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“You know, ‘cuz I’m leaving. For a few weeks.”
Quackity feels like his stomach’s dropped through his boots. He whips his head around, ignoring Schlatt’s raised eyebrow at the way his wings ruffle in surprise.
“What? What do you mean? Why?”
”I don’t fuckin’ know. I’ll probably go explore someplace else. Far away from you fuckers, that’s for sure. Need a break.”
Quackity likes being around Schlatt. This he knows, and he knows Schlatt knows, if the webbed footsteps etched into the land around his house and the loose feathers littering all his furniture said anything about it.
They had… something, in the past, before the ram had disappeared into thin air and whiskey. They drifted in totally different directions, but the duck always knew they’d see each other again. They always came back to one another, without fail, every time.
But even so, meeting on that cruise again, Quackity didn’t expect at all. He still couldn’t explain why something had tugged at his chest until he forced himself to step out onto the deck, only calming when he saw the outline of neatly kept horns in the distance.
After the cruise had crashed and they’d found each other again, Quackity had done the natural thing and followed him. Again. To his little island, and while he built his house, and then while his house was destroyed. And also when his house was subsequently fixed.
It was just so easy! Schlatt was as quiet as he was loud, as quick as he was slow, and everything Quackity threw at him was caught then tossed with nothing more than dismissal. That indifference made him stumble every fucking time- whether it was dragging him out to the Northern Mansion and forcing the ram to listen to him and Juan a scream at eachother for hours, or completely blowing up his front lawn in the name of baseless accusations, Quackity’s antics never phased him enough to put his foot down permanently. And it drove him fucking crazy.
Maybe crazy wasn’t the right word.
But honestly, he didn't know what the right word for it was. Thinking about it too hard made his head hurt like a bitch; it was the same emotion that came when he thought of everything that had happened before, well, you know. Except, he became increasingly frustrated at the thought of the feeling leaving rather than staying.
Quackity's not a complete idiot, contrary to popular belief. He knows it's only a matter of time until his previous (current?) involvement with the Federation and the suspicion of the previous islanders come back to bite him in the ass. He knows what he’s done and what’s happened to him, and he knows he’ll never escape it. Any of it. How could he?
But that’s the thing. Schlatt doesn’t know who El Quackity is. Or what Maxi’s talking about when he warns him that Quackity was dangerous. Or why Multi wants his DNA so badly. Or why Cucurucho’s eyes trail after him closer than anyone else.
He doesn’t expect anything.
He only knows that Quackity is the nuisance that he lets in his bed, one, two, three, four times a week.
That was the way the duck would keep it. No, Schlatt wouldn’t find out about the hurt the Federation put him through, what he’d sacrificed to save himself, and then the others. He would never know the story of the red ribbon tied like a lifeline around his arm (sometimes tight enough to make the skin under turn a haunting shade of purple).
As far as he was concerned, El Quackity didn’t exist, and right now, he was nothing more than the ram’s more-than-good friend that liked to fuck with him.
Schlatt was a dick. Everyone who’s ever interacted with him knew this, but maybe that’s why Quackity just felt grounded when he was with him; he liked having someone to just give everything to him straight, and not care enough to look close enough. At least this time, he wasn’t the only at a distance.
Someone who didn’t know how fucking frigid he used to be. He was.
And Quackity would let Schlatt blow as much smoke as he wanted into his face to keep him. Fuck, he’d inhale all of it, and keep it safe inside his lungs forever if it meant that the ram was still here to stare at him, look him in the eyes, and see the duck, raw and vulnerable, and do nothing more than open the door and invite him inside. Forget the yelling, or the dismissal, or everything wrong with them, Quackity just needed Schlatt. Simple as that.
“Do you… you need a few weeks for that?”
”Yep.” Schlatt pops the ‘p’, “18 days. I’d do more, but I worry about the state of my house around you guys.”
”Huh.” Quackity tries to calm the erratic beating of his chest. He uncrosses his legs, then crosses them again while looking at Schlatt, wide-eyed and adoring.
The cameraman behind them zooms in on the way his hand slides across the wooden planks of the dock.
”Yeah? That okay?”
Of course it was okay. Quackity knew there wasn’t anything Schlatt needed to stay around here for. Not any allies, that’s for sure, and probably not Katie or him.
According to the ram, he was incompetent anyways. And he’d always try and be better, mostly for himself, and also mostly for Schlatt to truly see him again.
Cucurucho always said he’d had a problem with validation, but listening to that son of a bitch was the last thing Quackity would ever consider. What did he know besides everything, anyways?
“Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?” The duck covers quickly, “Just wouldn’t want you to miss me.”
Schlatt laughs, honest and genuine and loud. Really fucking loud. His hand falls to the small of Quackity’s back and stays there. He half-expects to feel fingers sliding downwards.
The duck’s entire body lights up, feeling guilty and shameful and oh so fucking alive all at once. He thinks he smells alcohol from somewhere, and he thinks of before again.
”Fuck. You’re funny.”