Chapter Text
Everybody loves you, baby
You should trademark your face
Linin' down the block to be around you
But, baby, I'm first in place
“Did you actually do that?” Prism asked Visi.
Flambae was sitting in the corner table of the breakroom next to Prism. He had made food for the two of them—saffron chicken skewers with basmati rice in glass containers. He’d even had decorated covers for both of them! His niece was the one who was mostly responsible for all of the stickers, sure, but they were cute and he would never disagree with her designer decisions.
Today’s first shift had been absolute fucking chaos. Entitled fucks calling for coffee runs when their time could be used to fight some actual, really happening crimes, or random politicans who wanted defense and didn’t fucking deserve it. Absolutely horrendous. He and Prism planned for this lunch to be relaxing: to debrief about the shitty calls that they had and laugh over how stupid rich people were while they enjoyed some nice food. Then they would have decompressed enough to go onto the next shift.
What Flambae was not planning was exploding the entire fucking break room.
At the very least, he hadn’t done it yet. But that yet was on a very thin string of hope.
“Yeah, I guess.” Visi snorted. She’d been recounting the time that she, apparently, walked into the men’s bathroom to tell Robert about a sex dream she had with the two of them. On his second day. “I mean, I didn’t mean to. Well– I did, I intentionally walked in there and whatever. But it wasn’t a bad thing!”
Prism had only asked about it because Waterboy had mentioned something to them about an awkward conversation in the bathrooms when they were having their weekly sleepover. Flambae hadn’t heard anything about it at the time, and Prism wouldn’t have known anyways. Neither of them really expected Visi to be the cause of said awkward conversation—Flambae could only imagine how awkward that must’ve been for Waterboy—but he supposed that he wasn’t surprised.
Disappointed and angry? Yes, but not surprised.
“I don’t know if that’s something you should be proud of, girl.” Prism said. Flambae could see her eyes behind her visor. The look that said we’ll be talking about this later.
Visi shrugged and turned around, leaning against the counter with a pack of chips. “He was chill with it, y’know? Asked if he had a condom. Then Royd got mad at me later that day–”
“You did this in front of other people?” Flambae snarled.
Visi snorted. “What’s it to you? You jealous?”
“No, that’s just fucking disgusting.” he said. He almost always sneered when he talked, sure, but he wasn’t feeling very playful at the moment. Flambae wasn’t even just mad at the fact that she’d done what she had done, he was more pissed about the fact that she seemed completely fine with what she’d done. “You could just act like a regular fucking person if you want to flirt with someone.”
“Right, because going to a bar for hookups and dates at least once a week is so normal.” Visi drawled.
“At least the people who are on a dating app are consenting to a date. You’d known him for less than 24 hours before you did that shit.” Flambae said as he finished his food. He was too angry to be touching the glass right now—it would probably glow at the touch. “Don’t fucking talk to me again today, bitch.”
He didn’t wait for Prism this time when he left.
“Hey, Robert?” Flambae called out.
Robert was eating a twinkie for lunch. Literally nobody was surprised, but he felt the need to say it. Flambae was pretty sure that he was offended by the man’s diet—it was absolutely atrocious. How on Earth could someone survive so long on this planet yet only eat Twinkies. The closest thing that this man had gotten to carbs either seemed to be those stupid logs or a glass of beer. This probably spoke to some unresolved issues of their dispatcher. But Flambae didn’t care.
He didn’t, okay?
“Yes, Flambae?” Robert said. “Do you need something?”
This was probably a stupid thing to ask. Flambae doubted that Robert would even listen, he’d probably do the exact opposite thing out of pure spite. But he was trying not to think of Robert similarly to how he thought of the other dispatchers—and that started with this.
“Do you mind not putting me on missions with Invisigal today?” he asked. “I don’t want to talk to her.”
Robert blinked at him before finishing the last of his stupid Twinkie. He would have to find a better alternative to those Twinkies—they were too cheap and too low-quality for someone to be eating. And the way that Robert licked up any residue frosting was annoying, okay? Someone had to say it for the good of the people. Flambae would say it. “Is there a particular reason for this, or?”
“I don’t want to talk about it, bitch.” Flambae grunted before resting his head in his hands. “Look, I’ll make you food for a week if you say yes. Free of charge. Best shit you’ll ever have, like, ever.”
Robert chuckled. “You don’t have to bribe me about it, I won’t do it unless necessary. I just wanted to see if you needed to talk about anything, so if you need to–” he said. “I won’t mind listening.”
“She’s a creep,” he said.
Flambae was sure that he heard Chase snorting from his cubicle. He was even more positive about this when Robert glared at the same cubicle before turning back to him. “Did she do something to you?”
“Not to me, in front of me.” Flambae rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. “Talked about how she was– I don’t know– this guy that she met for one day. And then cornered him in the bathroom to talk about some dream that she had.”
Flambae hoped that Robert would pick up on the three warnings at once. One, Visi did not mind going around and talking about what she had done—which said that both Robert’s privacy was in trouble and that she also was not ashamed of what she had done either. Two, that this behavior was creepy. It creeped him out, and it should creep Robert out too. And three, most importantly, that Flambae wouldn’t openly talk about the things that she did because he actually cared about privacy. It was an important thing.
Robert hummed before nodding. “I’ll make sure to keep you two distant.”
Flambae smiled. “Thank you, Bob-bob.”
“Have you ever considered not being a walking HR violation?” Flambae snorted.
Robert and him both happened to be taking the elevator at the same time. During this time, at least three other women had come up to him and openly flirted with him. Robert, of course, had not noticed before Flambae decided to point out that most people didn’t just casually wink at others they hardly know.
“I just don’t understand what’s so appealing about me.” Robert said as his hands dragged down his face.
Flambae blinked before laughing. “Seriously bitch?”
“Yes, seriously!” Robert said before looking at Flambae, who had now keeled over laughing against the wall. “What? What’s so funny about that?”
Flambae looked at him. “Literally everybody in this building seems to like you, even Blazer. And you’re– you look nice! That’s what’s so funny about this!” he said to Robert, snorting at the utter confusion appearing on the man’s face. “Listen, you have this like– how do people put it– like a lost puppy energy! Yeah, that’s what it is. You look pathetic. But, like, in a good way. And people like it.”
Robert was still confused. “Thank you, I guess?”
“You’re welcome, bitch.” Flambae said. “You should, like, trademark your whole brand or something. Prevent people from stealing your sad guy charisma.”
“I thought I wasn’t your type?” Robert asked.
Flambae rolled his eyes at that. He isn’t Flambae’s type. Who said that he was? Certainly not Flambae, Robert was obviously making assumptions here. “You aren’t, bitch. Just, y’know, don’t like to put others down about stuff like that.” he said before pausing. “All the time, I mean. Sometimes I will–”
“I get it.” Robert said. “Thank you, Flambae.”
“Whatever, bitch.” he said before watching Robert leave.