Chapter Text
It was nearly a full moon, with just a few slivers of silver left until the celestial rock became a perfect circle. It gently shone its moonbeams down to an island, inhabited exclusively by a young man’s characters: characters that had come to life subconsciously, and over time, become their own unique individuals. Near the center of Inanimate Island, there sat a large, recently renovated hotel. The owner and his now-husband, Orange Juice (or OJ, as he prefers to be called) and Paper, still haven’t quite decided on a new name after deciding that naming a hotel after yourself is a very self-centered idea, especially if that hotel is co-run.
The inside of the hotel was peacefully tranquil, the pairs assigned to each room sleeping snugly in their beds. Some snored, like Bomb, some were deathly still, like Taco, and one even whistled through the gap in her teeth. But one resident was awake, though groggy and tired, unable to put a good read down: Fan.
A well-known fact about the red hand fan is, well, he’s a big fan of a lot of things. He doesn’t think he could recall a time when he liked something to a “normal” standard. Parappa the Rapper? He beat the hardest songs and got a “U Rappin’ Cool!” rating on each one, for all three games. My Little Pony? He sewed custom plushes of his favorite background characters. Vocaloid? He learned how to interpret Japanese (Unfortunately, it’s been years since he’s heard any Japanese, and he can’t remember most of it) to understand the meanings of the songs better, and handmade a cosplay of Len, his favorite.
Inanimate Insanity?
Well, that’s the whole reason he’s up at 2:29 am. He’s flipping between three tabs on his phone that consist of: the official page of the Inanimate Insanity reality show, his fan blog, and a self-indulgent fanfiction that he likes to read from time to time about him and a certain contestant who he may or may not share a room with. Oh, did he not mention the fact that he himself was on Inanimate Insanity? For two seasons? No? Ah, well, can’t win 'em all.
A fan (not Fan, a fan of the show) who orphaned their account years ago, made an 8k word oneshot concerning their favorite ship (Unbeknownst to that fan, the show is not fake, and those are real people, not just characters), Fan and Paintbrush.
There had only been a few interactions between the two by the time the fic was written, and most had been negative, but this user decided to take their rarepair and run with it. The fluffy oneshot was so sweet that not only did it make Fan’s teeth rot, but it also made his stomach clench, his feet kick, and his hands flap.
Maybe that wasn’t the author, though. Maybe that was Fan loving certain things too much, as he tends to do. Loving certain people too much for his own good.
Fan’s hands and feet stilled, and the giddy knot in his stomach turned into an uncomfortable pit. He glanced at Paintbrush, then back at his phone, where he switched to the photos app. He pulled up a picture of his main friend group at one of the hotel’s famous parties. Everyone in the image has some sort of smile on their face.
Paintbrush, Lightbulb, Test Tube, and himself.
His friend group.
His friends.
That’s all they’ll ever be. His cheeks grow hot and shameful, and his eyes begin to feel all prickly. His hands have started shaking. How could he ever choose just one? He can’t choose between them. A lot of fans think that the obvious choice is Fan and Test Tube, given that they both love their logic in different ways. People think they complete each other. Those people don’t understand at all, Fan thinks. Yes, they both have odd laughs, yes, they collaborate on so many things, yes, she’s the closest friend he’s ever had, but… They both get too caught up in their logic if left alone for too long, and that increases tenfold if they’re left alone together. The two thinkers need someone who’s a feeler.
Someone like Lightbulb. She’s so deep into her emotions, that she often forgets to think: the polar opposite of Test Tube (Fan doesn’t think he likes logic OR feelings more. Logic comes easier to him, but he doesn’t think he’s very good at it. Feelings are harder, and he doesn’t quite get them, either.). She always thinks of some crazy plan for any situation, a plan that makes you say “That just might work!” Often, the plans don’t work, but at least she brings spirits up. But when the plans do work? They work flawlessly. So flawlessly, in fact, that you trust her to make another plan. And she does, and it fails spectacularly, and you all laugh about it later. But all three, Fan, Test Tube, and Lightbulb, tend to think that their ideas will work without a hitch, every single time. There’s got to be a realist somewhere in there.
And Paintbrush brings that realism. They think things through for more than half a second, and actually think of more possibilities than just the best-case scenarios. They take many things into consideration, having the sharpest memory out of all four of them. If any one of them was the most mature, it would definitely be Paintbrush. (Bonus: They’ve also got a great sense of comedic timing and phrasing, mixing sarcasm and deadpan humor, with some occasional stupid facial expressions sprinkled in.) But when they get too caught up in those less-than-optimal thoughts about how things could go wrong, the other three bring them back up.
Well, maybe just Lightbulb and Test Tube. Fan doesn’t really do all that much. The logical thinker, the emotion feeler, and the realist. That’s… kind of all they need. Would they really need Fan?
It doesn’t matter anyway: Fan doesn’t think polyamory is their style. They would probably all prefer to stay friends, and Fan would make it weird by saying anything.
He’s always weird, isn’t he?
Fan scrunches up his face in an attempt to keep himself from breaking down. He knows that he cries loud, and he knows his roommate is a light sleeper. He tries to swallow a lump in his throat and keeps reading the fanfic about him and Paintbrush. It helps, for a few minutes, to indulge in one of his fantasy worlds.
And then that fantasy shatters on a simple typo. A skipped space, pushing two separate words together. Fan reminds himself that this is only a work of fiction, written by some stranger eight years ago. (God, was he really only fourteen then? No wonder he was so annoying.)
Fan switches the app he’s using once more, to a timer of sorts. It counts up, showing the steadily growing amount of time since his previous trip to rock bottom. He’s at a little over a month, having hit the one-month mark two days after Mephone4 and Mephone3gs’ departure. He stares at his phone screen, deep in contemplation. Finally, after a few minutes of mental back-and-forth, he closes the app and shuts his phone off, deciding that it’s not a good idea.
He wouldn’t want to wake anyone, of course.