Chapter Text
'Dandy? Hello? Gardeview to Dandy, are you there?'
Shelly's hallooing snapped me back to my shop.
'Oh, yes! Um.. how can i help you?'
'Dandy, somethings wrong with you. I can feel it.'
'Nothings wrong, just thinking about them.'
'Well, it's your fault they twisted, so serves you right!'
'Shelly, wait! It's not like that! It's - sigh.'
She stormed off, not even letting me finish my sentence.
Astro waltzed up. 'Hey, Dandy. What happened? Why'd she storm off like that?'
'She noticed something was wrong with me, but when I explained, she stormed off in a huff!"
'They blame you for it, you know? Where has your head been in the last few days anyways? You didn't even notice him!' Astro replied, pointing at the booth across from me.
It was Dyle. He was back.
"What - how - why - WHAT?! Why are you back? Why give them false hope? How are you back? What are you doing here?!"
"Dandicus, please do calm down. Everything is alright." Dyle replied.
"No, it's not! You were supposed to be gone! How are you back?"
Now, to the outside observer, it looks like we were having a battle of shops, but, Dyle was supposed to be gone. As far as we knew, once a toon is twisted, they don't come back. Of course, there might be a way, that I have been investigating, but that's Plan B.
"Us lethals can turn back to our toon selves, which I discovered entirely by accident. And they can't turn back because they are half finished."
That's when I noticed something. His usual ticking, was more fast paced, more anxious, then before.
"Your ticking. It's faster, Does your switching have something to do with it? How do you switch? What happened?"
"I stumbled into a pool of ichor, not the kind from the leaks, the kind that was runny, and was forced back into this body, but when I concentrate, I'm the beast again. Any more questions?" Dyle shot back, but I could tell that he wasn't in the mood for questions, and was asking as a niceity.
"No more questions." I affirmed.
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I was wandering the hallways of sub-floor 4.
'Sol? Flare? Anyone?'
Four for the sickness, four for the end,
The number of shadows they couldn't defend.
A permanent solution that came way too late,
Now we’re the masters of our own bitter fate.
I recognised Sol's voice, but when I saw him, I gasped. His face, it was gone!
'Dandy? Are you here to help? Well, you're too late! The window is gone. We are gone. It is just the twisteds now.' With that, he began to charge me. Being a logical toon, I did the logical thing. Run.
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I jolted awake. I wasn't running from Twisted Sol. I was in bed, in my room. 'Oh, Sol. If only I'd been quicker! Maybe... you would be walking these halls, sleeping in your now abandoned room! I glanced up. A faded sketch of them, hand drawn by Delilah, was the only decoration in my room.
Then, the cogs in my mind started to turn.
Runny ichor, Dyle had mentioned. I remembered the rest of the scene.
As I ran from Sol, to the pipes I had entered from, I passed a machine.
An older model, one that had a circular skillcheck.
Four squares that could light up, where they would have stood for their grand reveal.
A plan had begun to emerge.
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I stood in the back of my shop, with 8 toons in front of me.
'I have a plan to save them. The Summer 4. Operation Bring back Summer.'
'What? It's your fault that they are twisted in the first place, why did I even agree to this?'
'Shelly, I chose you because of your well rounded stats, not because you have a good relationship with me. And the same to all of you! I don't care if you hate me, I just want to see if I can call a truce long enough to save them!'
Everyone nodded, even Shelly, probably out of habit, as she facepalmed afterwards.
'I have been reaserching Delilah and Arthur's documents. The Summer 4's floor, Sub-Floor 4, is only reachble by this card,' I started, pulling out the old, sunburnt, rainbow shimering card labled 'Summer 4', 'Their floor is a dangerous, spacious map,' I continued, pulling out the map I had drawn the night before. 'These four squares in the middle, they will glow one by one once you finish a machine. While you are using a machine, DO NOT LET GO OF THE HANDLE! Shelly, Glisten, Finn, Yatta, that is your job. Finish a machine, get away from it, repeat. If you stop extracting, the progress wil drain. So that you don't get attacked, we have Pebble, Looey, Goob and Tisha. Your job is to keep Sol, Flare, Snap and Riptide away from the extractors and each other. When a square lights up, keep the Twisted away from the square. Only when all the squares are lit up, can you bring them onto the squares. Flare will constanly alert the others to your location, so kite her as far from everyone as possible. Snap will try to stun you, so keep a good distance away from him. Sol will emit a passive haze that will slowly sap your strength, and Riptide gives a speed boost to any Twisted that walks near him, and moves faster. I can give you one minute of protection, so use it to get into position. Organise youselves in the elevator ride down (it's very long), and take the map with you. Follow my instructions to the dot, and get out of that floor as quick as possible.' I finished.
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[POV SWITCH]
I stood in the elevator, with the team surrounding me.
As the only main that could speak in the team, I was the de facto leader, and had to organise everyone.
'Loey, we can stop at some earlier floors if you want to build up to max speed, because according to the info on the back of the map, the Summer 4 are all lethals, so it doesn't matter how many hearts you have. We're going to use a buddy system when we leave. Each of the twisteds will be camping a machine, so the teams will have one distractor to lead them away, and an extractor to start the machine. DO NOT let any twisteds near a machine, as a safety precaution. Glisten and Tisha, you two head for this machine,' I began, pointing it out on the map. 'Finn and Looey, this one. Me and Pebble will head for that one, and Yatta and Goob, you are on this one.' I continued, pointing out the respective machines. 'Looey, you are on Sol, Pebble, Snap, Goob, Flare, and Tisha, Riptide. Keep them away from each other and the machines, else it's game over.'
'Shelly, are you sure? Snap is camping the machine you're on -'
'Which is why I have Pebble. He can aggro Snap and still stay out of his stun range!'
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The doors hissed open. We split up, dashing for the machine we were assigned. The team Dandy picked was finally making sense! We all had 3* or more speed, so we could move quickly. As Sol's sickly haze crept into my vision, I sighted my machine.
'Pebble, go!'
The little pup raced ahead, a blur of pale grey. As soon as Snap was gone, I dashed to the machine, and started to extract. I glanced at the first skillcheck, and cursed. The machines were older models! The skillchecks were circular, not rectangular, and now some of the more dubious choces made sense. We all had high skillcheck, so that we could get used to the diffrent style of machines. I simply focused on my machine, and then, before I knew it, the machine was done. I went over to Yatta's machine, only to find her tag-teaming with Goob on Flare. I fell into step beside her.
'What are you doing?!' I hissed.
'Flare keeps flaring me! I can't extract!'
'Fine, you continue tag-teaming, I'll do your machine.'
Soon, that one was finished too. I ran over to Glisten's machine, then I spotted them also tag-teaming Riptide, but Glisten's machine was finished, so I headed away.
Finally, I came to Finn's right as he finished it. I let out a sigh of relief. Yatta hadn't been the bottleneck! I found Pebble and told him all the machines were done. He raced to the center of the room, and, as all the squares flashed a gold, used his ability, and barked so loud, I bet even Dandy heard it. The twisteds all converged on the same spot at once, and a wave of waterlike Ichor blasted them, and, they were mended, back into the faces of who they were meant to be.
'...Huh? Wh...What happened?' Sol muttered, dazed.
I smiled. "Welcome to Gardenview, Sol."
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[POV SWITCH]
As the elevator doors opened, they walked in, as clear as the day they were shown to the public. Then, I noticed Shelly was holding something.
'Shelly, what are you holding?' I asked, a sinking feeling growing in my stomach.
'A tape, what's wrong?"
"Nothing!" I said, exchanging a panciked glance with Astro, who had accompanied me into my shop.
'If it's nothing, then let's see it!' Exclaimed Yatta, popping it into the slot in the elevators TV.
"Wait -Yatta- Don't!" I spluttered a second too late.
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Static filled the screen, then cleared. We were looking at sub-floor 4 through a security cam.
"Delilah, we need to activate them, today!"
"No, Arthur, I've told you over and over, they aren't ready! They're prototypes, and they aren't supposed to be activated until the 4th of July!"
"The public wants to see them. Let the public see them!"
"No! They aren't ready!"
"If you won't, I'll do it myself!" Arthur snapped, smashing the button.
The Summer Toons woke up, and were shephered into the training room. Then, a bloodcurling scream. Delilah ran, screaming Arthur's and the Summer 4's names.
Static.
When it cleared, it was a video of me. I was wandering the hallways of sub-floor 4.
'Sol? Flare? Anyone?'
'Four for the sickness, four for the end,
The number of shadows they couldn't defend.
A permanent solution that came way too late,
Now we’re the masters of our own bitter fate.'
I recognised the scene.
"No. No no no no! You were never supposed to see this! Stop the video!" I cried. But they didn't listen.
'Dandy? Are you here to help? Well, you're too late! The window is gone. We are gone. It is just the twisteds now.' Sol had said. With that, he began to charge me.
In the video, I turned and ran. Static. The TV turned off.
'So... it wasn't your fault? It was Arthur's?' Shelly asked
'Yes.' I sobbed. 'I wanted to keep the blame away from him, you were never meant to see that!'
'Oh, Dandy, why? And you,' Shelly said, wheeling to Astro.' You knew the entire time?'
Astro nodded. 'Dandy didn't want me to spread the word, so I didn't.'
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[POV SWITCH]
That night, when I was in bed, I saw her. Delilah. She smiled, and hugged me.
'Shelly. Shels. Shannon still misses you, but I have a message for you.'
'I've missed you!' I sobbed. 'What happened?'
'Arthur made a mistake. We're all paying for it.' Delilah whispered. 'I have a gift for you, my brave girl. You had the courage to finish what Dandy started. Here,' she continued, pulling off her glove. 'This will boost all your stats by 25% when you wear it. And tell Dandy -' her voice broke. 'Tell him it's not his fault. It never was.'
The dream faded, but, when I woke up, I had Delilah's glove on my hand, and a message. I began to wonder, was it just a dream?
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'Dandy?' I called, knocking on his door.
He hesitantly opened the door. 'Yes?'
'I have a message from Delilah.'
He pulled me inside.
'What is it? What did she say?'
'That it's not your fault. It never was.'
'Shelly...' he said, then pulled me into a hug. 'You have no idea how long I've wanted to hear those words from you. I've loved you since the day I met you, and I couldn't bear to have you mad at me, and Delilah knows this.'
'Dandy... what I saw on that tape today, did that really happen?'
'Yes, Shelly. I used to have nightmares about it all the time.'
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[POV SWITCH]
I stood in my shop, cheerfully grinning and waving at everyone. Shelly came up.
'Astro said you had something for me?'
'Yep! Here you go!' I replied, handing over the soft red, spiky bundle. 'I hope you like it!'
Shelly unfolded it, and shrieked with delight.
'Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!'
I smiled, as Shelly pulled on the dinosaur onesie I had made her.
'You're welcome! Come again soon!'
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THE END
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Epilougue
Sol wandered over to Flare's room.
'Ok... Take a deep breath. You can do this.'
He knocked.
'What is it?! Im napping!' Flare shouted. 'Ah well, come on.'
'Um, Flare... I've had a bit of a crush on you for the last few decades... um... is it too late to ask for an encore?'
'Um... GROSS!' Flare yelled, kicking him out.
And behind a plant, I laughed and laughed.