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Sharpening his sword always reminds Mapicc of how much better it would be to have a mace.
So once a week — and his teammates might have think he didn't notice, but he has — his teammates leave the base on some random errands while he sharpens said sword and is pissed about it.
He feels vaguely guilty for it, but whenever it comes up, he tends to be to mad to really care.
Does that make him a bad teammate?
The whetstone glides along his blade again. Annoyingly, it is an activity that has to be done with a greater degree of finesse than what Mapicc has the motivation to do.
It has to be done anyway. He isn't going to let anyone else touch his weapons, no matter that said weapons aren't one Mapicc would choose. He hasn't sunken so far that he can't take care of his own gear.
He finds himself almost wishing for someone to be here, someone to argue with. Like this, he can only stew in silence. Stupid fuck.
Grinds his teeth alongside the whetstone, he vibrates with the tension of keeping his leg from bouncing.
Hell.
On the next slide of the stone, Mapicc slips.
"Fuck!", he exclaims the pain leaves him dropping both sword and stone and clutching his knee. That was going to bruise. Nothing went well when it was Sword-Sharpening-Sunday.
Embarassingly, Mapicc feels tears creep up in his eyes. He finds himself feeling strangely lonely all of sudden. Lost. If his teamamtes were here...
But that's just a fantasy. He couldn't tell them that he was still this upset about the Mace. He's just being stupid. And anyway, it's his fault they don't want to be around him.
"Mapicc?", Minute's quiet voice reaches him from somewhere behind, sending Mapicc's head flying as he scrambles to turn reound and sit up.
"Minute?! You're here?"
Apparently, not all of his teammates had left. He feels the blood rush up into his ears. Did Minute see all of that?
"Uh...yeah."
Right. Stupid question, Mapicc.
Awkard silence hands between them.
"Ah", Mapicc answers uselessly.
The eye contact is getting uncomfortable really quickly.
"Are you...feeling okay?", Minute asks. He sounds genuinely concerned, which makes Mapicc's embarassment only worse.
"Uh", he forces a chuckle, "Yeah, bro, like, absolutely fine, man."
But instead of saying "D'allrighhhht, bro" and laughing it off and dropping it, Minute only continues staring at Mapicc with those bright eyes of his.
"You want some company?", Minute offers.
Mapicc has the 'no' already on hos tongue when Minute amends, "No, wait, do you mind me, like, staying?"
Minute fidgets with the guardrail of the stairs he is stills tanding on like a creepy shadow figure.
The urge to say no lies at the back of his tongue. If this is Minute's attempt at acting helpful so he can make fun of Mapicc later, that would be really shitty.
On the other hand, Minute is an awkard guy. This might very well be his attempt at connecting with Mapicc. And he has been bothering Minute about opening to the team, so it would be shitty of Mapicc to say no, wouldn't it?
And he does want Minute to stay. His body itches for some form of contact.
Mapicc knows he has been thinking for too long when the nervousness on Minute's face turns into disappointment, turns into hurt, then is quickly masked by one of his standard blank expressions.
He fails at keeping it out of his voice, murmuring, "Sorry, I— guess I'll go. Sorry for bothering you. And stuff."
And Mapicc's turn to interrupt, reaching out as Minute turns, calling, "No! Minute, please, stay?"
If he wasn't sure before, the hesitant glow spreading over Minute's features confirms the fact that this is simply Minute's terrible attempt and connecting.
Not that he was much better, Mapicc admits to hinself.
He reaches down and puts his sword and gear away onto the table, scotting to the side to make space for Minute on the couch.
Minute sits ramrod straight and Mapicc isn't much better. There's an awkard amount of space between them, emphasized by the fact that neither of them is doing anything, glancing at each other out of the corner of their eyes and looking away when their eyes meet.
Stupid is what it is.
"I'm sorry", Minute mumbles intot he quiet and somehow still barely making himself heard, "I didn't want to like, interrupt your work or something."
He gestures towards the sword.
Mapicc sighs. He doesn't want to think about it. He pulls his knees close to his chest.
"You didn't. I was being stupid anyway."
Minute frowns when Mapicc glances over the next time. "What do you mean?", he asks.
Mapicc huffs. "Like I said. I'm still being stupid about the — like, just, all of the Mace stuff. And like, things."
"Well", Minute responds after a short pause, steader and more confident, "I'm also being stupid and all, if that's what we're calling it."
Mapicc looks at him. "Why are you being stupid?"
It's Minute's turn to look away. "Just the PMC. Same old boring stuff. I'm still not over it, so I'm definetely the stupider one between us."
That wasn't the same at all! The Mace was just a — a thing!
Minute might be a bit more hurt by it than Mapicc consider really normal, but — but of course Minute was allowed to be upset to be upset about his first ever team betraying him in specific.
"That isn't the same", Mapicc says.
"You worked a lot to get the Mace, of course losing it makes you upset. And it's so recent. And none of us were really here to comfort you and stuff."
Tears prick at his eyes again. He sniffles once. He glances at Minute, who must have some kind of telepathic abilities, because his arms are opening and pulling Mapicc in for a hug.
Minute is strong and more than a head taller than Mapicc, with arms long enough to envelop Mapicc completely.
Mapicc's lips wobbles threateningly, he clenches his hands in the back of Minute's shirt and burries his nose against Minute's chest. Worst of all, he starts crying.
The tighter Mapicc holds onto Minute, the tighter Minute squeezes him in return, in what must be another sign of telepathy. It feels as though Minute's arms are the only thing keeping Mapicc together.
Mapicc is the over-filled trashbag and Minute id the careful trashguy who lifts it up, one hand cradling the part of him that split open and wants to leak rotting banana peels all over the floor, keeping all of his inside's where they belong.
He falls apart.
Tears spring from his shurt eyes and snot leaks from his nose to soaked up by Minute's shirt, even spit ones out of his mouth as he pants and gasps for air and bawls his eyes out over such a stupid thing — and yet he can't stop, clawing at Minute, pressing their bodies as close as they can go.
And Minute obliges, curling aeound Mapicc and rolling them around untik Mapicc is stuck between the couch pillows and Minute's body,pressure on all sides and world completely dark.
And that Minute is so— so stupidly so awfully caring, that makes Mapicc start sobbing again right as the first wave of shaking lets up.
He cries for ages and then for ages more as he relaizes that his sword still isn't sharpened quite to the edge he wants it to have and that he'll have to do that later.
He's such a mess.
He comes up for air and smears his stupid disgusting fluids over Minute's skin, too, once his face finds its place in the crook of Minute's neck.
And all of the time, Minute whispers into Mapicc's hair, soothing and low and so quiet Mapicc can't make out a single word.
Somehow, it calms him down anyway.
He lets Minute manhandle him, sitting up and shifting and he sits upright again, leaning against the back of the couch with Mapicc's face in his lap, burrying his face in what little fat there is to be found on Minure's stomach.
Siad stomach flexes as Minute reaches out and something clinks.
The sword and whetstone and scrap of fabric.
"What're you doing?", Mapicc asks through his congestion. His throat sounds raw from all the crying. That was embarassing. Despite knowing he really should, Mapicc can't bring himself to sit up.
Minute is safe and comfortable and Mapicc doens't know how long, but he has craved this. This contact and this care and this comfort.
He sniffles again.
"Well, I thought", Minure starts, sounding unsure, as if he hasn't been doing anything Mapicc dreamed of and read every wish from even less than Mapicc's eyes, "That, you know, you wouldn't make me like, team with Clown. Because I'm still not over that. So I thought I could maybe whet the swrod for you?"
It's the care in Minute's voice that gets Mapicc again, gets his tearing up and crunching his nose his throat close up with gratitude. He nods and burries his face in Minute's stomach again.
He hears Minute exhale, as if relieved, then clinking and scratching until the steady sound of careful grinds of stone against sword fill the air.
A scratching, a pause, a scratching, a pause, a turning, repeat and repeat and repeat.
Mapicc's eye lids geow heavy, his eyes fall shut.
He falls asleep.