Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Spamton walked down the hall away from the main stage of TV World, knowing he looked more impressive than he felt. He was moving from his room near the stage, to one across the entire studio building at the back; he was headed to Mr. (Ant) Tenna’s dressing room.

   He liked to think he carried himself with confidence. His strides were even, worked to perfection upon treadmills in front of mirrors. His hair was gelled into submission, his eyes opened just a crack to appear closed to passerbys, as every addison ever knew how to do from creation. A grin sat encrusted upon his face, perfect for the screen, edited and tweaked and fussed and powdered before and after every shoot. Not a single wrinkle lay upon his clothes, except near his knees and along his inner seam at the crotch lines, staying only long enough to let him walk his perfectly measured steps.

   Each stride was also swift; he moved too quickly to be stopped by anyone else. Not that anyone would stop him, cut out of a magazine ad as he was to be taped up, untouchable, on someone’s mirror. What a show he put on, all the time, even when the cameras weren’t rolling.

   Five minutes ago, he’d finished a phone call.

   That in and of itself wasn’t unusual. Spamton had brought the phone with him when he’d moved to TV World, after all (‘moved’, he just made them keep a spare room for him - he still had to leave every time Cyber City detached from TV World, he couldn’t survive in the studio for long without the internet). People expected him to get calls at strange times around shoots, coming back from them with good deals, booming success, news that always shook the studio for the better. It made plenty of the Darkners who’d been here in TV World since their inception jealous, he knew, but what could Spamton do? He never cared about their opinions, anyways.

   No, he cared about one thing, and one thing only. Freedom. Success. …Two things. Yeah, he cared about two things, and two things only.

   Which meant that he cared at least a little about the TV studio, in which he’d managed to secure himself an important position - he considered himself the greatest conman to ever live for that. Which meant that he cared at least a little about the head of the studio, Mr. Tenna, at whose side he’d wriggled himself to be at constantly in the first place. He’d gotten close to Tenna, made the old TV trust him, a lot, convinced him to share insider business secrets and all sorts of time and attention. He’d given all sorts of time and attention to Tenna, in turn. Which meant…

   Well it meant a lot of things. Namely, that Spamton was a liar.

   He’d never admit it, but he’d fuss about the way his pace picked up just a touch when he thought about that big dumb cathode lug again; he cared about Tenna. Ant, he’d been allowed to call the big man just ‘Ant’ for about a week now.

   No one else was allowed to call Tenna that, not even Tenna’s closest confidants. And Spamton wasn’t allowed to call him Ant in front of anyone else, which was why he still thought of Tenna as ‘Tenna’ while he worked his way through the annals of the studio. But privately, when it was just the two of them? They were Ant and Spammy. …Aha, how corny. No one else got to know.

   So three things. No wonder he was a liar, he’d lied about the number from the very get-go.

   Towards Tenna, Spamton marched himself, pristine, perfect, sweat barely daring to gleam on his brow despite the layer of foundation that clogged his pores for hours and hours and hours and hours and- you get the picture. Five minutes ago, he’d finished with a phone call that was unusual because it had given him something more than just words. Something that he was told would change things, something that Spamton knew Tenna wouldn’t say no to. They were close enough, now, after all…

   His benefactor on the phone, the Phone, had told him that what he wanted was closer than he’d believed for a while. “Freedom, little puppet. Like you’ve always wanted.” That’s what they’d said. “For a price. Freedom requires power, sacrifice. You’ll have it. Very soon indeed, puppet.”

   Then the Phone had given him the box in his pocket. It didn’t make any visible difference to Spamton’s profile, it didn’t bulge in his pants. It was small, thin. He wasn’t allowed to look inside of it, not yet. Still, he knew what was in it, the Phone had said it.

   “The Thorn Ring,” the Phone had said. “Give it to him.”

   Spamton fingered the box in his pocket as he went, his other hand held delicately at his side, swinging slightly, intentionally. Everything he did was so intentional.

   The Phone had never led him wrong. When the Phone told him to do something, it was usually a bad idea to not do it. Not because he’d be punished - no, the ‘punishment’ would be simply that he’d made the wrong choice, and the consequences themselves would sort him out. The Phone was right about everything they chose to inform Spamton about, and sometimes about the things they chose not to inform him about. He always found those things out later, after the fact, retroactively shocked at how closely he’d missed the bullets whizzing past his face.

   So it was unfair, Spamton rationalised, for him to feel so unnerved about the Phone, especially this time. They had never done him wrong. They were always right. It was the right idea to go to Tenna, and give him the Thorn Ring. It’s what the Phone said, it must have been correct.

   In another timeline, maybe, Spamton would refuse to follow through. Even now, knowing that the Phone had never given him something physical like this before, he felt a sense of unease crawling up his spine, trickling doubt into the back of his mind. In another timeline, he’d falter, he’d save the stupid ring until he couldn’t give it to the big man anymore, and he’d live in regret for the rest of his days. In another timeline, Spamton thought to himself, he was a fool. He would follow through today, it was the right idea. The right thing to do. The Phone had said so. The nerves bundled in his stomach must have meant nothing, they were wrong and unfair. And persistent.

   He was two hallways more from Tenna’s room, now. He thought about the end of his conversation with the Phone, now six minutes ago.

   “What’s so special about this little thing?” Spamton had asked brazenly, feeling rather bold - he always seemed to, whenever it came to Tenna. “Just a little ring, ain’t it?”

   “To you, maybe,” said the Phone. “It has great power. In two forms. Today, it’ll show one. Right on track. Don’t get too distracted.”

   They’d hung up after that, and Spamton had put the receiver down on his end, too. He never got straight answers from the Phone, just ones he knew he’d understand later. This was one of those - he grasped that the ring had power, he just didn’t know what kind, yet. Didn’t know what it did. Didn’t need to. All he had to do was have faith in it, in the Phone. Tenna would never say no.

   (Was this really a good idea?)

   He found himself in front of Tenna’s dressing room. There was no one guarding it today - there was no one down the hallway it was attached to at all. Even still, Spamton felt eyes watching him, prickling his neck and making him nervous about eavesdroppers. He raised his hand with poise, pristine and camera-ready. The feeling didn’t leave.

   One sharp knock echoed down the hall. Another. His knuckles kind of hurt, he should probably look into doing a little more physical labour around the place more often - he was getting a little too cushy, a little too comfortable. That always set him on edge, maybe that’s why he was so stressed right then.

   He barely heard the voice from inside, an edge of static underneath that iconic, radio-ready voice, just the right pitch to be able to be heard at any frequency, day or night, long- or short-wave. Maybe Tenna’s talents were being wasted on prime-time, but then again the guy needed eyes on him just as much as listening ears, so maybe he was right where he needed to be.

   “Come in!” called that crystalline voice.

   Spamton did just that, ignoring the butterflies trying to choke him out, fluttering up and down his oesophagus, having run out of room in his stomach. Purely because of how trusting Tenna was being right then, nothing more. He could be anyone, knocking the way he always did. Anyone at all.

   And yet.

   The dressing room was dimmed, but not dark. The overhead was off, replaced by a lamp on the edge of a side table, which sat abandoned next to the lime green couch near the door. Its light was accompanied by the vanity mirror lights, only half of which worked - Spamton had offered to swap out that old, useless vanity for Tenna, but for some reason the old CRT insisted he liked that one. With its crack along the top, and its creaky drawers, and its tape residue all along the edges. He claimed it held memories, personality.

   Spamton figured it was just kind of gross, but he kept that to himself.

   The little addison fingered the box again as he shut the door quietly behind himself, the feeling of being watched still persisting upon him as he himself watched Tenna. The old thing was bumbling within a rack of clothes, all the exact same blazer that he wore on the regular in all the exact same colour and length. Spamton had teased Tenna enough for his insistence on replacements and duplicates, he didn’t need to start that old argument up again. Tenna seemed to find something amidst the coats, and he straightened up and out of the rack, then moved to his vanity, peering through the mirror to catch a glimpse of Spamton as he did.

   Even without eyes, Spamton knew when Tenna was looking at him. The grin that old screen displayed could light up a room - it practically was, with how bright Tenna’s face had grown and how dim the room was set to.

   “Oh, Spammy!” Tenna cooed, like he hadn’t known who had come in, and his hands worked on something that Spamton couldn’t quite see as he kept his focus on his guest. “What a pleasure to see you, though I didn’t think I would until later tonight. You’re not coming to tell me you can’t make your 11:45, are you?”

   “No, no,” Spamton assured Tenna, and he watched a little bit of tension leave those huge shoulders of Tenna’s, “nothing like that. Though, I do need to talk to you.”

   “Mm,” Tenna hummed, and he brought his face down to his hands, out of Spamton’s sight. The room smelled a little like burning dust, how long had Tenna been fussing about back here? “Well alright, so long as you promise it’s nothing that serious. Gotta be cheery for the fans tonight, you know! Nothing… particularly special, but the kids will be allowed to stay up a little later than usual, being Saturday and all!”

   “Of course,” said Spamton. “Not bringing the mood down. At least, I hope I’m not.”

   The box in his pocket felt cold, compared to Tenna’s smile half reflected in the mirror. Was this the right thing to do- oh, shut up brain, what’s the worst thing that’ll happen?! Absolute worst case scenario, Tenna hates the ring, and then declines it to ask for a different one, and then Spamton can simply tell his benefactor that he tried his best but that he can’t make Tenna do things he hates. Throws a fit if he has to, makes it a whole production, no one wants to see that! And the Phone would surely understand, considering apparently they wanted them together just like Spamton did and that would happen soon enough, because Tenna would say yes overall, and Spamton would say he just needed a different ring! That’ll be what he’ll say to the Phone, easy, no problem.

   …He was avoiding the problem.

   Finally, as Spamton fretted himself into a hole standing there in the doorway, Tenna finished whatever it was he was fiddling with in his hands, and turned around. Spamton didn’t even need to ask to see it, Tenna simply displayed it with a flourish - it was a set of brand new cuff links, with complementary handkerchiefs which he clutched loosely between his thumbs and forefingers like a lady waving off her husband on the train station platform. The cuff links, naturally, were vaguely in the shape of Tenna’s head.

   Or rather, one set was - the other actually had the shape of a sealed mail envelope, and Spamton realised Tenna was holding those out for him, after he’d done the initial show of his own cuffs. With a blink, Spamton approached and picked up the cuff links to examine them, as Tenna beamed down at him.

   “Came in today,” Tenna said, sounding gleeful. “A little something I had specially ordered for us. I thought that, what the heck, we’re gonna be advertising a whole new brand of men’s wear next week, you’d said you had gotten a whole new deal or what have you between your autos and some tailor… and well, if we don’t look in peak fashion, then how would our sponsors look, right?”

   Tenna laughed, and Spamton found himself smiling along, barely managing to forget about the box in his pocket and the anxiety that came with it for half a second before it barrelled right back into him. “Right, aha…”

   Then Tenna was watching him, and a small frown was creeping across that screen, frustrating Spamton just a touch. “You don’t like them?”

   “I didn’t say that,” Spamton huffed, then he rolled his eyes (not that Tenna could see that), and pulled his other hand out of his pocket so he could make a whole show of unbuttoning and rebuttoning his cuffs, fastening the links, and flashing them before Tenna’s face. “There, see? Wearin’ them already. They’re nice, comfortable, I don’t mind them one bit.”

   “But you don’t love them.”

   “Cut that out, you. Not my words.”

   “Will you wear them tonight?”

   “Sure,” Spamton said. “Because they’re nice. Okay?”

   Tenna’s smile beamed back at him like a first-place medal, glorious, shimmering. “Great! I’ll hold onto both handkerchiefs for now, though - just gotta figure out a formal set to wear them properly in.”

   He gently tucked the little pieces of finely-made cloth into a breast pocket on the inside of his jacket, and no, Spamton’s gaze didn’t linger there as his own hands lowered, one finding his pocket with the box inside again. He fingered the lid, tempted but not too much so to lift it and feel up the ring inside. ‘Thorn Ring’, huh? With a name like that, would it feel like barbed wire? How could such a small little thing get him closer to the freedom the Phone always promised? And why on… Tenna?

   Quit questioning it, Tenna was watching him. Any flaw in his mask, Tenna would pick up on - Spamton had to keep up the smiles. There wasn’t even anything to keep up on anyways, he should be feeling fine, feeling happy, even. He knew how this would look to Tenna, and he knew he kind of wanted it to look like that, too. This was the next step in their relations, the Phone had just provided the vehicle to make that happen. The prickling down his neck hadn’t subsided since he’d walked into the room, and refused to do so now, too.

   “I’ve… actually got something for you, too,” Spamton muttered, quiet; not a soul besides Tenna could possibly hear him now. “A little something you can’t show anyone else. ‘Kay, Ant?”

   Tenna was quiet, too. Tense. He didn’t reply, but his head tilted a little to the side, like he expected Spamton to explain himself. Spamton wasn’t about to.

   “We’ve been working together for a little bit now,” Spamton said, fiddling with the box in his pocket, “and I was wondering…”

   Something changed about Tenna’s demeanour, even though he didn’t move. Something, maybe, in the way he was holding himself. His arms looked looser, sort of, his head tilted further without being a centimetre out of place.

   “Maybe we could strike something of a… deal,” Spamton finished. His throat felt raw.

   Tenna spoke finally. “Oh? What kind of deal?”

   Finally, the box slipped itself out of Spamton’s pocket, magically appearing in his outstretched hand. Tenna gasped, and Spamton opened its little lid, revealing…

   Geez, this thing wasn’t going to hurt Tenna, was it? The Phone had told him not to even look at it; Tenna should be the first one to lay eyes on it, that’s what they’d said. And he was, metaphorically (no eyes, and all…), but as Spamton himself got a good look at it after him, he could see all the little… points and sharp edges. Yeah, sure, the Phone had called it the ‘Thorn Ring’, but Heaven above it really looked like it was made of thorns, huh?

   “Oh, Spammy!” Tenna gushed, and his voice yanked Spamton out of his musing about the little infernal ring. “W-we- are we- are you sure?! I-I mean, it’s- are- yes! I’ll say yes!”

   “And let’s be clear, here,” Spamton piped up - he hoped Tenna couldn’t hear the stress in his tone, manifesting in a low whine at the back of his throat, ever-present, “this isn’t the, uh, the last thing I’ll give ya, okay? No- no gem in it, yanno. So, uh… s-so think of it like a promise ring. ‘Kay? I’ll get you something fancier later.”

   Tenna’s screen was bright pink as he leaned in closer to the box, and the smell of burning dust returned with a force to Spamton’s nose, strong enough he could almost taste it. Boy, the old CRT was due for a cleaning.

   For some reason, Spamton felt the incredibly powerful drive to yank the box away from him. Was he doing the right thing? Seriously, would this stupid little ring hurt?

   “Well golly!” Tenna cooed, unaware of Spamton’s internal waffling. “I don’t mind one bit, but that’s really sweet of you, Spammy! Oh, it is so lovely on its own, though, isn’t it? Like it just… doesn’t need stones!”

   Spamton had to hide the frown that fought to take control of his brows and mouth - really? All he could see of the ring was a cruel-looking steel, spiked and primed for maiming. Maybe it looked nicer from the other side of the box?

   “Well?” Tenna said, and Spamton realised he’d had leaned back again and was presenting his hand. “Aren’t you going to put it on me?”

   “Oh. Oh! Yes, yes just gimme a…” Spamton scrambled, fumbling the box a little in his haste to turn it around towards himself and pull the ring out, “aha!” He held the spiked thing between his thumb and forefinger (ow, ow, ow) like how Tenna had held those handkerchiefs, letting the box snap closed one swift motion within his other hand (it still didn’t look ‘lovely’, but maybe Tenna’s taste was just a little more… gothic? Than Spamton had initially thought?). “Here we go, okay. Uh, hold still?”

   Tenna giggled, wiggling his fingers at Spamton, and as he put the box away, back into his pocket, Spamton brought the ring to the edge of Tenna’s ring finger. Again, a feeling came over Spamton, one of incredible pain, like something in him was telling him he would regret this, incredibly, for the rest of his days. But wasn’t that supposed to be what the other timeline version of himself was doing, wallowing in regret? He swallowed, holding the ring just before Tenna’s hand and praying to Heaven or anyone who would listen that the other man couldn’t see the way he was shaking.

   He couldn’t stop thinking, was he doing the right thing? Was this right? It wouldn’t hurt Tenna, would it?

   “Spammy?” Tenna’s voice once again broke into his thoughts.

   Right. Can’t back down now. It’d crush Tenna if he took back all of… this. Spamton stole a breath, filling his lungs as fast as he dared, then finally…

   The ring slid on.

   It was almost too easy to do. Like it was made for Tenna; maybe it was. Tenna didn’t even react at first, didn’t wince or hiss like how Spamton had kind of been expecting, what with those giant spikes along every edge of the ring. After he let go of it, Spamton couldn’t help but stare at the Thorn Ring, glimmering steely and cold upon Tenna’s finger. If he was being honest, it almost looked ugly, like a stain seeping over Tenna’s hand.

   Then from the corner of Spamton’s vision, he saw another change in Tenna’s demeanour. He didn’t move, not one inch, but it was like he relaxed. Collapsed. Broke down without even so much as shifting in the slightest. Then the light from the big screen suddenly blinked off, forcing Spamton’s eyes up to Tenna’s face.

   “Tenna?” Spamton asked. To no reply, he tried again. “…Ant?”

   Something seemed to almost… spark, at the centre of Tenna’s screen. A pixel bloomed, red, where his nose should have been. Then it grew wider, wider still - spiralling across his face like a web being spun by a frantic spider. Cracks, Spamton’s hazy mind filled in for him (God, was it just him, or did it suddenly become so much harder to breathe?), cracks projected themselves across Tenna’s face, lighting up only with red phosphor. One reached the edge of the screen, and suddenly the old CRT was moving again, leaning into Spamton, wrapping his hands around the little addison’s body to pull him forward. Maybe without meaning to, Tenna had forced Spamton to stay still, to not back away (had Tenna always been that freaking freezing?).

   Another crack reached another edge of Tenna’s screen, and Tenna’s speakers came to life again. “Thhhh… thank you… my little… your… Spamton…!”

   His voice was wrong. It warped and warbled, like something was messing with its connection, wrapping around the wires where the speakers connected to his motherboard. Spamton’s mind was racing as his body felt frozen, staring at his partner like he was an alien. He couldn’t stop thinking was this the right thing to do? Can I take it back?! What is happening, did I do this?

   Instead of saying that, Spamton forced a crooked smile, unsure if Tenna could even see him anymore. “S-sure, Ant, ‘course. A-and like I said, later I’ll, uh, I’ll have another one. A prettier one, something with a stone in it…”

   “Ooohhh,” Tenna hummed through the static that seemed to dominate his voice now, “only if you wishhhhh to, doll-face… I like this one, myyyyy… promise to… devotion to… youuuu…”

   Spamton shivered. “Uh. Um. R-right. Uh. H-how much time until you’re on, again?”

   And suddenly the world came back into focus.

   Tenna seemed to snap backwards, and he was right back to himself, pale glowing face with nose and mouth sticking out, grinning like nothing had changed. His hands whipped away from Spamton, and instantly they were pulling his gloves back on (wait, when had he taken them off…?), moving around as he talked.

   “…got a 6:30 tomorrow, too - AM, mind, right in the morning - so I’ll have to make sure the crew is prepared to get up nice and early, and it’d be lovely if you could join us for that, too!” Tenna was saying, and Spamton had to force himself to stay in the moment - Jesus Christ they were moving on so fast, had he hallucinated that encounter? What just happened?! “Oh, I can’t wait until we decide to break the news, I know everyone will just be so delighted! A good party is great for company morale, you know, and what’s a better party than a wedding?!”

   “W-wedding?!” Spamton yelped, then smacked his hands over his mouth as his eyes darted to the door, the same feeling crawling down his back. “I mean- y-yeah, I guess, but shit, Tens, one step at a time.”

   “Yeah yeah yeah, I know, I know,” Tenna said dismissively, waving Spamton off with a hand as he stood up and started to make for the door, “but once we get there, wouldn’t it be fun?”

   Then he stopped at the door, staring at it. His hand was out (the one with the ring on it, Spamton’s mind whispered to him - was he always going to be hyper-aware of that, now?), clutching the handle… but he didn’t move to open it. Spamton tilted his head, trying to see around Tenna, see if there was something stopping him from leaving.

   After a moment too long of him just… standing there, Spamton spoke up. “Tens? You… good, there?”

   Like a broken record, Tenna’s voice repeated his last line, a little warbled now, like he couldn’t help but say it again. “But once we get there, wouldn’t it be fun?”

   “Oh, I didn’t know that was actually a- I thought you were being rhetorical,” Spamton huffed, trying to hide how his heart rate picked up at the change (was that the ring? Was the ring making him sound like that? Just what was that little thing capable of?).

   Tenna looked over his shoulder as an almost hysterical laugh escaped him, and he shook his head. “Hah! Haha! Yeah, I had been! I-I don’t know why I- never mind!”

   Spamton chuckled along for a moment, but still Tenna didn’t move, even when his gaze went back to the door. “Are you… gonna leave?”

   “I’d…” Tenna seemed to hesitate. “I’d like to! C… can I?”

   “Can you what?”

   “Leave?” His voice dropped into a lower register, static buzzing within it. “Can I leave?”

   “Y- yes!” Spamton said, as another shiver went down his spine. “You gotta go do your job!”

   “Of course!” Tenna said normally, then laughed again, and finally the door handle twisted and Tenna was stepping through the threshold. “How weird! Whatever, I’ll see you later!”

   “You too…” Spamton replied, and Tenna vanished from sight.

   Spamton stared down at his hands. Shit. Fuck. This was… was that the right thing to do? For some reason, Spamton felt like he’d made a massively horrible mistake. But he… had known that this would change something, get him closer to the things he sought. That… that’s kind of what the Phone had said, right? ‘Closer to freedom’, something along those lines? And it being put on Tenna, then he had to have known that it would change something in Tenna, right? Besides, Spamton couldn’t take it back, now. Right?

   Right, of course. He just had to live with the consequences. Forward, into the future, they had to march. Tenna hadn’t even winced, that meant it probably hadn’t hurt, right?! Yeah, obviously. The guy had such a low pain tolerance, after all, he would have been crying if it even pricked him. And the Phone was never wrong, they’d said to give the ring to Tenna and now Tenna had the ring. So… so good, right? Right. Good.

   This was fine. He wanted this. Everything would be… fine.

Chapter Text

Eventually, Spamton pulled himself together enough to make his way down to the stage, following in Tenna’s footsteps. Sure, he didn’t have to be there, he wasn’t scheduled with anything during this airing coming up, but still. Something within him was telling him to go and watch Tenna perform. Something was telling him it was important.

   The hustle and bustle of the shows brought a sense of calm over Spamton. He was used to this stuff, used to people moving around him quickly, trying to get places in timely manners. It was all anyone ever did in Cyber City - showtimes TV World reminded him greatly of home. In a city never allowed to sleep, no single street ever quieted; similarly, TV World’s hallways almost never seemed to empty when a Lightner was about to watch. Later in the week some major halls may fall silent; disused again, but now they were alive like the veins and arteries they were.

   Because of the rush, it took a while for Spamton to get to the stage in the first place. He wouldn’t have had time to see Tenna privately beforehand, and he didn’t wish to anyways; he was still trying to shake off the weirdness of just an hour or so before. Instead, he wanted to watch the motion of all the bodies around him, most of them his same size and yet all so much smaller than their star up stage.

   It was strange, but Spamton felt drawn to make his way straight to the stage, ambling along in style and precision. The draw in his chest felt different from the way it seemed his deals with the Phone would drag him along, choking him with wires wrapped around his throat until the job was done. This was more… deep, he supposed? Like he could have been the one doing the choking, a thought which unsettled and unnerved him, though he did his best to hide it. He tried to put it out of his mind.

   The immediate backstage and wings of TV Time were just as busy as the hallways, but on a night like tonight, the movement and feelings surrounding each crew member were more relaxed. The show airing tonight wasn’t one of the headliners, just a fun in-between that helped the Lightners put the stress of everyday life away for a little while. It didn’t need to be perfect (even if Tenna insisted it be so, anyway), and it could afford a couple flubbed mistakes and tweaks in the editing room, where a blooper reel could be pulled and made into a whole other show. The scent of desperation always went down a little back here, on nights like these. It was one of the reasons Spamton allowed Tenna to book him on late-night broadcasting slots like these. Just the smell of dust and old cardboard props filling the air, the taste of cleaning chemicals sprayed haphazardly on minor messes, the sound of squeaky cameras being readjusted and relaxed chatter that quieted as it got closer to showtime.

   Spamton finally made it to the stage left wing, the hot stage lights illuminating dancing shadows which tried to draw his eyes away from the main show. He felt like his mind was getting clouded, preoccupied with a hundred different things as he stepped past the threshold between the rest of the backstage and into the wing properly. Just a curtain was all that kept him from being onstage, now, a flimsy curtain and the iron-clad will of a crew determined to put on a good show. A couple shadowguys were trying to convince some ribbicks to move along off of the contestant podiums set up on-stage as ten minutes was called by someone in the darkened audience.

   It was incredibly amusing, watching beings who could only communicate in music try and shoo things that could only communicate in ribbits and croaks. Spamton’s eyes lingered on them for a while, before they were almost forcefully drawn away.

   His eyes alighted upon Tenna on the stage; he’d been there the whole time, but Spamton had been partially trying to avoid looking at him. In the back of his mind, Spamton wondered if anyone else in the studio ever felt as big as Spamton did whenever the pair of them were together. There was something in standing and basking under the glow of Tenna’s screen that made Spamton feel like, maybe, the difference in their sizes was negligible at best. Honestly, it was funny, but… Tenna made him feel as tall as the other man was. He’d never told Tenna that; he’d never told anyone that. Maybe he never would.

   The others scurried around and about them regardless.

   Tenna himself seemed to pause, and then that glowing, grinning face was turned to Spamton, warming something in him like it always did when it faced his way. Aha, yes, Spamton knew himself to be a big, big liar. He could prove that to himself a million times. This time, he proved it to himself by just giving Tenna a small smirk and a wave.

   Tenna’s grin widened a little, and then he turned back to whatever his task at hand was. The stagelights brightened, sets shuffled around the star, the three contestants meandered their way to their spots on the stage. Spamton watched the last twenty seconds of set-up before showtime, watched shadowguys and pippins scurry this way and that. Then ten seconds was called, five seconds, the spotlight found Tenna’s body - and the show began.

   The start of the show went smoothly, just like it always did. Spamton wasn’t even sure why he’d felt like he needed to be there, and to be honest he kind of felt like he was just in the way. He watched the intro play, the backstage hands scurrying this way and that to keep the flow moving. He watched the contestants be introduced: a pippins, a zapper, and an animate trashcan, all studio employees that Spamton didn’t care to remember. He saw the first wrong answer be given, and the first opportunity for punishment arose, finally; it was the whole point of this episode, after all.

   Tenna raised a hand, all lights on him, a huge grin on his face. This bit, Spamton knew, the old CRT had been preparing for for weeks. It wasn’t the usual thing to do for this set, usually Tenna made the contestants make a choice, but this week was a specialty ‘punishment’ episode, where the biggest losers on the show (Spamton not included, thank everything) got another shot at redemption. Which meant that Tenna made their choices for them when they lost points, as part of the punishment… or was supposed to.

   Instead, Spamton watched Tenna raise his hand, a grand flourish… and then freeze. He couldn’t see his face, but he could hear down the speaker from every earpiece on every crew member near him a torrent of static issuing from Tenna’s clip-on. The backstage crew started to shuffle around, peering out onto the stage; Spamton followed suit and spied a number of the crew behind the studio audience starting to rush around.

   Shit. This was bad. And for some reason, Spamton knew exactly what was going wrong - it was that damn ring. The tone of that static, the way Tenna was just frozen as the contestants stared at him, confused… it was just like back in the room, when he couldn’t open the door on his own for some reason.

   He’d had to get Spamton’s permission to do it.

   Spamton’s whole body was wracked with a violent shiver, and he did his best to repress every guilty thought in his mind as it swirled wickedly within him. This was wrong wrong wrong but he had to figure out something to manage it, for the moment.

   He couldn’t just jump onto the stage and start ordering the star host around; he had to try and be subtle about it. No one could know about their little deal just yet. He had to get the floor manager’s mic, cut out all other feeds, and tell Tenna directly to keep the show running. That or, somehow, he had to get the big lug off the stage and into a private room where he could demand that he continue the show like normal. Damnit, how would he pull this off…?

   Someone slammed into Spamton, trying to speed past the side of the stage to get down into the audience and scrambling Spamton’s thoughts in the process. Spamton tumbled to the floor, slightly on-stage now, before he yanked himself off and glared down the retreating form who’d touched him. He harshly brushed off his flawless suit and nabbed the nearest shadowguy’s earpiece.

   “Watch where you’re going, asshole,” Spamton hissed into it, and he watched the guy in the audience jump, and then raise an apologetic hand as he kept going.

   …And so did Tenna. The static stopped, and Tenna looked around, seeming extraordinarily disoriented. If he had eyes, Spamton had no doubt he’d be blinking them blearily around, before his screen landed on Spamton as Spamton’s own eyes were drawn to him.

   “I-I wasn’t going anywhere?” Tenna murmured, seemingly to himself (though Spamton knew, intrinsically, that it was meant for him).

   The backstage were all trying to get something moving again - but the same thing would happen again if Tenna was made to try and make that same choice as before. Spamton needed to tell him something to… what? Let him make his own choices tonight? Fuck, what the hell was wrong with that ring?!

   So Spamton tried his best - he fingergunned at Tenna under his magnificent, distant glow, pretending to just be meaning to say encouragements, and said into the earpiece, “C’mon Tens, you froze up there - not getting stage fright all of a sudden, are you? Make those choices for the contestants, put on a good show, and after we can talk about it, ‘kay?”

   Something like a scan line flickered across Tenna’s screen, highlighted in the faintest of glitched-out red… and then Tenna was grinning again. “Yes, right-” he turned to the audience, hands wide, “right, sorry about that! Haha, just a minor technical difficulty,” he leaned forward and put a hand next to his mouth like he was letting the audience in on a joke, “must have not gotten enough sleep last night, had to take a little snooze before you all here! Haha!” He straightened up as the audience burst into relieved laughter, and spun to the contestants, who were all starting to look a lot less concerned and stressed. “Now! Where were we? Oh yes, the choice… is mine! So let’s take a look at those options-”

   Tenna spun again and presented his hand up in the air - and this time, he didn’t freeze. It seemed as though everyone in the backstage took a huge sigh of relief as Tenna continued the show as usual, maybe a little more showy than normal but just as vibrant and in it as he always was. Spamton, too, felt the knot of tension which had built up in his shoulder blades relax a little, and he slumped himself forward. But, ah shit, he was still in the wings, where a handful of the backstage crew were already starting to give him strange looks.

   He needed to leave. He needed to leave right now.

   Spamton rushed off set, away from the stage. He speedwalked down the hallway attached to it and burst into the Green Room, flashing his very best grin to everyone hanging around within, thinking about all the locations no one would be able to find him in order to have a good old fashioned freakout within. Maybe his room, with the phone in it, would work well - then he could also pretend to scream at the Phone, though he would never have the guts to actually dial them and yell at them for real. Except, he couldn’t do that, for two reasons.

   The first reason was that it would rumple his suit. His suit couldn’t have a single flaw - he couldn’t show weakness to a single soul, not even Tenna, not even the damn sun in the sky. Everything about him had to be intentional, practiced, perfectly refined. He was a star, a Big Shot, there were no rumpled suits in that.

   The second reason was because he was physically stopped from leaving the Green Room entirely. A small faded purple body got between him and the door on the opposite side of the room from the hall that led back to the stage, a downturned open mouth filling Spamton’s vision. There was no one in the entirety of both Cyber City or TV World that Spamton wanted to talk to less than the person whose face had just been shoved directly between himself and escape. Yet, here he was, forced to stop, so as not to collide with the little menace and create a scene.

   “Spamton,” Ramb said, and though his tone sounded light enough, Spamton could see the narrowing of the little plugboy’s socket eyes. “Mind comin’ over to the bar with me a minute, luv?”

   “Actually,” Spamton said, as haughtily as he could manage while the twisting, crushing pressure of rotting death felt like it was trying to turn his heart and lungs inside out from within him, “I do mind. Get out of my way.”

   “I think you may wanna reconsider,” Ramb hummed, seemingly dropping his voice as he eyeballed a couple pippins rushing past towards the stage, some freshly made costumes in hand. “If some things you’ve been keepin’ from th’ rest wish to stay kept, anyways.”

   The little shit. He wasn’t even that much shorter than Spamton (a fact Spamton loathed), and yet Spamton considered him truly the lowest of the low. Bastard could make a threat like no tomorrow, concealed as a simple suggestion - though, this time certainly wasn’t his finest work. It wasn’t even thinly veiled, it was just outright.

   Spamton ground his teeth together, then finally gave a short nod, turned on his heel, and made a beeline for the bar.

   Ramb was a nuisance at the best of times, always acting like he knew everything right from the jump. Even about things Spamton knew he couldn’t possibly have a clue on, Ramb kept wearing that smug little grin, cleaning his pristine glasswares constantly. Spamton himself would never raise his hand against the stupid plugboy - there was too much risk in it, not enough reward. He still prayed, each night with his usual bedside words, for the little shit’s comeuppance.

   As usual, Ramb slid behind his bar, a glass and a cloth already in his hands, as Spamton slid onto a stool. They both leaned over the counter just a touch - Ramb didn’t need to worry about other visitors that day. No one came to him, much, anyways, with him being so associated with Spamton and Tenna’s ire (Spamton always did wonder what Ramb had done to piss Tenna off, though).

   “So,” Ramb said.

   “So,” Spamton echoed back. “Whaddya want? I’ve got very important places to be while the show’s still running.”

   “I’m sure,” Ramb said. “Important like sorting out what you’ve done to ‘im.”

   Spamton’s eyes narrowed at the purple plugboy. “What the hell does that mean?”

   “You know,” Ramb said, that cocky little grin tainted by something else, a squint in his socket eyes that Spamton couldn’t fully place. There was a sharp acidic smell coming from him, and it wasn’t just from the various concoctions he worked with each day, Spamton could tell. “Not all of us are as easy to convince that there’s nothin’ wrong as the average pippins on set.”

   “So you say,” hummed Spamton, “but the shadowguys haven’t brought anything up, either.”

   “You admit it, then?” Ramb pushed, and oh, it was a glare - that’s what was tainting Ramb’s usual smug grin. “Didn’t think it’d be so easy to get you to say you did something to the big boss.”

   “I didn’t, you should get your ears checked. All you’d asked about was if there was something wrong, and by all accounts there isn’t anything. ‘Kay?”

   Ramb hummed, leaned back a little. “You’d better have a fix for this. Whole world relies on ‘im and ‘is light, you know.”

   Spamton frowned. “…His light?”

   “Why else do you think the studio’s near constantly lit, mate?” Ramb said. “‘S not the livin’ room overhead.”

   Aha. It was incredible to Spamton how so so so unbelievably close to the truth and freedom of the reality (or lack thereof, haha) Ramb always seemed to be, and yet how utterly wrong he was about… well, about damn well everything. The Phone had told Spamton exactly what made up Dark Worlds, and it wasn’t their leader’s ‘light’ or whatever Ramb thought in his stupid outlet head.

   Still… he wasn’t so extraordinarily wrong about Tenna being important, Spamton supposed. “…Sometimes I forget you can glimpse into Heaven like he can.”

   “Ah, but like you say, only glimpse,” Ramb said with a humble little shrug. “The boss’s got a full, constant view.”

   “Sure,” Spamton agreed with a tilt of his head, an arm coming up onto the bar so he could prop himself up into a more comfortable position. “Something you should maybe remember more often, plugboy.”

   Ramb’s smile grew a little rueful, and after a moment he said, “You’re the only one who calls me that term, addison.”

   “I’d just like to be clear, here,” Spamton spat, “you called me over here to tell me to ‘be careful’, and then say that I don’t know what I’m doing, is that it? You threatened me, just to threaten me some more, insult me, and then say I’m the one doing wrong?”

   “I never threatened you,” Ramb said. “Just suggested some things.”

   “Boy, can’t wait for all of this to reach Tenna,” said Spamton as he leaned a little further over the bar - he could just barely see under it where Ramb stored the bigger bottles and a couple illicit goods he knew Tenna would never bother to check there for. “Sure would be a shame if he finally found that one last reason to be rid of you, huh?”

   “And of you, as well, mate,” Ramb stated idly. “Maybe he’d finally cut contact with Cyber City entirely, mm?”

   A light went off somewhere overhead, with a soft ding telling the Green Room the show had taken a break. No wonder, Spamton figured Tenna was probably a little rattled from this little incident. He’d probably schedule filming to resume tomorrow.

   Spamton huffed, turned away for a second, and avoided Ramb’s look. “Are we done here?”

   “Not yet,” said Ramb, his tone turning harsh. “We all saw the way he froze up there, today. That wasn’t normal. And though the others may be able to brush it off, I’m not so easy to sway. I don’t mind ‘im gettin’ a little comeuppance every now and again, remind him just what ‘e is in relation to… erm, ‘Heaven’. But whatever happens to him, happens to us, too; and that includes you, Mr. Spamton, ‘cause I’ll remind you that while you’re a temporary visitor here, you rely on ‘is light when you’re here, too. No one wants to be thrown out, forgotten, or lost for good, you understand that, luv? No one wants to be petrified.”

   Spamton growled. “Sure, sure, whatever, but you’re blaming the wrong guy for whatever you think is going on, alright? I’ve done nothing wrong, I’m just helping everything run a little smoother! Place is damn well booming because of my help, or don’t you remember?”

   “Whatever it is you’re doing to help everything ‘run a little smoother’, it’d better have an exit strategy, that’s all,” said Ramb, and that stupid smug grin was back on his face. “Better know what you’re doing, luv.”

   “I-!”

   Someone cleared their throat from behind Spamton. Trying not to let the incredible rush of I’ll kill whoever’s interrupting me that filled him for a moment, Spamton turned slowly to the sound, following where Ramb’s eyes had drifted.

   Behind him, a pippins stood, frowning up at Spamton from where he stood below the stool’s height. He was… green, which Spamton was pretty sure wasn’t usually a pippins colour, but then again, he didn’t really know and certainly didn’t particularly care. Spamton huffed at the pippins, leaned back against the counter of the bar, and then wheeled a hand at the wrist at him, trying to tell him without words to get on with it.

   “Sorry to interrupt,” the pippins said, sounding extremely not sorry at all, to which Spamton glowered at him, “but there’s… a slight issue on-stage.”

   “So what?” Spamton snapped. “The show’s over for the night, right? Leave it until it’s a problem later.”

   “It’s a problem now,” insisted the pippins.

   “What is it?” Ramb said, cutting short the retort on the tip of Spamton’s tongue.

   “It’s… Tenna,” said the pippins. Spamton straightened up off of the counter. “He’s… standing in the middle of the stage. Not responding. Kinda just spacing off it seems, but we gotta get some props off the set and he’s a little in the way…”

   “A little in the way,” Spamton repeated, and his glower turned into an outright glare at the pippins, “is that all you think of your boss? Wow, such loyal employees, be a shame if that got back to him.”

   “Lots getting back to Tenna today, apparently,” Ramb murmured. Then before either Spamton or the pippins could turn on him, he said a little louder, “We’ll handle it. Thanks for lettin’ us know, luv. Tell the crew to take a bit of a break, come back to it later, yeah?”

   “Sure,” muttered the pippins, giving one last glance at Spamton before he jogged back towards the stage, “whatever.”

   Before he could turn around fully again, Spamton had a radio shoved into his face, and he snatched it away as he frowned at Ramb. “Hey-!”

   “Call him up on that,” Ramb said. “Should already be on the right channel. We both know he’ll only respond to your voice, there.”

   Spamton ignored the knot of horrid feelings tightening in his gut as he flicked on the radio, pressed and held the button, and turned his head away from Ramb as he held it up to his mouth. “Uh. Hey? Over.”

   Yes, saying ‘over’ was outdated, but so was everything in TV World, and it made Tenna happy. So screw him, Spamton always did it on shortwave whenever he was talking to the old CRT.

   The radio crackled useless static in Spamton’s hand as he put it to his ear, and a few agonising seconds went by before that crystalline, radio-ready voice echoed down the receiver. “Hey hey! Over.”

   “Tenna, what are you doing right now? Over,” said Spamton.

   Another handful of seconds, then, “I-I guess I was… waiting for. Um. For you. Haha! How ridiculous! I already knew you’d left! Um. I need to talk to you, by the way. Or, or rather, you wanted to talk to me, right? Can we talk in my office? Er- over.”

   “Yes,” Spamton said, jumping on the opening Tenna gave him under Ramb’s scrutiny (it wasn’t him telling Tenna what to do if Tenna was suggesting it himself, right?! Right…), “go and uh, do whatever you need to do in your office, and I’ll be with you as soon as I’m able, ‘kay? Over.”

   “Alright,” Tenna said, “see you soon. Out.”

   The radio went dead, and Spamton slowly handed it back over his shoulder. He felt Ramb pull it relatively gently from his grip, before it was gone entirely from his hand. Only then did Spamton turn back to the dumb purple plugboy, watching him slip the radio under his counter.

   As he popped back up, Ramb was already looking at Spamton with that glint in his socket eyes, like a spark on a loose wire somewhere in the back of his head. “You’ll never admit it, will you, luv?”

   “There’s nothing to admit,” Spamton said immediately.

   They both heard the doors from the stage to the Green Room open, heard the heavy footfalls of the giant show host pass through, heard the doors opposite that led from the Green Room to the hallways beyond open and close. Ramb had tracked Tenna’s movements through the room with his eyes, but Spamton hadn’t needed to. He’d heard the way Tenna walked, the strange almost falter in each step. The old CRT certainly wasn’t storming through, but it still made his employees scatter before him - Spamton listened to a couple of them leap out of the way before he left. Tenna made no comments, no passing remarks, wasn’t even muttering under his breath like he so often did as he moved himself across the Green Room. When he was gone, Ramb kept his eyes pinned on the doors he’d left through.

   “‘Course not,” Ramb said, almost to himself. “Well, you’ve got yourself a conversation to have.”

   “I do,” Spamton said, and he slid off the stool. “You’d better not listen in.”

   “Wouldn’t need to,” Ramb said, a glass and a cloth back in his hands again. “Already know what it’s about, don’t I? But maybe I’m the only one here who does.”

   Spamton stalked away without another word, trailing after Tenna in the path he’d cleared. The doors opened for him quietly, the hallway before him clean and pristine, just like him as he settled himself back into his role. There was no problem. No problem at all. Sometimes Tenna just spaced off, he’d done that before too - that was normal! Everything was so normal! This was fine.

   Dread pooled in Spamton’s chest as he marched himself down to Tenna’s office, more and more before he was directly before his partner’s door. Ramb was wrong. Ramb was wrong. There was nothing wrong, there was no problem, and Spamton just had to be careful. He sucked in a breath and pushed open Tenna’s office door without knocking.

   Inside, everything was in relatively ordered chaos. Like misplaced irony, Tenna’s office was the one place in the entirety of TV World where no posters or pictures of Tenna or his face were visible - in fact, the walls themselves were almost entirely bare. Only the burgundy wallpaper and a couple hooks for hats and coats near the door decorated the vertical. The horizontal, on the other hand, was cluttered like it had to make up for the wallspace being so bare.

   Tenna had a problem with placing papers on his desk and forgetting them there, complaining about the mess later when it got to be too much for him. In response, Spamton, as well as a few other employees with special office privileges, often sorted those papers out for him. Because it wasn’t just one person ordering, though, the files in the shelves around the sides of the room would often have strange orders to things, that they each tried to rearrange whenever it was their turn to put things away. Sometimes, if they all got frustrated with each other, they started just leaving half-ordered groups of papers on top of the filing cabinets, and there were at least half a dozen of such piles up there now, so far as Spamton could see; three of which he remembered making himself. And yet, Tenna always managed to find the papers he needed after they were put away, so something about the whole thing had to have worked for him, even if it didn’t for the rest of them.

   The desk at the back of the room was ornate, some sort of gleaming dark cherry wood, dense and big enough for the big man himself, if not his papers. It had a classic little green-shade desk lamp, bent over some unattended looseleaf that Spamton noted he should file away later. It wasn’t on, however, since it wouldn’t have made anything easier to see - Tenna’s face illuminated the script he was working on just then (he was… already working on something?), and the relatively ornate chandelier-like overhead illuminated enough of everything else. Next to the desk, a small wire trash bin sat, and Spamton noted with a touch more unease that it was empty, despite the fact that Tenna was, very clearly, working on a script. The old CRT was picky, as picky as anyone possibly could be, especially when it came to what he’d air on his show. He was incredibly picky; he’d set upon a script and immediately pull out lines he wanted scrapped, phrases and innuendos he didn’t think were fitting, suggested blocking that he simply didn’t want to do. And yet, the small wire trash bin remained empty that evening…

   Spamton put it out of his mind as he stepped in and closed the door behind himself. Just for extra measure, he clicked the lock into place, too, allowing the musty smell of papers and heated plastic and loooooong looooooong nights to try and settle him a little before he turned back around.

   “Hey, Ant,” Spamton said.

   Tenna didn’t look up. “Just a moment.”

   He had his tongue stuck out of his mouth now, clenched between his (unsharpened, for now) teeth. It was kind of cute, if Spamton stared at it for too long. He eyeballed it, then Tenna’s nose, then where his eyes would be if he had any… and then back to the trash bin. The pit in Spamton’s stomach grew, replacing whatever fuzzy feelings he’d had a moment before.

   “C’mon,” Spamton said instead of sitting in it, “you’re clearly not working that hard.”

   Almost like he couldn’t stop himself, Tenna’s pen fell to the table, unattended. Then a scattering of scan lines rippled over his face, and his mouth pursed shut and curled down. He reached for the pen again, only barely picking it up between his claws but not continuing his work.

   “I was, though,” Tenna mumbled under his breath, talking to himself. “Was I… editing? No, no…”

   Before he could get too lost in thought, Spamton cleared his throat, and Tenna jumped. “We’re here for a meeting, aren’t we? To talk?”

   “Right, right, we were going to talk,” Tenna hummed, and the pen was replaced back onto the table a little more gently as Tenna’s features melted into a warm smile at Spamton. “Great! Then let’s talk.”

   “Okay,” said Spamton, and nothing more.

   They stared at each other for much too long, before Tenna grew impatient and frowned down at Spamton. “You’re the one who wanted to talk.”

   “Well, sure,” Spamton said, “but, um. Well, you know… there’s just not much to talk about.”

   “Not much to- then why did you call this meeting?” Tenna looked genuinely confused. “I am very busy, Spam.”

   Larger and larger still, the pit grew in Spamton’s stomach. “You- we- you weren’t moving, on stage. Remember? So I suggested we talk about it, to snap you out of it.”

   “I…” Tenna’s mouth twisted, and instantly his whole demeanour changed as he shrunk a couple sizes down. “N-no, I… S-Spammy, can I tell you something?”

   “Anything, what is it?”

   “I think… I think I’m losing time, Spammy,” Tenna said, his voice rough through his speakers. “I don’t- did others see me freeze, too?”

   Shit. Tenna didn’t remember? There was no way that was the ring’s doing… right? How the hell would it have even done that, anyways? But, damnit, Spamton couldn’t think about that right then, he had to reply first.

   “Yeah,” Spamton forced out. “Everyone working today. Ramb suggested that I talk to you in the first place.”

   “God,” Tenna muttered, his hands moving up to his screen to scrub at the space above his nose. “That’s… scary…”

   No kidding. Spamton tried the first thing that popped into his head. “Sure, but, um… think of the bright side!”

   Tenna’s hands dropped, and even without eyes Spamton could feel the deadpan weight of the stare he levelled him with, his mouth an even line and his nose pointed directly into Spamton’s forehead. “What bright side could there possibly be? I wouldn’t even be able to tell when this all started, Spamton, I could have been losing time like this for- for years! This could affect our viewership; it’s already affected my performance! That’s bad, Spam, that’s really bad!”

   Wait, what? ‘For years’, no, Tenna had to remember that this was a recent development.

   “There’s no way you’ve been spacing off like this for that long,” Spamton said, trying to ease Tenna’s worries.

   “How could you possibly know?!” Tenna said, his hands flinging up into the air as he suddenly bounced back to regular height, loud and terrifying, right before he reigned himself in, his fingers curling around the base of his antennae. “Sorry, I just- you say you saw me up on stage tonight, didn’t you? And you called this meeting; was there something about this you wanted to say? Do you somehow know what’s causing it?!”

   “What-” Heaven above, was Tenna always this hard to follow? “How did you get to that conclusion, Tens?”

   “You always seem to know things about loads of strangeness happening around the studio!” Tenna slapped his hands down on his desk, papers scattering aside as he leaned forwards. “So out with it, what is this? What’s this terrifying affliction?”

   “I-I just…” what did he say, what could he say? “I’m not- there’s not- Ant, there’s not an easy answer to this.”

   At that, Tenna looked downright affronted. “Not an easy-?! What do you mean?”

   “Just that it might not… be so easy to explain.” That was a terrible excuse. He had to redirect - why was he even suggesting he knew anything? “It might come out like a lie,” that was arguably even worse, but he was stuck with it now, “and I don’t wanna lie to you, Ant.” What a joke.

   “So just tell me honestly, then,” Tenna said. “Just tell me what the hell is going on. You- you can’t say it doesn’t involve me this time, it is me!”

   Spamton clenched his fingers into his pants, twisting the fabric out of Tenna’s field of view; he was going to get wrinkles in his pristine slacks. “I… don’t know.”

   That was the truth. Wasn’t it? Spamton didn’t lie. He didn’t know what was going on, and he didn’t know if this was related to the ring in the first place (liar, he was a liar), and he didn’t know what it did anyways, not really, not entirely.

   Tenna scoffed. “What is it that you keep dancing around? Do you think whatever it is, I can’t take it? Do you not trust me with it?”

   “It’s not about trust, don’t start with that, Ant-”

   “Don’t start with what, Spam-?!” Static slid over Tenna’s screen for a microsecond as his voice shorted, a shot of red that Spamton would have missed if he’d blinked, and suddenly Tenna’s focus was on a new dimension of the argument and Spamton was left scrambling to catch up again. “Or is it somehow something you’re embarrassed about? Do you think I can’t take all sides of you in stride? I care about you more than that, I hope you know that by now. You’ve- you’ve seen me cry enough times to know that we both can take each other at our worst, don’t you know that by now?”

   “You’ve only seen me cry once.”

   “So? God, Spamton, just say it straight, tell me whatever it is you’re avoiding, whatever this thing is that’s eating away at me, I promise I can take it! You invited the both of us here in the first place, WHY is it so hard for you? Why won’t you talk to me?!”

   “Because there’s nothing to talk about!” Spamton cried, and he forced himself to take a breath and calm down a little before he continued - he just had to stay in the moment, stick with the plan (that he was completely making up on the spot). “I get it, okay? I get that you’re… scared. And- and I think maybe, there might be something just a smidgen… uh, wrong with you, but- but! Stay with me, big guy, this is a big but. But. I think maybe we just gotta, I don’t know… schedule some maintenance or something, okay? You’re not broken, you’re just losing a little bit of time; that happens to everyone, especially when they’re overworked, right? You’ve got so much going on all the time, plus now looking for venues, so much work is probably scrambling your internals, right?”

   “V… venues?” Tenna asked, sounding like he was suddenly ripped from the argument, his lips curling into a loose frown. “What do you mean by ‘venues’? Is- Spammy, there’s no way this is how you propose to me. I expect a little more.”

   Spamton blinked. “What?”

   Tenna’s screen grew furiously pink. “What?”

   “No- what? I’ve already…” There was no way the entire conversation from just a few hours ago had been wiped from Tenna’s memory. Just like there was no way Tenna didn’t remember this had started literally earlier that day, just like how there was no way all of this wasn’t solely the ring’s fault.

   But… clearly, there was a way, because all of that was a fact staring him down in the shape of Tenna’s confused, blushing features. Was it- was it Spamton saying ‘one thing at a time’ that was somehow doing all of this…? Fuck, fuck.

   “What’s already what?”

   “Prop…” Spamton felt like he could barely breathe. “Proposed? You… th-the ring, don’t you remember?”

   Silence filled the office for a moment, and Spamton felt each agonising nanosecond pass as he waited for Tenna to say something. Anything, literally anything. Because Spamton couldn’t break the silence anymore, he felt like someone was grabbing his lungs directly in his chest and strangling him from there. His body burned, the room was spinning a little, smelling like the fires at the end of the world as the universe collapsed in on itself. He squirmed a little under the scrutiny of Tenna’s gaze.

   Then finally Tenna broke the tension again, his mouth and nose scrunched together as static laced his words. “I-I… guess I remember something vague…” suddenly his features reset themselves, his mouth wide with a grin as he leaned into Spamton. “Oh- oh! But! I remember you promising me a ring! Something pretty, with a stone! Yes, oh goodness, yes! I remember that, of course!”

   Spamton gasped for air. “R… right.”

   Tenna beamed at him. “I’m so very excited for that, for sure! Aha, how could I have forgotten?”

   Spamton’s face was searing with the feeling of the false smile he forced upon it. “I’m not sure! Haha! And hey, maybe that’s what’s been causing all this, hmm? Some of your heatsinks getting too hot from the concept of getting hitched, what about that?”

   Tenna laughed, and Spamton tried his best to laugh back as the argument from before was, apparently, entirely left behind. It must have come across enough, because Tenna’s attention was off of him again, his mouth open and moving like he was saying more things. Spamton couldn’t hear it at all, however, because the world had devolved into a horrid ringing that filled his ears and made his brain feel like it wanted to pop within his skull and leave a nasty red stain on Tenna’s fine carpeted office flooring.

   The ring had… made… Tenna forget… about it. As in… about itself, entirely. And the conversation around it? And every time it stepped in to… fuck around?!

   Was it even still… there? On Tenna’s finger? Spamton glanced down at Tenna’s gloved hands as surreptitiously as he could manage. There was a bit of a weird lump on Tenna’s left hand ring finger, sure, but there were also all sorts of weird lumps all over Tenna’s hands, as he gesticulated while he talked. His gloves creased and flattened out in all sorts of odd ways, ways that Spamton hadn’t really noticed before. He supposed that made sense, the old TV was a mechanical thing, his hands probably didn’t look like regular people hands under those gloves, with all sorts of joints and such. Spamton hadn’t actually ever seen Tenna’s hands without the gloves (dear Heaven, did the ring make him forget what it looked like to put the ring on Tenna in the first place, too? Shit, he was going to develop a migraine), he’d always thought they looked so refined and beautiful. And it wasn’t like he was looking at them and thinking they were ugly now, just… well, he didn’t know. Tainted somehow, maybe?

   As well, the irregular lump surrounding the base of Tenna’s left hand ring finger remained unmoving even amidst all the movement, so Spamton decided he’d take that for his answer. It was still there, right where Spamton had put it. Still there, discrete, forgotten.

   Spamton swallowed, his eyes drifting back to Tenna’s screen, and he forced himself to tune back into the conversation. “…should probably get some others involved because honestly this is starting to sound like a lot of work outside of our regular schedules, this could take months and months to really properly plan out… hmm.”

   With a blink, Spamton bent the corners of his smile into something a little more genuine than his resting frozen one. “Aha, yeah, well, you’ll have to tell me which parts you need me to weigh in on, okay? Iiiiiin the meanwhile, I’m gonna go and, uh, get some work done. Alright?”

   One little flourish of his hands and legs, and Spamton was standing. Tenna ‘blinked’ at him (more like, had a few more disruptive scanlines than normal interrupt the regularly smooth progression of his face), then nodded and grinned.

   “Yes, yes, of course,” Tenna said with a laugh. “I’ll get back to you on stuff later - maybe check in with me in the morning?”

   “Sure thing, partner,” Spamton said, and he relished the way the corners of Tenna’s mouth glowed pink like he had cheeks there, despite the circumstances. “Just don’t forget to go to your room and go to bed when you’re done here, okay? Gotta get good sleep, and whatever…”

   Tenna blew him a short raspberry. “Like I’d forget about that, of course, of course. See you in the morning, Spammy!”

   Somehow, the door was already unlocked when Spamton backed into it, grabbed the handle, and opened it. He slipped out into the hallway beyond, still just as empty as it had been before he’d gone in, and shut the door again.

   He felt like the floor was going to swallow him up and chew him into pieces. Instead of reacting to that feeling, though, he straightened out his blazer, his hair, his pants, his tie… and then marched down the hallway. Around the Green Room, towards the back, a little ways away from the stage but not too far to be able to race to it at the last minute. He opened the door to his room, the Z-Rank room. Stepped in, closed the door.

   He fell to the floor like a marionette with its strings snapped. Then he jumped up, reminded about how that would crease his clothes worse than they already had been (he needed to burn these slacks, order new ones for the morning), and instead started pacing.

   Nothing about this was going to plan. Tenna wasn’t supposed to notice anything. He wasn’t supposed to forget about it, either. The rest of the cast and crew shouldn’t have been suspicious, there should have not been any single clue that something could possibly be wrong. Because. Because! Because nothing was wrong, this was exactly how the Phone wanted it to go, everything was fine and Spamton had never been led astray. He just. Had. To. Believe. In. It.

   Have faith. He was good at that. He could hold a lot of faith, in a lot of things, constantly. Don’t worry about the feelings in his gut, about the terrifying strangeness surrounding Tenna now, about the fear of what comes next. He just needed to have faith.

   The phone began to ring.

   Spamton twisted on his heel and faced it dead on. His hand dug into his pocket and found the side of his thigh, where he tapped a rough pattern onto it, pointer middle ring pinky ring middle pointer middle ring pinky ring middle pointer…

   He strode over to the phone in three wide steps, and on its fourth ring he picked it up.

   “Hello again, puppet,” the Phone mused, and Spamton could practically hear the grin in their voice, making Spamton grind his teeth together. “Late on the pick-up. Regretting it already? Such a crying shame.”

   “What the hell have you made me do?” Spamton hissed into the receiver, quiet as always, feeling like his teeth were all but glued together.

   The Phone laughed. “I did nothing. All you, little puppet!”

   “Like hell- ngk!”

   Spamton felt that familiar feel of wires wrapped around his throat, tightening as though someone had snuck up behind him and was strangling him to death. He barely managed to keep a grip on the phone in his hand as he sunk to his knees, his other hand scrabbling uselessly at the strings he knew he’d never be able to pull away. Foam started to build up in Spamton’s mouth as his mind went fuzzy, barely starting to overflow before the feeling finally relaxed.

   Spamton heaved in gulping breaths, gasping as he listened to the Phone titter away some more. Damnit, he hated this, he hated how reliant on this he was. He wished more than anything that he could get out of this, when the hell was the Phone going to deliver on their promises of freedom?!

   “Forward as always,” the Phone continued. “But mind your tongue. Take some credit. You gifted the ring. I’ve done nothing. Blame only yourself, puppet. Blame only yourself. …Besides, it’s working, yes?”

   The question was rhetorical, Spamton knew, but he answered anyways, his voice hoarse. “I-it’s… doing something, yes…”

   The Phone hummed. “Yes, it is. You so wanted control. Look, it’s yours! Just be delicate, okay? What’s the wording? ‘Despite his size, he’s’…”

   “‘Surprisingly fragile’…” Spamton finished off for the Phone reluctantly, almost breathlessly, much to their apparent delight.

   “Yes, you remember!” They laughed some more. “Keep that in mind. Now to business. Have you a pen?”

   Spamton scrambled around the small table he kept the phone on for the pen he always used, then diligently wrote down the words the Phone told him. For some reason, whatever the Phone had told him really just didn’t… stick in his mind, this time. The words flowed in through one ear, stuck around long enough for him to copy them down, and then flowed right out the other. Their prophecy, their warnings, their sweet, useless promises… he couldn’t focus, couldn’t stay with the Phone, and only really came back to himself when they’d hung up and a dial tone was playing in his ear.

   Frustrated, he set the receiver back into its cradle. That had gotten him nowhere.

   But… at the very least, it did tell him that the Phone wasn’t actively trying to do something evil to Tenna, or himself by extension. At least, not this time, not with the Thorn Ring. There were a number of questions he still had for the Phone, things he’d try to force answers for from them later, when they called again. For now, though, Spamton needed to focus.

   He could work with this. He just needed to keep an eye on Tenna, make sure he ran smoothly, just like normal, try and get all that suspicion off his back somehow. Maybe he could convince Ramb that everything was actually fine if he could prove to the stupid little plugboy that Tenna himself was physically perfectly fit still. Spamton had suggested to Tenna earlier that he could do with some maintenance. So…

   Spamton picked up the phone again, and dialled a studio internal number. It took a couple of rings, but finally the other side picked up.

   “Mr. Ant Tenna speaking,” came that crystalline, clear voice (maybe he could convince him to do radio as a side gig?), “what’s the emergency?”

   “No emergency, Ant,” Spamton said, feeling bold enough on their private line to speak to him like they were alone together. “Just thought I’d check in on you - how’s about we schedule that maintenance I’d suggested earlier?”

   “Oh, Spam- Spamton!” Tenna said, his tone perking up even as he avoided saying Spamton’s nickname - he must have had company, then. “Ah- yes, alright, why don’t we? I believe… the end of the week, this next week, should be free in the evening? I don’t believe either of us are booked for anything we can’t move.”

   “And you’d be the one to call the shots for moving them,” Spamton said with a cheeky smirk. “It’s a date, then. See you around.”

   He hung up before Tenna could reply, and sucked in a breath through his teeth. Great. Good. That was a good thing. That meant everything was going great. They just had to hold out until the end of the coming week, and then…

   And then they’d both see how completely and totally fine everything was. Yes, yup. So, so… fine.

   Spamton stood up from the ground, dusting off his knees as he left his room. He didn’t even need to turn off lights, he hadn’t bothered to flick them on in the first place. Down the hall, out into the Green Room, through to another door, down another hall, and another, and another, until- the Cold Place stretched far and long before Spamton’s eyes.

   He just needed a bit of a walk. To cool himself off, clear his head. Hopefully when he got back for his shoot at 11:45, he’d finally be able to believe the lies he told himself.