Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hey yallll welcome to the official request chapter

Of course you guys can request as the chapters go on - but because I might lose track let's try to keep the ideas in this chap for now lol.

Anyway- the rules!
- First of all: NO SMUT/SEXUAL CONTENT. absolutely none. zlich. zero. My asexual ass can't read it for the life of me, much less write it.
- Second, probably obvious, pleeeeease don't make your requests super simple, like "Person A and Person B kiss". it'd be difficult for me to get any sort of prompt out of that.
- Lastly, you ARE allowed to use other FNF characters but I do ask to try and stick to the main group from the Post-Corruption series and other characters that have shown up in it for now. I have oneshots coming in the future that will introduce more characters, so this will make it easier for me to write those. Building off of this, you can also request ideas that relate to hcs I've stated before, events that have happened in the series, orrrrrrr be totally random I don't mind.
However do take note that it's possible for you to request ideas that are going to be later plotlines in the series, sooooo yeah I gotta turn those down. sorry :P

also if you happen to have found this work without reading the main series (Setsunai) then uh... you should probably go read it it'll make everything in this work SO much easier to understand. I promise this isn't a shameless plug or smth it's just all these requests are based on my AU. thanksssss

With all that in mind, yall can go ahead and request in the comments - feel free to leave more than one request if you happen to have multiple ideas, it's good fuel for the writer in my brain  :D

Chapter Text

"Boyfriend- You're joking about this, right? Please tell me you're joking."

"Nope."

Boyfriend had a smug smile that never left his face. Soul sighed.

"You really don't see how terrible of an idea this is?"

"How so? It's just a prank."

So for whatever reason, Boyfriend had decided that it would be funny to pretend that he was corrupted again to prank GF and Pico. Soul, on the other hand, saw so many problems with this idea.

"...Okay. First of all, I know the Corruption ended FOREVER ago, but do you really think that Pico and Gigi aren't gonna be freaked out when they see that you're 'corrupted'? And second- how are you even going to look the part?! Use a can of black paint?!?"

"...I know you've said it before, but are you sure you aren't a mind reader, Soul?"

Soul paused for a second, before letting out a groan in annoyance.

"Urghhhh... This isn't gonna go well."

"You never said you wouldn't help, though~!"

"...Fine."

After lots of non-toxic, theoretically-removable black and pink paint with a bunch of nylon AND a shit ton of air-drying later, Boyfriend was ready. Now all he had to do was stand in front of the door and wait for GF and Pico.

Until he heard a voice from inside his mind.

"Boyfriend, you're not supposed to just STAND there. The Corruption was always actively seeking out its next victims, it never lured them anywhere."

Well, how the fuck am I supposed to know how I acted while I was corrupted?! See, this is why I need your help. How do you know this shit, anyway?

"I had the privilege of watching everything the whole time while you were asleep, dummy."

Hey!

"Well, if you're gonna just stand there, at least look a little more menacing."

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. BF stiffened, prepping himself to actually put this little plan in motion.

"Yo, Morse Code! You in there?"

Boyfriend simply gave a small "beep" in response.
Pico opened the door.

"You okay, Be- WHAT THE FUCK?!"

And he immediately slammed the door.

"Pico? Is he okay?"

"I dunno, Gigi."

Pico stepped away from the door, gesturing for her to open it.

"You tell me."

And once Girlfriend opened the door, she looked at the 'corrupted' BF in confusion and pushed the door completely ajar.

"You see what I mean?!"

Instead of reacting in any sort of horror, however, Girlfriend just tilted her head quizzingly.

"Something's different..."

"NO SHIT! HE'S CORRUPTED AGAIN!"

Boyfriend fought to keep himself from laughing at the silly exchange.
Once they found out it was just a prank, this was totally gonna be something they'd look back on and laugh at... maybe.

"No, I mean it's because he's corrupted. It doesn't feel like he is..."

"I'm sorry, I know you're a demon and all, Gigi, but what?"

Fuckshitfuck uhhhh Soul what do I do-

"Relax, Bee. Just throw your mic at them. Or something. You gotta get them to rap battle you somehow."

It almost scares me how you seem to be such an expert on this.

"AHEM. You're the one who wanted to do this shit. You can't hold it against me for having that knowledge against my will."

...Fair point.

Boyfriend then took the suggestion and threw his mic at Pico, making sure it fell to the floor before it could actually hit anyone.

Only for him to realize that he hadn't tied the cord around his wrist beforehand.

"Fuckin- shit- Okay, fine. I guess I gotta be the one to get you outta this stupid shit- God- WHERE THE FUCK IS SOUL WHEN YOU NEED HIM?!"

Pico pulled out his mic, only pausing when he realized that Boyfriend didn't have his back in his hand yet.
Boyfriend was so glad that the painted mask he had on could hide his expressions, because god was he embarrassed at the fact that he needed to physically point at his mic to signal for Pico to give it to him.
Soul snickering at him from inside his head wasn't helping either.

Pico simply sighed (and muttered something about how even while corrupted Boyfriend was still an idiot) before kicking the mic back to him.

GF pulled out some speakers and started a song.

And then Boyfriend ALSO realized something else regarding his mic.

FUCK I FORGOT TO HOOK UP THE VOICE FILTER-

"...Oh my god- Bee-"

Shut up we're just gonna improvise-

The rap battle began.
Pico was quick to throw out his verse first - but once Boyfriend's turn rolled around, it was easy for him and Girlfriend to notice that his voice sounded normal - and it definitely didn't sound that way back when he was corrupted the first time...

So what was going on?

As the song came to a close, Pico briefly checked over himself for any signs of corruption - only to find none. He looked at Girlfriend, who also seemed to be fine, and she gave him a shrug.
He looked over at Boyfriend, who was still fully corrupted.

That was weird... If neither of them were corrupted, then shouldn't that mean that Boyfriend would uncorrupt, at least even a little?
And then something else was finally taken into account.

"Pico, is it just me, or does it smell like dried paint in here?"

And Pico's confused expression quickly switched to a deadpan one.

"...He's not corrupted, is he?"

"I don't think so."

...Soul, fucking HELP ME.

"Nooooope, they've got it all figured out, BF. You're on your ownnnn~"

Okay, clearly Soul just wanted Boyfriend to get retribution for doing this plan in the first place.

Boyfriend lifted the paint-filled nylon mask he had on his face, giving a sheepish "hi" to the other two in the room.

"Hi, babe!"

"...Boyfriend, you have three seconds to run before I blam your ass."

Boyfriend stood there for a second, before taking off running with Pico following after him. Which resulted in the two running around the apartment for a good while (not to mention how many things got thrown around because of that, as if parts of the place didn't already look like a mess).

Girlfriend rolled her eyes with a smile, getting rid of the speakers as Soul appeared next to her.

"By the way, this wasn't my idea."

"Figured."

So much for an uneventful day.

Chapter Text

Last time the three of them had been at this highway, it was a high-octane, stressful battle that ended with them getting one step closer to ending the Corruption.

But now, Boyfriend, Girlfriend, and Pico were just there. Revisiting old memories.

"...You know, I still can't believe I fucking shot you."

Boyfriend groaned, facepalming.

"Okay, we've been over this- for one, that was the Corruption, not you. Second: you shot me in the hand, not the face!"

"I still almost merc'd you, though, Bee. And caused you a wound on your hand for a month- and I swear there's no way a wound like that should heal that fast."

Boyfriend shrugged.

"And that shit had the nerve to transform me into that crystal killing machine after that... Seriously, that move almost got me attacked by Gigi..."

"Don't be so surprised, Pico! That is my boyfriend you almost shot down, after all."

"Wellllll, you still looked cool in that form, though. And it was a good challenge."

"Right, because facing down your corrupted friend who just entered an incredibly dangerous new form is a regular Tuesday for you, Bee."

Of course, they were talking about when Pico went Nexus on the other two as an attempt from the Corruption to keep Boyfriend from fixing everything.
BF and GF had learned the name from Pico, courtesy of him having been the one to experience going into that form.

Breaking up the slight banter, Girlfriend popped up behind Pico, seeming eager to divulge her end of the events.

"Aw, but you have to admit, it was fun discussing ways to beat it out of you, wasn't it babe?"

"Okayyyyy, I can't argue with that. It kinda was."

"Adding to my earlier statement - I also can't believe you decided to punch me to break the Corruption off."

"And that annoys you why?"

"Because I wasn't expecting that shit from you!"

"Ehhhhh, that was kind of my idea..."

As Girlfriend gave Pico a sheepish grin, Boyfriend looked back and forth between the two of them, before letting out a nervous chuckle.

"Uhh, well, you may have given me the idea to attack him once he was down, Gigi, buuuuuuut I got the idea of punching him free from somewhere else."

Pico and Girlfriend looked at him, confused.

"...From where exact-"

And then a white light appeared next to Boyfriend, Soul floating in its place a mere second later.

"I FUCKING KNEW IT!"

"Oh, shut up, dude."

"Aw, even when your life was on the line facing down the Corruption, you still thought about me. I'm flattered~"

Of course, to add to the teasing, Soul had floated a little closer to Boyfriend as he said that. Boyfriend lightly shoved him away, getting a small laugh out of Soul, but he still couldn't suppress the small smile on his face.

"Stoppit."

Girlfriend couldn't help but giggle at the two's playful sibling-like antics, while Pico stood there, slightly confused.

"Wait, how the fuck exactly did you get the punch idea from Soul, of all people?"

"Oh, right. I forgot Bee didn't tell you about how I basically shoryuken-ed him out of his mind back when we escaped his corruption."

Pico let out a snicker.

"And he left out this part why?"

"Because it wasn't that important!"

"Yeah right. Anyway." Pico then gestured back to Soul. "Where exactly have you been for the past 5 to 10 minutes?"

"Well, I was thinking about cutting in when you mentioned the gunshot wound, because, well, I was the reason it healed so fast, but then I heard something about Boyfriend punching you and I wanted to see where the conversation was gonna go."

"Of course that's where you stopped to listen... But the other part makes sense, though. I seriously can't imagine a bullet wound like that healing so quickly on its own."

Boyfriend blinked, before shooting a smug look over at Soul.

"Aw, so you still thought about me, even if you weren't sure I'd ever come back? 'I'm flattered~'"

"That was me just looking out for you! You could've eventually died from blood loss or something. There's a difference here."

Boyfriend chuckled, walking over to the railing on the highway and leaning on it as the others followed suit.

"If there is one, I'm not seeing it."

"You know, I'm still surprised that you managed to dodge all of Pico's attacks, babe!"

"Yeah, I- vaguely remember that, what kind of power up did you get when I went Nexus on you, Bee?"

"I just have mad skills."

And then Boyfriend yelped at the feeling of something poking the middle of his back.

He quickly turned around to see Soul, still floating above him, snickering a little. And given the fact that he was still floating slightly above BF, it was obvious that Soul had used his tail to poke him.
Bonus points for the clearly unfair advantage.

"I thought you said you had mad skills."

"Oh, come on, that's not fair, at least I saw Pico's attacks coming! Plus, that was a very serious situation and I was running on lots of adrenaline, so it was easier to dodge anyway. There's a difference!"

"'If there is one, I'm not seeing it.'"

"Mean."

"Yeah, yeah. Anyway, there is one other thing I'm wondering about now... How come Pico went Nexus to stop BF, but... Gigi didn't?"

And the group went silent, Boyfriend and Pico looking over to Girlfriend.

"I... don't know? I may be a demon, but I don't exactly have clear memories from when I was corrupted, too, you know."

"Fair point. Should've considered that."

Boyfriend, realizing something, looked back at Soul.

"Not only that, but that also raises the question of why the Corruption didn't go Nexus to stop us from escaping."

All of a sudden, Pico cleared his throat, and the group's attention went to him.

"I think I have a theory."

"Shoot."

"Alright, so to answer the first question. I remember you guys talked about Girlfriend using a lot of illusions when you were saving her, right Bee?"

Boyfriend, along with Girlfriend and Soul (who had finally dropped down to lean against the railing of the highway next to Boyfriend), nodded.

"I somewhat remember that... especially that last one. I can't believe it almost worked..."

"Yeah, and you wonder why I had to come save his ass. Still though, once BF got over that one it was pretty much impossible for the Corruption to gain ground over him."

"Then that confirms my suspicions. Since the Corruption was mostly focused on using illusions with Gigi, using the Nexus form couldn't have been very useful in that scenario. But when the Corruption sent me after BF, it already knew it couldn't subdue him that way, so I guess it went with the last ditch effort option once I started uncorrupting."

"Not to mention you were probably its most powerful asset at that point, Pico."

"Hm. Gotta admit, that's a good point. It already lost BF once you stepped in, Gigi."

"Well, that explains one of the questions - but what about when me and Soul tried to break out? It didn't go Nexus even once."

"For that, I gotta ask something. How were you able to wake up from within the Corruption's influence in the first place?"

"Oh, that was me. His corrupted self looked really worn out after Deathmatch, so I took it as a moment of weakness and a chance to get BF out of it. I'm just glad it worked."

"Then it sounds like most of its energy was already exerted fighting Dearest, and from what I can tell, the Nexus form takes a lot of energy to use. But there's one other thing that confuses me - you said it tried to take control again, right?"

"About halfway through Neuroses, and for like, some of Discharge, yeah."

That was when Girlfriend perked up with a suggestion.

"Maybe the Corruption thought that wasn't a good opportunity to use it?"

"...That... might actually be right. When the Corruption uses its Nexus form, it heightens offensive capabilities, losing the ability to corrupt others because the only goal it has at that point is to kill. And since the Corruption was only trying to get BF back under its control by then from INSIDE his mind, there was no reason for it to lose its corrupting abilities or use offensive measures. Not only that, but the Nexus form can't be sustained for too long, and the corruption eventually starts eroding away from the host... So yeah, I think Gigi is right on this one."

"Huh. But it would've been cool to see what I would've looked like, though, right?"

"Okay, it could've looked cool, but it would've meant bad news for us, Bee."

"Still, though. I bet Gigi would've looked hot- I MEAN COOL- like that too..."

"Right, because Gigi wasn't already hot enough with her corrupted look."

Boyfriend definitely did not miss the white blush that IMMEDIATELY took over Soul's face once he realized he had mumbled that out loud (despite the obvious blush on his face from his own statement).
He barely stifled a laugh at that, and Soul sharply turned to face him.

"YOU DIDN'T HEAR SHIT."

"Eheh, I dunno about that, I clearly heard something..."

"Awww, even while I was corrupted, you both thought I was still hot? 'I'm flattered~'"

Apparently, Girlfriend also didn't miss that as well, a giggle following the end of her sentence.

Boyfriend's blush grew a little more while Soul buried his face in his hands.

"Oh my god, Gigi, please, you're going to kill me-"

Boyfriend let out a laugh at that.

"Heh, where's that cockiness and confidence from a minute ago, Souly?~"

Boyfriend was sure that he had the higher ground now in their little sibling-ish banter.
At least until Soul chuckled and shot him a smirk, his blush finally dying down.

"Big talk for someone who does the same thing."

"I- Shut up!"

And suddenly a voice spoke up from a few feet away.

"Oh my fucking god, all of you are SIMPS."

Boyfriend chuckled, shooting a smug look at Pico as he crossed his arms.

"Right, says the zucchini."

"Boyfriend's riiiiiight~ You're in a relationship with us, still, Piki~"

Pico stared at the three with a deadpan expression.

".........Can we go home now."

Chapter Text

Heyaaaaaaaa

So even though I don't have social media, I still freely roam through tumblr sometimes. with no account lol.

And since I've seen these everywhere on that site, I've been thinking: what if I were to do sentence prompt requests?

Like, if people sent me a sentence to be used in a request fic along with which characters they want me to use.

I just thought it was a pretty cool idea.

Sooooooooo if people also want to use this form of requesting a fic, feel free to! I wanna experiment with this whole request thing a little.

So far I only have one more request to work on - don't worry, it's comingggggg

anyways that's about it

cyaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Chapter Text

Sooooooooo with the release of "I'll Always Be Here" you guys (and. well. me by extension) are now allowed to include BB/Michael in your requests! Rules from the first chapter still apply though.

Also, after doing some thinking, I've decided to hold off on doing sentence prompts (the idea I mentioned in the previous chapter) as well! Tumblr is being mean and not giving me the sentence starter lists I found a while back.

Anyways, I'm gonna be busy in the next few weeks so fics/oneshots are gonna be churned out really slowly. I'll cya guys thennnnnnn

Chapter Text

It had been a while since the four of them had a movie night all together.
And for some reason, Boyfriend had picked one of the most boring horror movies ever known to man.

And by boring, it was boring.

The plot and characters were so easily predictable, and the story itself had so many inconsistencies and plot holes (all of which Pico took the sweet time to point out).

"Guys, I swear I had no idea the movie was gonna be this bad."

"Did you at least check the reviews, babe?"

"Uh.... it said they were mixed..."

"You only looked at the critic reviews again, didn't you."

"......no?"

"He totally did. Meanwhile, pass me the popcorn again."

"Even though it's clearly under-buttered, way too salty, and this movie is so terrible that it's not even worth eating this during it? Seriously, barely any of it's gone, Pico."

"I don't care. Just gimme some."

By the time they were barely into the second act of the film (which involved some weird-ass kidnapping subplot that seemed to have no real purpose being in the movie), they were all asleep.

Well, okay, "all" was technically inaccurate.

Everyone was asleep except for Soul.
For some reason, despite the clear uninteresting nature of the movie, he just couldn't fall asleep.

He had definitely considered switching out the disks for a brief moment - but if either Girlfriend or Pico woke up to him attempting to binge watch Soul Eater for the 20th time, then he was going to have a lot of explaining to do that he didn't want to deal with.

And he was absolutely going to wake them up if he had jumped to practicing guitar.

So into BF's mind it was.

Except for the fact that once he had teleported into Boyfriend's mindscape, it... well... wasn't his mindscape.

The dull purple room Soul was used to seeing, and had expected to see, was now a pitch black, the only other color being a few streaks of red that drifted around the place.

It was either that BF had done some decorating after he fell asleep, or this wasn't his mind at all.
And Soul had a growing feeling that it was the latter.

...Wait, so then whose mind was he-

"Soul?"

Soul jumped a little at the voice, before turning around to face the source. And Girlfriend was standing there behind him.

Ah. So that explained the red everywhere.

Soul let out a tiny nervous chuckle.

"Eheh..... Hey, Gigi....."

"It's, uh, nice to see you, Soul, but... how exactly did you get inside my head?"

"......I don't know? I, uh, actually meant to go into Boyfriend's mind, but somehow ended up in here instead."

Girlfriend hummed, thinking for a moment.

"...I'm... not sure how you ended up getting here, but! Don't worry, if I had to guess, it's probably some momentary thing."

"Are you sure? It's not like I could do this before, you know..."

"Positive! Maybe just give it a second try?"

Soul paused, before letting out a sigh.

"Fiiiiiine. Nothing better to do, huh? Well, see you when you wake up!"

However, before Soul could do anything, he felt Girlfriend grab his arm, pulling him down towards her.

"Ah, ah, ah~ Did you really think I would let you leave..."

Girlfriend quickly followed up her sentence by grabbing Soul, pulling him in for a brief kiss.

"...Without that?"

And then she had to resist giggling at just how blushy and stuttery Soul had gotten afterwards.
Once he had realized that he wasn't getting a coherent sentence out, he sighed.

"M-Maybe a little warning next time?"

"No promises~"

Soul rolled his eyes, but there was still a smile and a little blush on his face.
He even gave GF a smirk and a tiny kiss in retaliation before teleporting out of her mind. Girlfriend was left surprised for a moment, until her expression turned into a small smile.

Meanwhile, Soul had found himself in yet another place that was not Boyfriend's mind.
Seriously, how many times was this going to keep happening?

And whose mind was he in this time?

...Soul didn't even get to answer that question before what felt like a blaring alarm rang out throughout the mindscape he was currently in.

And by "blaring alarm," it was more like a cacophony of noise - now blended with a bombardment of flashing colors.

Needless to say, it was a lot. He wasn't sure how, but he could practically feel all of the sounds and lights reverberating through him, and it was not a nice feeling.

He wasn't even sure if he was actually capable of forming thoughts at this point.
There was still a clear goal in his head, though.

Where the fuck was his exit.

Taking a blind dive, Soul teleported again - and was relieved to see that he was laying on the floor in Boyfriend's apartment, the TV still playing that stupid movie.
He sighed again as he sat up.

And he was immediately met with a serious headache.

Still using one hand to prop himself up, Soul's other hand went to his head, wanting to alleviate the pain somehow.
That was when he heard a groan coming from the couch, and he froze.

"Urghhhh..... what the shit...?"

As Pico sat up, he noticed Soul sitting on the floor.

The two maintained eye contact for a couple more seconds, until...

"........Soul... were you-"

"Inside your mind? Uh..... eheh... yeah?"

"...What the fuck were you doing in there?!"

"I wasn't doing anything! I didn't even know I could do this until literally 5 minutes ago!"

"I- How the fuck does this- what-"

"I have no idea. And I don't think Gigi does either. But I was only trying to get into BF's mind, but then I ended up in Gigi's, then I ended up in yours... you get it."

"That's...... definitely not weird as fuck."

"Nice sarcasm."

"Uh huh."

Silence passed between the two for a bit.

"......So, uh, why exactly did your mind basically go 'alarm mode' on me when I got in there?"

"To be honest, I'd rather not answer that."

Soul held his hands up in surrender, letting the conversation drift away from that particular topic.

"Ooooookay, then. Well, that shitty movie is still going." Sighing out of either boredom or exasperation, Soul flopped back onto the floor- "And I'm too tired to change out the disc."

Pico gave him a slight chuckle.

"Yeah, I honestly don't feel like changing it either."

"That's only because you like to comment everything wrong with it every 5 minutes, you critic."

"Someone's gotta do it."

"And it has to be you?"

"Who else?"

"Okay, okay, that's fair."

Cue another bout of silence.

".........So, uh, when did this whole mind thing start happening?"

"Barely even five minutes ago. I told you the whole thing."

"And this is the first time this has happened?"

"Mhm."

"And Gigi isn't sure why this happened, either?"

"She seemed like she did, but I don't really think she does, if I'm being honest."

".....Huh."

And then Pico eyed the bowl that was now half-full of popcorn sitting on the other end of the couch.

"......Pass me the popcorn, will ya?"

"I- It's been sitting there for what, an hour at least?!"

"Don't care. Movie's still going. Just give it."

Chapter Text

"Nononono, I'm telling you, Gigi, he probably used them to restrain himself when he was corrupted!"

"Babe, I thought you said he tried to shoot himself before the Corruption took him over? Then that wouldn't make any sense! He probably put the chains on after he was fully corrupted to use as some sort of weapon!"

"Then that doesn't explain why he never used them against us. Or your mom, too, now that I think about it."

Ever since the end of the Corruption, Boyfriend and Girlfriend had always wondered why Pico's corrupted self had chains on him by the time they saw him again. Pico claimed that he had no idea why - despite it seeming obvious that he actually knew the reason, so it was more like he refused to explain it.

But his claim still made sense given that the three of them didn't retain a lot of memories from during the time they were under the Corruption's control.
So all the two could do at the moment was speculate.

Well... technically three.

".....Alright, I guess Soul is betting that Pico's corrupted self probably did something stupid, but I don't see how that's- ...What do you mean, corrupted people took forever to learn how to open doors?!"

"You know that you guys don't need to have mental conversations all the time, right?"

"For the record, we chat in person more than we do like this. And second, it's because we're actually betting."

"Betting what?"

"It'snothingimportant."

Girlfriend let out a sigh.

"Well, my guess is still that it was meant to be a weapon."

"Okay, okay, what about-"

"The fuck are you guys talking about?"

Unbeknownst to the two, Pico had walked in during the last bit of their conversation, unaware of what- or who- they were discussing.

"Hi, Pico!"

"We're trying to figure out why you had chains on you when you were corrupted."

At GF's statement, Pico facepalmed.

"This stupid shit again?"

"Well, if it helps, BF and Soul have a bet going on about it."

"And you never tell us the reason anyway, so we're trying to guess what it is."

"What are you guys now, theorists?"

"Maybe."

"You never know!"

Pico groaned. He seemed to be debating something in his head for a bit before he finally spoke again.

"Fineeeeee. You guys wanna know the REAL reason those chains were there?"

BF and GF nodded simultaneously.

"Alright, but you better not laugh at this."

"We won't, dude. Promise."

Pico crossed his arms, pausing for a moment.

".......It was because I attacked a chain fence when I was corrupted."

It was silent for a moment.

Then Boyfriend let out a tiny snicker.

"You fucker- I told you not to laugh!!"

"I- I know, but- out of the very few things that you remember from while you were corrupted, THAT'S one of them??"

"Oh, shut up. I probably wasn't the only one who did stupid shit like that corrupted, either."

"Given the stuff about doors from a minute ago, I guess I can think of a few things."

Boyfriend sighed.

"Yeah, speaking of that..."

And then Soul appeared next to him.

"HA! I TOLD YOU! Now hand over the 10 dollars."

Boyfriend groaned, pulling the money out of his pocket and handing it to Soul.

"I am never making a bet with you again."

"You keep saying that, only to keep making bets with me~"

"Shush."

Pico gave the two a deadpan look.

"Why was I expecting this."

"At least now we can cross this off our list of still-unanswered questions about the Corruption..."

"Gigi. I am asking you this as you guys' zucchini, but DO NOT start adding more questions to that damn list."

"Why not?"

"Because soon enough you're gonna have red string all over a conspiracy board."

"Aaaaaaaand that makes 5 extra."

"Pico why must you do this to me."

"Did you two idiots seriously bet on someone bringing up the idea of a Corruption conspiracy board?"

"......Maybe."

Pico sighed, while Girlfriend let out a tiny giggle.

All this theorizing was gonna go on forever, wasn't it?

Chapter Text

There were only a certain few nights in Philly that were even remotely considered quiet.
You could still hear the sounds of cars whizzing by in certain places, people chatting while out on a late-night walk...
But still, it wasn't overbearingly loud.

And Pico liked those nights.

He was currently sitting on the roof of the Newgrounds Office - the same place he rap battled Boyfriend after being contracted to kill him - taking a small smoke break.
Embracing the absence of noise that didn't usually come with living in the city.

It was all fine up until he felt his phone rang in his pocket.

Standing up, he tossed his cigarette on the ground and stamped it out before pulling his phone out. The caller ID showed that it was Boyfriend calling, so naturally, he answered.

"Hello?"

"PICOOOOOOOO!!!!"

Well, there goes the quiet night.

Pico quickly flinched, pulling his phone away from his ear, until BF finally stopped shouting. 

"What?!"

Boyfriend gave a sheepish laugh through the phone.

"Uh, well, I just wanted to ask, have you by any chance seen Soul anywhere?"

Now that surprised him.

And Pico also took notice that Boyfriend sounded abnormally anxious over the phone.
He wasn't doing a very good job of masking it.

"I thought he was usually with you?"

"That's the problem! He's missing! I-I can't find him anywhere! He was here when I took a nap for like, 5 minutes, and after I woke up, he was gone!"

Pico let out a sigh.

"Relax, Bee. I'm sure he's fine."

"Can you just help me find him, though? I'm just a little worried..."

Pico let out a long sigh. Knowing Boyfriend, he was probably overreacting and there wasn't anything at all to worry about.

"......Fine. I'll help you."

"Thank you, Pico!!! Meet me at Gigi's place in 5, okay?"

"Why her place?"

"Gotta see whether or not she'll be available to help us."

"Of course. Sure, whatever."

And then he hung up the phone, at least letting Boyfriend say a quick 'see you later' before he took off towards Girlfriend's residence.

However, when the two arrived there, the front door opened only to reveal Daddy Dearest himself, and they both stiffened in surprise while the demon squinted down at them.

"Just what are you two doing here?"

"B-Beep bep bo dai."

Dearest let out a slight growl at BF's request.

"Well, boy, even if I'd dare to let you anywhere near my daughter, she ain't even here right now. Now if you two will excuse me, my wife is over here trying to figure out where her damn limo is."

And the door closed.
The two looked at each other.

"Well- got any other places you can think to check?"

Boyfriend sighed, and he took a second to think, before nodding.

"There's only one other place."

"Sorry, Keith. I haven't seen him, either."

"Are you sure?"

"Yup. Got no idea where else he'd be, either."

"Oh, come on! I'm starting to freak out here!"

"This is really the only other place you think he'd be?"

"It's the only other place we both regularly visit!"

Yeah, Michael's apartment ended up being empty, too.

"I can't think of any other place than this! If he's not here, then where else would he-"

"Woah, woah, calm down, little bro! Listen, I may not know Soul as well as you do, but I still know him. I'm sure that wherever he is, he's doing just fine."

To Boyfriend's relief, his big brother even promised to call him if he found out anything, but so far, BF and Pico were out of luck.

So they went back to BF's place, where Boyfriend collapsed on his couch with a groan as Pico rolled his eyes.

"Ughhhhhh- dude, I don't know what to do!"

"Bee, seriously, relax. Just because Soul isn't at the TWO places you thought he would be doesn't mean that he's dead or something."

"I KNOW that! But what if something else happened to him?? What if he's in danger or something?! I wouldn't even know about it!!"

"Boyfriend. Calm down. You know he can handle his own as well as you can. He's practically you, remember?"

Boyfriend opened his mouth to respond, but before any sound came out of his mouth, the two heard the screeching of tires outside.
And they quickly went to investigate.

What they found, however, was the one and only Soul walking away from Mearest's limo with a bag (that obviously contained an electric guitar) on his shoulder, Girlfriend speaking to him from inside.

Well, that explained the whole thing with her parents at her place.

"Thanks again for the outing, Gigi!"

"Of course! Lemme know when you wanna do this again, and I'll come pick you up!"

Soul let out a laugh as he waved goodbye to GF while her limo drove off.
Then he turned around, only to see BF and Pico standing in front of the apartment.

"....Soul?!"

"Eheh, hi Bee- AH!"

Boyfriend then suddenly grabbed him by the shoulders, checking over him as if he had gotten hurt.

"Dude I got so worried are you okay are you hurt did something happen-"

"Bee..."

"Where'd you go I couldn't find you anywhere I started thinking you were hurt or worse or-"

"Boyfriend!"

And finally, Boyfriend snapped out of his confused frenzy as Soul placed a hand on his shoulder in a comforting gesture.

"Relax, Bee. I'm fine."

"Told ya."

"Pico shut up."

Soul let out another laugh, taking his hand off of Boyfriend's shoulder.

"Awww, did you miss me that much, Bee? I probably wasn't even gone for that long-"

"I took a nap for five minutes and you disappeared in those five minutes. I think I have a right to freak out."

"BF, let's be honest, you never fall asleep for any amount of time that's less than an hour."

"I swear, I only slept for five minutes- where did you even go, anyway?"

"Oh, Gigi called your phone after you fell asleep and told me that she 'borrowed' some money from her dad, so she wanted to know if I was willing to go to Guitar Center with her, since, you know, their shit's on sale. Originally, we were gonna pay for whatever we bought, but since she took her mom's limo, we just decided to crash through, see what we'd get for free. Can't believe the manager of the store tried to challenge us to a guitar battle for it, like he thought he'd actually win. He still put up a good fight, though."

".....Oh. That's... actually kinda cool!"

"I know, right? Oh, speaking of, here."

Soul handed BF the bag with the guitar in it. The guitar itself was mostly white, save for the tiny streaks of blue that ran down the body.

Boyfriend gave him a look of confusion.

"What's this for?"

At the question, Soul gave a slight chuckle.

"It's for you, you idiot. It was one of the first things I saw after the limo crashed into the store and I thought it was something you'd like. Don't ask why I wanted to get you a gift, I just felt like it."

Boyfriend looked over the guitar as a fond smile grew on his face.

"Awwwww, that's really sweet of you, dude."

And then he bonked Soul on the head with his free hand.

"But don't scare me like that again!"

"Owwww.... Okay, okahay! Tell you what, next time I'll just put a sticky note on your face while you're asleep, alright?"

Boyfriend let out a huff.

"Better than no warning."

Meanwhile, Pico had been watching the two with a small smile.

"Soooooo, does this mean that the search is over, Bee?"

"Oh- right, yeah. Sorry I freaked out and dragged you over here, Pico."

"Eh, relax. It's fine. But still - I told you so."

"Yeah, yeah."

Boyfriend then strummed the guitar, despite there being no amp connected to it.

And the result was something weird.

BF could tell the notes of the guitar were in tune, but that was just the thing.

It didn't even sound like an electric guitar.

"...Soul, are you sure this is a guitar?"

And upon closer inspection...

"...Wait a minute- are those fucking NYLON strings?? Oh, that manager fuck- I SWEAR this guitar had metal strings on it when I saw it!!"

Soul then let out a rather exasperated sigh.

"Alright, I've got spare metal strings that you can use, but the next time Gigi takes me there, I'm raiding the entire goddamn store."

Boyfriend couldn't help but snicker.

"Soul-"

"Ooh, can I join in?"

Pico spoke up with a smirk, twirling one of the UZIs from his waist pocket.
Soul returned the smirk on Pico's face with his own.

"You know what? Sure."

Boyfriend rolled his eyes as the other two went inside, eagerly discussing ideas for the store raid (that they would eventually have to let Girlfriend in on).

......He still couldn't help but fondly take one more look down at the guitar in his hands as he stepped inside to follow them.

Chapter Text

we interrupt your fic update with this random thing!!!!! :D

okay so there isn't really much to this besides I wanted to ramble about the new corruption episode and I didn't want to throw it all into the next GOAS (Glitch of a Soul) update bc I was worried it'd distract u from the fic itself. bc the next update is gonna be pretty big.

also I think people have mostly forgotten that this request work exists. well obviously requests are closed until GOAS is finished but that's besides the point.

anyway

first off. 
I LOVE THE NEW CORRUPTION EP

- we got cute BF and GF moment at the start hello
- JAPANESE HARVESTER JAPANESE HARVESTER JAPANESE HARVESTERRRRRR-
- also did anyone else notice that after the Harvester shocked BF's hand it flickered with a RAINBOW FLAME?? ISN'T THAT SOUL????? BRO IS STILL LOOKING OUT FOR HIMMMMM
- and of course NULL AND VOID. DOPE SONG DOPE VISUALS DOPE EVERYTHING.
- lastly. I was ABSOLUTELY surprised by Mearest's appearance but honestly it makes sense? when the Pico vs Mom week was releasing we got Senpai vs BF at the same time. I wouldn't be surprised if they're going that route again. I've also seen people talking about how the three of them might get separated, and Pico might face off against the spooky kids at the same time? if so that's gonna be pretty interesting to watch.

hhhhhhh THE WHOLE THING WAS SO COOL......

also I rewatched it to pay more attention to the Harvester's dialogue and-

"So you're the one I was told about?"

...they were told about BF? Hm...

starting to think they aren't really the person behind the Corruption like how it's been implied before.

if they were told about him, that probably means they're following some higher up that probably IS behind the Corruption. Monster/Lemon Demon maybe?

also TOTALLY wondering what is going on with Senpai. I saw theories floating around that maybe what BF is facing now is just his remnants, or he just wasn't entirely deleted in the first place. also wondering what gave the Harvester the idea to trap BF in there in the first place...

but that's just a theory! A CORRUPTION THEORY-

excuse my matpat nerdiness the FNAF movie is still fresh in my mind-

anyway! sorry I just really wanted to ramble about this ep as soon as possible bc I loved it so muchhhhh. updates for GOAS will continue in a few days!
until then I shall vanish into the ether of creative writing okay byeeeeeeeee-

Chapter Text

The rather loud sound of Paint It Black was currently echoing through BF's apartment, however it was emanating from the TV in the main room instead of one of Soul's guitars.

And the reason for that being that Soul had booted up Guitar Hero III.

With Boyfriend having gone out to visit the Neo universe for whatever reason, Soul was gonna be home alone for a while.
Naturally the boredom quickly got to him, so he took advantage of BF's absence to play some Guitar Hero.

Yes, he was still trying to keep up the illusion that he'd never play this game for as long as he lived. But Boyfriend had a point, it was pretty fun to play when you had nothing else to do.

It still wasn't a substitute for actually playing guitar, though. He'd die with that belief if he had to (though hopefully he wouldn't).

Sitting on the couch in the room, Soul had the guitar controller in his hands, casually continuing to play through the song - on Expert mode, because he was a show-off - attempting to beat the high score he managed to set the last time he played through it.

Because last time, the extremely note-dense section towards the end of the song made him lose his note streak thanks to an ill-timed click on one singular note and he was NOT standing for that.

And he was definitely not about to fuck up the note streak he had going right now.

He was just about to hit the section he'd broke his combo on last time when he heard the faint sound of a portal opening a few rooms away.

"SHITshitshitshitshitshit-"

Soul quickly scrambled to turn off the game and put the controller back where it was before he started playing, relieved when he'd managed to get back to the regular TV channels without Boyfriend having come into the room yet.

He could try again later. ...Whenever "later" was, he supposed.

"SOULLLLLLLLLL!!!!"

Speak of the devil.

Boyfriend ran into the room, and he found Soul flipping through the channels on the TV - he guessed he was probably looking for something to watch.

"Soul?"

"Yo."

"OhmygodthecoolestthingjusthappenedIgottatellyouaboutitpleasepleaseplea-"

"Pfft- Bee, calm down! You have more energy than you on your own sugar rushes right now. What's going on?"

"Okay okay okay- sooooo you know how I just went to visit Neo-B, right?"

"Yeah. What about it?"

At this point, Boyfriend was clearly trying to contain his excitement, noticeably fidgeting as if he were trying to keep himself from straight up bouncing in place.

"Wellllll I just learned that apparently there's a Neo version of you!"

"...Wait, really?"

"Mhm! We were just talking about the regular stuff, how we've both been since our last meeting, yada yada... and then out of absolutely nowhere, the guy goes 'oh by the way, I've got this friend I want you to meet' and activates this little wristband thing he has and I'm suddenly talking to the Neo version of you! It was so cool!!"

"Huh... I didn't think there'd even be other versions of me in those other universes..."

"And that's what makes it awesome!"

"...Do you think that means that those other universes lived through some sort of Corruption, too, like we did...?"

"Hm. I wouldn't take it that far, I don't think Neo-B actually went through something like that. He didn't tell me how exactly the Neo you came to be."

"Probably because you didn't ask."

"Shut it."

Holding in a laugh, Soul continued.

"So I take it they know about me now, huh?"

And Boyfriend paused right as he was going to speak, leaving Soul confused until-

"I didn't actually think to tell them."

"...Knowing you, I'm not even gonna ask..."

"Shut up! I was too caught up in the awe of knowing there's a Neo version of you, okay?"

"Who said I was blaming you?"

Boyfriend rolled his eyes, but he couldn't stop a smile from growing on his face.
The audacity he had to be sweet to him as a retort.

"Oh, shut up. ...You know what this has me wondering, though?"

"...You wanna find out if any other universes have me in them, don't you?"

As he finished speaking, Boyfriend was already nodding profusely, and he quickly took his hand to pull him over to his room, shouting "come on" repeatedly as they went.

The two entered BF's room, moving over to the dresser where the orbs leading to other worlds similar to their own laid on top.

They looked at them for a long moment, trying to decide where to go first.

"Well, I dunno if Ben's gonna have some version of you... maybe B-Sides might, but I'm not sure on him either..."

"Just pick one at random, and we'll go find out. It's not really that hard."

"Yeah, we'll just go to some random universe and ask 'hey so I was wondering do you have an alternate you but inside your head?'"

Boyfriend emphasized the absurdity of the idea with a fixed stare, and Soul let out a sigh.

"Are you sure you aren't overthinking? I'm pretty sure all those BFs have been asked some weirder questions."

"You know what- never mind. We'll just pick randomly like you said."

BF took the orb for the Neo portal out of his pocket, and immediately after placing it back down he grabbed a random one from the arrangement on top of the dresser.
He turned away from the objects to look at the one he'd picked up - immediately recognizing the symbol of his Minus self etched on the orb in his hand.

"Well, looks like we're visiting the Minus world first."

"This is gonna be interesting. Well, call me when you need me."

Soul then disappeared back into his mind, and Boyfriend twisted the orb to activate the device.
The object lit up and then flew out of his hands into the open space, splitting in two and opening a portal to the other world.

He walked through, and the orb fell in through the portal, closing it as the halves connected back together on the ground.

Boyfriend picked it up, placing it in his pocket as he walked off to find one of his Minus selves.

—

It wasn't very long before he accidentally bumped into someone during his search.

"Ay, watch where yer-! ...goin?"

Oh thank GOD.

"Eheh... hey, Pico."

"Classic? The hell you doin' here?"

"Looking for myself. Er, one of my selves at least."

"Huh. Well, if ya really wanna know, I ain't seen Beta or Mean lately. But Blue's probably still at that stage though, if ya wanna take a look."

"Cool! Thanks, Pico!"

"Yeah, yeah."

Taking his advice, BF made his way to the stage - hopefully not getting too many strange looks from other people - and pushed the (surprisingly unlocked) door open.
He was relieved to see that, not only was it empty, but one of his Minus selves, along with GF's Minus counterpart, were sitting on the stage talking.

Or, had been talking, were it not for Boyfriend walking in.

But they seemed to recognize him instantly, and he knew for sure it'd be safe.

"Hey Classic!"

"Hey!"

"Oh! Should I give you two some time to catch up?"

"Well... what'd you come here for, BF?"

"To, um, ask him a question, mostly. Might be a bit of a weird one, though..."

As he spoke, Boyfriend pointed specifically at his Minus self.
Minus GF hummed, before standing up along with Blue.

"It's okay, I can just run out and double check if the limo's caught up to us yet. You two have fun chatting!"

And with a small kiss from Blue, she walked off of the stage and, eventually made her way out of the building.

Silence rang out on the stage before Blue finally spoke.

"Soooooo, what's this question you wanna ask me? I doubt it's that weird by the way, I've been asked a LOT of weird shit, man."

'そう言っただろう.'  [Told you.]

'うるさい.'  [Shut up.]

"Well, this is gonna sound strange to say out loud, but do you know any other versions of yourself that exist here? B-Besides Beta and Mean, obviously."

"Hmm... Do you mean Golden? Why do you-"

"Nonono, I mean... in here."

And as he said "here," he pointed to his head.
He was worried he'd totally confused Blue for a moment until the latter suddenly made an expression of recognition.

"Wait- I think I know what you're talking about."

"Really??"

"Yeah, but- why exactly are you asking me this?"

"Eheheh... welllll..."

Taking the hint, Soul then appeared floating behind him, flashing a peace sign.

"Hey."

"Woah! I- he exists in your universe too?"

"Yeah! Honestly, I didn't think it'd be the same case here."

"He didn't seem to be around when you were visiting here before, though."

"That's because he only started existing when the Corruption happened. It's a long story, but he's the one who helped me break out."

"So- then he's not... Huh. He really does look a lot like..."

Boyfriend and Soul looked at each other briefly before looking back at Blue, obviously confused by his words.

Blue's eyes suddenly widened, and a huge smile grew on his face a second later - it was clear he'd just gotten an idea.

"Okay, hold here. I'll be right back. Just you guys wait, you're gonna love this!"

He ran off the stage and towards where Minus GF had gone.

"Girlfriend! Can you come back for a minute?"

BF and Soul looked at each other quizzically again, but didn't question anything as Soul went back in BF's mind.
Just what was he doing...?

Eventually, once Blue had come back with Minus GF, he'd explained how he wanted to try taking BF inside his own mind so they could actually meet Soul's Minus self in person. He admitted it was a much better idea than trying to explain it to them in words who he was, so the two went with it.

And it went in their favor that GF's Minus counterpart shared her demonic powers trait, which allowed the two to essentially link minds in order for the meeting to work.

Once the two passed out on the floor of the stage, though, she looked between them for a moment before shrugging and waiting for them to wake up.

—

"Damn. Even though we're technically different people, our minds look pretty alike."

"Well, hey, we're still BFs, aren't we?"

The two laughed at the joke, before Soul popped out of Boyfriend's mind again.

"So this version of me we're about to meet... you said he's not your soul, like I am to Bee?"

Right, and they'd explained everything regarding what exactly Soul was, given that Blue had asked earlier.

"Nope. How we met is a reallyyyy long story, but he's not a soul, he's an angel, actually."

The two stared at him for a moment.

"Huh. I wasn't expecting that. I AM interested though."

"Ooh, so does he have like, a halo or something like that?"

Blue couldn't help but laugh at the small twinkle of wonder in Boyfriend's eyes, and answered his question with a small cocky smile.

"Eh, you'll see. ...Speaking of, where is-"

He looked around for a brief moment, and seeing to realize that his friend wasn't already here, he called out.

"Jasper!"

Receiving no response, he called out again.

"Jasperrrrr!"

"You sure he's here?"

"Mm, sometimes it takes him a second..."

And, almost as if on cue, that was when a white light appeared beside Blue - and once it faded away, Jasper was now standing next to him.

"You called?"

As Blue began to explain what exactly was going on, Boyfriend muttered a small "cool" under his breath.
However, once the one-second-long awe of having a Minus counterpart swiftly passed by him, Soul had noticed his other self's appearance, and he almost instantly felt the heat rush to his face.

If Blue was saying anything to him right now, it was being drowned out.

Because oh god, he definitely hadn't expected his Minus self to look like this...

His outfit, his form...

...Holy shit.

Apparently he'd been zoned out with a blank, wide-eyed stare for wayyyyy too long, though, because a few seconds later Boyfriend's hand had been shoved in his face.

"Earth to Soul! Are you okay, dude?"

He noticed Blue starting to snicker, as well as a small "hi" plus a wave from Jasper.

And that was when he realized he'd been staring.
The mere second he DID realize, his blush grew slightly, and he let out a squeak as his hands went up to cover his face in flustered embarrassment right before he teleported back into BF's head.

Naturally, Boyfriend was confused by this.

"Wha- Hey- Soul!"

Noticing Jasper's confusion as well, Blue snickered again, and began whispering to him as BF tried to figure out what the hell was going on with his friend.

"Soul, what are you-"

'Bee, can we uh... go b-back home for a minute? I-I need to talk to you.'

"You're in my mind now, 魂. You can talk to me like this, can't you?"

Inside his head, Soul let out a nervous laugh, currently standing in the middle of the room with a hand still trying to cover his face.

'Eheh... I k-kinda wanna be somewhere a little more-' He stopped, his blush quickly growing again once he noticed he could still see his Minus self through the monitor screen, and he quickly turned around- '...p-private.'

Boyfriend let out a sigh, not really understanding why he was acting this way, but begrudgingly agreeing nonetheless.

He turned to the other two in the space, where they'd been laughing a bit at something Blue had said, by the looks of it - before BF cleared his throat to get their attention, an apologetic smile on his face.

"Sorry, guys, is it okay if I head home for a bit?" He noticed Soul had turned the screen off after his reluctant compliance, and decided to be truthful- "Gonna go take a sec to check on Soul."

"It's all good, man. Take your time."

Blue winked at him after he stopped speaking.
Hm.

Closing his eyes, he felt himself switch locations - after opening them, he gave a small greeting and a "be right back" to Minus GF, before pulling the orb out of his pocket and activating it to create his portal out.
He stepped through, and turned to close the portal manually as he heard Soul teleport out off to the side.

The orb was left floating in the air, still glowing as a way to easily reopen the gateway but not allowing anyone on the other side to hear any conversation.

BF turned to where Soul was sitting on the edge of the bed, surprised to find that he was currently covering his face with one of the pillows.

"...Soul, are you okay?"

It was silent for a moment, his concern, curiosity, and confusion only growing the longer it lasted - until he finally heard Soul's voice, albeit muffled by the pillow.

"...Bee, how do you, um, usually get past your bi panics?"

His eyes slightly widened at the question.
He didn't think that would be the first thing he'd ask.

Still, if it was gonna help in some way, he might as well answer.

"Erm... I usually just let it pass over. They don't tend to last super long once I'm away from whatever caused it..."

Soul resisted the temptation to remove the pillow from his face and deadpan at him.
Because riding it out wasn't really a good option right now.

"...Why do you ask?"

"...N-No reason."

"Soul, you're literally asking me about what I do when I'm having bi panics. There has to be a reason for that. ...And why are you hiding your face?"

All he got in response was a muffled groan.

Sighing, he walked over to lightly tap Soul on his shoulder.

"魂..."

Another groan - though it sounded more like a whine this time.

"You know you can tell me anything, right?"

He could tell he'd finally won when he heard his friend sigh, and slowly remove the pillow from his face, revealing a deadpan stare and...

"...You're blushing."

"I- S-So what?"

"You're blushing."

"Boyfriend..."

Soul immediately wanted to hide his face in the pillow again once he saw a small smirk slowly grow on BF's face.

"Why are you blushing, Soul?~"

Oh, and now he was leaning in just to tease him more, the mischievous little shit-

"B-Bee-"

"Come onnnn, you can tell me~"

He'd even hopped up onto the bed itself to lean in even further, and Soul was practically pinned under his gaze, clutching the pillow to his chest despite his blush growing back again.

"You clearly already k-know, so why should I-"

"Mmm, but I wanna hear it from you~"

Letting out yet another groan, Soul tried to pull the pillow back up over his face, but BF was quick to stop him.

"Does this have to do with your Minus self?"

The silence and the slight increase in Soul's blush told him everything he needed to know.

"Soul...~"

"Shut up! L-Look, it's just..." He stopped to let out a sigh, the next part of his sentence coming out as a small whine despite his attempts to make himself talk normally- "He's hot, okayyy?"

Boyfriend couldn't stop the snicker that escaped him, nor the muffled giggling afterwards - and Soul calling his name in slight irritation only made him laugh harder.

"Boyfriend!!"

"Ihi- I'm sorry, dude, it's juhust- oh my god- it's so funny that you're practically simping over your alternate self. I've never even done that!"

"I am NOT!"

"Are you sure about that?~"

"I was staring respectfully. There's a difference."

"You literally just admitted to me that you think he's hot~"

"That doesn't mean anything!!"

"Suuuuure, buddy. Keep telling yourself that while you're still all blushy and flustered and still having a bi panic~"

"I WILL whack you with a guitar again if you don't shut up."

It was obviously an empty threat, but Boyfriend let up - he figured he'd teased him enough.

"Heheh, alright, alright, I'll stop teasing you... at least for now~"

Boyfriend then stood up again, walking over to where the orb was floating, before grabbing it and placing it on the dresser.
He'd probably tell Blue about them not coming back soon enough.

"...You BETTER not tell anyone else about this."

"Oh, don't worry, I won't~"

And Boyfriend walked out of the room with a wink.

...He was absolutely gonna tell someone else about this sooner or later and Soul knew it.

.....It was fine.

He could figure out how to get him back for it eventually.

Chapter Text

"Are you sure you two are okay with us staying for a couple days, BF?"

"Yeah, dude! It's like I always tell you, you guys can crash whenever. Don't worry about asking for permission."

Currently, Boyfriend and Benjamin were standing in the former's apartment, after Ben and his Pico had come in asking if they could stay at BF's place for a while.
And of course, BF had gladly welcomed them - he understood their reasons for doing so. And besides, it'd been a while since he saw the two.

Pico walked in through the painted portal on the wall as it sealed shut behind him, a lantern in his hand which he was quick to shut off.

"Sorry we had to come by this late at night. No other options."

"Again, Pico- don't worry about it. I can set up the fold out bed, if you guys want."

"No need, Beeps. We're not that tired."

"Alright, alright. Let me know if you need anything, 'kay?"

The couple nodded, and Boyfriend turned to leave the room until Ben's voice popped out from behind him.

"Wait- where's Soul?"

"Oh, he's probably still asleep in my room. He tried to pull an all-nighter last night to work on music and it caught up to him like an hour ago. Dork."

"Hah. Definitely sounds like something he'd do."

BF stifled a laugh at Pico's statement - clearly Soul had already proven it's something he'd do.

"I'm sure he'll wake up eventually. If he isn't awake in like an hour though, I'm gonna go riff guitar in his ears again."

It'd been about 30 minutes since Benjamin and Pico had arrived at Boyfriend's apartment.

The two lovers were currently cuddled up on BF's couch, focused on the movie that was playing on the TV, while BF himself was busy cleaning up the sound room from Soul's earlier attempt at an all-nighter.

It was now fairly late at night, the only light in the place coming from the TV and the lights inside the sound room.

BF had just finished picking up all the scattered semi-filled-out sheet music and organizing it into an empty folder when the lights suddenly flickered.
He briefly looked at them, before shrugging and placing the folder in the small shelving unit beside the wall.

Oh, what a mistake that was.

The lights flickered again as he turned away from the shelves, before going out completely, casting him and the rest of the building in darkness.

...Along with most of the block.

"Damn! Just when the movie was starting to get good..." Pico paused, letting out a sigh- "Softie, can you help me find that lantern I left somewhere around here?"

Benjamin nodded, although he couldn't see it, before joining his boyfriend in blindly fumbling around the couch for the object.

It only took them a few seconds to locate it at the side of the couch on the floor, where Pico picked it up and turned it on, the white light glowing intensely.
The graffiti artist used it to look around briefly, and he spotted a flashlight on top of the cabinet below the TV - he grabbed it and switched it on, handing the lantern to Benjamin.

"Here. See if you can find BF, and ask him when the lights'll come back on. I'm gonna go wake up Soul."

Ben nodded again, and the two began walking off in separate directions.

In the sound room, it was pitch-black. Dark enough that Boyfriend had to keep his hand on the wall just to know it was there.

He forced himself to take deeper breaths. He wasn't about to get scared over this again, he wasn't.
BF knew the layout of the room like the back of his hand - so he was sure even in the dark he'd still know exactly where the door was.

Taking one final deep breath, he slowly took his hand off of the wall, and began carefully making his way over to the other side of the room.

With every step, though, his breathing steadily grew more rapid, his movements more desperate.

The floor turned grey, a chill wind swept through the air.
He could feel all those pink eyes, their stares burning into him.
He could hear those familiar, horrid voices screaming at him to give up.

Not again.

With shaking breaths, he put up his hands to feel around for the door, only to find it terrifying that he couldn't see more than an inch in front of his face.

It felt like the dark was enveloping him, he started fearing that any second now he'd go out of control.
In his (literally) blind panic, he'd rushed forward a step and tripped on something, combined with his unsteadiness it had resulted in him falling - losing his hat in the process.

This is still home.

The stress building up, he reached out, finally touching something...

...Only to feel from the texture that it was the wall.
His already anxious state worsened tenfold.

Boyfriend pulled himself closer, now standing on his knees, feeling for the door... just more wall.

Why?? He was sure he'd been going the right way, just how far had he veered off course???

He continued feeling around to no avail, his mind screaming at him that he needed to ESCAPE, to GET OUT.
Just like last time, his only way to break out of his hell had vanished, and his hope had gone with it.

YOU'RE NOT BACK THERE!

His chest had tightened so much that it hurt, his heart was pounding and he was shaking terribly, his breathing so shallow he was barely getting air in his lungs at all.

He felt trapped, the walls that he couldn't see starting to close in, the darkness suffocating him and seeping into his lungs whenever it got the chance.

Defeated, he pressed his back against the wall. The images, the feelings never left, and he began breathlessly trying to reassure himself to get control of his racing thoughts.

"N-No... no, I'm not s-stuck in there, I-I... I'm n-not..."

The attempts to ease his mind swiftly failed, the frightened tears pouring down his face in waves.

His arms wrapped around himself and he shut his eyes tightly.

Even then, he could still hear the voices, and see the eyes staring at him.

He could feel the chills running through him, that grey wasteland fading in against the pitch-black...
And he wanted to cry out and scream, but his voice was lost under the endless fear.

The darkness ensnared him, and he continued to drown.

—

Benjamin continued to search the now-darkened rooms for the host of the residence, softly calling out his name as he walked.

"BF? Are you still here? Hello?"

Admittedly, the darkness was a little scary for the boy - but he knew this place was safe.
Plus, he had the lantern. If anything, he'd probably whack whatever jumps out from the dark with it.

...Hopefully that wouldn't be his Toughie or BF.

He'd passed by a couple rooms already when a faint sound caught his attention.

Ben listened closely, catching the sound of ragged, sharp breathing, accompanied by what sounded like choked sobs.
His heart dropped, and he quickly walked over to the nearest door - noticing that the sounds were louder - before gently turning the knob and opening it.

He entered the now pitch-black sound room, illuminated only by the lantern, looking to the side where the noises were the loudest to see-

"BF??"

Ben was quick to rush to his side, setting the lantern down next to him as he got a better look at the rapper.

And, to say the least... he looked awful.
His eyes were pinpricks, focused on nothing but what he could see of himself in front of him, his arms were wrapped tightly around himself, he was trembling like crazy, and he seemed unable to slow his rapid, shallow breaths.

Worst of all, he was muttering fearfully under his breath (but at a level Ben could still hear) about how he didn't want to be "back there" and trying- failing, to convince himself that "there" wasn't where he was.

And that was when Benjamin had realized that this was much more than just a panic attack.

He looked at him with sympathy and compassion, and made an attempt to reach out.

"B-BF?"

He gently called to him - he was afraid to make any sort of physical contact with him, because he had no idea what was going to help him at the moment.
BF didn't respond, so he tried again.

"BF??"

Still nothing.

He couldn't hear him.

Realizing he needed a different way to help him, the painter took a deep breath before reaching over and gently grasping one of the other's arms - BF's muttering stopped, and his breath hitched for a split second, but he quickly relaxed into the touch before his softer counterpart could pull away.

Carefully, Ben helped him remove his arm from around his waist and guiding it down to by his side, where he took his hand in his own with tender regard, rubbing circles on the back of it.

It was the best way he could think of to keep the other grounded - the five senses trick he often used with his Pico wouldn't exactly be of good help, considering the lack of visibility in the room even with the lantern.

"Is this okay?"

Boyfriend nodded. It seemed like physical touch worked well for him, so Ben continued.
His breathing had gotten a little slower, he wasn't shaking as much anymore, and the tears slowly began to stop falling.

"C-Can... Can y-you... move the l-lantern... a little c-closer...?"

He'd opened his eyes again, and they didn't seem as panicked now.

Ben had noticed how BF was struggling to talk, though, so he quickly grabbed the lantern, still keeping his other hand in BF's, and placed it closer to the two.

"Is that better?"

Another nod.

"...Th-Thank you."

Benjamin nodded back.

"Of course."

Meanwhile, Pico made his way over to the hall where BF's room was, flashlight in hand and using it to light his path.

He was hoping the power would come back on soon. He didn't like being in the dark for too long, he was used to there being too many dangers that could easily hide in the shadows.
...That, and he'd been completely interested in the movie earlier. Now he'd have to look it up to see how it ended.

He also couldn't help but feel a little bad for waking up Soul. But on the other hand, from the way BF had made it sound, he needed a wake-up call, anyway.

Pico arrived closer to the room, when the sudden sounds of shuffling from inside caught his attention.

He backed away a little just in case, primarily out of instinct.

A few tense seconds passed, before the door to the room was thrown open and Soul rushed out with a blanket around his shoulders, placing a hand on the wall as he fought to gain control of his breathing.

Pico watched him, a little worried.

"Soul, are you okay?"

The entity in question looked up at him - but the confusion seemed to easily pass, a look of concern and fear replacing it.

"Where's Boyfriend?"

In the sound room, Ben had slowly gotten Boyfriend to steady his breathing again, but he still wasn't fully out of his panic yet.
And he couldn't help but wonder if it had something to do with the current lack of lighting in the room.

Maybe that was why he'd asked for the lantern to be closer.

For now, though, he just continued to rub circles on BF's hand, seeing as it was helping the other to stay grounded and keep calm.

A couple more moments of silence passed before the two heard the faint sound of footsteps coming closer to the door.

"Baby Blue! You in here?"

"Pico?"

A few seconds later, Pico walked into the room, and Ben was surprised to see Soul following behind him.

And it seemed Boyfriend had noticed too.

"S-Soul...?"

"Bee!"

Soul quickly made his way over to sit by him, and Ben let him take a shaking BF into his arms.

"Too d-dark... t-too many b-bad m-memories-!"

"Shhhh it's okay, Bee. I've got you. And you don't need to force yourself to talk."

So what Benjamin had thought seemed to be right - it was some past event tied to the dark that had set him off.
At least now he knew so he'd know to avoid it around him later.

Pico then came to sat by them, turning off the flashlight.

"...Is Classic okay...?"

"He'll be fine. He'll either be speaking in beeps or not talking at all for a while, but he'll recover."

Pico gave a nod in response, and Soul turned to Ben.

"And thanks. For helping him calm down before I got here."

"I-It's the least I could do, really."

"You know, I gotta ask, Soul. How come you were already up by the time I got to the room?"

"Well... that was mostly because I was sensing his panic. Woke me up and saw the lights were out, so I realized what was probably happening, and..."

"...You two share emotions?"

"Ehhhh... something like that."

A few moments passed, until finally, the lights flickered back on in the middle of a conversation between the trio.

Boyfriend breathed a sigh of relief, clinging onto Soul a bit tighter.

"Well, the power's finally back on. That's good. ...And the fact that it took this long means that damn movie is already over."

"THAT'S what you were concerned about this whole time?"

"Not the whole time. I didn't know BF was here in the dark panicking."

"I do kinda wanna know what caused the blackout though."

"Fair point, Softie. We'll be back, we're gonna go see if the news says anything about it."

Soul nodded, and the two left the room.

A couple minutes later, the duo heard Pico shout from the main room.

"YOU'RE SAYING I MISSED THE REST OF THAT MOVIE BECAUSE SOME DAMN IDIOT CRASHED INTO A LIGHT POLE?!"

As they heard Benjamin giggle in response, Soul and BF looked at each other.

"Heh... O-Only in Philly, r-right?"

"Yeah, yeah... Only in Philly. You okay, or do you still need a breather?"

"I-I'll... I'll be f-fine. But... m-maybe if it's okay, y-you-"

"I know, I know, you don't have to tell me."

With a laugh, Soul then picked up Boyfriend from the floor, carrying him into the main room.

Chapter Text

...How much longer?

How much longer did he have to keep suffering in this cycle of seemingly never-ending nightmares?

How many more times was he going to wake up in a panic, his hands grabbing at his chest to ensure there wasn't a sudden emptiness there?

Boyfriend didn't know.

All he knew is that it wasn't going to stop any time soon.

It'd been another one of those nights where he felt he'd been so close to breaking the loop. Putting a stop to the constant failing to save his friend.
Hell, he'd even tried sleeping earlier for once in the hopes he wouldn't go through this another time.

But no. He'd watched him die again, that lookalike of his taunted him about it again, he was "killed" and forced awake AGAIN.

He'd tried over and over and over. The outcome was always the same.

And every time, the despair and the powerlessness would flood his mind. He hated it.

He didn't like feeling like this, not in the slightest. It only served to remind him of the times he suffered under the Corruption, and that was a whole other can of worms that he didn't want to open again after the breakdown he'd had a long while back, trying to believe he could overcome the pain of those memories.

The time when he'd gone through so much in such a small span of being awake that it led to him starting to have more shutdowns than he ever did before.

...And the time when Soul was his only light in the dark.

Speaking of, Boyfriend glanced at the entity still peacefully sleeping next to him as he sat up from where he laid on his bed.

He figured Soul had probably decided to stick by him just in case he had another nightmare due to the sudden influx of them that he's had over the past couple weeks.

It was weird that he hadn't also woken up. After all, they figured out some time ago that not only were they themselves connected, but their emotions were too.
So BF was a bit surprised that his slight panic hadn't triggered that.

Or maybe it was because he wasn't panicking that much this time? Their emotions had to reach a certain intensity to really be shared by the other rather than it just being an echo, so maybe that was why.

...Did that just mean he was getting used to this, or what?

Boyfriend sighed and drew his knees up close to his chest, the guilt from the dream already starting to hit him.

It was always going to be the same.

And honestly? He... wasn't sure if he could take it any longer.

It wasn't easy to keep acting like everything was fine.

Like these nightmares weren't affecting him much at all. Like they weren't causing him to lose sleep out of fear.

...Like he wasn't fazed by watching his best friend die, over and over and OVER AGAIN-

His hands tightly gripped the fabric of the blue shorts he was wearing - an attempt to ground himself before his thoughts could get too out of hand.

Forcing his breathing to steady out, he slowly got out of the bed, already feeling the cold air of the night brush against his skin and making him shiver.

Why, again, had he decided to wear a tank top and shorts to sleep when it was nearing the end of fall?
For christ's sake, he lived in Philadelphia. He should already know how cold the nights can get at this time of year.

It made him pretty grateful that he's wearing socks because he's pretty sure the floor is actually colder.

A small, quiet sigh blew past his lips as he grabbed a black zip-up hoodie from his closet and threw it on, pulling his arms through the sleeves and only having the heart to zip it up partway as he walked over to the door, his hands shaking as he grasped and gently turned the knob.

Maybe just a little mindless TV-watching could take everything off his mind for a bit.

...It had been about 10 minutes now.

And this wasn't helping.

This wasn't helping him at all.

Every time whatever was onscreen failed to keep his attention, he found his mind constantly wandering back to the feelings that lingered from his nightmare.

He just wanted it to stop.
He didn't even know why he was feeling so weirdly emotional about it now - granted, living through the Corruption caused him to be more emotional in general than he would've liked, but there was no point in fighting it.

Boyfriend clung onto the sleeves of his hoodie, trying to find the strength just to stave off the sudden surge of emotions.

Just one deep breath after another.

Despite the resistance, the rapper still found himself struggling to keep the negative emotions from overpowering him, however, until he heard a voice from behind him that easily shut everything up.

"Boyfriend?"

He looked behind him to see that Soul had entered the room, a slightly concerned expression on his face.

"...I-I thought you were still asleep...?"

"Mm, I was. Probably just one of those 'randomly waking up in the middle of the night' moments. But when I saw you weren't still next to me and I could feel that something was up with you, well..."

Knowing what he meant, Boyfriend turned away, but the motion only encouraged Soul to walk around and sit next to him on the couch.

"...Bee, is everything okay?"

The person in question let out a sigh, though it came out sounding rather frustrated.

"Yeah, everything's fine."

"You know, your emotions may not be strong enough for me to feel them, but that doesn't mean I can't sense them. Just... tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong."

"We both know that's not true."

Boyfriend paused, hesitance clear in his movements.

"I..."

"And I have a feeling I already know what this is about."

"..."

"...Look. If you really don't want to tell me, then don't tell me. But... I at least want to try to help if I can, BF."

"It's... It's not that big a deal."

"...It's the nightmares again, isn't it?"

BF paused, and that was all Soul needed to confirm his answer.

"I knew it."

"I told you, i-it's not-!"

"Boyfriend, it HAS to be a big deal if it's making you feel this off. Besides, I told you before, it doesn't matter how many times you have that nightmare. That's still all it is. It's just a dream."

"And what if it isn't? What if one day I wake up, and that hole in my chest is real? I don't want that to happen, and I know you don't, either."

"It's not going to happen! God, I really don't understand why you think this is something more!"

"Then why do I keep having it?? Every time, I'll go for a while thinking it's gone, and then it comes back! And I'm tired of it! I'm tired of constantly waking up feeling like I want to scream my heart out, and I'm tired of constantly having to watch you die!"

BF quickly stopped himself after that - he wasn't planning to let his emotions spill out any more than they already have.

Soul just gave him a worried look, some of the frustration from moments earlier seeming to dissipate - he was tempted to reach a hand out to comfort him.

"Boyfriend-"

"It's fine. I'll be fine. I've gone for this long with it, haven't I? ...Maybe a little longer and I'll just get used to it."

"Bee, that's not how it works. It's obviously already bothering you enough."

"Like I said. It's not that big a deal."

"I don't know HOW you can say that when you've literally JUST yelled about how exhausted this shit is making you feel, BF. I know you feel like it shouldn't be that big of a deal, but it IS."

"I told you, I'll be fine. As long as I can still feel you're there when I wake up, I'll be FINE."

"Nonono, I'm not about to let you just brush aside your feelings like this. This isn't 'being fine'."

"What other options do I have?? It's not like I know how to stop them from happening! Besides, weren't you the one who just told me that I shouldn't worry about it because it's 'just a dream'??"

"I know what I said! ...But pushing aside the hurt isn't healthy for you either. It's going to build up, and it's GOING to come back to bite you, and you aren't going to like it when it does."

"You don't know that! Besides, I've handled way more dangerous stuff in rap battles compared to this! A little nightmare shouldn't even scare me this much."

Boyfriend pushed past him and tried to walk away, only for Soul to grab his arm and pull him back.

"And yet it still DOES. And I know for a fact that it still will."

"How the hell do you know?"

"You aren't planning on going back to sleep tonight, are you?"

"...Who s-said I wasn't-"

"Don't try and bluff your way out of this one. I know you. You think I haven't noticed how almost every night this happens, you refuse to go back to sleep, and then you get anxious about sleeping again the next day? Despite what you wanna tell me, I know you're not going to be okay. ...And I'd rather have you be okay."

Boyfriend remained silent, still facing away from him, his eyes fixed to the ground - he tried to find a way to keep dancing around the issue, but was failing.
Noticing this, Soul's grip on his arm loosened a bit.

"...You know I'm always here if you need to talk about something, right?"

The frustration returning, Boyfriend tore his arm out of Soul's grasp, folding his arms as he remained facing away.

"There's nothing to talk about!"

BF tried once more to walk away, only for Soul to grab his arm and pull him back again as he fought to pull himself out.

"Yes, there IS! And if you don't let it out, you're just going to hurt yourself! I'm just trying to help you!!"

"Well, nothing is wrong and I don't need help! So WHY can't you just DROP IT?!"

With one final tug, Soul pulled him back - which turned him around so the two were facing each other - and gripped both of his arms tightly, holding him at arms length to ensure he'd stay long enough to hear his next words.

"BECAUSE I WANT YOU TO BE SAFE!"

For just a split second, he could see those hidden emotions and the remorse show in BF's expression, but Boyfriend quickly shook his head and grabbed Soul's hands, pulling both of them down and releasing him from the other's grasp.

"So what?! Just because I have nightmares so bad I'm sometimes afraid to sleep doesn't mean that I need... h-help..."

His voice cracked at the end of his sentence as well as his facade. The emotions started to leak through as Soul watched him sympathetically.

Boyfriend took deep, but sharp breaths as he tried to focus on holding everything back... and then he felt Soul's arms wrap around him.

And the dam burst.

The tears started to flow, and his shaking arms reciprocated the hug. He collapsed forward, Soul continuing to hold him as he moved them both to sit on the floor.

Admittedly, he was still holding back. He knew that once he started, he wouldn't be able to stop for a long while.
Though, it was clear Soul could tell, given what he said next.

"Bee, it's okay. Let it out."

He felt a hand starting to rub comforting and reassuring circles on his back, and that was all he needed.

His grip on the other got tighter as he stopped resisting his emotions and began full-on sobbing into Soul's shoulder, the catharsis he'd desired for so long finally flooding in as his walls came crashing down.

The torrent of feelings proved strong enough to seep into their connection, if the stray tears that began to fall down Soul's face were any indication.
He simply wiped them away as he continued embracing the other - after all, they were BF's tears, not his.

It took a good several minutes, but Boyfriend's sobs eventually stopped, being replaced by small sniffles and the occasional hiccup.

He shifted to lay more on his side, his head now resting on Soul's chest as he ran a hand through BF's hair.
A familiar, welcomed gesture of comfort.

He... hadn't been that emotionally open in a while.

He never really allowed himself to be vulnerable around most other people. The only real exceptions had been Girlfriend, Pico, and his brother.
But with Soul, it was almost like being open to him came naturally.

If he was being honest, he kind of always felt safer around him. Even back during their first meeting, when the Corruption had done something to keep BF from realizing he created him to help, he still felt okay with placing all his trust in him... which clearly paid off.

That connection lingered ever since.

And now, with him in his friend’s arms, his other hand gently resting on the side of his face and wiping away any tears that fell, the comfort washing over him in waves...

He realized just how much he’d needed this.

Because of that, it didn't take long for him to begin sputtering out apologies, lamentations about how he didn't want Soul to worry, grief-filled admissions that every single repetition only brought him back to memories of the Corruption and he just didn't want to see his friend disappear again...

The response was wordless, with Soul only hugging him tighter afterwards - but Boyfriend easily read into the gesture.

And he didn't want to let go, either.

"...I just don't know what to do without you. N-Not... not after..."

"It's okay, Bee. I'm here."

Boyfriend muttered a small, but audible "thank you" in return.

The two sat there on the floor for an indiscernible amount of time - all that mattered to them at the moment was each other's comfort.
Eventually, though, BF pulled out of their embrace, significantly calmer compared to earlier, using his hand to wipe away any remaining tears.

"...Do you feel better now?"

Boyfriend nodded in response.

"A lot better. ...Thanks for, um... letting me do that."

Smiling warmly at him, Soul placed a hand on his shoulder.

"You don't have to ask."

BF matched his smile, his warmth easily driving out the cold creeping in from outside - and a few seconds later Soul stood up, reaching his hands out to BF for him to take, and once they'd grasped onto each other Soul pulled him up to stand alongside him.

"Well, I think we both already know neither of us are going back to sleep. So... Netflix and chill?"

"As long as it's either a good movie or a really stupid one we can both laugh at together."

"Deal."

As he said that, Soul then walked past BF, confusing the latter.
He spoke out, making the other stop in his tracks.

"Soul, where are you going...?"

"I'm just gonna grab something from your room real quick, should only take a couple-"

However, before he could take any more than a few more steps forward, Soul was stopped again by a pair of arms wrapping around him from behind, the rapper’s head now buried in the back of his shoulder.

"S-Stay... please."

"Bee..."

In an attempt to comfort him, he placed a hand over one of BF's, tracing circles on the back of it.

Boyfriend spoke again in a whisper, but it didn't go unheard by his friend.

"...I'm scared."

He felt Soul give his hand a gentle squeeze.

"I'll only be gone a few seconds, I promise. I was just going to get your phone, I thought maybe it'd help."

"But I want you."

There was a pause after that, before Boyfriend heard a gentle, fond call of his name and suddenly Soul had shifted in his hold to hug him back, his tail wrapping around BF's waist.

"...If you really want to, you could just come with me, you know."

BF remained silent, considering the offer.

"...Y-You said you'll only be gone for a couple seconds, right?"

"Mhm."

He pulled away, pushing down the anxiety he spoke again.

"Just don't take forever, okay?"

"Don't worry, I'll be back before you can even finish saying 'Soul is the best and no one can prove otherwise.' Hell, if I'm not, I'll buy you donuts."

After a few seconds, Boyfriend started to snicker, before it quickly grew into full-blown laughter - Soul chuckled a bit and rolled his eyes fondly, but out of relief that his little plan had worked.
It took a bit for BF to come down from his fit of laughter, speaking again once he did.

"Dork..."

"Hey, at least I cheered you up."

The last few giggles flowing out, Boyfriend was the one to roll his eyes fondly this time and look up at him, moving to grab the remote for the TV and already pressing the button to load up Netflix.

"How about I give you until I pick a movie on this thing instead?"

"Pfft- alright, alright, you killjoy. Be right back."

Soul then disappeared in a flash of white light, BF snickering again as he walked over to the couch and sat down.

He'd only scrolled through about four or five movies before deciding on one to watch.

A voice piped up from behind him as his thumb hovered over the select button.

"So, did you finish saying it yet?"

He quickly turned around, and lo and behold, Soul was there, typing something on BF's phone.

"I- Wha- When did you get back??"

"While you were still scrolling through the movies."

Boyfriend laughed a bit, shaking his head fondly, before realizing what he had said to announce his return...

"...I didn't think you were actually serious about that."

"Why wouldn't I be?~"

"Eheh- you dork..."

"You first, as always~"

"Oh, shut up and let me put on the movie."

He was about to press play before Soul interjected.

"Hold on, don't play it yet!"

"What? Why not? You wanna make popcorn or something?"

"Nah, we're just waiting for Gigi."

"...wait what-"

And as if on cue, Girlfriend appeared in her PJs in a cloud of red mist, holding her phone in her hand-

"Boyfriend!"

-speaking as she immediately went to hug him.

"Wha-"

"Soul may or may not have texted me saying that you had a rough night and needed comfort. I came as soon as I could!"

BF's eyes widened a bit at her words, and he looked over to Soul, who mouthed a "you're welcome" to him.
He returned it with a warm smile - an unspoken "thank you" - and pulled him over to join the hug. Soul simply rolled his eyes before returning the embrace.

The three-way hug was broken up a few moments later, and GF noticed the Netflix open on the TV, movie ready to be played.

"Movie night?"

Boyfriend and Soul looked at each other for a second, before smiling as they looked back at Girlfriend and nodded.

"Movie night."
"Movie night."

"Well, count me in!"

In her enthusiasm, she was quick to wrap an arm around BF's waist as Soul wrapped an arm around his shoulders, leaving him in the middle between the two.

He couldn't help but smile at the affection.

"You guys are the best..."

"Oh, stop being sentimental and put on the movie..."

BF and GF laughed a bit at his deflection, with the former picking up the remote and starting the film.

They'd barely made it anywhere close to an hour in and Boyfriend and Soul were already asleep next to GF on the couch - likely their drowsiness finally kicking in after the waves of emotions that came before.

Girlfriend smiled at them, before getting up to grab a spare blanket from BF's room and gently placing it over the two.

With one last loving look at them, she teleported back home, and a few moments later Boyfriend's phone buzzed with a text from her, letting them know that she left to avoid suspicion from her parents after the duo fell asleep.

That morning, Boyfriend was the first to wake up, almost instantly noticing the blanket and the text notification which he could only assume was from GF, seeing as she was no longer beside him.

Looking next to him, though, he saw that Soul was still peacefully asleep next to him, his arm still wrapped around his neck and his head resting on his shoulder.

BF smiled at the sight.
It appeared to be pretty early in the morning - he could wait a little longer to get up.

After shifting a tiny bit as to not wake the other up, Boyfriend wrapped his arms around Soul, gently resting his head on top of the other's - and he swore that he could see a small smile form on his face in his sleep.

Satisfied, the rapper closed his eyes, content and already starting to drift off.

Just like a few hours prior, he felt nothing but safe around him.

'君は愛そのものだ.'

Chapter Text

Boyfriend took a deep breath as he stepped onto the glitchy red level select plate.

That twisted... being had just finished his little tirade about how he and GF were in "his" world, among other things.

Honestly, typical villain speech. BF had heard it all before.

So why was this time sending the worst chills down his spine...?

One more deep breath.

One more song.

This finally ends.

A feeling of relief swept over him when Girlfriend appeared at his side, just as ready to fight as he was.

It was nice to see her after the whole thing with that Virtual Boy Mario (or whatever the hell his name ACTUALLY was, he didn't really care)...

...And...

...He didn't even want to THINK about MX.

But at least all the suffering was about to pay off.

The two smiled at each other, and faced the monstrosity standing before them.

Was this really the same person who'd challenged him to a rap battle at the start of all this?

The motives, he didn't understand.

...Okay, that was technically a half-lie. The guy DID get pissed at them for running from the challenge earlier.

But in BF's defense, try NOT running away when bro is getting MAD as hell and your powerless girlfriend is standing there right next to you.

He just didn't want her to get hurt.

...That went well, didn't it?

He DID perfectly understand that he was practically rapping for his life now.

GF was there, singing along with him. It was okay.

They'd make it through, together.

The two made it through the first section of the song just fine when...

...Girlfriend disappeared down the pipe.

Fuck, why'd he have to jinx it...?

And suddenly he was face-to-face with this... dumb Tanooki EXE... thing. Yeah, why did he care who these guys were again?

It was fine, Girlfriend already came back once and that was a level of relief that he's sure he never felt before.

He persisted on, even past the moment that one opponent turned into three.

And then the scenery changed.

His opponent, he very well recognized.

...His confidence plummeted.

His notes became screams, pleads even.

...Why did it always have to be her?

It wasn't fair.

Come now, take the step.

Don't look back, there's nothing left-

It wasn't fair!

-for you beyond the veil

You've tried and yet you've failed to save her.

Yeah, rub it in, why doesn't he.

Well, HEY, if he hadn't gloated about how DEFENSELESS the two were before their challenge maybe this would've gone differently.

It didn't matter. He wasn't listening. He was more focused on singing his heart out, at least as an outlet for the emotions that were currently consuming him right now.

Claws upon your heart

Rip and tear your soul apart

You've lost the game, it's always the same when you stand before a god.

He could practically FEEL the lyrical chanting from all around him now.

Just how much more did he need to be mocked about this?! HE'S CLEARLY GRIEVING, DAMMIT!

COME NOW, TAKE THE STEP.

DON'T LOOK BACK, THERE'S NOTHING LEFT-

-FOR YOU BEYOND THE VEIL

YOU'VE TRIED AND YET YOU'VE FAILED TO SAVE HER.

CLAWS UPON YOUR HEART

RIP AND TEAR YOUR SOUL APART

YOU'VE LOST THE GAME, IT'S ALWAYS THE SAME WHEN YOU STAND BEFORE A GOD.

The long stretch of notes finally ended, GF had disappeared again, and the tears were rolling down his face.

He just wanted to get this to stop.

Don't you see now?

We're one soul stronger, and you are ALONE.

You CAN'T WIN.

So WHY

DO YOU

STILL

FIGHT?

...This was it.

His very last chance.

One final stand.

He'd take this bastard down, (somehow) restore Girlfriend, and they'd both get out of here together.

...So, he sang.

He's sure his notes were invoking a fury that he's never had to sing with before.

But then again... he'd never quite been pushed to this level before.

At least as far as he remembers.

He HAD to keep going.

For himself. For Girlfriend.

No more of this stupid game.

He pressed on, even when the massive entity in front of him started using those other creations of his against him.

Even when he was left to sing solo, he just upped the ante.

He'd remained ever-defiant, essentially a big giant "fuck you" through his vocals when he suddenly felt a spike shoot through his chest.

His consciousness faded.

GAME OVER

...Boyfriend.

It's over.

Wake up.

WAKE UP!

With a soft gasp, Boyfriend's eyes tore open, and he shot up from where he was sitting on the couch.

His breathing quickened slightly as a result - probably from that very abrupt ending to his dream - but he was quick to regain control of it.

For that being one of those dreams, well...

Damn.

He was glad he hadn't lived through that one himself, but... shit.

"Babe, are you okay? Is something wrong?"

He looked beside him to see Girlfriend, who was now sitting next to him on the couch.
And, hearing another familiar voice, he turned the opposite direction to see Pico at his other side.

Oh, yeah... they came by there earlier to hang out... (he's not entirely sure how he'd convinced Pico to stay for a sleepover considering he'd just slept through an entire life journey at this point, but what the hell. He was here.)

"Something's definitely wrong, Gigi. He's crying, for fuck's sake."

Confused, Boyfriend lifted a hand to his face...
...And there were indeed tears rolling down it again.

Well, he HAD been crying by the end of his dream, so... maybe that was why? Because he didn't feel sad at all, per say. Guilty about the dream, sure, but not sad.

"I... I'm okay, Pico."

"Ya sure, Morse Code? You know it isn't exactly normal to wake up crying."

"I'm fine. It's just... what happened in my dream..."

Girlfriend and Pico exchanged concerned glances, understanding what he meant by that as BF wiped his tears away.

"...You mean...?"

"One of those weird dreams where ya travel to those other worlds in your sleep?"

"Alternate timeline this time... I-I think."

"What happened?"

At GF's question, Boyfriend tensed up, looking away from her.

"Are you... s-sure you want to know?"

Girlfriend nodded, and Pico placed a hand on his shoulder to tell him the same.

BF still remained unsure, until a voice gently spoke from inside his head.

'Deep breath, Bee. If they really want to know... then it's only fair to tell them.'

Following Soul's advice, he slowly took in a deep breath, and relaxed as he began to speak again.

"Alright, if you really want to hear it... So, it started as just some normal day, with me and Gigi chilling together. Then suddenly, this mail shows up, and it's a Mario cartridge, but the game's all glitchy and messed up... and then we were literally pulled into the game. And- there was this guy there- apparently another person that your dad fucked over..."

"Does he ever stop doing that with people?"

"Hell if I know, Gigi."

"...Anyway, so the Mario rip-off challenged us to 3 songs or he'd kill us, obviously I accepted... but after a while I think it just got too heated. Plus, your powers didn't work in the game, so I thought it was best to run but that pissed him off... we ended up facing a lot of other characters in there, I-I think I vaguely remember seeing Pico inside after a point too, but... when we got to the final fight, that monster called for us to face him again, and..."

"...And what?"

"...killed you..."

With those words, Girlfriend immediately hugged him, Pico joining in a few seconds later by embracing him from behind.

A few tears slipped out of BF's eyes, but he didn't allow anything more than that. Those weren't really his tears to cry.

"Babe, I'm so sorry..."

"It's fine... besides, I died not too long after, heh..."

He immediately shut up when he felt the other two hug him even tighter.

"Are you sure you're fine, Bee? That's one hell of a dream."

"I'll be okay. Besides... I'm not really that sad. I still have you guys here with me... and plus I think the fact that I could tell it was another timeline took me out of it when I woke up again."

The three pulled out of the hug, and BF gave them a warm smile.

"If you say so, Bee."

"Sooooo... we aren't going back to sleep, are we?"

"Gigi, it's 2AM. We should be going the fuck back to sleep."

"Nope."

"...Girlfriend, please-"

"Sorry, Pico. Looks like you're staying up with us~"

Pico blushed and looked away after seeing the smirk BF had on his face.

"Shut the fuck up."

"Mmm, wanna just watch a movie?"

"We do that all the time, though, babe."

"Yeah, but the shit they put on cable kinda sucks. Unless you just wanna keep rewatching recordings of SpongeBob."

"Movie it is! I'll go make popcorn!"

Girlfriend instantly teleported over to BF's kitchen in a swirl of red mist as Pico hopped off the couch.

"And I'm using the bathroom. Since you're dragging us into staying up until the crack of dawn."

As Pico began to walk off, BF yelled after him.

"You never tried to decline though!"

He laughed as he heard Pico groan in the hallway.
That was when he saw a flash of white light in his peripheral, and he turned around to see Soul floating behind him.

"I was wondering where you were."

"Ehhh... I figured letting you have a moment with just them was the best option. That dream DID involve those two in some form after all."

"Yeah, true... and thanks for helping me wake up after, at least."

"You don't have to thank me. Besides, I didn't get to chuck a guitar at you, but I'm letting it slide this time."

"SOUL!"

"Pfft- okay, okay, I'm just joking!"

"Good, because otherwise I'm gonna start throwing them back at you."

"Well, good luck trying~ About that movie though."

"Hm?"

"I think I have a better idea. But let me know if it's too soon."

"What is it?"

Soul leaned over to whisper in his ear, and when BF's instant reaction was to gasp and pout at him, he couldn't help but chuckle a bit.

"Dude, that's a terrible idea. It's going to end poorly for you."

"Says who?"

Before BF could respond, the two heard GF call out as she walked out of the kitchen.

"Back with the popcorn!"

A few seconds later, Pico also appeared from out of the hall.

"Well, seems I got good timing then."

And the other two were quick to notice the entity that had decided to join them for the night.

"Oh hey Soul."

"Hey."

"Sooooo anywayyyyy, what movie are we watching, babe?"

"Actually, Soul apparently has a better idea."

"Really? What?"

"Playing Mario Party."

GF and Pico stared for a moment.

"Uhhhh... wouldn't that be in bad taste right now?"

"Oh, I already told him this was a horrible idea. Unless you just really like getting your ass beat in that game, 魂."

"Excuse me, you're the one who only squeezed out a win because you STOLE ONE OF MY FUCKING STARS halfway through!"

"Hey, it's a competitive video game, anything goes. Plus, that screech of anger you let out afterwards was goddamn hilarious."

"Guess it isn't really that bad of an idea."

"Pico!"

"What? Watching Bee kick your ass like that last time was pretty funny."

"You're supposed to be helping me with this comeback."

"Says who now?"

"Alright, alright. I suppose we'll just save the popcorn for when Boyfriend starts stealing stars again."

"More like seeing stars. You guys are fucking going down."

Boyfriend stood up to match his fighting stance, easily firing a retort.

"Not if you go down first!"

And then one of the couch pillows was thrown in their direction.

"I am NOT being left out of this after last time. BOTH of you are going down."

"Hell nah!"

As the three continued squaring up, Girlfriend went to pull the game cartridge out of BF's collection of video games... only to pause and stare at it for a few seconds.

"...BF, none of these are actually cursed or anything... right?"

The other three immediately stopped, quickly turning to BF for an answer.

"...Nah, I don't think so. That was another timeline, not this one."

GF shrugged in indifference, and placed the game in the console as the others proceeded to bicker again...

Which carried long after the game had started.

And when it wasn't competitive bicker, it was confusion thanks to Boyfriend's near-constant humming of "No Party" as they played. (For the record - he was definitely keeping that silly little song to himself.)

Silly lil bonus that I thought of:

"Oh, no, there were a BUNCH of those guys I had to go through. There was a Luigi that fell into lava, a floating Wario head, Chris Pratt, some Yoshi Mario whose tongue was a pain in the ass to dodge-"

"Wait, back the fuck up. You're telling me that during that hellhole of a dream, in a world full of that asshole's creations, you rap battled motherfucking CHRIS PRATT???"

"Yes."

Pico stared at BF in complete bewildered disbelief.

"...That makes no fucking sense."

"EXACTLY!"

Chapter Text

Keep going.

Keep FIGHTING.

You can do this.

Those words echoed in his head as he continued to effortlessly match each and every verse being thrown at him.

And it was paying off well. The more he sang, the less corrupted she was.

Never mind what she had said earlier to taunt him - he WAS making progress.

She knew for a fact that nothing was going to keep him from his goal now.

Only her head was left to uncorrupt at this point.

It was losing... but it still currently had most of the control...

Perhaps it was time to be a bit more... creative.

The two entered the final verse, where Girlfriend had thrown a whole barrage of notes at him while he just sang longer held notes.

And he didn't even have the audacity to copy all of those notes. Smug little shit.

By the end of it, the Corruption lost its pawn, as what was left of it on her head finally cracked and she was freed.

Boyfriend, being the chivalrous hero he was, slid to catch her.

He heard a sharp sound akin to something tearing. And nothing fell into his arms.

Only a drop of blood fell between his hands.

Shocked by it, he looked up.

And GOD, he wished he hadn't.

One of the tendrils she had on her speakers had come up through the floor and stabbed her straight through the chest mid-fall.

Blood coated the spike at the end where it gathered up and fell onto the wooden floorboards beneath.

Boyfriend was numb. His mind in a daze.

Nothing felt real anymore.

He sunk to his knees as the infection began taunting him.

Did you really think you could save her?

Look at her now.

You let this happen. You got cocky.

You have no one to blame but YOURSELF.

BF didn't respond to it at all. He just sat there, empty eyes staring into the ground.

...I see you still aren't ready to give up.

Well, in that case...

He just barely had time to hear the sound of a gun reloading and a gunshot before everything suddenly went black.

...

Half-awakening to the feeling of his body being shaken, Boyfriend fully woke up with a jolt and a small gasp, immediately sitting up as he tried to recover from the dream.

It was only when he felt the gentle touch of a hand on his shoulder and a familiar voice speak beside him that he whipped his head around to see who it was.

"Boyfriend? Is everything okay now?"

And at the sight of Girlfriend sitting beside him, he quickly teared up and hugged her tightly, much to her surprise.

"Babe?"

She didn't get a response, he only continued to embrace her.
Thank GOD her dad was letting her stay over for a week because otherwise he's sure he'd currently be calling her in a panic.

He fully tuned out everything else, including the conversation that took place after all his sudden movements - he just wanted to feel that she was there right now.

In her confusion, GF looked up at the entity who was currently also awake on the other side of the bed.

"...Soul, do you know what's going on?"

At her question, Soul let out a small sigh.

"Probably Corruption nightmares again. He's been having a lot of those lately."

Girlfriend hummed in understanding.
It made sense he would, she figured he was hit the hardest by the whole thing.

Looking down at her beloved, she placed a hand on BF's shoulder to comfort him, gently rubbing circles into it.

"And from the looks of it... it was probably about you..."

GF looked back up at Soul, who was now looking at Boyfriend with a concerned expression.
She heard the blue-haired rapper begin to mutter, and she perked up a bit.

"BF?"

"Mm... G-Girlfriend?"

"It's okay, babe... I'm here..."

She felt him hug her a bit tighter, and she gladly reciprocated with a small smile.

"...Do you want to talk about your dream?"

Boyfriend hummed a bit, half out of anxiousness and half out of thought.
Was it... really worth it to tell her?

GF looked up again, and from the look on Soul's face, it was likely that he understood what exactly was going on in BF's mind.

"You know you don't have to say anything if you don't want to, Bee."

"Soul's right, BF. If it was that bad, we won't force you to talk."

"...I'm just... glad you're safe."

"Aw, Boyfriend, you have nothing to be scared of. We're all fine. Everything's okay now."

"I know... I wish the rest of me could feel the same, though..."

Her concern grew, and she looked over at Soul. The two shared a mutual nod before GF outstretched a hand to him to help pull him over to BF, where he hugged him from behind as GF continued to embrace him from the front.

Boyfriend easily relaxed into the comforting touch, much to the relief of the other two.

"I promise, babe, the Corruption is gone. We erased every single trace of it when we took it down and a lot of us confronted that monster over it. It's not going to come back, no matter how many times you dream about it."

"...But... if I know that, then w-why am I still having nightmares...? ...It's n-not fair..."

"Bee, you know that out of all of us, you've had a lot of the worst of it. You're still healing, and healing takes time."

"And no matter how long that process takes, you've always got us to help you through it!"

"...Yeah. I guess you guys are right, heh. I know I worry a lot, I just... can't really help it..."

"It's okay to be worried! At least you understand that you don't always have to be."

BF nodded, before looking back and forth at the two currently encasing him in a hug sandwich.

"...Are you guys going to keep me trapped like this forever, or...?"

"Probably~"

"Wellll, only until you feel better!~"

"But I do feel betterrrr!"

"Are you sure about that?"

"魂..."

"I don't think he feels better yet, Soul."

"...At this point, I think you guys just like hugging me."

He heard a slight laugh come from the other two, and their hold on him tightened a small bit.

"Maybe~"
"Maybe~"

With a playful roll of his eyes, he relaxed into the touch more, a small smile growing on his face.

"Besides, it's kinda easy to tell when you need it."

"...Thanks."

"Aw, you're welcome babe!"

The longer he was kept in their embrace, the more tired he started to feel.
And clearly it was showing, given that Soul had taken to teasing him about it.

"Uh oh, is someone getting sleepy?~"

Boyfriend shook his head, but the yawn he let out after gave him away fully.

"Heh, you usually don't really want to fall asleep after nightmares like that. I'm surprised."

"Mm... 's not my fault... you guys are still hugging me..."

"Or maybe that's just us being sweethearts and helping you go to sleep?~"

BF didn't say anything that time, only giving another sleepy groan.
The two let him go, and GF helped him lay back on the bed, a small amused smile on her face.

As Boyfriend drifted off and his eyes closed, he felt the two lay down next to him and Girlfriend gave him a small kiss on the cheek, hearing them both wish him goodnight as he finally fell asleep.

The rest of the night ended up being void of bad dreams, and - once they woke up - the three decided it was worth it to lay there for a few more hours.

Meanwhile, in the Dearest residence...

Somewhere around the middle of the night, Mommy Mearest suddenly shot up in her bed - the violent movements immediately alerting the demon that was her husband laying next to her.

When she realized she was awake, she just let out an annoyed groan and fell back on the mattress.

"What is it honey? What's wrong? Did someone break in??"

"No, it was just a stupid nightmare."

"Again?"

"Yes. And don't bother asking what it was, you could probably figure it out."

"It's always that damn corruption and that damn mercenary. Hmph. Tell ya what, I'll just make some early breakfast for the both of us, how about that?"

"Ahem, YOU are staying here and sleeping. I already know for a fact you stayed awake, you have bags under your eyes."

"Well, I can't just go to sleep when you're here tossin' and turnin' all night long! What if I get one of those stupid nightmares?? I'd be sobbin' on your lap like a little baby!"

Mearest only smirked, thinking back to when that exact scenario happened following his defeat at the hands of Boyfriend when they first rap battled.

"That wouldn't be the first time~"

Daddy Dearest deadpanned at her for a moment, before pulling the blanket back over himself and reluctantly trying to go to sleep.

Chapter Text

Pico found himself awakening in an unfamiliar location. That was the first thing that caught him off guard.

He stood up and gauged his surroundings, seeing the mostly-empty road around him...

...And almost immediately noticing the figure in a trenchcoat wearing a fedora with its back turned a few feet ahead.

Not weird or suspicious at all.

The figure began singing, and he responded back. It went on for a couple times even when its voice seemed to peel away at points to nearly reveal the true one underneath.

Pico was just confused the whole time, trying to figure out what exactly he was currently up against.

And then the figure turned around, shedding the disguise and revealing its true form as it laughed maniacally...

Wait, why the HELL did this thing look like that lemon freak?

Or... at least he somewhat did.
He looked practically INSANE, one of his eyes being a swirl while the other was just glowing white, the horns, how his jaw looked WAY too wide open...

"What the FUCK is that thing?!"

Pico quickly pulled his UZI out, starting to shoot at the monster but it didn't seem to be doing much.

The two continued to duel, Pico only getting more agitated as he waited for the other to just do something.

Eventually, the instrument picked up a bit as their surroundings rumbled, and he yelled.

"DIE, MOTHERFUCKER!"

The mercenary fought back against the being with his own freestyling, which was helpful enough considering that bullets still weren't affecting this thing.

...Aaaand then the tone of the song shifted, he could see the edges of his vision dimming to black.

There was no way in hell that he was about to lose to this demon.

He kept going with his side of the song, even when the lemon monster dropped out and he was left to sing on his own.

The track changed again, and suddenly his surroundings were totally different.

Granted, they were still on the road, it's just that now everything looked corrupted. Like the city was being claimed by it yet again.

Pico's fury rose, but so did his fatigue - the latter of which had to be this monster's doing.
He hadn't felt tired at all before now.

Still, the ginger attempted to keep up with him, with the song and all the notes, but eventually collapsed, and the instrumental paused.

The short little break allowed him to find the strength to rise again, trying once more for another turn, and another chance.

It wasn't until he saw a flash of white appear beside him and he started to hear a familiar voice contributing to his own did a cocky smirk grow on his face.

He looked beside him, and, as to be expected, Soul was there singing alongside him.

Standing up, the lemon monster reappeared in front of him, still smiling crazily but it was easy to tell that Soul's assistance was pissing him off.

The theme the two started the song with returned, except Pico's vocals were strengthened by Soul's now.

Pico tried once more to shoot him, only for it to once again have no effect.

He threw his gun down in utter frustration and Soul disappeared as a result.

"SON OF A BITCH!"

And he took off running down the road.

The demon followed, continuing to sing as much as he did.

In fact, he'd even duplicated himself to keep the mercenary confined to one direction, and even then he was still closing in.

Pico didn't give two shits, he just continued singing because FUCK THIS GUY.

Once the track was about to end - signaled by the hold note they'd both done at the end of all their verses, plus an extended note barrage from Pico - he turned back around and pulled out a knife, ready to confront the monster, delivering one last yell.

"Asshole!"

...Up until the screeching of wheels was heard and he saw Mearest drive by in her limo, straight up punching the demon in the face on the very last beat of the song, easily knocking him out.

Well, that certainly did the trick.

He put his knife away before walking up to the so-called "lemon demon" - and then he deadpanned, and knocked on the head.

"You can take the damn costume off now, Mike, Bee already said 'cut'."

"Oh- oops."

BB, in the lemon monster costume, was quick to stand up and wrench the head off, letting the rest of the costume fall off in the process. He briefly dusted off his hoodie after setting the head down before speaking again.

"So, how was that?"

"I'd say it went pretty well. At least the set didn't fall apart or somethin'."

Boyfriend ran over, letting out a whoop once he reached the two.

"Yeah! That was awesome!"

"...Okay, Bee, remind me again why you wanted us to use a song from your stupid Mario dream in a Corruption scenario?"

"Because! I thought it'd be boring to recreate you rap battling some creepypasta Luigi. That and I don't know everything from it... nor would I think any of us could pull off a mutilated ghost Mario look."

"...Fair enough."

"Hey, GF! Did we break the Mearest animatronic we stole?"

"No, I think it's fine, BB!"

Girlfriend shouted back at him from inside the limo, where she got out and pulled out the animatronic from the front seat, bringing it over to stand up against the two, casually handing BF the remote.

"Trying to control its movements to LOOK like it punched you in the face was hard though."

"Don't worry, GF, I didn't actually get punched in the face."

"Good, good."

"Either way it would've just punched the voice box or something."

"Ah, good point."

"I'm just glad everything went smoothly, otherwise we'd be here fore- AH!"

He quickly cut himself off with a scream at the sudden feeling of metal hands grabbing him, only calming down and deadpanning when he heard BF snickering behind him, using the remote to put the animatronic back to its regular position.

"Gotcha, Souly~"

Soul stayed silent for a few seconds, before spawning a guitar in his hand as he raised it to throw it at BF, who screamed and just barely managed to duck out of the way.

"D-Dude! I was just messing with you!"

"I'm getting you back for that, you know this."

"そんなことしない."  [No you won't.]

"じゃあ僕をやめようとするんだ. やってみたい."  [Then try to stop me. I DARE you.]

The two held a challenging stare at each other and it was easy to tell where this conversation was going.

Pico rolled his eyes at the two's antics as Girlfriend spoke up to get their attention.

"Well, do you guys think we should run it again, or-"

"Hell no!"

"Maybe just to be safe though-"

"That was our 5TH FUCKING TAKE!"

Take #1

Pico eyed his opponent curiously as they started the first set of verses - it was already clear that something was off here.

Not the fact that whoever it was he was rap battling was clearly in some sort of disguise, but rather...

"...Mike, I think the voice changer is broken."

The other quickly stopped singing and turned around, BB's voice now able to be heard under the costume.

"Ah shit! Is it?"

"Yeah... like there's hella crackling. Might wanna fix that."

Michael pulled off the head of the costume, and sighed.

"Time to waste a good 30 minutes on it then."

Take #2

The figure in front of him was wearing a trenchcoat and a fedora, its back turned to him.

It was shifty enough to make Pico keep his guard up.

When it seemed to take a deep breath, he tensed, waiting for the first few notes.

"...yo soy lemon de-"

"MIKE, YOU MOTHERFUCKING-"

BB snickered from under the costume - it was so worth it.

Take #3

Standing up, the lemon monster reappeared in front of him, still smiling crazily but it was easy to tell that Soul's assistance was pissing him off.

The theme the two started the song with returned, except Pico's vocals were strengthened by Soul's now.

...And then things fucked up that afternoon for the 3rd time in a row.

The three felt rumbling on the set, which made zero sense because it wasn't supposed to happen at this point in the song...

"What the-"

Creaking metal was heard, and then the backdrop fell back and broke into several pieces.

"...Bee, get your ass over here!"

"Hm? What's wrong Pic- oh. ...I'll have Gigi get the paint. And another wall."

Take #4

Once the track was about to end - signaled by the hold note they'd both done at the end of all their verses, plus an extended note barrage from Pico - he turned back around and pulled out a knife, ready to confront the monster, delivering one last yell.

"Asshole!"

...Up until the screeching of wheels was heard and he saw Mearest drive by in her limo, and-

Wait did it just miss the punch-

"Oh my fucking god-"

"GF! I think we didn't put the animatronic in the right place!"

Girlfriend rolled down one of the limo's windows to look at the two as she yelled back to respond.

"What do you mean??"

"It didn't punch me!"

"AND AT THE END OF THE GODDAMN SONG WE'VE BEEN HERE FOR FOUR HOURS-"

~~

"So no, we are NOT running this again. This take was perfectly fine."

"Yeah, I'd have to go with Pico on this one, babe."

"Alright, alright. Just checking."

And then Pico went silent for a few seconds, coming to a realization.

"...Wait Bee were you even recording this shit-"

"Relaaaaax, Pico. It's on my phone now, and it'll be on my computer in a couple more hours."

"Thank FUCKING god."

"Yeah, I ALSO don't want to be in this empty ass theater for any longer than we have to be."

"I'm feeling kinda tired from all this too, let's go-"

BF interrupted himself with a high-pitched beep when he felt something grab his arm, and he frantically tried to pull it back until he heard his friend start to laugh and he  realized what was going on.

Which made him the one to deadpan this time.

"Dude, come on, really?"

"Hey, you did it to me, it was only fair!"

"Soul, I hate to point this out, dude, but no one in here is holding the remote for that thing."

And at BB's words, everyone froze, and BF slowly turned to look up at the Mearest animatronic.
Immediately entering a frenzied panic a second later trying to rip his arm out of its hand.

"...KILL IT KILLITKILLITKILLITKILLIT-"

A knife was thrown directly at its face, and it powered off, letting go of BF and falling to the ground.

Pico crossed his arms, letting out a slight huff.

"No Five Nights at Funkin' tonight. Bitch."

Chapter Text

"Are you sure we're going the right way, babe?"

"Yeah! I still remember the way to the alley like the back of my hand. We'll be there soon enough, promise~"

Believing her, Boyfriend nodded and continued following after Girlfriend.

Currently, they were trying to make their way to the alley where they'd rap battled a certain smoker. It wasn't too long after he died that they found out he - or, well, to be more accurate, his ghost - still existed in the ashes his cigarette left behind, so naturally they routinely came back to the area just to chat.

Now that they had a certain soul in their lives, though, what better than to introduce him too?

Hell, Pico knew about him now, they're trying to figure out when to tell BB, and plus Garcello genuinely seemed like a nice guy.
...Besides, it would be pretty hard for anyone else to discover Soul's existence through him, especially given that he's a ghost whose whereabouts was something only the two lovers knew.

"Found it!"

Speaking of...

GF's voice knocked BF out of his thoughts, and he stopped walking, looking to the side to see the alley they'd been looking for.

It was rather obvious, given the slight amount of spring green mist that drifted along the ground.
The two nodded at each other, and stepped inside.

They walked down the alley, waiting to come across the small fenced area where they'd had that fateful rap battle.

Girlfriend could hear BF muttering in Japanese during their walk, likely talking to Soul and preparing in advance... because almost every time they did this resulted in a long ramble that pretty much never got any shorter.
She couldn't help but giggle a bit at the thought, which got the rapper's attention.

"Something wrong, Gigi?"

"Oh, nothing! Just wondering how you two are gonna spin the story~"

"I promise, it's not gonna take 10 minutes this time!"

"We'll see, babe!~"

They finally arrived at the small opening in the alley, and immediately began calling for the smoker to appear.

"Garcello? Are you still here?"

"Beep bo?"

And, as if on cue, a plume of smoke rose from the small pile of cigarette ashes sitting on the ground beside them, taking shape of the ghost of the man who once held it.

"Nice to see you, little man."

Boyfriend beeped happily, sharing the sentiment, and quickly dove to hug him - only for the blue-haired boy to pass right through the other.

"Oh. Oops. Sorry, I keep forgetting about that."

Garcello's form became a bit less see-through as BF stood up again, which the latter noticed - he went in once again for a hug, and it worked this time. As a result, GF ended up joining in at the smoker's other side, adjacent to BF.

"Soooo, anything interesting happen lately?"

"Nah. Just the usual going up to grab Ghost McDonald's and then heading back down here to sightsee and catch up. What about you guys? Been a while since I've heard from you."

"Staying strong as ever!"

"Cool. So, what's the reason for coming to visit tonight? Friendly rap battle, like old times?"

The two of them let go, before looking at each other with an eager smile, and Boyfriend beeped as he pulled out his mic.

"Yup! Though... with a slight twist this time..."

Garcello raised an eyebrow at that.

"What's the twist?"

"It's nothing too bad, we promise! Boyfriend here just wanted to introduce you to a friend of his!"

"Oh. That's it?" He looked around for a brief moment, a bit confused- "Well, where are they?"

"That... would be the part I need to explain."

"Alright, don't stress little man. I've got all the time in the world."

GF summoned her speakers for the couple to sit on as Garcello floated in front of them.

"So... were you around during the Corruption at all? ...Were you... even-"

"Oh, yeah. Was total hell to watch. Turns out one of the corrupted found the ashes from my cig, too, so I got corrupted 'cause of that."

"Yikes."

"I can imagine that wasn't very... pleasant."

"Yeah... probably why I don't remember much of it. But that's pretty much all I got."

"Well, you might be wondering how exactly everyone was freed, then, huh?"

"...Now that you bring it up... that IS a good question."

"Babe?"

"Okay, okay- so, long story short, I was the first person to break out using sheer will and save everyone, buuuuut I didn't exactly do it- on my own? That's where my friend comes in."

"Huh." He looked around again, the slight confusion returning- "...Is there something I'm missing?"

"I told you that you should've rehearsed this or something, babe..."

"I know, I know-"

And that was when a white flash appeared behind him, and something hit him on the head which yes, caused him to fall off the damn speakers.

"OW! What the-?!"

"Hey, someone had to make things less confusing. It's not like you were helping, Bee."

Ah. So he HAD been hit with a guitar again.

"You couldn't have given me, like, 5 minutes?!"

"Nope."

"That would've taken too long anyway, silly~"

"I was just about to say that."

Boyfriend sighed, still laying on the ground until he felt a poke on his shoulder - he looked up, and Garcello was floating just above him with a small amused smile.

"This your friend?"

"Oh- yeah, hold on-"

He pushed himself back up, briefly glancing at Soul who was now sitting at BF's previous spot on the speakers.

"Okay, Garcello, this is Soul, Soul, thi- actually, you probably already know him, huh? You've got my memories after all."

Soul nodded, and BF turned back to the ghost in front of him.

"Alright- sooo he's pretty much the one who helped me break out- I mean, I did make him up to do it, but it still counts. Anyway, I found him again after the whole mess and we started talking and now we're here."

"Should I start preparing a script? Because every time we do this, it's either the most detailed answer you could possibly give or the shortest, most botched speech ever."

"Dude, shut up! I can't just say the same exact words every time!"

"No, seriously, you did this perfectly with Pico. What happened?"

"Oh my god I said shut up-"

As the duo continued (playfully) arguing, GF turned to Garcello.

"They're total siblings, by the way. Not actually, but, ehehe, you know."

"Ah."

"Actually- what was the wording he used... his 'actual soul-slash-best friend-slash-brother figure-slash-imaginary friend who's real now'."

"Nice."

"...So how's Annie? Did she also...?"

"Yeah, she got corrupted too. As far as I know though, she's still energetic as ever. Like it barely even affected her."

"Aw, that's nice! Do you two still talk?"

"Pretty often, actually."

"Awww!"

The two's attention went back to the argument as it audibly heated up, and Girlfriend shook her head a bit with a smile.

"Babe!"

The two immediately stopped arguing and both turned to face her.

"Yeah?"
"Yeah?"

"Wasn't this supposed to be another rap battle?"

"Oh yeah. ...Oops. At least if you're cool with a 2v1, Garce?"

"No problem with that. But I DO want to ask something first."

"Sure, what is it?"

"How many people know about this? Your friend, I mean."

"Mmn... just Gigi and Pico. We got him to learn about this not too long ago."

"Why not just tell everyone you know? From the sounds of it, it's like you guys only plan to tell certain people he exists."

All three of them sighed in exasperation, with GF being the one to speak in the end.

"My dad."

"Damn. You too?"

"Well, he doesn't actually know Soul exists... yet. We're just trying to keep him from finding out and potentially hurting him, or using him to hurt Boyfriend, it's a whole thing."

"Hm. I get it. I knew a thing or two about wanting to avoid him when I was alive, so don't worry, your secret's safe with me."

"Thanks, big guy!"

Garcello held up a thumbs-up in response.
Thank god he was so chill.

"Going back to the battle, though I think BF actually made a remix for one of your songs, if you want to use that?"

"Sounds cool to me. Besides, I'm curious to see whether or not your friend there has tight bars like you do."

"Aw come on, I have more than just bars."

"Dude, don't you da-"

Before Boyfriend could even finish speaking, Soul had already pulled out his Razorback to start spamming riffs.

"...Never mind."

"You didn't tell me he could play guitar!"

BF wasn't sure if the look of amazement on Garcello's face was a good thing or a bad thing.
So that was something to face internally within the next 5 seconds.

"Duh! It's my personal speciality~"

"Well obviously, you THREW ONE AT ME AGAIN."

"I had to get you to quit stalling, stop complaining."

"Shush."

"Either that or you're just jealous again~"

"I said shush."

Garcello couldn't help but chuckle a bit at the banter before he spoke again.

"It'd be a good way to spice up the song though."

"...I'd usually say 'don't encourage him' but I'm just- gonna let this one slide for once."

"Hell yeah!"

GF started the music - and for the next two and a half minutes or so, it was just nothing but a chill rap battle between the three, some guitar being thrown in the mix by Soul.
Eventually, the four just settled down into catching up more and Boyfriend (finally) further explaining his and Soul's history together, even down to a reenactment of everything that happened when they first met once Girlfriend suggested the idea.

Again, Boyfriend didn't know if Garcello's (obvious) genuine interest in the story was a good thing or a bad thing and honestly he didn't bother trying to answer that this time.

It was only a few moments after all of it though, that an expression of concern appeared on Garcello's face.

"By the way, I don't mean to cut our time short, I would love to talk with you guys more, but usually your girl's dad's henchman start poking their heads in here at this hour. You might want to get going if you don't want to get caught."

"Oh, shit- thanks, dude!"

"You're welcome, little man. You guys drop by again soon, alright?"

"We will! Bye, Garcello!"

The ghost in question gave a wave as the three departed, before disappearing back into the ashes of the cigarette as the green mist returned on the ground.

Meanwhile, the trio made their way out of the alley carefully, engaged in conversation.

"Alright, I think that went pretty well."

"Besides you trying to get past all the explanation too quickly and you had to re-explain it aga-"

Boyfriend then playfully pushed him, interrupting him.

"うるさい..."  [Shut uuuup...]

"僕をさせる~"  [Make me~]

"Anyway-" Girlfriend was quick to interject before the two could enter another sibling-energy-fueled wrestling match- "Definitely better than us doing it with Pico first, huh?"

"Yeah, true. At least he's chill about it, Pico on the other hand tried to fucking shoot me. Which is kinda funny to think about now, knowing it wouldn't have done much."

"He had no idea who you were though, that was just poor planning."

"Oh, so you admit it now?~"

"魂!"

Girlfriend fondly rolled her eyes at the recurring banter.

The three finally got out of the alley, before Soul spoke again, causing them to stop in their tracks.

"Is it just me, or do you guys get the feeling he's going to be watching over us a little more frequently now?"

"...Hm. I wouldn't say it's not possible."

"I guess we'll have to see, then! For now, let's just get you two home."

The aforementioned duo nodded in agreement, before Soul went back inside BF's mind with another white flash, and the couple continued to discuss on the way back to BF's place.
The mist retreating as they continued to walk away.

Perhaps such a possibility couldn't be that far-fetched at all.

Bonus (part of the re-enactment because I really wanted to write this particular banter):

"And I ended up in the depths of my mind, never to be saved aga-"

"Well that doesn't make any sense. You're standing right here."

BF couldn't lie, Garcello's slight amusement with this part of the story was getting to him, and he laughed a bit in response.

"I know, I know, I'm getting to that! But anyway- it's all dark and quiet, the Corruption's talking to me, trying to get me to give up fully as I kept singing... and then these cracks appear in front of me, and then BOOM! Soul's back, and he's doing this sick guitar shred that- OW!"

Boyfriend IMMEDIATELY knew what had just happened as soon as he hit the ground, and he let out a disgruntled sigh.

Behind him, Soul floated down to stand on the ground, quickly noticing Garcello's slightly concerned look.

"...What? Stop looking at me like that, he's fine."

"You do NOT have to throw a guitar at me every single time."

Soul just shrugged as he turned back to GF and Garcello, who were sitting on the speakers, with a slight smirk.

"Told you he's fine."

And then BF kicked him, causing him to fall over with a small yelp. Once he heard BF chuckle, he immediately sat up to counter the rapper's earlier statement.

"It's the funniest part of the whole story!"

"Says you!"

As the two tried their hardest not to bicker (like the brothers they were) and get back to telling the story, GF rolled her eyes.

"Dorks. They're both dorks."

"Aren't they your dorks though?"

"...Yes. Yes they are."

The two finally managed to continue with the story once again, and the other two were back to enjoying their silly little recreation.

Chapter Text

The day hadn't started off too terrible.

All Boyfriend had planned to do was go to the mall to buy some stuff for the sound setup in his apartment that he'd saved up money for.

For the most part, it was a task that was never too much of a hassle.

However... it was becoming clear that the universe very much seemed to be against him as the morning carried on.

Usually the (relatively) little amount of sleep he tended to get wasn't much of a bother, but today he just felt exhausted.
He'd never been affected much by the sun peering through his window, but it just seemed too bright right now.

Everything seemed to be a little too much.

He still had that pressure on him from yesterday when GF's parents asked when he'd be releasing his next tracks.
When he tried to relieve some of that stress through recording for some songs, he found the mic he was using to have blown out.

Great, so now he had even MORE reason to go.

...And to add on to that, as the full-blown cherry on top, today was supposed to be abnormally hot.

And it was Saturday.

Which would mean crowds upon crowds of people.

He almost regretted planning to go today.

Come on.

You told yourself you were going to do this.

It'll be fine.

You can handle it.

Resolving to go through with his plans, he started getting ready to leave.
Despite how off he was feeling, and the dread that built up in him the closer he got to the door.

Even Soul seemed to picked up on it, if his offer to go with him was any indication.

He'd made sure to specify he'd remain inside his mind though. Except BF honestly couldn't tell if it was out of the two's concern for his safety or that he could sense his need for extra space at the moment.

Nonetheless, BF obliged, and Soul told him to be careful before disappearing in a flash of light.

He'd just made it out the door of the apartment building when he was struck with the feeling that he was forgetting something.

But he couldn't figure out what.

...Eh.

As always, blame it on the ADHD.

It was only a 15-minute jog to the mall, but he swore the heat made it feel like an entire hour.

He's honestly surprised his clothes aren't soaked in sweat at this point.
Maybe having an AC and a cold shower this morning helped for something after all.

Boyfriend had just barely walked up to the front entrance when he'd noticed the absolute ocean of people on the other side of the glass doors.

He sighed, a hand instinctively going up towards his neck... feeling for something that wasn't there.

And that's when he realized he'd left his headphones behind.

God fucking dammit.

He let out an even deeper sigh, the dread now seeping out. He could hear Soul's voice asking if he wanted to go back home.

No, he'd gotten this far. He could handle this. The idea of buying that equipment had been in the back of his mind for forever, and he was standing right in front of the doors to the mall now, so...

Sucking in a breath, Boyfriend pushed the door open and was immediately hit with the wall of noise.

The sounds of people chattering away, everyone walking around trying to get to god-knows-where, the music blaring from the speakers throughout the building...

Just focus on getting to that damn music store. It wasn't that far away. He could make it.
He settled for trying to block out the noise as best he could, beginning to walk forward into the swarm in front of him.

And he damn well tried to pass through while making as little physical contact with anyone as possible, but he'd still manage to bump into someone, or someone bumped into him.

Every unexpected touch felt like a thousand cold needles had just pierced his skin and it brought him closer and closer to snapping.

After finally getting past the large amount of people to a less crowded section of the mall, he made his way over to the music store that he usually got his stuff from.
One of his hands gripping his arm maybe a bit too tightly and the other just slightly tugging at his hair.

He finally made it to the store, hoping all that struggle would be worth it.

Only to be met with a sign that read "closed for lunch break."

Already? It was only 1 in the afternoon!
He let out a groan, burying his face in his hands.

As if his day couldn't get any worse.

Looking back at the sign, the store's lunch break ended at 1:30.

You know what? It was fine.
He could totally wait around for 30 minutes.

Briefly looking around, he found a nearby bench to sit and wait on, pulling out his phone in an attempt to distract himself.

Instead he found himself mindlessly scrolling through social media before realizing it wasn't doing him any good and he resigned to putting his phone away and sitting in not-exactly-silence.

Just take deep breaths.
It'll be fine.

You can do this.

Feeling slightly calmer at this point, he decided that maybe getting something from the food court not too far away would help him feel better.

BF stood up and instantly noticed the crowd of people around him.

What the hell?? Wasn't this place a whole lot more empty just a moment ago? Had he been zoned out that badly?
He could even feel the heat creeping in from outside as well.

It was alright. He's taken everything the universe has thrown at him today so far.

He could handle this, couldn't he?

Another deep breath, and he was almost ready to start making his way through the crowd for the second time that day...

When the loud sound of microphone feedback blared over the mall's speakers.

And he shattered.

Never mind, he couldn't handle this.

Damn waiting for the store to open, running away from everything currently assaulting his senses became his immediate priority.
He didn't care whether or not people saw him, gave him weird looks. He just wanted to get out of here.

Everything was too much.

Finding a small gap in between some of the stores, he made a run for the bathroom on the side.

Quickly sprinting in and locking the door behind him (thank god it hadn't been taken and no one else was inside), he was met with a dimly-lit, more quiet room.

And yet it still did a horrible job of blocking out the noise from the commotion outside.

Boyfriend collapsed to a sitting position against the door, a hand slightly tugging at his hair with a bit more force this time, but thankfully far from enough to pull it out entirely, while the other gripped his shirt enough to nearly turn his knuckles white.

His face remained hidden in his knees and by his hair, the only sound he could hear besides everything from outside being his own rapid breathing.

...He just barely, barely registered the slight, gentle feeling of a pair of hands on his shoulders, and saw a swirl of white light surround him and suddenly he was in a much cooler, near-silent place.

The immediate removal of everything that had his senses overwhelmed was a huge relief, even though he was in the midst of the meltdown still.

His hands let go of whatever they were clinging onto - his hat falling off in the process though he didn't bother to put it back on - and his arms wrapped around his legs as he began to relax.

"Boyfriend?"

The voice was soft, quiet, as if he were afraid that speaking any louder would make the rapper curl into a tiny ball.

BF looked up, and as he'd expected, Soul was there sitting in front of him.
Confusion flooding his expression, he looked around-

"I brought us back home. Thought it'd be the best place to take you to."

And he was clearly right, the two were sitting in front of his bed now after all.

Looking back up at the soul, he smiled a little, an unspoken "thank you" behind it.
Soul smiled back in response.

"Is this... better?"

Boyfriend nodded, and Soul seemed relieved by it.

It was definitely better than the sensory hell that was the mall-

...Oh, right.
The stuff he was going to buy.
Well, there was no way in hell he was going to go back for it now.

His change in expression at the thought must've given that worry away to Soul, judging by the reassurance that quickly came after.

"Hey, don't worry about the music stuff, okay? We can just text Gigi, Pico, or BB and ask them to get it. After all, I'd bet that if we told them why you couldn't go, they'd be running over there in a heartbeat to buy it for you."

BF couldn't help but slightly chuckle at his words - the mental image of that was pretty funny besides being heartwarming, because he was probably right.

Still, he sighed, the exhaustion hitting him in full. His arms were still wrapped around himself, as if he expected something to overwhelm him again at any moment.

Soul thought for a moment, before an idea came to mind. He snapped, and an article of clothing appeared in his hands.

"Here, put this on."

Boyfriend took it, and did so, realizing that Soul had given him one of his hoodies - it was the same as one of his own, just a much darker grey and the prohibition sign in the middle being white instead of red, with a few small white lines as extra decor along the front.

He nearly curled into himself, but with a smile on his face this time. Just wearing the garment gave him the same feelings of comfort that Soul's mere presence often brought to him.

It felt nice. Like a warm hug, almost.

Soul smiled fondly at him, happy that his friend was feeling better. However, he still waited for BF to give him some sort of sign that he was fully recovered.

A few moments passed in a comfortable silence until Boyfriend suddenly wrapped his arms around one of Soul's, latching onto him, almost, and tugging it a bit - the latter smiled again, easily knowing what he was trying to say.

"Cuddle on the couch?"

Boyfriend nodded.

Soul smiled, and BF let him go so he could stand and reach his arms out to him as an offer.

"Want me to carry you?"

Once again, BF's answer was non-verbal, but the fact that he'd reached his arms up and made grabby-hand motions at the other was a clear indicator of "yes."
Soul couldn't help but laugh a bit at it as he obliged his friend's request.

"Alright, alright, c'mere..."

He scooped the rapper up into a bridal hold, walking out of the room and down the hall to the main room where they could just chill.
Boyfriend welcomed the affectionate contact, wrapping his arms around Soul as well.

By the time the duo had gotten to the main room, BF was absentmindedly tracing random patterns on the other's shoulder, before having to shift as he was placed down onto the couch. He was quick to practically snuggle into Soul once he sat down on the couch next to him.

The two once again wrapped their arms around each other, Boyfriend melting into the feeling of one of Soul's hands running through his hair.

A smile grew on his face and it didn't go unnoticed.

"気分は良くなったか?"  [Feeling better?]

Boyfriend nodded again, and Soul pulled him a bit closer.

That was an understatement, though, honestly.
He was feeling a LOT better.

"いいね."  [Good.]

He easily relaxed into Soul's touch, letting the exhaustion win over as his eyes drifted closed.

They could text the others later.

Right now, those comforting feelings were all he could ever want.

Chapter Text

It was currently close to about 5am.

Boyfriend was (for once) actually getting some decent sleep, laying in his bed and deep in slumber.

...The same could not be said for Soul though.
He was laying next to his friend, and at the moment was stuck in the boredom of "randomly woke up in the middle of the night and can't do much of anything lest you wake up everyone in the building."

In fact, he was even tempted to wake BF up a bit early, but he refused to do so. The rapper needed rest, at this point his sleep schedule was all over the damn place (and it's not like his recent stressing was really helping with that).

A quiet sigh escaping him, he carefully made his way out of the bed and exiting the room, throwing on a hoodie as he did so.

Sure, he couldn't feel cold, exactly, but it was just nice to have one on sometimes.

He made his way to the main room, resolving to just turn the TV on and watch whatever was on there.

Only for nothing to really grab his attention, and he found himself flipping through the channels.
Well, so much for that.

Sighing again and getting off the couch, he absentmindedly threw on his sneakers with the very faint idea of just going up to the rooftop and contemplating life, before the smaller TV below the one he'd just been trying to watch caught his attention.

Ah, right. Soul had almost forgotten the frenetic chaos he and Boyfriend had gone through to bring Hating Simulator here.

Hm.
Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to spend some time in there. He needed something to satisfy his boredom, after all.

He walked over to it, picking up the controller as he switched the TV on, before changing inputs on the other.

The smaller screen went to static, as the bigger screen displayed the main menu of the game. 

"Now what was that stupid combination again...?"

Soul muttered to himself, looking back up from the controller at the small sticky note on the side of the smaller TV's frame. Sen had given them a specific set of inputs for whenever the two wanted to hop inside the game and he wasn't around to pull them in - so BF had written it down to place on the TV.

Because it wasn't like either of them would ever remember it.

'↑ ↑ ↓ ↓ ← → ← → B, A, Start'

He pressed the corresponding inputs on the controller, mumbling them to himself as he did so - at the last input, the static fizzed violently and he was surrounded in a red light.

A second later he was pulled into the game, the controller left on the floor.

Once Soul reappeared inside Hating Sim, he quickly sat up and looked around.

There was nothing in his immediate vicinity besides a set of speakers that was randomly placed in the middle of the path to the school building in the background.

Well, it was nighttime because the game's time corresponded with the time outside, but still. It was kind of weird.
Usually at least Senpai would be out here, he often dismissed the idea of sleep by stating he was a video game program.

Even though he probably still needed even a little sleep, but whatever. He tended to just sleep whenever he wanted anyway.

Standing up, a bit confused, he began calling out.

"Sen? Spirit? ...Are you guys even-"

*?

He quickly cut himself off and whirled around at the sound of text skipping over, only calming down once he realized it was Pixel popping out a bit from behind the speakers.

"O-Oh... Hey, Pix! Sorry, you kinda startled me there..."

They made a happy expression in response, and he relaxed fully.

"So, whatcha doing out here? Where's Sen?"

*Coding lessons

Okay, not entirely surprising. There was only so much that Spirit knew about coding, after all.
It made sense that Senpai would turn to looking for studies on it in his own school.

"Heh... fair enough, I guess. I take it you're just hanging around waiting?"

Pixel nodded - and Soul noticed how they were pretty much flopped over the top of the speakers now.

"You bored too?"

*Very

Soul couldn't help but laugh a bit, he very much shared the feeling.

"Yeah, same here."

*Isn't it late? Shouldn't you be sleeping?

"Eh, woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't go back to sleep. So I came here."

Pixel nodded, but didn't say much else besides that.

Letting out a small hum, Soul sat on the speaker beside them, grinning up at the other.

"Well, since you're bored, and I'm bored, how about I keep you company for a little while? I'm sure there's something we could do to pass the time until Sen's done."

The smaller entity seemed to brighten up at that, nodding happily - they seemed to get an idea for a moment, and they quickly pulled up a command prompt to type something on it.

A few seconds later, the command box disappeared and a microphone appeared in their hand as they held it up to him.

"You... want to rap battle?"

Pixel nodded, still beaming at the idea.

"Hm... alright. I don't see anything wrong with that."

He pulled out his own mic as Pixel loaded up a song to play on the speakers.

They continued scrolling through a small list of songs for a bit before finally settling on one.

*Mm... let's see if this song finally got fixed!

Soul didn't have the chance to ask about that as the countdown started up, and he just resigned himself to getting ready to sing.

The song started off slow and serene, with Pixel singing the first turn (that, guessing by the faint vocals in the backing track, belonged to Senpai), and Soul taking BF's side.

Honestly, the track sounded like it fit perfectly within the game - Senpai had probably written this himself.
It was weirdly calming, and he hated to admit that he kind of needed it.

Everything was fine up until the halfway point, where the track and vocals suddenly glitched, catching Soul off guard.

Pixel seemed to notice as well, if the apologetic look they gave him was any indication.

So this was probably what they meant when they said something about the song hopefully being "fixed."
He still continued on, but he couldn't prevent his slight nervousness from showing now.

But the track just kept glitching at random points, and every single time he'd get more and more unnerved. It was practically messing with him.

The only relief was that it was clear it wasn't being done on purpose, as there was some visible worry from Pixel that lasted throughout the rest of the song.

Once the vocals finally stopped, leaving the rest of the instrumental to play out, he managed to give the other a thumbs-up with a slight smirk to show he was okay - and then the end of the instrumental glitched out horribly, and he flinched, a hand shooting to his head, and once the track ended he could only sigh in relief.

*Sorry... I thought it wasn't going to do that, it's been bugged for a while I guess...

"I-It's okay, Pix... I'm fine. Guess I'm just a bit tired, eheh..."

Pixel blinked.

*You should get rest then!

"Nahhh, I'll be fine. I was just caught off guard is all."

He just didn't want to admit that what he'd said was a bit of an excuse.

It worked, and Pixel smiled.

"Hey, how long are Sen's lessons, anyway?"

*An hour

"And how long has he been gone for?"

*30 minutes

Only half an hour until he gets back... alright. It was fine. He could work with this. No problem.

"Okaaay... Is there anything else you usually do for fun?"

Pixel shook their head. He guessed that they tended to pass the time by just singing, which... was an option, but not the best one.
That'd get old pretty quick like this.

Soul hummed as he thought of something to do, jumping into the air to float.

At least until Pixel copied him, and he glanced back at the mostly empty school building behind him, and got an idea.

He looked back over at them, giving them a small smirk.

"Race ya!~"

He then zoomed off, staggering Pixel for a moment before they followed after him with a shout.

*Hey, that's not fair!

Soul chuckled a bit, letting them chase after him and occasionally looking back to lightheartedly taunt them as he stayed out of their reach - it was a much-needed bout of fun after the jarring turn their singing battle had taken earlier.

*I thought you said this was a race, where are you goingggg?

He laughed at that, playfully smirking at them again.

"You'll have to catch me if you wanna win~"

With that challenge, they seemed to turn a little more competitive, and he sped off again.

The two ended up spending a bit of time in that chase around the building, with Soul still managing to evade the other as time went on.

And he'd just barely dodged Pixel after they tried to teleport in front of him.

"Heh. Little rascal."

*:P

To be honest, he'd planned to try to tire them out, but their boundless energy seemed to be doing them a lot of good at the moment.
So he definitely needed a different strategy, and he needed one quick.

He noticed they were starting to catch up to him, so he rounded a corner of the building and swiftly dove to hide behind a portion of the building that jutted out.

And, as predicted, Pixel flew right past him, not seeing him at all.

He quickly flew to the other side of the corner he'd just rounded, barely ducking out of sight when Pixel went up above the building in search of him.

*Aw come onnnn! Hiding isn't fair either!

They zoomed over to the other side of the building, and Soul snickered a little before hovering up to stand on the roof of the building, just above the clock.

It was funny, how much this reminded him of when he and Boyfriend would mess around with each other sometimes.
...Hm. That was probably why Pixel even reminded him of BF so much - right now, at least.

However, he'd almost completely forgotten that he'd turned the two's little game into hide-and-seek, and got a stark reminder when someone suddenly nearly tackled him, wrapping their arms around him from behind.

*Ha! I caught you! I win!

"Pfft- yeah, yeah, you won. Shouldn't have let my guard down, ehehe..."

Pixel let go of him and moved to sit next to him as they both stared out at the scenery below.

*Pretty...

"Yeah, it is pretty nice, huh? I've never really seen this place at night. Feels a little more peaceful, though."

Soul remained silent for a moment, thinking.

"...Either way, it's definitely better... than it being destroyed..."

Pixel turned to look at him, somewhat confused.
That was... a little weird. And sudden. Maybe more weird than sudden.

Still, he was right. They very much prefer this game world intact and, well, not being broken to bits.

A few moments passed, and he was still strangely quiet.

They looked over at him again, observing him closely.

His hair was covering some of his face, so his eye wasn't visible, but it really seemed like he wasn't fully present in the moment there with them...
...Not to mention the worry they felt at seeing he was slightly tense.

Concerned, Pixel gently tapped him on the shoulder, and much to their surprise, he completely jumped back, almost in fear - until he realized what was going on and a look of realization mixed with remorse crossed over his face as he stumbled over his words, putting his head in his hands.

"Nonono- f-fuck, I'm sorry, I don't know why I'm still so hung up on this, I d-didn't mean to-"

He stopped himself, trying to take a deep breath, but he couldn't stop it from shaking as he let it out. Still failing to try and relax himself, he quietly muttered under his breath.

"God, what is WRONG with me...?"

Pixel scooted a bit closer, both out of curiosity and a want to provide comfort... but they had no idea what would help at the moment.
They weren't even sure what had happened exactly, or why Soul was suddenly acting like this.

*...Did I do something wrong?

"No, no, you didn't do anything, I promise. The past is just... still eating me up, I guess."

By "past," they assumed he meant...

...Ah.

It would explain his rather intense nervousness after the song glitched out earlier, the way he'd spaced out just now...
They still couldn't help but feel a bit of guilt for it.

They wanted to help.

He was feeling better just a moment ago...

*What did he do to you?

Maybe asking this question was a bit weird, but they just... had to know.

Soul, on the other hand, seemed a bit surprised at what they'd asked.

"...I thought you already-"

*I just know about what happened to the game. And that you two fought and hated each other. Not really much else. Sen didn't want to tell me or he didn't know.

He looked away for a moment, trying to figure out how to answer the question.

"...Hm. I... don't really know why you would want to know though... you already seem to hate him a lot more than I ever did, especially since he never even hurt you directly-"

*He EXISTED.

They were quick to interrupt Soul, the last word glitching a substantial amount out of the pure anger they'd poured into it.

*...He hurt me by existing.

Pixel paused for a moment, before adding on.

*I want to know so I can help you feel more... comfortable with me.

"Pix..."

The soul let out a small sigh, before pulling the smaller into a side hug.

"...You know I don't hate YOU, right?"

They nodded... and remained silent for a moment after.

*...but you still flinched.

And at that, Soul couldn't help but shrink back a bit in clear regret.

"I know... I know."

An uncomfortable quiet rang out between the two of them.

"I... didn't want to say it before, but... you remind me a lot of myself, you know?"

The other tilted their head, obviously a bit confused. Soul seemed to tense a bit at that, and it worried them a little.

"Wanting a disconnection from him despite all the evidence that says otherwise, I mean. As in, like... just knowing that you're not someone that you don't want to be, even when everything else goes against it, all because you can't afford to accept you could be something you're supposed to know you're not."

At that, they seemed to understand.
However, their pensive expression was quick to change to a more curious one as they looked back up at him.

Guess their earlier question still lingered.

"I'm, uh, not entirely sure how telling this story is gonna help... but if you really want to hear it..."

Pixel nodded, pulling away a bit, intent on listening.

"...Well- I... d-don't really like talking about this, but I'm- okay with it, for now, um- just- stop me if it looks like it's too much for me, okay?"

They nodded again in response.

It was alright.
He could trust them.

He could trust them.

"Okay... okay."

He stopped to take a deep breath, now anxiously fiddling with the drawstrings on his hoodie, preparing himself for the explanation that was to come.

"So, the first time that we all came back to this game, I was already having problems with reliving Glitch's memories for some reason. Turns out they got forced into my head or whatever. And... well, I don't know WHY exactly, but Sen said something about our code being similar and something in me kind of... snapped. A while after that, I was practically fighting myself not to believe I could be the same as him, but then someone brought him back in person, and he tried to convince me that we were the same. I tried to keep resisting it- keep resisting HIM, but... for a short amount of time, it... eventually worked. I broke. He had me wrapped around his goddamn finger."

He began tensing up again, though the entity couldn't tell if it was out of anger, or unease.

"Even NOW, I'm still haunted by giving into my doubt like that. I ended up so toxic to myself and it wasn't even for any good reason! A part of me KNEW he was lying, but I still believed him, and I just- GAVE UP and let him win so many times... And because of that I almost lost Bee, I would've been isolated and alone again and it would've been my own fault- god, I swear that sometimes I can still hear his voice in my h-head-!"

Soul finally cut himself off at the feeling of Pixel hugging him tightly, bringing him back to reality. Their expression radiated worry and concern, and now that he'd stopped, he could properly feel the tears pricking at the corner of his eyes.

That was... probably a big contributor to them interrupting him, wasn't it...?

"...S-Sorry... I didn't mean to go that deep..."

There was silence for a moment, before he began to hear the sound of text skipping over.

*It's ok

A bit relieved by the reassurance, Soul let out a rather shaky exhale as he returned the embrace.

"I never meant to make you feel like I always thought you could've been him. Or, worse- that you WERE him. That's why I wanted to stick around. I wouldn't have done ANY of what I just did with you otherwise."

*Even the song?

"Like I said, just caught off guard. Came with a bunch of bad memories that I really should be putting behind me, but I was fine."

*...you did look like you were having fun earlier...?

Despite the heavy mood their conversation moments earlier had sparked, Soul couldn't resist laughing a bit at that.

"That's because I was. There was a reason why I said I saw Bee in you, too."

They gave a small smile, and the mood lifted.

"I mean, you already have one thing in common, and it's that you guys like to mess with me."

Pixel bit back a laugh, their smile growing.
He was glad that they were cheering up now.

"Just don't end up like me, okay? You're NOT him. I don't care who the hell says or tells you otherwise."

He patted them on the head which resulted in another smile, and he took that as an agreement. Returning their grin, Soul stood up and the two flew down to stand in front of the school grounds once more.

"Well, I've had enough of being emotional for one day. And plus, it's been over 30 minutes and Sen isn't back yet. ...Wanna go pester the hell out of him?"

*Fuck yeah!

Soul laughed again, this time from the lack of filter from them - either the censor the senior and the spirit tried to add in for them was still buggy, or it just didn't work when those two weren't around them.

"Alright, alright- but don't tell him I've been swearing around you, okay? He'll metaphorically kick my ass for it."

He immediately regretted his own instinctual curse once Pixel gave him a small "really" look, still smiling.

"Okay, okay- never mind- why don't we just go?"

Suddenly, Hating Simulator was taken off of its home screen, and a window opened in the sky above, revealing Boyfriend with the controller in his hand, sitting on the couch.

"Wha- Soul?"

"Eheh- Hi, Bee... I- thought you were still asleep...?"

"About that- I kinda JUST woke up. Saw you weren't next to me, I heard the Hating Sim music as I walked into this room, and I figured that's where you went."

"Pff- no wonder why you look so dead."

"Hey!"

Pixel giggled at their banter, which got BF to notice them.

"Aw, you've been hanging out with Pix? I wasn't really expecting that, to be honest."

"I was bored, I couldn't just push you off the bed and wake you up because of that."

"Hey now."

Pixel then jumped up into the air enthusiastically, starting to fly off.

*I'll go bother Senpai until he's free!

They zoomed away, leaving the two alone for a moment.

"It's really sweet that you're spending time with them, you know. I was getting worried you'd get too nervous around them."

Soul shrugged in response.

"We talked things out."

"Niiiice. Glad to see you're feeling better about them. Speaking of, what were you guys even doing in there?"

"Ah, you know, rap battle, flying around a bit, just... chatting, honestly. You better watch out, by the way, their skills are starting to match yours~"

"You're just saying that to make me jealous."

"Are you sure about that?"

"You know what- when you come back out here, I WILL wrestle you on this couch again."

"Oh, and you think you're going to win?"

"I could pull you out right now and we'd find out."

"Do it. You won't."

"What in the world are you two talking about?"

Soul turned around, and the duo saw Senpai standing behind him with Pixel, looking confused as ever.

"兄弟冗談."  [Brotherly banter.]

"また?"  [Again?]

"はい."  [Yes.]

Senpai sighed, shaking his head.

"なぜ驚かないのか..."  [Why am I not surprised...]

The other two laughed, and eventually after the morning fatigue wore off BF made the choice to hop into the game as well.

And, at least to him, if Soul and Pixel's constant teaming up to mess with Senpai was any indication...

That bond was going to last for a pretty long time.

Chapter Text

Boyfriend continued walking down the dimly-lit hallway, traveling towards the light at the end of it.

'So... what exactly are we doing here again?'

"I... don't really know, man."

He honestly had no idea how he managed to find this place.
The building he'd entered looked old, mysterious, like it was going to fall apart any second...

Yeah, Girlfriend nor Pico were around, but he felt a pull to explore what was inside.

He just... had to see it.

Philly was just full of these weird-ass places, wasn't it?

BF walked further down the hall, eventually reaching a bigger room with its walls covered in mirrors.
Looking to the side, he could see his reflection in it, and he placed a hand against the glass.

...Wait.

There was music starting.
Besides that...

Why did he look slightly different in this mirror-

THWACK!

He didn't quite get to finish that thought before a microphone was chucked at his face.

Quickly pushing himself up, he looked up to see a duplicate of himself step through the mirror, and laugh while beginning a countdown.

...Guess he was battling.

Donning his signature smirk, he was quick to match his copy's verse, Soul cheering him on inside his mind all the while.

It didn't matter if this was some other version of him - he could still win!
Plus... getting to see the notes of his opponent's turn through the mirror behind him helped a good amount.

He didn't want to think about whether or not that'd be cheating. Ha.

Besides, now that the sudden premise of a rap battle was past him, he could take a good look at his alternate self's appearance.
Sure, he looked like him, but he was taller, much more disheveled... it was a little concerning, honestly.

'Are you sure this is really an alternate you?'

'Not really like we're gonna get to ask, huh?'

Like he wouldn't be able to tell the difference between some creepypasta copy of him and an actual alternate universe him... really, he's battled enough of both to see it.

Plus, the alternate hims always seemed to get him to gravitate towards them almost... it made the conclusion rather easy this time.

They'd gotten about a minute into the song when the instrumental suddenly picked up a bit and the other him had started a chain of longer notes with just a bit more passion behind them. Hm.

BF did his best to match it, and afterwards the song calmed down a bit, his alternate self continuing with another verse.

It was longer this time.

And since they weren't jutting into each other's turns and harmonizing every 5 seconds, Boyfriend noticed that as his other self continued... he felt weaker.
Which kind of made sense, this was HIMSELF he was rap battling after all.

So maybe he was draining him.

...Though wouldn't that imply he was trying to replace him?

Now he just couldn't LET that happen, now, could he?

His turn came around, and Boyfriend easily regained the ground he lost - only for him to be thrown into another more passionate part of the song once it ended.

After a moment, they stopped for a bit, letting the instrumental carry out... and his opponent suddenly shifted to stand at his height instead, practically mimicking him now.

Huh??

Since when could he do that??

...Okay then.

With Soul still keeping him motivated, he persisted through their turns. A little shapeshifting wasn't going to stop him!

It still made him wonder where the hell exactly this version of him actually came from... and why those mirrors seemed to connect to it.
But not now, they were still rapping, of course!

Neither of them let up - the other him especially when he hit the rapper with a particularly strong turn that weakened him a noticeable amount. But still, BF repeated it, gaining back the strength that he was NOT about to let this alternate him just straight up take.

The instrumental finally let up for a bit, and Boyfriend had a turn to himself.
And then his other self suddenly shifted back to his height from before- wait, did he also copy the laugh he sometimes did during battles too?

Well, consider him both impressed and a little, tiny bit annoyed.

Still, the two of them went on for a little longer as Boyfriend began to realize just how LONG they'd been rapping for. Guess he just had to make quite the long runners, didn't he?

It was gonna be fine. He just had to keep going, as he always did.

'C'mon, Bee, you can do it!'

He really wanted to let out a small "aww" at his friend's motivation, but refrained. Because, well, they were still going with the song right now.
But it was most definitely appreciated though, and Soul probably already knew that.

Suddenly, the two stopped as the instrumental paused... and his other self suddenly started singing. With ACTUAL lyrics singing.

It wasn't often that BF got to hear real words from whoever he was battling against in general, so he refused to interrupt.

I'LL MAKE

YOU SAY

HOW PROUD

The mirror behind him suddenly shattered-

YOU ARE OF ME

Their surroundings shifted, everything was coated in darkness-

SO STAY

AWAKE

JUST LONG

A red flash appeared beside him as blue light emanated from behind him, he could hear someone else faintly singing along-

ENOUGH TO SEE

MY WAY

Boyfriend tried to match the passion he'd put in the lyrics as he beep booped the same tune back. He had to admit, the whole thing was kinda epic.
Especially with all these swirling backgrounds and whatnot. In fact, the room and the two singers were covered in blue now.

However... he couldn't help but think about the lyrics themselves.

MY WAY

Who was he talking to- or rather, about? Who did he want to say was proud of him...?

And that flash of red- he couldn't get it to leave his thoughts either.
It felt too familiar.

Finally, their surroundings returned to normal, except...

Blue was the only color now. The arrows in the mirror, the shades on their clothing... well, wasn't like they were wearing many colors anyway.
Just blue, white, and red-

...Red.

He checked again, and it was the only hue that they were fully deprived of.

Something kept linking back to that color.

After a few turns, the two ended things off with a long harmonized verse, before the song as a whole was finished with a final note.

The instrumental faded, his other self's smile slowly fell, and he collapsed on his knees to the ground, clearly out of energy.

Boyfriend just watched him, unsure of what else to do. Should he just... keep walking?
He couldn't exactly just leave his alternate self like this... could he at least get him back into the mirror? Did he win, or did it not matter by the end?

'Hey, Bee?'

'Hm?'

'His mic.'

He looked at the ground where the mic in question currently laid, and he saw a faint red glow between the grooves before it vanished entirely.
And something seemed to click.

"...Bep bo bap?"

The other him just lowered his head slightly, but it was all he needed to know.

So his GF was...

Both the rapper and his soul felt a pang of sympathy ring within them - they couldn't bear to imagine what it was like.

Taking a deep breath, Boyfriend pocketed his mic, and took a slight step closer.
He heard Soul ask if it was a good idea, and BF just nodded - despite the fact that to anyone else, he'd be nodding at nothing. But Soul seemed to understand anyway.

Tentatively, he continued walking closer until he was right in front of his other self.

And after a few more seconds of silence, he hugged him tightly, an "I'm sorry" being muttered in the mix.

It didn't take long for him to feel himself being hugged back.

...He could make plans to leave this place later.

Chapter Text

"Are you sure that visiting right now is a good idea, Toughie? It's pretty late at night..."

"I'm sure it's fine, Softie. Wouldn't be the first time."

"True..."

The two of them were currently walking through the alleyways of the city, looking for a suitable place to stop so that Benjamin could paint a portal to BF's universe.

It was a rare instance where they weren't rushing into his world, rather just intending to pay a visit to him.

"It's just... kind of weird. I don't want to accidentally wake him up or something."

"Heh, we both know how late he tends to stay up, with all the times we've had to straight up tell him to sleep. I think we'll be alright jumping over there at this time of night. ...I mean, unless he IS actually asleep... but I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be, if we know him well enough."

"...Do you think we might be complicating this?"

"Beeps already said he's got no problem with us coming over whenever. I think you might be overthinking a little, Ben."

"Right... He did say that."

The couple looked back at the brick wall they were standing in front of, Benjamin holding the bucket of portal paint that Girlfriend had gifted him in his hands.
Pico stood beside him, casually drawing small bits of graffiti next to where they were planning to paint the portal to BF's universe.

And sure, they'd visited that universe many times, but the thought process was always the same.

Despite what BF had already told him.

"...Well? What are we waiting for?"

Ben took a deep breath, dipping his paintbrush into the bucket of paint.

Using the white on the brush, he carefully drew the oval on the wall to create the portal.
Once he'd finished, the empty space in the center began to glow along with the paint, and the two stepped back, somewhat anxiously waiting for the portal to open.

Every time they'd done this before now, that glow in the center would open to reveal a place in BF's universe, and they were expectant to see it finally connect.

But a few seconds passed...

...And the portal flashed red, before the glow faded away, and the paint on the wall dissipated.

"Wait, what? What happened? T-This worked the last time-!"

"Do you think maybe it's the paint?"

"No, this is the right paint, and I know I drew it correctly... huh. I'm just... gonna try again."

"Alright, Baby Blue. Just take it easy, alright? Let's not worry too much if it doesn't work. I don't think it's because of us."

Ben nodded, before repeating the same process of painting the portal once more.

However, once again the portal flashed red after a few seconds, the glow faded, and the paint dissipated, all for the second time in a row.

"What? That should've worked, why isn't it working??"

"Ben, take a deep breath. It's okay. We'll figure this out."

The painter did so, relaxing a little as his frustration began to fade.

"Maybe something's wrong on their side. I don't see why it would suddenly stop working for us now."

"How do we know? It's not like this has happened before."

"I know. But let's try to think about this for a second. Come up with some solutions. It's obvious that we can't get into their universe right now... maybe until they can get whatever is happening on their side sorted out? After all, jumping into universes is almost like a phone call. BF would probably get some sort of sign that we were trying to enter his universe, and know that we're waiting for him to fix things on his end. That should at least speed things up if that's the case."

"Yeah... you're right. I'm just a little worried, I guess."

"Hm... We can try checking some of the other universes, see if they can reach them?"

"That's... actually a good idea! Hopefully it's not us that's the issue here..."

And for the third time, he'd repeated the process of painting the portal, this time to the Neo universe - and much to the couple's relief, it worked.
Which was... a little weird? Why did it work for Neo's universe, but... not BF's...?

Either way, it didn't take very long for them to see Neo pop in on the other side, dragging the two out of their thoughts.

"Ben? Ben's Pico? Hey! What's up? I thought you guys were going to visit Classic today...?"

"Well, that's the problem... we can't get in."

"Huh?"

"Yeah, Ben's portals to his universe keep failing to connect, or something. So we were wondering if it was just our universe and maybe you guys could reach it?"

"Oh, sure! Gimme one sec."

Neo moved over to grab a computer sitting off to the side, a few wires and cables connected to one side of it. He typed a few things on it, before hitting a key, and a portal appeared.

The three of them were hopeful, just for a moment...

...Only for it to do the same thing Ben's did, and it destabilized a couple seconds after.

"W-Wait, why did...?"

"You see what we mean?"

"Should I try again?"

"It's worth a shot..."

At Ben's words, he looked back at the computer, inputting presumably the same things he'd typed in earlier...

...It only delivered the same end result.

"Oh, come on! What's going on with them right now?"

"Hold on, Pi... I think if neither of us can reach it..."

He began typing again, and after hitting a key, something flashed up on his screen, and his eyes slightly widened at it.

"Yeah. It's not just you guys, Ben. All gateways to that world have been closed... Classic's universe is on lockdown."

Neo turned the screen around, showing the text that said what he'd just revealed.

"Wh-What? Why??"

"I don't know, man! For that to happen, there'd have to be some sort of grand catastrophe on a massive scale for his universe to be closed off like this! Like some zombie apocalypse, or some sort of attack, or- whatever! Point is, whatever's going on there, we can't help. There's no way to get in, no brute forcing the gate open, nothing. We're stuck outside of his universe until it opens back up again, and who knows how long that could be?"

"Damn... hope everyone there is okay."

"Yeah, about that... that's really all we can do now. Just hope for the best."

"God... BF, I hope you're alright..."

On the other side of the portal, rested a pink, dark sky, black and pink figures roaming the city.

Some time after the Corruption's end...

"Ohhhhh, so that's why your universe was locked!"

"Mhm. We had to be safe, making sure that it wouldn't find its way into other universes... or at least Gigi's dad did. The orbs we used were still at her place at that time, so once her dad found out what was going on, he locked everything before the corrupted could get their hands on it. Honestly, it's the ONE thing I have to thank him for."

Boyfriend deadpanned slightly at that last bit, looking back at Benjamin and Pico who were sitting across from him in front of the couch.
They'd stopped by in a small panic, asking if he was okay after being unable to visit for so long due to the universe being shutdown for a long while.

And that had prompted BF to begin explaining (almost) everything about what happened with the Corruption.

"Well, even still... glad that it kept us safe. We wish we were able to help you out at least a little, though. That sounds like a lot to go through."

"I'm not gonna lie, it was. But honestly, I don't think there was much you could've done. It eventually spread to the rest of the world, even with the opposition. I would've hated for all you guys to get corrupted along with us, anyway."

"That's fair, Beeps. But I gotta ask you something though."

"Hm?"

"How exactly did you just 'break out'? I can't imagine that you just randomly woke up and freed yourself with sheer force of will like I think you were saying."

At that, BF let out a slightly nervous laugh.

"Eheh... well..."

There was a small pause before he spoke again.

"...That's a bit of a long story..."

And suddenly, he was interrupted by a gasp from Benjamin. He looked up, noticing that the painter was focused on the clock in the room.

"Wait, we're meeting with Grace in a little bit! I almost forgot!"

"One that I guess I'll have to tell you about later..."

BF sheepishly finished his sentence, causing his softer counterpart to look back at him.

"Sorry... we mostly just came to check in because we're supposed to meet with Grace so I can help her with art for her new tracks."

"Pfft- you're fine, Ben. Really. It's cool that you guys are collaborating though!"

"Yeah, I guess it is, huh?"

Pico let out a small laugh, before standing up along with the painter.

"Alright, alright, I guess we should take off now. But whether it's the next time you see us or not, you're gonna owe us that breakout story, Beeps, you know that."

"Yeah, yeah, come on. I don't want you to be late and I don't think you want to be, either."

The graffiti artist rolled his eyes fondly as the portal that his boyfriend painted opened on the wall. He followed him through it as the three said their goodbyes, before the portal closed and the paint disappeared.

Boyfriend let out a sigh as a familiar voice spoke inside his mind.

'Soooo...'

He noticed the white flash out of the corner of his eye, and when he turned around, he saw Soul lazily draped across the couch.

"Do you plan on ever actually telling them, or...?"

"Don't worryyyy, I will. Eventually."

"As in 'next time' eventually?"

"Just... eventually."

Easily realizing he wasn't going to get a straight answer, Soul just shook his head in response, but a smile still remained on his face.

"Fine."

Chapter Text

...He wasn't sure how exactly he'd ended up in this building.
In fact, all he did was close his eyes for a bit and a few moments later, he opened his eyes to be greeted with this place.

But the least Boyfriend had done already was spend god knows how long wandering around, trying to find some sort of exit to whatever liminal space he'd found himself in.

Really, what even was this place? A different version of the Backrooms??

So far, he was still walking down this same hallway he appeared in, with the walls coated orange by the light pouring in through the doors, the wood beams he'd pass by every few seconds as he continued...

For some reason, it all felt... fake.

And he's starting to wonder at this point if he's having some weird lucid dream.
But... then he'd know he was dreaming, wouldn't he?

...God, this was so weird.

His dreams were never like this.
Yet all he could even do right now was keep walking through this damn hallway. None of the doors opened, so that wasn't an option.

And for a while, he was certain that nothing was going to change.

However, there was a point where he could almost tell he was reaching the end of the hallway, because a door finally appeared at the end.

And he could hear some faint guitar on the other side of it.
Usually... that meant that Soul was around.

Finally, someone that he knew, that he was sure would be able to help him out of here!

So, naturally, he took that as his cue to head toward the door.

Yet... he was getting a bit unnerved by the familiar sound emanating from the other side of the door getting more and more distorted as he got closer to it.

Just ignore it. Probably something this world was doing to deter him.
Keep him from escaping.

...Wouldn't be the first time.

A few moments later, he finally reached the door, the notes of the guitar somehow more faint and even more distorted.

There was a small rumbling noise that he could start to hear as well... hm.

Still, Boyfriend walked up to the door, turning the handle and opening it.

...The guitar had stopped, the rumbling didn't.

And the door fully opened to reveal a mass of black strings stuffed in the doorway on the other side.

What the... fuck?

Where the hell was he??

He had to be dreaming. That's honest to god what it felt like right now. He had to be in some sort of fever dream.
But the more he tried to believe that, the more it was drilled into his head that this was real.

It was like the more he tried to challenge being asleep, the more awake he'd start feeling.

He didn't really want to know if that was just an effect of whatever world he was in right now or not.

Suddenly, he started to hear a voice on the other side.
And it was... calling his name?

...As well as calling for help.

The voice was familiar, but very distant.

Well... screw whatever this place was then. He was going in.

But, as he started moving his hand toward that tangled mass in the doorway, a few seconds later a few strings shot out and suddenly tightly grabbed his arm, making him yelp in surprise and futilely attempt to pull his hand away as the hall behind him began to collapse.

...So, this stuff was alive. Great to know now that he'd already put his hand toward it-

However, before he could do anything else, the strings pulled him in.

And he disappeared into the mass of black, the hallway unfolding to nothing.

When Boyfriend finally opened his eyes again after landing on solid, cold ground, he found himself in a completely different place compared to the one he was just in.

He heard a constant low droning noise, almost like wind even though he didn't feel any.
The ground beneath him that he sat on was just pure black, the vast, near-endless expanse around him some weird beige color, and when he looked up-

...Holy shit.

More of those strings. Dangling from the ceiling, so many of them he practically couldn't see where they were coming from up above. Nor how far it actually went for up there.

....And he very well knows how much he'd come to hate strings.

He stood up, only to notice a tight feeling in his chest.

Which was... weird.

It wasn't like he was anxious - in fact, this place confused him more than anything.
The way he'd entered wherever he was now wasn't... there anymore. Actually, he's more sure he fell into this place.

But he was stuck.
And he didn't know this world.

He had no idea where to go.

That tightness in his chest never left, and it just confused him even more.

...And then out of nowhere, a microphone dropped in front of him.

Did this place want him to... sing?
But what good would that do for him? He doesn't see how it'd change anything.

Either way, he sighed and still picked up the mic.

Nothing better to do.

In response, he got eerie music to sing along to... probably the doing of this place. He could just wait until it kicked up, no big deal.

Until he heard something shift behind him, and what he saw when he turned around and looked up resulted in his singing coming out both panicked and anxiously confused.

Because now he knew where that tightness in his chest was coming from.
Really, he should've seen it coming sooner.

As he continued to sing, Soul was being lowered in front of him to just above where he stood - only that he was wrapped in the strings above.

Not just tangled in them either, completely encased.

His eyes had a shadow over them, but his mouth was still visible, twisted into a smile that seemed outright demented.

It didn't feel like him.

This didn't feel like him at all.

While the both of them went back and forth, Boyfriend took a second to think.

The guitar in the hallway that got increasingly distorted...
The cries for him to help right before he entered...

...Oh.

This place had gotten to him first.

And BF figured if he wasn't careful, then he'd most likely be next.

Well, to hell with that! Even with how afraid he was right now, he wasn't going to let that stop him!

He'd just freed Soul from his corruption not too long ago - he already knew how much his friend hated being a puppet on strings, and in this very literal case it probably wasn't a pleasant experience unless he'd been granted the mercy of being unconscious this whole time. The more the two sang, it was more and more obvious that this place had him under its control.

Despite the obviously different circumstances, he wasn't afraid to free him again.

Two songs went by in a blur, the second much more frantic than the first and he'd barely made it through.
He couldn't stop that feeling of dread from building up in him throughout it no matter how much he wanted and willed it to go away.

Once that second song was over, though, he knew he had to make a decision.

And it seemed this place knew that too.

But all his options seemed like the worst ones.

Try to leave? No, he could feel that tightness in his chest worsening the more he so much as thought about that option and that made it obvious that this place would just rip them both apart, starting with his friend. It certainly had the power to do so.
He could feel an object - a lighter - in his pocket, should he try to burn the place to the ground? Can't, he doesn't know how good of an option that would turn out to be. Besides, he can feel that tug at his mind to go with that choice, and he knew it was this place trying to coerce him. Not taking that risk.

Or, try to save him now? He's too far below him, so saving him like this, without singing, couldn't be done either. At least not that he knows.

However, all the thinking by itself seemed to just obliterate all physical feeling. The only reason he was pulled out of his thoughts was due to the increasing sound of his own heartbeat and what sounded like... fabric stretching?

Finally, he looked down to find those strings starting to wrap around his own body, and he screamed, pulling himself away and falling back onto the ground.

The strings retreated, but this place had made itself very clear.

With the two of them here now, it wanted both of them.

...No.

No.

Fuck this.

There was no way he was going to let that happen, he has to do something. They can't just magically show up here all of a sudden, and this world declares them as its own to keep.
Not after what happened to them recently, he wouldn't allow it to.

And an idea formed in his head.

Standing up again, he picked up his microphone, taking a blind throw in hopes the cord would wrap around the strings above his friend that held him hostage to this world, taking the chance that with a strong enough tug he could sever the tie.

He can save him. No matter what this place does.

HE'S SAVING HIM.

The rumbling started up again the more he tugged, but he finally heard something snap and the force made him fall to the ground again.
BF quickly recovered, pocketing his mic with the cord and, at noticing the tight feeling in his chest was gone, he looked over-

...And found himself laughing a bit in relief.

His on-the-spot method had actually worked, and finally, Soul was free of the strings.

Yet... the rumbling didn't stop.
Why wasn't it stopping? He wasn't cutting its strings anymore...

...Or was it this place just being nice? Laughing at him, yet giving him a chance?

He heard his friend groan and slightly look up from where he laid face-down on the ground in front of him, quickly nabbing his attention.

"B-Bee...?"

"Soul!"

When he began to move closer, though, the world around them responded.
In the distance he could see a mass of black strings starting to move towards them, and his panic worsened tenfold as he came to a realization.

This place was losing its puppets, and now it wanted them back.

"Come on, come on, we gotta go!"

Frantically, he moved to help the other stand.
However, his weakness quickly helped him conclude that running with him wasn't an option. They wouldn't be fast enough.

So, quickly shifting to carry him on his back, he made a mad dash to escape the wall of black string behind them.

He could hear Soul starting to sing behind him as some music began to fade in, almost in an attempt to try and keep him calm despite how weak he was - so BF followed his lead.
And, well, he noticed it was helping them gain more distance, so that was another plus.

The longer the two continued singing together, the more confident Boyfriend felt that they could make it out of here.

They had to make it out of here.

Hell, the music itself sounded uplifting and hopeful enough, he didn't see how they wouldn't end up escaping this place.
Come on, just a bit further. The exit can't be that far.

If there even was one.

Both of them continued with the song, still staying ahead of the strings chasing them down.

...He should've known that confidence would be misplaced.

It was just over halfway through the song, right when it'd gone to an instrumental break, that the world finally fought back full force against their attempt to escape.

The rapper had been so focused on trying to get out that he failed to notice the strings that shot across the ground just in front of him, and he ended up tripping, sending both of them tumbling to the ground.
And the mass of strings chasing them stopped and seemingly unravelled, no longer needing to chase after its prey.

Still, it took a bit for Boyfriend to realize what had happened, but once he did, the panic easily took over again.

He pushed himself up onto his knees, looking around for his friend, only to find him hovering just in front of him...

...Those strings wrapped around him again, face adorned with that smile that wasn't really his.

No...

This... couldn't be how it ended...!

Why?!

THEY WERE SO CLOSE!

And, he'd been so deep in that despair that this time he was very late to notice the strings already wrapping around himself as well, and he fought to get free.

But he was unfortunately pulled up into the web above along with Soul, who he'd been tugged towards, and he now had his arms wrapped around him - one draped across his chest and the other over his head - as he continued to try and resist.

It was too late now. Why was he even trying? His fighting was useless.

He could feel the strings starting to wrap around him fully, he cried out in response, trying to appeal to his friend in the hopes that he was still somewhere in there-

"魂, come on, let go, please!"

His pleads went unheard, he was getting weaker, his thrashing in the hold beginning to slow.

The other was starting to mutter things to him, he could tell he was saying something, but it was all a blur. Either the hopelessness had tuned him out or it was just genuinely incomprehensible to him at the moment.

There was nothing he could do now. He sure as hell knew it, but refused to accept his fate.

Somewhere in the mix of anguish, frustration, and defiance, he let out a scream.

...It only allowed a few strings to shoot down his throat, choking out his voice in the process.

His memories kicked in that time, the strings flickered between black and pink and the familiar voice speaking to him turned as distorted as it had been just a couple days ago...

By now, he was completely wrapped in them, and they tightened their grip. The sound of his heartbeat filling his ears.

He could feel himself drowning, hanging on by a thread, his mind succumbing to the forces behind his bonds-

...

A scream tore itself out of his throat as Boyfriend shot up in his bed, desperately grabbing at himself to get the damn strings off, he wanted them off-

He briefly felt a weight on his shoulders and he tried to tear himself away from it, it was just another cruel trick - but it wasn't until he felt a squeeze to them and fully registered the voice that came with it that he started to realize what was actually happening.

"Bee- Bee! Hey, it's alright! Breathe! You're awake!"

Finally, he opened his eyes, having shut them tightly in his panic, and he saw Soul sitting in front of him with a worried expression.

"I- Y-You- That wasn't- W-Wha-?"

"Boyfriend, look at me, okay? Whatever happened was just a nightmare. We're both fine. Everything is fine."

Even though he was unable to stop his shaking and had already hugged himself out of fear, he still attempted to take deep breaths with Soul's guidance, trying to slow his heartbeat to the point where it didn't feel like it'd explode out of his chest.

He was home, they were home. It was just a dream. They were safe.

It didn't take very long after that for the tears to begin flowing.

"I... I-I'm s-sorr-"

"Bee, it's okay. It was only a nightmare. We're fine."

And admittedly, he couldn't stop himself from explaining what happened, either.

"I- Th-There was this- s-stupid string world a-and- and I t-tried to s-save you, but- I-I couldn't m-make it, and-"

"Shhhhhhh... it's alright, BF. It's over now."

He was quick to pull the blue-haired boy into a hug, where he immediately let the sobs fully take over, crying into the other's shoulder now.
Soul allowed him to let all the emotions out, continuing to hold him close.

The two of them stayed like that for a while, until BF's sobs died down, but neither of them dared to pull back from the embrace.

"大丈夫ですか?"  [Are you okay?]

"M-Mhm... もう一度眠りたくない..."  [I don't want to go back to sleep...]

He threw in a tiny, barely audible, absolutely pleading "please" after finishing his sentence, and Soul hugged him just the tiniest bit tighter.

"It's alright, Bee... you don't have to."

A sigh of relief was heard from him, and he nodded in response.

"Wanna just watch some mindless junk on the TV? Take your mind off of it?"

BF nodded again, a small smile on his face.

"Mm... a l-little Studio Ghibli would be nicer, I th-think."

"Alright, alright. Come on, I'll even let you pick."

With a slight laugh as the two pulled apart and Soul slid off the bed, Boyfriend followed after him.

...At least until his still-wobbly legs made him almost collapse to the floor.

Soul was quick to hold him up, but he couldn't help but shrink back a bit at the feeling of something wrapping around his waist - his friend quickly saw the reaction, and, humorously enough, semi-squeaked out an apology.

"S-Sorry! I was just trying to stabilize you... you're still shaking a bit."

"No, n-no, it's okay... I just didn't realize for a second that that was you, you know?"

He gave him a slight smile, giving him the okay to try again - however this time he couldn't help but notice something a little different as the other's tail wrapped around him.

"...Did you- make a heart on my back while you were-?"

"Well, hey, I didn't want to confuse you by making a circle or something... had to help you differentiate somehow. And- besides... it's easier to make..."

"Or, heh, you're just a dork..."

"Oh, come on, you've just had a nightmare. It's only fair for me to give you at least a LITTLE comforting affection."

As he said the last part, he gave a slight ruffle to BF's hair, getting him to giggle a bit.

"I should be calling you sentimental, then."

"You would've done the same for me, dummy."

"Yeah, but still."

Soul rolled his eyes, but it was fond, the smile on his face made it obvious.
BF returned it, but quickly found himself wobbling again after trying to take as much as a single step.

"Pfft- do you want me to just carry you to the couch?"

"...Yeahhhhh... probably."

Resigning himself to the option, he rested his head on his friend's shoulder from behind as he groaned in mock annoyance, getting Soul to laugh a bit as he hoisted him up a little to carry him on his back and starting to walk out of the room.

"Feeling any better yet?"

BF nodded.

"...Thanks, dude."

"No need to thank me."

The rapper smiled, resting his head on Soul's shoulder again.

At least... until another question came to his mind.

"Hey... do you think that place I dreamt about was... actually real?"

"Why, because you dreamed about it?"

"...Yeah..."

"Hm... I wouldn't worry about it too much. I don't think EVERYTHING you dream is gonna be real in some form."

Boyfriend just shrugged in response.

"If you say so."

Still... the idea remained lingering in the back of his mind, for some strange reason...

Yeah, getting his mind off of that... "world below"... is probably for the best.

Chapter Text

so first off - "Kade/Aiden where the hell have you been it's been ovER TWO WEEKS-" I know, I know heh. lemme explain put the guns down.

...I may or may not have been procrastinating on writing the main story because of art.

and low motivation is currently kicking my ass so there's that too.

yeah that art is nowhere near finished. I was telling myself to get it done and THEN write something buuuuut having both executive dysfunction and perfectionism SUCKS that shit is NOT getting done anytime soon I'm afraid :(

I've been TRYING to make some sort of progress on it for a while so I deeply apologize for suddenly falling off the face of AO3 heh. seriously, I realized how long I was gone for and was like "...hm I should probably post something-"

however I was right though, I had literally no time to work on ANYTHING while on that family trip so I was practically out of commission for almost a week. damn.

hopefully that explains things though! there's honestly a BUNCH of stuff in the side works that I have right now that I WANT to write but can't feel motivated to or always talk myself out of at the moment. (it's mostly that second one though.)

I promise that I'll try to have something done soon though! Not being able to write is KILLING me I did NOT need that break I feel very unsatisfied with my current inability to write. it's either gonna be art (not likely as far as I can tell) or something else, whether that be another request or something for the main story.

so I hope you guys can cope with my lack of a presence for like another day, it's really hard trying to convince myself to write the things I have in mind at the moment.

buuuuuut bringing that up, it's actually why I wanna ask: as a formal apology for the long-ass wait, how would you guys like a little fluff?

...actually saying a "little" fluff is quite the understatement.

it's very, very insane fluff. like tooth-rotting, giving-me-cavities-just-thinking-about-writing-it fluff. It's honestly not like the fluff I've written before but a part of me IS willing to write it even while the rest of me doesn't.

it'll either be in the side works series as a separate work, much like the anniversary fics, or just here on the request work!

as for me asking about it? just seeing if there are still people around and that they didn't disappear into the ether after I did, heh. and also because I think having people actually say they want to read it will help me convince myself to actually post it rather than gatekeep it LMAO

but I think that's everything! once again sorry for disappearing hhhhhhhhhh

also any dual gravity falls fans out there who are. also going feral today. unrelated but still I needed to say it somewhere.

also also! semi-unrelated, chat how we feelin about that new episode from the side story manga ;-; I'm currently still recovering but GOD the silly hyperfixation fuel is BURNING in me at the moment yall (i love Corruption content... but also save me, I have a new animatic idea paired with an inabakumori song sitting in my brain now because of this episode alone. can I just magically be able to animate and draw how I want stuff to look ugh.)

update done, cya when I post again!

Chapter Text

Of course, today of all days was when things had to go wrong.

He'd only wanted to spend some winter time with GF, buy her a few early presents for Christmas...

...Only for this lemon fuck to step in and corrupt her and start up this mocking little tune.

Boyfriend sighed, pulling his mic up to his face.

He really didn't like this guy.

Seems you couldn't listen well,

"Never come back" I did tell...

Heed my warnings, YOU DID NOT-

Now the consequence is all your fault!~

The rapper just beeped his own melody back in irritation.

He was the one who came to him! Seeking "revenge" for the past two battles and all that shit. It's not his own fault, it's this thing's.

You're a pest just like the rest,

Time to put you to the test...

Weigh your heart and all your sins,

And find the demon deep within...

He continued to hit him with beeps and boops, even cutting through his own lines to do it. Just to get the point across.

But when he'd said the word "demon," BF felt a strange tingling beginning to spread on his right side.

As he continued to sing, he looked down at himself, and saw a dark substance beginning to creep along his body.

What the hell?!

He looked back up at the demon, just to see a stupidly smug grin on his face.

Oh. So he was doing this.

This is fine. He can handle this. He can still win.

You angels are all the same-

Just talking to one makes me go insane...

You shouldn't be here at all,

So now it's time for you to take a fall!

Admittedly, he'd gotten a little confused when he said "angels"... was he just referring to everyone else that way because he was a demon?

Either way he's still the one who came to him for this dumb rap battle.

The substance spread further across his body, and that tingling transformed into pain.

You can't escape from me...

Now all of Hell will see-

Take a seat and watch the show-

As I make your darkness known!

Again, the religious terms were starting to confuse the shit out of him here.

But Boyfriend was a little more focused on the stuff that was currently coating his body in black, his hand that was holding the mic currently shaking like hell.

He looked over at his girlfriend on the speakers...
...It made him realize that the monster in front of him was planning to do the same thing he'd already done to Girlfriend.

"Make his darkness known" his ass.

He sang louder. He'll win this. And he can save her. He always wins.

...Doesn't he?

Close your eyes and say goodbye.

No... no!

He's not losing to this... lemon-headed freak of a demon!

Still, even against his mental pleads somewhere in the back of his head (he's never going to plead... not in front of this thing and everyone else.), the infection continued to spread. Almost his entire body was lost to that darkness now.

No one can hear your cries! You're just a-

-sinning angel at the end of your rope...

Losing hope, repeating all tropes...

Fallen down and hit a new low-

As I drag you down below!

The voices started to whisper in his head, begging him to give in.

To give up.

...No- he can't let go. He can't.

He's not going to lose. He doesn't lose. He can't afford to.

Just... hold out until the song ends... he can do that...

Can't he?

...The darkness that nearly covered every single bit of him, save for part of his face, said otherwise.

You're feeling weaker...

Room's getting darker...

You come down here so much, so why not join us?

He can't lie, he IS feeling weaker- No, he's not.

His vision is getting more and more blurry, the pain's growing- No, it isn't.

His notes are forced, all strained and waning- No, they're not!

The voices are getting louder- NO THEY'RE NOT!!

Grasping his mic tightly with what little control he had, Boyfriend tried to hang on to what little consciousness he had.

It was fading rapidly. His voice got more frantic, his melodies more complicated.

...He can feel his grip slipping.

You can't escape from me...

Now all of Hell will see-

Take a seat and watch the show-

As I make your darkness known!

His eye is the only thing left uncovered.

He can feel himself falling asleep.

The monster just watched him with that sinister smile, already knowing what was going to happen.

...Why?

Why now, why this, why him?!

He fell to his knees, he can hear the distortion in his voice.

He spat out one last desperate verse to try and regain some semblance of control.

To no avail.

His eye closed, and he fell into darkness.

Enjoy the ride -

...

Aaaaaand that was when Pump awoke in the middle of the night.

Was that... how the Corruption started? Weird.

He heard footsteps just outside the room, and saw his sister walking down the hall with a glass of water through the door.

"...Susie?"

She jumped at the voice, and looked over to see Pump awake in his bed.

And her immediate reaction was a frown.

"You should be asleep."

"...can I have some water?"

She groaned, and proceeded to walk back to the kitchen.

In the Dearest residence...

A few seconds of quiet echoed through the halls before a sudden shift in fabric interrupted it as Mearest shot up in bed.

Her husband was still next to her, sound asleep thankfully.

It was very odd for her to have a random dream about the Corruption starting.

It was DOUBLY odd for her to have heard what she heard at the end.

What was the phrase again...?

MY UPRISING SHALL BEGIN!

...She laid back on the bed, closing her eyes again.

Eh.

Demon dreams can weird sometimes.

Chapter Text

It was official.
There was one thing Boyfriend could say he hated and feared more than anything else...

...And it was thunderstorms.

With every strike of lightning that appeared through the blinds of the windows, he and Soul only held each other tighter and did their best to hide in the security of the blanket they were covered in.

How long exactly had they been trying to endure this storm again? 3 hours, probably, by now?

...This was exhausting.

In fact, it was made worse when the power went out about an hour ago.
Because now they were just left with the darkness and that did NOT help at all to cover the lightning.


GF was stuck at home thanks to her parents, and the heavy rain made it nearly impossible for BB to get to them.

Clearly, the weather just had it out for the two tonight.

The rapper was still in the middle of sulking about all this when a very pronounced lightning flash made itself apparent through the window, a loud boom of thunder immediately following it. The storm was likely right on top of them now.

He and Soul screamed, tightly clinging onto each other, their nerves on high alert even when the panic began to fade.

...Actually, he's pretty sure that time he almost knocked Soul over.

"...S-Sorry..."

The other sighed, but it came out fond, a thumb already moving to wipe away the tear that had gathered at the corner of his eyes.

"It's fine, Bee. As long as you don't bring the whole blanket fort down, silly."

"Pfft- As if this can even be considered a fort. We'd be the only support structures."

"My point still stands."

With a shake of his head, Boyfriend let out a sigh, pulling away.

"How much longer do you think we're going to be here like this? I'm pretty sure it's at least past midnight now."

"I'm sure it won't be for too long. The forecast never said it was overnight, and we checked right before the power even went out."

"Mm... doesn't make riding this out any better."

"I can play more guitar if you want, you know."

"Nah, I don't think it'll help at this point. I want to sleep... but I'm too awake to be tired."

Another lightning flash, another loud clap of thunder, and another scream from them both as they clung to each other.

Once the panic passed over and they looked at each other again, making sure the other was alright, BF groaned in frustration, noticeably shaking a little.

"This fucking sucks..."

"I know... it really does."

If only the two of them had some idea to make the weather a little less scary...

...And then an idea popped into BF's head.

"Wait! Okay, Beep B suggested this one time, and it kinda worked... it was something along the lines of 'sing a tune, and you get a point for every time the lightning is on beat when it's your go.' It's supposed to make it more tolerable, I guess."

"Do you want to try that? I mean, I'll honestly take what I can get at this point, but-"

"Mhm! I just... need a song to use."

Following a brief pause, Soul smirked, snapping his guitar into his hand.

And as soon as he hit the first chord of Discharge, a lightning strike made itself apparent through the blanket, making them both flinch (probably repress the urge to scream again too).

"Wha- That's not fair! How come the weather decided to give you a point right off the bat?!"

"I guess it just thought that the timing would look awesome~"

BF scoffed.
...He had to admit, though, that was pretty cool.

The jealousy is still protesting otherwise in his head however.

Despite that, they still continued through the song, and by the time they'd made it to the end of the track, BF was leading by a single point.

Naturally, Soul couldn't let himself go out on that note and they went at it with a few other songs they picked at random...

...Only for the rapper to win the last one as their tiebreaker.
Which obviously left Soul a little less than amused.

"...Okay, obviously you already have experience with BB. This is cheating."

"Come on, you got a super cool intro to Discharge when we started because of that one lightning strike. At least give yourself that."

"...Fine."

"Plus, at least now you can't say that you don't know how the game goes, dude."

"Yeah, fair enough. Do you at least think it helped?"

"A little. Definitely better than if we hadn't done it to begin with though."

"Good. But next time, I'm winning."

"Let the weather decide that one for you~"

Before the two could say or do anything else, a rather close few lightning strikes flashed through the window along with the very loud crash of thunder, making both of them scream again and cling to each other tightly.

The panic didn't subside for a while after that one.

And when it finally did, and the two once again checked on each other, Boyfriend just gave a tired sigh.

"Why can't the weather just give us plain rain for once...? At least it'd be more fun to go out in that than staying in here, cowering under a blanket."

"Yeah, but there's a difference between cowering under a blanket, and cowering under a blanket with your best friend."

Boyfriend looked over at him, confused - getting Soul to roll his eyes.

"What I'm trying to say is, at least you're not alone."

"True. But you're suffering along with me, so it's still not fair."

"If that's the case, then I'd rather be here suffering with you instead of letting you suffer all by yourself."

BF remained silent, and Soul smirked, knowing it was because he didn't have a retort for that.

"...And you say I'm sentimental."

"Well, you are. At least more than me."

Letting out another groan, Boyfriend pulled away, despite being unable to hide the clear smile on his face.

"Oh, come on! You can't tease me for being sentimental and then be all sappy yourself without letting me tease you back about it!"

"There's another difference between me being sappy and me trying to comfort you, too, Bee."

"No there isn't. Not when you're being all sweet and caring about it."

"Right, right, as if YOU aren't affectionate with everyone all the time. Therefore holding up my point that you're more sentimental than me."

"But that still makes you sentimental."

The lightning struck again, but it only got a flinch out of the two (and a beep from BF) thanks to how deep in their banter they were now.

"Not my fault I always happen to know exactly what you need to hear."

"Dork."

"You first~"

"Nuh uh, I'm not letting you win this one. You're the one who started all this by saying that."

"'Win'? Oh, I see how it is~ What, did you NOT want me to comfort you?~"

"That is NOT what I said."

"It sounds like that's what you're saying."

"Shut up!"

"僕をさせる~"  [Make me~]

Another lightning bolt flashed and a gust of wind kicked up, howling against the wall - only diverting their attention for a brief moment before they were quick to regain their focus.

"Whatever. You're still the sentimental one right now."

"Eh, but still not as much as you."

"Can I at least get one tease over you??"

"Nope~"

"Tch- mean."

"All this because you let one little sentence that was meant to be comforting get to you? C'mon, Bee."

"I'm just saying, it's not fair."

"Well, if you REALLY think it's THAT unfair, then fight me."

The fear from the lightning and thunder was long forgotten now, only garnering flinches from both of them, all their focus on their current conversation.

"Heh... you sure you want me to fight you?~"

"Please, it's not like you're even going to wIN-!"

Soul cut himself off when BF suddenly tackled him with a war cry onto the bed they'd been sitting on, the blanket shielding them from the outside shifting in response.

"I'm 'not going to win', he says."

And the other very quickly pulled the rapper down to turn the tables completely, making it so he was now the one pinned instead.

"Like I said - no, you're not."

BF smirked, rolling his eyes, and immediately the two began tussling, trying to pin down the other - or, at the very least, tire each other out enough to keep pinned.

There had been a few times where the lightning came to interrupt them for just a few seconds, but that's as long as it lasted - in fact, a couple times it would only end up helping them, being a long enough distraction for one to gain ground over the other.

Neither of them knew by then how long they'd been at it, as they were too busy having fun and goofing off, their little battle being their only focus.

...And then in the middle of it, Boyfriend had somehow managed to grab pillows to use to his advantage - a move Soul swore was cheating - and... a move that was pretty much instantly used against him.

Prompting the rapper to try and escape by sneaking out of the blanket.

"Woah, woah, woah, just where do you think you're going, huh?~"

Notably a failed attempt.

"Soulllll!"

"Hey, don't 'Soul' me, you're the one trying to cheat again!"

"I- you were also cheating!"

Because yes, he had definitely tried once or twice to win the whole "pin the other down" battle with his tail, something BF already called him out on right before grabbing the pillows as defense.

"That was before you started throwing pillows at me, silly!"

With a slight grumble, he pulled the edge of the blanket with him and used it to wrap up the other, allowing him to escape.
He couldn't help but laugh a bit as the other struggled to get the blanket off so he could see again, ranting a bit about how the rapper was cheating again.

And the mere second Soul had gotten the fabric off of him, BF tackled him again, successfully pinning him down.

"Gotcha~"

"I- there's NO way that's actually fair."

"Yes it is. Do I win now?~"

"Ughhh... alright, I guess you do."

"Aaaaaaand do you admit you were being sentimental?"

He sighed, not bothering to fight it this time.
Besides, he could let the other have it, just this once.

"...Fine. I guess sometimes I can be."

"Aha! So I finally get a tease over you now!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. It won't stop me from teasing you about it next time, though."

"Shut up, I know."

BF then let him go, and flopped back onto the bed beside him - and the very brief moment of silence made him realize something.

"Hey... is the storm gone? I don't hear any rain hitting the window anymore..."

Letting out a small hum, Soul slid off the bed to walk over to the window, and looking outside, found the skies to be devoid of clouds.

"Huh. I guess it did. Not entirely surprised we didn't notice, though, with all the messing around we were doing."

"Pfft- is this a sign that we should joke around like that again the next time a storm passes through?"

"I think we'd both get tired of that a little too quickly, Bee."

He let out a sigh, the drowsiness already starting to hit him as he rubbed his eyes.

Soul walked around and sat down next to where he was laying on the bed, already having noticed his tiredness.

"Sleepy already?~"

"Mmn... うるさい..."  [Shut up...]

"Alright, alright, I'll stop messing with you. Get some rest, there's no more storms now."

With a sleepy whine, the blue-haired boy quickly pulled Soul down by his hoodie to lay next to him, already wrapping his arms around the other afterwards.

"You... you get rest too..."

Soul couldn't help but roll his eyes.
Not like he could really refuse sleep any longer now, with Boyfriend keeping him trapped in his hold at this point.

But still, he wrapped an arm around him anyway, with a little relief knowing they could sleep in peace without any lightning ruining it for them.

...And yet they still both abruptly woke up the next morning to texts from both BB and GF asking if they'd mentally survived the storm.

They were never escaping from that, now, were they?

Chapter Text

He's not sure when exactly he started to spiral, but he definitely feels like he's going crazy now.

It wasn't the burst of panic he'd gotten used to.
But rather the anxiety in him had been growing and growing and it was hitting a high currently as Boyfriend pressed himself further against the wall of his room.

He knows he's been more of a nervous wreck lately, but he wasn't even ready for the build up to result in his own mind screaming at him like this while he tried to mitigate, or at least control, the symptoms.

At least if he doesn't want it to explode into something worse.

Still, he feels horrible, knowing that his best friend and his brother were probably still having fun up on the rooftop doing guitar battles, only for the former to have to come racing down to check on him because he can't seem to get a grip on the racing heartbeat and lack of breath he's being hit with right now.

If he's being honest, there's a part of him somewhere in there that really, really wants to scream until his throat is hoarse.

And when he doesn't want to scream, he just wants to shut down completely.

It hurts.

So now he was here, fighting for what little control of himself he had, trying desperately to keep his emotions in check.

Hands tugging at his hair and his body curling into itself on the floor.

And he can't even pinpoint what exactly had caused all this. It was a bit frustrating.

He wants to stop feeling like that, not knowing his feelings.

BF curled into himself further, his arms now hiding his face. He's pretty sure his hat isn't on his head anymore too.

Despite the want to run, to get out, escape, anything, he can't find the strength to move.
With how drained he'd become, it opened up the floodgates, and his heart pounded faster in protest.

The anxiety increased tenfold, and with how he was pushing himself into the wall as if he wanted it to swallow him whole, it just made the tightness and pain in his chest worse.

His breathing was ragged, unsteady, his body shaking. ...Guess this was a sign to stop pushing his emotions to their limit, wasn't it...?

And while he didn't want to admit it, he damn well knew he wasn't getting out of this one on his own.
Well- not for another 30 or so minutes, he wasn't.

Through the panic, he screamed for help... but he's more than aware that those pleas choke in his throat and never make it out of his mouth.

It's hopeless.
He feels hopeless. Helpless.

He can't take it.

...But, after some unknown amount of time, Boyfriend could hear a faint, familiar, rather rough voice make its way into his ears.

"...dget."

Who...?

"BF."

He just barely managed to lift his head slightly, and through the tears in his eyes, he saw-

...Oh.

Please. No. Not here, not now.

He knows his brother had brought him along, but he didn't want him to see him vulnerable, like this.

...But... why...?

Why the hell is he here, if he's not trying to calm him down?

...He's not sure whether he should be feeling more or less anxious right now.

Meanwhile, Armaros continued to watch him, a neutral look on his face... with a hint of sympathy.

Carefully, he positioned himself to sit down next to the rapper, who still hadn't turned to look at him. He'd seen him move his head, so he could only assume that he knew he was there, but, still... trying to help the boy calm down was a bit of a risk.

It wasn't like he could ask him to name anything - he could barely even look at him, and he's pretty sure speaking in beeps and boops won't help him much.

Still, he sighed, looking over at BF again.

"Can you hear me?"

The slightest nod came after a few seconds, much to his relief.

"Alright, good. I'm just going to keep talking to you for now and I want you to have all your focus on the sound of my voice. Can you do that?"

Boyfriend nodded again.
Even through the rising panic and the noises of his breathing, he could hear the fallen angel's gentle and patient tone.

It was something he'd never heard from the other before.

Which was good... he was kind of his only way out right now.

As promised, Armaros continued to talk to him, reassuring him that the feelings weren't going to last forever, that he'll be okay and that he's safe.

This continued for some time until BF felt something being gently placed on his shoulders.
Finally, he brought himself to raise his head and uncurl a bit, and saw the angel's coat wrapped around him.

"You need something for you to focus your sense of touch on. I want you to feel the fabric for a bit, I'll still be talking to you."

He was slightly hesitant, but Boyfriend did so, focusing on the feel of the garment and the angel's voice next to him, still offering those same affirmations.

And for the first time in what felt like forever, he can feel his breathing evening out, his heartbeat slowing to a normal pace.

Once BF was finally in a much calmer state, silence rang over the room, the fallen angel letting him recover.
The rapper took a final deep breath, and then heard the crinkling of plastic.

He looked over, and saw Armaros handing him a water bottle.

When did he even have time to get one? From how much he'd heard his voice, he was with him pretty much the entire time he'd been panicking.

Still, he slowly but gratefully took it, opening the lid and taking small sips.

"Are you alright?"

Okay, to hear this question come from this guy of all people definitely threw him off.

But he nodded slightly anyway, not wanting to leave him without an answer.

"Good. Now-"

"Bee bop skdoo bep dai...?"

Why did you help me?

Armaros seemed taken aback a bit by the question, but he knew why the other was asking.

"...Well, I just came to check on you on Michael's behalf, but even I know it would be inconsiderate to simply leave you there like that and not help."

Boyfriend hummed a little in response.
He can't say it still didn't surprise him that he helped in the first place, though.

"Do you think you'll be fine now, or do you want me to get your soul and your brother?"

Yeah, he's definitely not used to the other being so nice to him.

Though, he guessed that him being a former angel would probably have something to do with that.

...Honestly, he had half a mind to expect the two to already be running down here.
On the other hand... he would feel so much better with their presences around right now.

So, he brought himself to speak, handing the fallen angel back his coat.

"...B-Beep bo bee."

Armaros seemed to understand, and took the coat, standing up and putting it on.

Boyfriend stood up behind him, grabbing a blanket that had been hanging off the foot of his bed and wrapping it around himself.
As the angel had said... something to focus his sense of touch on.

Just so he wouldn't spiral again.

He watched as the other began to walk out of the room, before in some mix of desperation and resignation, he spoke.

"Wait- i-it's Armaros... right?"

Surprised, the fallen angel looked back at him, clearly confused, but nodded after a few seconds.

He'd pretty much never heard the other speak English to him, save for a few words when they'd last met.

"...Thank you."

Ah.
Now he understood why that was.

He wanted to be more sincere.

The angel nodded again, more slight this time.

"Get some rest. I'll be back."

Boyfriend watched as he turned and walked out of the door to his room.

His thoughts trailed somewhere more benign for once as he pulled the blanket around himself more.

...Maybe the angel really wasn't as bad as he'd thought he was.

Chapter Text

If there was one thing he had to admit, it was that hanging out in his apartment was getting rather... boring.
Thankfully for Boyfriend, he had a wonderful girlfriend whose parents just so happened to be out of town for the time being.

Sooooo... of course they'd totally conspire to hijack their stage for a bit and lock it up to sneak Soul out of his place for a little while.

"You idiots done locking up the place yet? I don't wanna spend forever waiting for you two to close a couple doors."

And naturally, they'd dragged Pico along with them, too.

"Just relax, Piki! The last door is done, we'll be fine now until my parents come back! Which they won't, not for a while~"

Boyfriend beeped, and as if on cue, Soul appeared in a flash of white light next to him.

"Nice to finally get out of the apartment for once, huh?"

"Absolutely. Not that I CONSTANTLY wanted to step out for a bit, but it sometimes got kinda repetitive having to stay cooped up in there half the time."

"Well, then again, it's for your own safety."

"Yeah, yeah, I know."

"Gigi, what exactly were we plannin' to do in here anyway?"

"Oh... I- hadn't really thought that far. Whatever we want, I guess!"

"Fair enough."

Pico jumped up onto the front of the stage, sitting down and seemed to begin surveying the area afterwards.

Girlfriend stared at him for a moment, before shaking her head.

"Anyway..."

She turned to Soul, immediately hugging him from behind.

"It's been wayyyyyy too long for my liking since I last got to see you in person!"

And she quickly followed that up with a flurry of kisses to the other's cheek, eliciting a squeak followed by a stream of giggles from him as a blush grew on his face.

"Hehey! G-Gigi!"

"Whaaaaaat? Can't I be a little affectionate with one of my boyfriends, hm?~"

She'd thrown that gentle teasing in between her kisses, only getting the target of her affections to blush even more.
BF snickered, having been watching the whole thing with a small smirk.

"Pfft- I think you're gonna kill him if you go for much longer, babe."

Reluctantly, she pulled away with a sigh, letting go of Soul.

"Fineeeeeee... I guess I can be a little nice. You're lucky you're both too cute~"

Of COURSE she found a way to throw that right back at him - and by extension his friend.

A small blush grew on BF's face, while Soul just hid his own in his hands, mumbling under his breath.

"'mnotcute."

"Oh, say that one more time, babe, and I'm going to HAVE to start kissing you again~"

She got another squeak from him. Win.

The three of them heard Pico call out from the stage, interrupting the sweet but teasing moment.

"If you lovebirds wanna stop flirtin' with each other, I found something back here that ya might wanna look at."

"Ah- I know what he's talking about. Pico, wait!"

She then ran up to the stage, and Soul found Boyfriend to be standing next to him as his blush began to die down.

"...Sooooooo, am I gonna get a 'thanks' for saving you?"

"Not since she ended up teasing both of us like that, you just made it worse. So no, I'm not thanking you."

Boyfriend crossed his arms, pouting playfully with a small "hmph."

"Well, it's definitely not my fault you can't handle being called cute."

"I- SHUT UP! Why are you both suddenly ganging up on me?? This is NOT fair!"

The rapper sputtered out a laugh at that and the fact his blush immediately came back with a vengeance.

Pico then cleared his throat, getting the two's attention.

"I would gladly join in on this teasing, but we got something interesting in the back here. And plus, I think you should spare your soul for a bit, Bee."

"Ughhhhhh... fine."

"Heh."

"I will gladly continue this later if I want to."

"We'll see if you even remember~"

Soul then hopped up onto the stage without giving him a chance to retort, and BF just groaned, following him up.

Once they were both on the stage, Girlfriend popped her head out from behind the back curtain.

"I mayyyy have also sneaked over my dad's guitar collection... I thought you'd wanna take a look at it!"

"Why, so we can see whose is cooler? I thought we already knew the answer to that~"

"Someone's confident."

He looked over to see BF smirking at him.

"Are you seriously taking DD's side?"

"What? No. It's just funny to see you like this after what happened a few minutes ago~"

"Shut up."

BF playfully stuck his tongue out at him as GF pushed out the guitar rack.

It didn't take very long for him to give it a once-over.

"Really? Most of these are just Les Pauls and SGs. As a former rockstar I thought it'd be better. More varied maybe."

"Mm, my dad said that these were the 'classics' and you 'can't go wrong with them'. Buuuuuuut I consider you the expert, babe~"

Getting past the slight blush from her compliment, Soul was quick to respond.

"Well, they ARE classics, and they ARE good guitars. I never said they weren't- these actually look pretty well taken care of. But I'm just saying, my collection is a whole lot cooler than hi- ohmygOD HE HAS A RHOADS??"

He quickly zipped over to the somewhat hidden spot in which he'd spotted the guitar, picking it up and practically admiring it.

"Holy shit, I haven't gotten to hold one of these in a while."

"Soul, you go raid Guitar Centers all the time with Gigi. I'm pretty sure that model is popular enough to be everywhere."

"They started hiding all the cooler guitars whenever they hear the limo skidding toward the shop. Now I can't rely on them to expand my collection. It's fucking dumb."

Pico snickered, pointing to the guitar in his hands, an idea having came to him.

"You should steal this one from DD then."

"Oh, I am TEMPTED as hell to."

"Do it. We'll cover you. Say someone broke in or some shit."

Soul laughed at the idea, shaking his head a bit.

"I'm pretty sure that'd just make the big guy MORE angry about it, Pico."

"Well..."

The other three looked over at GF, who seemed to be thinking.

"I could just say that I lended it to a friend...~"

She winked at him, once again getting a small blush to form on Soul's face. But still, she'd presented the opportunity...

He snapped, and the guitar vanished in a flash of white light, and he smirked triumphantly.

"DD can complain all he wants, this shit's MINE now~"

"Predictable."

"Bee, shush, that can easily be chalked up to you knowing me well enough."

"I dunno, can it?~"

Soul just sighed, not having a comeback for that.

GF stifled a few giggles, while Pico just stared for a few seconds.

"...Alright, I'm bored again now."

And without warning, he ran over and snatched Soul's hat off his head, forcing him to chase after the ginger.

"Wh- Hey! Pico!"

"Not my fault you weren't paying attention, DragonForce!"

GF rolled her eyes, amused by the antics at play.

"Yeah but- why?"

"Like I said, I was bored. Plus I could've gone for Bee, but Soul was closer."

"You jerk, get back here!"

"Try and catch me first!"

BF and GF just watched in amusement as Soul continued to chase Pico around the stage for his hat back.
However, it wasn't until Pico stopped in his tracks to trip him that he'd accidentally crashed into Boyfriend in the process...

...And something weird happened.

There was a flash of white light, and when Pico and Girlfriend had looked over again, Boyfriend was the only one who'd fallen on the ground, face-up and holding his head.

"Ughhhh... wha-?"

He looked up to see both his girlfriend and his QPP staring down at him.

...Hold up.

"...Guys...?"

"Bee, where the hell did Soul go?"

"What do you mean? He's right here!"

...Was it just them, or were both of their voices speaking at the same time...?

"Babe, I don't know how to tell you this, but-"

"Both of ya fused."

"Pico!"

"What?"

"You can't just put that so bluntly!!"

Meanwhile, BF looked down at himself, noticing those familiar white streaks across his body, the tail now connected to his lower back-

"...Holy shit- no way!"

"Since when could the two of you even do this shit?"

"Dude, I don't know! But that doesn't mean it's not cool!"

He jumped off the stage, both surprised and not surprised that he ended up floating in mid-air.

"Woah, this really is just like that one alternate universe dream I had!"

As the rapper continued flying around, Pico and GF looked at each other.

"...Are they gonna be okay like this? They've never been able to do something like this before, y'know."

"I'm sure they'll be fine! As long as it doesn't end up hurting them."

That was when the two felt a hand on their shoulders, and both of them jumped.

"Surprise~"

BF popped out of the shadows from the curtains in between them, chuckling a bit.

"Oh man- now I see why Soul likes doing that, that was actually pretty f-funny-"

They couldn't help but notice how BF's voice had taken the forefront there.
But still-

"Not very funny, Bee."

"Come on, it wasn't THAT bad!"

And then the three of them heard banging on the entry door, before Daddy Dearest and Mommy Mearest burst in, red eyes ablaze.

"...oops-"

"ALRIGHT, WHOEVER THE HELL BROKE IN AND WANTS TO STEAL MY SHIT, SHOW YOURSELF RIGHT NO-"

"Hi, dad!"

DD's vengeful demeanor instantly vanished at hearing his daughter's voice...

...only to slightly return at the sight of Pico and BF.

"Hi, sweetie!"

At least his wife had responded to her...

"Don't mind us, dad! We just got bored and decided to hang out here."

The three of them were currently sweating nervous bullets - everything seemed fine right now but for the love of god if the two of them unfused-

"Wait a minute... why the hell is your boyfriend glowin' like that?"

"H-Huh? O-Oh! He's a-always been able to do that, y-yeah! He's just... never told you?"

Silence rang through the air for a minute.

"Hah! I honestly kinda like the new look, kid! Didn't think I sensed any demon energy in ya, but hey! This is an improvement!"

Mearest just sighed.

"He means, welcome to the family, dear."

BF laughed, pulling out his mic.

"Alright, old man, let's see if you can still take me like this then!"

Yeah, he was fully playing into Girlfriend's half-lie.
However, there was really no better option for the two, so...

Daddy Dearest pulled out his own mic, accepting the challenge. GF and Pico, on the other hand, let out a sigh.

This was gonna be an interesting Friday night.

(Later that night, after the rap battle...)

Boyfriend finally arrived back in his apartment, he and Pico having been dropped off at their respective places by GF.

He let out a sigh of relief, at least now that the Dearests were no longer on the list of problems for the night.
They were DEFINITELY going to question this later, weren't they...?

...And the both of them haven't even fully figured out this whole fusion thing either.

Were they just... stuck like this now?

'Do you think I can still talk to you like this?'

'Apparently, yeah.'

'You think we can try and-'

'Unfuse? Yeah. I'm getting a little drained, if I'm being honest. Not used to having those marks out all the time.'

'Even though we're both sharing that energy now?'

'Technically, that's still coming from ME, so I'm not really surprised.'

'Fine, fine. On the count of three. 1, 2... 3!'

...Nothing happened.

Well, shit.

"...There's no way we're actually stuck like this... right?"

'Bee- god- calm down a little, will you? I'm sure we can figure this out.'

'Dude, we don't even know how we did this in the first place! You flew into me by accident and boom! We fused!'

"Boyfriend. We'll figure this out. Just take a few deep breaths first, yeah? Nothing's gonna happen for the rest of tonight, so I don't know why-'

And then a portal appeared right in front of them.

'...You had to jinx it.'

'Shut up.'

They waited cautiously, waiting to see what would happen.

...A few seconds later, a familiar figure stepped out of the portal.
Familiar to one of them, at least.

Identical to the rapper, the main difference being that swirly pink in his eye.

"How the... fuck?"

Spirit narrowed his eyes - this definitely wasn't his world.

What the fuck happened?

Despite the confusion, he gripped the mic in his hand tightly.
Only one way "he" tended to settle things, right?

Meanwhile, BF was frozen.

The low synth already starting faintly.

'Bee, are you okay? You're shaking a little.'

'I-I'm fine.'

'Boyfriend-'

'Just shut up and rap!'

Soul sighed, taking control slightly to summon the mic in his hand.
Knowing BF, he's not getting an answer to that now.

The two entities began singing, both of them trying to figure out what the hell was going on.

There was a brief break early into the song where they took the chance to power up, clearly not getting any direct answers from the other.

Once the vocals kicked back in, the instrumental flourishing, the battle was on.

But as the song continued, it was obvious that the two matched each other, even as BF in the fusion struggled to keep up a little.

He wouldn't admit it, but knowing who exactly this was thanks to those... dreams, was a little unnerving.

The song began to calm down, but neither of the singers did.
A small break came again, where they both took a second to watch each other, as if they were expecting the other to do something.

Fearing the worst, the mere second Spirit had raised his free hand, BF was quick to fire some energy of his own.

When the vocals came back, Spirit had seemed a bit more pissed.
That little move clearly got them nowhere.

They spent what was left of the track trying to fight the other off - they weren't sure what was going on at the moment, and at this point neither of them really wanted to know.

But then, when they stopped singing, Spirit was blasted back into another portal suddenly as the instrumental faded away.

And BF looked behind him to see the Dearests standing there at his door.

...Wait, when the fuck did he get here?!?

"Sorry, kid. Crazy universe stuff was happening here according to our daughter. Dunno why. But those abilities of yours are definitely interesting, boy."

"Oh... uh- thank you?"

"But I'd rather know where they're really coming from..."

...Why did that feel so ominous...?

It wasn't until the red glow in DD's eyes intensified, the rest of the room around them started to melt away, no no no, they could feel themselves getting separated-

How'd he even figure this out?

Before either of them had the chance to do anything, a white light enveloped their vision and everything went black...

That was when Boyfriend opened his eyes, a bewildered expression growing on his face as he sat up in the bed, casually muttering out loud as if no one else was asleep and it wasn't 1 in the fucking morning-

"I just had the weirdest dream just now."

He heard a half-asleep questioning hum from beside him, and looked over to see Soul having woken up, looking at him confusedly.

"Huh?"

"Dude it was actually super cool I gottatellyouaboutit-"

"Bee, go back to sleep. You can tell me in the morning when we're actually awake..."

"魂..."

Soul then sat up a bit to place a hand on top of BF's head, pushing it down onto the pillow beneath him.

"Head. On the pillow. Go to sleep."

BF rolled his eyes, but still pulled the covers up over his shoulders and turned to look at him with a slight smile.

"Dork."

"You first-"

"Shutup."

When they both woke up later that day, BF was quick to ramble about the events of his dream to Soul.

...As well as propose a rather silly idea.

"Come on, we gotta try it at least once!"

"Bee, you said it yourself, that fused version of us has only shown up in dreams. Plus, we went through some of that exact same stuff at the stage a few days ago and none of that other stuff actually happened. I really don't get why you want to try this."

"Becaaaaaaause! Our fusion's been in TWO dreams! Two! It's gotta be a sign!"

"A sign of what exactly?"

"That we might be able to do it! Come on, just once. Pleeeeeeeeease-?"

"Oh my god- you don't need to pull the long 'please' on me, I'll do it."

"Cool!"

Soul sighed. This was going to be a horrible idea.

But, here he was anyway, so...

He floated off the ground and flew toward BF, at least that was what happened in his dream-

...And both of them tumbled to the floor, groaning in pain.

Soul lifted his head, placing a hand on it, and deadpanned at BF, who was now laying under him.

"Urghhhhh... remind me to never try anything from your dreams again."

Boyfriend just sheepishly chuckled in response.

Eh, it was worth a try.

Chapter Text

Mostly asking this because I honestly have no idea what to do and my indecisiveness is NOT helping sooooooo

About the bonus oneshots - would yall rather me move them over to the Headcanons work or make an entirely new work in the "Side Stuff" series for them?

Kinda been going back and forth about this all day so I figured getting an input would help.

Because on one hand, I feel like the Headcanons work is a better place for them, and I won't have like a zillion works in the side stuff series (and also cuz I haven't updated that shit in a WHILE... been wanting to finish new art to post there first before anything else. I'm not sure why I decided on that.)

On the other... having them in a separate work entirely could be better considering it wouldn't be grouped up with other stuff and each side work can remain its own separate thing (we don't talk about me putting general updates like these into the REQUEST work. nuh uh)

I'll see what the majority of comments say after some time and then go from there. And to those who do comment, thanks for the help yall :D

Chapter Text

...How long, exactly, had he been laying here on his bed?

While everyone else was in the main room, probably not as... bothered by their own minds as he was?

To be honest, as much as he wants to get up and join them, he doesn't want to move. He feels almost numb, and it's hardly in a good way.
And he's doing everything just to block off the probable source of his current lethargy.

It's been a while since anyone's come to check on him - the last person to do that had been BB.

He's sure everyone can be fine without him for a little longer, can't they?

Boyfriend sighed, his hands tightly gripping the sleeves of his sweater.

This wasn't doing any good for him, huh?

Yes, he'd came here to rest for some time after a while of feeling so out of it, but now the silence in here is just a little too loud.

His thoughts are too noisy against the quiet.
In all honesty, it's terrifying.

And lonely. Very.

Finding his gaze longingly trailing toward the door again, he decides staying here isn't worth it anymore.

Slowly, he tries to encourage himself to at the very least sit up. That's a good start. It'll actually get him somewhere.

...Even though he's not sure why he wants to get up. Laying here, as detrimental to his trainwreck of thoughts as it is, is still comfy.
Despite that, he does manage, finally sitting up on the bed and away from the warmth on the blanket.

He can still very faintly hear the chatter coming from the main room of his apartment, where everyone else was.

Maybe it wouldn't hurt to join them. A part of him protests at the idea, but it's quickly overpowered by his want for solace.

Not giving himself any time to renege on the decision, he stood up, hands falling into his pockets as he left the room.

Once he reaches the main room, he's met with the surprising sight of BB guiding Pico through... the very first level of Sonic Adventure 2.
Admittedly, he's not surprised. BB loves those games and it made sense that he'd introduce them to the group at some point.

Especially right now.

...He finds himself reeling at the absolute terror that floods him at that thought.

It's... probably for the better that he just focuses on the fact that this is getting the group's minds at ease.

There's no need to think about why.
None at all.

"Hey, Keith! You're finally up! You okay?"

Boyfriend just nods, sitting next to him on the couch next to Pico - the mercenary is now in between him and his brother, eyes focused on the gameplay while Soul and Girlfriend are sitting on the floor right in front of the couch.

"Are you sure? You've been in your room for a while, babe..."

"No, no- it's okay. I'm alright."

To his relief, the others accept the answer, and the conversation lulls, soon turning into encouraging cheers as Pico gets close to the end of the level.

By the time they're on the next cutscene, they're already quoting the SnapCube dubs to hell and back.

God, he loves their shared sense of humor.

Not much else happens besides all the quoting while they're going through the game (minus the aggressive scatting of the Pumpkin Hill theme). For once... he feels an eerie kind of calm in him.

Deep down, he desperately hopes that nothing comes to rip it away.

He forces himself to focus on the game and the fun the group is having right now - anything other than the thoughts that were telling him he never should've left his room in the first place.
That were waiting for whatever's in him to snap, and something terrible in the split second after.

Still, he's unable to stop fidgeting with loose threads on his sweater, unknowingly waiting for the other shoe to drop already.

No one else seems to notice it, thankfully. It's more of an idle motion than anything, as he can't seem to notice the feelings that are building up.

It's not long after, however, that he feels a hand rest on his shoulder, and a familiar voice gently speaking- no, whispering beside him.

"本当に大丈夫ですか?"  [Are you sure you're okay?]

"Mhm."

He notices that Soul is now just beside him, standing at the end of the couch and leaning over the armrest a bit, watching him with what seemed to be concern.

"...なんで聞くの?"  [Why are you asking?]

"Mm... 緊張している. 僕にはわかる."  [You're nervous. I can tell.]

God, why?

Was that their connection kicking in? Had he really been feeling these dumb emotions that strongly...?

As if he could tell he was right and that BF was having a crisis over how he knew right now, he sighed, answering the question he figured was floating through the rapper's mind.

"...とても...そわそわしている."  [You're fidgeting... a lot.]

Of course.

He should've known that wouldn't go unnoticed.

Either way, it doesn't stop him from leaning in to rest his head against his friend's chest.
Soul's hand slowly starts to run through his hair in response.

"...ただ疲れているだけ."  [...Just tired.]

"それだけ?"  [That's all?]

BF nods.

He doesn't know if the others are paying any mind to the conversation, but based on how Pico's nonchalantly continuing through the game, they probably aren't. At least he hopes.

...Yet, he still doesn't feel fine. And he hardly knows why.

To his relief, Soul seems to finally accept the answer, though he still held the blue-haired boy close.

It's by all means comforting and he wants it to stay.
Because he's not sure if he'll still be here one second and then ripped away from him the next-

He clings a little tighter, trying to distract himself from that train of thought.

Ignoring the fact that for Soul, it just entertains the idea of something being wrong.

And then suddenly, there's the mention of Pico's in-game death count, how many times they've tried this particular level and that's when he realizes he doesn't even know how much time has passed - and something in him finally snaps, sets off, and before he knows it, he's already halfway down the hall, barreling towards his room.

He just needs to feel safe, to avoid the darkness rushing behind him that threatens to ensnare him, make him watch as his friend is torn apart-

Unable to register the concerned voices that shout after him, he reaches his room and shuts the door behind him.

He backs away from it in a panic, his breathing shallow, and then scrambling to the closet in hopes that the darkness encroaching the door goes away before it can reach him.

Back in the main room, the others are left confused, but with the feeling that they know exactly what just happened.

"Ughhhhh, I knew my dumb fuckin' ass shouldn't have said anything about that stupid death count!"

"Pico! Dude, you gotta chill! It's okay!"

Aggressively, he turned to face BB, throwing the controller down on the couch.

"How the hell is it okay?!"

"Look, I know you're upset! But standing here, blaming yourself any longer isn't going to help, and I think you know that."

The ginger finally seemed to calm himself, sighing at Michael's words.

"I know... I know. But I was the one who brought it up. I was the one who set him off, now-"

"Piki, it's okay. We should focus on helping him now, alright?"

Pico nodded, GF's hand settling on his shoulder.

"Yeah... it's just- I feel so fuckin' dumb. Knowing that I caused him to run, when I know exactly what that's like in the first place? Your mind always sendin' ya back to memories ya never wanted to revisit?"

Everyone else froze a bit at that. They knew he had a point.

"...We know. Let's just- go help him, then, okay?"

Pico then nodded toward him.

"You should go first."

Maybe diving into the closet to hide wasn't the best idea. The only thing he can hear now is the rapid, out-of-control breathing.

It takes him a bit to realize that that breathing is his own.
And it's not doing him any good, since what quickly follows is the realization that he'll easily be found because of it.

Which just makes him panic more.

It's a whole loop.

One that he doesn't want to be stuck in.

Before he even has a chance to try to correct it, Boyfriend hears the door to his room gently open, and he tries to conceal the noise as much as he can.

He faintly hears a voice calling for him, but in his current state he can't tell whether or not it's there to help or to hurt him.
All of it only makes the problem worse and worse.

...Then the closet door opens, just as gently, but he doesn't notice, having buried his face, riddled with plain fear that he couldn't hide any more than he already was, in his arms.

"...Boyfriend?"

Finally, he truly hears the voice that's speaking, and he brings himself to look up.

His eyes meet with Soul, who's looking at him with a mix of concern and compassion.

"...魂...?"

It's clear that BF doesn't really see him here in front of him.

He crouches down to better meet his eye level, but the second he tries to move toward him, BF flinches back.
And it's also obvious with that motion that the panic still has a pretty tight hold over him.

Wordlessly, he holds his arms out, sitting in the space next to him.

To his relief, Boyfriend shakily uncurls, bringing his hands up to carefully grasp Soul's - almost as if the other would break, he notices.

He can see it in his eyes, him questioning if this is real, and all it takes to get him to believe that is a slight squeeze to his hand, with a whispered reassurance of "I'm here."

The words reach him, and a tiny sigh of relief echoes through the small space.

"怖いのは分かっている. 大丈夫ね."  [I know you're scared. It's okay.]

He can feel, just through his hands, how quickly he relaxes, through their connection he can feel the panic and pain of those memories finally fading from his mind.

And that's how he knows he's broken through.

Successfully, he coaxes BF out of the terrors of the closet before pulling him in and hugging him tightly.
BF easily reciprocates.

He feels stupid for having let those emotions get the better of him, and force him to run away.

Yet, while something in him protests that he should be stronger, that he shouldn't be letting it affect him so much anymore, something about Soul's embrace tells him he doesn't blame him one bit.

Girlfriend, Pico, and BB are waiting at the door to the room still. They're quick to decide that talking about this together can be saved for later. Much later.

So they walk inside and join the hug as well, despite all having differing reasons behind their comfort, and Boyfriend doesn't seem to mind their sudden presence.

It's comforting, and all he wants right now is for it to stay.

Chapter Text

"Do you really think this stuff is going to get us any closer, birdbrain?"

"You are the one who asked for my help, Michael. What you're seeing is all I've got."

"Right, because reports about demon attacks are definitely related to the thing that's hunting my little brothers."

"They're the closest I could possibly get! It's not like you guys have much more information on this thing."

"Did going into his nightmare really not help?"

"It helped a bit. I got to see what it looked like. But not much else."

"Great."

Both Michael and Armaros were currently sitting in the former's apartment, in front of the couch while leaving the TV playing as they sorted through a bunch of papers on the floor.

And all those papers were their theories on that... entity that'd been after Boyfriend and Soul.

So far, they hadn't gotten any good leads.

"Look, I just want to get this sorted out before it does something crazy. With everything it's already done..."

He swore that as he looked away, out of the corner of his eye he could see Armaros eyeing him with some concern.

"...I'm sure we can get to the bottom of this, Michael. It's gonna take time, but... well, what work like this hasn't?"

"Didn't think I'd live to see the day where you're giving me reassurance, Angel Freak."

"Shut up. ...How are they?"

"Hm?"

"Your brothers. Are they okay?"

Michael seemed rather surprised by the question, but quickly got past it and answered anyway.

"They're alright. Getting better now that that thing's given them time away from it."

"Good. The more time we have, the better."

After all... they've had yet to make any sort of breakthrough.

"What about your angel buddies still in Heaven? You ask them about this yet?"

"No. I don't have any real way to contact them, but as far as the letters are concerned, they keep drawing blanks. I hate to say it, but we're probably on our own here."

"Damn... is it difficult? Being away from them? I know you said you miss home, but..."

Wanted to ask anyway.

Armaros stayed silent for a moment, before speaking again.

"I do. Very much. I don't know if they even miss me now either. With what I've become."

"They probably still do, man. Before you fell, it sounded like you had good friends, and I don't think they'd lose faith in you, especially if someone up there gave you that chance at redemption. I... hope one day you're allowed to see them again."

"...Thank you."

He frowned for a split second - why was he being so nice right now?

Shaking his head, the fallen angel returned to the papers in front of them.

"Alright, let's just... go over this thing's powers again. It can corrupt people, bring back entities from the dead... what else?"

"Infiltrate people's dreams, definitely."

"Mhm. Power level still remains undefined... we hardly know its limits. Nor what else it can do besides that."

"Do you think... its form is some sort of mask? My brother keeps saying he knows it isn't supposed to look like him, and it doesn't even try to sound like him either."

"Perhaps... I still can't tell what exactly it is. That's the problem. Even in your brother's nightmare, it was still scrambled. Whatever this thing is, it has some weird kind of power."

"...Isn't it kind of weird that it could corrupt someone to begin with, though?"

"Michael, we don't know what kinds of people got their hands on that stuff in the aftermath and were able to harness it. I only guess that because it hasn't spread again, but to go after your brothers with it is incredibly specific. There's gaps in our theories and right now, we can't fill them in properly."

"Keith did say that it's probably been watching them..."

"And we don't know for how long."

"True..."

"...Your ghosts don't know anything either?"

"Nope. It always manages to keep them from seeing it somehow. When I saw it before, I know some ghosts went and followed it, but lost its trail pretty quickly."

"Then we should assume it knows about those too. ...Again, somehow."

"Hm. I guess they could still do better than you at potentially tracking it down."

...The angel couldn't tell if that was a dig at him or not.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Nothingggg, I'm just messing with you, man. Besides, it's not a bad idea."

"Are you saying I'm not helpful?"

It seemed they were right back at it with the bickering again.

"I never said that. I'm giving you a suggestion. Not my fault you're not considering it."

"Because that suggestion sounds like a stupid one. If your ghosts couldn't keep up with it, why send them after it?"

"Maybe learn to calmly and gently shoot down an idea first before I tell you."

"Learn to word those suggestions of yours better and maybe I will."

Michael just groaned at that, rolling his eyes.

"You know, it's moments like these that make me wonder just why you even decided to ask me for my help."

At that, the other remained silent, and the gravity of that question proceeded to strike.

"...Why... did you even ask for my help?"

There was a brief moment of silence, before Michael let out a sigh.

"Because, if I'm being honest, you're pretty much the only person I could think of that'd be able to help us out. I figured it wouldn't be so bad, considering we had that talk after... everything. I just... had to hope you would even be willing to help."

He paused, leaving the fallen angel to ponder the answer for a moment.

"Even with every jab we make at each other, though, I'm glad I decided to ask you. And that you're here trying to help."

Finally, Armaros smiled - a genuine one - placing a hand on Michael's shoulder.

"Well... not going to get any more work done sitting here talking about other stuff, are we?"

Yeah, he was changing the subject. But it was clear that he appreciated his words.

Michael sighed, dropping the papers in his hands.

"Nah. We've been working too long. I have a better idea."

Armaros sighed, but went along anyway.

"Fine. What's your idea?"

"Taking a movie break, dude! I've got a bunch of them, just take your pick based on whichever one looks interesting to you."

He picked up a box full of movie cases and set it in front of where the two were sitting. Armaros was quick to sift through the movies in the box, before pulling one out not too long after - the word "Unstoppable" on the image in the cover.

"This one."

"Good pick."

Not even an hour into the movie, and they were already commenting on every little thing that they found to be cool... or a plot error.

Either way it was still fun.
Michael would point out small hidden details or drop some interesting behind-the-scenes information every once in a while, and Armaros found himself enjoying it.

It was obvious by the time that they'd gotten to the "get in the siding" scene that they were both fully immersed in the movie.

Guess this one was a good pick.

Their theory work still remained on the floor, but out of sight, out of mind as the two focused completely on the film.

By the time it was over and the credits were rolling, after a pretty lengthy conversation about their thoughts on the movie, the older sibling finally picked up the papers again to start their work back up.

"Alright, alright, that downtime was good, we should probably get back to-"

He was interrupted by Armaros getting up and walking over to the box full of DVDs that he had gotten earlier.

"One more movie."

Michael rolled his eyes, but didn't stop a smile from appearing on his face.

"Sure. Just don't pick a shit one, man."

"Well, then, how about you pick?"

Scoffing, Michael got up and walked over to where Armaros stood with the box.

Yeah, maybe one more movie and just a little longer of a break wouldn't be that bad.

Chapter Text

"Dude, look, I hate to say it, but after all this blows over I think you're gonna need therapy."

Boyfriend looked up from the screen of his phone at his big brother, who was sitting on the other end of the couch and giving him a deadpan look.

"...Bep ba."

"What do you mean, you 'don't need it'?"

"Beop bo bee."

"Come on, man, you were the one telling me to get help after you started visiting. You should be able to acknowledge when you need it yourself."

"Beep B..."

"What? You know I'm right! You can't even talk about half of what's happened without having an emotional reaction! You need it, dude."

"Bep bop. ...I can manage."

"Keith. Are you serious?"

"Why are we talking about this all of a suddennnn?"

"I think the panic attack you had yesterday when we were trying to talk about it speaks volumes, man."

"Dude... whatever happened to having company boosting your mental health?"

"At least you haven't tried to push people away yet... at least not actually. But since you had me make an appointment, it's actually been a lot of help for me. I just think it'd help you out too."

"Beeeeeeee..."

"No. You're not avoiding this conversation. Don't turn into me, man."

The small joke got a slight snicker out of the rapper, but nothing more.

"Urghhhh... who's to say it's actually going to help?? It's not like they'd understand half of what's going on..."

"Bee, they're literally trained to do that. No matter how outlandish your shit sounds, they can still give you the tools to work through it. Though, given all the diversity and what goes on in this city anyway, it's probably not gonna be that bad."

"I'll be better when this is dealt with. There's no reason to go if-"

"Okay. Now you're just saying that because that's what you want to believe is gonna happen. In reality, it's not gonna be easy to get over. In fact, I'm pretty sure you STILL have some mental scars from the Corruption. If you don't get that sorted out, it's gonna come back to bite in the worst way. Trust me on this one, man."

BF cringed back a little - he knew the older sibling was right.

"I'm not saying you have to call in right now. We gotta get that thing taken care of first. Okay?"

"Wouldn't they just be fully booked already though? People are probably still shaken from the Corruption and-"

"Keith. Just make the damn call. You're just giving yourself excuses to keep dodging it at this point. Will you just admit you might need it?"

"Be- I- You ju- ...fffffiiiiinnnee, once everything's done and over with, I'll make the dumb call, alright??"

"That's more like it. And I hope you know I'll be there with you while you do it."

"...Dude, I may be younger than you, but do you really think I can't handle a phone call to a doctor?"

"Fuckin' shit- you're literally the one who thought the same for me when you told me I should call in. I'm serious. It's helped me a lot. I'll even have you ask for the therapist I go to if it makes you feel better. Deal?"

"...Can't banter my way out of this, can I...?"

"Nope."

"Alright. Deal."

"Good. But I promise, dude, I wouldn't have said anything if I thought it wouldn't be good for you. You trust me, right?"

"Mhm..."

"Then you don't have to worry about this. It'd also help just to open up to us every once in a while, too. So that in the end, you feel a bit more comfortable doing it with someone you've never met."

"I feel like that's gonna be a problem..."

"Again. They've literally trained and studied to help people with things like that. The people you know can only help so much."

"...Okay. I... I believe you."

"Cool. Trust me, you're gonna thank me for this later."

"Pfft- yeah, yeah."

The two went back on their phones easily, as if the conversation never happened.
Or at least, so BB had thought.

Because a few seconds later, he felt something land on his side, and when he looked down, he saw BF leaning against him, his phone presumably in his pocket.

And he mumbled something, but loud enough for him to hear.

"...Bep ba bo."

He smiled and wrapped an arm around him.

"Love ya too, Keith."

Chapter Text

title!

but yeah Null Demo was INSANELY amazing Phantom Fear always delivers and we love that :D

I DO find it interesting that they removed the post-CHKDSK cutscene where someone (maybe BF? maybe Spirit? we don't know.) tries to write in a code command to get out of the game... hm.

on the other hand though... (besides all BF enjoyers more than likely looking A W A Y when THAT scene happened...)

THE BAD ENDING GOES SO HARD???

first of all THAT ROCK TRACK?????? ACTUALLY AWESOME (I'm not one for screaming heavy metal tbh but the rest of that song is goated.)

I also DO wonder what exactly happened there... it kinda looked like BF went sorta MAD after deleting Null Senpai and getting out, like he was in Estranged??

and then the Corruption started talking... kinda curious as to what exactly drove him mad there, nonetheless about DELETING Null Senpai in the first place... guess we're all left to become MatPat and theorize again haha.

however I AM tempted to say that, based on the fact that in the corner we SAW BF gain admin access and delete Null Senpai himself when he was being confronted by him, paired with the fact that NS himself is making him face "his" actions that led to the game ending up the way it is - it could be more like self-defense? but of course with all that in mind it's probably no wonder that he went insane right after.

that's just my own theory tho. if anyone else has any others before the event that we get lucky and PF confirms something himself, you should totally tell me about themmmmm

and- not to mention those messages when the text from Discharge returns??? is that implying BF did what he did because he was sleep deprived??? (go frame by frame on that part if you don't know what I mean.)

seriously though I am DEFINITELY downloading this when it comes out. this mod is GOATED. (also star if you're reading this I ALSO saw the Bake no Hana card parallels and am ALSO sobbing inside thanks)

that aside, I'll try to post something soon for yall! general life has been keeping me busy :P

cya soon!

Chapter Text

sooooooo it's been a while chat!

don't worry I am NOT trying to disappear for weeks on end on purpose. I have my reasons.

and all of them just so happen to involve art lmao.

trust me, I'm working on it buuuuuuut I haven't seemed to be able to get started on it, in between being busy for christmas and planning for my birthday which is in like. a week.

which sort of bled into my writing cuz I've been putting a LOT of energy into trying to get the art done bc I told myself I could NOT update main story Setsunai again until I got it finished since there's stuff I need to draw that I'd rather show you guys first. it's complicated lmao.

but I promise I'll try to get it done quickly and post stuff in the meantime!

especially considering I am probably... not going to be fond of whatever's to come this next year. due to several political factors.

but anyway! not gonna get all doom and gloom, I've got an AU to finish after all!

and you guys are gonna love what's to come :)

on the other hand. I am using this update to go promote the shit out of the FNF Beyond AU because it just dropped the Soul-related chapters of its Corruption arc and finally got me to leave a comment on it lmaoooo. and I love them. I love them I love this AU so so much.

seriously! take my word for it and go check it out if you haven't it's really really cool!

also- may or may not also be because there are a few ideas I noticed in the new chapters that are related to some of my own that aren't mentioned in Setsunai yet. how many great minds think alike moments am I going to have with Corruption writers here (yes MMS I'm looking at you specifically.)

my rant aside- go check out FNF Beyond pls,, I'll be workin on stuff to keep yall sated until I can drop art and then the next part of Setsunai's main story!

if I happen to have enough energy in the next few days I may also post a request chapter or smth soon :P

happy New Year yall! あけましておめでとうございます！ :D

Chapter Text

Boyfriend had been sitting in his room, bored out of his mind, when he'd heard the guitar riffs leaking out of the sound room and spilling into the rest of his apartment.

Naturally, he went with his first instinct once he heard it was to smile and shake his head slightly - he knew for a fact all that shredding was Soul.
Really, who else would it be?

That is... at least until he realized a bit of a while in that the particular chord progression he was hearing sounded WAY too familiar.

He sat up, his attention now completely diverted away from his phone as he tried to figure out why he recognized the music.

And then the lyrics came in.

"~I see no, hear no evil, black writing's on the wall...~"

He quickly shot up on his bed, in a mixture of shock and a little awe.

Was he really playing...?

A smile slowly but surely grew on his face, and he got up out of the bed, running towards the sound room.

Meanwhile...

"~Can you see all of me? Walk into my mystery! Step inside and hold on for dear life!!~"

Yeah, Soul could unabashedly admit that Sonic games had some of the best and the most fun guitar songs that he'd ever play.

But he can't seem to avoid the fact that he's had a tiny bit of a preference lately.

Which was probably why he was in the sound room, jamming out to one of said songs that just so happened to be from Shadow the Hedgehog.

He'd just gotten to the end of the first chorus, entering into the second verse when he heard the door to the room slam open behind him.

Causing him to suddenly stop, and turn to see BF standing there.

...Judging by how out of breath he was he definitely ran all the way here.

"I found you, faker!"

Oh, so they're playing this game now, huh?

Easily, Soul returned his smirk, adding onto his joke.

"Faker? I think you're the fake guitarist around here... You're comparing yourself to me? Ha! You're not even good enough to be my-"

"I'll make you eat those words!"

The two paused for a moment, before they burst into laughter.

It took them some time to come back down from it, but it was well deserved.

"Ohhhh man... that bit's never gonna get old."

"Definitely not, eheh... but anyway, what exactly did you barge in here with a Sonic Adventure 2 reference for?"

"Dude. It's because you're just standing in here casually playing All Of Me!!"

"...And? What about it?"

The rapper stuttered for a moment, seemingly trying to find his words.

"I- You- How do you know that song? Especially how to play it??"

At that, Soul couldn't help but laugh a little. Of course that was going to be what he asked.

"Oh, I got bored sitting around in your mind before we met again, so I went looking for more songs to learn the guitar parts to. This one kept popping up everywhere and, well, it's a Sonic game song. I HAD to."

"Fair... I guess. Doesn't explain how you learned it."

"Same way I was able to tweet on Twitter from inside your mind~"

"Meaning you used a copy of my phone that could somehow properly access the internet to look up tabs."

"Yup."

"Dork."

"You first."

"Shush."

Both of them went silent, but once BF started glancing between Soul and his guitar, the sheepish grin that grew onto his face made the other come to a swift realization.

"...This means you want me to teach you the song, doesn't it?"

"Maaaaaaybe."

"Coming from you, that's a yes~"

"Aw, come on! Did I really make it that obvious?"

"Kinda."

"...Will you still teach me the song though?"

"I thought you wanted to learn how to play Live and Learn, last I heard."

"I mean, yeah, but Beep B already learned Escape From the City and I gotta one-up him somehow. Has to be from a different game or it doesn't work."

Soul tried his best to stifle a laugh at that - somehow, he's not surprised.

"Pfft- okay, okaaaaaay, fine, I'll teach you."

With a small whoop, Boyfriend quickly ran over to hug his friend tightly, despite the fact that he'd nearly toppled them both over.

"Thank you thankyouthankyou thank you!"

And Soul returned the gesture with a small chuckle and a slight shake of his head.

"Something tells me I'm gonna be doing this with every song you catch me playing in here."

"...Maybe."

Initially, the song had proved to be not too much of a challenge.

And it kind of helped that there weren't too many new chords that would appear later in the song.

...What seemed to be the MOST annoying for the rapper was remembering when to actually change chords.

Scratch that- this was proving to somehow be a challenge for him.

"Heh, and here I thought that this song would be a piece of cake for you~"

"Dude, shut up! I don't know the song as well as you apparently do. And before you ask, Beep B is the Sonic nerd, not me."

The other couldn't help but roll his eyes playfully - he'd almost forgotten why the rapper even wanted to learn this.

"It's not even as hard to learn as my songs are, BF."

"Yeah, and?"

"Bee, you had a reason to be taking so long to learn them. This is... this is just sad, honestly."

"Last I checked, you were the one who offered to teach me, so... looks like you gotta just deal with it, Souly~"

"The difference between me teaching you our songs and this one in general is INSANE, by the way."

"In what way?"

"Are you even putting effort into letting your hands learn the song? How else are you supposed to build the muscle memory, silly?"

"Well, that's because our songs are special. This one is for sating my competitive spirit."

"Guess that explains why you're taking so long to learn it~"

"And HOW long exactly did it take you to learn this song in full again?"

"I dunno... 30 minutes? You're already 15 past that."

"See, I gave you god-tier guitar skills, you're an outlier and therefore don't count."

"Outlier my ass. This song still isn't even that difficult."

"Exactly WHY I'm having such a hard time with it."

Soul just let out a sigh.

This was going to take a while, wasn't it?

Eh, doesn't matter. They have all the time in the world right now.

"I'm starting to think that you must know some secret to this song that I don't. Fess up, man."

"Bee, I'm telling you, there's not a whole lot to it. It's really just remembering when to change the chords, silly."

"You make it look easy."

"Oh, that's because do that with everything~"

"TOO easy."

"Well, that's just a skill issue on your part then."

"うるさい."  [Shut up.]

"Whaaaaat?~ 僕が間違っていますか?~"  [Am I wrong?~]

"Noooo. You're being mean to me now, stoppit."

"I'm not being mean if I'm right and you just don't want to admit it~"

"...What even made you want to learn this anyway?"

"Simple. I was bored. There's not a whole lot to do in your head, you know."

"Then just be less bored."

When Soul looked at him after that snide remark, he immediately saw the smug smirk on the other's face and deadpanned.

"You try sitting in there for a few weeks with absolutely nothing to do and see how you like it."

"Alright, alright, I was kinda joking."

He'd been playing along to audio of the song during their conversation (apparently Soul wanted him to do it as some sort of "test"), and groaned when the chords in the song changed, taking him by surprise.

"Pfft- you think that with how you reacted when you discovered I was playing it, you'd know this song a little better~"

"Well I've never listened to the song enough to know it."

"Sounds like you should just live and learn."

"Oh, so we're trading puns now?"

"Eh, maybe. Still, you get to learn from me instead of random tabs and videos like I did."

"But- learning this song specifically? It's kinda old."

"One, it was one of the first ones to pop up on my- or, well, technically YOUR feed-"

"It's not MY feed if I'm NOT the one looking up the tabs-"

"And second... it's a good song."

"Eh, I won't argue with that. ...It's still funny to imagine you just sitting around in my mind slowly learning this song chord by chord. And you being to blame for probably every time it's randomly popped into my head."

"I learned it MUCH faster than you currently are though."

"Shush. You little show-off."

"Can't be a show-off if you just suck at playing it."

"No I don't shutup."

"Point is, it's fun to play once you've learned it. It doesn't take this long, though. You're just bad."

"Fuck offfff.."

"Nah."

"Why noooooot?"

"Get good."

"Soul!"

The other couldn't help but burst into laughter, even as BF threatened to throw the guitar in his hands at him.

Oh, that response had been totally worth it.

Well, after a good couple hours, the two of them were finally past what BF had surprisingly deemed the hard part of learning the song.

Now all that was left was to put the lyrics on top of all that.

...And to Soul's absolute relief, that hadn't been another level of difficulty tacked onto their sudden guitar lesson.

Looks like watching the fandubs had gotten him somewhere after all.
(Of course... it had to be the dubs.)

He's pretty sure it actually made the guitar part easier on BF, as a matter of fact.

Win.

Soon enough, the two of them had taken to dueting the song together, as some form of prep.

Prep for whatever BF was doing to show off to BB, at least.

When it seemed that Boyfriend finally had the song down, they stopped to take a breather.

"Okay, fine... I guess playing that song is actually kinda fun."

"Again, when you actually KNOW it~ Aren't you glad I taught you now?~"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever man."

He tried to act somewhat dismissive, but the fond smile on the rapper's face had already given him away.

The two sat in comfortable silence for a while after that, save for Soul gently strumming "Live and Learn" on his guitar.

"...You should get, like... a Shadow-themed guitar. For playing that song, I mean."

Soul didn't give him a response to that, but the rapper took it as confusion and continued for a little longer.

"And I could have like, a Sonic-themed one or something. We'd be matching, it'd be so cool-"

"...Is this supposed to be you calling me edgy, BF?"

BF was the one to start laughing that time - he knew he was probably at least half-joking, but in all honesty he was about to turn that into an actual statement.

"...Maybe."

"Bee-"

"I'm just saying, man, it'd fit you."

"Because you think I'm edgy."

"Whaaaaaaat? Nooooooo, I'd never!"

"And it's funny by itself, considering you're the one who created me. Still, you're not slick, XML. If anything, you're more of an edgelord than me."

"No I'm not!"

"The amount of times I've seen you stare off into the distance looking like you're brooding says enough~"

"Shut up! I was not 'brooding', that's just my tired resting face."

"Excuses."

"Meanieeeeee."

His friend just let out a chuckle, satisfied by the lack of a snarky remark to match his own.

"...Ha, with how much we bicker like this, though, you'd think we ARE those two."

"Well... At least we're not actual rivals."

At that, he'd given him a smile - one that was mostly knowing in a cocky sort of way, you might as well call it his usual grin - but there was a strong hint of fondness behind it that Boyfriend had picked up on.

Despite rolling his eyes at his words, he still smiled back and leaned in to rest his head on the other's shoulder as he listened to his playing.

"...You're still edgy though."

The rapper was then comically bonked on the head by the other's guitar.

Resulting in the music stopping for just a short, brief moment before Soul resumed playing like nothing happened with a smirk.

"Jerk."

"Deserved."

"Fight me."

Chapter Text

HEY GUYS WE GOT THE NULL DEMOOOO (we are getting this game and get it trending /j /ref)

AND ALSO HAPPY 4TH ANNIVERSARY TO CORRUPTION!!!!

"Kade/Aiden dude wtf you're hella late" yeah yeah I know I am guys SHUT UP /lh

I was literally out for most of the day so imagine my excitement AND frustration when I saw that it released WHILE I WAS OUT HSJFGHJHGJFHGJSDGHJHJKSJKHG

but holy shit I was so happy about it releasing and then I got home to download it and CHAT??? the new menu, the extra stuff, actually getting to play it!??!!

...as well as the secrets and lore.

holy shit the lore.

in other words.

phantom can you please kindly stop driving a knife into my back :D

in other other words! I'm talking about the Log files!!!

now yes I am happy about Corruption lore. yall know this I go feral for this shit

but at the same time hi hello did NOT expect the Corruption to be a lab grown virus bro what.
at least I think the implications are pretty damn obvious. but star I'm getting this idea from you because up until I saw your reaction the full realization kept flying over my head. :P

(technically it could also be that the virus was acquired from somewhere and didn't start spreading until it breached containment in the lab, but idk how likely that is given what's in the files. (haha so this is actually the case I think I will blame it on the tiny ass font in the logs that shit is SMALL. but still throws a knife bc we dunno what the source is))

now does this shoot down the whole idea of Monster being behind the Corruption?

yes.

yes and no.

because I'm too good at making deranged connections to ignore this shit, I came up with these explanations in like two minutes after I was struck in the face with the bat of L O R E

I mean mostly because part of my AU kinda depends on this whole idea so I said fuck it

cuzzzzzz the virus escaping containment does NOT line up to me given how BF and GF are still (probably ONE OF now) the first to be infected (if that's even still canon, but judging by the corrupting Pico week I'm willing to say it is)

soooooo naturally my first instinctual thought was "oh Monster got ahold of that shit and went up to BF and GF being like 'yeah hi fuck you take this v i r u s'"

I'm really tempted to say he has control of it or something because the corruption kinda acts like a hivemind. and that's not even getting into all the "harvest, 10000 souls" thing. I'm still waiting to see how Harvester plays into all of this too.

that and, I HIGHLY doubt the devs will abandon any ideas about Monster considering that like 95% of the community backs that theory.

look I'm just saying man smth aint right abt it..

really you COULD argue that BF and GF happened to pass by ground zero buuuuuut with the nature of this mod I find it hard to believe that THAT'S the route they'd take for the breakout.

(honestly tho it puts that Corruption EAS scenario vid I watched into perspective holy shit.)

...I'm still not even getting into the whole "BF having the X variant" thing because that by itself is so much to unpack and raises so many questions. and I'm saying all this as a Gravity Falls fan.

but- it's still REALLY fun to dissect (heh) Corruption lore though. ESPECIALLY with the huge truckload of it that got dumped on us alongside the long-awaited null demo.

(also because I want to mention this because phantom you little shit /aff I NOTICED THIS but the clock in the freeplay menu. that shit says January 9/10 depending on which song you're on. so either the Corruption took over the world really damn fast and was bluffing its ass off to BF before Discharge OR it's been AT LEAST ONE YEAR since it started. we know for a FACT it broke out during winter (December most likely) since BF and GF have their winter clothing on. dude I'm going insane over everything that got subtly/explicitly revealed JUST from this one demo, phantom fear you godsend)

okay okay. ramble over I just wanted to get all that out since said realization got me to fuckin write this and post it-

onto the other thing though!

the 4th anniversary babyyyyyyy

admittedly I really wanted to get some art done in time for it buuuuut I might be a few days late. school starts back up in literally a couple days for me (thankfully I'm in college and I have NO classes on friday wooo)

but seriously I can't say enough how much I have grown to LOVE THIS MOD. I still have the exact day that I started this fixation on it too - January 11th, 2023.

not very far behind the anniversary... coincidence I think NOT

it's still very insane to me how I rewatched the whole thing that night to explain it to a friend (for a totally different idea that I'm never going to write atp) and then suddenly BF and Soul started taking up a huge chunk of my brain.

which paved the path for me to get so fixated on them AND this mod that I started writing a whole AU for it.
(and struggle to keep it in line with canon despite being an AU but fuck it we ball.)

not gonna lie. still really surreal.

and plus I've gotten to read some really cool works and see super awesome content from other Corruption enjoyers, actually start talking to people in the community who I think are really cool - hell, it's even getting me back into art.. clearly.

that being said - as much as I despise how easily I set myself and my AU lore up to be stabbed by new Corruption lore hdhjksdgfksjdhf - I truly, sincerely want to thank Phantom Fear, PincerProd, literally everyone on the dev team who made this mod possible (I do hope they give themselves a lil break after this cuz they've done so much work for this passion project already)

and by extension, the Funkin Crew for making this silly little rap battle game

...and also to all those people for giving me characters to obsess over /hj too I guess lmaooooo

so once again HAPPY 4TH ANNIVERSARY TO CORRUPTION MOD!!!!!!

well, giant love letter aside! tiny update.

for once the art is actually coming along smoothly and if I dedicate a good chunk of time to it then you guys MIGHT see it within the next week, week and a half. I can't entirely promise it but I'm letting the boost of motivation I'm currently running on speak for itself at the moment.

look BF I love you you precious boi but WHY ARE YOU SO FUNKIN HARD TO DRAW (hugging my lil bf plushie as we speak btw.)

ahem- listen it's VERY funny because right before I started writing this I was working on that art. I will go back to working on it after this gets posted too lmao (turns out I like drawing while having StickyBM streams playing. if it works it works)

consider it late anniversary art I guess? it's... Setsunai so it's technically Corruption...? but eh I don't have the time or skills to make a full piece yet. I would've loved to tho! hm, perhaps next year..

and hey, once you start seeing some more art from me, expect me to be hopping on Bluesky soon at that point!

I... think that's everything. at least everything I wanted to cover. I'll still try to post some request stuff and maybe one or two bonus oneshots but for now I post when I post.

feel free to leave comments on this tho whether its more speculations or additions to the love letter (the devs deserve one from me man), I'll still respond!

cya guys whenever + whatever it is that I post :P

Chapter Text

...So, how long has it been again, since he's had a nightmare like this?

Honestly, he wished it could've been longer.

Even with as long as it's been, with the comfort and peace that now surrounds him in the waking world, it still stings.

The memories.

The feelings.

...The lingering worry.

Now he'd tried all he could, and he still ended up backed into a goddamn corner.

Just... why?

It shouldn't still be here.

Why does it all still plague his mind like this...?!

He could only press himself further up against the wall behind him as those damned pink eyes, the twisted grins across their faces, continued to bore into him.

Tearing a hole in his psyche.

What does this matter? He's okay. It's over.

...Right?

He still has enough of a grip to not let himself think his fear knows better.

Right?

...There's nothing more to be afraid of. 

...Isn't there...?

Or is he just... falling deeper? Coming a little too close to outright suffocating in his own terror?

A horrible reality that is all but such, only focused on ripping away any semblance of safety.

Even the events that never even happened, that he only witnessed in dreams... why did it weigh down on him so much as if it did...?

He feels the chains weighing down on his wrists despite its ropes that remain disconnected from anything else around him.

And he recognizes the familiar pink faces amongst the corrupted.

So it's just a matter of time... isn't it?

Until everything's gone.

Everything, everyone who could ever help hold him together again - vanishing, giving in before his eyes.

Serving as just another reminder that he failed them again.

It... can't be that hopeless...

He's- supposed to be okay now, after all.

...What even is that at this point?

He tries to resist the urge to curl into a ball.

The train of thoughts that he ends up plunging into, those familiar yet now cold stares as he sinks, the infection beginning to spread from the shackles... serves to terrify him further.

And he finds he's paralyzed.

...What more does the world want to take from him?

Hasn't it already taken all he is? All he used to be, wished he still was?

Doing nothing more but leaving him so sickeningly empty, so incomplete??

...Fine. Let it come back.

Let it consume him.

Then maybe it'll have just a little mercy, spare him again.

Everything can go back to feeling like it's some sense of "normal".

And he won't feel so helpless for himself anymore.

...

He barely registers the faint, far-away calls of his name, he's distantly aware yet disconnected from the feeling of his body trembling, hardly noticing the quick and sharp breaths leaving his chest-

Suddenly the distance is ripped out of him, and it spurs him to shoot up from the bed he'd been laying in.

Immediately, he loses the will to fight the urge to make himself as small as possible, pulling his knees to his chest and hiding his face in his arms.

Like that's even going to protect him.

That's when he feels a hand gently rest on his shoulder - but with him being scrambled from sleep, it's anything but.

A harsh voice demands he give up, stop resisting.
To go back to sleep.

No- he can't.

He can't let it win again, he can't lose another part of himself to it AGAIN-

Before he can even give himself time to properly process everything, he's already pulled himself out of whatever's got its grip on him, but it results in him falling off the bed, taking some of the blanket with him.

Whatever pain and aching that's caused by the impact goes unnoticed as he pulls himself to sit up.

Only for Soul's voice to begin to finally reach him through the fog.

"Boyfriend- come on, can't you hear me? ...Are you okay?"

He looks up to see his friend staring down at him with concern from where he sat on the bed - and probably along with a little anxiety thanks to the fall he took.

Yet, he reels back slightly in fear, blind to the comfort of his presence as some part of him remains stuck in the nightmare.
There's nothing but a knowing malignity in its place.

And the familiarity meets him in the middle with the phantom feeling of darkness crawling up his legs and his own mind screaming that he needs to get away.

Just get away.

It's not safe here. You're going to get caught.

Run.

Amid all of Soul's confused questions that don't quite seem to reach his ears, his adrenaline spikes and he backs up a little further before the push grows to be too much, and runs past him out the door.

"Wait- Bee- Bee! Where are you-??"

Before he could finish his sentence, the rapper was already gone. Soul had gotten off of the bed to follow him, but he refrained.

The confusion is quick to set in.

He wants to know what the hell just happened.

Letting out a sigh, he sat down on the bed to think for a moment.

Him having a nightmare was the obvious part. But every time he's had one, he didn't completely bolt away like he did just a moment ago.
Not to mention, the fear in his eyes, even when he met his concerned gaze. It was like he didn't see him, but rather something else.

Guess that had been enough to make him leave.

And now he's not sure whether he wants to give the blue-haired boy the space or go after him.

But, despite the two of them being well aware of just how bad his nightmares could get... it never resulted in this.

Soul had been able to comfort him before. He was stable enough, he guessed, to stay.
...It either would have been him, or, like before he was around... it was Girlfriend.

He looked back at Boyfriend's phone, still sitting on the nightstand beside the bed, before making the decision to reach over, open the phone, and dial her number.

Right now, he doesn't know what else to do. But she just might.

To his relief, she'd picked up just when he thought the call was about to go straight to voicemail.

"Hello...?"

"Eheh... hey, Gigi..."

"Soul...? Why are you calling in the middle of the night..? Is something wrong?"

"Well... kinda. Sorry to wake you..."

"No need to apologize.. this is important. What's the matter?"

"It's Bee. He had a nightmare, but it must've been bad this time, because when I tried to console him, he got so panicked that he ran out of the room."

He could hear some shuffling of fabric on the other end - likely GF sitting up in her bed.

"D-Did he really?"

"Mhm. It's like he couldn't even hear me. Or really see me either."

"That's... weird. I thought his nightmares weren't that severe anymore, but I knew I'd probably be wrong."

"I know. But he's really freaking out right now, and I need a little help."

"Wait- is he in the room with you?"

"No, I just-"

"But- how do you know how he's feeling, then...?"

"I just know... I guess. But, look, if it's... not too much of a bother, can you come over? I'm not sure what to do..."

He heard a pause, and a small sigh from her.

"It's okay, Soul. I'm coming over now." He let out a sigh of relief at her reassurance, the soft tone helping to ease his worries- "You're in BF's room, right?"

"Yeah."

"Alright. Be there soon, babe!"

He couldn't help but blush a tiny bit at the petname despite the situation. That was... still so easily bringing up fluttery, light feelings in him.

"Thanks."

"No problem!"

She then hung up, and the call ended.

Barely five seconds passed before she appeared in the room through a swirl of red mist.

"Okay, I'm here. Do you know where he is?"

"Dunno. I mean- he's still somewhere here, I haven't heard the front door open, so he can't be far."

"Alright. But let's be gentle when we find him, yeah? If he still hasn't fully recovered, we don't want to spook him any further."

Soul nodded in response, and she smiled before taking his hand in hers as they started making their way out of the room.

It took a bit for them to search every room nearby, even every nook and cranny of the sound room - but so far, nothing. At least not yet.

"Hey, you're sure he didn't leave his place, right?"

"Positive. But if we still haven't found him, that probably means he's hiding. I don't know why he would, I don't know what's wrong, and I-"

She gently grabbed Soul's shoulders, and it was enough to get him to stop.

"Aw, Soul, I'm sure he's fine. There is one room we still haven't checked after all."

"I know... I'm just worried. There's not really anywhere to hide there."

"Well... we'll see when we get there."

He nodded, and she took his hand again before they walked out to the front room.

The first surprise was that the TV was on - but the channel was static.

Probably a channel with bad signal... it happened sometimes.

But the other was the very faint, but still noticeable sound of BF's whimpering.

He had to be close by.

GF and Soul shared a look, before letting go of each others' hands as they moved to where they believed the sound was coming from.

Which, gauging it based on volume, was coming from the couch.

Carefully, the two walked around to the front of the piece of furniture.

Illuminated by the light of the television was something covered by a blanket on the other side of the couch.

And it was shaking.

Meaning BF was under it.

It made both their hearts ache - clearly that nightmare and everything that happened in his confusion prior was the cause.

Taking a deep breath in, Girlfriend slowly approached where BF was sitting on the couch, Soul hesitantly following her lead and circling around to the back behind him.

"...Babe?"

His whimpering stopped, and even though he was still shaking, they could tell he was listening now.

"It's okay, love. It was just a nightmare. You're alright."

A small, absolutely drained "beep" came from under the fabric.

Denial.
It stung.

"...Do you wanna maybe come out from under that blanket?"

No response.

At least not a direct one.

"BF, it's just me and Soul here. No one else. If... that's what you're afraid of."

She continued trying to gently coax him back out into the open - but if he wasn't going to budge, she wouldn't force anything.

Until, finally, he seemed to curl in on himself more, yet he let out a tiny but affirming set of beeps and boops.

Girlfriend scooted closer to him, and bit by bit raised the blanket to the point where he was visible, the fabric still covering his back in case he ever desired to throw it back over himself.

She watched him lock careful eyes with her own sympathetic gaze, switch over to Soul at the top of the couch beside him, and then back to her.

It was minuscule, but he was starting to relax.

"...bop bo."

"Are you sure you're okay, Bee?"

Silence.

"You can tell us if something's wrong. You can trust us."

That was when something seemed to finally give, through that one last attempt at denial - before he began sobbing, tears beginning to stream down his face.

Whether it was from their comfort, or him just flat out breaking, she didn't know.

But it surprised her slightly when Soul floated around to be at his side before gently pulling him into a hug.

And more so, how the rapper had accepted the hug even with how much it seemed he wanted so badly to hide himself at the same time.

It spurred her on to hug him at his other side as well.

Gradually, he accepted both gestures in full, letting them hold him as the tears continued to fall.

A good few minutes or so passed until he was able to stop crying, and another minute of silence fell over the three before BF finally gathered the courage to speak.

"I-I'm sorry..."

"You don't have to apologize for anything, Bee. You're alright... in some form at least. And that's what matters to us."

"Mhm. We're here for you. And we want you to always know that."

"But... i-it's not fair..."

"Hm?"

GF and Soul shared a confused glance - but once Boyfriend spoke again, more softly this time, it just made way for yet another moment of heartache.

"...You guys sh-shouldn't have to s-see me like this..."

"Aw, babe..."

In response, they hugged him just a little tighter, and BF clung onto them more as a result.

"There's nothing wrong with being vulnerable. Especially around us. We understand, Boyfriend. We always will."

"I... B-But you-"

"Bee, we're serious. It's okay. When you're feeling like this, that's when you need everyone to be there to comfort you the most. We just... wanna be the ones to give that to you."

He remained silent, and GF took the opportunity to speak.

"Soul's right. Even if we don't know why you don't want us to see this... sometimes it's better to know that you need someone to see it. You won't drive us away. I promise."

And then he gave a small hum in response, finally letting himself focus more on their comfort than his own thoughts.

Of course, he wasn't going to just admit that she'd hit the nail on the head with some of her words... but having them around was enough for him.

"Do you... wanna talk about it?"

Right. He... hadn't given him an answer yet as to why he suddenly ran away from him with no warning.

"...freaked out. Didn't know what was going on. ...couldn't see you."

"That bad of a nightmare, huh...?"

BF nodded.

"...I didn't think it'd come back again. I just... keep feeling lost, almost. Like I know it's all over, and everything should've gone back to how it was before... but I don't know where to go. Where 'before' even is. The memories don't want to leave, either, and it just makes it all worse- and I hate it. It scares me. And... I don't like feeling scared. But I can't tell if that just means I'm scared of myself. Or if I should be."

Despite trying not to tear up as he neared the end of his impromptu monologue, his voice still ended up wavering slightly.

He's pretty sure the other two noticed it.

Not only that, but he immediately felt the guilt hit him when neither of them responded after hearing his tiny rant.

For just a moment, he had the feeling he'd said too much.

At least, until he was being shifted in the two's arms, and Soul was now hugging him tightly from behind, resting his head on his shoulder, while GF sat in front of him with a comforting smile, carding a hand through his hair and keeping her other hand in his.

She took another deep breath before starting to speak.

"Boyfriend... You don't have to make yourself face all this, force yourself to grapple with all these feelings you can't understand alone. If anything, that's what's not fair to you. That's why we're here. ...Look- we know, nothing feels normal anymore after... well. But when you feel lost, you have us. You still have something to hold onto. If that helps, at least."

Her response ended with a slight nervous chuckle, something that'd made her attempt at reassurance feel so genuine - and he heard Soul speak up from behind him.

"What she's TRYING to say is... we'll always be here if you need us. For better or for worse, no matter what happens or changes. Even when it doesn't feel that way... or when you're trying to convince yourself you're better off without it. Don't leave us out, too, you know?"

And finally, their words seemed to reach him, as BF fully relaxed into Soul's hold, wrapping an arm around one of his, and gave a slight squeeze to GF's hand.

The two of them smiled at it, and Girlfriend leaned in to lightly kiss the rapper on the lips.
He reciprocated easily, and she found a small smile to be on his face when they pulled away after a few seconds.

It was a slightly tired and drained one, but a smile nonetheless.

"Hm, well, at least I got you to smile!~"

"Whaaaaat? You got him to smile? Now we're getting somewhere~"

"Maybe I should kiss him again, then, and he'll be smiling more~"

BF then let out a laugh at their joking around - and god, did that sound brighten up the room and lighten the mood of their current conversation entirely.

It came as such a relief to hear that noise from him.

"Damn, if you're just going to kiss me back to being happy again, then maybe I should air out my grievances a little more..."

"First we get a laugh out of you this time, followed up by a joke? Is that progress I'm hearing?"

"Oh, hush."

Both of them laughed off the banter, and GF couldn't help but smile even more at it.

"Are you... gonna be okay, babe?"

"I... think so. Not sure if I wanna sleep yet, though. And- you guys are already here, too, so..."

"Movie night?"

"...Yeah."

"Predictable."

"I know dude shut up."

GF giggled a bit, knowing the exact reason why he'd gone straight to that.

Watching movies tended to be a good way to help get his mind off of whatever it was he'd dreamed about.

"Have a preference, babe?~"

BF hummed in thought as he tried to mentally settle on a movie, before looking between her and Soul with a slightly sheepish smile on his face.

"...Totoro?"

The other two gave a slight chuckle at the suggestion, but he could tell it was fond.

"Alright. I'll get the-"

Soul had started to get up from the couch, only to be pulled back down by Boyfriend, who was now hugging him tightly.

Girlfriend shook her head with a smile at it.

"If BF is willing to let go of my hand for a few seconds, how about I get the movie and you can stay here with him?"

The rapper in question beeped in response, and Soul sighed, but still nodded.

Just a few minutes later, they were already starting the film, a serene air flowing over them as the worst of the night was now finally over.

...And if BF happened to fall back into sleep in the middle of the movie again, they couldn't say they'd mind.

There was nothing wrong with letting him get that much-needed rest.

Chapter Text

"Is that everything we need here for the movie night, babe?"

Girlfriend looked over their inventory one last time.

She and BF had been prepping to have another movie night, except they'd taken the liberty of inviting Benjamin and his Pico over to watch as well.

"Pretty much! Just waiting on our special guests... and the snacks."

At that, both Boyfriend and Girlfriend heard a tired groan come from behind them, and they looked back at Soul, half-asleep and laying across the couch.

"Are you sure it was a good idea to have your parents come here, Gigi...?"

"Because somebody here forgot to go snack shopping..."

Pico had piped up from beside the couch where Soul was, causing BF to turn back around to face him after he'd already gone back to searching for the film they were going to watch on the TV.

"I know, I knowwwww. I'll go tomorrow."

"It'll be fine, Soul. They're just dropping the food off. Still, I even got my dad to give me more training on that power! And he still doesn't know I'll be using it to mask you. I've been practicing, too, so you're in good hands, babe!"

The entity in question couldn't help but smile a bit at her enthusiastic reassurance.

"If you say so..."

Meanwhile, BF looked back at his friend on the couch.

"...You sure you don't want to go to sleep, 魂? You look really tired. Heh, figured you staying up last night to write guitar tracks would've caught up to you eventually..."

"Ehhhh... I'll be fiiiine..."

"Ya act like that's convincing."

"Shut up, Pico..."

"Dude, seriously. It's okay if you wanna rest for a little while. We've both seen this movie, like, only twenty times."

"Mmmnnn... but it'll be different watching Ben and Peeks react to ittt..."

Yeah, they finally came up with an actual nickname for Ben's Pico counterpart.
About time...

"I can always just fill you innnn...~ Plus I think it works better for Gigi, because it's easier to mask you when you're sleeping, something about your energy being dormant or whatever."

"Well, if he really doesn't want to sleep, he doesn't have to. Though that IS true... buuuuut also yeah you do look like you could use some rest babe."

At GF's immediate agreement with BF, Soul let out a groan.

"Really...? You too, Gigi...?"

"Yup."

She even popped the "p" for extra emphasis.
Yeah... there's no way he's going to get out of this without them getting him to sleep.

"Don't worry, babe, I got this~

Especially once he heard Boyfriend say that before walking over to the end of the couch where his friend was laying, shooting a subtle smirk down at him.

"Come on, man, just let yourself sleep. I promise I'll fill you in on whatever happens when you wake up."

"Mm... and what if I didn't...?~"

He immediately regretted trying to provoke him the second he felt BF's hand gently rest on top of his head.

"I have my ways and I know your weaknesses, Souly. You can't win this time~"

With a sigh, the other finally gave in, relaxing into the touch.

"...Fffffiiiiine..."

BF smiled fondly at him following the brief triumphant feeling he got at Soul admitting defeat, running a hand through the other's hair before he vanished in a flash of white light. And, by the sound of soft snoring that he began hearing inside his mind, he easily guessed that was where Soul had gone to.

He couldn't help but laugh a little as he turned back to GF.

"Told you I got it."

"I'm definitely going to have to ask about those weaknesses you mentioned at some point...~"

"Ehehe, maybe some day. He made me promise not to tell anyone."

"Aw, man..."

BF couldn't help but laugh again at her pouting, and she let out a sigh.

"Well, anyway- is your brother coming down yet?"

"Nah, he still prefers chilling up on the roof. He said to just let him know when we're about to start the movie so he can come down."

That was when Pico suddenly spoke up to get their attention.

"Hey, Bee?"

"Uh huh?"

"They're here."

He pointed to the nearby wall where a familiar oval of light was forming - indicative of one of Ben's painted portals.

And, as expected, once the portal had stabilized, the gateway opened for Ben and his Pico to walk through.

"Sorry we're late!"

"Well, technically, since we're still kinda unprepared, I'd say you guys are pretty much on time!"

"That's a relief. Given how much you hyped up the idea of watching Your Name with you guys, figured we shouldn't miss it."

"Hell yeah! Kimi no Na wa is awesome!"

"I'm glad Grace taught me enough words in Japanese for me to realize all you said was the Japanese title..."

"Eheheh... yeah, yeah."

"Where's Soul?"

"Asleep. Dummy tried to pull an all-nighter just because he was so locked in on writing guitar music."

"Heh- yeah, that sounds like him."

Girlfriend then located the movie and set it to be ready to play on the television before turning around to greet the duo.

"Movie's all set up! Oh, and it's nice to see you two again!"

"Hi, Gigi!"

"Hey."

BF paused when he realized Pico hadn't really introduced himself since the duo arrived.

"Pico- are you gonna...?"

"Did you two bring more people without telling us?"

"...Huh?"

The five of them looked back at the portal, where two figures were starting to appear in the void of light.

"...No...? I don't know who they-"

And then the figures got closer, their silhouettes becoming a bit more recognizable.

...Never mind.
Benjamin knew exactly who they were.

"...Oh no."

"Heya, sport! We finally found you!"

"There's our little boy!"

BF found himself already clenching his fists at the voices.

While he wasn't going to admit it himself... this hadn't been the first time he'd met one of them.

...

Boyfriend let out a groan, having been looking through the dimly-lit alleyways for the couple he was planning to visit.

Maybe trying to find them in the nighttime hadn't been the best idea...

"Hey, kid! You lost?"

He turned around just a tiny bit at the voice, and saw a man with navy hair and a lit cigarette in his hand walking up to him.

"You know, it's really dangerous to be walking around at this time of night."

Quickly, he threw the hood of his hoodie over his head.

If this was who he thought it was...

...Then he definitely didn't want him making any correlations.

"Relax, kiddo! I'm not here to hurt you! Actually- I don't think I've seen you around this city before. Mind telling me your name?"

He remained silent.

"Not much of a talker, huh? That's alright. How about you come with me and we'll find a safer place for you?"

The man reached out, but BF quickly backed away.

"C'mon, kid, it'd be rude of me just to leave you out here in the dark."

Look who's talking...

"Wait- I haven't even introduced myself, have I? My name's Frank! Frank Fairest."

BF continued to back away.

"Seriously, what's the matter? If anything, it's not me you should be worried about. There's a lot of damn street rats out here, waiting for someone that they can rob or kill to come by. I hope you don't think I'm one of those-"

And he stopped, as Boyfriend ended up tripping on something in the alley.

That hadn't been what caught his attention, however.

Because when BF had fallen, it put him near the streetlight just a few meters away.

His hood had fallen - his blue hair much more visible than in the dark of the alleyway. He'd even felt something fall out of his pocket too.

Once BF got up, rubbing his head from the fall, he seemed to realize.

Quickly looking up at the so-called "Fairest," he immediately wanted to shrink back at that unmistakeable orange shine in his eyes.

"...You... look like my son..."

"...I-"

Before he could really say anything, the man had already approached him, a twisted sense of desperation on his face.

"Why? Are you friends with him? Do you know where he is?!"

The rapid-fire questions left the rapper unable to respond... not like he wanted to, anyway.

His eyes trailed off to the side, and-

"You have a mic..."

...For FUCK'S SAKE.

"That means you're a singer, right? And... you really resemble my son... that- that's perfect! Someone that's like him and sings could finally convince him to drop that stupid artist idea and-"

"Why the hell would you expect me to do that shit for you?"

Immediately, once he processed the sentence, a shadow fell over his eyes. The lit end of his cigarette glowing dangerously in the darkness.

"...Did you think I was asking, son?"

Eugh.
His usage of the damn word had been metaphorical, at least he thinks... but regardless it leaves a horrible feeling in his gut.

"...I think you and I should have a quick talk, kid."

Again, he reached out, only for BF to forcefully pull his arm back.

"NO."

"Don't you understand? I'm simply trying to get my son to come back home!"

"I'm sure there's a good reason he ran away."

"How dare you!"

And the retired singer was very swiftly punched in the face.

Causing him to stagger back as BF stood and proceeded to verbally chew the man out.

"I don't care that you think I can "fix" him, and I don't care that I'm a singer and he's not. I believe he deserves to be whoever he wants to be, and that's more than I can say for you, この野郎."  [you bastard.]

He let out a growl as his nose started to bleed, and he stood in a failed attempt to intimidate the young rapper.

"You don't even know anything! So who are you to tell ME how to treat my own son?!"

"Don't you DARE call him your son. With the way I've heard you treated him... it sounds like you hardly even deserve to be a parent at all."

Snapping, he lunged at the blue-haired boy, but was stopped by a punch to the gut and a mic to the face.

He collapsed on the ground as the rapper took off running, trying to get as far away, as much distance as he possibly could from him.

A scowl growing on his face, he brought a hand up to cover the nosebleed.

That kid isn't getting away with this.

Meanwhile, BF continued running, in a mix of vitriol, relief at getting one over the damn guy, and a giant terrified heap of 'holy shit did I really just do that.'

He looked back for a split second to see if he was being followed - and of course, that was the moment he just happened to not notice the person in front of him.

Falling back onto the pavement yet again, he looked up to see who he'd accidentally bumped into...

"Oh! Hey Beeps! What are you... doing out here so late at night?"

Grace's voice rang in his ears.

Thank GOD.

After taking a second to stand up and get his bearings, he let out a sigh.

"Look, I don't have time to explain. It's just..."

He looked up at her pleadingly, whispering in a quiet tone meant only for her ears.

"Where's Ben?"

Her eyes widened, and she looked around before whispering back.

"Follow me."

She extended a hand and he took it gratefully, and snuck one last look behind him as she pulled him into another alley.

Nothing.

He can only hope it stays that way.

...

"So this is where you've been running off to! And with that pest, no less."

At the word "pest," Mairest scrunched her face, earning a scoff from the graffiti artist in question.

"Wait a minute... you're the kid from the alleyway who punched me in the damn face, thinking you could teach me a lesson!"

Naturally, at this, Ben instantly exclaimed in surprise, while his Pico gave him an equally surprised yet impressed look.

"You did WHAT?"

"Eheh... sorry for not saying anything?"

"And to think I once thought you could convince my son..."

"DO NOT try to play that shit on me EVER AGAIN."

"Oh, so these guys are the motherfuckers that call themselves your damn parents! Now I wish I'd brought more than a fucking pocket knife..."

"Pico!"

"Do NOT try to stop me, Gigi. It'll be deserved~"

"You seriously think I'm gonna let you have all the fun to yourself??"

"...Oh. You fuckers are in for it now."

Fairest let out a slight chuckle.

"So, you think this little posse is gonna protect you? They don't know what's best for you, sport. I think we owe you for tarnishing our fame and getting us thrown in the slammer, hm?"

BF was the one to laugh a bit at his statement that time.

"Well, I think the fact that I punched you in the face and whacked you with a mic, oh the irony, says enough. Not to mention we have a literal trained mercenary and a DEMON on our side. Pretty sure we have you outmatched, old man."

"You really think so??"

"I'm sure our son will realize there's a much better way to resolve this conflict without any violence, and it can end in us all forgetting this ever happened!"

"I already told you not to call me your son! Besides, these guys are my friends, and they've been kinder to me than you've ever been!"

There was a pause.
And then Fairest let out a sigh.

"You always liked to do things the hard way..."

He was quick to make the first move towards BF, while his wife targeted both Pico and GF, as Ben's Pico got them both away from the fight.

The main trio still held their own (unsurprisingly well to both Ben and his Pico), and it was pissing the two off.

Well...
...Just left the option to cheat their way to victory.

Fairest simply used his height over the boy to his advantage, while Mairest was forced to improvise more, being against a mercenary and a demon.

Pico in particular was rather pissed off at how quickly they were turning the tides. He watched as the woman managed to take down Girlfriend with a jab to the throat, followed by her kicking him in the gut.

Damn, fuck whoever made heels, those things hurt like a bitch.

And with both of them down for the count, and Fairest having taken down BF somehow, the duo turned to the two artists attempting to hide in the nearby kitchen.

"Now... where were we?"

Ben huddled closer to his Pico, who pulled him in protectively - how they'd even managed to win against the three of them, they couldn't figure it out.

However, before their transgressors could get any closer, the door was slammed open.

Two familiar demons stood in the doorway, holding plates full of snacks.

"We're here, sweetie! We brought the food you guys wanted!"

"And I even cooked some! Where do ya want us to... put..."

Daddy Dearest trailed off as he noticed the state of the room they were in - and its inhabitants.
His rage flared up at the sight of his daughter, laying bruised on the ground.

It became a fire once his eyes turned to the two so-called "parents" in the room as well.

They weren't about to question why there were two Picos, and two of that blue-haired boy... it was the least of their worries.

"...Did you... beat up... our daughter?!"

Well shit.

"Uh- no, look, sir- we only came looking for these two over here! Just trying to get our son back home! Hah..."

"Why- yes! Exactly! You see, they-"

"Can it."

Mearest's tone immediately made her shut up, and for good reason.

"Honey, can you be a dear and put the food away?"

DD wordlessly moved all the food to the kitchen counter with a snap of his fingers, and that was when the Fairests realized that this was DEFINITELY gonna suck.

The two demons lunged.

...Ohhhh, they were so screwed.

When BF finally got out of the dazed state he was in thanks to the Fairests' brawl, the first thing he noticed was Ben and his Pico talking with the Dearests.

And they were just... talking.
Given how the Fairests were gone from the room, too...

...Huh.

He had one thing to thank them for after all - even though they probably did it for their daughter...

The Dearests then seemed to say a goodbye and walked back out through the door.

Ben's eyes, slightly concerned, then trailed over to him, and lit up slightly.

"Hey, you're awake!"

A few minutes later, Ben was busy helping to patch BF up on the couch, and Ben's Pico was monitoring GF while she worked on healing the Pico of the main trio.

"You sure you guys are gonna be alright? You took quite a beating back there."

"D-Don't worry Peeks... we'll be fine."

"If you say so, G."

Meanwhile, Ben had just finished wrapping a bandage around some of BF's harsher injuries.

"Alright, done! You should be good to go now! Just... take it easy...?"

"Relax, I will, eheh. Sorry for punching your dad in the face and not telling you about it though."

"It's okay! I think my Pico's actually kinda proud of you for that. But... I'm just concerned that you ran into him and he kinda learned who you were in the first place..."

"Yeah... But in the end, I'm just glad Grace got me further away and to you guys before anything worse could happen."

"Hm. Guess so. Still, your girlfriend's parents came in and kicked them back into our universe for the police to pick up. I should thank them for that."

"Fair. I... suppose I owe him thanks too, to be honest."

Letting out a sigh, Ben let himself brighten up a bit, and smiled back at the other.

"Well, I'm gonna ask Pico what snacks he wants now that they're here."

The painter turned around to do so, and Boyfriend smiled fondly at his willingness to move towards just enjoying their movie night.
He leaned back against the couch to stretch, and it succeeded in helping release any remaining tension in his body until-

Aaaaaaand he let out a hiss as he felt a sting on his neck.

...Dammit.
Guess he got me better than I thought.

Ben immediately turned back around at the noise, and noticed his expression of discomfort and pain faster than BF could hide it.

"Do you have another injury? Why'd you try to hide it?? Here, let me-"

"Wait- Ben, it's fine! You don't have to- I can just ask-!"

"Just let me see!"

"Hold on a-!"

The interjection came just a bit too late, as Ben already brushed the hood of his hoodie aside...

Quickly noticing the faint burn mark left on the side of the rapper's neck.

And he froze.

"...Oh, god, BF, I'm so sorry-"

"Nonono- it's okay, Ben! I'm fine! I was gonna ask Soul to heal it once I woke up. I honestly didn't think he'd managed to land it until now..."

"Still- are you sure you'll be okay??"

"Yeah! Actually, I wouldn't really mind taking it if it meant it was because I'd tried to keep you from getting it instead."

"W-Wait- really...?"

"Dude, you're like a little brother to me. Of course I wouldn't."

After taking a second to process his response, he sighed again, but it came with a fond shake of his head and a smile growing back on his face.

"Can I at least put some pain reliever cream on it then?"

"Hehe- alright, alright. If it makes you feel better, I'm willing to let you paint cool stuff on my face again."

Benjamin couldn't help but laugh at his suggestion, earning a questioning look from him.

"I dunno, man... last time I tried to do that, you couldn't stop giggling and kept pulling away from the brush."

"Don't make me regret making that offer, mannnn..."

"Pfft- okay, okayyyy. But- lemme do this first."

He began applying the pain reliever onto the small mark (which, thankfully, was quickly working its wonders), as Pico began telling Gigi what snacks to get from the ones her parents had dropped off earlier.

And then the door was opened again.

"Yo, bro! I didn't get any message from you about you guys starting the movie, so I thought I'd come down and see what's-"

BB paused, immediately seeing the impromptu first aid that was taking place in the room.

"...What the fuck happened in here?!"

Following his exclamation, BF and Ben looked at each other, before snickering a bit.

Eh... they could all explain everything to him and Soul later.

Chapter Text

Soul had already figured something was up when he realized he hadn't seen Boyfriend around the apartment at all lately.

Naturally, it became incentive to look around the place for him, hoping something wasn't wrong.

He kept coming up empty.

The only thing that kept him from being too concerned was that he could feel that BF was relatively fine - but it definitely wasn't like him to go somewhere without letting him know first.

And he could've sworn that his phone was still sitting on the nightstand beside his bed.

What was going on...?

Just when he thought he wouldn't get an answer, he heard a familiar voice shout his name from behind him-

"Soullllll!!!!"

He quickly turned around to see Boyfriend himself just down the hall, who excitedly waved once he noticed Soul had seen him.

It made the other chuckle. He couldn't help but wonder what he was so happy about.

Except he was taken by complete surprise when the rapper proceeded to run towards him at Mach 5 and envelop the other in a tight hug, resulting in the two spinning around.

They quickly became lost in laughter alongside each other, though Soul was quick to stop their spinning any longer, pulling away so he could face Boyfriend directly with a confused smile on his face as he spoke.

"Bee- what are you doing?"

"Whahat does it look like I'm doing? Hugging you, silly!"

"Pfft- looks like you're in a good mood today."

"Hehe- well, what can I say? I'm feeling the wave, and I'm riding it. And that wave seems to involve me wanting to hug you. Sooooo here I am!"

"And would THAT explain why I couldn't find you for the past 10 minutes?"

"I might have been hiding just to be able to surprise you...~"

"Dork."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But I wasn't done yet, c'mere!"

Soul was pulled back into his little spinning hug, and he didn't bother to fight it, rather letting him pull him in.

More laughter echoed through the hallway for a moment or two.

It was only an hour after that that Boyfriend found himself laying across the couch, scrolling absentmindedly on his phone.

The high energy state he'd been in earlier had simmered down for the time being, to his chagrin.

Now he was just back to being bored.

And it kinda sucked.

He let out a sigh, letting his phone drop onto his chest.

Maybe trying to just cobble together some music ideas would help... at least somewhat.

Before he could get up from the couch, though, he felt a tap on his shoulder. It immediately made him sit up and look around.

There was no one else around. Hm.

"...Wha- WAH!"

Letting out a surprised shriek as he was suddenly pulled off of the couch, he heard a mischievous giggle from behind him, and that paired with the feeling of being hugged from behind as he was spun told him exactly what was happening.

"Hehey! Soul, I know that's you, man, whahat are you doing?"

"Aw, what was it you said? 'What does it look like I'm doing? Hugging you,' you goofball."

Consider his boredom solved, and his mood lifted back up again - try as he might, BF couldn't seem to stop laughing at the whole thing.

"Besides-" He paused as he stopped spinning both of them, while still keeping a hold on BF- "You looked like you needed a pick-me-up."

"Eheh- wehell, congrats, it worked. Buhut this is pretty much what I did for you earlier, it's not that originAL-!"

Okay- evidently Soul took his statement as a challenge, considering he barely got to finish his sentence before the other swept him up in a bridal carry.

The second that he reoriented himself and saw the slight smirk on his friend's face, he deadpanned.

"...Haha, very funny."

"You're still smiling thoughhh~"

"うるさいぃぃぃぃ..."  [Shut uuuuupp...]

Soul just let out a chuckle, prompting BF to smirk back up at him, an idea coming to mind.

And not allowing even a second for the other to react, the rapper sprung up and hugged him again, causing both of them to spin one last time before the force resulted in them falling to the floor.

When they opened their eyes, Boyfriend pushing himself up and leaning over Soul, they found themselves laughing again at their own silliness.

They'd totally gotten carried away, hadn't they?

After a moment, their laughter died down, and BF was the first to speak.

"Dorks. We're both absolute dorks."

"Too bad, because I wouldn't have it any other way."

BF rolled his eyes, but his smile still remained on his face.

Smirking, he then proceeded to let himself flop onto the other, keeping him from getting up - wrapping his arms around him when Soul had attempted to do so.

Which resulted in a groan from him.

Okay, now he was starting to regret this.

A tiny tiny bit.

He shoved at Boyfriend a bit, but he refused to move.

And he let out a small sigh.

"Bee, come onnnn, we're still on the floor. Can you get uuuup?"

"Five more minutes."

Soul pouted a bit, but wrapped his arms around him anyway.

A few seconds later, he shook his head a bit as a tiny smile grew on his face.

...Maybe just five minutes would be alright.