Chapter Text

airy sat in the chair in the waiting room. all was calm and silent. he felt sort of at peace now. like maybe... he could learn to live with himself. here. alone forever in the waiting room. in his eyes he'd been shrunk down and placed delicately onto the plane. that place he'd worked on so hard, and loved so much. but it was never meant to be. he knew that. he couldn't stay here, much as he'd like to. after meeting backpack- no.. liam, in his old world, he'd realized how much he missed being around others. the twenty or so years spent alone must've dulled it somewhat, but he knew now more than ever that he could no longer bare being alone for one more moment. so.. he flicked through radio channels, settling on one after a moment or two. bracing himself for what could lie on the other side, he flicked the radio's antenna up, and...

Chapter Text

airy stumbled to the ground. the world around him was dark. so dark he could barely see a few feet in front of himself. so as he stood, he reached up the back of his neck and flicked his light on. the tiny flame illuminated a creature in front of him. some large beast with red eyes and a gaping mouth full of razor sharp teeth. the coloured petals around its head hinted to airy that it could be some kind of flower. maybe it was once something friendly, but a sinister shadow clouded it as it was here right now in front of him. this creature was out for blood, and airy had now become its target. he stayed completely still, not moving a muscle for fear of being tackled to the ground and tossed back to the waiting room so soon after he'd arrived.

a loud banging sound made airy flinch. the flower creature turned away from him, its unnatural head snapping to the location of the sound. it was something like pots and pans being banged together. now, airy could get a good look at the things body. it looked like some kind of black panther, with big colourful clawed paws on its front legs. it dripped with an inky black substance that airy couldn't identify. then he heard a shrill voice call out.

"HEY STUPID! OVER HERE!"

the flower thing immediately rushed to the voice, leaving airy alone once more. it was still far too dark for airy to make out his surroundings, other than that he was in a building of some kind, he was stumped. the patter of small footsteps sounded on the ground, followed closely by the loud pounding of the flower creature's paws. the sound grew farther away, and airy looked around again. he let out a shaky sigh as he realized he wasn't going to die.

airy felt a small hand grab him by his wrist from behind, he about yelled from being startled but another hand clasped itself over his mouth. he was helpless as he was dragged backwards over to a wall and then tossed to the ground.

"are you nuts????"

that voice, airy realized, was the same one that had distracted the strange flower monster previously. he got a good look at them. they were short, about a head shorter than him. they looked a bit like a shrimp, the kind you would buy at a grocery store. they had four arms and wore a red dress with a stripe on it, and from the look on their face, they were very unhappy with him. their top two arms were crossed, the lower rested with balled up fists on their hips. they tapped their foot impatiently.

"what do you have to say for yourself??" they hissed in a hushed voice.
"uh.."
"you cant just stand out in the open like that, you're not distracting, that's my job. you should be helping the mirror bitch extract ichor."

airy looked like he'd just been tossed out of a moving train. he had no idea what this shrimp was on about.
"it's.."
"wait- who even are you anyway???"
"uh... my name is.... airy." he said, blinking in utter confusion.
"you're not supposed to be here." the shrimp stated. they grabbed airy's wrist again and carefully tiptoed over to a different corner of the building, dragging him along.

Chapter Text

the shrimp person dragged airy along for a while, doing their best to keep quiet. he could still hear the flower monster stomping about, just far enough not to notice the flickering light of the flame inside airy's head. his captor released airy near a wall, sheltered away from the twisted beast. it wouldn't find them there, he hoped. like before, the shrimp tossed him roughly to the ground. despite their puny size, they seemed to be unusually strong. perhaps they worked out? airy didn't have much time to think about that before his back crashed noisily against another body. it was some kind of cold metal, much like his own, not copper, though, he noted. something else. brass maybe? silver? he couldn't tell. he felt the other person's arms reach to rest on his shoulders for just a moment before gently pushing him away. airy stumbled on his knees, catching himself with outstretched arms before flipping over again to look at both the people he found himself with.

the shrimp gestured wildly at airy with two arms, the arms on the other side held balled up fists. they looked ready to fight someone, their shrimp-like tail curling in on itself.
"glisten do you know who the fuck this is??" they demanded in a hushed voice.
airy's gaze turned to the other, sitting on his knees on the ground much like himself. he was a mirror, airy realized, and he was golden, not the other metals he'd guessed previously. a pretty pink bow was tied around his waist, and he had white legwarmers to match. as airy's eyes met that of the mirror's -glisten, he guessed- all he saw was his own reflection gazing back at him. that was how mirrors worked, he supposed. airy was allowed a moment to recognize on his face that the ugly shatter that had taken his eye was gone now. he hadn't noticed before, too caught up in the whirlwind of this new world to be able to focus much on himself. he blinked with both eyes separately, raising a hand to the eye that had been cracked away before.
glistens butter smooth voice broke him away from his thoughts. "i've never seen them before." he said, rising to his feet in a graceful motion. airy was mesmerized by him.
the shrimp tapped their foot, anger seething from them in harsh waves that airy could almost feel. they gazed up at glisten with a scowl. "well what are we supposed to do with them?" they asked. "i can't distract for more than one person at a time, you know that." they hissed, shoving glisten in the shoulder.
glisten flinched back, but didn't seem phased by their frustration, he was clearly used to it already.
"calm down, shrimpo."
"don't you 'calm down shrimpo' me!!! my job just got twice as hard!!!" they -shrimpo- stamped their foot in frustration.
glisten blinked at them, sighing wistfully. "i knew we should've brought sprout and rodger along."
shrimpo's eye twitched at the mention of this "sprout" person.
"and left stupid little shrimpo at home!!"
"i never said that! you just called yourself stupid." glisten said, fighting back a chuckle.
shrimpo stamped their foot again. "you were thinking it!"
glisten rolled his eyes at them. "we're getting sidetracked. i've got enough ichor to make it back to gardenview, we can deal with them," he gestured towards airy, "when we get back. which way is the elevator?" he asked, looking around. shrimpo pointed two hands in a direction, somewhere near where they'd first encountered airy. their other hands held up middle fingers at glisten. glisten rolled his eyes.

a loud crash made the three of them flinch. airy tensed, he didn't want to encounter the flower monster again. shrimpo reached to grab airy's wrist again, he wanted bat their hand away but he stopped when he realized these two knew more about this place than he did. shrimpo dragged him to his feet and he stumbled, nearly bumping into them. he righted himself in time to see shrimpo growl at him. he felt another hand on his shoulder, warm and comforting.
"pay no attention to shrimpo, they're a bit short tempered." glisten explained. airy felt as though he could melt at glistens voice. he had such an air of confidence about him. about everything he said was pure magic.
"ok-"
"will you two shut the fuck up, i'm trying to listen." shrimpo snapped.
the three stood there in silence for a moment, then shrimpo pointed out the elevator again. airy strained his eyes to see it in the dim light. he could barely make out the sliding metal door that would be their escape. the booming sound of the flower monster's pawsteps rang loud in the quiet building. shrimpo tightened their grip on airy's wrist, and glisten moved his hand down his arm to grasp his hand. as their fingers entwined airy felt his fear melt away. as long as glisten was there, he'd be safe.
shrimpo spoke up again.
"when i count to three, we run. okay? one, two.. THREE!"

Chapter Text

the three of them immediately started running to the elevator. airy noticed that glisten, despite having been behind them moments before, had taken up the lead. shrimpo lagged behind a bit, airy reached his hand and helped them along by grabbing hold of multiple of their arms. airy wondered how they'd managed to get away from the flower thing before.

booming pawsteps scraped against the floor behind them. "GO GO GO!!" shrimpo shrieked. glisten slammed his hand against the elevator button and the door slid open, and he pulled airy along into safety. but shrimpo couldn't quite make it, something was stopping them. airy looked back, gasping in horror as he watched the flower monster sink its razor sharp teeth deep into shrimpo's leg. shrimpo cried out in pain, "GET IT OFF!!" airy pulled on shrimpo's arms, glisten mirrored him on the other side, whilst pressing the button to close the elevator door several times in a panic.

as the door started to slide shut shrimpo used their free leg to kick at the flower's face, and finally it relented, releasing shrimpo from its jaws just before it would've got stuck. the three watched it hiss in frustration as the door closed all the way. they took a moment to catch their breath. shrimpo pressed their back against a wall, clutching the bite on their leg with all four hands. "ffff- DAMMIT!" they choked out, their whole body was shaking. airy noticed a black substance ooze from the wound. is that blood?

"what.... was that thing..?" airy asked as glisten typed a number into the elevator.
"twisted dandy." glisten stated.

they stayed silent for the rest of the elevator ride, the only noises made came from shrimpo wincing in pain.

---

airy and glisten left the elevator once they'd reached the top floor. despite their protests, shrimpo had to be carried by glisten cause they couldn't walk due to their leg injury. they were huffing about it and crossing their arms the whole time. shrimpo's door creaked as glisten opened it. "are you sure you dont need a band?" glisten asked as he set shrimpo down on the thing in their room that just vaguely passed for a bed.
"i'm fine! it's just a scratch, fuck off glisten!" shrimpo snapped, pushing glisten away.
"you couldn't even walk.."
"GET OUT OF MY ROOM!!"
glisten let out a frustrated sigh before walking out, being careful to dodge the random bricks scattered around the floor. he didn't look back at the injured toon as he shut their door behind him.

glisten walked back out to where he'd left airy. he was sitting near the tree in the center of the building.
"i never did catch your name..?" glisten prompted, taking a seat next to him.
airy blinked, he'd been zoned out since they left the elevator. "oh.. um..." he fiddled with his fingers. "it's.. airy..."
glisten turned away from him, gazing up at the ceiling. "i'm glisten. welcome to gardenview, airy."

the two sat there in a comfortable silence for a while. minutes felt like hours, the whirlwind of the past hour had left airy shaken, dazed and confused. he wasn't sure how he made it out alive, but he had. and now he was here, wherever "here" was.
"i'm sorry if your welcome wasn't a very friendly one... i remember my first time seeing a twisted... it's..., not pleasant to say the least."
"mm.."
"how'd you even get there, anyway? i don't think either of us saw you come out of the elevator, so..?"
airy paused. should i tell him? he wasn't sure how to explain everything, dying, the waiting room, the radio...
"i.... don't remember." he lied.
"ah..." glisten seemed to accept this answer, but he still looked at him as though he knew there was more he wasn't saying.
"well.." glisten stood up, rolling his shoulders back so he wasn't slouching. "i've got things to do. i'll see if i can find an empty room for you to stay in.. i'd suggest getting to know the other toons, but it's up to you." he shrugged, then walked away, leaving airy alone again.
airy cursed the pang of being left alone, it stung. he wished glisten would stay longer. but he was busy... airy sighed. being around people again would take some getting used to.

Chapter Text

the day so far had seemed normal, well, as normal as things could be in a place like this. i was going about my typical business, combing through old newspaper articles, trying to find something that might lead me to the answer of what happened to this place. but then, i heard a knock on my door, and a familiar face made himself known..
glisten poked his head through rodger's door. "rodger."
"glisten, what a pleasant surprise," rodger set the newspaper he was looking at down, "what's on your mind?"
i studied his expression, clearly there was something bothering this toon, i couldn't help but wonder what it was.
glisten clutched the edge of the doorway, avoiding eye contact as he spoke. "well.. me and shrimpo were down in the lower floors, right?"
"go on..?"
"we uh... we ran into a new toon"
a new toon..? now that piqued my interest.
"a new toon, what could they possibly have been doing down there? and how did they get there?" i was all too curious at this point. how much had glisten learned about them?
glisten shrugged. "he says he doesn't remember. honestly though, i think he's hiding something, so like.." he gestured towards rodger. the magnifying glass immediately picked up what he meant. he stood up from his chair, taking a few paces towards him.
"i'll get on it right away. thank you, glisten, you've been a big help." rodger patted glistens shouder.
glisten stepped back so he wasn't blocking rodgers door, "one more thing." glisten said.
rodger waited. "his name is airy, he's.. some kind of lantern. i left him by the tree, he should still be there."
with that, glisten walked away, having left a glorious breadcrumb trail for rodger to follow. airy...

i made my way down the familiar hallways that would inevitably lead me to this.. airy fellow. i knew it would be an interesting conversation at the very least. i was certain i had much to learn from him, i just hoped he'd be willing for an interview. rodger spotted airy, he was sitting where glisten had said he'd be. he looked to be lost in thought, or perhaps disassociating? i wouldn't blame him. rodger took a moment to look him over. a copper trawler lantern, intriguing.. his body was orange and shiny, like he hadn't had time to oxidize, or had recently been waxed, it was hard to tell. his arms were darker, more brown than orange, like a penny that had been left on the ground for a while. his face is glass. more similar to finn than to me and glisten though. i wonder if he can be lit..? rodger hadn't noticed airy turn to look at him. he hadn't spoke up yet but he had definitely noticed him staring. "can i.. help you..? airy asked after a while. rodger flinched, breaking away from his thoughts. you're going to scare him away! keep it together rodger! rodger straightened his jacket and took a deep breath. "yes, actually," he cleared his throat. "you're airy, correct?" "yeeah?" "wonderful. my name is rodger." he held out a hand. airy blinked, narrowing his eyes just slightly as he shook it. what are you thinking, lamp.. the two were silent for a moment. get to the point, rodger! he cleared his throat again, "i was wondering if you'd be willing to do an interview?" please say yes.. "um.. ok." airy said dryly. yes!!!! rodger tried to contain his excitement. "well then, follow me." rodger turned and started walking away, internally celebrating when he heard airy's footsteps behind him. don't get too excited yet, he hasn't told you anything..

rodger led airy to a mostly empty room, it was roughly the size of an old janitors closet, the only things inside were a table with two metal folding chairs, one on either side. on the table was a yellow notepad and an old cassette recorder with a blank tape inside.
"please, have a seat." rodger gestured to a chair. airy sat down as rodger closed the door behind them. he took the seat opposite from airy and pressed the button to start the tape recorder, then flipped to an empty page in his notepad.
"so, airy-"
"am i being interrogated..?" airy asked, cutting him off.
rodger paused. "no. don't worry. i just have a few questions. it's not an interrogation, i assure you." make him feel comfortable, he's clearly on edge..
airy fiddled with his fingers. rodger took a moment to write down a physical description of him, along with some traits he'd been able to pick up on. `he's distant, a bit quiet, and has a monotone. rodger looked up at him a moment, then scribbled down. `nervous ticks: fidgets with his fingers.
"airy, do you remember what floor glisten and shrimpo found you on?" rodger asked, this should be simple enough.
"um.. floor seven i think..? i wasn't really paying attention.."
`found on floor seven. he wrote that down.
"it was really dark, i had to put my light on, but i still couldn't see well." airy explained, flicking on his light to demonstrate. rodger noted that down, `can be lit. that solves that mystery.
"now airy, do you remember at all how you got there?" he watched airy flinch, and noted him begin tapping his foot on the ground. he updated his nervous ticks note.
"i don't.. remember."
he's lying. rodger squinted at him. leave it alone for now, come back to it later.
"do you remember anything from before you ended up there?"
"um... yeah."
rodger blinked, waiting. go on..?
"i was in the woods by my cabin."
`lives in a cabin in the woods.
"um... i went out to collect reeds, and i fell."
`fell whilst collecting reeds. "what happened after you fell?"
airy paused for a long time. rodger could tell he seemed very uncomfortable. there's definitely something he's not telling me.
"it's okay if it's a painful memory, this is completely confidential, i won't tell a soul." i want to know what's bothering you, i'll find out somehow, whether you tell me or not.
"it's um... it's hard to explain..." airy looked away from him.
`dislikes direct eye contact.
"take as long as you need." rodger tried his best to sound comforting.
"well... i didn't just fall." airy stated. rodger raised his eyebrow.
"i was walking on this plank bridge i made over the river, it was raining so it was slippery.. i um... i fell over the edge of the waterfall.." he paused, wincing at the memory. rodger looked at him sympathetically, then updated his notes, crossing out the previous description.
"were you hurt?"
"uh... you could... say that..." airy's voice had gotten small. i'm close to cracking this, whatever it is.
`hurt himself after falling over the waterfall.
"it um... killed me."
rodger froze, staring at him with his eye wide. he died..??? but.. he doesn't look like connie, so he couldn't be a ghost.. what the fuck happened here....?
shakily, rodger noted that down. `killed by the fall.
"i'm sorry, i..i don't understand."
airy hugged himself. "it's hard to explain." he stated again. "when i died, i got sent to this place that i've been calling the waiting room. usually it's like.. this wide open place that looks like a pink sunset. theres a couple chairs there, and a table with a radio on it. dunno how it works, but when i flip through the channels on the radio, it sends me to different universes. that's... that's how i got here." airy said finally.
`transported to floor seven by... a magic purgatory radio???
rodger rubbed his forehead. "that's all i need for now. thank you." he said quietly, flicking off the tape recorder. airy stood from his chair silently, and left the room, leaving the door cracked open. rodger looked over his notes. that left me with more questions than answers... i'll have to speak with him again sometime. he gazed at the door.

Chapter Text

airy hadn't left the room with the tree since he left rodgers weird interrogation room. this building was too big to explore without getting lost several times. his lid was leaned up against the small brick wall that surrounded the patch of grass the tree grew out of, he'd taken it off so he could lie down flat on the cold floor. he stared up at the small skylight above, hands folded over his chest. stars twinkled beyond glass, and a full moon lit the sky, casting brilliant white light onto the trees leaves. all the toons were asleep, he assumed. nestled somewhere in their dorms. he hadn't looked around enough to know where those were. the lights coming from outside made him slightly homesick, a feeling he hated. he hoped he'd never see that bleak empty forest again. so he'd never have to spend another winter night freezing, with snow keeping him trapped in his drafty cabin. never have to spend hours fishing just to turn up empty handed, reduced to eating bitter dandelions to keep himself from starving. never have to wait out thunderstorms in his cave, afraid of the floodwater coming in and drowning him. he shuddered, pushing painful memories away. he was homesick, but he didn't miss living there. he hated to admit it, but he was glad he'd died. at least here he was safe from the elements. and he had some sort of company, though he hadn't talked to anyone since rodger. he wasn't sure how many hours had passed since then, enough for sunset to give way to the darkness of night. his heart ached with need for interaction with anyone. his first instinct was to push that away, shove it down so he wouldn't think about it... but i'm not alone anymore. but it still stung a little bit. yes, there was other people here, but they hadn't bothered talking to him.

it felt like another half hour had passed. airy wished he had a way to tell the time. he had nearly fallen asleep on the floor, which wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world, but it certainly wouldn't feel good when he woke up. sighing, he sat up, putting his lid back on. glisten hadn't found him a room yet so it was likely he'd end up falling asleep here anyway. he didn't have to yet, he could save sleeping for when he was truly exhausted. he sat down on the wall again, looking up at the stars. he felt his eyelids droop, before snapping open again at what sounded like footsteps, and a blanket being dragged across the floor. he turned his head, seeing just the back of another toon as they sat opposite from him and gazed up at the skylight like he'd been doing. why are they up so late..? all airy could make out about them from their dark form was the nightcap they wore, and the blanket draped over their shoulders. he watched them for a long moment, before taking a deep breath and walking to join them where they sat.

"hi." airy said. the toon turned to look at him. his face looked a bit like a crescent moon, his left eye was cast in darkness and looked like nothing but a dull glimmer of light. his blue blanket covered most of his body, held tight against his torso by hidden arms. he stared for a moment before replying. "hi."

"i'm airy.. um.. i'm new here, i guess." airy turned to look back up at the sky.
"astro. i hope you're settling in well."
"eh.."

their small conversation was punctuated by bouts of silence. honestly, it was pleasant.

"the stars are pretty tonight." astro commented quietly.
"yeah."

"are you tired?" astro asked after a while. airy blinked the drowsiness from his eyes.
"i don't have anywhere to sleep.." airy stated. he cursed how miserable-sounding that had came out.
astro gazed up at the sky, thinking.
"i have some extra pillows i can bring you." he said. i haven't slept on a pillow in years...
"that would be nice.." airy replied.
astro stood silently, walking off and disappearing down a hallway. airy wondered if he'd even come back. he wouldn't blame him if he didn't. i'm too awkward to talk to..
astro returned a few moments later. two pillows scrunched between his hands which were still hidden under the blanket. another, folded, blanket was balanced precariously on top of them. when he got close enough he handed the items to airy, then adjusted his hold on his own blanket. "...thanks." airy whispered. he clutched the feather pillows close, relishing the feeling of comfort they brought. he desperately hoped he wasn't dreaming all this. that he wouldn't wake up back in the woods. he almost wanted to cry.
"i don't like seeing the toons suffer.." astro went on, "there probably aren't any empty dorms right now. if you want, i can check if someone would be willing to bunk with you." he offered.
you don't have to do that for me...
"would you?" airy mumbled.
"yeah. you can spend the night in my room if you want." astro offered. airy desperately wanted to take him up on that, but he couldn't. he just couldn't. "i'll be fine out here, thanks astro.."
"okay. if you need anything, i'll be in my room. it's got a moon painted on it." astro informed him.
airy nodded. "thanks again.."
"it's really nothing.."

astro left airy alone again, but this time he didn't feel nearly as bad. i think i just.. made a friend. airy blinked, smiling. he set the pillows onto a bench, then took his lid off again and wrapped himself up in the borrowed blanket. and he was out like a light almost immediately.

Chapter Text

"is everybody here?"

finn gazed around the elevator. he hadn't managed to find many people who weren't busy already, but surrounding him were looey, glisten and shrimpo. "looks like we've got a full school!" finn stated, earning a giggle from looey, but no one else reacted. he made sure to mark his friends' names on his clipboard. a little over the top, but this was his first time leading a run, he wanted everything to be perfect.
"might be nice to have rodger or sprout with us.." glisten commented, leaning against an elevator wall.
"i tried to find more people, but everyone was busy, it was a turtle disaster." finn stated. once again, the only one laughing at his jokes was looey. the clown toon always had a great sense of humor, finn thought.
"are we gonna go yet?" shrimpo demanded.
"you betta believe it!" finn answered, pressing the button to close the elevator.

the number on the elevator switched to show [floor 1]. "alright, me, shrimpo and glisten will do the machines. looey can you handle distracting by yourself?" finn asked, resting his hand briefly on looey's shoulder. looey flinched, then looked at finn a moment before masking his expression with fake confidence, "do fish have gills?" he replied.
"fintastic! alright," finn wrote down each person's jobs before dropping his clipboard on the elevator floor. "um, shrimpo, can you leave your brick here?" finn asked.
"WHAT??"
"well, i wanna make it to at least floor 10, we don't need you anchored to shore." finn said, twiddling his thumbs.
"I CAN WORK JUST FINE WITH MY BRICK, THANK YOU." shrimpo yelled, just clutching the brick tighter.
"okay... just don't get yourself... krilled." finn said, stifling his own chuckle. behind him, looey burst out laughing. he pressed the button to open the elevator onto floor one.
"lets hit the waves!"

[FLOOR 1]

floor one went off without a hitch. the only twisted looey really had to pay attention to was yatta. the other was tisha, who was easy enough to avoid. it kind of hurt seeing yatta so soon, it reminded looey that he'd missed hanging out with her that day in favor of helping finn with his run. no matter. can't get off track...

looey led yatta out of his friends' way as they made their way back to the elevator once all the machines had been completed. he waved to her as the elevator door shut. feeling just a bit sad. now's not the time, looey... he tried to keep his ears from drooping.

"anything i can help you with?" dandy's voice startled looey, though finn spoke up first, "i think we're all ship shape for now, dandy, thanks though!"

[FLOOR 2]

finn pointed out the closest extractor machine to the elevator for shrimpo, although they didn't seem all too pleased with his help. instead "running" off to a farther one. finn shrugged, watching them for a moment to make sure they made it safely before walking to the machine he'd pointed to. a couple skill checks passed before he heard a giggling behind him. he glanced over his shoulder briefly, eyes meeting with a tiny twisted crawling quickly towards him on the floor. "carp- toodles..." finn quietly backed away from her. he knew if he could get her attention on something else she'd leave him alone. he moved to knock some boxes off a table, but toodles latched onto his leg before he could reach them, trying to knock him off balance.
"LOOEY!!-" finn screamed.

-

"LOOEY!"

there was the unmistakable sound of glass shattering, it rang in looeys ears, distracting him momentarily from the twisted he was running from. boxten managed to get a hit on him and he almost fell over. keep yourself together, looey, they're all counting on you!!

invigorated with a new burst of energy, akin almost to drinking a pop, looey rushed out of boxtens line of sight, heading directly for where he'd heard finns scream.

finns shattered face sent a chill down looeys spine. ichor leaked from his body where whatever twisted had gotten to him had bit down. no matter how many times he saw his friends die, it never got less disturbing. crap... not finn... he was so excited for this run... looey hugged himself, looking around until he spotted the twisted responsible for his friends death. toodles..? shit-

looey skipped over to the twisted child, waving his arms around until she noticed him. "hey toodles! watch this magic trick! i can make this balloon dog disappear!" he stated. toodles started running at him and he dodged behind a wall. coming out the other side, he waved his arms around again until she saw, then he did a mock bow before rushing to the elevator that had reopened. glisten and shrimpo were already safely inside.

-

"TOODLES ON FLOOR TWO??? WHAT THE FUCK." shrimpo yelled, throwing their brick at the ground so hard they thought it might leave a dent.
"unlucky.." looey said quietly.
shrimpo grabbed him by his shoulders, shaking him. "WHY WEREN'T YOU PAYING MORE ATTENTION???" they hissed. looey looked dazed, "i didn't realize-"
"I HATE YOU!" they threw looey against a wall.
dammit...GOD DAMMIT, STUPID DOG!! FINN IS DEAD AND IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!! I HOPE YOU STEP ON A NAIL YOU-

"you guys need anything?" dandy asked, leaning against his shop's counter. shrimpo glared at the flower, then at their two remaining run partners. "DON'T MAKE ME TALK TO HIM."
glisten shrugged, "i'm alright."
"what about you, looey? you look like you could use a medpack..?"
looey threw up his hands, "no- i'm fine, really!" he stated, chuckling nervously. shrimpo noticed glisten squint at the balloon, but he didn't say anything.

[FLOOR 3]

glistens legs weren't moving the right speed. typically, he had no problem moving on to the next machine, but something was off this time. it was only when he heard looey crying out "FINN, IM SO SORRY, I DIDN'T MEAN TO GET YOU KILLED, PLEASE DON'T HATE ME-" from somewhere close by that he realized his reduction in speed was the fish bowl's doing. figures.

still, he made his way to the next machine... and the next one after that. shrimpo isnt pulling their weight. he thought bitterly.

[FLOOR 4]

looey's health was below half at this point. without realizing it, he'd backed himself into a corner. cosmo and shrimpo kept getting closer. there was nowhere to run to, nowhere to hide. there was no escaping it, he was dead. he failed. again. im sorry finn, shrimpo, glisten... im so sorry!
knife sharp teeth dug into his arm, cosmo. he could feel the helium and ichor hiss out of the wound as he slowly deflated. he hated dying, it was excruciating, and it took too long. he was almost grateful when twisted shrimpo got close enough to dig their claws into his face, ending his agony once and for all.

-

"looey is dead." shrimpo hissed quietly. glisten turned to them, blinking.
"what do you mean looey is dead?"
"what do you think i mean, jackass???"
surely he couldn't have died so soon..?
"hang on, i'm almost finished." glisten passed his last skill check with ease. and shrimpo followed him back to the open elevator.

"you guys ready to buy something yet?" dandy asked, he sounded a bit more desperate than last time. glisten crossed his arms, huffing. i don't have time for this..
unsurprisingly, shrimpo ignored dandy as well. one thing we can actually agree on, it seems.

[FLOOR 5]

floor five was kind of a blur.
shrimpo finally committed to ditching the brick back at the elevator. i guess i have to do EVERYTHING MYSELF now because STUPID LOOEY was INCOMPETENT at his STUPID JOB!!!
now, shrimpo was distracting. the twisteds were looey, and tisha again. shrimpo was basically fine to ignore tisha entirely, she wasn't bothering them or glisten, caught up in sweeping the stupidly dusty floors. your broom is covered in ichor, idiot, YOU WILL NEVER CLEAN ANYTHING WITH THAT.
shrimpo ended up sticking far away from glisten. as much as they hated him, they hated the idea of doing a run all alone even more. so they did their best at keeping looey occupied for as long as they could manage. if he got too close, shrimpo would throw a chair at him. it had somehow been working.

[FLOOR 6]

now that shrimpo was the only one to distract for him, glisten had started feeling the pressure of being all alone in this weigh him down. it wasn't fair to be stuck with someone he hated protecting him, he never should have agreed to this run in the first place!
he could almost feel the gaze of someone burning into his back, as he turned, he came face to face with his own broken figure. "oh ..." he wasn't sure how to feel about this. twisted glisten made him come face to face with all his worst nightmares every time he encountered him. shakily, he reached out his hand, the twisted reached for him in turn. holding hands with his twisted, he walked to the next extraction machine, making sure to keep one eye on him at all times, even during skill checks. i know how it feels, dear. things do get better, i'm here for you.

after all the machines had been completed, he tracked down shrimpo, twisted glisten was still with him up until they got into the elevator. "i'm sorry to have to leave you." glisten told him as he finally let go of his hand, backing into the elevator and pressing the button to shut the door. for a brief moment, he thought he could see twisted glisten start crying.

"GOD. you are so FULL OF YOURSELF!!" shrimpo yelled.
"what was i supposed to do, ignore him??"

the two stood in silence for a minute.

something's missing...

glisten and shrimpo's eyes drifted away from each other, and towards dandy's little shop.

shrimpo coughed. "um.. where's dandy..?"

Chapter Text

airy hadn't slept that well in 20 years. he never wanted to wake up again, to be quite honest. the pillows astro had lent him were softer than any cloud, and much preferable to sleep on than reeds and grass ever were. sunlight streamed down onto him from the skylight. he squeezed his eyes shut tighter. not yet, please..
but something seemed to block the sun, suddenly. airy blinked his eyes open, gazing around at what looked to be somewhere around a dozen faces staring at him. amongst them were toons he recognized, rodger and glisten, standing side by side, along with a fishbowl wearing a lifevest. astro was a little ways off, standing between what looked to be some kind of shell girl, and a tv head. close by was some kind of strawberry, and next to him was someone with a chocolate cake roll for a head. behind the strawberry was a yellow purple and green balloon dog, and some kind of piñata was standing beside him. airy noticed the small face of an 8 ball peer out from behind rodgers leg. he flattened his back against the back of the bench. too many people... he picked up his lid and set it back on his head. his hands clutched the blanket, he wanted to run and hide.
"well well well, isn't this a lovely surprise! looks like we've got a special guest today folks! big round of applause forrrr AIRY!!!!" the tv heads voice was booming, amplified by the microphone in her hand. airy covered his ears. go away please...
"WELCOME TO GARDENVIEW AIRY!!!!!! looey isn't this GREAT?!! a new FRIEND!!!" the piñata shook her balloon companion, looey, airy guessed, by his shoulders.
"we haven't had a new toon since this place was still open.." the strawberry commented, gazing off somewhere, he had a solemn look on his face, as if longing for better days past.
"y'think this means we'll be open again soon..?" the cake roll muttered.
"highly unlikely, cosmo. as much as we'd all love for gardenview to still be operational, that isn't going to happen. but that leaves us with the question of "why?"" rodger spoke up, his gaze directly on the strawberry.
"you're not getting that interview, rodger." the strawberry stated, wrapping his arms around himself in a tight hug. the cake roll, cosmo, rested a hand on his shoulder in a comforting gesture. rodger looked a bit disappointed, gazing off somewhere else. as he did, the child that had been hiding behind him shyly approached airys bench.
"where'd you come from?" she asked.
"floor seven, toodles, that's where we found him at least." glisten answered.
"aw man, you guys made it to floor seven?" the fishbowl asked solemnly.
looey stepped closer to him, "just him and shrimpo, i didn't make it past floor four."
"we're lucky we even made it through floor seven, there was a blackout, not to mention dandy. it's a miracle he wasn't already dead when shrimpo found him." glisten explained. the tv person across from him looked flabbergasted. "twisted dandy???" she hissed, pushing astro out of the way to come face to face with glisten.
"very convenient that you left out that detail when you told me what happened earlier!!"
"i'm sorry, vee, but when i said shrimpo got bit right as we were getting to the elevator which one did you think i meant?" glisten mused, crossing his arms.
"i dunno! toodles?"vee said, exasperated. she turned to glare at glistens previous run partners.
"finn, looey, did you have anything to do with this??" she demanded. hands on her hips.
"i died on floor two!-" the fishbowl- finn -yelped, holding his arms up. looey also shook his head, "i was too frazzled to pay attention to the shop.." he stated, his ears and tail drooping.
vee's furious gaze snapped back to glisten, who seemed to be checking his nails.
"what the fuck were you two thinking??? where's shrimpo." vee huffed.
glisten pointed to a hallway, "in their room." vee stomped off, yelling "don't think you're ever going on a run without me again, glis!" finn turned almost immediately. running after her and calling out "vee wait-!" glisten watched them go for a while before turning back to the group. everyone looked awkward.
"aaaanyways. i'm sprout, that's my friend cosmo." the strawberry- sprout.. so many names to memorize..-spoke up, resting his hand on cosmos shoulder. "then there's looey, yatta, glisten and astro-who you've already met- i'm assuming you know rodger too, and his kid, toodles. finn was the fishbowl and vee was the television." sprout pointed each of them out as he said their names. "am i missing anyone?" sprout asked, looking around.
"shelly." astro stated. beside him, shelly looked flustered and waved her hand at astro. "haha, no big deal, really!" she insisted. airy noted she sounded a bit unsure. shelly... finally a name that makes sense!
"i'm airy." airy said in his normal, awkward monotone. possibly amplified by the number of people surrounding him, big groups made him nervous. sprout clasped his hands together, "welcome! you must be hungry, right? me and cosmo were actually on our way to the kitchen to make pancakes, you should come with us!" he offered. airy thought he heard his stomach growl at the thought. pancakes... i can't remember the last time i've eaten something sweet.
"yes please."
sprout waved the group together and they all followed him. airy stayed at the back of the group, walking alongside astro. so far he seemed the most comfortable around him.

Chapter Text

vee didn't even bother knocking as she barged into shrimpos room. it took finn a minute or two to catch up with her. by the time he'd made it to the doorway she was already yelling at them.
shrimpo sat up in their bed, upper arms rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, lower stretching out. finn noticed a scrap of one of their shirts was tied around their lower leg, damp and soaked entirely in black. clearly, the wound hadn't yet scabbed over, proving the suspicion that they hadn't bothered to get a band or a medpack yet correct. tiny droplets of ichor dotted the floor, along with a big black stain on their bedsheet from where they'd been sleeping a moment ago.
"shrimpo you know full well we all promised never to summon dandy." vee hissed, crossing her arms. shrimpo blinked at her. "why are you blaming me?? i never talk to that freak regardless, it's glistens fault for ignoring him." they stated, yawning.
"don't give me that!" vee scoffed. "if there's only two people left in your party, you both have a responsibility to keep him from snapping, you should know this by now!"
"i don't have to do anything!" shrimpo argued, crossing all of their arms.
"now bait just a second here!" finn said, stepping between the two.
"it was an ac-sea-dent, vee, they didn't mean to."
"you're not involved in this conversation, finn, go away." vee snapped. finn glanced at shrimpo, they looked a bit less than pleased about him defending them like this.
"no! shrimpo is my.. um.. my friend, and i'm not gonna sit here while you snapper at them for an honest mistake!" finn insisted.
"ugh." vee rolled her eyes. "finn, you know what happened the last time someone got killed by twisted dandy.." she said. the room fell silent for a moment, the memory weighing heavy on all of them.
vee stepped past finn, gesturing to shrimpos leg. "look, their wound hasn't even stopped bleeding yet. we promised not to summon dandy for a reason. remember R&D."
"it's not all my fault, stop blaming me!!" shrimpo hissed, scooting away from vee.
vee sighed. "ugh, just.. pay more attention next time!!"
she finally walked away. finn watched her leave, then sat next to shrimpo.

the two sat in silence for a while. "she's right you know.." finn whispered.
shrimpo leaned against him. "about what part?"
"dandy being dangerous.. just look at your leg.."
"my leg is fine, thanks." shrimpo hissed.
"yeah, and fish breathe air."
...
"can i sea it real quick..?" finn asked quietly. huffing frustratedly, shrimpo rested their leg on finns lap. gently, finn untied the bloodied shirt, revealing the deep gash in their leg. more fresh blood trickled down onto the already soaked shirt. shrimpo... oh... finn frowned.
"it's nothing! i can walk it off!" shrimpo insisted in a yell.
"you need a medpack, badly." finn said.
shrimpo reached down to their leg, wincing as they tied the shirt back over the wound. they tried to stand up but about immediately fell back onto the bed, clutching their leg.
"ow ow ow ow OW!"
"take it easy, prawn.." finn said sympathetically, reaching to help them up. shrimpo batted his hands away. "stop babying me! i just.. need a minute.." shrimpo insisted.
finn waited while shrimpo breathed through gritted teeth, before managing to sit upright again, knee still pressed tight to their torso.
"you're not a crab, you don't have to act so tough all the time." finn stated. "it's not weak to admit you need help once in a while.."
"yes it is..." shrimpo whispered under their breath.
"oh, prawn..."
finn moved to wrap his arms around them. he gave them plenty of time to jerk away if they weren't comfortable with it, but they didn't.
the two sat there like that for a long moment in silence. occasionally finn would mutter something comforting to shrimpo, but not much else besides that.
finally, he helped them up. shrimpos arms wrapped around his neck and torso, keeping all of their weight off their hurt leg. hopefully food will distract them enough for me to put a band on that bite.. finn thought as he walked them to the kitchen.

Chapter Text

airy about feinted at the sugary smell that wafted through the room.
"pancakes and waffles for everybody!" sprout had announced, walking out into the toon's dining area followed by cosmo and looey, who were helping him carry plates. airy was sitting at a table across from astro, rodger and toodles, the third of which was busy messily colouring in a printed colouring sheet of her guardian with crayons. sitting beside airy was glisten, and shelly was seated on his other side, deep in conversation with yatta next to her. airy hadn't caught much of what they were saying, but he'd heard enough to know they weren't talking about him. looey reached over airy's shoulder, squeezing his thin rubber body between him and glisten momentarily to set a couple plates in front of each of them. glistens plate had a neat stack of plain waffles on it. airy's looked a bit more messy, with multiple kinds of pancakes and waffles stacked lazily on top of each other. a blueberry waffle, a chocolate chip pancake, classic buttermilk, french toast, a cinnamon roll...
"sprout didn't know what kind of breakfast things you like so he gave you what yatta usually has, which would be everything, ehe.." looey chuckled, squeezing back out and taking the empty seat next to glisten. this is a whole lot of food... he glanced over to the piñata toon, who was currently drowning her food in enough maple syrup to put someone in a hospital. airy shuddered. looey called to her from across the table, "you're gonna give yourself a cavity, yatta!"
"cavity's fear me!!" yatta exclaimed back, trading the empty maple syrup container for a can of whipped cream. airy had to squint considerably to even be able to tell he had the same food as her. he looked back at his own plate, feeling suddenly very nervous about eating in front of so many people. he shrunk back in his chair, taking his plate onto his lap and bringing his legs up to rest of the edge of the seat, sitting like a gargoyle or whatever. he wasn't sure these people would be the type to steal someones food, but he could never be too careful. clearly, it would take a lot of effort to beat the "this might be my last good meal for weeks" mindset out of him. airy didn't bother grabbing the fork left on the table for him. too much effort when he had two perfectly good forks right there in the form of his hands. airy picked up a waffle, nibbling at it like a frightened, starving rat. he earned a couple concerned glances from the toons that sat with him, which just caused him to scrunch in on himself even more. until no one could see his face from under his lid.
airy finished his food quicker than any of the other toons, leaving his empty plate on a countertop near the kitchen doors. sprout was the first to notice this, patting airy on the back lightly as he walked back to his chair. the touch startled him slightly, he wasn't used to being around so many people.
"if you want seconds, just ask!" sprout stated, grinning with pride that the new toon had enjoyed his baking.

airy slumped back into his chair, blocking out the chewing noises that uncomfortably surrounded him with his hands. "do you want to go somewhere else..?"
airy took a hand off his head, looking at astro.
"what?"
"until they're done, do you want to sit somewhere quieter?" astro restated.
"oh... yes." airy mumbled. astro picked up his empty plate and dropped it off with the others, then the two walked side by side across the dining area to some empty tables far enough from the people eating for the chewing noises to not be deafening anymore. they were there alone for a few minutes until they were joined by a toon airy hadn't met yet. "hi there, i'm brightney!" she greeted them. "vee said there was another lamp toon here, but i didn't expect you to look so... rustic!" brightney rambled. yes, her and airy were both considered lamps, but not the same kind by a long shot. airy being an old copper oil lantern, and brightney being an electric house lamp with a deep pink lampshade. it was like coming face to face with a distant relative.
"i'm airy.." airy said, brightney nodded.
"nice to meet you airy! so, astro, have you read any good books lately?" brightney had turned her attention to airy's companion.
astro nodded to her, "oh yes. i recently picked up this new series called warriors, it's about cats." as astro started explaining the plot, airy found himself zoning out to the gentle sound of his voice.

...

"airy..."

"airy darling......?"

"did you fall asleep or something..?"

airy blinked his eyes groggily, then reached up to rub at them. he was still sitting at that table with astro, but brightney was long gone, and so was most of the noise in the dining area. glisten stood beside his chair, having been waving his hand in front of airys eyes just a moment previous. as his tired eyes gazed around, airy noticed most of the toons had left. with the exception of himself, glisten, astro, vee, shelly, looey, and rodger. a couple faces he hadn't seen enter with the group, finn and shrimpo, were also there.
"he was napping." astro stated with a yawn.
"you look like you were about to start napping too." glisten noted, which made astro giggle.
"naps are nice.."
"i'm sure they are, but we can't have you two so tired if we're going on a run." glisten stated.
a run..? airy rubbed his eyes again, "what's that..?" he asked.
glisten waved his hand dismissively, "you'll see, now come on." he offered a hand and airy took it, letting glisten pull him up. he relished the mirror's touch, almost not wanting to let go.
airy, glisten and astro then walked to join up with the rest of their group.
"is this everyone?" finn asked.
"i'm not coming, sorry.." astro said tiredly. airy supposed seeing him fall asleep had made the other toon sleepy.
"COWARD." shrimpo growled. finn nudged them with an elbow.
"you shouldn't be coming either, shrimpy!" finn chuckled, causing shrimpo to let out a huff, kicking the ground with their uninjured leg.
"i'm fine! you gave me a band! i can walk it off!" shrimpo insisted. airy thought he could hear some amount of uncertainty in their voice.
finn rolled his eyes. "whatever you say, prawn.."
"WRONG CRUSTACEAN." shrimpo hissed, crossing all their arms. finn chuckled again.
somewhere during their conversation, astro walked away.
"i can't come with either, i'm busy. and that means YOU," vee pointed at glisten, "have to stay behind too."
glisten scoffed, "busy with what, exactly?"
"writing questions for my gameshow." vee stated, putting her hands on her hips. a gameshow? ooh... airy couldn't help grinning at the thought, he adored gameshows.
"you mean the gameshow that ended when this place got shut down?" glisten asked, smirking.
vees mouth formed a perfect circle for a moment, "UGH!" she stomped her foot, "it didn't END, it's just, um... it's... IT'S ON HIATUS." vee refuted.
"a permanent hiatus?" glisten asked, chuckling.
"you are SO annoying!" vee huffed.
"yeah, but you love me." glisten said, vee rolled her eyes.
"fine, whatever, i'll come on your stupid run." vee decided. airy noticed shelly's eyes light up.
"you're coming with? in that case, i'll come too!" shelly said with a smile.
"alright, and i'm assuming you're also coming, rodger?" finn asked. the magnifyig glass nodded.
"sure."
"and we have to bring airy along so we can figure out what he's good at." glisten decided, pulling airy close to himself by his upper arm. airy's body went rigid until glisten released him again.
"cool! we've got a lot more people this time around!" looey grinned.
"you're not coming." shrimpo said.
finn looked at them, confused. "what do you mean he's not coming?"
"i mean i'm not letting that STUPID BALLOON come with and get you killed again, finn!" shrimpo stated. then, they froze. their face going a bit red when they realized how many people they just said that in front of. vee raised an eyebrow at them.
"it was an accident!" looey sputtered, ears drooping.
"yeah, it was an accident, shrimpy! to be fair, toodles caught me off guard anyway, it wasn't looeys fault-" finn said, shrimpo covered his mouth. "it WAS his fault! he's a lousy distractor at best!" shrimpo insisted.
"i-if you guys really don't want me, i'll go-" looey stuttered, starting to walk away. vee grabbed him by the tail, earning a loud "YIP-!" out of him.
"you're coming with. i'm not gonna get stuck on distraction duty." vee stated, pulling looey back by the tail.
shrimpo glared at vee, vee just bared her digital teeth and glared back.
"can we stop arguing and just go already??" shelly cut in, stepping in the middle of everyone.
"fine."
"FINE!"
"let's get this boat on the ocean!" finn exclaimed excitedly. airy watched him go to grab shrimpos hand for a split second before stopping, seemingly changing his mind about something or other, then he led everyone to the elevator.

Chapter Text

[FLOOR 1]

the lower level wasn't as dark as it was on floor seven. in fact, it looked a lot like the other rooms airy had passed through. he wouldn't guess this place would be dangerous. vee stood beside the elevator door silently for a moment before calling out, "poppy and boxten."
"got it!" looey rushed off, and vee followed him, quite a bit slower. and shelly followed after her.
rodger split off on his own, and finn and shrimpo walked away side by side, the back of finns hand would brush against theirs occasionally, but he never made a move to hold it.
this left airy alone with glisten.
"i'll show you how the extraction machines work." glisten stated, clutching airy's hand and dragging him along. an intrusive thought snuck its way into his brain, it feels like he's looking for any excuse to touch you.. airy gulped, no, that's silly. this is just how being around people is. he reminded himself. or, maybe it wasn't. he hadn't had contact with someone who didn't hate his guts for several decades, he wouldn't remember what it was like either way.
glisten brought him to a tall glass cylinder that looked like a cloning chamber from sci-fi movies. it had a red light on the top, and a valve on the front.
"here's how it works." glisten purred from behind him. he felt the mirrors arms trail down his own, giving him goosebumps as glisten pressed himself close to his back. he guided airys hands to the valve, showing him how to turn it. "you just keep turning until that black liquid reaches the top, and the light turns green. you got that darling?" glisten asked. airy felt warm. glisten was too close for comfort. or was it something else..?
well, it was gone when glisten moved away, standing beside him to watch. airy kept turning the valve how glisten showed him. he thought he saw him look impressed at how quick it managed to fill up.
"we may have found ourselves a new extractor~." glisten praised him. airy felt his face heat up. it wasn't that hard...
"all the machines are done, get back to the elevator!" vees voice rung out, amplified by her microphone. glisten took airys hand again, dragging him back to the elevator.

the elevator ride felt stuffy and confusing. when other toons touched him, it didn't feel the same as it did when glisten did it. he raised his hands to cover his face. i don't understand what could be so different about him..? airy looked up, noticing glisten smiling at him.
"you did good, airy. for a newbie." he said.

oh.

butterflies.

Chapter Text

[FLOOR 4]

glisten and airy had stuck together for the most part. it was helpful being around someone who knew what he was doing. but every touch, even a gentle pat on the shoulder, left airy feeling uncomfortably warm, like he'd been lit, even though his flame was off.
"airy, are you alright?" glisten asked. the two of them paused from walking to stand against the safety of a wall.
"you haven't said a word since floor 2, is something bothering you?"
airy wasn't sure how to respond. i don't understand. there's something wrong with me. i...
"i think i need some alone time, glisten.." airy whispered. glisten blinked, airy thought he looked hurt for a moment.
"oh, sorry if i was crowding you at all, um.. i'll... i'll get out of your hair.." glisten muttered, frowning as he started to walk away. airy felt like a pit had opened in his stomach. it's not your fault... glisten was already too far from him for him to say anything else. sighing, airy resigned to wander in search of the next machine.

along his path he came across rodger, who was currently picking up some strange cylinder off the ground. airy noted it looked a bit like a miniature version of an extraction machine.
"rodger can i ask you a question..?" airy asked quietly. rodger flinched, standing up straight again and slipping the capsule into a satchel he had brought along.
"airy, what a pleasant surprise. what seems to be the problem?" rodger asked, brushing dust off his coat and turning around to face him.
"is um..." airy paused, fidgeting with his hands. "is glisten usually this...uh... touchy with people..?"
rodger blinked, airy thought he saw his face flush for a moment. the detective tugged at his shirt collar.
"oh yes, all the time. nothing out of the ordinary for him." rodger chuckled. "why?.. is he making you uncomfortable?"
airy waved his hands in front of him. "no- um.. nothing like that... i was just.. curious.."
"oh good. just know that he would stop if you asked, i'm sure." rodger stated. airy nodded.
"glisten didn't receive much physical attention in his formative years, i suppose being affectionate towards his friends is his way of making up for that." rodger explained, before letting out a tiny gasp, "don't tell him i told you that.."
"i won't." airy promised. towards his friends.......
rodger sighed, clasping his hands together. "right, well.. since you're here, would you like to help me look for research capsules?" rodger offered.
"oh, okay." airy said, nodding.

airy followed rodger around for a while, picking up what rodger had called "research capsules" whenever they came across them. rodger paused while airy cranked an extraction machine they stumbled on, and they continued on after that. airy enjoyed rodgers company. he was mostly quiet, like astro, only muttering to himself a few times, which airy didn't mind. rodger also didn't make a point to drag him around like glisten had. thinking about glisten made airy feel warm again, so he focused instead on the sound of his and rodgers footsteps. after a while vees voice called out again to get everyone to make their way back to the elevator. they were already close, so it took them only a few short moments to get there. vee and shelly were already waiting inside, then looey came sprinting up, far faster than he'd been before. the balloon toon let out an exhausted huff as he slumped to the ground against an elevator wall.
"you look rough." vee commented.
looey waved his hands dismissively, though airy thought he looked a bit deflated. "i-i'm fine, don't worry about it!" he insisted.
vee stared at him for a moment, a blank expression on her face. she approached him silently, flattening a bandage over a hole in his ear. "don't lie about your health, looey. i don't care if you're faster when you're hurt, dying isn't helpful to anyone." vee stated. looey looked embarrassed, staring at the ground as he brought his knees to his chest to hug them.
"HEY SHITHEAD." airy turned to see shrimpo stomping towards the elevator, finn was nowhere in sight.
"I'VE HAD IT WITH YOU. I'M PUTTING THUMB TACKS IN YOUR ROOM." shrimpo yelled, pointing at looey.
"what did i do??" looey cried, ears drooping.
"I LOOK AWAY FROM FINN FOR TWO SECONDS AND HE'S DEAD! WHERE WERE YOU???" shrimpo growled. the weight of their fury was suffocating. if that's how it makes me feel, i can't imagine how looey must feel right now..
looey let out a quiet whine, hugging his legs tighter. "ugh, you're such a bully, shrimpo! leave him alone, it's not looey's fault!" vee scolded.
"ohhh because NOTHING is ever looeys fault, i guess!" shrimpo threw their arms up in frustration.
glisten sprinted up to the elevator. he was being followed, no.. chased by what looked like yatta, but her face was distorted in an unsettling grin that made airy shudder. her eyes glowed red, and a black liquid was dripping from her ears and face. once glisten had made it into the elevator, the twisted yatta hissed, her smile turning to a frown as she squinted at the bright elevator lights. she backed off as the door closed.

the air was tense as the elevator traveled deeper down. airy moved to stand next to glisten, a silent way of showing he wasn't upset with him.
"dandy." vee said flatly as she approached the pop-up shop.
"vee." dandy replied. his expression was blank and unreadable.
vee picked up a medpack, and handed dandy something airy couldn't see well.
"sold." dandy said, turning away from her. his shop lowered back into the ground after a short while.
vee pointed at the spot in the floor where it had been a moment ago, looking at shrimpo and glisten. "see? that's how you deal with dandy." she said snarkily.

Chapter Text

[FLOOR 6]

airy walked with glisten a few paces from the elevator before looey walked up behind the two of them.
"hey, glisten, i know you said airy's good at extracting and everything, but i still think he should um.. have some basic distraction skills.. just in case! can i borrow him?" looey asked. airy glanced at looey, confused. glisten let out a disappointed sigh.
"i suppose, just keep him safe, alright?" glisten stated. looey nodded eagerly, his tail wagging a bit.
"rodger, would you be a dear and partner with me for this floor?" glisten called. rodger looked a tad flustered for a moment, turning and skipping over to him.
"that would be lovely." rodger stated after clearing his throat.
airy watched them leave. he took note that this floor looked more run down than the ones previous, it made him shiver a bit.
"we've got finn and scraps." vee said, then she pointed somewhere to the left. "finn is hanging around a machine and scraps is closeby there. i have to keep an eye on shrimpo, you can handle this, right?" vee asked. airy thought looey looked uncertain, but the balloon dog nodded anyway.
"shouldn't be too hard, plus, i've got airy with me now." looey assured her.
closer to the elevator, shrimpo was pushing shelly away from themselves, exclaiming "I DON'T NEED BABYSITTERS, I'M NOT AN INFANT! I'M BETTER AT THIS THAN ANY OF YOU. SHRIMPO WINS!" they tried to run away but shelly easily caught up to them.
"little help, vee?" shelly shouted.
"that's my cue. good luck with the new guy." vee said, amused. then she strode over to shelly and shrimpo.

looey gestured for airy to follow him. they went in the direction vee had pointed out, and her foresight turned out correct, as it always was. airy recognized the disfigured form of finn lying on his stomach frighteningly close to a machine. the other, that must have been scraps, looked like a cat of some kind. airy thought he might have seen her in the dining area briefly, but any semblance of personhood had been drained from the both of them, shown clear in their red bloodshot eyes. looey ducked behind a shelf for a moment, pulling airy along with him.
"distracting is easy, all you have to do is keep the twisteds occupied and out of everyones way, alright?" looey explained.
"is that really finn..?" airy asked with a shudder. he couldn't believe finn was dead, but that... thing... sure looked like him. i wonder if he's in the waiting room..?
"not the finn you knew. no one really knows what the twisteds are, they look like us, though..." looey stated. that just confused airy a bit more.
"i can handle finn, you deal with scraps." looey told him. he prepared to jump out from behind the bookcase, but airy grabbed his arm.
"looey are you okay?" airy blurted out. looey faltered, staring at him. his eyes gave away a kind of tiredness he'd been masking until now. airy noticed how thickly his facepaint was plastered on, especially just under his eyes. possibly trying to cover up eyebags from sleep depravation. airy frowned.
"don't worry about me-! we can't keep standing around, we have a job to do. get scraps to chase you, airy, and watch out for her tail. we can talk later." looey jabbered, not giving airy time to respond before he sprinted away to get twisted finns attention. airy walked out more slowly, spotting scraps after just a moment. he waved his arms in the air.
"hey, um, scraps.. ooover here." he said. the cat twisted growled at him, claws digging in the worn carpet before she started stalking towards him. whenever he could, he would duck behind walls or shelves, making sure to stay well out of her way. he led her far away from the extraction machine she'd been lurking around. at some point he spotted the familiar green light that gave away a completed machine and decided bringing her there would be a safe bet, since the others would be looking for empty ones. airy wasn't nearly as fast as looey, but he managed to outpace scraps most of the time by losing her behind objects. his heart pounded loud against his chest. it was nerve-racking doing something that felt so dangerous. especially after seeing what happened to finn. he tried not to let it distract him.

"everybody back to the elevator!" vees voice called out. scraps turned her head in its direction, giving airy just enough time to lose her. he stumbled to the elevator, panting a bit as he stepped inside. shrimpo was already sitting in a corner, looking frustrated. vee stood near the front, and shelly was close to her. rodger and glisten came next, then looey. vee had to put another bandage on him since it seemed like he'd been hit again.
"i swear, sometimes i feel like you do that on purpose." vee growled as she flattened the band down over the puncture in his tail.
"you don't..do you?"
looey didn't respond, looking off in some vague direction.
airy moved to sit down next to him. "can we talk now?" he asked.
"i'm fine, airy, i mean it.." looey insisted, frowning.
"i know what it's like to have people hate you.." airy whispered. one of looey's ears raised up, concern replacing his sadness.
"it's... hard... and what..shrimpo said to you was awful." airy continued. looeys ear drooped again. he crossed his arms over his stomach.
"no one deserves to die over a mistake." airy stated.
"what if i do deserve it..?" looey croaked quietly, his voice squeaking like.. well.. a balloon.
"why?"
"i... i'm not good enough... no matter how hard i try, i always end up getting someone killed... i'm unreliable... no one even likes me all that much..."
airy blinked at him sympathetically. i know how that feels..
"i like you, looey." airy stated, resting his hand on looey's shoulder. looey sniffled, rubbing his nose.
"do you..?"
airy nodded. looey shifted closer to airy, wrapping his arms around him and nuzzling close to his chest. he's like a puppy...
vee nudged airys leg with her foot, "break it up, snugglebugs, we're here."

Chapter Text

[FLOOR 10]

they lost shrimpo on floor 8, there was a blackout, and with shrimpo still being angry and insisting on going off alone, and the appearance of twisted flutter on that floor, it had clearly been a recipe for absolute disaster. airy noted that floor ten looked a bit more worse for wear than the previous floors. it reminded him sort of of old office buildings. ugly wallpaper, bright fluorescent lightbulbs, and papers scattered absolutely everywhere. vee stood still, tapping her microphone a couple times. she let out a deep breath.
"it's only rodger and glisten." she sighed, a small smile forming on her face.
"finally, a break!" shelly stated, stretching her arms.
glisten seemed to notice airys confusion and approached him, resting his hand on his shoulder. "twisted glisten and rodger aren't agressive like the rest of the twisteds." he explained. airy reached up and touched glistens hand there for a split second before the mirror moved it.
vee raised her voice a bit so the other five could hear her, "i think we should head back after this floor." she suggested, everyone seemed to agree with this.
"someone needs to keep an eye on glis. airy, i'm putting you in charge of that since you're new here." glisten said. airy stared at him for a moment, is that really such a good idea..? he could feel his face heating up again. glisten had already walked away with rodger so airy couldn't argue against the idea.
vee pointed somewhere to the right. "he's over there, good luck, and don't get too far away from him," she instructed, "he gets antsy if there's no one around."
vee reached out to hold hands with shelly and the two walked away somewhere else, and looey went off on his own, leaving airy alone by the elevator. to the right...

airy wandered for a bit before a voice caught his ear, painful in its familiarity, but off enough to be recognized as separate.
"is anyone there..?"
airy froze. up a short staircase was the shattered form of the once handsome mirror airy had grown to know. it wasn't how horrifyingly disfigured twisted glisten was that frightened him; it was the sight of the left side of his face. a massive broken crack that removed his left eye entirely. the hole was void and black with ichor that stained the broken glass around it. subconsciously airy reached up to touch his own left eye, as though making sure it was still there. he knew every bit of how painful losing your eye felt, he wouldn't wish that kind of torture on anyone. to see glisten, or at least a version of glisten, like that... airy felt like he'd been stabbed through the heart. a painful jolt that made his breath catch. all his senses were screaming at him to go comfort him, try desperately to make him feel loved and cared for. a charity he wasn't granted when liam saw him like that. as airys thoughts whirled around him he hadn't noticed the twisted get closer. his bloodshot eye locked with airys and both said nothing for a while.
"you're not going to leave.. are you..?" twisted glisten whimpered. though his voice sounded less like it was coming from his mouth and more like an echo bounced back from some long time ago.
airy slowly and gently pulled the twisted into a hug, running his fingers lightly across the jagged metal on his back.
"no." airy responded. he could hear the shaky breaths of glisten as he sniffled and hugged airy back, twice as tight. actually, his grip on him was a bit scary. airy felt as though any minute glisten could kill him. his body collapsing in on itself, broken by the force of the twisteds hold. he tried not to think about it. when he pulled back glisten seemed to release him. black tears beading under his eye. airy moved a hand to caress his cheek, he touched the edge of the crack, shivering at the familiarity of the feeling. he winced suddenly. pulling his hand away to see the tiny bead of red forming on his fingertip. airy stepped back, holding his hand in a tight fist in an attempt to stop the bleeding.
"i've gotta help do machines." airy mumbled, mostly to himself. he decided to take glistens hand, bringing him along so he wouldn't get too far away, like vee said.

they only encountered twisted rodger once. the detective stood silently in a corner and stared as the two of them walked by. airy thought he could hear looey muttering to himself at one point, but once he came into his sight, the balloon dog flinched and ran off somewhere else.

all in all the machines were completed relatively quickly after that. but when vee gave the call, airy was hesitant to leave glistens side. he stood a few feet away from him, glancing in the direction of vees voice, and back to glisten again. taking a deep breath, he spoke up. "i have to go now.. i'd stay if i could.."
twisted glisten said nothing, instead taking a couple of unsure steps towards him. airy could feel the flame light in his head this time. not giving himself enough time to think it through, he stepped close to twisted glisten. their eyes locked one last time as airy pressed a kiss to the twisted's forehead. the flame in his head roared so harshly his ears rang. he turned immediately and ran away, covering his face with his hands in embarrassment. i can't believe i just did that i can't believe i just did that.. why did i do that..?????

airy couldn't bring himself to face glisten, the real glisten, in the elevator once he got there. collapsing onto the ground in a ball of uncomfortable heat. vee yelling at him for cutting it too close before the elevator would've closed fell on deaf ears. all he could think about was what he'd just done.

he hated how his mind had started replacing twisted glisten's face with that of normal glisten.

it finally dawned on him why he was feeling so warm.

Chapter Text

airy had sat on the floor the entire elevator ride back, not daring to look at anyone and trying his best to calm himself. he probably looked like he was having a panic attack of some kind. which was why it was no surprise when shelly sat beside him and asked if he was doing okay.
airy looked at her with a dull expression.
"are you okay? you look kind of rough." shelly repeated. airy blinked as she rested the back of her hand against his forehead. "you're running a fever i think." she noted. airy shook his head.
"you didn't get any ichor on you, did you?"
"what?"
"the black stuff on the twisteds? it can make you sick if you're not careful." shelly explained. airy's mind was brought back to what had happened on the last floor. the feeling of glass against his lips... he pushed the strange feelings in his head away, trying to remember if there was any of that ichor stuff in that spot. there very well might have been, but he was too caught up in getting out of there to remember. quite frankly he had no idea. i'm probably fine, my face is warm from the flame... even though it had went out some time ago the warmth lingered.
"no. i'm alright." airy assured her, though shelly must've picked up on his uncertainty, cause she raised an eyebrow at him.
"okay, if you say so. but if you start feeling sick at all go straight to the medbay." she instructed. "it's right outside the lobby, down the hall."
airy nodded. shelly sat with him for the rest of the elevator ride. she didn't touch him much but it was still nice being close to someone. he was starting to get used to closeness again. it was comforting, like returning home after two years of college.

the elevator opened in the lobby and glisten and rodger stepped out, deep in conversation about something or other. toodles, who had likely been waiting for them, was sitting on a bench by the tree. she stood and ran over to them, tugging on rodger's sleeve and saying something airy didn't catch before pulling the detective somewhere else. glisten chuckled and followed them more slowly. airy had to stop himself from staring at him. looey left the elevator next, going in a different direction, and shelly left after that. airy stood finally and walked to stand beside vee. she was just outside the elevator. looking at her jogged a memory in his mind suddenly, something she said earlier...
"hey, um, vee... you... earlier you said you had a game show." airy prompted. vee turned to him.
"have." vee corrected him blankly. airy nodded, fidgeting with his hands.
"um... i really like gameshows, do you have any of the episodes taped..?" airy asked shyly. it had been years since he'd watched a proper gameshow. his computer didn't connect to the internet so doing his own show was his only real entertainment. his heart lurched at the thought of ONE. he hoped his contestants were safe. maybe liam would find a way to send them home..?
vee's face brightened at the question. "of course i do. i'll show you." vee ushered him back into the elevator, hitting a couple buttons. as the door slid shut vee asked him, "what kinds of gameshows do you like?"
"um... i watched jeopardy a lot.." airy said.
vee smiled at him, "jeopardy is great. one of my favorites. other than my own, of course." airy smiled back at her.

they got to the projector room fairly quickly. it was a large room with tall ceilings, and a similar layout to some of the floors they'd visited on their run. one of the walls had a big white sheet on it like in a movie theater. airy noticed someone was already in there. up the short staircase and sitting on a beanbag chair. they seemed to have two heads, shaped like masks. airy could see in the dim light that both heads wore headphones connected to the same music player. "that's razzle and dazzle, they won't bother us." vee said, walking up the staircase. the lighter coloured head, belonging to razzle, opened his eyes and looked over at airy. he gave him a smile and waved before closing his eyes again.

airy slowly followed vee up the short staircase. by the time he'd made it to the top she had already disappeared somewhere to look for the tapes. airy sat in a beanbag chair a short distance from r&d. razzle looked at him again and took his headphones off. airy could faintly hear the music the two were listening to. he didn't recognize it at all so it probably came out some time after he... died originally...
"are you airy?" razzle asked. airy nodded. word about him had probably traveled to the other toons pretty fast after breakfast that morning. though airy didn't think he'd seen these two before. maybe they ate in their room.
"yeah that's me."
"nice to meet you, i'm razzle, and that's my brother, dazzle." razzle nodded towards the grayer head.
"vee told me, yeah."
airy's eyes drifted back to where vee had disappeared to. razzle seemed to put his headphoes back on since he wasn't talking anymore.

a few moments later vee walked out carrying a cardboard box full of tapes and set it on the floor beside the projector. airy walked over to her as she haphazardly dug through the box, looking for a specific tape most likely. after a bit she pulled out a tape labeled "VQC-1 FLOWER POWER".
vee frowned at the tape. "this is episode one, it's awful but it's probably best to start from the beginning so you know how the show works." vee stated. her face flashed an error screen for a brief moment before swapping to a look of either disgust or embarrassment, airy couldn't tell. she stood and popped the tape into the projector, before walking with airy back to the beanbags. the two sat as the tape started playing.

a title card that read "VEE'S QUIZZICAL CORNER" appeared onscreen before slowly fading out to a stage decorated with a green and grey colour scheme. a live studio audience gave applause in the background as the camera panned in towards vee, who was stood at a podium shuffling through some note cards. airy noted she looked somehow a bit younger in the video, despite being a robot. vee's attention turned to the camera. "hello hello and welcome to the very first episode of vee's quizzical corner!!!" she exclaimed. she held her arms out as green confetti rained down on her from the ceiling. the crowd applauded again. "today we have a very special guest joining us, please give a hand to gardenview's own dandicus dancifer!" airy thought she sounded like she was speaking through gritted teeth. he wasn't even sure she even had teeth, though. vee then gestured offscreen and the camera panned away, landing on a different toon standing at the podium in the middle of the stage. airy recognized the face immediately. it gave him chills. after his encounter with twisted dandy the first hour he'd arrived there, he couldn't find it in himself to be able to separate the twisted from the toon. even though he'd seen him in the elevator earlier and he seemed okay enough. though the more he looked at him, the more differences he noticed between this dandy and the dandy from the elevator earlier. his face seemed softer, friendlier, and he lacked the sharp teeth that present day dandy had. his smile was genuine, airy could tell from the dimples on his face, and the sparkles in his eyes as the studio audience cheered for him. he looked less... fake. fake was the only way airy could describe present dandy. there was something so very off about him, but he couldn't tell why, or what it was.
"i never wanted him on my show, but i didn't get much say on it. dandy was the mascot, he had to be there." vee grumbled quietly from beside him. vee didn't seem to like dandy very much, and airy couldn't say he blamed her. at least this dandy seemed more friendly.
the show went on, and vee introduced the contestants for that episode. all "mains," sprout, astro, and bobette; a toon airy didn't recognize.
it was a fairly simple quiz style show. contestants would hear a question relating to dandy, then they'd buzz in to give their answers. once everyone had answered, vee would announce who got it correctly. astro ended up winning. he seemed the most aquainted with dandy, airy thought. especially when dandy got up from behind his podium after the crowd cheered for astro to give the moon toon a tight bear hug and congratulate him. the tape flickered out into black and vee stood silently to remove it from the projector. she put another one inside and sat again. the show started playing in the background, but airy found his attention drifting elsewhere, back to his thoughts.
"i had my own show for a while..." airy mumbled. vee looked at him, intrigue plastered over her screen.
"oh?"
"well, not really a show,, wasn't filmed or anything..." airy fidgeted with his hands, he suddenly felt very nervous. if i'm not careful she'll think i'm some kind of crazy kidnapping stalker...
"just... a few people from all over, i put them in teams then they'd do challenges each day, whichever team lost would get a member eliminated.. mm.." airy explained vaguely.
vee nodded along, "interesting, so it was more of just a competition then, without the film crews."
"yeah."
"was there a prize of some kind..?"
"yeah... mm... a wish for anything." airy whispered. he gave himself chills.
vee snorted, "are you a genie??" she laughed, then her face grew more serious. "you are a lamp..." she mused, chuckling more.
"no.. i..." shit. what do i say here?? "um... i had a lot of money, so.. mm.. whoever won i could use some money to... do their wish... yeah..." airy lied. he didn't like lying much but the truth made so little sense that surely bending it here wouldn't hurt?
"how come you didn't film it?" vee asked.
"uh.. well... i would've liked to, but it didn't work out.. the competition kind of... fell apart after a while.." he responded, sadness clouded his voice. i would've liked to finish ONE. i never realized how much it was hurting everyone... i hope they're safe now...
vee turned her attention back to the projector screen. she didn't seem the best at comforting people.

they sat and binged most of the tapes in the box until airy fell asleep in his beanbag. vee brought him a blanket and left him alone to dream, going off somewhere else.

Chapter Text

airy found himself in some dark place. a floor from the looks of it. which one? he couldn't tell. the present blackout masked the layout everywhere except for a red light nearby. airy reached up to the back of his neck, twisting the knob to turn his light on. he squinted as his eyes adjusted to the dim light.

all airy knew was that he probably had to complete machines. he didn't know how he got here, but he probably had to. he made his way towards the first, though the distance between him and the machine seemed to grow larger with every step he took. then a massive form blocked out the red light from the machine, as well as the reflection of airy's flame in the glass. one more step revealed the sharp rainbow petals of twisted dandy, a creature that had haunted and terrified him internally ever since he got here. looey are you here? help!! when he tried to speak, no voice came out, just shuddered breaths as his body acted on insinct, backing away from the creature. he turned and ran, finding himself much slower than he'd like. dandy gave chase, clear from the loud thump of massive paws much too close behind him. and then, in the middle of a wide open room, with no places to hide, airy tripped. a piece of pulled up carpet caught on his foot and he plummeted to the floor with a loud crash, sending his lid tumbling a few feet away. airy flipped himself over, subconsciously checking his left eye for any damage. dandy let out a triumphant growl as it slowly crept towards him in a crouch akin to a hunting cat, hunger clear as day in the red eyes that glared down at him. airy felt no bigger than a child compared to the beast. he found himself unable to move his body, quivering in terror. all around him, blood red eyes gazed out at the scene from the safety of the shadows. dandy leapt from the spot, and airy felt the sharp claws of the twisted lock deep into his shoulders. warm sticky blood trickled from the wounds they made. the malformed toon wouldn't let up even as airy wiggled around, struggling under its grasp. in fact, the struggling seemed to intice the toon to dig its claws even deeper until it hit bone. dandy's face was no more than an inch away from airys, its blood stained teeth shimmered in the dim fire light coming out of the lanterns head.
"airy." dandy sneered, its voice nothing of the cheerful flower airy had seen on vee's show that afternoon. though he hadn't said much there, it was enough to show him just how different his twisted counterpart was.
"you may believe you are safe here, but you will not be able to avoid us. airy." its voice was more of the deep rumble of a hungry predator than a cartoon mascot for a childrens center, it seethed with loathing directed at the lamp. airy shivered, it sort of reminded him of his interactions with liam. the backpack had hated him, as the twisted seemed to now.
"looey and the other distractors cannot protect you forever."
airy noted the other twisteds surrounding them had gotten a bit closer. dozens of red bloodshot eyes were locked onto him, some with looks of hunger, others of distain. but glistens expression broke his heart the most. he could see despair and longing in the broken mirrors eye. airy wanted nothing more than to break free from twisted dandys grasp and run to his side. hold him and promise never to let go.
"one day, they will fail you. and you will die." dandy hissed. "and when you die, you will know what true hopelessness feels like. never in your lifetime will you learn what happened to make us like this..." dandy's face had gotten closer even still, growling right against his neck. "...but you will join us, and suffer as we have. to eternally hunt down those you hold most dear. powerless to stop yourself from tearing their broken bodies limb from limb."
finally dandy let up, padding off somewhere outside of airy's vision. airy made a move to push himself to his feet, but his arms failed him. he looked down, noticing the scarlet of his blood slowly mixing with the black ichor left behind on the floor by the twisted. his blood began to run out black. he let out a small gasp as his body began to rust around where the blood dripped and outwards. a hole crumbled itself through his torso. he felt a sharp stinging in his eye, the same one he'd lost once before, then a shattering sound as half of his vision went dark. all he could do was cry, but he sounded like a machine that needed oil, an awful screech that would grate ones ears to listen to.

and finally, he woke up.

Chapter Text

finn was able to locate a machine pretty quickly in all fairness. he'd offered to let shrimpo do it, but they'd refused. instead they'd insisted on stomping around the area he was in to "keep watch", whatever that meant. they had looey with them, surely he'd keep them safe? especially since vee was helping him. finn cranked the machine in silence for a little while, before gazing over at shrimpo. their little stomps on the ground made him giggle. they looked sort of like a bodyguard. a tiny, adorable bodyguard.

BEEEEEEP.

finn flinched as a cold fear ran down his spine. shrimpo, startled, had got their claws caught on a carpet a decent distance away, and had fell. they were currently trying to get their claws unsnagged. finn looked back at the machine. he had failed a skillcheck. carp.. he'd failed a skillcheck because he was distracted by shrimpo. shitt...
he looked to his side and was even more startled by the appearance of twisted looey, currently making a b-line towards him. finn took a couple of steps back, too frightened to remember to run.

"FINN!" shrimpo shouted, tugging at their leg that was still stuck until they'd finally freed it. they waved their arms around as they stood, trying to get the twisted's attention. but it was too late by then. they recoiled as finn was shoved to the ground, his glass head shattering on impact. twisted looey didn't seem to notice shrimpo, his eyes instead locked to something a small distance away.
"H-hey, over here!!" it was looey's voice. twisted looey scowled at his living counterpart, and ran in that direction, leaving shrimpo alone with finn's body.
shrimpo walked over to him, collapsing to their knees. finn... why does this keep happening???
they frowned, eyebrows furrowing as they stood to finish the machine, luckily it was almost done so it didn't take an insane amount of time.

-

finn opened his eyes, squinting as they adjusted to the brighter lights in the medbay. sprout was sitting a short distance away, reading a book before noticing finn.
"oh, oh dear, are you feeling alright finn..?" he asked.
"well, dying is never fun.." finn said, moving to sit up and dangle his legs off the side of the medical cot.
"i just hope shrimpo is okay."
sprout raised an eyebrow at him. finn broke eye contact. can't tell. don't tell. you promised.
sprout set his book down and picked up a clipboard, walking over to him. he checked his blood pressure, heartbeat, reflexes. a pretty standard medical check-up. it was always good to do that after a respawn, just in case something didn't go correctly somehow. none of them knew how the respawn machine even worked, who knew if it would malfunction one day?
"you're good to go, finn." sprout stated cheerfully. he gave finn a pat on the back as he got up.
"thank cod." finn chuckled.
"good to see your sense of humor is still intact." sprout said. finn noted how he didn't laugh, like, at all.
"finn." finn looked up, astro was standing at the door.
"thought you were napping?" finn said, surprised.
"i was. are you okay?" astro asked, walking a bit farther into the medbay.
"mhm, doctor sprout here said i'm fit as a dolphin." finn chuckled.
sprout stared at him with a look that said 'i didn't say that.'
"i'm more worried about shrimpo, really. they were with me when i died, i hope they're alright.." finn rambled as he walked to the door.
sprout huffed, rolling his eyes.
"is that because they're your.." astro paused, noticing both finn and sprout's eyes had locked on to him.
"what?" finn squeaked.
astro held his blanket a bit tighter in nervousness. "nevermind."
HE KNOWS?????????

Chapter Text

looey opened his door slowly, gazing around the floor, looking for any signs of thumb tacks. it had happened before. he didn't doubt shrimpo's threats. in fact, he had died several times before because of things like this. but there wasn't any tacks on the floor. he took one careful step through the door, bracing himself in case he'd simply missed it. nothing. he opened his eyes, touching his face as though he was surprised to be alive. maybe they forgot..? he walked a bit farther into the room, making it close enough to sit down on the edge of his bed. his gaze drifted to the nightstand. he froze when he noticed an object lying on top of it. it was a nail. he shifted closer to look at the small scrap of paper it was lying on. a sticky note that simply read "I HATE BALLOONS."

looey picked up the nail, turning it over in his hand. his mind flashed back to the time sprout had insisted on checking every inch of looey's room for sharp objects. that day he'd had a bad breakdown after dying in a run and accidentally confessed to hurting himself to sprout, who had been in charge of the medbay at the time. he hadn't revealed to any other toon the specific reason behind checking looey's room for dangerous objects, just that "he could get hurt." which would have been fine, if rodger hadn't uncovered the box looey kept under his bed. inside it was a stash of bands, and a shit ton of tacks. it took them a good hour to find every other sharp object he'd had stashed around, and everyone had promised looey they wouldn't let word get out about his problems. and if he ever felt like doing it again, he should go directly to sprout. it had been almost a year since then. did looey listen? no. in fact, he'd been getting worse lately. and the thought of talking to sprout specifically about all this made him feel sick to his stomach.

he turned the nail over again. some little voice in his mind reminding him of how good it felt, and how much he deserved it after the awful runs he'd been on lately. he shook his head, choosing to ignore the urges as best he could handle. he stashed the nail, and the sticky note, in the drawer on the nightstand. later. i'm too tired to deal with that right now.. he whispered in his mind. he lied down on his back, hands folded over his chest. he tried to ignore the berating thoughts rushing through his mind, but before he knew it, tears welled up in his eyes. he turned onto his side to face the wall beside his bed, curling in on himself and clutching his stomach as stifled whimpers filled the room.

he was alone for a while before the door flung open and blot and yatta entered. blot walked to his side of the room, sitting on his bed and continuing his conversation with yatta. looey didn't catch much of what was said on his end, it was hard enough to tell what he was saying anyway, even harder when you're busy crying.
"it was kind of ridiculous, i mean come on! he knows i love sweets, there's no reason i couldn't have had seconds." yatta complained, sitting down on looey's rolly chair and spinning around in it. blot folded his legs under himself, nodding to yatta.
"?uoy evig ot sdnoces yna t'nsaw ereht fi tahw tub sey" blot noted. (yes but what if there wasn't any seconds to give you?)
yatta stared at him like he was stupid. "there was seconds! i saw him giving boxten more waffles. why does BOXTEN get more waffles but not ME??" yatta yelled, throwing her arms up and leaning back in the chair frustratedly.
"?egludnirevo uoy esuaceb" blot pointed out. (because you overindulge?)
yatta huffed, crossing her arms. "i think cosmo just hates me." she said, pouting.
".attay, uoy fo diarfa s'eh kniht i" blot chuckled. (i think he's afraid of you, yatta.)
yatta blinked, then laughed with him.
"afraid i'll EAT him!!" she snorted.
"!mih tae t'nod" blot exclaimed. (don't eat him!)
yatta laughed again. she stood from the chair and walked over to looey's bed, climbing about halfway up the ladder to her top bunk before pausing and looking down to see the disheveled looking balloon dog on the bottom bunk.
"ohmigosh LOOEYYY!.." yatta shrieked, letting go of the ladder and tumbling to the ground in a clumsy summersault. she stood almost immediately, crawling onto looey's bunk and instinctively wrapping her arms around him. blot had got up and walked close enough to see what was going on.
"looeyyyyy..." yatta nuzzled against looey's neck, her rough paper fur rubbing uncomfortably against his skin. he didn't mind it though, he was used to her.
"i told you to tell me if you were feeling saaadd..." yatta whined.
looey sniffled, rubbing some tears from his eyes. "i didn't wanna bother you.." he mumbled.
"that's bs, looey. you know i'd drop anything to make sure you're okay." yatta stated, hugging him tighter.
"?deneppah tahw" blot asked. (what happened?)
"yeah, what happened?" yatta pulled away from him, shifting to sit facing him on the end of his bed with her legs crossed.
"did you get hurt? did someone hurt you?? was it shrimpo??? i bet it was shrimpo!! they're always putting tacks in our room!!!" yatta concluded.
looey sniffled. he didn't want to admit it, but it was partially shrimpo's fault. he tried not to let the capricious little toon's words get to him, but it was hard when so many of them reflected his own thoughts about himself. he found his mind agreeing with just about everything they said to him whenever he was the target of their rage. and it hurt hearing that stuff out loud.
looey rubbed his nose. "don't worry about it.." he muttered, gazing off at nothing in particular.
"well now i AM!" yatta chided.

looey yelped as yatta threw herself over him, pretty much pinning him down. looey stared up at her, fear drying up his previous sadness. he moved so he was lying facing her properly. her expression showed a level of concerned determination that he recognized very easily from her.
"!eltneg eb attay-y" blot stammered. (y-yatta be gentle!)
"WHO HURT YOU LOOEY?" yatta demanded. "IF I HAVE TO KILL SOMEONE, I WILL."
"t-that's not necessary, yatta-" looey stuttered. he felt uncomfortable. there were several toons he'd much rather be in this position with.. yatta wasn't one of them.

yatta stared down at him. no one made a move or any kind of noise for a few minutes at least. the silence droned on until another voice could be heard.
"hey looey, i know you just went on a run but could you-AH-!" poppy's words were cut off by a look of cold embarrassment. ".EKIL SKOOL TI TAHW TON S'TI" blot scrambled to sign to her while he spoke, since poppy couldn't understand him. (IT'S NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE.)
"i-if you're busy that's fine-!" poppy covered her eyes with a hand and slowly backed away.
"HI POPPYYY!!" yatta exclaimed, letting looey up and running over to the door. clearly yatta didn't understand what poppy thought was happening there.
"i'm not busy! what did you need?" yatta asked. poppy blinked, sort of realizing she was wrong. she coughed, not making eye contact with the acrobat.
"uhh.. i was going to ask looey to come on a run with me and boxten.." poppy explained quietly.
"grrrr boxten.." yatta muttered.
poppy gave her a confused look.
"looey is sad right now, but i can come with you!" yatta offered.
poppy's expression lit up a bit. "oh, okay! that sounds good! um.. i hope you feel better looey!" poppy called. looey didn't look at her, he just grunted and hugged his knees.
"you can handle this, right blot?" yatta asked, starting to walk away with poppy. blot looked like a deer in headlights. "!elpoep trofmoc ot woh wonk t'nod i" he cried. (i don't know how to comfort people!)
but yatta was already gone by that point. blot looked over at looey sadly.
looey moved so he was sitting upright. "it's okay buddy.. being around you guys made me feel a little better anyways, you don't have to do anything.." looey said softly. blot shook his head, walking over to the bed and climbing up to sit beside him. blot hugged looey from the side, resting his chin on the balloon dog's shoulder. "that works... thanks blot..." looey whispered, leaning against him.

Chapter Text

airy's eyes shot open with a start. he sat up, clutching the blanket tight to his chest and gazing around as his eyes adjusted again to the dim light in the projector room. the vision of his nightmare lingered in his mind like a vengeful parasite rearing its head, come to tear him down into despair how he'd been back in his old world. it took him a few shaky moments of heavy breathing to come back into reality.

a movement just outside his vision made him flinch, and as he turned to see what it was, he half expected twisted dandy to be crouched there, sneering at him with its stupid cheshire grin. but it wasn't. airy took at deep breath as he took in the sight of astro. he was sitting in the beanbag vee had previously occupied. r&d weren't there anymore, either. it was just him and astro.

"hhhhi." airy murmured, shifting his blanket to drape over his shoulders like a cape. he held the front edges together similarly to how astro did with his own.
"hi. are you feeling alright? that was a nasty nightmare." astro asked, tilting his head. airy felt the goosebumps on his arms. how does he..?
"i can walk in peoples dreams.." astro explained, as though he'd read the lamp's mind, gazing off somewhere else.
"oh."
airy fidgeted with his hands under the blanket. in all honesty, he wasn't sure how he was feeling.
"i'm.. i'm scared i guess... um... worried..." airy answered after a while.
astro nodded, "yeah. do you um.. want a hug..?" he offered. airy paused, thinking on it.
"um.."
airy took his lid off so it wouldn't get in the way, and silently shifted closer to astro, resting his head against where astro's chest might be under the blanket. he felt astro move back a little bit, then two arms left the safety of the blanket, leaving a second set hidden, still holding onto it. he felt astro's lower arms wind around his torso, pulling him close into a warm embrace that, for the first time in years, made him feel truly cared for.
"i'm glad i met you..." airy mumbled, relishing the warmth the hug brought.
astro smiled. "i'm glad i met you too, airy. i'll make sure you only have good dreams from now on, okay?" astro promised.
airy pulled back from the hug, putting his lid back on. he fidgeted with his hands for a moment before holding onto his globe guards. "thank you."
"of course. anyway... it's getting pretty close to dinner time. would you like to go wait in the cafeteria with me?" astro offered, standing and holding out one of his still exposed hands to airy. airy took it and allowed astro to pull him back to his feet.
"that would be nice." airy agreed. astro turned and walked off towards the elevator and airy followed a short distance behind. it was only then when he realized how hungry he'd gotten. eating that morning felt like six blissful lifetimes ago. he wasn't quite used to food again yet, but hunger tends to become more ravenous after eating a big meal. that's why airy didn't eat much in his old world, so the starvation that followed wouldn't be so bad. the others must have noticed how malnourished he looked when he first got there; and how malnourished he probably still looked. it would take many months worth of meals to get him looking less like a sickly victorian lantern and more like how he used to be. however long ago that was by now. his body wouldn't change much, but his limbs certainly would. astro pressed a button in the elevator and airy could feel it going up.

as astro led airy into the cafe they could hear the loud sounds of yelling coming from the kitchen doors.

"come on, i don't see what the big deal is!" sprout cried as cosmo smacked him lightly on the head with a spatula.
"the last time you tried to cook for people, they all got food poisoning!" cosmo hissed, blocking sprout from getting back into the kitchen by holding his arms out in front of the doors.
"so i didn't cook the shrimp enough, big deal! i'll do better this time cozzy, cross my heart!" sprout insisted. cosmo shook his head furiously, smacking sprout with the spatula again.

"what's going on here?" astro called to the two. they both froze and turned to look at him.

Chapter Text

cosmo and sprout stood, awkwardly staring at astro.
"hey astro..." sprout chuckled as astro approached the two. "i thought i could help with dinner tonight." sprout stated, casting a glance at cosmo.
cosmo huffed, not moving from his place in front of the doors.
"didn't you give people food poisoning last time?" astro pointed out quietly. sprout's face flushed with embarrassment, though it was kind of hard to tell, and cosmo pointed at him.
"that's what i'm saying!!" cosmo agreed. "sprout's not allowed in the kitchen for dinner related stuff."
"i can't believe you think i can't cook!" sprout retaliated.
cosmo rolled his eyes, "no. i KNOW you can't cook!" he corrected him.

"i know how to cook..." airy said quietly. the other three turned to look at him.
"oh hi.. um... airy..?" sprout guessed. airy gave a slight nod to confirm he had the correct name.
"i'm um..." i haven't cooked properly in several decades. "a little out of practice, but i can make soup." airy concluded.
cosmo's face lit up. "that's great! airy," cosmo grabbed airy's wrist, "you're helping me make dinner."
"what?! he gets to help and i don't? coz, we barely know this guy!!" sprout cried.
"i don't trust you around savory food sprout!" cosmo insisted.
"you mean you don't trust me!" sprout yelled, running away.
"sprout you know that's not what i meant!!" cosmo called after him. sprout was too far away by then to hear him.
cosmo sighed. "well. we'd better get dinner started." he stated. astro went to sit at a table with a book, airy noticed it had cats on the cover.

cosmo dragged airy by the arm into the kitchen. he watched the cake roll rummage around a drawer for a moment before tossing him a plain white apron with the words "fish can't stand him!" embroidered on it.
"that's finn's apron, but he's not using it right now so i'm sure he won't mind." cosmo stated.
isn't finn dead..?
airy didn't take long to dwell on it. cosmo's apron said "your opinion wasn't in the recipe." which made airy snort. the two sat side by side on some stools beside the kitchen island. cosmo set a recipe book down in front of them and flipped to the section with soup recipes.
he stood up again as he spoke, "i'm getting a couple of pots, you find a recipe." airy nodded, beginning to flip through the pages. his mind was taken back to his childhood kitchen. the uncomfortable feeling of his mother's eyes looming over his shoulder as he looked through the notecards that held their family's recipes. warren skimmed through the words on the slightly worn paper. his mother's handwriting was beautiful, but he could barely read it. he silently handed the notecard over his shoulder and it was taken by a red and white hand while warren put the rest of the cards back in their case.
"beef soup? good choice. i trust you can handle this by yourself, warren?" his mother's voice was akin to a cold sneer. she assumed he couldn't possibly make dinner all by himself yet, but she had been willing to give him a chance to prove himself. finally.
"i'm 13 mom, i know how a stove works." warren stated as catherine handed the notecard back to him.
"if you fuck this up, you're paying for the groceries you wasted." catherine said as she left the kitchen. warren stared down at the notecard, silently memorizing the ingredients and the very vague instructions written on the back of the card.

the sound of fingers snapping next to his face snapped airy out of his semi dissociative state.
"airy? are you okay?" cosmo asked. airy turned to look at him as cosmo waved his hand in front of his face.
"sorry. remembering things.." airy muttered vaguely. he held the recipe he'd decided on up so cosmo could see it.
"oh, good choice, haven't made that one in a while." cosmo nodded.
airy set the recipe book back on the counter before standing up.
"my mom used to make this." airy noted.
"oh cool."

airy and cosmo gathered up the ingredients pretty quickly. as airy chopped vegetables, cosmo spoke up again.
"what was your mom like, if you don't mind me asking?"
"oh uh... she was... weird. i... stopped talking to her after i moved out." airy explained quietly.
cosmo nodded. airy willed him to not press farther. "what about you?"
"oh um.. heh, never really knew my mom. growing up it was just me, my dad, my uncle, and my cousin ginger." cosmo said. "my dad was nice. he was a baker. taught me everything i know. he wasn't too fond of the idea of me coming here but, y'know how things go." cosmo shrugged.
airy nodded, scooping up the carrots he'd chopped and putting them aside in a bowl. he went to cut some celery next. airy and cosmo worked in silence for a while before the kitchen door slammed open. airy and cosmo turned to see what the commotion was, just to find a sort of disheveled looking rodger leaning against the doorframe to catch his breath.
"i forgot i was on dinner duty, cosmo, my sincerest apologies." rodger huffed, taking a deep breath and standing up straight again.
"no biggie! airy's helping me." cosmo gestured towards the lamp on the other side of the kitchen. airy waved shyly at rodger.

the magnifying glass went to grab his apron from the drawer. it read, "worlds okayest cook."
with rodger helping them they got the vegetable prep done in around 5 minutes. they made two batches of the soup, one with meat and one without for toons like boxten who didn't eat meat. airy found cooking with these two to be quite therapeutic. his bad memories of cooking alone in his childhood slowly replaced with the warm, happy memories of cooking with his new friends. around the tail end of the soup cooking sprout showed up again, standing awkwardly at the door until cosmo approached him.
"i'll be right back, you guys get this plated up." he'd said, before dragging sprout out of the kitchen to who knows where.

Chapter Text

"it's so unfair!" sprout huffed. he lighted up his bic, bringing it up to the blunt in his hand. looey sat on his bed beside him with his legs crossed. he felt awkward. he knew blot wouldn't care much for the weed smell that would be stuck in there for a while after this. but he didn't dare reprimand sprout seedly for smoking pot in his room. no. that would just ruin this. this tiny show of insecurity. the knowledge that looey was the first person sprout thought to go to in his time of need made looey's face feel warm.
maybe he loves me too..?
"i thought for sure we were past this," sprout paused to take another huff of smoke. looey muffled his cough with a hand. god he hated how weed smelled.
"but nooooo. because i fuck up a meal one time suddenly i'm some idiot who doesn't know what the hell i'm doing." sprout hissed. awkwardly, looey patted sprout on the back.
"he's just worried i think..." looey said quietly.
"worried my god awful cooking's gonna kill some'n..." sprout slurred.
"and if it does, we just respawn." looey joked, "i'd eat your cooking, sprout..."
"that makes one'a you. waant a hit?" sprout asked. the strawberry held the blunt closer to looey.

looey froze, feeling very awkward and just a little bit uncomfortable at the prospect.
he'll think you're a weak little baby, show him you're not scared of a little bit of weed! tentatively, looey took the blunt from sprout. he stared at for a moment. sprouts eyes boring into his soul as he waited for looey to join in with him getting high. i really, really don't want to do this. looey took a huff, half coughing out the smoke afterwards. he wasn't entirely sure how smoking worked. he'd never done it.
"careful." sprout took the blunt back. "breathe, looey." sprout said sweetly. he blew some smoke right into looey's face.
i hate this please stop... looey gulped, laughing awkwardly as his eyes watered.
"you'll get used to it." sprout cooed. looey scooted a couple inches away from him. uncomfortable.

sprout lied back on the bed and looey took the blunt from him again so it wouldn't catch the sheets on fire. sprout started giggling and didn't stop for about a whole five minutes. in that time looey tried to take another hit, finding it more successful than the last time. he could almost feel his brain turning to putty. he had no idea how sprout did stuff like this all the time.
"i don't even know what we were talking about, man..." sprout laughed. looey let out an awkward "heh." looking at sprout somberly.
"how cosmo banned you from cooking dinner?" looey gently reminded him. sprout shot up. he took the blunt from looey again and inhaled deep, letting out a big puff of smoke that made looey gag. sprouts eyes dilated more than they were before.
"i better go apologize. thanks fer talking with me loo." sprout mumbled, patting looey between the ears. he stood up, taking a moment to make sure he was stable, then walked to the door, leaving looey alone. the first thing looey did once he was gone was leave the fan on with the door open to hopefully get any of the lingering smoke to disperse, out of the circus troupe's room.
you're so beautiful, sprout. why do you destroy your mind like this...

god i wanna kiss him so bad.....

Chapter Text

rodger had been given the ridiculously difficult task of rangling everyone for dinner, and cosmo had went to speak with sprout, which left nothing for airy to do but stand around and wait. and so, airy sat down beside the astro that was huddled with his metaphorical nose in some book about cats. the light blue cover showed a scene of cats trailing through a snowy mountain range, with a rectangle portrait of a grey tabby in the center.
warriors, moonrise.
airy peered over astro's shoulder. "we're not looking for trouble, but if you are enemies, we can fight." the cat narrowed his eyes.-
he was going to read more but astro closed the book suddenly, startling airy just a bit.
"hi airy." astro said, setting the book down.
"hi." airy looked away awkwardly. "what are you reading?"
"warriors." astro replied absently. "i'm gonna get the book club to read the first series pretty soon."
"mm."
talking to astro was always so calm. there was no pressure to be funny, or say the right thing. him and astro truly were cut from the same cloth. so strangely at ease around each other that they could probably sit for hours in complete silence and still have a good time. to anyone else they might seem incredibly boring.
if airy had to choose anyone to take back to his old world with him, he'd choose astro.
he was broken from his thoughts of fond feelings by a certain ammonite shell sitting across from the two of them.
"invited airy to the mains table, huh astro?" shelly joked, smirking.
"he invited himself." astro replied, no particular emotion to his voice. airy nodded to confirm astro's words.
"well, anyways, this is pretty convenient because i actually have a question for you, airy!" shelly said, pointing at him.
airy stared at her, waiting.
"are you sleeping in the lobby again tonight?"
"um.... probably." airy said in a slightly hushed voice.
astro frowned. "you can't keep sleeping in the lobby, airy." he mumbled sadly.
it seemed like a light went off in shelly's head because her eyes started sparkling.
she snapped her fingers to get the boys' attention. "i just had the greatest idea... airy... why don't youuu..stay in my room?" shelly suggested with a smile so infectious airy almost felt the side of his mouth twitch.
"i wouldn't want to intrude..." airy said shyly.
"pfft! no way! i've got plenty of space, really!" shelly assured him. "and besides, it'd be so cool to have a roommate!" shelly stood from her chair and walked to the other side of the table with a spring in her step.
"come on, let's go get you a bed from the warehouse." she said, dragging airy up off his chair.
"we'll be back when dinner's served. later astro!" shelly said, waving to the moon toon as she grabbed airy by a globe guard and dragged him to the elevator.

"are you really sure i can stay in your room, shelly?" airy asked. he really didn't want to impose in her space.
"of course, i'd love to have you! oh, we're here!" shelly stepped out of the elevator, then immediately did a double take.
"what..?"
airy gazed at what she was looking at. all the shelves in the warehouse had been moved to the side walls to make room for one of those big above ground pools people install in their yards sometimes. a hose ran from a wall all the way over to the pool, slowly chipping away at filling it with water. finn poked his head up over the edge and held himself up with his arms. his life jacket was presently absent. airy saw it sitting on the ground a little ways off.
"oh, hey guys! check out the pool, pretty great right?" finn beamed.
"i thought you were dead." airy said flatly.
"i respawned, silly!" finn laughed.
"oh."
"this is so cool finn! what's the occasion?" shelly asked.
"trying to get that guy to clam down..." finn said a bit quieter, pointing his thumb towards shrimpo, who was huddled in a corner fidgeting with the drawstrings on their swim trunks. their face was scrunched up in a look that gave off held back excitement. they were clearly trying really hard not to smile.
"they always loved swimming, but there's nowhere to swim here. so i fixed that!" finn said, gazing fondly at shrimpo.
"aww, it's so sweet that you would do that for them, finn."
what a kind gesture... i hope other people will be able to use the pool...
"anywaves, what are you two down here for?" finn asked.
"mattress." airy stated.
"should be in one of those supply closets. i made shore not to block any doors."
shelly nodded and the two made their way across the room to search. sure enough, one of the side closets held a number of mattresses stacked up against a wall.
"i'll take this back to the elevator," shelly said, starting the tedious task of dragging a mattress back by herself, "try to find some sheets." airy nodded, leaving her to it.
the shelves in the warehouse weren't hard to search. eventually he found a set of green bedsheets with lighter green triangles printed on them.
this seems like it was made especially for me... he picked the sheets up and took them back to the elevator.

"oh, holiday sheets? are you a fan of christmas, airy?" shelly asked. airy hadn't even noticed the ridiculous bright red pillowcases that came with the set.
"no. i'm not using the pillowcases, i just liked the green."
"oh okay." shelly poked her head out of the elevator briefly.
"finn, shrimpo, it's almost dinnertime so maybe put this on pause?" she suggested.
"alright! thanks shelly!" finn called, waving to them as the elevator door closed.

airy gazed around shelly's room as she dropped the mattress beside a wall opposite from where her bed was. on one of the walls, there was a mural of dinosaurs. airy tried to mentally name all the dinosaurs he knew the names of pictured, but he could only name the t-rex and the triceratops. the rest were unknown to him.
"bassie painted that." shelly mumbled.
"who?"
"oh, you haven't met her yet. she's a holiday toon, they only come around during certain times of year. she'll be back around april. i think you'd like her, she's really sweet." shelly rambled. airy nodded absently. he tossed the red pillowcases away and put the green sheets on his new bed.
i really live here now...
the hole in his heart from being cut off from people for so long was starting to heal. he was feeling a sense of belonging that he'd never known before.
this is where i should've been all along. here in gardenview with these... toons.
"are you crying?" shelly's voice broke him from his thoughts. he reached a hand up, feeling the wetness under his eye.
"i'm just... tired." airy lied.
this is where i'm meant to be.
"oh, well... let's head to dinner so you can get to bed sooner." shelly left her room with airy trailing close behind. he made sure to memorize the look of the door before they left so he'd know where his room was. a tan door with an ammonite shell painted on it.

Chapter Text

finn turned the valve connected to the hose until he could hear the water at the end slow to a stop. he dragged the hose back away from the pool he built until he could wrap it back up and place it on the wall where it belonged.

shrimpo still sat huddled in the corner. they'd been there the entire time he was setting the pool up, not saying much of anything, not even their usual sharp remarks. their lower hands fidgeted with the untied drawstrings on their swim trunks, while their upper arms were wrapped tight over their exposed chest, as though they were cold or something of the sort.

finn walked over to them, trailing wet footprints as he walked. he'd just been in the pool, after all, albeit briefly. crouching to be closer to eye level with his companion, he gently replaced the strings they held with his hands, helping them to their feet.

shrimpo said nothing. their expression wasn't the same as it had been when airy and shelly came down earlier. instead resembling a nervous cat. their eyes didn't leave the spot they'd been staring at. finn guessed they might have gotten into some sort of dissociative state.

"i've got every-fin set up. you ready?" finn asked, keeping his tone quiet and soft.
"yeah.. i think i am." shrimpo decided, meeting his gaze.

finn let go of their hands and they walked side by side to the little step latter finn had set down beside the pool. it was only 5 feet deep, but that was still pretty deep for toons, and they couldn't just step over the sides.

sprout probably could. he was unreasonably tall. but finn didn't want to think about sprout right now. his focus was entirely on shrimpo.

he watched with fondness as they climbed up the step latter, peering down into the water before dropping in with a loud splash. finn followed close behind. he took a deep breath before letting himself sink to the bottom, dropping to his knees to keep his head below the surface.

it took his eyes a moment to adjust to the small amount of salt in the water. brackish is what it was technically called. shrimpo was a saltwater creature, so he'd made sure to put some salt in. they didn't have enough to make it truly ocean levels of salty, but brackish would do. they could breathe in brackish water.

finn could feel his gills open up once he'd been in the water for a few moments. his fishlike tail no longer hidden. most toons weren't aware of this phenomenon. finn was partially a "mermaid", though not quite in the same way as you'd imagine, and the features that defined this only really showed up when he was submerged. but enough about finn.

his gaze drifted back to shrimpo as he let out the breath he'd been holding, feeling the water flow down his throat and clog his lungs as he adjusted to breathing underwater again. shrimpo was already absolutely at ease. clear as the bright smile plastered on their face. it was an expression finn was half convinced they were completely incapable of making. it warmed his heart knowing how happy they were right then. finn swam closer to shrimpo, pausing just in front of them. they were sitting with their legs folded under them, eyes half closed as they took in deep breaths of the partially salty water. finn watched their chest rise and fall in a steady rhythm, the faded scars present no longer covered by their arms.

"how do you feel?" finn asked. shrimpo opened their eyes, gazing at finn contentedly.
"can i live here?" they breathed.
finn frowned. "i don't think the others'd let you stay in the pool permanently." he stated sadly.
the classic frown that characterized who shrimpo usually was returned to their face. "i hate air breathers and their stupid, dry buildings." shrimpo huffed, crossing their arms again.
"hey, maybe not all the time, but you can absolutely come here whenever you need to, prawn. that's what it's here for." finn reminded them. finn held shrimpo's cheeks and they leaned into the touch.
"i haven't felt this comfortable in years..." shrimpo muttered, inching closer to finn to rest their forehead against his chest.
"usually everything hurts. it's like i'm constantly suffocating. i can breathe again..." shrimpo babbled. finn wrapped his arms around shrimpo's back as they squeezed him with all four arms. finn wasn't entirely sure shrimpo was even aware of what they were saying. he'd never catch them being so open above water. maybe it was the knowledge that no one could hear them down here. he felt one of shrimpo's hands brush against the fins on his face.
"i'm so fucking in love with you." shrimpo squeezed him tighter.
"not just saying that cause of the water?" finn asked, his face flushing.
"i mean it." shrimpo confirmed. they pulled back to gaze into his eyes. finn looked away shyly.
"i love you too, shrimpo." that was the first time they'd really confirmed it since they started seeing each other.

"good, cause i'm awesome. everyone should love me."
that earned a chuckle from finn. the two of them probably lost track of time. just enjoying each others company in the water. luckily it was taking rodger a while to gather everyone for dinner.

Chapter Text

"looey?"

"oh hi rodger.."

looey hadn't moved since sprout left his room a number of minutes ago. he'd been feeling weird and lightheaded, probably a side effect of the very illegal substance he'd just been exposed to. rodger's face held a look of slight concern.

please don't mention the smell...

rodger took a step inside, saying "i came to let you know dinner is ready, you should probably make your way up there." to which looey nodded absently.
"okay, will do. thanks rodger."
"don't get into trouble, looey."

he knows.

rodger squinted at him and backed away from the door. looey got up, steadying himself from feeling dizzy by leaning against the latter up to yatta's bunk for a few long moments before walking to the elevator.

looey's paws dragged him a slightly different way to the toons' shared cafeteria room. off to the side, a bit secluded from the many tables, was a small seating area with some beanbag chairs and a tv. it was slightly cut off from the rest of the room, out of the way past a turn in the wall.

though he wracked his brain, he couldn't remember why he'd decided to go here. everything felt dizzy and confusing. maybe he just forgot the way.

the sound of a voice just beyond the wall he was standing against made him freeze in place. he peered around the corner to find a certain cakeroll, as well as the strawberry he'd been speaking with before. in his heart he felt a fuzzy feeling of dread claw him, he wasn't sure why.

he couldn't take his eyes off the two.

"i'm sorry that i yelled at you, sprout." cosmo apologized, rubbing his arm awkwardly.
"you know how i am about keeping everyone healthy.."
"don't worry about it coz, it's not a big deal, really." sprout assured him, resting his hands on cosmo's shoulders.
"i'm sorry i got so upset. i just have bad memories associated with that time. you understand."
cosmo nodded slightly. "it doesn't mean anything. let's just forget about this dumb argument." he said, to which sprout nodded, inching closer to his face.

looey felt his heart skip a beat when their lips connected. he felt like he'd just been dunked into a tub of ice water.

no... they're...?

the realization that cosmo and sprout...

"heh.. you taste kinda funny, sprout..."
"yeahhh...."

looey backed away from the edge of the wall, feeling tears well up in his eyes. his ears drooped.

he wasn't supposed to see that.
he didn't want to see that.

all this time, and.... i never had a shot to begin with.....

looey's feet carried him back to the elevator. he couldn't face sprout and cosmo at dinner. not now. not now that he knew.
sprout...
he didn't feel like eating anyway. he knew deep down it was stupid to get so upset about someone elses relationship. but something had skewed his rational thought. he wasn't thinking clearly. especially not when he opened up the drawer on his nightstand to pull out the little "gift" shrimpo left for him.

Chapter Text

by the time airy and shelly got back to the cafeteria, just about everyone was there already. he nodded to shelly as she went to sit with vee and a couple others that he didn't know yet.

now came the difficult decision of choosing where he should sit.

astro was with most of the book club. they looked like they were having an unofficial meeting since astro was holding up a book with his magic and talking about it. airy didn't want to interrupt them, he wasn't part of the book club, after all.

he could join shelly and vee, but everyone else at their table was unfamiliar.

he didn't know blot and yatta well enough to sit with them.

airy grabbed and held onto his globe guards as he realized he was starting to get anxious about not knowing who to sit with. then he noticed rodger waving him over.

thank you, detective.

"is everything alright, airy?" rodger asked.
airy nodded, slowly letting go of his globe guards and resting his hands on his lap. "yeah... i just didn't know who to sit with."
"that's fair i suppose. well, you're always welcome to sit with us." he stated, giving airy a sympathetic look.

airy glanced at everyone around rodger's table. glisten, toodles, finn, shrimpo, and a teacup lady he didn't recognize.
rodger noticed him looking at her and spoke up, "that's teagan, she's a friend of ours." rodger explained.
teagan glanced away from her conversation with glisten to wave at him.
"hello darling! you're airy right?"
he nodded.
"very nice to meet you." teagan said with a smile. she went back to her conversation pretty quickly, leaving airy practically alone with rodger, since everyone else was preoccupied.

a small noise from behind him sounded, and just about everyone turned around. cosmo had stood up on his chair and held a glass and a spoon.

"everyone. before we serve dinner, me and sprout have an announcement to make." he said, loud and clear for the whole cafeteria to hear.
sprout joined him, standing on his own chair. they locked their fingers together before cosmo spoke up again.
"me and sprout are dating!"

silence.

and then somebody shouted "WE KNOW."

airy glanced back at the people at his table. shrimpo was the one who yelled. they held a look of years of resentment coming back up to haunt them.

"we've only been dating officially for a couple months now, just thought we should let everyone know." sprout stated.
"congratulations guys!" that was shelly.

then most of the other people in the cafeteria went to congratulate them.

except shrimpo.

shrimpo looked pissed off.

"of course he gets with cosmo. fucking cosmo... i knew he had a thing for him even when.." airy couldn't hear the rest of their sentence as it dipped into a spiteful mutter.
"on the bright side, maybe cosmo will help sprout get over his... uh... issue?" finn pointed out, not stating directly what the issue was.
"cosmo is smart, i doubt he'd.. y'know, cave."
"or sprout'll just break up with him." shrimpo snorted.
that idea seemed to calm them down a bit. it was that, or the fact that finn was rubbing their shoulders. yeah, that probably contributed.

airy leaned over to rodger. "do you know where looey is?" he asked.
rodger glanced around the cafeteria for a moment. "how did you notice his absence before me..?" he mumbled, dumbfounded.
he shook his head. "i saw him go up the elevator here when i was fetching gigi. he should be here."
rodger had a face of deep concentration, before pushing his chair out and standing, walking to yatta and blot's table.
having nothing better to do, airy decided to follow him.

"looey seems to be absent, have you seen him?" rodger asked, taking a seat at the circus troupe's table.
airy sat beside him.
"not since i left on my trio run with poppy and boxten." yatta noted.

poppy and boxten. i'll have to remember those names for later..

airy noticed blot's hands moving as he spoke. ".rehtie mih nees t'nevah i" (i haven't seen him either.) he was suddenly very grateful he took sign language instead of spanish in high school.
"he might still be in our room. he was pretty bummed about how his last couple runs went..." yatta went on.
blot nodded in agreement. ".ylthgil ti gnittup si demmub" blot murmured. (bummed is putting it lightly.)
"but that can't be right, i saw him go up the elevator..." rodger recounted.
"we don't know where else he could be." airy put in.
rodger sighed. "i suppose you have a point. he may have gone back for something. this is the best lead we've got at the moment." he pushed his chair out and stood again.
"we'll go with you to look." yatta offered. "we need to bring him dinner anyway."

blot went off to fetch a bowl of soup for looey while the rest of them waited by the elevator. airy hadn't realized his eyes had drifted to glisten on their own. he watched the mirror laugh at something from across the room and he felt his cheeks warm.

he's so cute.....

"airy." airy turned back to rodger, who was beckoning him into the open elevator.
"sorry.." airy muttered as he stepped inside.

yatta led the way to the circus troupe's room once the elevator dropped them off. about halfway to the door blot paused, a sour look on his face.
".ereh ni top ekil sllems ti" he observed. (it smells like pot in here.)
"i was wondering what that was." rodger added.

the smell only got worse the closer they got to the room. that mixed with something else. almost metallic. airy wouldn't be surprised if he was the only one who noticed it since it was so faint compared to the weed smell.

"?moor ruo ni top gnikoms saw ohw" blot complained. (who was smoking pot in our room?)

yatta was the first to enter. followed by a shriek that made the other three rush to the doorway. airy was the last in, gazing over at the forms of two toons on the ground near blot's bed, cast in shadows from the light being off. their backs were turned towards everyone, but it was still pretty clear what had happened.

"looey you promised you'd tell us... you PROMISED..." yatta's voice cracked as she spoke.
she clung to the half deflated balloon toon tight, but not tight enough to further aggravate his wounds. she was shivering, but it seemed looey was shivering worse.
"oh, looey..." rodger mumbled, averting his gaze from the scene.

airy crept closer as blot joined looey on his other side. he noticed at once the dozens of holes poked in looey's arms, dripping with fresh blood. as well as the nail yatta was currently prying out of his hands.

rodger walked over to the open drawer on looey's nightstand, removing a small orange sticky note. airy looked over his shoulder at it.
"I HATE BALLOONS."

"shrimpo..." rodger breathed, putting the sticky note back where he found it.

"sprout loves cosmo...." looey blubbered, finally letting go of the nail. yatta handed it to rodger, and blot went to grab some wrap bandages from his own nightstand.

airy took yatta's place on the ground as she and blot worked to cover up the holes on his arms and prevent him from deflating further.
"were you in love with him?" airy asked quietly.
looey sniffled. big crocodile tears dripping down his face. "uh-huh....."
airy frowned. he wasn't familiar with situations like this so he wasn't entirely sure what to say.
"well... that's awful, but these things happen... all you can do is move on." airy advised.

looey met his gaze, and airy noticed his eyes were super bloodshot, moreso than they would usually be from crying alone. he'd seen the same thing in...

sprout's eyes.

back at the cafeteria.

"i don't want to move on!" looey sobbed. he pulled his, now bandaged, arms away from his friends. standing and running away faster than any of them could react to in time.

"looey!" rodger yelped as looey got into the elevator, slamming his fist on the button inside to shut the door.

they couldn't reach him in time.

Chapter Text

"but he might be horrible danger!" rodger protested.

he'd managed to track down vee after everyone else had eaten dinner. since vee was typically in charge of planning runs, she had final say on when runs were hosted. even after having explained the very dire situation to her, she wasn't backing down from her stance on the matter.

"i'm sorry rodger, but you're just going to have to wait until tomorrow. you know the floors black out at night, it's not safe to go down there." vee stated. her voice was cold and emotionless, like a, well, a robot.

"which is why we have to find looey quickly before something bad happens to him! we'll take brightney along, and airy, they both emit light, and we won't split up like on a normal run. please vee, he's unstable, possibly high, and very vulnerable to being attacked." rodger insisted.

vee placed a hand on his shoulder and started walking the frazzled detective to her door.

"i'm not budging rodger. wait until tomorrow, then you can look for him. you look like you need sleep anyway. goodnight, detective."

"if you could just-" rodger flinched as the pale green door was slammed in his face. he frowned, rubbing the spot under his eye where his nose bridge would be if he was human.

since finding looey is off the table, i suppose i'll have to find out why he's done this. i guess my first clue is the "pot" smell. i know sprout has had access to marijuana in the past, but i dont have enough evidence to accuse him yet. i don't know why he would give it to him, nor why a toon filled with air would agree to smoke marijuana in the first place. the substance could linger in his body well past where it would in a normal toon. it seems counter intuitive to do that to yourself. i suppose smoking marijuana in the first place isn't great, but especially not for someone as fragile as he is...

with that trail cold, he turned to the next clue, the note clearly left by a certain crustacean.

i'll have to find shrimpo first. and... oh... vee was right. rodger leaned against a wall, blinking the exhaustion out of his eye.
nevermind. first order of business. procure some coffee.

he went back in the elevator, making sure to stop by the circus troupe's room first to grab the evidence from the scene, as well as to inform blot and yatta that their rescue mission would have to be postponed.

he walked into the kitchen, putting a kettle on to boil while getting his french press from the high cabinet he'd put it in for safe keeping. no one else drank coffee so he had reason to keep it out of reach, he thought. the container labeled "coffee" was already sitting on the counter. he brought it closer, scooping a couple spoonfuls into the french press then replacing the lid. he leaned against the counter, waiting impatiently for the kettle to boil already.

looey could be who knows how many floors down by now...

he was broken from his thoughts by the creak of the door as it was opened, then left to slam shut on its own. he squinted. the toon responsible was shorter than the counters. it was only after he noticed the tip of a shrimp like tail bobbing above the kitchen island that he knew it was shrimpo, and not his daughter, who was also shorter than the counters.

he watched shrimpo walk out from behind the kitchen island they'd been hidden by. they dug through a floor level cabinet for a moment before grabbing out what rodger could only assume was a protein bar.

"dinner wasn't enough for you?" rodger asked quietly.

i'm not going to accuse them of anything immediately, shrimpo is fidgety, they might run away if they think i'm mad at them...

shrimpo flinched and looked over at him, wordlessly shoving the protein bar into their mouth while making eye contact. rodger glanced at the kettle as it started to whistle. he grabbed it off the burner and made sure to turn the heat off the stove, before pouring about half of the boiling water into the french press.

"i hate soup." shrimpo stated plainly after swallowing their protein bar.

at least they've learned some manners.

"you can't live off only protein bars, shrimpo." rodger advised, but shrimpo only rolled their eyes.

"you're not my dad."

rodger froze.

he wasn't sure why, but that kind of hurt to hear.

he pressed down on the french press, letting it filter the coffee grounds out of the coffee before pouring most of it into a mug.

"i..." rodger sighed "i'm aware."

shrimpo sat at one of the barstools next to the kitchen island.

now might be a good time to bring up the nail.

rodger drank about half of his coffee before moving to sit next to shrimpo. he set his "best detective" mug down before fishing the little sandwich bag that had the nail and the note in it out of his pocket. he set it down on the counter in front of shrimpo.

"i'm assuming this came from you?" rodger asked in the calmest voice he could muster. shrimpo looked at the makeshift evidence bag, then back to rodger. they leaned back in their chair.

"yeah. so?" shrimpo stated clearly.

no surprise there...

"this isn't what you normally do." rodger noted. he analyzed shrimpo's facial expression. they didn't look guilty, or even ashamed of being guilty. but they didn't look happy with themselves either.

"i couldn't find any tacks..." they mumbled.

ah... disappointment.

"now, shrimpo... normally i would keep my word in regards to... sensitive situations... but i fear if you're going to be involved in looey's life in a negative way, it's best to inform you of this..." rodger started, breaking eye contact.

"of what?" shrimpo grumbled.

"around a year ago, me and a few others discovered that looey... struggles with harming himself." rodger stated.

shrimpo said nothing, staring down at the nail in the bag. he watched their eyes widen as, he assumed, they noticed the ichor crusted to it.

"we found a number of sharp objects he was hoarding to hurt himself with. most of them were tacks left there by you." rodger tried to sound as gentle as possible as he spoke.

"...what." rodger noticed shrimpo hug their stomach with their lower arms.

"...we had an incident earlier tonight involving this nail." rodger explained.

he noticed shrimpo shifting slightly in their chair, which he realized after a moment was them rocking back and forth slightly, possibly to calm themselves. they looked distressed, a look that wasn't very common on shrimpo. though rodger had likely seen it more than most toons.

"i..."

"i didn't know he was gonna do that..." shrimpo whispered. their voice sounded strained, like it was a struggle to get the words out. rodger was worried for a moment that they might start having an asthma attack. rodger patted shrimpo on their shoulder gently.

"i'm sorry..." shrimpo said quietly.

"i'm not the one you should be apologizing to." rodger stated softly.

shrimpo sniffled, then let out a huff. "i still hate him."

"why, if you don't mind me asking?"

shrimpo shrugged rodger's hand off their shoulder.

"i do mind actually. i'm not telling you." shrimpo hopped down from the stool, walking to the kitchen door. rodger got up to follow them.

"shrimpo-"

"I'M NOT TELLING YOU, GET OFF MY ASS RODGER." shrimpo yelled, stomping towards the elevator. rodger rushed to get in the way.

"shrimpo, this isn't something to be taken lightly! why do you hate looey?"

"OUT OF MY WAY, OLD MAN." shrimpo hissed. they tried to shove past him, but he grabbed them by their upper wrists.

"shrimpo."

"LET GO!!!"

"shrimpo, i'm not letting you use that pool in the warehouse until you tell me why you hate looey so much!" rodger exclaimed. he hadn't meant to be so harsh, but now he had to go with this.

"WHAT?? YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" shrimpo cried, straining to free themselves from rodger's grasp. he let go, and they tumbled to the floor.

they stared up at him with a look of hurt and betrayal that threatened to stab rodger straight through the heart.

"i... I HATE YOU!" shrimpo yelled, standing up again and running to the elevator. rodger let them go this time.

i'm sorry, shrimpo...

Chapter Text

dinner was over before he knew it. most toons had started getting up and heading to bed by now. normally, astro would be on top of that as well, however, there was one last thing he had to take care of first.

he slipped into the kitchen and grabbed a container with a lid that he could reliably carry without spilling its contents. he filled the container with soup and grabbed a spoon to take with him, then headed up the elevator to the main toon's floor.

the mains had their rooms on a special floor all to themselves. and unlike the regular toon rooms, each door was personalized with a symbol that represented the toon that lived inside, as well as their main colour. shelly's had a shell, vee's had a tv, astro's had a moon, and so on.

astro made his way to the end of the hallway. he flinched as he heard a door slam shut behind him, and he glanced back to see an exhausted detective sigh in front of vee's door. he debated briefly over whether he should ask what was wrong, but rodger had already started walking back to the elevator, plus, the soup was starting to get cold.

astro used his star hand to open dandy's pale yellow-green door. all the lights were off in the room. he could hear the faint sound of pebble snoring on his doggy bed somewhere in the corner. he closed the door behind him, taking a moment to let his eye adjust to the darkness.

he made out the shape of the flower he was looking for, sitting crosslegged at the edge of his bed, with his back facing the door.

"dandy." astro called quietly.

dandy slowly turned his head, that stupid plastic grin still stuck to his face like it had been glued to look that way permanently. his expression showed no emotion, only the shallow husk of the toon he once was.

it wasn't the same anymore.

he wasn't the same anymore.

astro approached the bed slowly, holding up the soup container with his magic.

"i brought you soup." astro said.

dandy didn't react for a good few, long seconds. not even blinking. the way he moved was unnatural, it was no wonder he spent all his time in his room when he wasn't working the elevator.

"thanks pal!" dandy said, almost robotically.

it finally turned to fully face astro, hanging its legs off the edge of the bed. a small bead of ichor dripped down its chin. astro moved closer, wiping the blood away with one of his actual hands.

astro sat next to dandy, opening up the soup container and setting it on his lap. he took up a spoonful of soup, guiding it to dandy's mouth. dandy seemed to fully register there was food for it now, since it took the spoon from astro and moved the soup container to its own lap. astro watched helplessly as dandy fumbled with eating.

it hurt so much seeing him like this. he kept wondering if it would ever be possible to get the old dandy back. but it was clear his friend was too far gone. he'd given in to what astro and the other mains had started calling "ichor wasting disease."

back when gardenview was running, the handlers gave the toons a different kind of ichor in the form of shots that were supposed to make them "more docile" or easier to control. this backfired a bit, however, causing most toons to revert into very primitive stereotypes of their personalities until the shot wore off.

dandy, obviously, was the face of gardenview. he was put in front of kids the most, as such, they gave him the most ichor. he was given it so often his brain started being affected by it worse than the others. he started not knowing how to live without the stuff, inevitably giving in to taking it even when the handlers weren't around.

and something went wrong.

something went so incredibly wrong that one day, he just wasn't himself anymore. and no matter what they tried, they couldn't make him go back to normal.

he was just... this.

more like a helpless animal than a living toon.

astro was the only one who took care of him anymore. no one else even bothered. astro leaned against dandy's shoulder as he waited for him to finish eating. it didn't take much.

once dandy was done, it gave astro a dead stare.

"thanks for the meal, pal!"

astro frowned, taking the dish back from him. "you're welcome, buddy." he responded quietly.

astro tucked dandy into bed, then used his powers to put him to sleep. he leaned against the side of the bed for a moment, making sure dandy would have only good dreams that night, before silently leaving the room.

Chapter Text

airy lied back in his new bed as shelly shut the lights off across the room. dinner had been... awkward after the looey situation. airy found himself unable to eat much after all that. he thought back to the faded scars he'd seen on liam's wrists in the brief time they'd spent together in his old world. he frowned. self-harm was never a good solution to problems, as hypocritical as that was for him to say...

he didn't want to think about how things used to be. he wasn't alone anymore. he was safe. and he was actually sleeping on a mattress for once. he couldn't remember the last time he'd slept on a mattress. that is, if he would actually manage to fall asleep.

the room was illuminated mostly by a small stegosaurus nightlight beside shelly's bed, and a beautiful scattering of glow stars stuck to the high ceilings. the room was quiet, save for the dull hum of the air conditioning. shelly got settled under her covers, then called out, "goodnight, airy!"
airy kicked his blankets down and out from under him, then pulled them up over his legs. "goodnight, shelly." he replied quietly.

it wasn't long before shelly's gentle snores joined the white noise of the ac.

as much as he wanted to, and as exhausted as he was, airy couldn't find it in him to fall asleep. he was too worried about looey, and the nightmare from before was still fresh in his mind. insomnia trapped him like a boa constrictor, and all he could do to pass the time was count the ceiling stars. one. two. three. four. five. man this was boring. he wished he had a book or something, maybe that might help. his mind wandered back to astro showing the cat book to his book club. the book club...

airy hadn't read anything substantial in a while. mostly outdated news articles on his computer. it might do him some good to read a good old fashioned novel again sometime. i wonder if they have any copies of watership down here. i loved that book when i was younger..

more unsubstantial thoughts filled airy's head as the alarm clock on shelly's nightstand ticked away the minutes. it had been a whole hour before he knew it. i may as well be sleeping with how fast that time changed... dang...

airy flinched as he heard a knock on the door. it took a couple more knocks to shake shelly from her sleep. airy sat up on his mattress as she went to check it, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. shelly yawned, opening her door to be greeted by the familiar face of astro.

"hey astro.. what's up?" shelly greeted him tiredly, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the light in the hallway.
astro looked past her, directly at airy.

"airy can't sleep." astro said knowingly. airy felt goosebumps rise on his arms.

"how'd you know that..?"

"i couldn't find your dream." astro explained. he walked past shelly into her room, sitting down on the end of airy's mattress. "are you okay, airy? i heard about what happened with looey..." astro gazed at the floor.

"i'm alright i guess.." airy replied, pulling his knees up to his chest and hugging them. "i'm just worried about him. i don't think i'll be able to sleep well tonight." airy sighed. astro frowned, thinking.

shelly joined the two of them, sitting next to astro on the mattress end. "astro can help with that, he can put people to sleep, right astro?" shelly said.

astro nodded, then shook his head. "i have a better idea. let's get some toons together and have a sleepover, as a way to sort of officially welcome you to gardenview." astro suggested, looking back at airy for his thoughts on the idea.

shelly suddenly seemed a lot less tired, her expression brightening. "that sounds like fun!"

"i haven't had a sleepover since i was a little kid... let's do it." airy agreed.

"i'll go get some of my friends, and grab some sleeping bags from my room." astro stated. he stood and walked away, leaving airy and shelly alone again.

shelly went and turned the light in her room back on, making it slightly dimmer. airy hadn't seen technology like that before, it must be new. she also dragged a small crt tv out of her closet. it had a built in tape player on it. not as impressive as the screen in the projector room, but for a little slumber party it would suffice.

"help me pick out some movies!" shelly called, beckoning airy over. the two of them spent a little while looking through shelly's personal tape collection. godzilla. barney's great adventure. the land before time. jaws. the land before time 2. you've got mail. the land before time 3. the land before time 4. we get it she has all the land before time movies jeez- then something caught airy's eye.

"what's jurassic park?" airy asked.

shelly picked up the tape, giving an exaggerated gasp. "you've never seen jurassic park???" she asked, shocked.

airy shook his head. "i... don't really watch movies."

shelly set the tape down again, grabbing airy by his shoulders and shaking him. "dude. we have to watch jurassic park. it's literally my favorite movie."

airy blinked, taking a moment to recover from being jostled around. "uh... okay..."

the other movie they picked was you've got mail. apparently it technically belonged to brightney, shelly had just never gotten around to watching it since she'd let her borrow it. speaking of which, astro returned a few moments later, followed by brightney, razzle and dazzle, and... glisten. airy's heart skipped a beat. he tried not to stare as glisten sat down on the ground like the others had done.

"rodger's busy... being rodger. so he couldn't come." astro explained. he used his magic star hands to set down the little pile of sleeping bags.

brightney sighed. "it would be nice to have the whole book club together for once... at least glisten's here."

"i'm not going to pass up a sleepover." glisten said, nonchalantly checking his nails. "i brought my nail stuff. thought we could do some manicures. up to you guys though."

"great idea, glis! i thought we could do some games, and watch a couple movies too." shelly added.

"or we could read." astro said, holding up his cat book. the cover read "warriors: into the wild".

"oh! we started reading the copy you gave us actually! dazzle's really liking it so far!" razzle beamed. dazzle looked a little flustered, nodding with a shy smile.

"how far?" astro asked.

"chapter... five i think?" razzle guessed. "it was chapter six." dazzle corrected him. "oh.. yeah!"

airy tuned out their conversation as astro started rambling about whatever was going on in chapter six, his gaze drifted back to glisten as brightney helped him set up his manicure things.

"this pink would look really nice on you, brightney." glisten suggested, holding the nail polish bottle where she could see.

"oh, cute! shelly, you wanna help me with this?" brightney asked, gazing over at shelly. shelly was in the middle of slipping the you've got mail tape into her crt. "just a minute!" she responded.

as the movie started playing, the light in brightney's head grew a tad brighter. "oh! you're finally watching it!" she squealed excitedly. shelly crawled on her hands and knees over to where glisten and brightney were.

shelly nodded, "mhm! thought it would be a good time for that! anyways, about those nails..."

"this teal matches your eyes, darling." airy flinched as glisten's hand came into focus in front of him. somehow while he wasn't paying attention, glisten had managed to move beside him, showing him the teal nail polish. airy felt his face heat up. he moved an inch away from glisten.

"i've... um.... never painted my nails before..." airy mumbled shyly.

glisten moved again so he was sitting in front of him. he gently picked up one of airys hands. "that's not a problem, i can do it for you." he offered, giving airy a sweet smile. he felt his heart skip a beat. he hoped glisten assumed his face was just lit up because it was pretty dark in there.

"that would be... cool...." airy breathed.

glisten looked pleased. he opened up the bottle of nail polish and delicately painted over airy's claws, being careful not to get any on his peach fuzz fur. airy didn't look at him for a second while he worked. he didn't ever want to admit how nice it was having glisten's attention and focus on him.

god i'm pathetic....

"are you having fun, airy?" astro asked from a little ways away. he and the twins were working together to set up sleeping bags on the floor.

airy looked over at him, letting out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. "i think so..."

"that's good. slumber parties are the best." astro said.

glisten finished painting airy's nails quicker than he expected. he had to catch himself from continuing to reach out for him once the touch of the mirror toon's gentle hands were gone. he tried to reason with himself that it was probably just the fact that he'd been isolated for so long, it didn't have anything to do with glisten in particular, really! he was just touch starved in general! honest!

he waited a moment for the paint to dry off, then found that he'd started hugging himself subconsciously.

everyone in the room had a go at decorating their nails, and shelly made some popcorn before they all huddled together in front of the little tv to watch the remainder of you've got mail, and jurassic park after it. about a half an hour into the second movie, airy noticed glisten starting to drift off. he silently moved closer to him, letting the mirror toon rest his head against airy's shoulder. he made sure that he wouldn't fall over and risk cracking his face all throughout the rest of the movie.

by the time it was finished, everyone was due for some shuteye. with astro's help, airy moved glisten onto one of the sleeping bags, then he returned to his mattress. shelly shut the lights out again and everyone fell asleep. except airy, for a little while at least. eventually the sound of soft breathing and quiet snores lulled him to sleep. either that, or astro put him to sleep with his magic. he couldn't tell the difference.

Chapter Text

the stars on shelly's ceiling had seemed to multiply overnight. it didn't make any logical sense. some of them looked like they were falling down, almost mimicking raindrops soaking through a roof.

everything had an odd tint of blue to it. oh well, it was probably nothing.

airy shuffled to get up off his mattress, and it was only when he moved that he noticed the body lying next to him. he froze immediately.

what???

taking a deep breath to collect his senses and prevent the absolute panic that washed over him, he slowly glanced over at the form that was taking up so much space beside him. when he saw who it was he felt about ready to pass out on the spot.

WHY IS GLISTEN IN MY BED???

airy gulped, inching slowly away, not DARING to risk waking him up. this had to be some kind of mistake, right??? surely????

whatever the case, glisten's eyes started to open after a moment. he sat up, yawning a perfect, adorable little yawn, before gazing over at airy with the kind of look you'd give to a precious loved one. not some random lantern you've known for less than a week.

"is there something wrong, honey?" glisten asked him.

airy felt the words catch in his throat, he was completely unable to say anything.

"did you have a nightmare dear?" glisten crawled over to him, wrapping his arms around airy's torso. "i hope i can help you feel better. i don't want my sweet, perfect little lamp feeling bad.."

something is DEFINITELY WRONG HERE.

airy's eyes met glistens, which was when he noticed the distorted and frankly unsettling image of himself in the reflection of his face. just then, he remembered something someone had told him a long time ago.
"never look in a mirror if you're lucid dreaming."

oh god.

it all made sense now.

it was just a dream.

and that thought alone was enough to shake airy awake for real.

Chapter Text

"if you're going to be involved in looey's life in a negative way, it's best to inform you of this..."

"looey struggles with harming himself."

"sharp objects he was hoarding."

"most of them were tacks left there by you."

"we had an incident earlier tonight."

rodger's words circled shrimpo's thoughts. they'd been making their way back to their own room, to either sleep or punch their punching bag deep into the night until exhaustion took them. but they'd been stopped dead in their tracks by a very, very familiar scent lingering in the hallway outside the circus troupe's room.

the full realization of what had likely happened here made them feel nauseous as they put the pieces together. somehow the notion that looey was hurting himself didn't affect their psyche as much as the idea that he was doing it with a skewed perception of reality. the perception of things that comes with being influenced by drugs. he could've killed himself because of this... sure, respawning meant it wouldn't really matter in the long run, but it was still a terrifying thought.

they weren't sure how weed affected looey, or if it was anything like their own experiences with the stuff, but if it was, that meant that whatever emotional distress he was presently going through had been amplified tenfold. they hated how their brain immediately started sympathizing with him. it was looey goddamnit! you're supposed to hate looey!

they held their breath as they walked past, only breathing in again once they were far enough from the smell. they stomped over to rodger's door, banging on it with no remorse for if the detective was asleep in there. they heard some shuffling from the other side, then rodger's eye greeted them through the small crack he'd opened.

"rodger.." shrimpo glanced behind rodger for a moment, checking if toodles was awake. it seemed barely so, she was snuggled up under the covers at least.
"i need to talk to you." shrimpo whispered, not wanting to wake their baby sister toodles.

after glancing back at her for a moment, rodger nodded, stepping out of his room and into the hallway. once the door had been securely shut behind him, shrimpo grabbed rodger's wrist and dragged him a couple feet away.

"why didn't you tell me he was high??" shrimpo hissed.
a look of confusion came over rodger, quickly being replaced with understanding. "i knew this would happen.." rodger sighed.
"shrimpo.." rodger crouched to be at eye level with the frustrated toon in front of him, "i didn't tell you because i know you. i knew it would make you upset, and that you were likely to blame sprout for it, but i don't have enough evidence to accuse sprout of giving it to him at the moment." rodger explained gently. he rested his hands on shrimpo's shoulders. "that's why i didn't tell you."

shrimpo's face scrunched up. "who else could it be??? name one other toon that smokes weed in gardenview." shrimpo snapped.
rodger stood again, thinking. "well, it seems looey does now."
"THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT!!"
rodger let out a soft chuckle, "what i mean is, he could've snuck out and gotten ahold some by himself. we can't blame sprout until we're sure." rodger stated.

shrimpo clenched their fists, all of them, but sighed after a moment. the detective was right, much as they hated to admit it. and as much as they loved the idea of thoughtlessly blaming sprout for everything, it wasn't going to work this time.
"anyways, i presume you're still upset about the pool thing." rodger asked.
shrimpo frowned. "yeah. i am." they crossed their lower arms.
rodger looked like he was about to respond, then paused, as though choosing his words carefully. "you don't have to tell me why you don't like him right now, you can explain everything whenever you're ready. i'm not gonna keep you from the pool, i said that in the moment without thinking, and i apologize for upsetting you.." rodger said gently.
shrimpo stepped slightly closer to him, leaning their head against his arm. "it's fine i guess.." they mumbled.

rodger glanced over at the elevator across the hall. "for now though, we need to prioritize getting looey back unharmed."
"can't you just wait 'til they respawn?" shrimpo asked.
rodger shook his head. "if no one comes looking for him it'll only reinforce his belief that nobody cares about him, and who knows how much worse that could make things. he's in a very unstable state right now," rodger wrapped an arm around shrimpo's shoulder in a side hug, "we have to do everything we can to show him we do care."

"i wanna help.."
"shrimpo, you don't have to do that." rodger replied.
shrimpo moved to face him again. "but i want to. if there's a chance sprout did give him the weed, i have to do something about it. i can't let him hurt anyone else." shrimpo stated. "'sides... i kinda feel bad about the nail.." they looked at the ground.
"that's very kind of you, shrimpo. you can come on our run to look for him tomorrow morning. but for now we oughta get some shut eye." rodger said. he crouched and held his arms out, and shrimpo accepted the hug. "goodnight, shrimpo." rodger mumbled, letting go of the smaller toon.
"night, rodger." shrimpo responded.

they stood and watched rodger return to his room before continuing to go back to their own. when they got there they gave their punching bag a gentle shove as they walked past. then they went to turn the humidifier on. they noticed how it was low on water, they'd have to fill it back up tomorrow. as usual they put the humidifier on the highest setting, took their shirt off, and flopped onto the bed. they stared up at the ceiling in silence as the moisture in the air increased, the gentle hum of the machine slowly lulling them to sleep.

Chapter Text

airy's eyes shot open. the glass of his face was damp with condensation when he reached up to touch it. all around him he could still hear the gentle breathing of everyone who had been a part of the sleepover. he seemed to be the only one awake. he wiped the fog away from his face with the short fur on his arm, forgetting momentarily about the nail polish on his claws. he gazed at them for a moment, it really was a good colour on him.

the moment he sat up the flame in his head roared to life, and he had to reach back and turn it off. as he reached over to the side of his mattress to retrieve his lid, he heard quiet giggling coming from the edge of the bed. putting his lid in its rightful place, he glanced over at the toon who was responsible for the noise. it was astro, staring and giggling at him with a knowing look in his eyes. he felt his face grow warm again and he rushed to snuff the flame out before it got too big.

"good dreams last night?" astro teased, climbing onto the mattress with him.
airy covered his face, whining.
astro cocked his head to the side, shuffling closer on his knees. "better than having more nightmares at least, right?"
airy uncovered an eye. "why would you do thattt.."
"i don't have full control over what happens in the dream, just whether it's good or bad." astro explained, though the smirk never left his face. "it's not my fault that you dreamt about glis-"
airy shoved his hand over astro's mouth. "sshHHHHHh."
he could feel astro giggling against his hand.
airy threw a pillow at astro and he fell over dramatically, still giggling. "don't worry, i won't tell~." he whispered, miming zipping his mouth shut with one of his real hands.

for some reason, airy didn't believe him.

"you're not the first toon whose dreamt about someone else like that, airy." astro rolled onto his back and gazed up at the ceiling stars.

there's probably someone specific he's referring to..

"is it morning?" airy asked, changing the subject. it was sometimes hard to tell what time it was here. given that most of the floors were underground, there weren't any windows. airy wasn't used to being somewhere where he couldn't see the sun at all times.
astro sat up again, nodding. "yeah, its around 7:30. when some of us normally get up. course, rodger usually gets up at 6 am sharp... same with cosmo and tisha... yatta blot and... looey... usually sleep in til around 10:30. the craft twins and toodles also wake up then.. boxten wakes up at 5 am because of his insomnia....." blah blah blah.

airy ended up tuning out astro's voice a bit. he found his gaze wandering to glisten, still fast asleep in his sleeping bag. he glanced at the spot glisten had been in his dream.

do i want that..?

"airy?"

airy's focus snapped back to astro, who was smirking again.
"don't let glisten see you looking at him like that~." astro teased.

in a second airy's other pillow had been hurled in astro's direction. this time, however, astro caught it with his magic, tossing it right back at airy. airy grabbed hold of the pillow, standing up and walking towards astro before directly hitting him with it. astro shrieked and giggled, grabbing hold of the other pillow and smacking airy with it in retaliation.
pretty soon they were locked in an intense pillow fight. the sound was enough to stir the other toons from their slumber. shelly rubbed her eyes, dragging a pillow with her from her bed and going to join the tussle.

"i haven't seen astro smile that much in ages!" shelly commented, patting astro's shoulder. he was still smiling, in fact.
he glanced away from shelly shyly. "it's nice having a new friend.." he mumbled.

everyone from the sleepover had moved into one of the cafeterias for breakfast after hanging out for a couple more hours and picking up shelly's room. breakfast today was simple eggs and toast, plus bacon and breakfast sausage if you weren't vegetarian. there was a few toons who were still absent, mainly sprout seedly.

cosmo said, when he was handing out plates, that sprout hadn't been in his room that morning, so he had to handle breakfast himself.

i wonder where he could've gone?

just as that thought had hit him, the tall main toon made his presence known.

"sorry im like, super late, i had to take care of something." sprout announced vaguely. cosmo got up and made sprout a plate than walked over to him.
"dude, where even were you?" and the bakers sat down together at a table close enough for airy to eavesdrop on them easily.

"nowhere important, coz. i was almost out of something, i had to go get more." sprout explained.
"did you leave the building?" cosmo asked, a tinge of worry in his voice.
sprout stretched, putting an arm around cosmo's shoulders. "yeah. not far though, didn't even leave the subway, so it was practically nothing."
"sprout, you're not supposed to leave the building alone, what if something happened to you?" cosmo shrugged sprout's arm off his shoulders.
sprout rubbed his arm awkwardly, "who says i was alone?" he grinned, but not the happy kind, the 'please don't ask any more questions' kind.

"okay, who was with you, then?" cosmo stared at him as though he knew he was lying.
"mm.. no one important, cozzy." sprout mumbled, looking away from him.
cosmo let out a frustrated huff.
"breakfast is really tasty today, did i ever tell you how good you are at cooking?" sprout praised him, hoping to change the subject. cosmo just rolled his eyes and went back to eating.

that's suspicious.

"airy, astro, shelly, i'm assuming you're coming to look for looey with us, correct?" airy turned to see rodger standing by their table.
"oh, yeah." airy responded, while astro nodded.
"..i would come, but i already promised vee and tisha i'd help organize the projector room today.. sorry..." shelly said shyly.
"right, well.. you two finish up your food and meet us by the elevator.. and, astro?"
"yeah?"
"fetch pebble, would you? we have no idea how many floors down they'll be." rodger instructed him.
"mm'kay." astro nodded again, standing from his chair to put his dish away and go find whoever pebble was.

as rodger walked away, airy noticed blot, yatta, and finn, as well as... shrimpo following him?

why is shrimpo going with?

airy glanced down at his plate, there was just a bite of toast left, so he shoved it in his mouth and got up to meet the others.

"airy wait up!"

as airy was turning to leave the cafeteria, he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder. he turned to see sprout, who looked just a tad stoned. he could clearly smell the pot in his breath from how close he was standing.

to be honest, it made him super uncomfortable. he could absolutely tell why blot hated the stuff.

"um.. hi sprout.." airy responded awkwardly, pulling away from his hand.
"you guys are going to look for looey right? mind if i come with?" sprout asked.

before airy could even respond properly he just started walking towards the elevator anyway.

looey did this because he was upset about sprout being with cosmo, right? airy's brain so helpfully reminded him of information we learned chapters ago but that is now being restated here because i had to fix this one and it's been a hot minute.

"i dunno if that's a good idea-.." airy called after him, sprinting a bit to catch up.
sprout folded his hands behind his head as he walked. "how come? if he's hurt you're gonna need a healer, right?" sprout noted, gesturing to himself to get the 'i'm a healer' point across.

"looey was upset about-"
"WHAT'S HE DOING HERE??" shrimpo pointed at sprout, airy flinched at how loud they were being.
"uh excuse you?? i have more of a reason to come with than you do." sprout grumbled.
"yeah? what?" shrimpo demanded, stomping over to where sprout stood with all their arms crossed.

"oh, let me see.. for one i'm actually his friend and don't constantly antagonize him, two," sprout poked shrimpo's forehead, "i actually have a use. if he's hurt, i'll heal him."

shrimpo batted sprout's hand away, not giving a shit if they scratched him in the process. "i have a use." they hissed.
"yeah, and what's that? slowing us all down so it takes ages to find him?"
"break it up, please." rodger stepped between the two of them.

".emoc dluohs uoy fo rehtien kniht i ?kniht i tahw wonk annaw" blot signed along as he spoke. (wanna know what i think? i think neither of you should come.)

sprout blinked at him, dumbfounded. "i can understand shrimpo," shrimpo glared at him as he spoke and gestured to them, "but why me?? what did i do??" sprout argued, honestly sounding hurt by blot's words.
"!top ekil llems UOY dna ,lian taht yeool evag opmirhs" (shrimpo gave looey that nail, and YOU smell like pot!)
sprout gasped as though that observation wasn't the most obvious thing in the world.

"you gave him what????" sprout turned back to shrimpo, looking pissed as all hell.
"HEY I DIDN'T REALIZE HE WAS GONNA ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING WITH IT-" they yelled, being cut off by rodger pushing the two apart for a second time.
"ENOUGH. THAT'S ENOUGH. sprout, shrimpo, if you want to come with you can. this is about finding looey first, you can argue later." he hissed. sprout let out a grumble, but reluctantly backed off.

"i'm not getting in an elevator with him." shrimpo muttered to rodger.
"just ignore him for now." rodger advised. shrimpo hissed something under their breath but dropped it from there.

it took a few more minutes of waiting for astro to return. airy correctly guessed that the little puppy-like, rock-like creature that was wrapped up in his blanket was pebble. after doing a headcount, rodger opened up the elevator. the air was thick with unresolved tension as the toons piled in, notably with sprout and shrimpo posted in opposite sides of the space. and so the search began.

Chapter Text

they were about six floors down at this point, looey was no where to be found. rodger had started getting antsy about how far down looey ended up. unease settled in the minds of all the toons present, with maybe the exception of pebble since he didn't know what was going on.

shrimpo had made effort to stay far away from sprout seedly at all costs, instead searching for the missing balloon by the side of finn, whose hand grasped theirs tightly every time they split off from the rest of the group where no one would see them.

sprout was the only one going alone, rodger had airy, astro had pebble, shrimpo had finn, and yatta had blot. sprout was alone, and probably for the better. no one seemed to be getting along great with him lately.

shrimpo and finn rounded another corner, the latter walking off to start on a nearby machine while shrimpo searched.

"looey?" shrimpo called out, as hushed as they could manage. they kept their center of gravity low, and walked slowly and behind things wherever they could. they couldn't afford to die while they were searching. walking slow helped in not getting their claws snagged on the carpet, and keeping their noise level down. they peered around the back of some boxes, only to hear the quiet sobs of the person they were looking for.

looey was huddled over on the ground, knees pressed tight to his chest and rubbing tears from his eyes. they were badly injured. even ignoring the bandages wound around their arms, there was tiny pinprick holes all over their legs and body. there was a steadily growing puddle of ichor surrounding them, and their tail was completely deflated with a massive gash in it. their head as well had shrunk significantly. shrimpo would have laughed at how ridiculous it looked if it weren't for how horrifying everything else was.

slowly, quietly, shrimpo crept over to looey, crouching just shy of the ichor puddle in front of him.
"hey.." shrimpo whispered, trying to get looey's attention.

looey flinched, looking up at them. upon seeing who it was, looey flinched again, pressing his back tight against the boxes behind him. he looked afraid, but more notably, he looked like a complete mess.

"hey, shh, calm down.. everyone's looking for you right now, you know that?" shrimpo told him, keeping their voice down.
"...why?" looey asked, hugging his knees.
"what do you mean why? you hurt yourself and freaked everyone out by coming down here all by yourself, did you really expect us not to look for you??" shrimpo hissed.
looey looked at the ground. "why'd you come with..?" he mumbled.

shrimpo blinked. honestly? they didn't really have an answer for that.

"i-"

"you hate me ..right?" looey asked. he made eye contact with shrimpo again, waiting for an answer, even though they thought they already knew what it was.
"i.... i said i hate balloons." shrimpo clarified, very unhelpfully.
looey's ears drooped down to the sides of his head, probably more from the air loss than the negative emotions he was feeling. "but that's what you meant, right? that you hate me?" looey stated.
shrimpo frowned, reaching a hand to wipe some tears from looey's cheek. "i was wrong, okay??... i.... i shouldn't have given you that stupid thing... i wouldn't have if i knew what you were gonna do with it. i..... i'm........" they trailed off. it was silent for a few long moments, save for the occasional sniffle from looey.

"......"

"...........i'm sorry, okay?" it seemed like a struggle to get the words out, but they went ahead and said it anyway. this was one situation where apologizing and taking accountability was absolutely necessary. more tears fell from looey's eyes like a waterfall, he just hugged his knees tighter and squeezed his eyes shut. shrimpo wasn't sure if he even believed them.
"as much as i hate to admit it, we need to get you to sprout.." shrimpo muttered, glancing in the direction of the machine finn was working on. only the top half was visible from there, but it seemed to be about halfway done.

"no... no..... you should kill me."

shrimpo's eyes snapped back to looey.

there's no way they just said that, right?

"y-you can tell everyone what happened.." they paused to rub their eyes and sniffle, "a-a-and i'll respawn good as new back at the center..."
shrimpo blinked at him, "are you nuts?! i'm not doing that!" they snapped, harsher than they meant to.
looey flinched again, frowning more than before. "shrimpo, i'm in a lot of pain right now.."
"and whose fault is that?!" shrimpo took a deep breath to calm themselves, before reaching out to looey and picking him up bridal.

he's lucky he weighs like nothing.

"we're getting you healed, looey. i'm not gonna kill you, idiot.." they stated. the green light of a complete machine glowed nearby. shrimpo stood up, walking carefully over to where finn was last.

"shr- oh, you found them!" finn skipped over, "thank cod.. we were so worried about you, looey."
looey didn't respond, he just pressed his forehead against shrimpo's cheek.

if it weren't for the fact that they were currently bleeding out, and that shrimpo hated them for so long, it would've felt oddly soft. it was the kind of thing they could only expect from looey, though. that boy was one of the touchiest people in gardenview.

it didn't even surprise them when he wrapped his arms around them to hold on tighter. some deep buried instinct to reassure him resurfaced suddenly. they were able to catch themselves before they started muttering mushy stuff. they had to remember they still hated this guy.

they did, didn't they? he kept getting finn killed, after all...

but... finn forgave him...

why shouldn't they?

.....well, they're shrimpo.....

but shrimpo is allowed to have friends, right? or at least people they don't hate?

they couldn't tell if it was just because he was bleeding out, but looey felt really warm. they found themselves wondering if he was normally like that.

what am i even thinking.. just focus on getting to the elevator, dammit!

they turned their attention back to following finn like they'd been doing before. not far off, they heard pebble's bark, ensuring the twisteds were dealt with for the time being. the elevator came into view at last. yatta, blot, and sprout were already there. astro was standing outside the door, waiting to call for pebble when everybody was accounted for. a tiny spark of fear shot through shrimpo when they realized rodger hadn't returned yet.

"do you want me to carry them the rest of the way, because... i know you probably don't wanna be near sprout..." finn asked quietly as the three of them got closer.
shrimpo shook their head. "i want them to know i found them." they decided.
finn nodded, saying nothing else.

they got on the elevator and yatta and blot immediately surrounded shrimpo.
"LOOEY!! you FOUND him!!"
"?evila eh si" blot asked, (is he alive?).
at some point while they were walking, looey had passed out, but they could clearly still feel his heartbeat, however slow and faint it was. "yeah, he needs healing badly though." shrimpo said, their voice was softer than usual.

yatta held out her arms and shrimpo took that as a cue to gently hand looey off to her. yatta cradled him like a beloved plush toy before turning to take him to sprout.

"is everyone there? somebody help me!" shrimpo turned to the voice of rodger, who seemed to be dragging a limp airy along as well as he could muster. some red liquid was leaking from a gash in his chest, and the left side of his face had been shattered. astro immediately sprinted over to help lift him, and after a moment shrimpo decided to help too. the three of them heaved airy's body onto the elevator, he looked about in as bad shape as looey, if not worse. astro called out to pebble and the little rock dog came sprinting out of the darkness and the elevator door finally shut.

"sprout, do you have enough heals?" astro asked. sprout looked up from where he was crouched next to the wall, he'd got looey into a stable enough state from the looks of things. he stood and walked over to where the three of them were circled around airy.
sprout's eyes widened upon seeing him. "...? red...?" sprout breathed, getting closer to inspect the wounds.
"....shit, my heals won't work on him, azzy." sprout noted, looking up at astro.
"huh? why not?"
"he needs ichor. my heals won't work unless he's got ichor in his system." sprout explained.
"i haven't seen NORMAL blood in ages.." yatta squeaked, frightened.
"that means he's not connected to the recovery center either." rodger pointed out.
"fuck, why didn't you guys give him ichor when you found him??" sprout said loudly.
"of course you'd want to drug a stranger!" shrimpo hissed. sprout shot them a nasty look, but didn't respond.
"astro, you know where the ichor is kept, would you get it once we're back up?" rodger asked. astro looked heavily uncomfortable. shrimpo couldn't blame him, after the shit that happened to dandy..

"it's dangerous, rodger, you know what that stuff does to people!" astro cried, holding his blanket tighter.
"do you want him to die for good??" sprout hissed.
"calm yourself, sprout." rodger stood from where he was crouching.
"we're all upset about dandy, astro. but unfortunately this situation calls for it. sprout is right, he could die from this if we don't get him connected to the recovery machine, and we need ichor to do that, and only you know where it is." rodger said. he was outwardly calm, but shrimpo could tell from the way he was trembling ever so slightly that that was an act. internally, he was panicking.
astro still looked unsure. rodger rested his hand on his shoulder, "we'll only give him enough to get him connected to the recovery center, alright? any side effects it has won't alter him permanently. we all took it too, remember?"
astro looked at the ground, before silently nodding. "okay.. i'll get it. i don't want him to die..."
"good."

the elevator door opened back up to the lobby.

"let's get these two to the medbay." rodger said.

Chapter Text

the green light of the machine rodger was doing a moment ago flashed, replacing the red. airy stood close by, looking around for any signs of looey. so far, six floors down, they hadn't had any luck. airy started to wonder if he'd maybe died already, and this search party was for nothing. they couldn't give up, though. not yet.

they heard pebble bark in the distance. it reminded airy of how looey would distract. except he didn't usually make a whole lot of noise like pebble seemed to.

"three more machines on this floor, i think." rodger stated.

airy followed him through the maze of boxes piled up on storage shelves and infrequent open areas. while rodger looked for the next machine, airy kept searching for looey.

he peered around a corner wall, coming face to face with twisted tisha, whose eyes immediately locked onto him. he tried to make a move to dodge out of the way, but she was quicker. before he knew what was happening, the wooden handle end of twisted tisha's feather duster had collided harshly with the left side of his face.

panic spread through him as the thick glass cracked, blood dripping down from his eye as he stumbled backwards. he could no longer tell what was happening around him, instead being forcibly pulled back into the memory of tripping in his cave and shattering that same side of his face. he started hyperventilating.

no.. no.... nonononononononono.... not again... no... not again! not again! please!

"airy!" rodger's voice snapped him back to reality as tisha's feather duster came down on his face again.

the glass cracked and splintered away into big shards.

half his vision was gone. something he had stopped being used to ever since he got here.

it disoriented him. he stumbled back again, tripping over something and clattering to the ground. tisha continued pursuing him. this time her foot slammed down on his chest. so much force behind the blow that airy could feel the weak metal bend in place as rodger called out trying to draw the twisted's attention away from him.

a long crack formed in the dent, and blood began seeping through. he felt a spasm of pain shoot through his body before passing out completely.

when airy woke up, he expected to be in the waiting room, but instead, he found himself in what at first appeared to be a completely black abyss.

"you're not going anywhere."

airy turned towards the voice. twisted dandy stood proudly behind him. all instincts told him to run, but his feet stayed stubbornly planted in place.

"you're connected to us now. you will feel all the hurt we felt. you will walk with us, finally." it sneered.

airy shivered. terror coursing through his veins. burning. he felt like he was on fire for a moment, and then, suddenly, everything went dull, including his emotions. his thoughts seemed to disappear like they'd never been there to begin with.

"join us, my child. rise." twisted dandy faded from view, and airy awoke again to the overly bright lights of the medbay, and the feeling of cold metal against his back.

Chapter Text

bandages had been placed sloppily over the gash in airy's chest, and the hole in his face, preventing any more blood from leaking out. if rodger had to guess, he'd been reduced to one heart, or possibly less. they had to work quickly if they wanted to save him.

astro returned to the medbay after not too long, a small capsule of a golden liquid in his hands. this stuff, the drug, was what was actually supposed to be called "ichor," everything else they called ichor wasn't really the same.

they weren't entirely sure what the stuff in the machines was, so it was named for its similarity to their blood, which typically turned black permanently after being given ichor. not even the handlers were entirely sure what even caused that reaction. just another freaky side effect of experimental drugs, i suppose. and ichor the currency was stretching the label just about as far as it could reasonably go.

rodger pushed the short fur on airy's arm out of the way so he could find a good vein. after a moment, he located one and nodded to astro, who had just filled up a syringe up with the stuff.

he hesitated for a moment. he still felt bad, and didn't want to do this without airy's permission. but they didn't really have much of a choice here. the guy was hanging on by a thread. astro tried to be gentle as he injected the ichor into him. he felt bad knowing how it would affect airy for the next few hours as his body got adjusted to it. he set the empty syringe into the sink across the room.

"okay, it's done. now what..?" he asked.
sprout walked over to where airy lay on the table. "i'll heal him when he wakes up." sprout stated.

the three of them stood in silence for a long while, before airy slowly opened his remaining eye, immediately squinting at the bright lights above him.

"mornin' sleepyhead. i'm gonna need you to eat this, okay?" sprout helped airy sit up, and then offered him a cupcake. airy didn't respond at all as he took the cupcake from him.

sprout leaned over to astro, "what do you think he'll be like?" he whispered.
astro shrugged, "quiet, probably. he's normally pretty quiet anyway." astro guessed. sprout sighed, as though he found that answer boring.

airy gazed around at the present toons. "i feel lightheaded." he stated. his voice was dull, lacking any kind of emotional response. astro frowned, still clearly very worried for his friend.

the way ichor functioned was drastically different from any other drug out there. reinforcing a toons internal instincts and emotional responses to things; it made shrimpo angry, it made rodger overly suspicious, it made looey nervous and unsure of everything, it made yatta loud as hell.. and.... dandy........ astro didn't want to think about how much of that stuff dandy took, with and without the handlers making him do it. regardless, if airy's base instinct was apathy, he'd have a really rough go of it.

"you're gonna feel lightheaded for a while, eat the cupcake." sprout said.
"why." airy questioned.
"it's medicine, i don't have time to explain. down the hatch, airy." sprout hissed, quickly growing frustrated at him.

airy sighed and ate the cupcake. it wasn't the worst thing in the world, he supposed, but to be honest, sprout wasn't all that fantastic at baking.

airy's remaining eye flitted from one toon to another. rodger, sprout and astro. he couldn't come up with anything notable to say about sprout, but rodger was his friend, and so was astro. but that was about the extent of being able to perceive them.

he still felt hot, like the blood and kerosene inside him had to work overtime at fighting back potential infections, up to the point of boiling. the burning sensation only got worse as he finished off the cupcake. any other time he would be crying out in pain, but for some reason, he couldn't find it in him to react at all. it was like there was a thin wall disconnecting him from his own body, seeing himself from some third person view.

"can i leave yet?" he asked.
rodger shook his head. "i'm afraid you still need time to recover, airy." he explained.

airy felt frustrated. he didn't like this room. it was too bright. the lights were florescent and made a low hum like an old office building. there were too many eyes on him. it smelled like a dentists office and the clanking noise coming from that machine on the back wall was giving him a headache. not to mention the cold metal table he was sitting on, only barely blocked by a thin layer of parchment adjacent paper, a texture he didn't care for at all.

the bandages on his face and chest were too tight, and he could feel the stickiness that would take ages to scrub from the glass and copper almost melting from his too high body heat. he wanted to scream, or rip the bandages off, or both. all the fur on his arms started standing on end. he felt an insatiable urge to tap his foot, hum some old song ingrained in his bones, hold tight onto his globe guards until they stung, or maybe chew on his hands and arms.

the combination of this and the ghost of the burning pain in his system was quickly compounding into the worst overstimulation he'd quite possibly ever experienced in his life. and as someone who'd spent a significant amount of time at truck stops, and had experienced at least once the hell that was buc-ee's, that was really saying something.

and despite all of this, the presence of other toons prevented him from acting on almost any of it. like he thought they'd find him weird and ostracize him for it. he had mask his discomfort significantly in order to even get by for a second, but his subconscious kept noticing more and more things to make his consciousness upset.

he didn't even notice he was shaking, but he felt like he was going to explode, so the spasms were unsurprising. the only way he thought to ground himself was to hold onto his globe gaurds. it wasn't a super overt thing, no more than someone resting their hands on their hips, it could be passed as a regular behavior.

he didn't notice how much time had passed since getting stuck in his head. sprout had left, rodger was standing by the machine, and astro was still gazing at him, softly, but with a worried look in his eye. he needed some way to distract himself from how painfully uncomfortable he was, and fast. through the fog, his brain was able to call upon an interest of his that he'd spent countless months pouring his soul into, compounding into a deceptively simple question.

"do you have computers here?" airy muttered.
astro took a moment to think, "somewhere in the run floors maybe, it would be hard to move one up here right now though." astro responded, "i'll see about getting one for you."

airy nodded, squeezing his globe guards slightly less. he could really use a good text based adventure game right about how, better yet, an html based webpage to mess with. the thought of computers and all the ways they could make being in his stupid fucking room more bearable calmed his 90 miles per hour thoughts down slightly. he closed his eye, thinking back to his old pc in the cave, he wondered how it was doing without him.

if there was one thing he missed about that place, it was the pc. he thought back to theplanedatabase, he could probably access some of his old code if he got ahold of a computer here, especially if by some miracle they had internet access. his thoughts drowned out the annoying, itchy, loud, bright world around him, and he began to feel slightly less overstimulated.

Chapter Text

looey was already relatively stable by the time they left the elevator, and by then, rodger and astro, and... ugh... sprout, were all preoccupied with getting airy to safety, leaving shrimpo and finn alone with the circus troupe.

it took a lot of convincing, most of which was done by finn, to get yatta and blot to leave looey alone with shrimpo. could they blame them though? they were pretty notorious for making attempts at looey's life by this point, but if they were gonna have this conversation, they had to be alone with him. they would have had finn there, if it weren't such a sensitive topic.

no, they had to talk about this alone.

so looey was there, sitting crosslegged on shrimpo's uncomfortable bed, waiting for them to be done punching their punching bag. if they couldn't get their frustrations at sprout out on sprout himself, that was the next best thing. shrimpo took a few deep breaths before tossing their boxing gloves haphazardly to the floor.

they turned to looey, who still looked nervous and sad and....a complete mess if they were being honest. he'd been restored to his regular air level, keeping the healing holes at bay with a ridiculous amount of bands. a cartoonish caricature of injury.

that's what happens when you're a balloon, though.

shrimpo wasn't sure how to start this, so being blunt was the only way forwards.

"sprout gave you the weed, right?"

looey flinched at their forwardness, his ears drooping slightly, like a kicked puppy. "uh.. um.... yeah....." he broke eye contact with them, hugging himself.
"that fucking BITCH." shrimpo spun back around and gave their punching bag another bare-fisted hit, hard enough to leave their hand aching slightly. looey scooted farther back onto the bed, pressing himself against a wall. he was scared, probably. of what? shrimpo couldn't tell. probably of the ASS KICKING they were gonna give sprout later.

they took another deep breath to try and retain some semblance of calm. "did he force you?" they asked, more 'gentle' this time.
"h-huh?" looey glanced back at him.
"deaf idiot... did he FORCE you to do weed with him?" shrimpo rephrased it.

"i....." looey paused for a long while. too long.

fuck, he did didn't he?... cod.....

"i.... technically i didn't.... say.... no........exactly....." looey's voice trailed off as he stared at the ground.
"so he forced you." shrimpo concluded.
"n-no, i mean- well... i did take it from him of my own free will, i... didn't really want to.... b-but he didn't force it on me!!" looey squeaked. he was grasping at straws to defend a horrible person. a horrible person who drugs people now, apparently. great. love to see that turn of events.

"looey...not saying no isn't the same as saying yes." shrimpo explained.
looey had to think about that for a moment. "..really?"
"oh my cod.. yeah. no duh. did you want to smoke weed with him?"
"....n-no..."
"exactly."

looey frowned, losing himself in his thoughts. he pulled his knees up to his chest, hugging them tight. shrimpo climbed onto the bed with him, sitting a short ways away. they hesitated for a long while, they weren't exactly the 'comforting people' type. looey was coming to terms with the fact he'd been taken advantage of somewhat..and they had nothing to say to help?

"i'm sorry he made you do that." they mumbled after a while.
"n-no, it's my fault, i should've said something about it... i just... didn't wanna tell off sprout seedly, i guess... heh..." looey chuckled nervously.
"cause he's a main?" shrimpo guessed.
"no..." looey gazed off at nothing in particular, "i.... kind of have this big, stupid crush on him.." he explained.

uhoh- no no no no no no-!

shrimpo jolted, like they were about to grab looey's shoulders, but they stopped themselves, instead just staring at him with a sort of fear in their eyes. "that's not a good thing!" they squeaked.
looey looked confused, tilting his head slightly.
"he- ...he's not a good person, looey. you haven't seen the worst of it, you don't know what he's like........" they looked away from him, willing themselves not to think too much about it.
"what do you mean? he's nice to me?" looey said.
"you don't get it..." shrimpo breathed. "if you have any common sense left, stay away from sprout..especially when he's high.." shrimpo stated. they hoped looey wouldn't notice how afraid they were getting.
looey frowned at them, his ears drooping again.

"you're a good person, looey....i....don't hate you... i also don't want sprout to fuck you up.." like he did to me.. they added silently.
"it's not like i have a chance anyway, he's with cosmo now.." looey sighed.
"that's not a new thing. he's been with cosmo for months. like, ever since he broke up with me.. the whore.."
looey tilted his head again. "really?"
shrimpo nodded, growing increasingly frustrated at how dumb looey was.

deep breath shrimpo, they're in the same boat as you..

"oh..." looey looked away again.

they're really down bad, aren't they? fuck.... why sprout?.... why not any other toon..?

"i mean it looey, stay away from him." shrimpo hissed. "try to...." they paused fidgeting with their hands for a moment, "try to get over it, you're better off without him."

they watched looey grab his ears, pulling them down to the sides of his face and squeezing. a painful jolt of memory shot through them. they used to do the exact same thing with their antennae when they were upset or overwhelmed. they didn't notice how their eyes watered a bit.

they're just like me... cod..... COD DAMMIT SEEDLY.

they shuffled forwards on their knees and wrapped all of their arms around his torso. looey froze for a moment before cautiously returning the hug. they felt his chin rest on top of their head.
"stay away from him, looey.." shrimpo mumbled.

looey didn't respond.

Chapter Text

after airy's conversation with astro, the two took a trip down to the warehouse to check if there were any computers down there before risking another run so early in the day. no matter where he went, or what he did, everything was almost too overstimulating to handle.

about halfway through their search astro had so kindly drapped his beloved blanket over airy's shoulders to quell his incessant shivering, which he likely interpreted as just him being cold. airy clung to the blanket in almost the same way astro did, with his arms holding it closed tightly, albeit with a little less security since airy only had the average amount of arms. it was a little strange seeing astro walk around without his blanket, he looked a bit intimidating in all honesty, probably because he was a main... whatever that meant.

the warehouse noise was almost worse than the medbay. whirring ventilation fans, random creaking noises, the building settling. the pipes overhead kept shifting and made him nervous. even the still water in the pool was making some amount of noise.

astro's voice projected across the room. airy hadn't even noticed when he'd stopped following him. "i think i found one."

airy walked slowly over to astro's side, careful to avoid any water puddles. he filed in between the metal shelves, gazing down at the chunky monitor astro was pointing at.

"windows 98. good operating system." airy mumbled.
"does that work for you?" astro asked.
airy nodded silently, handing astro his blanket back so he could lift the monitor.
"let me handle that, you still need to heal.." astro blocked airy with his hand, then picked up all the pieces of the computer using all of his arms. airy seemed a bit shocked by how strong astro was. he took the blanket back and the two of them walked back to the elevator together.

airy walked up to shelly's bedroom door, noticing under the ammonite shell graphic there was now a small, crudely painted orange lantern outline. his face heated up a bit but the burning of the rest of his body made it almost unnoticable. he gently opened the door, holding it for astro and shutting it once they were both inside. astro set the computer down next to airy's mattress, before glancing over at the bed on the other side of the room.

"shelly?" astro called.
"oh, hi astro! um, turns out they didn't need my help all that much, soo i've just been hanging out here." shelly responded. she was lying on her stomach on the bed, holding what looked to be a journal of some sorts. it had cute keychains of hearts attached to it, and a couple stickers of vee's face.

airy immediately noticed how much more quiet shelly's room was, and, after all the earbleedingly loud rooms he'd been in for the past hour or so, he relished it.

"oh geez, airy are you okay??" shelly hopped out of her bed and walked over to him quickly. astro plugged in the computer before standing and rejoining the other two as shelly turned airy's face slightly to inspect the bandages.
"what happened to him???" shelly squeaked, frightened.
"he got attacked by twisted... um.... tisha, i think. we had to give him ichor..." astro explained, sounding a bit apologetic.
"what's ichor?" airy questioned.
"i'll explain later." astro batted shelly's hands away from airy's face, "why don't you go check out your computer?"

computer........

airy turned away from them and planted himself on the ground in front of the dusty old pc. first order of business was figuring out if this thing had internet. opening up internet explorer showed that it did in fact work somehow. airy grinned for the first time since being given the ichor as he typed his website url into the search bar.

www.https://planedatabase.com/

immediately a rush of familiarity overcame him as the simple html website popped up on the monitor. it felt all too familiar, especially with his eye being missing again. he recalled countless hours on this webpage, trying to make it perfect, trying to make ONE the best it could be. he half expected to turn around and be back in his cave. but when he turned he just saw astro and shelly standing over him and gazing over his lid at the computer screen.

"what's that?" shelly asked, kneeling next to him. astro mirrored her on airy's other side.
"oh, um... this is the website for my old contest show..." he mumbled.
"ooh. who're the season one contestants?" shelly pointed to the imbed link to the next page.

airy felt embarrassed about how abysmally awful season one went. he shook his head and clicked over to season two, batch one.

"huh. i've seen that backpack guy in one of your dreams before." astro noted. airy felt the short fur on his arms start standing on end.
"you have?" he muttered.
"mhm... they were chasing you with an axe or something.."
"i don't remember that one." airy stated loudly.
"these are... um.... kind of weird images for a contest show, huh?" shelly noted, pointing to the very poorly cropped picture of charlie howling. "is that a baby??"
"they didn't have any decent pictures." airy said. he input the debug command into the computer and the website popped up in an editable form. "can i have some space.?" airy requested dryly.

astro nodded awkwardly and stood up, airy handed his blanket back to him again.
"sorry! have fun with your computer airy!" shelly said, getting up and returning to her bed.

"i'll come check on you later." astro called as he left the room.
"okay."

this is probably a bad idea.. airy thought as he inputted a line of code he remembered. a moment later a very familiar text box appeared on his screen.

- [so cool that you guys fo ... ... what._]

airy felt nervous as he typed a reply.

- [hi texty._]
- [where the FUCK am i_]
- [and who are you? your thing doesn't have a camera_]
- [it's airy._]
- [what the FUCK??????_]

Chapter Text

looey stayed with shrimpo for a long while. they stopped talking entirely, only really focusing on each other's presence. it was strangely comforting coming from someone who looey was previously certain was out to get him.

seeing this side of them sort of opened his eyes a bit. was all of that anger a front? was it a wall they put up to prevent themselves from being hurt by people like sprout again? what did sprout even do to them that was so abhorrent?

he couldn't ever ask, it wasn't his place to know.

i'm not even really their friend..

it probably had something to do with the drugs.

looey let go of shrimpo, and shrimpo let go of him, scooting back and letting their arms fall to their sides. they made no eye contact with him as he got up to leave the room. it was probably a bit embarrassing borderline cuddling with somebody you wanted dead just days previous.

looey shut the door behind him and started walking back towards his own room, where his troupe would be waiting to hear about whatever was so important shrimpo had to get him alone to tell him.

it was awfully quiet in this hallway. a kind of stillness that fills your heart with dread and gives you goosebumps. especially when the shadow of someone you were just warned to stay away from gets silhouetted on the floor in front of you. looey stopped in his tracks. he wasn't sure what to do.

i know shrimpo has their reasons for not liking sprout....but he's nice to me..? surely he wouldn't try to hurt me?

"hi looey!"

he finally made up his mind to turn and face him. his eyes still showed vague signs of being stoned, but nothing else about his appearance displayed anything wrong. his leaves didn't look wilted, he was smiling, and he seemed to be in a pretty good mood.

"oh, h-hey sprout.." looey stuttered, rubbing his arm awkwardly.
"is something wrong?" sprout asked, taking a couple steps closer.
looey subconsciously took a step back in turn, catching himself before he did it again. "uh, no, no..." he looked up at him. ignoring the abnormal pinkish tint of his sclera, sprout's dark green eyes were sort of mesmerizing in a way.

immediately shrimpo's words bit back at him, "stay away from sprout!" and a chill ran down his spine. but he ignored it.

"just... recovering still, i guess..." looey finished, looking away.
"yeah.. well, i made you some lemon blondies to help cheer you up, they're your favorites, right?" sprout noted. only then did looey notice the tupperware he was holding. looey looked back at him. he couldn't help it to feel comforted by the gesture.
"y-yeah..! how'd you remember that?" he asked shyly.
sprout rolled his eyes, "i remember everyones favorite desserts, silly! it's kind of my job. anyway, is there somewhere we can go to talk?"

"stay away from him." his brain repeated again.

looey gulped, "i kind of... have to...." his voice trailed off as sprout took him gently by the hand and started walking him down the hall. his stomach twisted itself into knots trying to figure out what shrimpo thought was so wrong with sprout. he was nice, right? looey could walk away if he wanted to, it wasn't like sprout's hold on his hand was super tight or anything.

they ended up in the small living room type area at the end of the hall, sprout sat on the couch and looey found a spot next to him.

he was only weird earlier because he was smoking, he's fine right now.

"i wanna apologize for earlier.." sprout began vaguely, "i should've had a little bit more self control, my bad." he took the lid off the tupperware and held it out to looey. they looked great, obviously, no one could hold a candle to sprout's baking... except cosmo maybe. looey took a couple, one to eat now and one to eat later so he wouldn't have to ask for more mid conversation.
looey seemed just a bit confused by what sprout was referring to. "hm?"
"blot really got on my case about smoking in your room. won't happen again, haha!" sprout clarified.

oh... that....

"oh..hahah...." looey looked away, taking a bite of the dessert he was given. everything about it seemed normal so far. something inside him couldn't shake the gut feeling telling him there was something off about it.

he was probably just trying a different recipe..... he.... he wouldn't do something to these, right.....?

"althoughh.." sprout looked up at the ceiling, "if you ever wanted to try it again, my room's open..." he offered quietly.

nothing about his voice portrayed any pressure being put on looey to do that. it was a suggestion. an offer, not a demand. not something that would be expected of him. or something sprout would be upset at him for not following up on. and as much as looey didn't like the idea of trying to smoke again, something buried deep in his subconscious wanted to take him up on the offer.

shrimpo's warnings called forth again, but this time looey ignored them outright.

i can do what i want..

his heart felt fuzzy. the familiar feeling of warmth and butterflies from being near someone he had a crush on for so long came over him. they were tempted to try and rest their head on sprout's shoulder, but ended up being too nervous to go through with the action. instead, they put their hand right next to sprout's, and he responded by taking it and giving it a gentle squeeze.

"...yatta filled me in on what happened earlier... i told you if you were feeling unstable like that you could come to me about it, loo.." sprout whispered, holding looey's hand tight, like looey might try to run away if he let go.

looey felt self-conscious, he could feel sprout's gaze being directed at the slightly bloody bandages that covered his wrists and forearms. he wanted to pull his hand away, but at the same time didn't want to loose the contact.

"...sorry..." looey breathed, his ears pressing tight against the back of his head in shame.
"you should be sorry."
looey blinked, looking back at sprout, trying to read his expression.
"you made us all really worried, don't do that again.." sprout's expression showed sympathy, but there was no comfort behind his words. it only really made them feel worse. they tried to brush it off.

he's right... i know it's bad for me... but did he really have to say it like that?

"i don't want to have to worry so much about you, looey. you're a good person, and you mean so much to me... but it makes us all upset when you hurt yourself. do you really want to do that to your friends?" sprout looked away, gazing off at something on the ceiling.

looey shoved the other lemon blondie in his mouth. did sprout even realize what he was saying wasn't helpful? a brief wave of nausea caught looey as he took in so much sugar at once. he blinked, holding his breath to let it pass. he reached for another one out of the tub on sprout's lap.

sprout returned his gaze to looey. "enjoying those?" he chuckled.
looey blushed as he bit into it, glancing away awkwardly.
"good... sugar makes everything better right? you'll feel much better soon..." sprout said, finally letting go of looey's hand.

another wave of nausea hit him. he couldn't tell if it was from the sugar or something else, but everything around him was starting to seem a little...brighter? his train of thought came to an abrupt halt. he blinked, one eye at a time, slumping back against the couch.

"there you are~." sprout purred, his voice muffled by something, but looey couldn't tell what. sprout put his arm around looey's shoulders. they could do nothing but lean closer to him, cherishing his warmth, and the comfort it brought.
"it takes a minute for it to kick in, huh?" sprout chuckled. looey had no idea what he was talking about, but he laughed anyway.
"don't you feel so much better~?" sprout petted looey between the ears. they felt like if they leaned any closer they'd end up taking the place of the tupperware on sprout's lap.
"y-yeahh..." looey mumbled.
"yeahh.." sprout paused petting them, "you ate like three of those things, i prolly should'a stopped you..."

looey's mind was barely clear enough to wonder what he meant by that...

Chapter Text

- [lemme get this straight... you get access to a computer and IMMEDIATELY kidnap someone again_]
- [it's not like that._]
- [really?_]
- [i just wanted to talk. i'll send you right back after._]
- [jackass_]
- [fine._]
- [talk away you goddamn psycho_]
- [after i got sent to the waiting room i tried to find a new world to live in._]
- [you mean after you killed yourself?_]
- [what?_]
- [liam said you killed yourself. jumped off a waterfall or some shit_]
- [i didn't jump, okay? i fell._]
- [like i'm supposed to believe that_]
- [i'm not suicidal????_]
- [next you're gonna say you're done kidnapping people lmaooo_]
- [just listen. i got sent to this place called gardenview. there's other objects here, but they're a little weird looking. anyways_]
- [did you start forcing them to do your little competition too_]
- [no!!!!_]
- [y'know what they say about criminals_]
- [what._]
- [they're always at risk to reoffend_]
- [ANYWAYS. i'm actually doing really well here. i've made friends, and people actually enjoy my company for once._]
- [like we were supposed to enjoy your company when we were literally forced to be around you_]
- [ok buddy_]
- [i'm sorry, okay?_]
- [uhuh._]
- [it was wrong of me to do what i did. i went a little bit crazy from being isolated for so long._]
- [a little bit?_]
- [point is, i'm recovering now. so you can tell backpack_]
- [liam._]
- [liam... or whoever, that ONE is over. for good._]
- [how am i supposed to believe you. you've already shown you're not above kidnapping again_]
- [texty please. i mean it._]
- [if you mean it so much then why am i still here?_]
- [you're gonna tell him right?_]
- [..._]
- [texty, please._]
- [......_]
- [...fine._]
- [i'll tell him._]
- [now send me back_]
- [okay. goodbye texty._]
- [fuck you._]

airy put in the code to send texty back to their own computer. he sighed, feeling a bit like he'd gotten nowhere with them. it would be so much easier if he could just talk to backpack, or any of them himself... "they're always at risk to reoffend."

...

i can't do that... that would just prove them right that i haven't changed... but....

he gazed at the computer screen.

would it really be that bad?