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Once upon a time, Ahato had been a neat freak.
She supposed it was an extension of her perfectionism. She kept her room tidy to a fault; clothing meticulously pressed, bed made crisply, and not a speck of dust to be seen. At one time, it was a point of pride. She and others considered her the clean one, and it was an aspect of her identity she embraced. She also figured that her martial training didn't help either. Going through bootcamp you learned to disassemble, reassemble, maintain, and prepare. Ahato wouldn't be caught dead with a single screw, thread, or inkblot out of line.
Although, in a way, Ahato was caught. And dead.
Nowadays, dedf1sh is much messier. Her sparse office within Kamabo had very little to mess up, but was still caked in dust and ooze stains. No microbe dared to eat the sterile sanitized ink, so large deposits encrusted onto the floors and furniture. Water damage seeped in from the ceiling, mixing the stench of mildew with the astringent smell of sanitization. Somewhere during her time there an iv bag had fallen to the floor, and remained there until the NSS found her at her computer desk.
Her room on the surface could be confused for a bomb site. Clothes and blankets strewn across the floor and wadded up wrappers and papers littered the room. Cords to a variety of electronics jumbled into inscrutable tangles. Half empty water and beverage bottles crowded each table, and the floor where they had fallen; Ahato had long made peace with having bugs for roommates. You either had to gingerly step around piles or make peace with crunching garbage beneath your feet in order to traverse it.
While much of her had forgotten how to feel, some part of dedf1sh felt anguish towards the filth that piled around her. It crawled on her skin how messy her environment was, but her sanitization had robbed her of almost all her daily energy. She barely had enough energy to get out of bed each day, and that was without the random shooting pains that come with antiseptics seeping into atrophied muscle. This made it harder to clean, leading to worse messes and greater anguish. Like a Horrorboros swallowing its tail, it becomes a vicious cycle where at a certain point dedf1sh had become immobilized at the very thought of tackling such a mess.
A great deal of her first months back on the surface were spent in that paralytic unease. At one point, she wondered if she would’ve been better off never leaving the metro. Luckily, time passed, friendships grew, and she began desiring a life on the surface alongside her Squidbeak rescuers. And while that was great, and while any progress is great, she still ended every day sea-pig sty.
More time passed, Splatfests changed hosts, and dedf1sh made another friend. Well, it started that way at least. dedf1sh had heard of the vocalist for the Chirpy Chips even before she fell into the Metro, but was certainly not expecting to meet her in a collectibles store while on a day trip to Splatsville. After a couple brief exchanges about retro gaming and many drawn out silences, they exchanged social medias and had been inseparable ever since.
Sometimes, it almost felt like cheating to date someone like Harmony. She was so laid back that dedf1sh could reveal that she lived in an ACTUAL war zone and all she would do is ask if it’s a shoes-off household. It was definitely shocking at first to have someone who genuinely didn’t mind the mess. It had forcibly reframed dedf1sh’s all-consuming inner turmoil to witness someone she loved straight up not care about the thing causing her so much trouble. But, slowly again, dedf1sh grew to accept Harmony’s acceptance. One night, when dedf1sh was frozen from stress on her bed, Harmony looked over from her upside down spot on a beanbag chair and plainly stated “...Your worth isn’t based on your cleanliness. Love you,” before continuing to play Tetris. That alone had knocked some sense into her, and the rest fell into place as they spent more time together.
In the way that many of the best things are counterintuitive, this led to actual progress. No longer frozen in fear, dedf1sh began to tackle the beast outside. Cups began to disappear, dirty clothes ended up in one pile instead of many, and a cleaner space began to take root. There were days when she brought out cleaning supplies that weren’t used till a week later, but they were used eventually. Through trial and error, she learned things; like if you’ve stood up to wash a single spoon, you might as well wash two so the second is clean for later. Floor and desk space appeared in her room, and she began inviting Harmony over more often.
The first time dedf1sh invited Harmony over with her bed cleared off, something clicked. Harmony had beelined under the covers and played her gameboy underneath, and cozily welcomed dedf1sh into a spoon when she crawled in beside her. While Harmony didn’t really smile to show happiness, her body was warm and relaxed, and her tentacles ambiently grasped toward dedf1sh. She gently snaked her hands around her and planted a kiss on the back of Harmony’s baseball cap, and Harmony let out a soft heh in reply. Feeling the ambience of Harmony’s breathing and the bleeps of the gameboy, dedf1sh felt a peace she hadn’t in a long time. Clutter was still stacked around the bed and scattered across the floor, but the bed stood as an island in a stormy sea. With three hearts full of sunlight, it dawned on her that she didn’t need to clean, really. She was just as worthy of love in filth as she was in neatness. But, the love she had was worthy of space. And in her own way, on her own time, she could clear a place for the two of them.