Chapter Text
I’m not supposed to feel like this.
Trophy’s eyes wandered to his hands.
This isn’t right.
They were shaking.
Shouldn’t it be gone by now?
He wonders how much of him is shaking.
I’m just not trying hard enough.
Maybe no one else will notice.
I just need to try harder.
Just one more.
This is all one big misunderstanding.
His arm ached.
I’m not-
“Trophy?”
Trophy jolts at the voice outside his door, tossing his pocket knife into the drawer and kicking it shut. Right. He was going to play a game with Pickle. “Yeah, yeah!!”
He can almost hear Pickle rolling his eyes. “”Yeah yeah’,” he mocks in a high-pitched voice. The pitch is what gets Trophy. “You’re late.”
Trophy opens the door, already in a sour mood. “Maybe you’re just early.”
”I’m the one who planned this, dumbass. I was waiting for you for 20 minutes.”
”Uh huh, you’re fine.”
”’You’re fine!!’ Do you hear yourself?”
”Kill yourself.”
The lower level of the hotel is empty, aside from Bot and Paintbrush sitting on the floor doodling. Trophy hasn’t spoken to Bot yet, and he didn’t care to. As interesting as her-her? Their. As interesting as their existence is (seemingly just Test Tube and Fan failing to cope), there’s no need to talk with them.
Pickle puts on the game, but Trophy’s heart isn’t in it. Luckily, Pickle doesn’t notice. He’s always been a bit dumb. No idea what Knife saw in him.
He knew he was just Knife’s replacement.
After only 30 minutes, he gets bored of jumping over digital obstacles. He spots Bomb walking in and convinces him to take his place. Pickle seems happier with the stuttering mess, so Trophy leaves, intending to go back to brooding.
”Hiya!”
Trophy nearly trips over something - or, well, someone. He looks down and spots Bot waving up at him, not phased by the near-death experience. At least they weren’t like Suitcase, who had looked ready to kick his shins in when he’d done the same to her a few days ago. “Uh… hello?”
”I don’t think I’ve introduced myself yet. I’m Bot!! Te-“
“I know who you are. Pretty much everyone does.” He backs up so he can actually see them.
Their smile falters. “Oh… Yeah, that makes sense. And you are..?”
He wonders if they’re joking. Everyone’s just named after their objects, and he’s clearly a Trophy, yet they’re patiently awaiting an answer as if it’d be anything aside from the obvious. “… Take a wild guess.”
”Well, you never know! I wasn’t always named Bot, so…”
”Trophy. Not anything else.”
”Trophy!”
Trophy turns and walks away, but Bot follows. “I was actually wanting to talk to you!”
”About what?” Trophy doesn’t slow down, but Bot doesn’t seem to have trouble keeping up. Shorter objects are surprisingly fast from having to keep up with tall objects, so no surprises there.
”You just seem… I don’t know… familiar!”
”Well, yeah, I was in the 2nd season. I also live here, and have lived here ever since I got eliminated.”
”Maybe I could’ve worded that better.” They step in front of him, and he’s forced to stop. “Something about you is familiar.”
”Again-“
”Okay, I’m sorry, I’m wording this all horribly.” They laugh, rubbing the back of their head. “What I mean to say is, you remind me of someone else.”
”Who?”
”Uh… me!”
Trophy almost laughs himself, more mockingly than they did. “I don’t think we have anything in common, sorry. If you want someone like you, I’m not him. I’m gonna go take a nap. Goodnight, nice to meet you, whatever.” He steps around them.
”What I mean is,” they continue, unfazed, “you remind me of when I used to be ‘Bow’.”
Trophy stops.
The silence stretches on, which Bot takes as an invitation to continue. “I don’t know you, and you don’t know me, so I don’t expect some kind of… confession or reveal or even for you to listen to me. But the way you act and hold yourself… even Paintbrush says it’s a lot like how I used to be. When I was trying to force myself to be ‘Bow’ even though it didn’t feel like me.”
Trophy spins around, a grin on his face. “Listen, I’m sure it sucks to know you’re alone in your feelings, but you don’t need to project to feel less alone. I’m perfectly happy being a guy.”
Bot blinks - which they probably don’t actually need to do - as the metaphorical and literal gears turn in their head. “… I never said anything about gender.”
Trophy tenses. Shit.
Bot seems to realize where his claim came from and makes an ‘oooh’ sound. “Well, uh, that explains… quite a lot, actually! So, I know you and Paintbrush aren’t that close, but I think we can-“
”What?!” He forces his voice out rough, and it hurts his throat. “What does it ‘explain’? Because I ensure you, there is nothing-“
“Woah, woah, woah!” Paintbrush waves their arms as they come over, their glare fixed on Trophy. “Inside voices!”
”Painty! Perfect timing!” Bot doesn’t seem that fazed by Trophy’s mood change. That’s annoying. “I was actually just talking to Trophy about you, and I think-“
”You don’t seem to do that much, clearly.” Trophy crosses his arms, taking a defensive step back.
“Hey!” Paintbrush raises their finger (a very inappropriate one at that), but Bot steps between the two of them.
”Now, now! As I was saying, I was thinking about what we were talking about earlier, and it may have some truth to it!” They point to Trophy, who glances behind him to see if he can make a break for it. “They had said-“
”They?!” This time, both Trophy and Paintbrush interrupt poor Bot.
“Listen,” Trophy continues, “you’ve got the wrong idea. The whole assuming-you-were-talking-about-gender thing, that-that was just process of elimination! I’m not a robot, and knowing I was made from MePhone hasn’t affected me as much as it has others, so that was clearly the only thing you were talking about!”
Bot crosses their arms. “I could’ve been talking about several other things, actually. ‘Forcing yourself to be something you’re not’ can apply to a lot of things outside of gender. I was actually thinking more about something with your personality, but you jumped to gender - which is a long leap, by the way. And you’re very defensive about it.”
“Maybe I’m defensive because you’re really wrong and stupid about it.” Trophy didn’t like how Paintbrush looked a little less angry at him. That’s the opposite effect he’s trying to achieve.
“Actually, when someone’s wrong, you just laugh at them,” Paintbrush comments. “Maybe even play into the bit.”
”Okay, well, maybe I’m just not in the mood, eh?”
”Mmm, no. So, do you wanna be a girl, or-“
”NO!” He immediately realizes he probably just confirmed their suspicions. “I mean, uh, no. I like being a man.”
”Okay, so that’s a yes.” Paintbrush looks down at Bot, who seems horrified at how quickly this is escalating. “So, what do we do about this?”
”What-there’s nothing to be done!” Trophy steps back again. “I don’t know where you got the idea that you have the right to make such baseless claims.”
”Not really baseless-“
”Shut the fuck up, Paintbrush!” That one gets them, and Trophy takes pride in that. Nothing but pride, definitely. “I’m sure you weirdos want to-to indoctrinate someone else, but I’m not part of this! Be happy being whatever the hell you want, I don’t care even if it’s stupid, but don’t-I’m not going to be happier as a woman, and that’s final!”
”Woah, hey, listen!” Bot steps towards him. “Just promise you’ll think on it? Please?”
Trophy scoffs, taking a few more steps back. “Nope! I already-“ He cuts himself off, but they all know what he was about to say. ‘I already think on it a lot.’ “I’m taking my nap now. Bye!”
This time, they let him leave. He didn’t feel bad about leaving them like that, nor about saying all of those things.
Men don’t feel bad. Guilt is feminine, and Trophy isn’t feminine.