Work Text:
The thing about filming with Derek, Avery would say later, was that he had not anticipated the calm.
He should have. He had watched the footage, all of it, multiple times, in the process of making the video that had introduced Derek to the internet. He had seen Derek solve a cipher stack in seventeen minutes and set a backup trap without telling anyone and decode a zombie's sunburn patterns and talk down a cosmic entity using Minecraft mechanics. He knew, intellectually, that Derek Hutchins did not rattle.
But knowing a thing and experiencing a thing were, Avery was discovering, different.
"Okay," Avery said, on the morning of, looking at his filming setup. He had cleaned the apartment. He had moved the plants so they were visible but not distracting. He had set up the second chair, Derek's chair, which they'd bought specifically, which Derek had selected based on back support and Avery had selected based on whether it looked good on camera and they had compromised on a chair that was both, at the correct angle. He had tested the audio twice.
He had been doing YouTube for years. He filmed in this apartment regularly. This was his space, his setup, his camera.
He was nervous.
"You've done this thousands of times," Derek said, from the kitchen, where he was making coffee with the unhurried ease of someone who had not noticed or was not acknowledging that the occasion was significant.
"I've done it alone thousands of times," Avery said.
"The process is the same."
"The process involves another person this time."
"You talk to other people on camera regularly," Derek said. He appeared in the kitchen doorway with two mugs, Avery's sunflower one in his left hand as always, and looked at the setup. "What's different."
Avery looked at him. At his very calm face. At the complete absence of any anxiety in his posture, his expression, his entire bearing.
"You're not nervous at all," Avery said.
Derek considered this. "No," he said.
"How."
"I've looked at worse things than a camera," Derek said, and handed Avery his mug.
Avery took it. He thought about what worse things meant in Derek's specific context and decided that was a reasonable point.
"What if you hate it," Avery said. "Being on camera. What if it's-”
"Then I'll tell you and we won't do it again," Derek said. "But I don't think I'll hate it."
"How do you know."
Derek looked at the camera. Then at Avery. "Because you'll be there," he said, with the simplicity of someone stating a fact, and went back to the kitchen to get his own mug.
Avery stood in the middle of his living room.
He was going to be fine.
They had agreed, beforehand, on the format.
Not a grand announcement. Not a meet my boyfriend video, Derek had looked at Avery when Avery suggested this with an expression of polite horror and Avery had immediately said okay not that, forget I said that, just a video. Them, talking, playing Minecraft, the way they actually spent their time. The channel was already shifting in that direction anyway; anyone who had been paying attention to the comments on recent videos could see it, could see the second presence in the background, the occasional voice off camera, the sunflower plant that had appeared on the windowsill next to what was clearly a new addition.
The internet had opinions about the new addition. Avery had been monitoring this carefully.
is that a succulent in the background avery has acquired a succulent and a mystery person who apparently talks to it the way the succulent keeps appearing in different positions. someone is tending to it. who is tending to it I'm normal about the plant person. I'm so normal about the plant person.
Avery had screenshot all of these and shown them to Derek, who had read them with the expression of someone who found humans mildly baffling and then said: "The succulent's name is Hastur."
"I know that," Avery said.
"They don't," Derek said.
They were going to know today.
"Okay," Avery said, sitting in his chair, looking at the camera. Derek was in the second chair, slightly angled toward Avery the way they'd positioned it, close enough that their shoulders were almost touching. "We're rolling."
"Okay," Derek said.
Avery looked at the camera. He did the thing he always did, the thing that was muscle memory after years, settled into himself, found the version of him that was comfortable being watched, opened his mouth.
"Hey guys," he said, "so-”
Derek looked at him.
Not at the camera. At Avery. With the look, the full, specific attention, the one that meant Derek was reading something, cataloguing it, keeping it, and Avery lost the thread of his sentence entirely.
"So," Avery said.
Derek continued looking at him.
"So, um," Avery said.
"Take your time," Derek said, helpfully, still looking at him.
"I'm taking my-” Avery pointed at him— "don't look at me like that."
"Like what," Derek said.
"Like that," Avery said, making a gesture that was meant to indicate Derek's entire face and its current configuration.
Derek looked at the camera instead. He looked back at Avery. "Better?"
"Marginally," Avery said. "Okay. From the top."
It took four attempts to get through the intro.
This was not Avery's finest moment professionally. He had done intros hungover, intros while sick, intros while a pigeon was audibly losing its mind outside his window. He had done intros under conditions that were objectively more difficult than sitting next to a person he liked while a camera recorded them.
The problem was Derek.
Specifically: Derek on camera was exactly Derek off camera, which Avery had known but hadn't fully processed until he was watching it happen in real time. There was no performance. No adjustment for the presence of the lens. Derek sat in the second chair and was just, Derek, with his particular stillness and the way he thought before he spoke and the dry humor that came out sideways when he wasn't expecting to be funny.
This was, Avery was discovering, much worse than if Derek had been wooden or awkward or stiff. Wooden and awkward he could have worked with. Wooden and awkward would not have made him forget his own intro.
"You know what you want to say," Derek said, after the third attempt, in the patient tone.
"I know what I want to say," Avery agreed.
"Then say it."
"I'm trying to say it."
"You keep stopping after 'so,'" Derek said. "What comes after 'so'?"
"What comes after 'so' is a sentence that I know," Avery said, "which I then forget because-” he stopped.
Derek waited.
"Because you look at me," Avery said.
Derek processed this. "I can look at the camera," he said.
"You tried that. It was worse."
"How is it worse-”
"Because then I can see you not looking at me," Avery said, which made complete sense to him and apparently also to Derek, who went quiet in the way of someone who had understood a thing and was filing it correctly.
"Okay," Derek said. "What if I look slightly past you. At the wall."
"At the-”
"There's a mark on the wall," Derek said. "From when you moved the bookshelf. I'll look at that."
Avery looked at the mark on the wall. He looked at Derek. "You notice everything," he said.
"I notice the things that are there," Derek said. "Roll the camera."
Avery rolled the camera.
Derek looked at the mark on the wall.
Avery said: "Hey guys, so, I have someone I want you to meet."
Once they got past the intro, it was easy.
This also surprised Avery, though it probably shouldn't have. They had been talking for months, through nightmares and grocery runs and Skywars games and kitchen floors and plant audits and all the other ordinary extraordinary things, and whatever they were together on camera was just the continuation of that, just them being themselves in a slightly more documented format.
Derek was good at this in the way he was unexpectedly good at several things: not flashily, not immediately obviously, but with a quiet competence that revealed itself gradually. He answered questions directly. He didn't oversell or undercell. When Avery made a joke he responded to it honestly, laughing if it was funny, not laughing if it wasn't, occasionally improving it, which was both annoying and good for the video.
And he was, dry. In a way the camera liked. In a way Avery suspected the internet was going to lose its collective mind about.
"Tell them about the cipher," Avery said, at the point in the video where the story required it.
"Which part," Derek said.
"The solving it part."
"I solved it," Derek said.
Avery looked at him. "In seventeen minutes," he prompted.
"In seventeen minutes," Derek agreed.
"With a pen and paper."
"That's how pens and paper work, yes."
"Derek," Avery said, in the tone of someone who had been having variations of this conversation for months.
"It was cipher stacking," Derek said, to the camera. "It's a bad practice. Once you know to look for it the layers separate reasonably quickly. The pen and paper were for tracking the substitution patterns. It's not remarkable."
"It absolutely is remarkable," Avery said.
"You're biased," Derek said.
"I'm right," Avery said.
"Those aren't mutually exclusive," Derek said.
Avery pointed at the camera. "That," he said. "That is what it's like."
Derek looked at the camera with the expression of someone who did not entirely understand what was being indicated but was willing to accept it.
They played Minecraft for the second half of the video.
This had been Avery's idea, it was relatable, it was content he made anyway, and it gave them something to do with their hands and their eyes so the conversation could flow sideways instead of head-on, which was how the best conversations worked. He had thought this was a good idea.
He had not thought through the fact that Derek's screen would be visible.
"What," said a man named BramblewickGames in the live chat, which Avery had made the mistake of having open on his phone. "WHAT IS THAT HOUSE."
"Is that a working farm," said someone called perpetualmoss. "Is that a PLANNED farm. are those water channels."
"the flower pots," said ThunderOakStudios. "AVERY THE FLOWER POTS."
"he built READING NOOKS," said an account called just_here_for_the_lore. "AVERY YOUR BOYFRIEND BUILT YOU READING NOOKS."
Avery had not mentioned the word boyfriend. He looked at the chat. He looked at Derek's screen, which was currently showing Derek placing lanterns on a path with the focused unhurried attention of someone who did not know or care that six hundred people were watching him garden in Minecraft.
"People are reacting to your base," Avery said.
"Hm," Derek said, placing a lantern.
"They like the farm."
"The water channel layout is efficient," Derek said.
"They like the flower pots."
"The porch needed something," Derek said.
"Derek, they-” Avery looked at the chat, which was moving too fast to read properly now— "they really like the house."
Derek looked at the camera. Then at Avery. "Thank you," he said, to both of them, with the simplicity of someone who had practiced receiving things.
The chat went somewhat insane.
The video was four hours long.
Avery edited it down to forty-seven minutes, which involved cutting three instances of himself forgetting sentences, one extended tangent about biscuit structural integrity that went on longer than was necessary but that he left in because Derek's expression during it was very good, and a section where Derek had gone quiet and Avery had looked at him and said you okay and Derek had said yes, just, this is nice in the tone that meant he was being straightforward and hadn't decided yet whether to be embarrassed about it.
He left that in too. It was four seconds. The four seconds would, though Avery did not know this yet, be clipped approximately forty thousand times.
He added an intro card: feat. D3rLord3 | Derek | the guy the cipher was about
He looked at the thumbnail for a long time. It was them, side by side at the laptops, and Derek was looking at Avery's screen and pointing at something and Avery was laughing, and neither of them had noticed Avery's camera capturing the angle because they were both looking at the Minecraft world, and it was just, them. Just exactly them.
He uploaded it at eleven pm on a Wednesday.
He went to sleep.
He woke up to his phone making a sound it had never made before, which was the sound of a notifications volume that had exceeded its normal parameters.
He looked at the screen.
He put the phone face-down on the nightstand.
He picked it back up.
He looked at the subscriber count, which had, overnight, done something that Avery could only describe as vertical.
"Derek," he said.
From the living room, where Derek had apparently been awake for a while: "I know."
Avery came out of the bedroom. Derek was on the couch with his laptop, which meant he had been reading comments, which Avery knew because Derek only used the laptop before nine am when he was reading something with intent.
"How long have you been awake," Avery said.
"A while," Derek said.
"What are you reading."
"Comments," Derek said.
"You're reading the comments."
"They're interesting," Derek said, with the tone of someone who had been described as a person for the first time and was processing the data.
Avery sat next to him and looked at the screen.
The top comment, with two hundred and forty thousand likes, said:
the way he said "this is nice" like he was surprised. sir you survived an eldritch horror with minecraft mechanics and a pen and paper and THIS is what gets you. the minecraft house with your boyfriend. this is nice. i am not okay.
Derek was looking at this comment. His expression was neutral in the specific way that meant something had landed somewhere important and he was holding it carefully.
"Are you okay," Avery said.
"Yes," Derek said. "People are-” he paused— "kind. About the video."
"People love you," Avery said.
Derek looked at the screen. "They love the cipher," he said.
"They love you," Avery said. "The cipher is part of you. The house is part of you. The-” he gestured at the comment— "the this is nice is very much part of you."
Derek was quiet for a moment.
"Forty-seven thousand new subscribers," he said.
"Since last night," Avery said. "Yes."
"That's-”
"A lot," Avery said. "Yeah."
Derek looked at the screen. He looked at the subscriber count. He looked at it with the expression of someone confronting a number that did not compute in any framework he currently had available.
"They watched the video," he said.
"They watched the video."
"About-”
"About you," Avery said. "About the world. About everything that happened. About-” he gestured— "this. Us. The Minecraft house."
"The reading nooks," Derek said.
"You have no idea," Avery said, "how many comments are about the reading nooks."
Derek's mouth curved. He looked at the subscriber count again. He looked at the comment about this is nice. He looked at Avery.
"Hm," he said.
"Don't," Avery said.
"I didn't say anything."
"You're being smug."
"I'm processing the data-”
"You're being smug about the subscriber count," Avery said.
"I'm simply noting," Derek said, with immense dignity, "that the video performed well."
"You're smug."
"I think the word you're looking for is pleased."
"I'm looking for the word smug," Avery said.
"Pleased," Derek said, "that the video did well. Pleased that people-” he paused-"responded positively. To the video." He paused again. "To me. In the video."
His voice had shifted slightly on the last sentence. Quieter, more genuine, the smugness setting down.
Avery looked at him. Derek was looking at the screen, at the comments, at all the people who had watched a forty-seven minute video about a Minecraft world that shouldn't exist and an eldritch horror and a cipher and a library with reading nooks and four seconds of this is nice, and had responded with two hundred and forty thousand likes and the particular warmth of people who had been moved by something and wanted to say so.
"They were always going to love you," Avery said. "I knew that. From the first time I watched the footage."
Derek looked at him. "What?"
"The footage. On the Google Drive." Avery gestured. "When I first watched it. Before any of this. Before the hospital, before— I watched you set the backup trap without telling anyone, and solve the cipher in seventeen minutes, and I thought: whoever this person is, they're, I don't know. Remarkable."
Derek looked at him with the expression that meant something had landed.
"You never told me that," he said.
"I'm telling you now," Avery said.
A pause.
"Thank you," Derek said. It came out right, the way it had been coming out right more often, full weight, properly received, not deflected.
"You're welcome," Avery said.
They sat on the couch together in the morning light, laptop open between them, the comments still loading in real time, forty-seven thousand new people who had found their way to a video about a world that shouldn't exist and decided to stay.
Derek reached over and closed the laptop.
"We should make another one," he said.
Avery looked at him. "Yeah?"
"The audience seems interested in the Skywars content."
"In you being bad at Skywars," Avery said.
"In my progression," Derek said. "In the learning process."
"In you dying off the edge of the map repeatedly."
"In the-” Derek stopped. Considered. "Yes," he said. "Fine. In that."
Avery smiled. "I'll set up the recording software."
"After breakfast," Derek said.
"After breakfast," Avery agreed.
"I'll make toast," Derek said.
"I'll make toast," Avery said immediately.
"I can make-”
"Derek."
"The incident was months ago-”
"Derek."
"I've improved my monitoring technique-”
"I will make the toast," Avery said, "and you will make the eggs, and we will both be happy."
Derek considered this division of labor. "The eggs were always my contribution," he said.
"They were always your contribution," Avery agreed. "You're very good at eggs."
Derek looked at him with the almost-smile. "Thank you," he said.
"You're getting better at that," Avery said.
"At eggs?"
"At that," Avery said, gesturing at the thank you space in the air between them.
Derek looked at the gesture. Looked at Avery. Looked at the closed laptop, at the window where the morning was doing something golden, at the windowsill where Hastur sat in his pot being mildly smug and the sunflower seedling, three weeks old now, was reaching toward the light with the steady uncomplicated confidence of something that had decided to grow.
"I have good practice material," Derek said.
Avery opened his mouth. Closed it. Looked at the ceiling.
"You can't just say things like that," he said.
"Why not," Derek said. "It's true."
"Because it makes it very hard to-” Avery stopped. Looked at Derek, who was watching him with the look, the full attention, the you are a thing I have decided to pay attention to look that had been making Avery forget his sentences since the first day they filmed together.
"Hard to what," Derek said.
"Hard to be normal," Avery said. "About you. In general. As a concept."
Derek considered this for a moment. Then he said, quietly and with great precision: "Good."
Avery stared at him.
Derek stood up and went to the kitchen to make eggs.
The second video went up two weeks later.
It was called TEACHING MY CO-HOST SKYWARS (he dies 34 times) and it had, in Avery's professional opinion, the best thumbnail he had ever made, Derek's expression at the exact moment he walked off the edge of the map for the twelfth time, which was the expression of a person confronting an outcome they had statistically predicted and were still somehow surprised by.
The description read: he solved a cipher stack with a pen and paper in 17 minutes. he cannot bridge. we are working on it.
It got three million views in the first week.
The top comment said: the way he says "a temporary inefficiency" every single time he dies. he has died 34 times and he is still calling it a temporary inefficiency. i respect it so much.
Derek read this and said: "It is a temporary inefficiency."
"I know," Avery said.
"Each death is a data point-”
"I know."
“-that I am actively applying to improve my-”
"Derek," Avery said. "I know. That's why they love it."
Derek looked at the comment count. He looked at the subscriber count, which had done another vertical thing.
"Hm," he said.
"Don't," Avery said.
"I'm just-”
"You're being smug again."
"I'm being pleased," Derek said. "There's a distinction."
"There is no distinction," Avery said. "That is the same face."
Derek looked at his own reflection in the dark laptop screen. He looked at Avery. He looked back at the screen.
"Perhaps," he said, "a small distinction."
"Zero distinction," Avery said.
"A marginal-”
Avery kissed him.
This worked, in the sense that Derek stopped talking, and also in every other sense. It was brief and warm and tasted like the coffee Derek had made and Avery had stolen a sip of, and when they pulled apart Derek's expression had done the thing, the undone, warm, fully-received thing.
"You did that to stop me talking," Derek said.
"I did that because I wanted to," Avery said. "The stopping the talking was a secondary benefit."
Derek's mouth curved. "Efficient," he said.
"I learned from the best," Avery said.
"The cipher-”
"I was talking about the eggs," Avery said.
Derek looked at him for a moment with the full attention, and Avery looked back, and the morning was doing its thing with the light and Hastur was on the windowsill and the sunflower was growing and somewhere on the internet forty-seven thousand people who had watched a video about a world that shouldn't exist were reading a comment about this is nice and feeling something.
"Avery," Derek said.
"Yeah."
"I'd like to make another video."
Avery smiled. "Yeah?"
"The audience seems interested in the building content," Derek said. "I thought perhaps a tutorial."
"A building tutorial."
"Basic principles. Grain direction. Window placement. The importance of structural-”
"Derek," Avery said, "that sounds perfect."
Derek looked at him. "You think so?"
"I think," Avery said, "that watching you explain grain direction to forty-seven thousand people is going to be one of the best things I've ever filmed."
Derek considered this with the seriousness he gave most things. "The grain direction is genuinely important," he said.
"I know," Avery said. "That's why it's going to be perfect."
Derek nodded, once, the small decisive nod that meant something had been decided and would now be done.
"After breakfast," he said.
"After breakfast," Avery said.
He made the toast. Derek made the eggs. The sunflower reached toward the window. Outside, the city did its morning thing, and inside, in a small apartment with good defensive positioning and a windowsill full of plants and a laptop with forty-seven thousand new subscribers and a succulent named after a defeated god, two people who had found each other at the end of something impossible ate breakfast and planned a video about grain direction and were, in the fullest and most specific sense of the word, fine.
Three months later, the building tutorial video would have more views than the cipher video. The comment with the most likes would say: "he just said 'the eye wants patterns, and if you understand what the eye wants, you can give it something true' about MINECRAFT BLOCK PLACEMENT and i need to sit down." Derek would read this comment and say "that's accurate though" and Avery would say "I know" and add it to the growing folder on his phone labelled 'derek says things' which contained, at this point, forty-seven screenshots. Derek didn't know about the folder. Avery was going to tell him eventually. Probably. When the moment was right. When he had more than forty-seven.