model which he grinned and pointed at while he looked at the other four, "that's me."

"Uh...sure," Austin responded, not entirely seeing the resemblance.

"Wait until you see the eggs. I saw a picture of Pomme a while ago, she is a literal egg," Niki told him.

"Ah, I'm not sure if I have screenshots of the eggs," Cellbit worried, "though other people will definitely, I can ask them now. Who do you want to bully for photos?"

Cellbit opened a new app on his computer, called Discord. There were already a bunch of notifications that he scrolled past to get to his DMs with the other players on the server he'd been recently messaging.

"If you ask Phil then maybe we can also ask how everyone at his house is doing," Vinny suggested.

"That is true, but Phil also might not be checking messages right now..." Cellbit pointed out.

"Who's that one?" Ethan asked, pointing to a profile that had just sent him a message.

"Oh, that's Jaiden, I hope she's not messaging because of something bad," Cellbit dragged his mouse over and clicked on her message.

◯ Jaiden Hoy a las 05:26
Hey Cellbit just wondering how u guys are getting on and also if u have photos of ur cat I mentioned it once and now everybody wants to see it

Ethan gasped, "you didn't say you had a cat!"

"It was a surprise for you," Cellbit laughed as he wrote out his message back to Jaiden.

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 05:27
I'll trade cat photos forv any photos u have of the eggs
Need to show everyone how pixelated they look

"Can we see the cat?" Vinny asked.

"Better than see the cat, you can pet the cat!" Cellbit backed out from his desk and left the room to go and locate his cat while everyone waited for it excitedly. Austin saw an opportunity, though, and quietly crept closer to start using the keyboard.

"What are you doing?" Niki asked once she'd noticed, a little off-put by the sudden trouble making energy Austin had.

"Writing a message, can't I write a message?" he responded in offense, so Niki simply looked at the screen to find what he was doing. Now he was sending a message to one of the other icons on the side, which must have been some kind of group as there were messages from multiple people before Austin's. Speaking of Austin's message, he had just put something simple.

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 05:29
maximuss egg is stinky

"Mature," Niki sighed.

"What?! I got bombs thrown at me, I bet the egg you were with didn't throw bombs at you!" Austin responded defensively. Their attention was quickly drawn back to the screen, though, as another message made a sound as it popped up below Austin's.

◯ Maximus Hoy a las 05:29
SHUT UP YOU ARE BEING LIED TO HE IS BEAUTIFUL

Austin made a face to imply to his friends that he didn't exactly believe Max's claims.

"Maybe let's stop being mean to other people's kids and do something else with our time," Vinny suggested.

"Maybe his kids shouldn't have thrown bombs at me and I wouldn't wanna be mean to him," Austin disputed.

"Yeah, I meant to ask about that, uh, what?" Ethan looked wide-eyed at Austin but didn't get a response as Cellbit re-entered the room, cat cradled in his arms.

Niki immediately responded, "aww!" and she sprung up from the floor to meet him halfway and start stroking the cat's head.

"You'll be very happy to have visitors," Cellbit told the cat, no doubt because of all the attention it would be receiving. Ethan wasn't far behind and started petting the cat too, much to its enjoyment.

"Come on, let's go see the cat," Vinny persuaded as he grabbed Austin and tried to pull him away from the computer, "I'm not leaving you here to write any more messages."

Austin begrudgingly followed with one last glance at the computer like he was making a promise to return. The cat jumped down from Cellbit's arms as he reached it, which he hid his disappointment at, and Cellbit tried to wipe some of the hair from his clothes the best he could.

"I guess it's food time," he explained, "you guys follow the cat to the kitchen if you want food or anything too, I'll just shut stuff down in here."

The other four nodded to him and happily followed his cat through the house as he returned to the computer, scoffing at the message sent through his account moments ago. His hand hesitated over the power button as he saw a new message come up and decided to check that first.

He smiled at the DM for a moment, then typed in his response and was about to shut the computer down again when there was a muffled crash from another room. He sighed, knowing it could be the cat just as much as it could be the four other people. Time to go find out.

He backed out from his desk and slipped out of the room to get to the bottom of the noise, having forgotten about shutting down the PC and leaving the dull blue glow of Discord lingering in the room, screen left on the most recent conversation.

◯ Quackity Hoy a las 05:32
hey cell im assuming u were showing ppl your computer from your ladt message on tje qsmp discord lol
anyways rhank you for helping with everything u really didnt need ti, hope eveything is good and im always open to help if theres any ways that i can

◯ Cellbit Hoy a las 05:33
It's no worries man, I know you've probably got a lot happening so I wanted to take some off ur back
But I'm sure it would def also help me if u gave me creative in your next smp ;)

~

"Alright, beds should all be set up," Kristin informed them as she passed by the table, brushing her hand on Phil's shoulder as she did, then headed towards the kitchen, "got any ideas for what we're eating?"

"Oh, don't worry, I'll help," Phil offered, "I think pasta is the only thing we could feed five with right now, but we could get some ideas together for buying for the rest of the week."

Phil glanced to the other three at the table, "any food you guys would want in particular?"

By now Sneeg and Charlie seemed to have properly woken up and were aware of the world around then, but they stumbled over coming up with any foods they liked. When Phil realised why that might have been he moved on, "i-it's no worries if you can't remember, I'll just go out and buy a mix of stuff for you to try. Then you can rediscover your favourites!"

That seemed to do pretty well at putting them at ease, so Phil smiled and excused himself while he went to assist in making the pasta with Kristin.

Suddenly Charlie stood up from his position at the table, "wait, d-don't-! Y-you, you..." he looked nervously around, as if just realising how loud his outburst had been, "u-uh, I mean, um...please don't- please don't cook for me."

That seemed like a strange request, but when Phil looked Charlie in the eyes, he could see a worryingly serious expression looking back at him. Whatever this was, he couldn't understand it, but for his friend he needed to try regardless.

"I- okay, alright," he conceded, "you do still need to eat, though."

"Yeah, I know," Charlie looked sheepishly to the side, "I'm sorry, I'm not trying to be rude, but is it okay if I make my own stuff? Sorry, this is just-"

"That's fine, mate, you don't need to apologise. You need me to help you with the kitchen equipment?"

"I mean, I think I can remember stuff like cooking skills, but I'm probably rusty, so..."

"No worries," Phil held out a hand, sensing his hesitation, "our kitchen's big enough to fit three, it'll be fine."

They both left the table and met Kristin in the kitchen, "everything alright?"

"Yep, Charlie's just come to make his own stuff. Doesn't trust me not to burn pasta," Phil joked.

"I-I didn't-!" Charlie objected nervously, but Phil cut him off with a laugh.

"Only joking. Now, pasta...let's see how much we'll have each."

Phil lead Charlie through the process of pasta making, and he set up his small pan next to Phil's pan for the other four of them. There seemed just enough to feed each person for now, and if not Phil assured them there were enough little snacks around the house to keep them going until the next night. At one point Kristin noticed Charlie reaching out to a bag of flour they had on the counter, but stopping himself with his other arm. She decided to leave it be, as it seemed he was able to handle whatever it was on his own.

The whole cooking process did seem somewhat stressful for Charlie, more than normal even considering this was his first time cooking food again in a long time. Phil tried his best to guide Charlie through each step and they got to the final product without major incident, then brought the plates through to the table with the awaiting Sneeg and Ranboo.

Once they'd sat down Sneeg tapped Charlie's arm and muttered something to him, to which he nodded and gave a reassuring smile. Sneeg smiled back to him as Charlie started on the pasta he'd made for himself, and Sneeg couldn't wait long to start on his own plate too.

Ranboo took a few bites, and realised this tasted different to any food he'd had on Quesadilla Island. The texture was more familiar, the heat of the food warmed his body like nothing there had, and they supposed this was what real food was like. And then they tried to remember before that, what else they'd eaten to compare this to, but each and every memory besides those on the island carried the taste of metal and rubber, jagged in his throat. It dawned on him that they'd never let him eat there, not without making him forget it. It dawned on them that the food in his mouth was the only real food he could ever remember eating.

And it was good food, it was warm. It was homemade from scraps and they wouldn't be too surprised if any of the ingredients were out of date. It was made for them and he would have all of it, taking joy in every mouthful and the smell of freedom that came with it.

Ranboo found that they liked pasta. They liked pasta a lot.

Ranboo was looking forwards to finding many new things to like.

Chapter Text

◯ FoolishGamers Today at 11:53
GUYS
GUYS GUYS GUYS
LOOK WHAT I GOT

📄 unknown.png ↓

◯ Etoiles Today at 11:54
BRO HOW COME YHEY SENT YOU A PICTURE OF YOU IN THE GAME YOU LOOK SO BUFF BRO
I WANT ONE OF HOW I LOOKED I WAS SO EPIC

◯ Roier Today at 11:54
he is GOLDEN no MAMES

◯ FoolishGamers Today at 11:55
Leo got me a grwat reference image fir my statue :)

◯ Ph1LzA Today at 11:55
I'm sorry, for your WHAT

◯ FoolishGamers Today at 11:55

📄 unknown.png ↓

Phil decided it was probably best to let everyone else handle that after opening the image and seeing a screenshot of halfway through a video titled "How to make a GOLD STATUE (Beginner Friendly)". If Foolish was going to make bad financial decisions then that was his problem, Phil had other things to be doing. He could hear some movement downstairs, which he assumed was somebody waking up. The five of them hadn't stayed up that late last night, but he wasn't surprised everyone else besides him and Kristin had slept until midday to recover from the prior mental, physical and secret-third-thing exhaustion.

Ranboo had actually been the first to go to bed, maybe because he had been the first out of their trio to wake up, but when a film night had been suggested they also seemed a little uncomfortable about it. They assured everyone else that it was fine to watch something without him, so in the end they settled on a very shitty looking rom-com. It did get them to laugh, but probably not at the parts they were supposed to find funny.

Sneeg managed to persuade Charlie to take the other spare bed after bringing up how many times Charlie had almost fallen asleep on him during the movie, and said he would be happy on the sofa until they sorted out getting another bed in the house. It was him who Phil found walking downstairs the following morning, sluggishly looking through some of the cupboards in their kitchen.

"Hey, you looking for breakfast?" Phil asked quietly, trying not to suprise him and also to not wake up the other two who might have still been asleep.

Sneeg startled a bit when he realised Phil was there, but made an effort not to show it besides a small flinch, "uh- yeah, but you said we might be low on food, right?"

"Yeah, we will be right now, but Kristin went out earlier this morning when we got up to do a big food shop. I think she said she was on her way back a few minutes ago," Phil checked his phone to confirm the text he'd gotten from her.

"Ah, right, no worries. So..." Sneeg put his hands on his hips and looked around, raising his eyebrows in a way that made Phil question if he should have cleaned up more for them, "how long until you're gonna kick us out?"

Phil laughed, "kick you out? Mate, I'm not gonna do that, you're welcome to stay as long as you need here."

There was a short silence as Sneeg looked over Phil, and it seemed as if he was searching for any kind of trick or deception in the man, "I mean, but like...surely that's not even, like, affordable."

Phil shrugged, "we get by just fine. I guess I'll be getting back to streaming soon, too. It won't be any trouble at all."

Sneeg still seemed uncertain, so Phil continued, "mate, if you're really that worried, I could probably find a part time job for you somewhere. Actually no, I really don't want one of your first experiences back in the real world to be retail...eugh..."

"Mm..." Sneeg considered it, and eventually shrugged, "I guess. What's the deal with the streaming, anyway? How do you get money from that?"

Phil laughed, reminded of every time he had to explain his job to people, usually older relatives, and started telling Sneeg about Twitch and the thousands that would tune in to watch him play video games. Sneeg probably thought he was making some of it up, which was fair.

Later Kristin returned with bags upon bags of food to put away, only then realising they needed enough space to store all of it. They just about managed it by organising it all like it was a Tetris game, and Phil decided he'd make a fancy English breakfast for them all despite it being lunch time already. The sound of eggs in a pan must have roused Ranboo and Charlie from their sleep, as they emerged from the spare room just as Phil was getting everything served.

"Hey, you sleep alright?" Kristin greeted them as they took seats at the table. Ranboo nodded to her, the movement still half asleep.

"It's definitely been worse," Charlie shrugged with a smile.

"I would really like to stop waking up in a different place each time..." Ranboo mumbled to himself.

"Hopefully it gets better once you get used to this place," Kristin assured them, "I know the first time sleeping somewhere away from home tends to be a little weird."

Charlie hesitated over his seat as Ranboo sat down, his eyes staring down at the plate of toast, eggs and bacon as though he was seeing something different in its place. Ranboo noticed and looked up at him, then followed his eyes to the plate, and had a realisation. Charlie started breathing faster so Ranboo quickly took ahold of his hand, pulling his attention away from the food.

"Charlie, you alright?" they asked.

Charlie shook his head, eyes flicking to the food then quickly away from it again, "I- do we have just, uh- like, cereal, or something I could get?"

There was a moment in which Phil was processing the question when he saw Charlie's expression change from anxiety and pleading to a sudden fear and regret, and he started talking again before Phil could reply, "I-I'm so sorry, I don't mean it's your food or anything, I- it looks really good, u-uh, I just-"

"Charlie. You're all good. Don't worry about it, I'm sorry I forgot you wanted to make your own stuff," Phil interrupted.

"But you, you made this for me, I don't wanna just..." Charlie looked down at the plate of breakfast-lunch like he was mourning it.

"Mate, seriously. I'm pretty hungry so I could probably just have that for seconds. Come on, I'll show you how to fry eggs," Phil smiled and made his way back into the kitchen, Charlie bashfully following.

After a minute or two, sizzling could be heard again from the kitchen. Kristin looked up from her plate to the two others at the table and decided to break the silence, "so, is there anything you guys would like to do?"

"...like, anything?" Sneeg asked.

"Well, within reason," Kristin laughed, "I just don't want you sitting inside all day and being bored is all."

Ranboo hummed, looking to Sneeg for ideas, but both of them seemed unsure of what to suggest.

"We've got some games you could try out?" Kristin suggested after a few moments.

Suddenly Phil called from the kitchen, having somehow overheard the mention of games, "oh, Kristin, do you think we could try and set up that old console with Halo and Tony Hawk and everything?"

"We could do!" She replied, then looked to Ranboo and Sneeg for their input.

"Video games sounds fun," Sneeg nodded, and Ranboo seemed to agree.

Most of that afternoon was spent messing with old technology and trying to get it to work, but eventually they had it in a useable state and took it in turns doing some sick skateboarding tricks. It was immediately very competitive and everyone was trying to get a better score than the person who went before them, which didn't usually lead to a better score and instead lead to falling off the skateboard many, many times. That ended up being part of the fun, though, and eventually it spiralled into a competition to get the worst score.

Phil got them to have an evening meal before they forgot about eating entirely, this time remembering to let Charlie do his own, and like that another day had just about come to a close. Phil decided before he went to bed to quickly make a post, updating everyone that he'd be back to streaming again tomorrow evening. Rumours were already starting to spread about why a bunch of streamers had simultaneously taken breaks, so it would probably help everyone for him to clarify that they weren't dead. He wasn't planning to say anything about the streamers that had returned, since he felt like that would be their decision to make if they wanted to return to the public eye at all.

Since he was online, he thought he might as well check in on everyone else while he was there. There were already tonnes more messages on the QSMP Discord that he didn't have the energy to scroll through right now, but he had a few DMs he could probably look at.

◯ Jaiden Today at 16:20
PHIL URGENT HOW DO YOU MAKE AN IKEA BED

◯ Jaiden Today at 21:23
nvm we got it :)

Phil chuckled, only able to imagine what might have been happening in her house during that five hour time period. At least they figured it out eventually.

He was suddenly reminded of Toby's worries about his oven but stopped himself from sending a message, realising he had probably posted something about it online. And just as he'd thought, the first post he found himself scrolling past on Toby's account was a reference to dying from inhaling gas fumes. But he seemed to be alive, so that was fine.

~

Ranboo had a nightmare, again. He thought maybe a benefit of the frequency would be that they got used to them, but it had been just as bad as the rest. The sentiment that it would never get easier loomed over his head, but when he opened his eyes, all that was over their head was a ceiling. The lights weren't fluorescent and the walls were more than just hastily thrown together plywood to make up a film set. It was a house, it was a real house, that just maybe Ranboo belonged in.

And to their side was a window. God, Ranboo didn't realise how much they would appreciate windows now. The curtains did well to hide the light, but there was still a little line of it that slipped through between the two draped pieces of fabric, a clock without any need for hands or numbers that told him the time was day, and it was probably time for him to get up.

Nightmares were never a good way to wake up, it tainted the whole morning with specters of that past life, a taste of metal that couldn't wash out of their mouth. But the taste faded with a homemade breakfast, and the specters drifted into shadows as sunlight poured through wide windows and covered each room. Echoing screams were drowned out easily with a laugh at somebody's terrible joke, because they didn't have to be funny at all, because there was no audience expecting that of them anymore.

When Phil brought up that he would be streaming later that day, Ranboo found himself strangely interested. Charlie, meanwhile, wasn't.

"I tend to watch them downstairs on the TV," Kristin explained, "so you guys can watch on there too if you'd like."

"I, uh, probably won't..." Charlie admitted.

"You gonna be grinding in the other room to beat us all at Tony Hawk?" Sneeg nudged him jokingly.

Charlie smiled, "no, no, I uh...I don't know exactly what it is, but I guess watching someone doing a livestream again...that just makes me a little uncomfortable."

Phil nodded understandingly, "yep, that's alright. I won't be doing all that much anyways, it's mainly just so I can stop people from worrying about where I've gone."

"Can I see what it looks like?" Ranboo asked, "I mean, the setup and everything. I'm wondering if it'll remind me of when I did streaming and everything."

"That's not a bad idea!" Phil told them, "sure, I could show you now if you like. I need to go up and make sure everything's ready ahead of time."

Phil lead him back into the office where all of them had woken up a little more than a day ago. He stood by the desk to turn his computer on and offered Ranboo the seat, but he assured Phil he was happy standing. There were a few minutes of Phil just setting everything up before he started pointing out specific things to Ranboo.

"Alright, so this window here is all my streaming stuff- you can see where chat would be there, obviously it's empty right now but there's usually lots of messages coming through on there while I'm live. Hold on, I can show you what the facecam and everything is like if I load up a game..."

As Ranboo watched Phil selecting a new item on his desktop they felt that they did recognise all of this, but not exactly where they recognised it from. It was still familiar, though. Ranboo liked it.

"Time to check in on my hardcore world and make sure it hasn't all exploded," Phil muttered to himself as Minecraft opened up on the screen. Ranboo watched as Phil's world loaded and he pointed to the other monitor where they could see both of them on the left of the frame, captured by the little camera atop the main monitor.

Looking at the camera still brought up some uncomfortable feelings in Ranboo's gut, but he knew rationally that right now it wasn't being broadcast anywhere, it was just them and Phil, and that was alright.

Finally the game world loaded in and Phil moved his character a little to look around, "alright, so far so good."

He was in a much more complicated house than any Ranboo had seen while in the game, with dozens of chests lining the walls, filled with who-knows-what. Phil didn't linger inside too long and started towards the doors as he continued talking, "so this game will be the main thing people see when they watch the stream, and I'll be on that little camera to the side to talk to the chatters. It's nice to have little conversations with the people watching the stream, it's a very chill atmosphere."

Ranboo nodded along, able to visualise it in their head with a strange vividness. Was this a thought, or...a memory?

Names scrolling past in the chat, his eyes catching on a few to read and riff on. Rows of little images- were those called emotes? They were laughing. They seemed to be having a good time.

"Oh, what the..." Phil started talking again after having been quiet while Ranboo was lost in thought, and their attention came back to the game onscreen.

"What is it?" Ranboo asked, not immediately seeing anything irregular.

"I uh, I don't remember planting those there. Hm," Phil told him, moving his view in the game to focus on two things on the floor in front of him; a red flower, and some kind of crop. It was hard to tell exactly what they were due to the pixelation.

"It's a poppy and a potato," Phil explained, sensing the question Ranboo would ask, but maybe also just to clarify it to himself. He said it solemnly, like there was much more to that answer than there seemed on the surface. Ranboo glanced over and saw he was smiling, though.

"Pretty," Ranboo commented, deciding that he didn't need to anything more if it was something Phil wanted to keep to himself. They did remember something about Quackity and a poppy he'd gotten, but not much more.

"Yeah," Phil nodded, "they are."

~

Later that afternoon Phil began his stream, and Kristin, Sneeg and Ranboo gathered downstairs to watch it on the TV, Charlie standing by his decision to sit this one out. As the three sat on the sofa together they watched the timer approaching zero and the text to its side scrolling far too fast for anyone to be able to catch a single message.

"It's usually not quite so intense," Kristen thought she should clarify while they waited, "but since Phil's been gone a little while, everyone is getting pretty excited for him to be back."

"How is he gonna have conversations with them if they're all gonna be like that..?" Ranboo asked, not envying the job Phil had ahead of him.

"He's been doing it for years, he'll manage," Kristin assured them.

The chat's speed only got faster when the timer at last hit zero and Phil's voice came in, greeting all the viewers just before his face appeared on the screen. The first few minutes were spent giving reasons for his absence, which weren't completely false, but certainly not the whole truth. There was a distinct lack of reality-bending video games and a little more 'technical issues' that had to be sorted out.

As Phil continued with his introduction of the stream, Kristin turned to the other two on the sofa and quietly asked, "do you guys know why it is exactly that Charlie doesn't like streams?"

"Uh," Sneeg looked at Ranboo briefly as he tried to think of his answer, "I dunno about answering that on his behalf...he told me how he had a bad experience with them, but I think you're gonna have to wait for him to be ready to tell you."

Kristin nodded, "oh, that's alright, I just didn't know what it was."

"It's kind of weird that me and Charlie came out of it with, like, opposite reactions," Ranboo added as he also tried to consider the reasoning.

"What, you wanna do streaming?" Sneeg asked with a grin, only after he said it realising he was more right than he thought he was.

"I...I'd like to try it, I think," Ranboo turned his eyes back to the screen, watching Phil laugh at something read out by a text-to-speech voice, and just barely being able to hear the same laugh from the room upstairs.

"So you're gonna do streaming, Charlie's probably gonna want to do more karaoke, and I don't really give a shit what I do. Sounds good," Sneeg gave a thumbs up.

Ranboo laughed, then abruptly stopped, because something had caught their eye. In the back of Phil's stream the door was slightly open, probably so that the room didn't overheat, but in the slip of the hallway that could be seen there was a sudden movement, barley noticeable, but he wasn't the only one to notice it.

"-something in the hallway?" Phil asked, reading the dozen or so messages that rushed past in all caps, like they were shouting to him about the thing in the background. Phil turned, but it was gone, so he tried to wave it away, "probably Kristin."

Ranboo turned to look at Kristin. That hadn't been Kristin.

"Did either of you see that?" Ranboo asked now that Kristin and Sneeg's curiosity had also been drawn to the screen.

Sneeg shook his head, but Kristin looked confused by something, "I uh, I think, but..."

She trailed off as something else caught the attention of the three on the sofa, the sound of somebody walking down the stairs behind them. Charlie nervously walked into the room, angling himself to avoid looking at the TV, "sorry, I just wanted to ask, uh, which cupboard were the cups in?"

"Charlie, did you have to go past Phil's room on the way here?" Kristin asked, sounding a little like an interrogator.

"I- yeah, uh," Charlie's eyes flicked around nervously, "I wanted to come down for a drink, so, uh-"

"Charlie I think they could see you in the background of the stream," Ranboo warned him.

Charlie didn't respond for a moment as he realised what that meant, "oh, shit."

"Well, that's fine, right?" Sneeg tried to make the situation better, "Phil said it was Kristin so if it was in the background they won't be able to tell it was Charlie."

"That might be true, if I knew how to do a forward roll," Kristin told Sneeg, then raised her eyebrows at Charlie.

"Wait, he- he what?!" Sneeg looked at Charlie with his mouth agape.

"I-I wanted to be sneaky! I knew he was, y'know, he was streaming, so I thought t-to get past I should, well..." Charlie tried his best to defend his ingenious idea to avoid discovery.

"Act like some spy movie protagonist?" Sneeg finished for him.

"...maybe," Charlie said, not making eye contact.

"Could you, maybe...learn to do a roll?" Ranboo asked Kristin.

She sighed, "that's probably the weirdest thing I've ever had to do to keep a secret, but I guess I could try, yeah. Come on, I'll show you where the cups are."

Kristin gave a little smile as she rolled off the sofa and lead Charlie to the kitchen. Sneeg and Ranboo were left in the room, with Phil's stream continuing in the background.

"You really ready to do a stream in front of a bunch of people?" Sneeg asked after a few moments, "not that I think you can't. You were just pretty reserved about doing karaoke that night."

Ranboo tilted their head, not entirely sure themself why it was something he wanted to do, "I guess, it's like...it's a different thing for me when the audience is right there, and they'd have the power to boo me off the stage if they wanted to."

"We weren't gonna heckle you, kid," Sneeg laughed.

"Well yeah, I know that now," Ranboo smiled, "but still, when it's a stream I'd have more control over stuff, I'm the one who went live so I could shut it off any time. Phil says he can also ban people in chat, and that's kind of appealing."

"Don't get power hungry now," Sneeg nudged him, "I can see your point, though. Maybe I'll do it too one day, but for now I'm just chilling."

"Chilling is good too," Ranboo laughed.

~

Days passed, and life returned to a new sort of normal for everyone. They got regular updates from the other households- Jaiden was getting all her housemates into DDR, and Cellbit had been taking his out to some fancy sounding food places. Ethan had apparently remembered his allergy moments before eating something including peanuts, averting disaster, although that subsequently scared everyone else about any forgotten allergies. They would probably be okay, though.

Every now and then, Ranboo would find that they were reminded of something even if they couldn't place exactly why, or even what it was he was remembering. One day he saw a beanie left on a shelf, and a name came to mind.

"Hey, uh, Phil, is the name Amy supposed to mean anything?" Ranboo asked when he and Phil were alone in the kitchen, the latter making himself a drink and secretly preparing a second one for Ranboo.

"Oh- like, Aimsey?" Phil asked in return.

"I think so, yeah," Ranboo nodded, the name definitely ringing another bell, "is that someone I knew?"

"Yeah, it is," Phil seemed to think for a few moments, "they'd be pretty happy to see you again, if you're up to it."

Ranboo was also quiet while he thought on his answer. Their main worry was the response they'd get, if it was worse for one of his friends, someone he'd clearly been close with judging by the emotions that name pulled at, to know that they'd been completely forgotten, and if it would be better to leave them never knowing. They remembered the name, but nothing else. What would they even have to talk about?

But he hadn't remembered Phil, or Toby, or anyone else, and they had all been pretty happy to see him despite all of their problems. Even though he didn't feel like the same person they'd all known before, everyone had been welcoming and accommodating without expecting anything back. It might also just be a good excuse to get out of the house, since they had all avoided that due to the risk of being recognised in public, and they wanted to avoid anything like that while they were still in an adjustment period.

So eventually, hesitantly, Ranboo nodded, "yeah, I- I want to try."

It was scheduled for a few days from then, with Phil giving away nothing more to Amy than it being a surprise. Ranboo was nervous, admittedly, but he knew he wanted to give this a shot.

~

When the day came he was sat in the back of Phil's car, as the windows for the back were a little tinted, being driven to meet with someone they really hoped wasn't going to test them with personal questions. That was pretty unlikely to happen, but it was still in the back of his mind the whole way to their house.

When the car stopped, Ranboo had an overwhelming urge to stay in his seat.

"Alright, you ready to go?" Phil looked over his shoulder from the driving seat.

Ranboo shrunk into their seat and muttered, "I'm nervous."

Phil tried to give him a comforting smile, "hey, it's alright mate. I'll be there with you, I can step in if anything happens."

Ranboo hummed begrudgingly and put his hand on the door handle, forgetting that it was locked, "oh. Oops. Guess I can't go now, the door won't open."

Phil laughed and pressed a button to unlock it, "that's not gonna work. Come on, let's just go give it a try."

After taking a breath, Ranboo stepped out of the car, and felt uncomfortably out in the open. Phil was soon by their side, which helped a little, and there wasn't really any backing out now. He lead them to the door, and confidently gave three knocks.

Without realising it himself, Ranboo had stepped behind Phil as if to hide from the door. They really shouldn't be this scared, this was one of their friends, it's not like he would get told to go back home. He stayed behind Phil when the door opened, though.

"Hey, Phil! Hope the roads weren't bad," somebody's voice greeted. And Ranboo realised, very distinctly, that it was a voice they knew.

"No, it's no worries- I've brought a guest too, hope you don't mind," the grin on Phil's face was audible, Ranboo could tell he was excited for the two of them to be meeting up again. And that was probably as clear a signal they would get, so they stepped up to see the face they'd once known.

He was surprised to find it was a face he recognised so much.

And she definitely recognised them.

"RANBOO," they practically screamed, jumping forward and restraining herself just enough to stop the two falling to the ground.

"H-hey!" Ranboo greeted in return, a little more focused on trying to keep his footing.

"R-Ran, you- oh my god, it's you, it's you!" Amy said, muffled by having their face pressed against Ranboo, which made him laugh a little.

"Yeah, it is," they agreed, their head too high above Amy's to have their own talking obstructed.

"I can't believe, I- you call this a suprise, Phil?!" she suddenly turned against the man accusingly.

"Well, I-I mean, wasn't it?" Phil nervously asked.

"A suprise doesn't feel important enough for this!" Amy turned back to Ranboo and he worried they were going to try to push them over again, but they instead pulled him into a gentler hug.

Phil gave them a few moments then asked, "do you guys wanna head inside so we can talk about everything?"

Amy leant back and nodded, wiping her eyes and then wiping them again, "yeah, yeah, probably better than standing on my drive all day," he laughed weakly but with a genuine smile and lead them both inside.

Talking went well, better than Ranboo had been scaring themself it would be, and after all the simplified explanations they quickly turned to normal conversations and dumb jokes, as if all of it were normal and this was a meeting between friends after a day or two apart.

Ranboo was so happy they could feel normal. The reassurance he could return to a normal life, that he wasn't tied up as an amnesiac, a hero or property of some stupid media company he was already forgetting the name of. They were just Ranboo, and these were their friends, and they could spend hours together talking about nothing at all. He didn't realise that sometimes they'd stopped feeling like a person, but it felt so much better when they did feel like one again.

Amy said they were welcome to come round anytime they liked, and he would probably take up that offer. On the drive home Phil mentioned the meetup with all the QSMP members they'd been talking about before they left, and it was still a distant idea, but the thought they might be able to get together again seemed nice. It hadn't even been that long since they'd left, but Ranboo thought it would be nice to see them all again sometime in the future.

~

Charlie and Sneeg were in the kitchen together one day; Sneeg offered to make the two of them lunch, and for the first time, Charlie let him.

He'd been trying to build up to it for a long time. It would be difficult to completely move on from everything that had happened, especially with the New York accent that continued to slip into his voice now and then, but he wanted to try little things, step by step. He wanted to be able to enjoy a meal made for him by friends.

"And if I spit it out or anything, I don't mean anything by that, it's probably gonna be completely involuntary if I do," he informed Sneeg.

"I know, it's only like the fifth time you've told me that," Sneeg raised an eyebrow and smiled at him.

"...fourth," Charlie corrected. Sneeg just laughed and continued cutting up ingredients.

Charlie played with his hands for a little while, then looked back at Sneeg, "how long will it take you to make this, by the way?"

"Don't worry, I'm not gonna make you miss your call thing," Sneeg assured him. A few hours from now Charlie had organised to play D&D with some of his old friends who he apparently used to do a podcast with. This would be their second session of a new campaign that wasn't being recorded, just being played privately between the four of them.

It was a nice way to get to know them all over again, playing characters who'd never met. The whole campaign had been set up only a day after Phil reintroduced them, his friends clearly being too excited to all play together again. But Charlie was finding the game very enjoyable, so he could see why they were all so desperate to play again.

Sneeg had also been reconnecting with some people, online mostly but with plans to meet those in the UK soon. And Ranboo was currently at another meetup at Amy's house, with other people like Toby there too.

Sneeg hummed, "how long until we're meant to tell police about this? Since we're still classed as missing people and all."

"I think we were supposed to have told them by now," Charlie pointed out, "but until we don't feel like we'll be completely exhausted by the process, I don't think we need to."

"Dunno if I'm ever gonna reach that point. Sounds like a lot of paperwork and also trying not to sound insane when we tell them we came from a video game," Sneeg sighed.

"Yeah, maybe we find a way around saying that part..."

"Actually, wait," Sneeg leaned against the counter as he had a thought, "how are we gonna tell them about the stuff before that? Kidnapped by an evil media company is also kinda hard to believe."

Charlie nodded, having not considered that part yet too, but he had an idea, "well, weren't they all broadcast? Surely we can find archival footage of that somewhere?"

"True, true," Sneeg nodded, "but how? I assume that's dark web stuff, and if I ever knew anything about that, I think I've forgotten it."

"Hm, well...wasn't Cellbit good at investigating stuff?"

Sneeg pointed to Charlie, signalling he might be on to something, "but first, we gotta eat."

"Oh god..." Charlie really hoped he wouldn't throw up, and he felt like he could probably stop himself from doing so, but the worry was still there.

"Don't get too excited," Sneeg joked as he brought the two plates of sandwiches to the table.

"Sorry, sorry," Charlie took a deep breath, "alright, I can handle this."

"Yeah you can," Sneeg tried to hype him up as he took a bite of his own food. Charlie laughed a little and picked up a sandwich, lifting it closer to his mouth. He could do this.

He shut out any second thoughts and took a bite. Sneeg glanced over, trying to gauge a reaction, happy that he at least didn't immediately throw it back up.

"It tastes like food," Charlie commented.

"I'd hope so," Sneeg laughed.

It wasn't that bad. It was definitely weird, and it felt crucially wrong, and Charlie didn't want to look at what he was eating in case he saw it change colours, but he also knew he wasn't in a shitty fake cabin anymore and this had been made for him in an actual kitchen with actual ingredients, so it couldn't be that bad. And it wasn't bad, it was food.

"Hey, now you owe me something," Sneeg told him.

"What, a sandwich?"

"Yeah."

Charlie rolled his eyes, "alright, I'll make you a sandwich tomorrow."

~

Sneeg stared at the links highlighted in blue on the computer in front of him. He didn't know how, and he didn't know if he wanted to, but Cellbit had managed to find them; episode 1, 2 and 3.

Ranboo crouched bedside him as he looked at the messages too, "well, I guess that's pretty damning evidence. If that company ever was real they won't be after we get this out."

"Yeah...I was actually thinking, do we just show this to the police and detectives and whatever?" Sneeg asked.

"Just? Who else do you wanna show?" Ranboo sounded a little apprehensive of anyone besides the necessary people seeing these.

"Well, it's only as long as all of us are okay with it, but I was thinking maybe we show Phil and Kristin. Just so they...so that they know, I guess."

Ranboo tilted their head and looked back at the links, "well..."

He pursed his lips. A short while ago he probably would've been quick to say no, shut the idea down right then. The idea of people like Phil and Kristin seeing them as they were back then, frightened and controlled, hurt and dying. But now they were beginning to feel more like the friends he'd had for years, and he felt they deserved to know what it was that had taken them apart.

So, with some consideration, they nodded, "yeah. I mean, I don't really wanna be in the room at the same time they're watching it, but I think they can see it."

"Understandable," Sneeg agreed, "we can ask Charlie tonight. Speaking of..."

Sneeg looked knowingly at Ranboo, who avoided eye contact, "yeah, yeah, don't remind me, I'm getting nervous enough anyways."

Ranboo's stream was tonight. After talking about it so long, they had finally settled that today would be the day. Ranboo would be the first one to make a public appearance again since everyone's disappearance, so a talk with the police would probably be in order after that since they'd been delaying that so long as well. At least now they had these links to show them, so that it was at least plausible what they had been through.

But all of that came after, and Ranboo wasn't nearly as worried for that as he was for the stream. There wouldn't even be anyone physically in front of him, but of course he had seen from Phil that there would be a number displaying his viewership the entire time and dozens of people's messages coming through. It probably wouldn't be that difficult, especially compared to being in front of a real crowd, but just saying something like that never did much to help with nerves.

Sneeg sighed and took Ranboo's hand, "listen kid, if you're nervous, just know that Charlie is scared shitless and he's not even on the stream."

Ranboo laughed, "I'm not sure if that helps, but alright."

They supposed maybe it did, not necessarily knowing how scared his friend was for the stream as well, but that his friends would be among the ones watching the stream. They had assured Charlie he didn't have to, but he wanted to try and watch Ranboo's first stream alongside Sneeg and Kristin downstairs in the hopes he could build up to watching Phil's streams as well. Phil had then also assured him he didn't need to watch his streams either, but Charlie was determined to one day watch them with everyone else.

So on Ranboo's stream he would be able to remember the three sat downstairs and that the audience they had wasn't so unfamiliar. And of course Phil would be right at their side to make sure the technical side of the stream didn't suddenly explode, since Ranboo had yet to relearn how to control a stream besides the big red button that ended it.

Tonight. That wasn't very far away.

~

"Alright. You ready for this?"

Ranboo nodded to Phil, who was stood leaning over the mouse and keyboard to set everything up while Ranboo just sat in the chair, sinking further into it with every anxious minute that passed.

It wasn't time to start quite yet, but Phil wanted to keep checking in with them to make sure they were still happy to go ahead with it. That didn't exactly help the anxiety, and neither did Charlie tapping his foot as he stood beside Ranboo, but if he weren't there Ranboo might have felt worse for it.

"I really don't know how you can do it," Charlie admitted, "but, y'know...I'm proud of you, man."

Ranboo struggled to think of the right words so smiled to Charlie in response, visible enough through his eyes with the mask being in the way of their mouth. Phil was going to suggest they put one on but Ranboo had already planned to, since in situations like this it just felt more natural to be wearing it. That must have been the instincts of his old self leaking through.

"Okay," Phil let out a breath, "we're all ready. Probably won't bother with the starting soon screen for this one, I'm ready to hit 'go live' whenever you are."

"I guess I'll get going," Charlie stepped towards the door but Ranboo swiveled the chair a little to keep facing him.

"Uh, wait, Charlie," they paused a moment, trying to think of the right words, "I'm can't pick one specific thing to thank you for, but I still wanna thank you. You're helping more than you probably realise."

"No, it's nothing," he smiled sheepishly, "just don't start reacting to any colours, alright? I will come up here and punch you if you even mention it."

Ranboo laughed, "I wasn't planning to, man."

"Alright. Good luck, man," Charlie gave him a thumbs up. Ranboo waved as he stepped out and went downstairs.

He turned the chair back around and saw Phil waiting with his hand by the mouse. One click and it would be as though they invited thousands of people to join them in this room. But another click, and they could all be kicked out just like that. The stream only went on as long as they wanted it to. Not a puppet, not some hero, just a random online streamer- and Ranboo was more than happy with that.

They nodded, "okay, yeah. I'm ready."

Phil nodded and looked back at the screens. There was a little moment before he clicked where he could've been thinking of any number of things, considerations and realisations, but he just smiled as he pressed down on the mouse and stepped away to stand by Ranboo.

Ranboo didn't really know why he did what he did next. There was a moment, a few of them, looking at the monitors and seeing a message pop up, then two, and a few moments later a few more came up. They hadn't yet reached the top of the box they were being listed in, and before they did Ranboo was able to think about memories of times like this, vague fragments and sensations from a lost life.

But lost things don't stay that way forever, his life that had been taken was returning and dragging itself out of every dark empty space it had been crushed into. A life could not be kept hidden and Ranboo's life was their own, it would never belong to another soul, or even a soulless company.

So as Ranboo could feel these memories tapping at the precipice of coming to light, he felt there was something they had to do, that the old self leaning over their shoulder would never be happy without. Routines and tradition become awfully important parts of daily life no matter how important they are, and despite being only a small action this tradition felt crucial for a time like this.

Even without knowing exactly why they did it, Ranboo still knew he had to. So he leaned a little closer to the mic with a smile.

"Gasp, hi chat."