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Chapter Text

There is no sense of “waking up,” no natural, gradual change that one might experience during a sleepy weekend dawn, not even a sudden vigorous jolt that might come with being shaken awake. 

There is simply a lack of awareness, of sensation, and then there is.

There is --

Color. Color so bright it hurts to look at, patterns offensive to the eyes, and you stumble -- when were you standing? -- fall on your ass.

“Wha--” you start, and then immediately stop, because the sound does not come from your mouth -- there are conflicting signals being sent to your brain, a horrid tingling sensation amid all your limbs and in your head, God, your head --

Your limbs --

They are a pallid, neutral gray, not anything you would see in any sort of flesh tone at all, and your chest jolts at the unfamiliar sight, protests as the signals to move move these unnatural limbs, scrabbling across the floor, technicolor tiles smoother than anything you’ve ever touched, not so much a texture so much as a lack of it -- you are naked, and yet every line of your flesh is smooth, smooth, no nipples, no genitals, no hip bones, no ribs, nothing to even hint at a place to pee out of, and the buzzing in your head skips on something and the fuzziness all snaps into a deeper intensity, one that saps you of strength and slows your breathing. 

Breathing. Breathing. You don’t have a mouth, yet your chest, it moves. Do you dare lift a hand to your face, to check for a nose?

Impossibly, you breathe. 

There is a sound, sounds. Footsteps? Do you even have ears to hear them? Your hands lay at your sides as you stare at the ceiling. 

A face looms over yours, one not human at all. A purple... bunny rabbit, yellowed chesire grin impossibly wide. Its hands are on its knees as it gazes at you. 

It hums, considering, then reaches out a gloved hand and takes the sunglasses off your face.

You hadn't even realized they were there, and if the colors were bright before, now they're unbearable. Strength suddenly surges into your core again as you blink, wince, and a singular goal sears itself brightly into your brain:

Get your sunglasses back from that jackass.

You swipe at it -- gray hand, oh God. It hops out of reach without much effort, and turns away from you. It appears it's already forgotten about you, and it holds the sunglasses up before sliding them onto its face. You can't see how they look from behind it, but you can see that they don't appear to stay on its face -- it's not as though it can put the arms of the glasses over its ears on the top of its head. It makes a disappointed "aw," and pats the sides, trying to get them to stay on its head.

Slowly, quietly, you get to your feet. It's only a few steps away -- one large bound, a leap, and you tackle it from behind. 

It is annoyingly taller than you, and stumbles but does not fall. 

"Hey!" He yelps -- masculine voice, your brain registers -- probably more instinct than anything, and your hand darts up to claim your plastic prize. Before he can react you disentangle yourself and shove the sunglasses back on your own face. 

When -- when you'd run your hand up his chest, you'd thought you'd felt it move under your hand. Breath.

"Hey," you say back, and cringe. Speaking feels so unnatural without a mouth. You unthinkingly run a hand over your face -- and find it totally smooth, and yet the sunglasses remain in place. Ohhh, God, this is freaky.

The rabbit narrows his eyes at your panicked jerk at the feeling of your own body. 

"Are you..."

He gestures at you, pointing up then down. His offensively highlighter yellow gloves have the wrong amount of fingers.

"Y'know..."

His hand dangles limply after gesturing to all of you.

"...gay?" You ask, or at least try to ask. 

All that comes out of your mouth -- mouth? Lack of mouth -- voice. All that your voice produces is a duck quack.

"Oh, you are human. Hah!" He snickers. "You totally look like a generic NPC. I mean, there's Zooble, and then there's you. You gotta get some paint or something, you're all monochrome!"

"Gay," you try again, and this time you get a sound like a squeaky toy. "Gay, gay gay, faggot fag dyke --"

Bicycle horn, cartoon slippery sound, bubble popping, kazoo noise. Hm.

"HEEEEELLLLOOO THERE, HUMAN!"

The voice makes your shoulders hike up to your ears. You glance upward at the teeth.

Teeth. Eyeballs. The thing lifts you up, eye to eye, eye to eyeballs. "And WELCOME to the AMAZIIIIIIIEEEE ---E EEEEE EEEEE -- "

You'd reached out, and plucked one of the eyeballs. It is cold, smooth, and a deep, computer-death blue at the moment, whites and all. You may as well be holding a blue glass marble.

"Oh, BLOOP, why didn't I ever think to try that?" The rabbit beneath you says over the EEEEEEEEEEEEEE that a dying computer might make.

Wordlessly, you lean down and offer the eyeball to him with an outstretched hand. You can't seem to wiggle out of your post in the air, but you can lean over, and when you really stretch your arm it's enough to reach. Probably.

"Oooooh," Rabbit coos softly, stepping forward and staring at the orb in your palm. "Boop!"

He pokes the eyeball, and somehow, the EEEEEE increases tenfold. You wince, and his ears flatten. 

Then, as abruptly as it went blue, the eye returns to normal again, and swivels -- you feel it swivel in your palm -- to look at you. It almost makes you want to gag, and your body shudders on a reflex that it lacks the parts to fulfill at the moment. 

"That was very rude of you! Didn't your mother teach you not to pluck out eyeballs!?"

'I didn't know you were alive. I don't know if I'm alive,' you want to say, but before you can get a word in, the eyeball floats back to join its partner in the gaping maw. 

"Don't do that again."

There is no silliness, no cheer, no false showman emphasis. That is a command. 

You nod.

"Now, let me show you around!"

.

.

.

The tour is short, but enlightening. When you are deposited into the colorful room again, you have a focus, a goal. Not escape, no -- you want to test.

What are the limits of this world?

When Caine had asked your name, you'd instantly responded with a "Fuck!" that turned into a glass bottle breaking. 

"You cannot name yourself that."

You don't even hum -- this one might just take a hum for a name. 

"If you don't pick a name, I could randomly generate -- "

You shake your head vigorously, and the teeth creature's fingers twitch. You try to remember -- there was a way you used to get around things like this when you were little and the online games had whitelists for the chat, wasn't there?

You decide to spell it out:

"Eff. Vee. Cee. Kay." 

"Effeesikay it is! What a wonderful, family friendly name!"

The rabbit looks as though he is trying not to die laughing. It's quiet, but there, and it makes the empty space in your chest warm. Zooble rolls their eyes... but even the nervous one, Pomni, grins a little.

The purple rabbit, Jax -- you watch him from the corner of your eye as you are all assigned an "adventure."

Since you have sunglasses, nobody can tell where you are looking. 

Never mind the fact that you'd felt underneath, and that there are no eyes under the sunglasses. 

You try not to think about it too hard.

"Now, last time we had a new person, I tried an exciting adventure, but, ahahaha, we all know how THAT went!" Caine states.

Pomni shudders. Ragatha looks away, one hand crossing over her skirt to grab her other wrist. 

"I don't know how that went--" You start to say.

"SOOOOOO, I have a simple adventure for you today. The adventure of COLORING! Beautiful artwork awaits you! All you have to do... is create!!!"

A giant rectangle drops from the ceiling, blindingly white and large as the side of a house. Along one side -- wait, is this KidPix?

It is! This is totally KidPix TM, the beloved internet art program designed in 1989 for Macintosh computer! 

You bound forward and are immediately pawing at the colors on the side. There's a satisfying sound effect when you "click" one, and you immediately thwack your hand onto the wall and lift it away.

A handprint, in bright red! You would have grinned if you could. 

"Well, it's good to see someone is excited! You could all do well to emulate Effeesikay's sense of wonder!" Caine calls from behind you.

Jax makes a sound like something is stuck in his throat.

"It all gets the same after the first five minutes," Zooble grumbles. You mostly ignore them both as you hop up to get to the top stroke of a large circle. You make a dot in the center with a fist...

A movement to the side startles you. You glance to your left, at Gangle, who has a ribbon to her face where her chin would be and seems to be considering what color to pick. You glance back at your... art.

Two giant, round balls touching each other. Two perfectly centered dots in them, and below, a biiiig.... 

A dick. You drew a giant dick. But with dots on the balls, for plausible deniability. 

Caine still hasn't turned around when you turn around, lean against the wall, and slide into a cross-legged position. When you look up, there's a thick stroke of red down the canvas ending at your body, next to the giant dick you drew. It looks like you got shot and slid down the wall or something. 

Kinger stares, the joke seemingly lost on him. Jax did offhandedly mention that one had been here the longest. Perhaps he ... doesn't even remember what a dick looks like. Your chest twists.

Ragatha, Jax, and Pomni, though, seem to be trying not to laugh. Who knows where Zooble went. Caine is still droning on.

"...and honestly, all I do for you! I put food on the table --"

"--that we can't eat." Pomni whispers, seemingly unthinkingly.

"-- I provide fun activities every day, really, you should all be grateful!"

Ragatha seems to just be nodding along, while Jax is transfixed on your giant dick grinning like the cat who caught the canary. Finally Caine seems to notice where his gaze is and whirls.

Freezes.

"MY, my.... Effeesikay, what have you drawn here?"

You have a response ready. 

"A biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig,"

Jax doubles over, shaking silently in held in laughter as you draw out the word, and Caine's fingers are twitching at his sides like he's playing phantom piano.

"Smmmille. For my lovely friends. I only want to see them smile. There's the eyes, and there's the smile."

If Caine wants to take your drawing rights, he's gonna have to admit that what he sees, is a giant dick. And that wouldn't be very family friendly of him, would it!?

He looks like he wants to gnash his teeth, which is quite a look for someone who is literally all teeth. 

"You know what!? We've drawn enough for today!"

The screen goes black, blip, like a TV turned off, and Gangle, who had been the only one actually drawing, makes a wounded noise. 

"You have a free day for the rest of today! Have fun!!"

And then, he's gone.

Jax immediately breaks out into cackles. 

"You're so childish," Ragatha chides at the both of you, though she's grinning too. "We shouldn't... tempt him."

Pomni seemed lost in her own little world again, but jerked back into... not reality, but something, at that. "T-tempt him? Caine?"

Ragatha jerks, like she's said something she didn't mean to, and you tilt your head. 

"Oh, you know," she murmurs, "I-it's just, not good, you know? To make Caine mad."

"What does Caine do when he's mad?" Pomni asks, voice shaking. 

"Terrible things," Jax cuts in, and there's none of the usual easygoing humor in his voice.

The whole group is silent.

"Man, I'm hungry. I'm gonna head to the kitchen, you guys can mope here if you want."

Jax begins prodding off. Ragatha, meanwhile, has moved closer to Pomni, who looks on the verge of a panic attack. Poor thing. Gangle is still at the black screen, prodding at it with her ribbons, probably trying to get it to turn back on, and you feel a little bad for ruining her drawing time. Maybe you can find some crayons or something.

In the kitchen.

You're not following the rabbit to the kitchen.

You totally are.

"Hey, Kay," he says as you catch up with him, and that nickname shouldn't feel as good as it does. 

"Jax," you manage. It doesn't feel good yet, to talk. For a moment you both walk in silence. 

"Y-you, don't, uh. Your mouth."

Jax eyes you, something mischievous in his grin.

"Whaddaya wanna know about my mouth, huh?"

"Did you get used to it?"

His smile drops at that, and he goes rigid -- only for a moment, though, and then he's stepping forward again, hands in pockets, the picture of carelessness.

"What, the fact my teeth are solid most of the time? Yeah. Everything... becomes normal. Well, not really, but you get used to it."

You round a corner, and you realize that while you're completely lost, he's walking like he knows the place like the back of his hand. Considering how long they've all been here... he probably does. 

"Ragatha's right, though."

Your head whips to stare at him. He's stopped walking, and though his grin is ever present, it's gone all bitter, his eyes half-lidded like he's not actually looking at the hallway.

"There's not many of us that don't freak out like Pomni, at the start. That don't... completely lose it, real fast."

He inhales shakily, and it's then you realize it sounds more like a hiss, through his teeth. How often does he feel like he can't get enough air? You shove aside that question before you can focus on your own anatomy too long.

"Don't think I like you or anything. I just think you messing with Caine is funny as -- BLEEP. But you're real clever, and Caine hates not always bein' the smartest person -- smartest thing in the room."

You both stand in stillness, and silence, for a few seconds. The hallway feels liminal. The carpet has this stupid, horrid pattern of multicolored polka dots.

He tilts his head to look at you where your eyes would have been.

"You got that?"

You nod.

His grin returns, and it feels more real.

.

.

.

What feels like weeks pass. Or what you think are weeks. There is a day and night cycle, but no calendar, and your sense of time is slipping.

Or it would be, if it weren't for the fact you were doing tally marks on your wall. There were crayons in one of the kitchen drawers, after all, and most had gone to Gangle, but some to yourself.

Cliche, but it works! You're drawing them.... really small.

You try not to think about how much room, how many tally marks you might need. There are four walls, one ceiling, and one floor...

Best not to think about that. 

.

.

.

Jax likes to trip people, you've noticed, but he hasn't gotten you yet. When he enters a room, you usually pay too much attention to him for him to trick you like that.

But one day. 

One day he goes too far.

Pomni is pacing, muttering, an anxious wreck that hurts to look at. Ragatha has tried to console her, she's the only one Pomni lets get close like this. 

Probably because Ragatha looks the most human. Pomni doesn't like you, you think, because you're uncanny valley territory. The only defining feature you've got is the sunglasses of anonymity, but your body is unnervingly both human and inhuman-shaped. So generally when she gets anxious you give her space. 

And you're deep in thought, about your body, and feeling the general disgust over how... featureless it is, no ass or hips or anything to speak of, just straight lines and mortuary gray, so you don't think, and you don't look, until you hear a thud and Pomni's cry of pain turn into choked sobs.

(Pain... is confusing here. Things that should hurt don't, and things that shouldn't hurt do. You've got this theory that it's mostly psychosomatic, having to do more with mental state than any body reaction -- after all, none of you really have bodies... right?)

You look up, and there he is, that bastard, grinning sardonically. Ragatha is yelling at him, but you can tell it's going in one rabbity ear and out the other, and you get to your feet, fury making your movements sharp and strong. 

You step carefully around Pomni, sobbing on the ground, hands in fists. Jax gives you this look, this stupid grin and smug face that says it all without words: "What are you gonna do about it?"

You swing your foot back, then forward, kicking him hard as you can straight in the balls.

He doesn't quite yelp, but makes a choked little sound like an "ahhaowww--" and drops to his knees before curling on his side, hands on his crotch. 

Ragatha gasps before muttering a "serves you right." She looks at you and nods in respect before going to speak quietly to Pomni curled on the floor, and you look down at Jax, who, somehow... has got a red flush on his scrunched up face, ears flat back, smile looking like a grimace.

"HONK Kay, that was just a joke," he huffs, and you squat down to look at him, head tilted.

"I've seen Zooble choke you out and you don't even flinch, and I can put you on the ground with a kick to the BEEEP?"

His eyes widen before he blinks and curls into himself again.

"I just wasn't expecting it, is all."

'You weren't expecting it from me,' is what you think, but you don't say that, instead you say:

"Why's that hurt when you don't even have RIIIIIIIING?"

"HEY, I could have 'em, I don't prance around in my birthday suit like you do."

You snicker. 

"Yeah, well, I kicked you real hard, and I didn't feel anything. I think we're all smooth down there."

Jax just grunts, and uncurls. His face is still scrunched up, but he looks more thoughtful.

"Why did that hurt...?" He questions quietly, almost to himself.

"Hah, so you admit it!"

"Oh, shut up."

.

.

.

Two days pass, and Jax is weirdly quiet. You've spent most of your time on adventures with Gangle lately, mostly because they're genuinely nice and you don't want to make Pomni uncomfortable with your presence, and Pomni is always clinging to Ragatha. 

"Ragatha told me you gave Jax a good kick," Gangle giggles to you quietly one day as the both of you are working on a giant slide puzzle. Apparantly Caine had decided thirty slide puzzles increasing in difficulty were the "adventure" for the day. Honestly, the company is the nice part. The rest of the group had mostly scattered, giving up on the puzzle, but Gangle was the most patient, and you stayed with her. 

"Yeah," you grin. "You shoulda heard the noise he made."

Gangle's mask, currently the comedy one, nods. "He's always mean to me. Why do you even hang out with him?"

Your hands still where they're pushing a tile. 

"Mmm. He was the first one I saw. And... I dunno, he seems interesting?"

"If you think mean is interesting. But I wanted to ask you... Ragatha said you... hurt him."

"Yeah?"

"I..."

Gangle's ribbons wiggle. 

"You've, you've got hands. With fingers. The right amount, if I remember right."

"That I do. What... what are you asking?"

"I just want to hold them," Gangle finally says, all in a rush, the two ribbons making poor imitations of hands curling and uncurling. "Sorry. Please. Sorry. It's been so long. And if you can hurt him, maybe, uh, maybe, you could, not, maybe, hurt me? Does that make sense? Please?"

You look at her, before wordlessly holding your hands and arms out like you would if offering a hug.

"Oh," she says, voice risen in pitch. "Oh!"

And then her red ribbons snake up your hands, arms, she draws her mask in close to rest on the crook of your neck. She can't sigh, doesn't even have a false body that could move air through it in such a way, but she hums, and her weight, slight as it is, less than a corpse, sags into yours.

Neither of you are human, and yet, for a moment...

You gently, so very gently, grasp one ribbon between your fingers, and Gangle tightens around your arms and makes a sound like a gasp. Something in your heart thrills at that.

"YOU TWO AREN'T DOING ANYTHING UNWHOLESOME, ARE YOU?" A voice thunders from above, and you don't need to look up to recognize it as Caine. Gangle disentangles from you so fast your skin burns, and flees faster than you've ever seen her, like a spring, like a snake fleeing a hawk, ribbon eel fleeing the shark.

"Just hugging," You say, hoping your voice doesn't sound heavy with emotion. "Wholesome family hug fun time fun?"

You look up at Caine, whose fingers are twitching.

"...I've got my eyeballs on you, Effeesikay."

It was a hug. It was only a hug. And yet it was so intimate, so desperate. Why is human touch so immoral to this thing? Why does it hate intimacy? The censorship of words, of bodies, of even the most innocent and yet intimate actions, fuck!

For the first time you've been here... you want to snap at Caine, really snap at him, but Ragatha's warnings echo and you only nod your head.

.

.

.

"What'd you do to Gangle?"

Jax's question, much like him, is out of pocket and rude. His eyes are fixed on the door she fled through when you'd both entered the room. 

"Normally she never avoids anybody."

"Caine got mad at us," you say, dropping your voice very low and quiet, and one of his ears twitches.

"What for?" he asks, voice quiet to match yours, and you consider avoiding the topic or lying, but...

"He caught us hugging."

"...huh," is all he says to that, and then his "Wocket-Sprocket-Meter" beeps.

"Well, buddy," he says, tossing you the meter, which you manage to catch while holding your own, somehow. "Thank you sooooo much for collecting all my Wockets for me. I've got a very important date with my pillow, can't miss it, I'm sure Caine'll understand --"

"Oh BLEEP that, Jax."

Jax snickers but keeps walking.

"Are you avoiding me now too?"

He stops, turns to look lazily at you from over his shoulder. 

"Nawww, Kay, I wouldn't do that to ya."

"You're literally leaving me to finish this stupid task Caine assigned us both right now."

"Kay," he says. "Kay, Kay, Kay, I..."

"Do you want to hug?"

He freezes. Totally stock still, the tips of his ears standing straight up. Good lord.

Then he whirls around, and opens his arms wide. 

"Aww, you really want it from me that bad?"

Whatever. He's gone without meaningful contact longer than you have, you bet he'll melt in your arms or something stupidly endearing like that.

You walk forward matter-of-factly, and wrap your arms around him, leaning against his chest. Stupid how tall he is.

He's not soft. He doesn't have fur, he almost feels... rubbery. But he's warm... and he breathes. Like when you first met and you stole your sunglasses back from him. You were right back then, he does breathe...

It's then you realize that he hasn't moved to return the hug. He's almost totally still. That's probably not good. Quickly, you remove your hold and move to pull away --

and then he

pulls you back in, quickly crushing you against his chest, arms crossed over your back and hands gripping your arms. He rocks back and forth slightly, and you wonder if it's even a motion he's even aware of -- does he have any control over the fact his breathing picked up a little, or are you imagining that?

You could make a quip here. Something about him being the one that wants it that bad, or being desperate.

You don't.

He rocks several more moments before he seems to realize what he's doing and stops. He sucks in a breath through his teeth, looks down at you, then shoves you away by the shoulders.

His hands stay on your shoulders.

His smile is wide and unreadable.

Then he pulls his hands away and turns.

What could you say to him? You can't think of anything by the time he's out the door, leaving you to find enough Wockets for two people.

Chapter Text

A few weeks ago, on your very first night in the circus, the moment the door to your bedroom was closed and locked and you were sure you were alone, the first thing you did was sit on the bed and stick a hand between your legs.

Smoothness, as expected. Your own body was warm, but the texture was not that of skin… not rubbery like Jax either. It was almost… inoffensively, generically smooth, as if the blandness of the gray color of your form had been translated into texture. It was like touching a brand new laptop heated with heavy use that had never felt the oil from someone’s fingers, or a newly painted office wall dried by sunlight, or a paper fresh out of a copier still warm from the machinery. The only thing that felt alive about your body was its temperature, and you felt a pain of… homesickness? 

Could an old body you didn’t quite remember be a home? 

Well, if a body could be a temple…

You pressed down experimentally, and despite the fact your hand was where your crotch should have been, you got the same amount of feedback as if you’d pressed on your arm or something equally bland. You rubbed a slow circle, and still nothing. You brought your hand to your “mouth”, momentarily forgetting, and your fingers bumped up against the empty wall of your featureless face. 

You wanted to wash your hands suddenly, feeling disgusted, but the thought of leaving your room to look for a bathroom -- did this place even have bathrooms? If you got out of this place alive you’d never be ungrateful for the ability to have a break from everything to take a shit again.

If bodies were temples, this was an empty parking lot.

You tried to huff in annoyance, felt your body do a strange little spasm without the lungs to do it, and ended up making a weird hum. You flopped back as hard as you could onto the bed, realized the lights were on, got up, paced in a circle, turned them off, and threw yourself onto the mattress with abandon.

'I don't have a body to get tired, and to produce chemicals that induce sleepiness. Or do I? I have to have a brain somewhere, to be experiencing this. That last thing I remember was the headset. So there's either one of two things going on: Either I've been discovered comatose with the headset, and the hospital my body is in is working to fix things, or my mind is experiencing a fucky, time-dilated dream when in reality it's only been a few moments since I put the headset on.'

'The first situation is obviously ideal. There is also the possibility I'll never be discovered, and my body will die of thirst, after which I will cease to exist here. I hope. I really hope. However... if the others are really human, and to be believed, and they've been here for years, the time dilation theory is much more likely. Because in reality, I'd never heard of some accident with headsets happening and making people go into comas -- even if I don't remember my name or real life, I can assume that I wouldn't have put the headset on, if I knew it would do this.'

'Either way, this is an endurance game. A game. And to win, I just need to keep my sanity long enough. To draw out the game as long as possible. Either I will be revived, and I'll win, or I will die of thirst or during removal from this world, and I'll die.'

'So back to sleeping. Sleeping is necessary for survival. If time is being dilated, that means my brain won't be able to actually... make sleepy chemicals fast enough at the rate I am experiencing time. My body is running on a clock hundreds, or thousands or whatever, times slower than me. Huh. I wonder how that'll impact me here. Anyway, it's up to my mind alone to sleep, which means I am fully capable. The mind is very powerful. Very...'

You had thoughts like that for what felt like a few more hours, tossing and turning in the bed. Your sheets were soft, but had a weird texture that felt distinctly wrong in a way you couldn't place or describe.

And you couldn't close your eyes, because you had no eyes. Your face was smooth and blank, the only feature was its sunglasses that you'd placed on the generic nightside table. If you concentrated, though, everything went sort of dark and hazy.

Eventually you'd fallen into what felt like a very light sleep, where you were just barely aware of the room, still having thoughts but they were barely coherent and left unexamined. It felt... nice, almost, and when the alarm had rung on the next morning, your second day there, you hadn't really felt rested, but you felt better.

Repeat for several weeks.

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.

.

"Good morning everyone! How did you all sleep?"

Ragatha's voice is sweet, but hesitant, and you already know the reason why:

"GOD, ugh --"

"You KNOW we didn't sleep, shut UP!"

Zooble and Jax both look at one another with disdain as they accidentally talk over one another. You're all in the hallway, outside your doors, after the "morning alarm" went off. It's different every morning, but usually is a thematically appropriate sound, which over the course of these weeks has included but was not limited to: roosters crowing, the sound of an old fashioned analog alarm clock, trumpets, and…. cow moos accompanied by UFO alien sound effects, once.

After the alarm, usually you all end up waiting in front of your doors as Caine does a headcount. Then you go eat "breakfast" if you desire, and you have a few hours of free time to kill before "lunch." After that you all have to sing the theme song, do some kind of Caine-endorsed activity, and then there's some kind of small reward, dinner... and then "bed."

You can't help but be reminded of how prisons work with the morning line-ups and then headcounts, the schedules, the not leaving...

Though what a prison actually looks like seems to be slipping from your mind.

"I dreamed there were bugs crawling all over my body," Kinger says, bringing your attention back to the present. "It was nice."

That's...

Jax wasn't exactly wrong, about the not sleeping thing, but he wasn't exactly right either.

And now you were with everyone before the morning count, and Kinger was saying he dreamed bugs were crawling all over him, and you didn't know if that counted as a dream or a hallucination because of how lightly sleep seemed to work here.

"Kinger," you say, and he jerks, hands clenching as his eyes flick to your face. "Sorry, didn't mean to startle you. Kinger, how deeply do you generally sleep here, now? I feel like I can get a very light sleep, here, but I wonder if that's something you can do too."

The others have been here for so long, the mental strain is clear. They're paranoid, worn out, and always just a few bad days away from snapping completely. You need to be kind, and careful with your words, and explain your intentions so they can't be misread or unclear or interpreted the worst possible way. Maybe that way, when you eventually start having your own bad days, there will be enough trust there that they can take care of you too.

"Oh," Kinger says. "I just stare at the ceiling until the alarm rings."

"Cough, crazy, cough," Jax says, but instead of pretending to hide the insult in between two fake coughs, he actually says the word cough. Zooble, meanwhile, is giving you a weird look.

"Y-you can sleep?" Pomni asks, something like hope creeping into her voice. "I haven't been able to sleep very well. I mean, sometimes I get that sort of, l-light sleep you're talking about, b-but --"

"GOOOOOOOOOOD morning, everyone! Glad to see you're all looking so chipper on this fine day!" Caine shouts as he appears suddenly in the hallway.

"Chipper like a wood chipper," Zooble chimes in, and Jax snorts.

"One-two-three-four-five-six-seven," Caine counts to himself all in one beat, pointing at each of you in turn. "One-two-three-four-five-six-seven."

"Hey, Caine, what happens if one of us misses a count?" You ask.

Caine stops mid-point, which happened to be on Gangle, currently wearing her comedy mask. She squirms as his finger doesn't move from pointing at her and simply twitches. A sudden silence descends over the group.

"Well, Effeesikay, then you're simply marked a b s e n t."

"Well what does being uhh," you try to replicate the drawn out, staticky, horrific way he said the word, "abbbbbseeeennntt mean?"

"Too many unexcused absences mean you'll get detention! Can't have you holed up in your room too long, it's not good for you to miss meals and adventures when there's a whole beautiful world to explore!"

He flings his arms outwards, doing a little midair spin, gesturing to the room and presumably the tiny "world" "outside." You see Gangle visibly relax as Caine's attention shifts.

"Didn't help Coffee," Jax mutters, almost too quiet to hear, and you resist the urge to tilt your head in thought, because that would show that you'd heard him.

Who's Coffee?

Presumably, one of the people who had once lived in one of those many, many crossed out doors. And considering how tense the group gets, perhaps someone who... died, you suppose. And recently.

"BLUEBERRY WAFFLES FOR BREAKFAST!!!" Caine shouts suddenly, and nearly everyone startles, save Kinger, who is staring at the end of the hallway. Slowly, you all start making your way towards the "dining room" which is just the main room with a table and chairs spawned in.

You've walked down this hallway many times now, you know the drill. But... the mood is so low.

"Bet I could get there first," you say idly, but nobody moves.

"A race? What are you, twelve? That's stupid," Jax says. You nearly respond before suddenly, in a blur of red and ribbon, Gangle is gone.

And then, with a speedy sound effect, there is a Jax-shaped outline next to you but no Jax. You hear Ragatha laugh, a real laugh, and you race forward, trying to make up for two people getting a head start.

Running! You haven't run yet! Somehow, you can still feel the exertion of it, but it's not unbearable and you know the distance isn't far. You can see Gangle is still ahead of you, extending her ribbons long as they can go with each bound forward, and you try to do the same.

You can feel the impact of each step, but before you can register the unreality of the texture, you are already on to the next one. There is nothing but the race, the beating in your chest, the scream for air, and the race, the race. Jax is ahead of you but behind Gangle -- when she really stretches her body she still gets a longer stride than even him, tall as he is.

Instead of the tortoise and the hare, you've got the ribbon and the rabbit.

And then you round the corner and have to veer to the side in order to avoid crashing into Jax and Gangle, who are just standing there panting (or Jax is, at least). You nearly stumble and feel Gangle’s ribbons pull you back upright, but before you can react she’s retracted back into herself and is staring at the end of the hall where the main room should be.

Instead, Caine is in front of it, in front of a massive cheering “crowd,” except the crowd is all faceless and jumping up and down generically in the stands like in a sports video game. There’s a white and black checkered line where the door is, and a big golden ribbon across it, and further beyond that is a paved cement circle surrounded by flowering bushes, a big grassy expanse, and then the stands full of … fake people fake cheering. In the middle of the circle is Bubble, wearing a chef’s hat, hovering over the usual dining table filled with plastic-looking pancakes and waffles with little bowls full of various berries, whipped cream, and flavored syrup toppings.

Gangle shifts herself from one foot to the other, cheerful mask grinning nervously.

“Is it, like, cannibalism if you break that ribbon?” Jax asks. “Ah whatever, I’ll do it.”

He suddenly sprints forward without warning, oblivious to Gangle’s “HEY!!”, and when he does break the ribbon, confetti flies everywhere, spawned from nowhere. 

“YOU WON!!!!” Caine shouts, dropping a giant metallic gold medal over Jax, which looks ridiculous on his thin frame as the rabbit staggers with the weight of it. A podium sprouts up from the ground like some kind of cubic mushroom -- the tallest part of which Jax is occupying, labeled with a number one. 

The two and three spots are empty.

“Go ahead,” you say to Gangle. “You should have won, anyway.”

“O-oh, uh, are you sure --”

“HURRY UP GANGLE I WANT TO EAT SOMETIME THIS CENTURY!!” Jax shouts, pacing around the edges of his tiny part of the podium, looking distinctly like someone currently facing the problem of invisible walls. He kicks one foot out and it stops where the edge of the podium is, as though there were a pane of glass -- he has no paw pads on the underside of his feet, you note. Like a real rabbit.

Gangle crosses the boundary and yelps -- she is gone, gone!! -- and then the second half of her yelp rings out from a completely different area than where she just was as she respawns in second place on the podium. 

“YOU WON!!!” Caine congratulates her, putting the silver medal over her neck. Gangle yelps as it immediately drops, dragging her lightweight ribbons down, and her mask-face hits the floor with a distinct crack.

“Oh, God,” you mutter under your breath before calling out to her. “Gangle, are you alright?”

“She does that all the time,” Jax says as Gangle responds with a weak “y-yeah…”

It’s then that you hear the voices of the others behind you, about to round the corner, and you go ahead and step over the finish line just to get this over with. You were braced for a teleport onto the podium, but it’s still disorienting, and you were halfway through a step, so you might have stepped right off the edge had the invisible walls not been encasing you in your earned third place. 

“YOU WON!!” Caine shouts at you, and he sounds genuinely excited as he adorns you with the bronze medal. It’s not as big as the gold or silver ones, but it’s still a bit cartoonishly oversized, and it’s very heavy. You move your hands to hold the ribbon so that all that weight is dispersed instead of digging into your neck.

From your spot you can see as the rest of the group rounds the corner, and their immediate reactions:

Pomni hides behind Ragatha, who puts an arm out in front of her protectively as her one eye squints in confusion. 

“I just wanted to have a normal breakfast,” Zooble groans.

Kinger doesn’t even react and keeps walking. 

As he crosses the finish, Caine gives him a smaller participation medal, along with an enthusiastic assurance that HE WON!!!

“Oh my God these people take forever to walk,” Jax mutters to your right, pacing circles in his spot. “Hurry up, hurry up.”

Finally Agatha has convinced Pomni to move after Kinger takes his seat unharmed, and it’s only after everyone has crossed the finish line and received their WINNING PRIZES that the podium sinks into the void below the floor and the canned cheering dulls to quiet background noise. Jax steps over Gangle pinned to the floor by the weight of her medal in his rush for pancakes, and it’s you that leans over and helps her up.

“Thank you,” she whispers as she arranges her body back into its characteristic curly shape. “U-um… thank you!!” 

“No problem,” you say as you stand and offer her a hand, which she wraps around to pull herself up. “Are you… is your… your face?”

“Oh,” Gangle says, looking down at the two mask halves at her feet. “My comedy mask breaks all the time. The others… Jax mostly… thinks it’s. Comical. Hah…”

“Maybe pancake syrup is sticky enough to glue it back together.”

She actually giggles, and the teardrops at the corners of her eyes jiggle slightly but somehow don’t fall.

“Don’t worry about me… I’ll just have to fix it again, but it’s not like I haven’t done it before…”

She picks up her broken mask and goes to take a seat before you can think of a response or way to comfort her. 

The only empty seat left is one between Jax and Pomni. You pull up a chair to appraise the spread. Everything looks… like plastic toy food, except for the syrups and whipped cream, which look weirdly well-rendered. You take your fork and spear three waffles before piling them onto your plate, then put some red and blue spheres that pass as generic “berries” on there as well.

“Hey, Pomni,” you say, picking up a red and a blue berry and rolling them between your fingers.

“Wha-huh?” She startles, looking up from where she was staring at her own food. “What?”

“They’re like you.”

She glances over and narrows her eyes at the red and blue berries in your hands. They’re as brightly colored as she is.

“.... I’m a poor representation of a real object, so far from the original that it can only be faintly recalled from the copy, leaving you to wonder if the original ever even existed?”

“You’re red, blue, and round.”

“HAH!” Jax cuts in from the seat to your right. “Kay thinks you’re FAT!”

“I’m literally referring to her sleeves, and buttons, and shorts,” you defend yourself, hoping Pomni doesn’t believe this jackass.

“Faaaaat,” Jax insists in a sing-song voice.

“You’re a literal twinky twig --”

“-- Effeesikay. You said you could sleep.”

Both you and Jax turn to look at Pomni, who is looking at you with wide, desperate eyes.

“Please sleep with me.”

Jax nearly falls off his chair. Somewhere, you hear Bubble pop, and Caine makes a noise like he’s having a heart attack.

“N-not like THAT! I-it’s just, it’s been… so. Long, and I--” Pomni quickly tries to clarify, her face bright red, waving her hands around.

“Oh, pleeease, it’s been so looong!” Jax mocks her in a high-pitched falsetto, and there’s a wooden thud and the clink of silverware as Pomni knocks her head into the dining table and grabs the tassels of her hat so hard her hands tremble. You think Zooble and Ragatha are trying not to laugh at her poor choice of words.

Jax is such a bitch.

“Really jumping at any opportunity to practice begging in front of the whole class, huh Jax?” You say, and take delight in the way his ears twitch and his pupils contract before he blinks and relaxes back to his normal self. 

“Hey, you’re the one that made it weird, Effeesikay,” he says before taking a big bite of, for some godforsaken reason, pancake and waffle simultaneously, ruining the texture experience for both.

“Oooo,” Zooble coos. “He used your full name.”

You try a piece of your own waffle, “closing” your “eyes” so you don’t have to look at how weird it looks, and the taste is like most of the food here: an amalgamation of every memory of waffle you’ve ever had, fluffy and buttery and artificial and absolutely delicious as long as you focus on the taste and not the lack of texture or the fact you have to essentially force the waffle to clip through your head in order to eat since you don’t have a mouth oh God don’t think about it --

‘MMMMMM buttery and there’s a syrupy taste YUM.’

When you open your eyes again, you look over at Pomni to see that she’s still dying internally with her head on the table. Ragatha looks like she’s trying to decide whether to try and comfort her or not, Zooble is pushing berries around a pile of whipped cream on her plate with her fork, and Kinger is staring into space, nothing on the plate in front of him. The latter two have to eat food like you do, with the “clipping method,” and you… don’t think they like to, which is understandable, because it feels so weird and disconcerting --

Better think about Pomni for a little bit. 

“Do you want to have a sleepover?” You ask her.

“A sleepover?” She echoes, turning to face you, cheek resting on the table. 

“A WHOLESOME sleepover?” Caine echoes her, voice straining with his emphasis on the word wholesome.

“Of course it’ll be wholesome,” you state with extreme confidence. “Me and Pomni having pure and wholesome family fun time fun. What could possibly go wrong?”

Chapter Text

”I think a million things could go wrong here,” Pomni says, and when you nod in agreement she stiffens.

“A million things could go wrong,” you say. “But, a million things could also go right.”

“Ah—” She says, raising a finger, then she lowers it as a thoughtful expression crosses her face. “A-ah, I mean... you're not... that's not wrong, but —”

“Exactly! How could I go wrong when I'm not wrong?”

“Hold it!” Caine interjects, and a sound like a record scratch brings the conversation to a halt. You realize, suddenly, that everyone else's eyes are on you — you and Caine. Watching.

“Who's to say I'll even let you have this so-called sleepover in the first place?” Caine asks, making air quotes with his fingers as he says the word sleepover, then leaning over with his arms crossed.

“Why're you saying sleepover like that, Caine?” You ask with false innocence.  “I don't get it.“

Somewhere, Jax snorts.

”How am I to be assured you don't have nefarious intentions with our poor Pomni here?“ Caine says, flouncing through the air to hover behind the aforementioned jester. ”Look at her. So sweet and delicate. Meanwhile, YOU.“

He points an accusatory finger at you, the curled fingers tight enough that they look to be digging into his palm.

”You... Y O U...“

”Me,“ You reply, wishing more than anything you could be giving him a shit-eating grin. ”Meeeeee!“

”You don't know how things are supposed to work around here! And Pomni is so new and impressionable!“ Caine cries, running his other hand across the tops of his gums the way a person might smooth back their hair when stressed.

”U-um—“ Pomni tries, and Caine pulls out a television remote from hammerspace and straight-up mutes her. Pomni tries to say another word, but nothing comes out, and she stiffens before her eyes turn into panicked scribbles and she starts staring at nothing.

”HEY,“ You bark, standing up so fast that your chair clips through your legs and gets launched backwards across the room.

'That's, that's not fair, this thing shouldn't get to play God with us and snatch our essential needs for love and respect and communication right out of our hands, that's worse than violating! That's inhuman!'

Somewhere behind you can hear your chair clattering, but that's irrelevant, the only thing that matters is how loud you can make your voice and how close you can step to Caine, who's hovering back now as you invade his space. You're so mad you're shaking, your whole body ready to pounce on this maw of hypocrisy, something deep in you thrumming, writhing, and wondering how fast you could take this guy out if you started with his eyes.

”HEY,” You say again, loud. “Unmute Pomni, NOW.“

”You and I are having a conversation, Effeesikay—“

”Unmute her!“ You shout at him, and your shoulders jump as he raises his hands in front of himself.

”Let's all use our indoor voices, now!”

Oh, that motherfucking --

“Kay,” another voice snaps, sharp, making you jump. It takes longer than it should for you to realize it's Ragatha, and you keep your face pointed at Caine as you shift your eyeless gaze toward the rag doll. Pomni has disappeared under the table, you realize, and Ragatha is standing between you and her — between you and Caine and her friend.

Everyone is tense, expectant, the silence potent.

Well, you're not letting that fucker get the first word in.

“Indoor voices,” you agree, practically growling, but no longer shouting. “Unmute my friend.”

“Well, I can't just go around giving everybody whatever they want every time they throw a temper tantrum! The Circus is all about awarding only GOOD behaviors!“ Caine explains, as if you're a child demanding back a plastic trinket and not an adult begging for your friend's voice back. Your fists tremble at your sides as you look up at Caine, hovering high enough that his feet are near your chest.

”If you've got a problem with me, punish me, not Pomni or anybody else,“ You state, voice shaking.

“You're being mean, Caine,” Bubble suddenly says, hovering out from behind the toothy fiend, who screeches and lets go of his cane, which simply floats midair.

“Bubble, not in front of everyone!”

“Aw, why not??” Bubble asks. ”You're being a freak. A CONTROL freak.“

“Bubble has a point there,” Jax suddenly cuts in, and you can't help but move your head slightly when you look at him because you can hardly believe he actually kind of stood up for someone.

Something has shifted in the atmosphere, though. Caine visibly wilts, and after a snap of his fingers, the sound of Pomni sniffling underneath the table becomes abruptly audible.

“O-oh,“ she says, and then she goes quieter again.

You've never wished for the ability to sigh in relief quite so badly before.

“Caine, I think the more you try to control everyone in the name of protecting them, the more you end up hurting them,” you say.

”You don't know anything,“ Caine states, and there is no malice or hatred in the sentence, simply stone-cold certainty, and somehow that is worse.

”You should totally have that sleepover though,“ Bubble adds, floating aimlessly upside down, apparently bored of watching your proverbial dick measuring contest with the devil in charge of this particular circle of hell. Caine makes a noise like he's drunk lemonade and it's gotten in his mouth-eyes.

”I'm taking that as permission, no take-backsies,“ You state quickly.

”That's not—! You can't just— Bubble, why would you do this?!“ Caine yelps, going through a series of dramatic mid-air poses before landing on a floating fainting couch spawned out of nowhere.

Bubble  merely grins with fanged teeth.

Caine is a fucking asshole, this is true.

But his main motivation behind his rampant paternalism seems to be... safety, fun, and comfort for everyone. Even if he just ends up making things worse by eliminating essential human experiences and emotions. 

So...

You clasp your hands underneath your chin, tilt your head back to look up at him, and pretend you're making the biggest, wettest, most pathetically cute puppy-dog eyes known to all of mankind.

”Oh, please,“ You plead, and somehow it doesn't quite surprise you when you see golden and white sparkles appear around your head, framing your cuteness as much as possible when you can't make your own facial expressions. ”Please, please Caine, can I please have a sleepover?“

”Augh!“ Caine cries out, clutching at his chest and wriggling as though in immense pain. ”No, NO! The CUTENESS! NOT THE CUTENESS!!!“

Critical hit! 

”Oh, but Caine, we would have so much fun!”

Caine makes a sound halfway between a scream and a squeal that he draws out just long enough to get a little uncomfortable before he simply shouts:

“FINE! Fine!! Have your fun little sleepover, Effesikay, but if you start corrupting my circus goers you're going to regret it!”

“YES!” You shout, pumping your fists in the air and doing a victorious hop. You swing yourself down to peek under the table at Pomni, who looks downright astonished. 

“Didja hear that!?” You exclaim, pointing at her, and then everyone else in succession. “YOU get a sleepover! And YOU get a sleepover! And YOU get a sleepover! Everyone gets a sleepover!!!!”

Ragatha shakes her head, but there's a small smile on her face she doesn't bother trying to hide. Pomni's face brightens a little as she crawls back into her chair. Zooble's antennae twitch, but they don't roll their eyes, which you decide to count as a win. Kinger blinks at you.

Gangle actually gets a goofy little grin on her face and looks down at the table — and to your surprise, she's actually capable of blushing.

Jax, meanwhile, makes an amused scoff and tilts his head, grin looking somehow calculating. 

Caine simply huffs, and you look up at him again.

“I meant what I said,” you say to him. “Wholesome fun time fun. You won't regret this!“

”I'm sure I won't, Effeesikay,“ Caine replies before picking up his cane from where it was spinning slowly in the air. ”ANNNYway, I've got to make preparations for today's ADVENTURE! I'll see you all in a few hours!”

He disappears with a burst of confetti — an uncommon but not unheard of occurrence — and the little colorful papers and sparkles settle on all the sticky, uneaten pancakes and waffles. As soon as he's gone the space around everyone distorts and warps, and you put your hands on your face to black out your vision because it makes your head hurt. When you pull your hands away, the room is once again in the default circus state instead of the fake outdoors and crowds it had been before. 

”Normal breakfast,“ You hear Zooble whisper venomously at their now-sparkling plate of waffles. ”Just... one... That's all I want.“

”Are you gonna eat that?“ Bubble asks them, staring at their uneaten waffle stack covered in paper and glitter. Zooble's antennae twitch again.

”No,“ they say with enough vitriol to make you shrink in your seat several feet away.  Jax stands up and leaves without another word, and you turn to look at Kinger and Gangle, both staring off into space. A glance at Pomni and Ragatha reveals a similar situation.

”Why's everyone so quiet?“ You ask the table, and Ragatha blinks her one eye before turning to you.

”You... you stood up to Caine. Reasoned with him. And then he gave you something you wanted.“

”And?“ You ask, smooshing the remaining food on your plate into a glittery paste.

“That... almost never happens. He never listens. And you got him to listen,” she continues, sounding amazed — and a little apprehensive. You have a sudden lurch in your chest as you start to think:

'These people see Caine as an enemy — and they're not even really wrong to think of him that way, if I'd been here as long as they have I might too. Maybe I might in the future. But if I seem to be aligning myself with him... they might not trust me anymore.'

You stare at Jax's empty seat.

“It's just a matter of knowing how he thinks,” You try to explain, gesturing with your fork. “He wants us to be his definition of safe, he wants us to be happy and have fun, but he goes about it all stupid and wrong.”

“He has a weird definition of safe and fun,” Zooble chimes in. 

“Yeah,” You agree. “That's the issue. And I'm pressing the issue, until he snaps.”

“You're going to get hurt,” Kinger warns you suddenly. “The trap snaps shut. Teeth are made to bite.”

It's the most talkative he's been at this breakfast, and it makes you shudder.

“We'll get there when we get there,” you reply, and stand. “I'm gonna go make my room nice. Whoever wants to come over tonight can.”

“Have fun,” Gangle says quietly as you depart, and you try to smile at her out of habit, but end up giving her a thumbs up instead.

.

.

.

Your room is boring.

It's mostly bare, the only furniture being a bed and a bedside table. You don't have a closet, because you don't have clothes. There's a light switch, but no visible light bulbs or source of light, which is mildly freaky. There's no window, either. The floor is a generic gray-brown carpeting, the walls inoffensive beige. At least they're a good backdrop for the crayon tallymarks you've got going to keep track of the days. 

“Hm,” you hum, putting your hands on your hips. “Hmmmmmm.”

Your bed is a single. You don't know if that'll fit everyone. So, first order: get a bigger bed, and some more pillows and blankets. While you search, keep an eye out for cool decorations.

You look in the bedside table to see your one possession: the half-empty pack of crayons. Then you suddenly remember the 3rd place medal from that morning's race you left on the table. Maybe you can hang that on your wall. 

You'll go back to the dining room, then look around for a bigger... mattress? Yeah. A mattress in a circus. Surely, among all the weird rooms, there's a mattress room somewhere.

As you walk, you think about the places you've seen so far. It's actually not much. You've purposefully been avoiding exploring a lot, simply because you want to preserve the illusion of space for yourself as long as possible. The longer you can still find things that are “new” and interesting, the longer you can preserve your sanity. Hopefully.

This is an endurance game, after all.

When you get back to the table the only person... well, you don't think Bubble counts as a person. The only... entity? Bubble is the only one still there. He's cleaning up the rest of the food, mostly by licking it up with his obnoxiously long tongue. 

“Hey, Bubble,” You say, walking around to where you'd been sitting, and picking up your medal with both hands.

“Hi, Fuck!”

“Do you know where I can find a — wait, say that again.”

“That again?”

“No, my — you said my name, but it wasn't all — say it again?”

“It again?” Bubble says innocently before eating a bowl of berries in one bite, bowl included. You resist the urge to pinch where the bridge of your nose would be if you had a nose. 

”Do you know where I could find a bigger mattress?“

“A mattress,” Bubble says, deadpan. “Hmmm, mattress, mattress, WHY do you need  a bigger mattress?”

“For all my friends to sleep on?”

“Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm,”Bubble hums. “Sus. Sussy.”

“I'm not inviting my friends over for a giant HONK, Bubble,” you sigh, exasperated. “I'm inviting my friends over to help them deal with chronic insomnia, stemming from an environment where they feel watched and unsafe. Which you could HELP me with if you help my room look less sterile and wretched, and you could START by helping me find a big, comfy mattress.“

Bubble blinks at you. 

“Huh,” he says.

”BEEEP does not equal intimacy,“ You state firmly. ”Caine likes to pretend otherwise. But it's not evil or bad to be close with others. Especially in a place like this.“

Bubble licks the confetti from around his mouth and teeth.

”You'll owe me,“ he says. “For interior decorating services.”

”Owe you what, exactly?“ You ask.

”A favor. I decide what and when. Not a huge favor. Not a gigantic favor. But a big favor.“

“Yeah,” You reply. “But what's stopping me from finding what I need myself?”

“You'll never find it before lunch,” Bubble sing-songs. “And then you'll have to do Caine's adventure, and then dinner, and then everyone will go to your room and it'll be all bare and sad because you didn't let your buddy Bubble help you out —”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” You grumble. “Fine. You help me make my room look warm and inviting, and I'll help you out later. Deal?”

”That wasn't so hard, was it?“ Bubble asks. ”I can get all this later. Follow me.“

As you go to walk behind him, he looks down at the heavy medal in your hands. 

“Why're you still holidng that?”

“Uh?” You say, confused. “Because it's mine?”

“You know you can put it away?”

You feel the muscles of your face scrunch up in confusion, which is a really weird feeling when you don't have anything those muscles are actually attached to. 

“Like... pull stuff out of nowhere? I can do that?“

”The others can,“ Bubble says. ”I can make stuff appear on my tongue. Look! Blehhhhhh.”

As Bubble opens his mouth you see, perched on his glistening tongue, a Caine-shaped keychain. The man is in a jaunty pose, seemingly smiling, you'd guess from the body language. It's hard to tell when he's smiling, since it's all teeth. 

You nod in approval. Pretty impressive for a guy with no limbs or hands to have a way to carry whatever objects he wants.

“Sick,” you say as he pulls his tongue back into his mouth. 

“Try it,” Bubble says. “Just put it behind your back and let go. When you reach for it it'll be there.”

You hold the medal behind yourself, let go, and —

KLUNK.

You hear it clatter onto the floor, and look behind yourself to see it resting on the tile. Bubble snickers.

“You have to believe it'll work, or it won't work. Try again.“

”Okay,“ you say after you pick it up, square your stance, and hum in lieu of a huff. ”Watch this. I'm gonna make this heavy metal object... disappear.“

THUD.

Bubble hoots in laughter as you begrudgingly pick up the object again.

“You were so serious! HAH! Do it again, again!”

“POW,” is the sound effect that comes out of your voice instead of the word 'bitch' that you wanted to say, as you let go of the medal you think about how badly you want to get it right, rather than the fact it shouldn't be possible at all — and there is silence. 

You turn. Nothing is on the floor.

“Oh my God,” you say as you spin around. You don't see it anywhere.

“Pull it out again!” Bubble says, and you shake your head. 

”I'm not doing all that again,“ You say as you walk behind him. He's hovering away now, towards one of the many hallways.

”Yeah? Well, you'll have to when we get back to your room, cos you'll need to use hammerspace to store anything you wanna take back.“

You groan. 

Bubble takes you on a winding path through a maze of colorful corridors until you feel that you wouldn't be able to make your way back without him. Along the way, you help yourself to a few cool paintings, a neat rug in front of  a blank locked door, and a small round accent table plus the vase of flowers on top of it. You pick them specifically because they're simple and plain and in soft pastel colors -- in this world of garish primaries and eyestrain, you want to specifically choose everything in your room to be a visual break as well as a mental one.

Finally, at a dead-end hallway, you see a metal door. This hallway has white tile flooring, and some idiot designer has decided red spatters and trails on the tile would make for a friendly environment. You can hear what sounds like electric lights humming, but there's no lights visible, like most places within the circus. 

There are no other doors. Just the long, empty hall.

”Is that it?“ You ask Bubble, pausing and waiting for him to keep hovering in front of you. He doesn't.

”Yep!“ He replies, popping the P, an impressive feat for someone with no lips. 

”...Can I walk behind you?”

“Why?”

“This hallway is creepy.”

“Well, yeah, that's why Caine doesn't let me come in here. Or anybody else. You wouldn't be able to find this spot if it wasn't for me.”

Instantly you're tense, and you take a step back.

“I... are you sure this is a good idea?”

“Nope!” Bubble says, still popping his P. “Too late to turn back now, though, right?”

“Won't Caine know I was here, if I take something from here?”

“There's other ways to get a big mattress. This was just the fastest. Plus Caine never checks here anymore.“

You stand still, staring at the metal door. Considering.

You think of yourself in the center of a sleepy cuddle pile of friends.

You take a step forward. Then another. And soon, you're walking down the hallway, footsteps silent since you don't have shoes. 

(Your feet, like most of you, are simplified: the only toe you've got is the necessary one, the big toe. The rest is smooth and gray. Which is stupid, since you've got five fingers, why not five toes? But whichever freak gave you your body apparently takes no constructive criticism.)

You touch the door handle. It's cold, and now that you're close you can see there's a little slot in the door, like for mail. Or food. 

Is this... a prison door?

You look over your shoulder at Bubble, who is hovering at the end of the hallway. 

”Bubble? Is this door gonna close and lock on me?” You call to him.

“Noooooooo!” Bubble calls back, and that makes you feel worse.

“Can't you, like, hold the door open with your tongue or something?”

“You're so needy!” Bubble whines as he floats over to you and joins you. “Fiiiiiine. But it's not gonna lock. It's unlocked.”

You turn back to the door and open it — oh.

It's a padded room.

It's all white, soft. In the center is just a single mattress with no sheets. It's clean and white, and doesn't look to be used — but then again, nobody sweats or sheds skin cells here, so who's to say how used it actually is?

Your hands are shaking again.

”Bubble,“ You say, voice wavering. ”B-Bubble, what room is this?“

”The rubber room!“

”I-I, I don't wanna go in there. You get it. Go grab it. Please.“

“Alrighty!”

The bubble floats cheerfully into the padded cell, and chomps into the mattress with his sharp teeth. With a grunt, he begins to drag it out of the room, painfully slowly, inch by inch. The moment he's close enough you reach out with one hand to grab at the mattress and help drag it more quickly towards the exit. 

Your other hand stays on the door. You're not letting it close behind you, unlocked or not. Finally after a few moments it's halfway through and you can use both hands to drag, since the mattress itself is propping open the door. Bubble decides to push from behind, and between the two of you you get it out and the door swings shut with a horrible click.

“O-okay, I want out, just need some sheets and blankets on the way back but I want out of this hallway now please,” You state, all in a rush. You look down at the big mattress and realize suddenly that it's too big to pretend to drop behind yourself. Can you even add something this large to your inventory?

“Impatient!” Bubble chides you. “Fine, I'll grab it, you probably can't carry something this big yet anyway. Go wait around the corner, I'll be with you in a sec.”

You practically run down the hall and turn the corner, press your back against the wall and sink to the floor. You take off your sunglasses with one hand and the other presses up to your face, obscuring your vision. You want so badly to breathe, to maybe hyperventilate, but you can't even do that, your heart is fluttering in your chest and there's nowhere for the bad feelings to go and you curl your hand and press your fist into your face and wonder, if you started tearing at your face, what would be underneath? You press your fingertips to where your mouth used to be and whine as you wish you could chew your fingernails but you have no nails and you have no teeth, and you press your palm up under your chin and rub hard, but your jaw doesn't budge because this time it wasn't designed to move, God, you want fingernails so bad, do you even bleed at this point, if you started trying could you —

“I'm baaaaaaaack,” Bubble sing-songs, and you jerk and whimper a little but somehow get unsteadily to your feet. 

Bubble makes no comment on your state, simply turns, and you stumble behind him, trying to put it out of your mind, trying to think of nothing except how you're gonna lay out everything in your room when you get back, wondering if you asked for a window, what Caine would say. 

.

.

.

Lunch is hard. Mostly because you're not feeling very talkative, but also because you don't want to act any different than normal, which is hard because you can't think of anything to do or say. 

Luckily, it seems Gangle, Kinger, Zooble, and Pomni spent their free time playing some kind of card game, and most of the lunch period is spent with them discussing and arguing the results of that game. Ragatha starts explaining the rules for other card games they frequently play to Pomni, who actually seems interested. The doll makes an effort to include you, too, since you're also new, and while you do think it would be fun to play sometime, you mostly just nod and stare at your plate. 

Jax, too, is weirdly quiet, only piping up to deliver a sarcastic remark once or twice, but finally lunch is over and Caine gets everyone's attention by clapping his hands twice.

(He always gets everyone's attention in a different way each time. Sometimes he claps, sometimes he hits a spoon against a glass, sometimes he simply says something. You're weirdly grateful for this, because if he just did the same thing every day eventually you'd probably get trained to a single singal like a dog or something.)

“I've got a great game for you all today,” He says with his usual showman tone, but today it's a little quieter, a little more warm. “Today I'll be assigning you all into pairs and one group of three, and each will work to get the most points! However, today's game is a little different — I have a prize in store for the winning team! My golden WINNER'S TICKETS, one for each winner! Winner's tickets can be exchanged for one thing you want — whatever your heart desires, I'll try my best to make it happen! This won't be the last time I ever do this, but it will be rather rare, so you'd all better do your best on the games today!“

Suddenly, you feel as though you're in a school of sharks who've scented blood. Everyone — everyone is staring at Caine with unbridled hunger. 

”E-even,“ Pomni says, ”Even if we want to leave? What then? Could we leave?”

“Hey, wait,” Jax snaps. “Won't the team of three have an advantage? That ain't fair.” 

“Excellent point, Jax! That's why I'm leaving the assignment of teams not up to you or me, but rather LADY FORTUNE HERSELF!“

A giant wheel falls from the ceiling and thuds onto the floor, making the silverware and plates on the lunch table rattle. There are seven slices on the wheel, each colored with an appropriate color and labeled with a cartoon image of one of your faces. You instantly pick out yourself — a slice of gray, the face a spherical head adorned with only sunglasses. 

”NOW! Get ready for the theme song, everyone, because after that we'll be doing our TEAM ASSIGNMENTS!!!“

Chapter Text

"Did anyone just feel that?" Kinger says suddenly.

"The thud from the spinny wheel?" Ragatha asks, turning to look at him.

"No, it felt like hundreds of days passed in the moment of darkness when I blinked my eyes just now."

Bubble sticks out his tongue.

Jax snickers, and makes the hand sign for crazy by his temple, looping his pointer finger in a circle.

There's not much else to say, then, because you feel your feet leave the ground as Caine hovers the group skyward to perform the theme song. You tense up and swear to yourself that you're never picking up a cat or dog unless you have to when you get out of this circus. 

The song feels mercifully short  -- you could sing it in your sleep by now -- and then as you're placed back onto the tile a drumroll starts playing from the ether. Caine stretches out one arm in a rubberhose fashion and spins the wheel so forcefully that you half expect it to start rolling away. The plastic arrow goes "tika-tika-tika-tika" as it spins and slows, and then...

It lands on Zooble.

"You know," Zooble says, crossing their arms (today it's one of those plastic clapper hands in bright orange and a blue robot grabby claw), "I could actually sit this one out, if you guys wanted even team numbers."

"SIT this one OUT?!" Caine exclaims. "Even for a WINNER'S TICKET?!"

"I know better than to trust a wish from you," Zooble says. "Knowing you, you'd turn anything into, like, a monkey's paw situation."

"You want a monkey's paw?!?"

"Not what I said --"

Zooble's protest is cut off by Caine flinging a long, dark purple object out from behind his back. It ragdolls in his hold like a dead thing. Zooble leans back instinctively, eyes narrowed in disgust, but then leans forward a bit upon really seeing it, gaze softening.

"Huh," They say, taking it in their hands. It looks like the sort of plastic pieces that they're made of, and they detach their orange hand clapper to try the new limb out. They turn their new appendage over and wiggle their fingers.

The purple arm ends in what looks remarkably like a monkey's paw, not quite human but slightly smaller and with long, spindly fingers.

"Okay, this... doesn't suck as much as the last one. You win this one. I'll try your game."

Confetti spawns from nowhere as Caine cheers -- "Hooray!" -- and Zooble's antennae twitch, eyebrows pinching in a way that makes you suspect they're already regretting their decision.

"Will you spin the BLOOP wheel already?" Jax grumbles, crossing his own arms and tapping his foot impatiently. Caine cheerfully obliges, the slice representing Zooble quickly being eaten up as the wheel's colors rearrange to show only the remaining contestants.

You wonder if Jax would actually stomp when mad or fearful, like an actual bunny, as you watch the wheel slow and land on Pomni.

"Oh," she says, glancing at Zooble a bit bashfully. You haven't really seen them interact one-on-one much. Zooble's lower eyelids raise up as though giving a friendly smile, one that Pomni returns. Cute.

Caine spins the wheel again, and when it lands on Gangle, she squeezes her eyes shut and crosses the pointed tips of both her ribbons as though crossing her fingers.

"Not Jax, not Jax, not Jax," you hear her whispering under her breath. 

The wheel spins again. 

Lady Luck is a sadist.

"Well, Ribbons, looks like it's gonna be you and me today," Jax says, sidling up beside her. Her happy smile looks incredibly strained. You think you hear a muffled, tea-kettle like scream emanating from behind her closed mask-mouth.

"Aaaaand that leaves Kinger! Ragatha! And Effesikay! For our last team!"

Caine snaps his fingers, and suddenly everyone is wearing a large neon shirt over their clothes, each team with a different color. Pomni and Zooble get that florescent yellow that safety vests have, Gangle and Jax get neon pink, and your team gets bright green.

"Oh, cool, I finally get clothes," You say as you grab the hem of your shirt and hold it out to examine the color, stitching, and fabric. It feels like a generic dollar-store t-shirt, cheap mass-produced feel, but still, it's nice to wear something other than sunglasses. You glance over at your two teammates.

Kinger's shirt is somehow remaining on him, over his purple cape, despite the fact he has no shoulders or arms to keep it held up, the fabric sleeves hanging limply. Ragatha is talking with him -- "Hey, look, we match!" -- and turning this way and that to see how the new shirt looks on herself over her dress. Somehow, the green and purple combo is working well on her.

"Alright, everybody! Let's get started!" Caine says, pointing at the ceiling. A whirlpool of color opens up, and the gang is all unceremoniously tossed through the portal. You stumble out, somehow ending up on your feet despite the fact you were just tossed upwards, in what looks like --

A school hallway? It's all shiny and has the polish of computer blender art, but it's your stereotypical U.S. American middle or high school hallway, with white-black-gray flecked tiles, blue lockers, beige walls and bright square lights. 

A giant whiteboard appears from nowhere, capital letters emblazoned on it in red before it disappears:

SCHOOL SCAVENGER SCRAMBLE

"Oh, gross, school. I never agreed to this," Jax grumbles. 

Caine is already in front of you all, twirling his cane in one hand. 

"I've prepared for you all a SCAVENGER HUNT! All over AMAZE HIGH I've hidden QUESTION MARKS! Touching a mark uses it up and earns your team a QUIZ QUESTION! You have three minutes to answer, and when all the question marks are gone, whichever team has gotten the most questions right wins the game, and the WINNER'S TICKETS!"

Then, suddenly, speaking so fast it's as though he's listing side effects in a medicine commercial, Caine says:

"Winnersticketsandquestionmarksarenontransferableonceclaimedtheamazingdigitalcircusstaffarenotliabletoanydamagestobodypersonhoodsenseofselforsanitythatmayormaynotoccurduringtheplayofschoolscavengerscramblebycontinuingbreathingyouagreetothesetermsandconditions."

"Wh-what?" Gangle asks. She's shrunken in on herself, but is still smiling apprehensively.

"This sounds really fun," Ragatha chirps brightly. "Kinger, are you... any good at trivia?"

"About six thousand silkworm cocoons are needed to produce one pound of silk," Kinger says, holding up two fingers.

The sound of an airhorn makes everyone jump. 

"Let the games begin!" Caine shouts, holding the horn in his hands, before disappearing with a pop. Bubble stares at the empty space for a moment before a wadded up neon pink shirt flies into him and makes him pop, too. You glance over at Jax to see he's gone back to just wearing his overalls again. 

"What?" He asks when faced with you and Gangle's stares. "I'm already wearin' pink, it's redundant."

"Jax," Gangle says. He turns to face her, trademark grin on his face. When she leans in, his brow twitches and he leans back slightly, but she stops by his ear and lifts her ribbons to the sides of her mouth, as though whispering something. 

Jax's wide pupils narrow into little square pinpricks as his smile drops. He pulls away and gives her an unreadable look. Gangle's mouth is a thin, straight line. 

He nods. Turns. The red ribbon hesitates, then follows behind him as they pick a hallway and begin to explore. Pomni and Zooble, Yellow Team, have seemingly decided to go up a nearby staircase, conversing in low tones.

What the hell was that about?

You ask Ragatha and Kinger as much as the two of you head in the opposite of Pink Team. 

"Mm," Ragatha hums, her mouth a frustrated line. "Jax and Gangle are... certainly something, aren't they?"

"He's a bi -- a. A big.... beachball."

Ragatha actually snorts. 

"Goodness, you make me wish I could actually say the word! I've tried everything! Telling him off, talking to Gangle, trying to get her to stand up for herself... but there's only so much I -- I mean we, can do when we're all forced to hang out together every day." 

She grabs her wrist as she walks.

"Have you tried beating the CUCKOO out of him?" You enquire.

"What?" She asks, whirling to face you so fast the physics engine makes her hair wiggle a little bit.

"You know," You say, gesturing with your hands. "Tackling him, pinning him, wailing on 'em with fists. Choking. Biting. The works."

"That's--!" Ragatha chokes out, turning to face the other way. "O-oh! A question mark!" 

There's one stuck halfway in the vents of a storage locker, bright white with a bold black outline. When she touches it, it turns your team's green color, and you see a transparent green textbox pop up above it:

Solve the equation.
9x+20=-7

"Oh, jeez," Ragatha mutters. "Algebra. I haven't done this since college."

"You know, when I don't know the answer, I always pick B," Kinger pipes up.

"This isn't multiple choice, Kinger."

"Oh."

This is gonna be a long day.

Chapter Text

What is the human body's heaviest organ?

Answer the question within three minutes.

"It's obviously blood," You say. Ragatha laughs, a bit higher than usual. You turn around to look at her, and she takes a step back.

"That -- that was fast!" She exclaims.

"What? It's liquid, right, and liquid is heavier than everything else," You reason.

"Well, yes, but --" Ragatha fiddles with the hem of her shirt. "I -- don't think?? Blood is an organ?"

"Mmmm... maybe you're right. Dunno what else it could be. Kinger, any ideas?"

"Tungsten is pretty heavy."

"Good idea," You say, "But not in the body. Blood, final answer."

There's an incorrect buzzer as the answer is revealed below the text:

S K I N

"Oooooh..." You say, facepalming. You're starting to get used to the texture of your own new skin. The feeling of feedback when you press a palm to your own forehead is grounding.

"I don't like this question," Ragatha mutters, quiet enough that you're pretty sure you weren't supposed to hear. You shake out your hand as you look around.

The Question Mark remains green -- useless, now, since you can't get another question out of it. At least the other teams won't be able to use it. You open the door to the nearest classroom and poke your head in. Surprisingly, the whole school is highly detailed -- there's actually pencils, schoolwork, and pens on each desk, different colored backpacks tucked away under chairs. Each classroom clearly belongs to a different subject -- this one is a geography or history class, you think, with the maps on the walls and the globe on the back shelves next to some books.

Probably because you haven't spotted a single NPC. The resources that go towards running those went to decoration instead.

It kinda gives the whole place an abandoned, eerie vibe, but in a fun way.

"Not a fan of blood?" You ask Ragatha as you waltz in and start looking in the drawers under the teacher's desk. There's stationary, some books, folders labeled "graded" and "ungraded." No Question Marks, though, so you ditch that, leaving the drawers open, and start rifling through backpacks. Most of them... are just filled with crumpled cardboard, like the filler stuff you might get in a package where whatever's inside is way smaller than the box itself, but not delicate enough to warrant packing peanuts.

It all feels more than a bit fake, surreal, like you walked onto a movie set. You almost want to start posing for imaginary cameras.

"I just..." Ragatha responds as she starts searching the desks. "I don't -- well, didn't! It's not like we bleed here -- didn't like seeing people get hurt. Or... getting hurt. Nobody likes that!"

"Understandable," Kinger says. "Oooh, I found one!"

A new text box pops up:

How old are the horses that run in the Kentucky Derby?

"Oh, I know this one!" Ragatha chirps. "They're three years old! Final answer!"

A triumphant ding rings out. She was right!

"Nice!" You say, walking over and holding up your palm. She gives you a high five. Her hand is pleasantly soft to the touch, which isn't surprising, but still nice.

"You know," You say, glancing around the room for any signs of question marks. "I'm actually enjoying myself. This is pretty fun."

.

.

.

"This BOINK sucks," Jax mutters at the florescent pink textbox.

Two concentric circles are of radii 5 cm and 3 cm. Determine the length of the chord of the larger circle which touches the smaller circle.

"Didn't you go to college?" The rabbit asks, turning to face the shell of a female beside him. "You should know this kinda SPLUNK, right?"

Jax hadn't. He'd gotten trapped in the summer between high school and college, waiting for answers back from his scant applications. He feels his face do a weird twitch and refocuses on the curve of Gangle's ribbons, how she withers under his height. He's looming, he realizes.

He doesn't stop.

"I went to college for graphic design," she says, her voice more a wisp than a statement. "I'm not... I don't remember any of this."

"Oh yeah, that's why you quit," Jax remembers, and his grin widens when Gangle shrinks into herself further. He gives her a half-friendly smack on the back of her mask, since she doesn't have a shoulder to clap. Feels his own chest twinge when she jumps under his hand. "But hey! Don't be such a Debbie Downer, when we get those tickets you won't have to worry about any of that bull anymore."

"Right," Gangle says, glancing up at the awaiting textbox. "Um.... four?"

The textbox dings. That makes fifteen questions right.

"Oh ZOINK, you actually guessed right," Jax says, blinking. "Ah, well, onto the next."

He doesn't need to look behind to know Gangle is following him demurely, even if she's so light that she doesn't make the sound of footsteps.

She knows what happens when she goes against him.

She's smart enough for that, at least.

"H-hey, um, Jax...?"

"What?" He snaps. The venom in his own voice surprises him. The lack of movement in his face doesn't. He's gotten used to being able to speak without the requirement of actually emoting. 

The more he does it, the easier it gets to stay that way.

"O-oh, um... sorry...it's just..."

Jax says nothing. Yellow eyes rove the halls, looking for question stickers. His brain hurts with memories of ducking through halls like these, getting chastised by teachers for having earbuds in, bumping shoulders with his friends, animated chatter of people, flesh-and-blood warm people, real and alive and --

"Are you really going to... I mean, do you think Caine is capable of granting a request like that?"

"You're the one that suggested it, Ribbons." Steel leaks into his voice, making her next words somehow even more tremulous.

"I know, it's just, I'm thinking about it more... I don't know, I'm wondering if it's really a good idea? I just... Caine, he... might not do that right. I think if he could f-fix... or change... he would have already? I think? I mean, Zooble said that stuff about a monkey's paw, and that story is literally about -- "

"Gangle."

He hears her sharp inhale. She shuts up. A rotten gladness spreads in his chest.

"You know, I read that story in ninth grade. I was in AP classes back then," he says, stretching his arms wide, lacing his fingers together at the back of his head. He doesn't feel the touch of his own skin, only the gloves.

They walk in silence a few moments.

"I don't care if it's not real," he says. "I don't care. None of it is real. We're not real either."

He hears a textbox ding, and turns around to see Gangle staring at a newly-pink question mark stuck to the underside of a water fountain.

Which ear did Vincent Van Gogh cut off?

"Left," She states, so quick that Jax barely has time to read the question before it disappears. Ding.

Jax turns and keeps walking. They'll need more than that to win.

.

.

.

"I think we're going to win," Pomni says brightly. "That's twenty-two questions now."

"You're good at math," Zooble says, and there's a genuine warmth to the compliment that makes Pomni chuckle and twist the ends of her brown hair in her fingertips.

"I was an accountant," She explains. "For a large grocery chain. I... numbers are easy to understand..."

There's a lull in the conversation as she trails off, but not an uncomfortable one. They're in a health classroom, a fake skeleton in the corner, colorful diagrams of skin layers, human cells, and organ systems on the walls. They each take a side wordlessly to search, looking in the cubbies under desks, along the shelves.

"What did you do?" Pomni asks, tone friendly.

"Ah, this an' that," Zooble responds. "First job was at a clothing store. That wasn't very long. Then tattooing, some bar-tending. Now I'm here."

"That's really cool," Pomni says, stepping from the shelves. "I've always admired artists. Especially ones that are confident enough to make something permanent."

She stands in front of the human skeleton. It's taller than her, especially hanging on its stand. Pomni reaches out and picks up the limp, plastic hand, held together by little metal rings, and splays her own gloved fingers to mirror its own.

Her body looks so different than it should.

She feels Zooble's presence beside her and glances over. Even with no mouth, Pomni can see the crestfallen expression on Zooble's face.

"What did you look like?" She asks, gently. Zooble's eyebrows knit, and the jester knows she's said the wrong thing.

To their credit, Zooble doesn't lash out at her for her blunder.

"I'd rather not talk about that," They say, polite but firm, and turn away.

"Sorry."

"It's okay. You're at least trying to be nice. Unlike some people."

Pomni huffs out a short laugh. The disdain dripping from Zooble's last sentence leaves no question as to which purple rabbit they're talking about.

When she laughs, she looks down, and it's then that she spots the question sticker on the floor.

"Oh!" She chirps, tapping it with her red shoe, and the yellow textbox appears.

What character did Walt Disney create before Mickey Mouse?

"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit!" Pomni says instantly, and smiles upon hearing the correct ding. "I loved older rubberhose cartoons as a kid... Epic Mickey on the Wii changed my whole life."

"Maybe that's why you look like that," Zooble says, but not in an unfriendly way, more an observing one. Pomni blinks.

"Huh," She says. "I have elbows and knees, though... so maybe not quite? I can see it with the gloves and shoes, though. And I'm littler than I was. Which is... not great. But... you know, I kinda do look like a cartoon character I would have liked as a kid. I appreciate you pointing that out to me."

"I think what we liked as kids influenced what we are here," Zooble replies. "I liked these colorful building block things. Now I'm this."

Pomni pauses a moment as she takes this in.

"Does that mean Jax really liked a bunny toy as a kid?"

Zooble laughs.

"Man, don't even try with him. Whatever soft side he had has been ground into dust, doused in gasoline, and set on fire by his own hands. He is the definition of self sabotage."

"What's his deal?"

"Not my story to tell," Zooble says simply, walking out of the classroom as they ran out of places to search. Pomni follows close behind. Zooble walks a little slower than someone their height normally would, accounting for their mismatched limbs, something Pomni appreciates since she has to take two steps for every one of theirs.

"You know, you seem like a good person," Pomni says idly. "Uh! I mean! You just have this calming, honest demeanor? It's kind of nice that you act... real. Am I making any sense?"

Pomni feels Zooble's gaze on her, but busies herself looking for more question marks, feeling heat rise in her cheeks.

"Appreciate you pointing that out to me," Zooble replies. "Just 'cos I don't like it here doesn't mean I have to act FWOOP to the people around me. Or pretend that I do like it. Which is something few here seem to understand."

Pomni stares at the end of the hall, at a green tree's leaves swaying in a false breeze just outside a big glass window. There's picnic tables outside in a paved courtyard, an outdoor cafeteria. She remembers feeling the sun on her face between her own classes in university, walking between the buildings, sitting outside to eat real food.

She can't actually go outside. None of the doors open, it was the first thing the duo tried.

"I like to think," Pomni says slowly, "That everyone is just doing the best they can."

Chapter Text

What is the study of moths and butterflies called?

"Lepidopterology," Kinger states confidently. "Obviously."

Ding!

"Yayyy!" You exclaim, grabbing Kinger's floaty hands and swinging them up and down, bobbing on your feet. "That's thirty questions now! We've got this in the bag!"

"We just might," Ragatha says with a smile as she opens the door for you two, gesturing with her free hand as though ushering you into a fancy restaurant and not a school gymnasium. You exit the storage closet, leaving behind the heavy scent of rubber dodgeballs and basketballs and volleyballs and bowling balls and also, for some godforsaken reason, in the corner of the closet, a giant kiddie pool of ball bit balls. 

The light wooden gym floor is sleek and supernaturally shiny. Apparantly Amaze High's school logo is a circus tent, judging by the picture in a circle in the middle of the floor, and their school colors are white and red. The rows of bleachers, alternating between white and red each row, kind of give the impression of mouths.

Still, a empty, shiny big floor is just an invitation to leap out and do a little spin. The way the cool, just-waxed flooring feels on your bare feet is kind of amazing since you're the first person to ever touch it. And you don't have to worry about athlete's foot. You think.

"Hey, Ragatha, nobody's ever gotten, like, sick here, have they?"

"What?" She replies from halfway up the bleachers, voice confused. "I mean... I've seen people vomit, and become, erm, mentally unwell, but getting the sniffles? No."

"That's pretty funny, since I've gotten sick of you," A voice that is unmistakably Jax calls out. You whirl on one foot to spot him leaning against the padded wall by another door, Gangle already slinking into the space under the bleachers, presumably for question marks while you're distracted.

"Jax!" Ragatha says his name like a curse, offense painting her tone. 

"How long were you waiting there in order to do a snappy one-liner, bun?" You ask, clasping your hands behind your back as you rock on your heels. You've slowly let your body language get a little more  exaggerated over the past few weeks, to make up for your lack of face.

"Wh--" Jax blinks, frowning. "I wasn't waiting, don't be stupid. And don't call me that--"

"Found one!" Kinger calls out from afar. "Oooh! A sousaphone!"

Ding!

"Pity," Jax says, crossing his arms and making a tsk sound. "Whatever amount you have, it can't possibly compare to what me and Gangle have gotten."

"Is that so?" Ragatha asks as she steps down the bleachers in a way that could almost qualify as a stomp. She's not really heavy enough to make much impact, being full of stuffing and all. The doll takes her place by your side and puts her hands on her hips. "Well, why don't you share your score with us and put your money where your mouth is, mister?"

"Oh, do you really wanna know?" Jax asks, holding his hand up in a manner that preppy teenage girl might examine her acrylic fingernails when talking to a boring teacher. He turns his hand over, the grin on his face unchanging. 

"Sounds like you're full of BRRRING," You reply, half-wondering what his hands look like under the gloves.

"December eleventh!" You hear Gangle's voice from under the bleachers. Then a wrong buzzer. Then a huff of frustration.

"Naw," Jax replies, not even acknowledging the lost question. "More like full of forty-two questions."

"I don't believe that," Ragatha replies.

"Doesn't matter, though, since we have forty-eight," You lie easily.

"That would be a lot more convincing if Ragatha didn't just make a face like a confused puppy."

"Aww, Ragatha, didja hear that? He thinks you're cute!"

"I did not say that!"  

"You compared her to a puppy!" 

"A confused one!"

"IT APPEARS!" Caine suddenly shouts from the public announcement system, and everyone startles. You take a moment to appreciate Jax and Ragatha's awkward faces while they're looking up towards the speakers in the ceiling, unaware you're watching them.

"What appears?" Kinger shouts up at the sky.

There's a sound like a bubble popping, and then Caine is floating in the air above you all. 

"IT!" He shouts again, his voice no longer crackling over the PA system. "The part of School Scavenger Scramble known as the FRENZY ROUND!"

He snaps his fingers, and suddenly you and Jax are both holding... a pair of brightly colored stick things.

"These are your DOODLEBUGGERS!"

"That's not what my doodlebug looks like," You say, and Jax doubles over laughing. 

"All teams have been given one pair of DOODLEBUGGERS! Simply tap together the ends of your DOODLEBUGGERS, and they'll instantly point in the direction of the nearest question mark!

"Y'hear that, Kay? He -- pffhaha! W-wants us to touch tips," Jax snickers, tapping the ends of his rods together. 

"Whoa!" He shouts as they appear to swing his arms wildly to point somewhere. His pupils dilate like a cat upon seeing a little critter in its path as a potential snack.

"GANGLE!" He hollers. "Plan B!"

"Heard!" She shouts back just as loud.

'Line cook behavior,' somewhere in your brain pings. 'Bet she says 'sharp, sharp' when walking with a knife and 'behind' when in a kitchen.'

And then, before anyone can react, Jax dashes. With a running start he leaps and touches the question mark halfway up the gym brick wall: then, before the text of the question has even loaded out, he shrieks out a "ninety-seven." 

There's an incorrect buzzer, but he's already tapping his dowsing rods and running out the gym, a pink sticker left in his wake.

"That BEEP!" You say, heartrate rising, shoving your Doodlebuggers into Ragatha's hands. "He's tryna ruin all the questions so nobody else can use them -- keeping his team's lead -- gotta go stop him!"

And before Ragatha can even say anything, you're off like a shot, hot on the rabbit's heels.

Luckily, he's not quite out of the hallway yet. He turns, gives you a shit-eating grin as he taps the sticks together, then starts running again. 

He runs so stupidly fast! He doesn't even really stop for the stickers, you notice, simply slaps at them and huffs out a random number while continuing to run, the question turning useless in his wake. Still, you're slowly gaining on him, and even when he ducks out of sight behind a corner you can still hear his footsteps. 

All hallways eventually end, however, even in Amaze. When he gets to the end of the hall he ignores the open classroom doors. You both know it's likely to end in a stalemate that way, with him inside and you keeping him there. Instead, he shoves the Doodlebuggers into the front of his overalls and drops to all fours, a feral, cornered animal with a wild grin. The pair of you are panting.

Neither of you move, a wordless agreement to catch your breath.

"Move," He growls out, smile bared like a snarl. His legs are trembling every so often, from exhaustion or tightly coiled energy, you can't tell.

"No," You reply simply. You can't just let him win, which he knows, which you know he knows you know.

His upper lip twitches and his grin sours. That's the only warning you get.

Metallic slam -- the breath knocked out of you -- he moves so fast, pounced and threw you hard into the lockers -- you reach out and grab his overalls strap. He turns, tries to swat your arm off, you pull him backwards and yourself up, pink fabric stretching. Stumble into his back, he intentionally falls backwards, slamming you into the locker again, trapped between cold metal and his body weight, it hurts. You press your face against his shoulder to bite hard revenge -- no teeth, no mouth, goddamn --

He whirls and the fabric slips from your hand. A rough shove to your shoulder sends you to the ground, he tries to kick you in the stomach but you grab his leg.

"What I wouldn't give to BEEP bite you right now!" You spit out, pissed.

"Get your hands off me," Jax spits, trying to pull his leg back. You grab a fistful of the fabric of his overalls and jump to your feet, then stick a hand down his overalls -- warm, smooth --

Jax shrieks and slaps you across the face. You don't let go of him, instead letting him have a turn at getting shoved into the lockers. For a second, his pupils become tiny black stars as he's stunned, then he blinks that away and grabs your sunglasses, flinging them away. They clatter away somewhere on the tile.

You can't help the hiss that escapes you as the bright overhead light assaults your brain. You duck your head, trying to get away from the overstimulation, which ironically makes you end up buried in the space between Jax's neck and shoulder. 

One hand is on Jax's upper arm, pressing it into the locker.

The other is still down his clothes.

His arm is really tense. His chest rises and falls under your palm.

Jax is very, very still.

He smells... artificial. Plastic. Yet...

"Anyone ever tell you smell like bubblegum?" You mutter into his neck, and he does a full-body twitch under you.

"Shut up," he says, but his voice wavers. "Don't -- don't say HONK like that when you -- BLEEP."

You chuckle. This close, you can feel how the movement of your body makes him jump.

"Effesikay," He says, voice thin. "I've had about enough of this. I'm not gonna tell you twice. Let go of me."

"But then you're just gonna run off and win. Give me your Doodlebuggers."

"No!" Jax shouts, and you reach your hand down further, looking for them, and Jax hisses: "Fffff-- quit it!"

He leaned into your touch when you did that.

"Told me twice."

That finally makes him move: he grabs your wrist and yanks it out of his clothes, then flips you over, pinning your arm in an exceptionally painful twist. You yelp and squirm, chest smooshed against the uncomfortable wall, and then yelp again when he knees you in the back, hard.

"Jesus Christ, Jax, it's just a game! The point is to win!"

"Yeah," Jax hums, and then your forehead gets slammed forward into the wall by a large hand splayed on the back of it. "The point IS to win. And I'm winning."

That would probably have hurt a lot more if you had an actual nose. Still, you gasp and go a little limp -- there's a faint ringing in your head now from all the getting-slammed-around. If you still had a real body you'd think you would have at least one concussion at this point.

Jax leans his whole weight forward, pinning you again while his hands leave to go do something else. You try to lean backwards, but he digs his knee directly into your spine, which hurts like a bitch, especially if you keep trying to move. So you stop.

You hear a locker door open, and your blood runs cold. The locked door at the end of the red-spattered hallway slams shut in your mind.

"Jax," You say, all the play and teasing dropped instantly. "Hey. Jax. Buddy. Listen. I know we've had our differences these past five minutes --"

You don't get to finish the sentence -- he throws you to the ground again, and then 
stomps on 
your 
fucking 
neck. 

Something snaps wrong 
in your brain instincts and you're seeing nothing but fuzzy black across your vision. It takes a moment for it to register that the pained-animal noises are coming from yourself. There are flashes of color -- beige wall, yellow glove, purple arm. Everything is slow and fast at once.

Your limbs are being crammed into a metallic coffin you're too big for and you would probably start to cry if you could and you reach out a hand that gets smacked away and you want this all to stop -- 

"Ja-ax--" You try but your voice comes out wrong, your throat hurts so bad and it feels like fire to try and talk and you feel something welling and burning where your eyes used to be. "Jaaax. Wait. Wait."

He grabs your ankle and shoves in your foot, forcing your knee up by your face. You slip the other foot out before he can shut the door, your last rope to the shore, the thread connecting you to the outside. The feeling you got when you witnessed the rubber room is back but ten times worse now, because you're actually going to be behind a locked door, alone, confined in this coffin in this coffin-body -- 

"Please," You manage to wheeze out.

Jax grabs your foot. You press back with all your effort. 

He slams the door on your calf. 

You don't move. You can't. If you do you'll die.

Again he does it. Then he kicks the door with his foot, presses his paw up against the door. Starts leaning his entire body weight on it.

You sob.

It's an ugly sound for someone without lungs to make.

You feel the pressure subside. Jax panting outside. You can see hints of light and color through the slits in the locker door, but between the panic fuzzing your vision and your glasses being God-knows-where you can barely see a thing. 

You tumble out of the locker and retch. There's nothing to come up and no way for it to come up. You still, on your hands and knees, dry heave.

"I told you," Jax says from somewhere far away. 

You flop over so you can throw him the finger. Also because your arms are really shaky. 

He scoffs. You hear the sound of two rods tapping together. You can't bring yourself to care as Jax begins to jog off. You curl on your side and lay there, head spinning, body hurting.

That's one way to win, you suppose.

.

.

.

Gangle knows they're going to win.

Jax is fast. She knows that fact well. He's especially fast when he's motivated, or chasing something, so he's going to be burning through all the remaining questions like wildfire.

All she needs to do is keep answering and make sure their score stays high. 

Her heart thrills at the idea -- Jax will be happy again, when he uses his ticket how she suggested. He said he didn't even care how Caine did it, after all! And then, she won't have to be so afraid of him anymore. He won't want to pair up with her for every adventure and every team game. Won't toss her mask around, trip her over, call her names, yank her ribbons...

She bounds along the hallway, giddy at the thought, light as a feather. She touches every question mark she sees and answers questions that are, somehow, pertaining to Pretty Planet Pure Idol, which she gets right, of course, she loves that anime. 

And then, her surroundings shift. Her ribbons touch ground onto a silvery tile stage. Gangle blinks -- there's a podium in front of her, like for a TV show -- looking up, she spots the others behind their own podiums, in front, an NPC crowd.

She shrinks a little, her grin widening. It's stupid and dumb, but even a fake crowd is enough to set off her anxiety. 

"And that's a wrap! Every last question answered, folks! Thank you so much for the audience submitted questions!!!" 

Caine is there, in front, doing his thing. He always poses so cool. He's really fun to draw, Gangle thinks, but not her favorite. Her favorites to draw are probably Zooble, because of all the fun shapes that are always changing, but the Essence of Zooble doesn't change. And Fvck, because they're the closest thing Gangle has anymore to a human reference.

She looks over at the other podiums as Caine drones on about this and that, curious.

Her eyes widen a bit. 

Fvck has fallen down, or started kneeling -- they're crumpled at the base of their podium, curled away from the crowd and lights. Their signature sunglasses are askew. Ragatha has left her spot and is knelt by Fvck, speaking to them in low tones.

Gangle, without moving her mask, flicks her eyes to Jax.

There were no NPCs on this adventure. No dangers, no frightening gimmicks. Only one person could have caused this. 

Pomni and Zooble are also staring at Jax, with apprehension and anger, respectively. 

Jax doesn't seem to care, trademark relaxed grin on his face as he leans lazily on the podium, chin propped on one hand.

Suddenly, there's canned laughter from -- from everywhere.

"Whoops, everybody, looks like our shooting stars have swayed off their course tonight!" Caine chirps brightly, floating backwards to the group. "My, what a commotion -- here, Effesikay!"

He taps the gray humanoid on the top of the head with the tip of his cane, and as he raises his cane up, they stand, as though pulled by a tether. When standing at their full height again, Caine spins his cane away in a little twirl, and Fvck tips forward, grabbing the edges of their podium for stability. They lean on it heavily.

"Upsy-daisy! Now then, what you've all been waiting for -- the WINNERS! Of the WINNER'S TICKETS!!! Bubble, rolldrum!"

Bubble appears from the side of the stage, a big bass drum spinning forward like a wheel in front of him.

"And now drumroll!" 

The bass drum falls off the stage -- there's a sound of shattering glass, a cat yowling, and then a chicken clucking before it fades away. The bubble opens its razor sharp teeth and the sound of a drumroll emanates from it.

Gangle does not like the fact a soft and round thing has such scary and sharp teeth, personally.

"In third place, with a respectable fifty-one questions... TEAM GREEN!! Everyone give it up for Ragatha, Kinger, and Effesikay!"

The crowd roars and claps. Ragatha presses her lips together a moment, but then smiles a bit sheepishly and waves. Kinger smiles and waves, too. Fvck... sort of sways in place.

"Team Green each earn one ticket for a FREE COMBO MEAL from Burrito Door: Taco Bell's Better Older Sister!"

Caine squints at the little papers in his hand.

"It, uh... actually says that. The stuff about Taco Bell. I don't -- I don't know why they would put that there. That's just asking to get sued. I don't know who put this here."

He tosses the coupons behind his shoulder as the crowd laughs.

"ANYWAY! Drumroll again, Bubble, if you would! And now... in second place... with... fifty-TWO questions... TEAM PINK!!! Round of applause for Jax and Gangle!!!"

Gangle's mask slips off her face and shatters at her feet with a sound like a dish breaking. She goes very still and stares blankly ahead. 

She doesn't want to see what sort of expression Jax has on his face right now.

She's stupid. She's so, so stupid. She shouldn't have said anything. If she hadn't said anything, he wouldn't have gotten his hopes up. It would have just been a normal game and been over. But now he's going to be mad. Mad at her. She wants to crawl into a hole and not ever come out. 

The crowd hollers and cheers.

"-- not one but TWO novelty puzzle erasers each! Shaped like tigers and tapirs! You won't see anything like these erasers anywhere else!"

Someone in the audience boos. Caine coughs and puts the erasers in his pocket.

"... Anyway, the winning team... with a truly impressive NINETY-SEVEN questions, is TEAM YELLOW!!! ZOOBLE AND POMNI!!! Get on up here!!!"

Distantly, Gangle feels a jolt of happiness at seeing Zooble actually win at something. And being actually happy about it. Pomni, too, she's nice. They deserve it. Certainly more than Gangle herself does. And a lot more than Jax.

But still.

Jax is going to kill her.

And then, since they don't die, kill her again.

Caine raises his arms to the heavens. A golden, sparkling light appears from above. Slowly, two white doves descend, a golden ticket clutched in each one's beak. Caine pulls the shiny papers free and then holds out his top hat, which the doves fly inside. With a flourish, he turns and presents the duo with their tickets.

"Have you thought about what you'd like yet? Or would you rather save these?"

They look at each other, then back at him. 

"Yeah," Zooble says. Pomni nods.

"Well then," Caine says. "What are you waiting for?"

Chapter Text

"I'm saving mine," Zooble says quickly, putting the shiny golden ticket into their hammerspace before Caine can make a big production of it.

'Smart,' You think, adjusting your sunglasses to better block out the bright lights. Fuck, you wish you could block out the canned cheering too. You're starting to get a bad headache. There's no visible bruising on your body, which makes sense, considering you don't -- well, you don't think you have blood. But aching like this with nothing to show for it just makes your ache worse, primal lizard brain crying out for physical recognition of the ordeal you just went through.

"That's 100% a-okay by me!" Caine replies, clasping his hands together, and the sound makes you jump. Then wince. Wincing feels weird without eyes.

"You're not gonna forget I have this and make it invalid, are you?" Zooble asks him, raising an eyebrow.

Caine gasps in mock offense, putting a hand on his chest as though affronted.

"Zooble!" He cries. "You know I have the mind of an elephant! I never forget!"

An elephant trumpet emanates from somewhere. The audience laughs. 

"Uh-huh," Zooble says, sounding about as convinced as an atheist handed a pamphlet by a Evangelist on the street.

"I highly doubt you'd let me forget, anyway," Caine replies, whirling in place so fast his coattails swish. "POMNI! How about you, hmmm? What will you redeem your ticket for?"

Two shining spotlights click on, and beam right onto the clown, so bright her pale skin glows. The audience hushes, enraptured, the silence poignant. She looks down, fidgeting with her hair a moment, then up at Caine again before speaking:

"Um, I wanted to talk with you first, if that's okay?"

"We are talking! Right now!" Caine replies, tilting his head a tad and starting to twirl his cane around.

"I mean --" Pomni turns, looks at you all on the podiums. "I mean, in private? If that's--"

Cane snaps his fingers, and suddenly the pair are gone, spotlights shining on nothing. The echo of his snap reverberates through the room, and you realize that the crowd is no longer simply quiet -- there's no soft murmuring like there was before, no natural sound of shifting in seats. No, now all the wooden mannequins in the crowd are dead silent, backs ramrod straight in their chairs, puppets inanimate without their master around. 

"Well, that's not creepy at all," Jax quips into the void left behind the circus master, cheek still resting on his hand.

Poof!

With a sound effect like a cartoonish cloud of smoke, Pomni and Caine reappear right where they were before. Instantly, the room is filled with the false sound of life again. Pomni stumbles a bit before righting herself -- she gasps once, twice, before bringing herself to her full height again, brushing off the front of her shirt.

"Are you wishing for anything, Pomni?" Ragatha calls out curiously, hands clasped in front of her chest.

"Not yet," Pomni replies, turning and giving the group a bittersweet sort of smile. 

"Booooo!" Jax shouts, and Pomni yelps when she actually has to dodge a tomato pulled from his hammerspace. The splat sound it makes when it hits the ground is exceedingly gauche. A head of cabbage follows it.

"Wh -- hey! Stop!" She cries out at him, an angry flush obvious on her face.

"What's the point of earning something you're not even gonna use?" The rabbit questions, standing up straight to cross his arms and giving Team Yellow judgmental glares. "Both of you are lame."

Everyone in the audience gasps dramatically, as though this were a soap opera and Jax just accused his wife of cheating. 

"Sore loser," Zooble states, giving him side-eye. 

"No heckling each other onstage, now!" Caine chirps. And then, in a lower false-whisper:

"That's for the greenrooms!"

"Yeah, you heard him, Zooble," Jax says, grinning. "Quit bullying me just because you won!"

"Can we go back now?" Zooble asks with a sigh, ignoring the rabbit in favor of looking up at Caine tiredly.

"Well, if you're such eager beavers!" Caine replies, opening one of his signature swirly-colored portals. "Everybody in, now! Bubble's made an excellent dinner -- spaghetti and meatballs!! And then I believe a certain someone was throwing a little get-together in their room afterwards!!"

Oh, yeah!

"Girls night!!!" You holler as you step back into the circus, pumping your arms excitedly in the air. "Ow -- girls night!! Girls night!!"

"You're a girl?" You hear Jax's voice snark incredulously behind you, and you turn around to walk backwards for a moment, studying his face as the portal closes. He was the last one out.

He looks slightly peeved. It's like he never even beat the shit out of you and caused a full-blown panic attack.

You make the split-second decision to continue pissing him off, because you're still mad about that, dammit.

"I'm whatever you want me to be, honeybun," You downright purr at him, making a heart with your hands in front of your chest. Jax brings a hand to his mouth, looking ill.

"You did not just say those words in that order to me," He mutters, revulsion dripping from his tone.

"Bro can dish but can't take," you say, whirling on one foot and shrugging as you face the rest of the group. You hear a cut-off, amused snort from Pomni, then an attempt at a cough to cover it up. Ragatha is staring at you with a vaguely worried expression, one hand grasping her wrist -- makes sense, since she was the first at your side when you sorta fell over back on stage. 

"It's nothing, really," You'd told her earlier as she fussed. "Jax and I got in a fistfight after we both ran off, is all. Well, he won. Dude fights like a cornered animal."

"That's not nothing!" She'd exclaimed, but then Caine noticed you, and after he tapped you you felt marginally better, if not really tired and sore. She's still worried, you can tell. 

And Gangle, well. She's not-so-discreetly put you, Ragatha, and Pomni between herself and Jax and looks like she's about to cry for real, not just with the ever-present tears on her inner mask. Considering the track record of those two, and the fact they lost... you can guess what she's upset about.

"You don't mind if we have company, do you, Pomni?" You ask the jester.

"Oh, no, I don't mind!" Pomni says, looking at Ragatha and Gangle beside her. "I figured that was what we were, uh, doing already?"

"Awesome!" You cheer, and then whirl again to face Jax, who has one hand on his hip and is already stalking off. You hear a trio of groans behind you, which you ignore.

"Jaaa-aax," You sing-song, jogging forward to walk in front of him and then face him. He steps around you without stopping to even look at you, eyes fixed on some far-off spot. "I don't suppose you wanna join the girls an' I for a night, wouldja?"

"Hard pass," He says as you move beside him to match his stride.

"Aw, but we could watch movies and eat popcorn and paint each other's nails and talk about boys!"

"There's something seriously wrong with your head."

"Know any good headshrinkers?"

That actually makes him pause for a moment and huff a short laugh. Then he shakes his head, less in a 'no' fashion and more in a way to shake off a mood, and keeps walking.

"Are you having fun?" He asks dryly. "Or are you some kinda -- mass of Christ?"

It takes you a moment to figure out what he meant. Mass of Christ -- masochist. He was trying to get around the censors for that one.

"So you beat me up once and I lost my nerve," You reply, tone light. "Doesn't mean I'm gonna start acting like a little BOING around you. Besides, we're just in a simulation, right? I don't even have any bruises. If the only thing that makes it real is how I feel about it, if choose to feel nothing, well, I still come out on top!"

Jax actually pauses, then, and a slow grin starts to spread across his face. The silence carries a beat too long, and you speak:

"I mean, this is all... all endurance. So I just need to protect my brain and foster healthy bonds. And right now I wanna have a sleepover."

"Right now, I wanna get away from you," Jax replies. "The last thing I wanna do is to be stuck in a room with you."

"Okay!" You reply sunnily, and your grin widens when you see his lower eyelid twitch despite his smile. He starts walking again, and you stay in place a few seconds before jogging back to the trio.

"Please tell me Jax didn't want to come," Gangle says.

"Jax didn't want to come," You echo, and all three of them sigh in relief. You hold back a laugh.

"Could I... stay the night with you too?" Gangle asks shyly, pushing the tips of her ribbons together. "I-I don't... really wanna be alone tonight..."

"Of course! And you too, Ragatha!"

"O-oh! Sure!"

"But first," You say, tone suddenly gravely serious. "There's something we must do."

"Eep," Gangle says quietly, putting her face in her ribbons. Ragatha and Pomni get apprehensive looks on their faces.

"Eat spaghetti!" You say, clapping your hands together and flouncing off, humming. You really wanna see what Bubble's spaghetti is like. Will the meatballs be perfectly round? Is the sauce going to have a good liquid physics? There's countless possibilities!

.

.

.

There were countless possibilities as to what kinda goodies he could find in the girls' rooms tonight while they were all preoccupied. Maybe more blackmail for any of them. Or he could leave a bunch of bugs in Ragatha's bed. Pomni though, she interested him the most. He hadn't gotten dirt on her yet.

Jax hadn't needed to be outside his room to hear the group of girls -- well, mostly girls. He thought. Maybe? Kay, to him, had given the impression of boy because of their voice, but the way they'd been acting lately -- he shook his head. Didn't matter. He didn't like them either way. Always rubbing him the wrong way. Mentally and literally.

He recalls how that faceless thing just -- felt up his chest back in the hall, and shivers. 

Nobody had ever touched him like that. Not even when he was alive. He spreads a hand over where theirs had been, recalling the warmth of it.

Fucking disgusting.

The direction of the conversation outside shifts as the group walks down the hall. He presses his cheek against his door and puts one ear flat against it. 

"-- so obviously Homura and Madoka are meant for each other, you know? Homura really loves her!" Gangle was explaining to the group. Evidently they'd gotten into some weeb conversation during dinner. Jax hadn't been there, he'd been curled in his bed.

'Well, obviously,' Jax agrees silently. 'The whole point of the show is that they literally need one another or the universe will explode.'

"That's not healthy love, though," he hears Pomni say. "That's --"

He hears the creak of a door opening, then shutting.

'Okay, first fact learned: Pomni has shit taste,' Jax thinks. 'Not that I'd ever say that to her face.'

He counts to sixty, then puts out one finger on his hand. When four minutes pass he stands and exits his room, locking the door behind him.

"Hey, Jax."

He yelps, nearly dropping the key to his own room -- it slips out of his hands up into the air like a bar of soap before he snatches it and shoves it into his pocket. He gives Zooble a withering glare.

"What do you want, Zooble?"

"Oh, nothing," the multi-colored mess says easily. "It's just last time Gangle left her room unchecked someone put a bucket of red paint over her door and her tragedy mask was pink for a week. So I'm just sitting in the hallway, reading my book, making sure something like that doesn't happen again."

Zooble reclines in their folding lawn chair, turning another page in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. They flick their eyes off the text to meet Jax's gaze.

"Something wrong?" They ask, and Jax can hear the light amusement running through the question.

Jax turns back around, unlocks his door, and slams it shut behind himself.

He'll just go to sleep now, and try again in a couple hours. 

Not like Zooble will pull an all-nighter just to watch doors.

Chapter Text

"Oh," Pomni says as you close the door behind everyone. You watch her blink and look around. "Your room is, uh... a lot different than mine."

You've pulled together enough to keep it from feeling like you just moved in, but it still needs a bit more work, honestly. You pushed your single bed to be parallel to the wall opposite the door, then put your new mattress down on the floor in front of it. The sheets that your single spawned in with are white, and the ones you found for your bigger bed are, too. Besides the bland gray comforter on your bed, there's two fluffy blankets. One is purple with yellow stars and the other is a soft teal. You have enough pillows for everyone -- if one person is willing to share, that is. 

You've stuck a painting of a blue cloud-filled sky on the center of the left wall, remarkably similar to the sky-orbs hovering around in the main room of the circus. On the opposite wall, facing it, is a similar sky except at sunset, the clouds cotton-candy pink, background brilliant orange and red, with an encroaching dark indigo promising night. The perspective shifts as you move around the room, like a lenticular poster, giving it a 3D effect.

They're almost like windows.

In one corner by the door you've got your little round table, upon which rests the vase of flowers and your 3rd place medal from the other day. If you ever get an armchair you plan on making that a reading nook. And in front of the door, you've got that cool rug you found, off-white and blue in a wavy checkerboard pattern. The rug-on-nasty-colored-carpet looks kinda tacky, but hey, you need a pop of pastel color in here. 

"This actually looks sort of like a real bedroom," Gangle observes, slinking around you to step further inside. "Oooh, I like your paintings."

"Thanks!" You reply, going and sitting on the bigger floor-bed, leaning your back on your actual bed behind it. "It's a work in progress. Some chairs would be nice... a beanbag, maybe, some lamps, a shelf..."

"Your room wasn't already decorated?" Ragatha asks, taking a seat beside you. As she does, she turns to face the wall where the door is, and the soft smile on her face instantly drops into some expression that's tight and wide-eyed.

She's staring at the tally marks on your wall. 

Pomni and Gangle glance at where Ragatha's obviously staring. 

"Oh," Gangle says, wilting. The silence goes on a beat too long.

"Come on, guys," You respond, tone deliberately light. "That's just my calendar. Don't make it weird."

"Well, I guess it is an effective way of keeping track of how long you've been here," Ragatha admits with a nervous laugh. "Sorry, I -- didn't mean to make you feel embarrassed or anything."

"It's no big deal," You respond, patting the open space around you with your hands. "Pomni, Gangle, are you just gonna stand there staring all day? Come and sit with us."

"You know," Ragatha says as Gangle sits knees-to-chest beside you, "I could take a look around my room for things I don't use anymore, if you want them?"

Pomni plops down criss-cross applesauce between Ragatha and Gangle before nodding. "I might have some stuff, too? But it doesn't really match what you seem to be going for all that well."

"All I ask is that it's pastel or some color that's easy on the eyes," You respond. "Or... oh! Hey, Gangle, do you take commissions?"

"Wh -- me?" Gangle asks, her black eyes going wide. "I - I mean... I don't know if my art is good enough for you to p-pay me for it...!"

"It would be nice to have some art on the walls that my friends made, though! And I see you draw a lot. I doubt you're that bad." 

"You think we're friends?" Gangle asks breathlessly, the tips of her ribbons fidgeting nervously together.

"Of course!" You respond, smiling -- or at least, you tell your brain to smile as you tilt your head to look her full in the face. What happens instead is that you get a cheerful, radiant yellow-and-pink glow around your head as though you were a joyful Animal Crossing character. Flowers flutter at the edges of your vision before disappearing like a mirage.

Gangle brings both ribbons to her face -- they don't do a good job of hiding her face like hands would -- and squeeeeeees.

Pomni laughs -- not a malicious laugh, rather a happy one. 

"Aww," she says. "Gangle, I consider you a friend too, you know?"

Gangle's squeeee increases in pitch.

"Hey, Ragatha, if you say something nice to Gangle I think we can get her up to dog whistle levels of sound," You say.

Gangle's squeal cuts out at that into a giggle. She yanks her sketchbook out of her hammerspace and starts scribbling with a slightly oversized pencil. Ragatha smiles.

"It's nice to see you this happy, Gangle," she says, and the ribbon's pencil pauses.

"Yeah... not something that happens very often, huh?" She replies, a little bitterness bleeding into her tone. Ragatha instantly looks dismayed.

"I -- uh, didn't mean it like --"

Better get this situation back in control.

"So, Gangle," You interrupt, "Since we don't have money here, what kinda favor you want in exchange for your art? And don't undersell yourself! I'm happy to barter."

"Oh," She replies, tapping the pencil's ferrule against the metal rings of her sketchbook. "Ummm. I'm... not sure?"

"Let's see, uh, I could make you a little craft or drawing in return... I could try to find some item you'd like while on adventures, I could slap Jax's PLINK BWEEEP and TOOOOOT VROOM CRASH in the SPLAT and make him regret being such a FWOOSH and RRUFF TICK TICK PEWWWWW CLATTER MMMMEOW BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP."

When you finally finish everyone is staring at you.

"Did, uh," Pomni breaks the silence, "Did something... happen between you and Jax?"

"No," You say instantly, too fast. "I mean, uh, nothing out of the ordinary. For him. Based on what I've seen. It was nothing! I already told Ragatha."

"I still don't think getting in a fist fight so bad you can barely stand is nothing," Ragatha mutters, frustration bleeding into her tone as she looks away.

"Snitch!" The word tumbles out of your not-mouth before you think, pointing a finger at her.

"Wh -- you were going to keep it secret?!"

"Well, no, but maybe I wanted to be the one to tell!" You reply, crossing your arms and looking pointedly away from her.

"Then say it!"

"Fine!" 

You uncross yourself and pull one of the pillows into your hands, kneading at the cool softness of it.

"Uh," You say, adjusting your sunglasses. "Sorry for snapping at you, Ragatha. 'S just... if I let myself get upset about what happened... then it's the only thing that makes it real. So when you keep making it a big deal... I get upset? I guess?"

"It's okay," Ragatha says, putting one hand on the back of her neck. "I kind of get where you're coming from."

"For someone who wasn't upset, you sure were cussing about Jax a lot, though," Pomni points out, putting one hand to rest on her pink cheek, elbow on her knee.

"It's not me I get upset about," You say, looking at Gangle from the corner of your vision. "I don't care what Jax does to me. But when I see all the PLINK he puts you guys through, I get pissed -- hey, remember that time I kicked him between the legs? Hehehe."

"What did he do to you?" Gangle suddenly speaks up. She looks up from her sketchbook, straight at you.

"I wanna know," She says. You would have blinked if you could at her sudden seriousness.

"Well," You say, squeezing the pillow again, "It kinda started when I cornered him in the hall..."

You relay the whole encounter to your friends, complete with hand gestures and poses to show what happened in the fight:

"So he wouldn't give in, and tried to grab it out of his pockets..."

"And then he sorta threw me into the lockers --"

"--stunned for a moment, but then I grabbed him, maybe he was mad because he thought I was teasing him? But I really wasn't, though, I just wanted to win the game, but he wasn't co-operating..."

"Tried to bite him, cos he was being such a DINK that I forgot I couldn't, and I told him 'What I wouldn't give to bite you right now!' and I think that really ticked him off..."

"So then I shoved him back into the lockers and kinda pinned him like this, and that was the first time he shut up and went still -- wh -- Gangle you're bleeding!!"

Indeed, despite the smoothness of her mask, and complete lack of a nose, there's a thin trickle of blood running down Gangle's face coming from where her nose would be. Her eyes are very big and round.

"Ignore me," she says, slapping a red ribbon over the blood streaming down her face. The ribbon darkens into a deeper ruby shade. "Please. Do go on."

"Oh, here!" Ragatha says, pulling something lacy and pale purple out from behind herself. "I have a handkerchief you can use."

"Thank you," Gangle says gratefully as she presses it into her face. You look helplessly over at Pomni.

"Uh, how did Jax react after that?" Pomni asks, twirling her hand in a 'go-on' kind of motion.

"Well... he flung my sunglasses off my face, and the light hurts my eyes, so I sorta ducked my head down really close to him and -- "

You think you hear a short, faint squeal from Gangle before you continue your story.

When you finally arrive at the end, Pomni stares at you with an incredulous expression, Ragatha looks supremely uncomfortable, and the hankie Gangle is still pressing to her face is soaked almost entirely in crimson.

Pomni inhales slowly and closes her eyes, and as she does, brings her hands together as though in prayer. When she opens her eyes and exhales, she points the tips of her hands at you, still pressed together.

"Kay," She says, "Why do you think Jax got upset enough to stomp on your neck and try and shove your whole body into a locker?"

"Uhhhh, because I was trying to win? He literally said that's what he was trying to do. And I said it," You reply, scratching an itch on your cheek. "And the stakes were high with the Winner's Tickets. And he seems to have a tendency towards violence in general, sooo..."

"W-well, he does, but that's not the point -- you seriously can't think of any other reasons he might be upset?"

"No?"

Pomni pinches what would have been the bridge of her nose.

"Okay," She says, a bit of frustration leaking into her voice. "Okay, um, let me try it this way. Imagine you're in real life, in high school or whatever. Run that whole scenario through your head again, except you're a boy and Jax is a girl."

You stiffen.

Him asking you to move. You refusing. Him trying to push you away. You retaliating by sticking your hand in his clothes. Him asking you to stop. You refusing and then teasing him about it and commenting on his scent.

How still he went. How he leaned up against you for a split second. 

How vicious he got after how close you were.

"Oh," You say faintly. 

"For the record," Gangle says quietly at your side, voice weirdly pinched as though she's actually pinching her nonexistent nose, "You also sort of perfectly recreated the scene between Madara-senpai and Kohaku-san in Secrets of the Silent Heart."

A purple-black gloom descends upon you as you squeeze the pillow in your lap, and Gangle huffs in amusement.

"You've got the anime sad lines around your head right now," she points out helpfully.

"Oh, God," You wheeze, grasping the sides of your head. "I touched Jax's milkies! Why the KA-CLACK did I do that?!"

Ragatha actually makes a sound close to a gag.

"Why would you describe it that way," Pomni says, completely flat.

"Because I can't say BOINK! GADOINK! Breasts -- oh."

A pregnant silence descends upon you all. You rub your face under your sunglasses.

"I gotta make it up to him," You mutter.

"Maybe you could just apologize, and explain you weren't trying to be a creep?" Pomni suggests.

"No, I -- I gotta do something. Show him I really mean it."

"Oh, God," You hear Pomni mutter, so quiet you think you weren't supposed to hear. And then, louder:

"He still overreacted. He really shouldn't have gotten so violent, either, don't forget that. And he's still a jerk. Don't let him use this to guilt-trip you into-- into letting him treat you even worse."

"Anyway!" Ragatha suddenly pipes up. "Now that we all know what happened between you and Jax, does anyone else want to play something? I brought some board games and a deck of cards from my room!"

"Can we play Scrabble?" Gangle asks, voice still nasally. 

"I don't see why not!" You say, tossing the pillow away and smoothing the blankets to make a better gaming surface. You grin when you see Gangle's whole posture go bright and bouncy at that. 

.

.

.

Zooble hears Jax sneeze from behind his bedroom door. Their antennae twitch. 

Several hours have passed. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has already been re-read and put away. Now they've moved to Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. A lot of the real, non-decorative books Zooble has managed to find and snag in the circus are pretty old, and no longer have copyright, which is probably why they were the few coded in. They don't even keep them in their room out of fear of Jax stealing them or the books despawning. Nope, Zooble keeps their tiny library on them at all times in their inventory.

God, what they wouldn't give to look in an actual tiny library again...

They return their attention to their novel. Conseil has just jumped into the ocean after Professor Pierre. Zooble remembers they thought that scene was really romantic when they first read this book as a kid.

The sound of a doorknob clicking makes them flick their eyes back up to Jax's door. The door opens a hair, revealing nothing about the pitch-black room behind it. A familiar pair of big yellow eyes peer out, then narrow upon seeing Zooble. Zooble watches that trademark yellow grin spread, and maybe it's because she just read Alice's Adventures but Jax's grin seems downright chesire today.

"Forget something?" Zooble asks Jax, dogearing their page and closing their book.

Jax doesn't say anything. Zooble glances behind their chair over at Fvck's door. They can hear faint laughter from within, then Ragatha's gentle voice. Fvck jumps in with their own enthusiastic tone, and there's more giggles.

Zooble looks back at Jax.

"You jealous?"

"No," Jax says instantly. "Pff. No. Why would I be jealous of those losers? They're annoying enough separate, but together they're probably ten times worse."

Silence again. Slowly, Zooble opens their book once more. Still quiet.

"Have you ever smelled anything like bubble gum in this circus?" Jax suddenly blurts out, making Zooble jump.

"What." Zooble says. Jax stares at them, pupils tiny pinpricks, still grinning.

"Why are you asking me about smells?" Zooble asks, utterly bewildered.

Jax closes his door.

Zooble waits a few seconds before opening their book again, smoothing out the dogeared page.

"Weirdo," They mutter under their breath before continuing their story.

Chapter Text

"Hah!" Gangle says as she places her last tile. Ragatha's 'leisure' becomes Gangle's 'athleisure.' You whistle as you watch that play. "And I believe that blocks the only play you can make with your V tile."

"H-how did you know it was a V tile?!" Ragatha exclaims, holding the little wooden piece in her hands.

"Welllll, that's easy!" Gangle chirps, gesturing with their ribbons as if counting, even though they don't have fingers to count with. "Every Scrabble game comes with a set amount of tiles for each letter. A has 9, B has 2, C has 2, D has 4, E has 12 --"

"Okay, okay! You win!" Ragatha says, putting her piece down in front of her. "Gosh, I had no idea you were such a Scrabble fiend."

"I spent a big portion of my childhood reading dictionaries for fun," Gangle says. "My parents used to punish me by taking my computer and sketchbook and looking through them, so I would draw little things in the margins of my boring books... they never checked there! Hahahaaaaa...."

You go still for a moment. The others here remember their parents? Their actual lives? You check internally for your sense of self.

Nope, still static.

"Your parents sound like FOOPholes," You say, voice shaking a tad. You cringe internally as you open the tile bag and start scooping up tiles to dump in. 

"Oh no, they were -- I just -- I just wasn't a very good kid, is all. My grades could have been a lot better than what they were... maybe if I had listened, I would have gotten more money for college..."

Gangle starts to fold up the Scrabble board, cleared of tiles now. "What were your parents like, Pomni?" She asks.

"My parents?" Pomni echoes. "Um, my parents... I lived with my mom. They divorced when I was little, I don't, uh, remember much of it. But my mom never remarried. My dad and stepmom were good to me too, though, I lived with them during the summers in another state."

She stares at your sunset painting, eyes distant as she talks:

"My mom is... I dunno, normal? Really sweet. I... I miss her cooking, and hearing her sing... and my dad, I miss playing video games online with him, I... I'm their only child. I h-hope... nothing happens to me..."

"If it helps," You say as you lay on your side, "I don't think that anyone's realized we're gone yet."

"Kay!" Ragatha says, in the exact same tone you've heard her use to chide Jax.

"No, wait, lemme finish," You say before she can get a word in. "This whole place, this whole game -- we've still got new schmucks like me coming in, right? Which means the administrators or game devs or whoever is in charge of this whole thing -- they haven't pulled us out yet, even though it's been years. And the electricity to run something like this must be colossal, so there's gotta be someone overseeing it all. Yet more people are coming in. So I think the real world hasn't realized anything is wrong yet, or they do and they dunno how to fix it. We're experiencing time way faster than they are."

Pomni's normally-huge eyes are tiny red-blue pinpricks. She blinks and her expression goes to something clearly annoyed.

"Thanks, BEEP," She says. "That helps my anxiety so much."

"Well, there's a silver lining. And that's that all we have to do is wait it out," You explain, spreading your hands apart to gesture to the room. "Which means we've got whole entire years to just spend doing whatever we want, building skills, existing, whatever, and we won't age, won't get sick, we won't die -- like, Gangle, you've been here how long?"

"U-um... a while?"

"Exactly! You've had a while to just work on your art!" You sit up again, feeling a tad dizzy with the thoughts running through your brain. "And we don't have any real responsibilities! We get to just... be. I mean, really, this place is just adding extra years on our lifespan. No meetings, no phone calls, no fetching coffee --"

You pause. Your hands have gone numb. You hold your gray hand in front of your face. There's no palm lines on it. You press your thumb into your pointer finger. It feels like static.

'Where did that come from?'

"It's just endurance," You say again, quieter. "Just have to endure."

"What about your parents?" Pomni asks.

"Huh?"

"I mean... Gangle and I just shared. But you don't have to! If you don't want to," she continues.

'Do I tell them? Do I tell them I don't actually remember my life like they do? Why do I look like this compared to them? Why is my room different? Why am I different? What if I never had a real life in the first place? What if I'm just--'

"Don't feel like it right now," You say, bringing your hand back to yourself to pick with the skin on the inside of your elbow. "Ragatha, you spill."

"W-well, um... my mother and I... she certainly was a character! She and I... had our differences... she sure did yell a lot... I doubt she would even notice if I stopped contacting her, heh!"

Ragatha's mouth is a line of worry as she messes with her hands.

"Hey," Gangle says, and Ragatha jumps. "Um... you didn't... deserve any of that, I think."

The smile the doll gives her is so tired. 

"That's sweet of you, Gangle," Ragatha says. "I guess we both had similar upbringings, huh?"

"Well, maybe my parents weren't like your mom, b-but... mom was always telling me art wasn't a real career, and it didn't feel great," The ribbon replies. "Unrealistic... do something real, like d-doctor or programmer or something... but I'm not s-suited to that stuff at all..."

"Hey, look at me," Pomni cuts in. "I had a 'real job' as an accountant, yet, I'm still here with you all because I felt so... bored and unimportant."

She made air quotes around real job. Ragatha and Gangle's eyes both brighten a bit.

"Well, we're glad you're here, Pomni," Ragatha says before her eye widens. "N-not that we want you to be trapped or anything--"

"I know what you meant," Pomni says warmly. 

.

.

.

The next morning, when you wake up, you feel tight. A good tight. Pressure like a weighted blanket, sort of, but instead...?

Instead of opening your eyes, awareness floods back into your vision. Your sunglasses are off, folded somewhere by the bed, so everything is slightly blurry. You're laying on your side, a blanket half-tossed over you, no pillow under your head, and supremely comfy. There's something very warm wrapped around your leg, draped over your spine, your arms --

Your arms are wrapped around loosely with red ribbon.

You pull your arms apart slowly, and suddenly all the warm ribbons over you tighten. Your wrists are pulled together. Fabric squishes into your thigh. You hum in surprise, and you look over your shoulder to see Gangle's upper half laying mask-down on the mattress. 

Even though she doesn't technically breathe, you can hear her soft breaths, slow and deep, emanating from her mask.

She's...

hugging you in your sleep.

Oh my God, that's adorable.

You glance up to see Ragatha has stolen your actual bed. Pomni is still on the floor mattress with you all, curled on her side facing away with the second blanket, but the slow rise and fall of her chest tells you she's asleep too. 

You put your head back down and let yourself melt back into Gangle's sleepy form, feeling very pleased with yourself.

This is so relaxing... you feel so content. If only you could stay in this moment forever --

Until the sound of bugles playing Reveille and Assembly BLARES through your bedroom. Pomni yelps as she's jerked out of her sleep, and you hear Ragatha groan from above you. Gangle goes "eek" and hugs you tighter for a moment before realizing what she's doing, and then goes "eeek" at a higher intensity and starts to slip away.

"Noooo," You whine, pressing her ribbons wrapped around your arms to your chest. "You're warmmm."

"I- I- er," Gangle stammers as you sit up, and she's dragged with you. Her mask ends up pressed to your upper back, and you hug your own chest, which is kind of like hugging Gangle too since she's wrapped around you so much.

"Mmm, my blanket friend," You say before glancing over at the other two. Pomni is rubbing her eyes, while Ragatha combs through her yarn hair with her hands, fixing how it got mussed as she slept.

"Did you guys actually manage to sleep tonight?" You ask as you slip your sunglasses onto your face. The sight of your forearm wrapped around with Gangle's own arm makes you wish you could grin.

"That was the deepest sleep I've had since I got here," Pomni says, leaning back and stretching big, and Ragatha nods.

"It was a nice change of pace," The doll agrees, smoothing out her skirt.

"Gangle?" You ask, looking back at her over your shoulder, or at least trying to. Her mask is pressed into your back, between your shoulderblades, but she hasn't disentangled herself fully, only unbound your hands. 

"Likedsharingabed," She says all in one breath, so fast its barely intelligible. 

"Yayyy!" You respond, standing up, and you feel her grasping at you for support, but she's so light it doesn't burden you at all. "I wonder what's in store for us today."

You feel the tip of her mask touch your shoulder, and glance over to see she's lifted herself up a bit so she can see as you walk. Pomni looks up at the two of you.

"Are you two, uh, gonna stay like that?"

"Gangle is doing an excellent job of being my personal heater right now," You reply simply. "Also, like, I miss wearing stuff like clothes."

"Guh-- Gangle, you can't just be Kay's clothes!" Ragatha says as you walk to your door, unbothered.

"It's okay," Gangle replies, and you feel her turning to face her mask backwards as you open the door. "I like being Kay's clothes."

You step out into the hall and stand at your door only to spot Zooble sitting in a lawn chair, reading something. They glance up at you, then turn their eyes back down to their book, then jerk their gaze back up again in an obvious double take.

"You, uh, have fun last night?" They ask as Ragatha and Pomni file out of the door behind you.

"We played Scrabble!" Gangle chirps brightly. "I won three times."

Whatever response Zooble would have had to that is drowned out by sudden, uproarious laughter that can only belong to Jax. You feel Gangle tense around you as you turn towards him and wave brightly.

"Oh --- hhhahaha -- oh my God, Gangle, are you really out here with Kay inside you where everyone can see?!" Jax hollers, bent over with one hand on his knee, the other wiping tears from the corner of his eye.

Gangle makes an embarrassed noise that could only be described as "uwaaaaaah" as she slides off you so fast you feel like you're getting rope burns. 

"My heater," You mutter mournfully as Caine spawns himself into the room.

"GOOOOOOOD morning my cheerful little cupcakes! How are you all? Did the four of you have fun at your sleepover?"

"Oh, yes!" Ragatha says. "We--"

"AWESOME!" Caine interrupts. "I hope you're all well rested, because this next adventure is gonna be a doozy! It'll be up to you to stop the GIANT METEOR from crashing into PLANET PLAZOOKY! But watch out, because two of you will secretly be ALIEN SABATEURS..."

"Is it just me or is this just Among Us?" Pomni asks.

"Among what?" Caine asks, a tongue poking goofily out of his teeth like a puppy.

"Among these nuts," You say on instinct. "Oh, hey! It didn't censor me."

You hear Jax snicker, which is a reward in and of itself.

"One-two-three-four-five-six-seven," Caine counts you all. "Now onto breakfast! Can't be doing these adventures on an empty stomach now!"

Breakfast that day is eggs. Just eggs. They're not cooked or anything. Just a basket of pure white eggs still in the shell on the table.

Nobody really eats breakfast that day. Well, not like you really eat breakfast any day, but still.

Across the table, you stare at Jax while your face is pointed in another direction. Not having true eyes has its perks.

And you've gotten an idea as for how you're gonna apologize to him.

.

.

.

When Kinger opens his eyes, its dark, and his head is in a bubble.

"Oh!" He says after his brain catches up. "Hi, Kay!"

"Hey, Kinger," The gray one replies with a wave. They're wearing a gray spacesuit now, a clear bubble encasing their head, still adorning their sunglasses. A suspicious musical sting plays from nowhere, and the word SABATEURS in bright red appears behind them both.

"Oh, yes!" Kay says, pumping their arms. Suddenly Kinger feels a Gun and Knife added to his inventory. He reaches into his robes, draped over his own spacesuit, and produces a 9mm. Very nice.

"Remind me again what I'm supposed to do with this?" Kinger asks Kay, who's wiggling in excitement as they pull a giant, wicked dagger from behind themself. They cackle. It reminds him of his youth. He'll have to ask how old Kay is sometime. 

'Well, they have to be at least eighteen,' He reasons. 'The adventure they're on is rated Mature, after all.'

"We have to kill everyone else, but without them catching on that we're the killers!" Kay replies, tossing the knife back and forth between their hands. "That's the game today. We're gonna have to be sneaky and look all innocent."

"I see," Kinger says, procuring ammo from his inventory and loading his weapon. "Well, if there's one thing I can do with a gun, it's paint."

"Paint?"

"The walls!"

"O-oh!" Kay chuckles. "Yeah! And, hey, King?"

"Yes?"

"Leave Jax for me, wouldja? I have plans for him," Kay says in a mischievous voice.

"Your plan is safe in my hands," Kinger says solemnly. He pauses. He's forgetting something.

"Wait, where did I put my hands...? Oh, they're right here! Holding this gun. A 9mm. Nice gun."

Then, there is the familiar pull of a forced teleport. With a pop, they're in a bright place, with brown tile and round blue tables. Kinger instantly remembers his childhood eating lunch on tables like these, his young friends around him, peanut-butter-jelly sandwich in his hands, talking about made-up fantasy worlds -- what were their names again? His friends or the fantasy worlds? Voices murmur around him, and he looks up, blinks. 

Everyone else is wearing spacesuits, too. Pomni's big hat is crammed into her head-bubble. Pomni and Ragatha are walking off together, Jax is gone. People are pairing up.

Kinger hears a beep. He pulls his clipboard from his inventory. On the page some tasks are marked, empty checkboxes next to them. If only he had a little virtual assistant right now to make sense of this.

"I need a paperclip," He says to nobody in particular, then starts making his way down the hall. In the upper corner of his clipboard there's a greeting-card sized map of their spaceship. The text is sort of small, but Kinger can just barely read it. Honestly. He might as well just pick a direction and go.

He walks down hallways with cold steel sides. The air is cold too. It's like being in a refrigerator! Brrr. Kinger is glad for his robes. He puts his hands inside, and brushes up against something else cold. Oh! His gun. Yes.

He walks to a set of doors that slide open for him. What is this, a grocery store? Inside is a place with lots of wires. Kinger almost doesn't see Gangle in there, since she looks so much like a wire herself. She's doing some sort of task, connecting little colored wires together.

"Hi, Gangle!" Kinger says, and the young woman jumps. 

"Wahh! Oh! Hi, Kinger," Gangle says, turning. "You haven't seen the imposter, have you?"

"Seen the what?" Kinger asks.

He takes out his gun and shoots her between the eyes in one clean, fluid motion.

.

.

.

You've somehow already lost Jax -- that bunnyboy is slippery as a fucking eel. Distantly, you hear a gunshot, and freeze on instinct. You're in the communications room, messing up the security cameras, and every little sound is making you think someone's about to walk in on you.

With a final, decisive click, computer communications fizzle out, but then you hear a voice over your walkie-talkie:

"Emergency! There's a body!"

....That's Kinger. Reporting his own kill, you suppose. That might actually be a good strategy, though --

You shiver as you're teleported back to the cafeteria, the brown-and-tan tile pattern spinning across your vision. All of you are circling the round center table with a big button in the center.

"Who? Where?" Zooble asks the second after everyone adjusts to the sudden change. Zooble's astronaut helmet is triangular instead of round. There's little sealed rings for their plastic antennae to stick out from, and their yellow-orange astronaut suit actually has human hands. It's sorta strange to see them with a normal-ish body plan.

"What? Why?" Kinger asks, and Zooble sighs, their hands placed flat on the blue table.

"The body, where was the body and whose was it?"

"Oh! Gangle died in the wires room," Kinger answers.

"Pff, of course Gangle would get murdered first," Jax quips. His ears are crammed into his round helmet -- he looks like a lop-eared rabbit. His astronaut suit is his trademark pink.

God, he's cute like that.

"And what were you doing when Gangle got killed?" Zooble asks pointedly.

"I was in navigation," Jax says, twirling his finger, "Spinning around in the spinny chair."

He glances over at you, grin widening as his eyes narrow. 

"Kay's awful quiet, though. And wasn't with anyone."

A screen with all your names and little icons of your faces pops up.

"Yeah, guys, let's trust Jax and vote for me," You say cheerfully, and almost instantly everyone skips the vote. You shoot Jax a Look across the table, and even without the ability to give him a smug grin, the Energy must still come across, because he throws up his hands and starts tapping one foot.

"Wh -- are you serious? I'm on your guys' side!"

"Uh-huh," Ragatha says. 

"I'm trying to help you win! I want to win too!" He says, but the remark falls upon deaf ears as everyone pairs off to go do their tasks again. You pointedly don't look at your fellow saboteur-imposter as you sidle up next to Jax.

"Hey, you're right, maybe I should pair up with a buddy," You say, and Jax looks you up and down.

"Jeez, don't you have any other hobbies besides obsessing over me?"

"Not my fault you're constantly begging for attention by actin' out," You respond as you walk down the hall, both of you leaving clacking footsteps with your big boots. "Like I said, don't dish if you can't take."

"What, and you don't? Always with your weird little jokes?"

"As if you don't laugh at them!"

You both arrive in the reactor room, and you let Jax walk ahead to restart the reactor. You walk up behind him, pulling your gun out of your hammerspace...

Then place it on the keypad in front of him, pointing away from you both.

"What --" Jax says, going still. His pupils have become tiny squares. The whirring of heavy machinery ka-chunks ka-chunks away like a heartbeat.

"Why did -- huh?"

"I'm sorry," You say. "For yesterday. I was so focused on trying to win I didn't realize I was freaking you out. And I feel bad about it. So I'm giving you my role in the game. You can be imposter this round."

"You can do that?" Jax asks, reaching for the gun. As soon as his gloves brush its surface, two tiny icons appear above both your heads with a little pop: yours a red skull, his a blue heart. 

Then, with another pop, they swap.

"Oh," Jax hums. He picks up the gun.

Then he swings the barrel towards you.

You're already running.

Chapter Text

You can hear Jax in close pursuit behind you as you streak out into the hall. There's a familiar feeling rising in your chest -- this feels like when you and him and Gangle were racing --

A bullet ricochets against metallic walls and you squeal instinctively even though you feel like you're running out of air. The gun's sound is so loud your hearing rings, but that quickly fades: benefits of simulated gunfire, you suppose. Behind you, besides the pounding of boots, there's metallic clicking, and a grunt of frustration.

"There's a cooldown on the gun, genius!" You shout back at Jax, turning to look at how close he is as you reach the upper engine room -- the first impression you get in those brief seconds is of his huge smile. He looks like a kid playing Uno who just slapped down a Plus Four on someone about to win. You return your attention to the next hall, wondering if you can lose him by ducking into the medbay while he keeps running ahead.

"I still got hands and teeth t'kill ya with!" He hollers back at you, sounding giddy. You feel your heart jump at the thought of him killing you with his bare hands. Jesus. You check behind again in the second before you duck into the medbay, don't see him, and flee into the room, immediately dropping to your hands and knees. The soft parts of your spacesuit are silent, unlike your boots, and you shuffle underneath one of the beds and curl up, hoping the gray of your suit will camouflage you in the shadows.

You go completely quiet. You don't even need to breathe. Who needs that? Not like you've got lungs. Or a heart. Never mind the burning in your chest making your vision blur. 

You hear his footsteps as he runs down the hall after you. They slow. Then they stop. You bring your hands to where your mouth would be.

The door to the medbay slides open, and as it does you hear him panting. You can see his pink suit's feet as he stands in the doorway, seemingly looking around the room. His posture changes as he leans on the doorframe.

"Oh, Kaaa-aaay," He sing-songs. "Countdown's over. I've got a bullet with your name on it!"

He stands there a few seconds longer, catching his breath. You feel yourself shaking. You have the insane urge to burst into giggles.

"Hm," He mutters, quieter. "Must've run off."

And then his feet pad away. The door slides shut.

You relax, practically melting into the gray tile. You wait a few seconds longer before crawling out from under the bed, then, slowly, still on your hands and knees, shuffle over to the door.

You pause outside the motion-detector range and listen. Nothing. Only then do you stand and take a hesitant step forward. The doors slide open, and upon seeing only the red and yellow painted signs pointing to engine and cafeteria, you step out.

BANG.

.

.

.

The Fucker finally drops.

"HAH!" Jax shouts instinctively. Then he realizes Fuckface hasn't ragdolled onto the floor in psuedodeath but instead has dropped into a crouching position. A glance slightly ahead reveals a new bullet hole in the tile.

They burst into giggles and spring back up, starting to run.

"Oh, no you don't!" Jax shouts, stretching his arm further -- he grabs them by the shoulder and yanks them backwards onto the floor. They fall flat, then apparently give up, lying on their back and looking up at them through their creepy sunglasses. The inside of their helmet fogs, and their chest rises and falls, even though they don't have a mouth or nose. 

Freak.

Jax's gun is still in his hand. Standing above them, he jabs the barrel into their stomach, impatiently waiting for the cooldown to finish. The dumbfuck has the audacity to giggle, wiggling under the barrel.

"Th-that tickles!" Dumbfuck laughs, and Jax slides the tip of his gun up none-too-gently so he can dig the cold metal into their breastbone. Jax knows how uncomfortable it is for someone else to jab that spot; when he was a teenager and his little siblings got in his space or his room he would use the knuckle of his pointer finger to dig in right there. Heavy fabric shifts between the barrel and gray skin -- these stupid suits are just costumes, after all, not the real deal for space.

"Owowow -- hhhah, hehehehe, ow," Fuck whines, still giggling.

"What're you laughing for?" Jax huffs out, grinning triumphantly, and the tone of his own voice surprises him. He meant to sound more annoyed. "I'm 'bout to blow your brains out."

And in response to that, the dumbfuck glows. Tilts their head and just -- sparkles. Little golden and white twinkles appear around their head like some comic panel bullshit.

"I'm having fun!" They reply. The tension in his hand goes loose without his brain's input. He feels the tip of his gun press into Kay's chest with every breath and little laugh.

He remembers how they looked yesterday in that hallway, scrambling out of that locker, sick and shaking and desperate. 

'Fun?'

The cooldown runs out.

Kay stares up at him, smiling. They don't have a mouth but Jax can tell they're smiling.

He can see his own reflection in their dark sunglasses. His eyes are huge and dark. His mouth is almost invisible, only a thin line.

Jax slowly traces the gun up Kay's chest until it clinks against the plastic of their bubble helmet. They just stare placidly, like a friendly chicken that doesn't know its about to get its head chopped off. 

'They're not scared?'

BANG.

Jax shrieks, and fires his gun, but it only hits tile -- half of Kay's body is gone, only their legs and waist remaining, with a single, cartoonish white bone sticking out of their pallid remains. 

This doesn't register in Jax's brain at first. He's hopped at least a foot into the air like a startled cat. He whirls, clutching his chest with his free hand. Whips his gaze to Kay's corpse, then at their killer.

Kinger stands in the medbay doorway, gun in hand.

"K-Kinger, Kinger you sshhhh -- stupid, senile -- that was MY kill!" Jax hisses.

"It looked like Kay had you cornered," Kinger says simply. "They're a tricky one."

At that, Jax feels a heat rush to his face. His ears twitch against the plastic trapping them.

'Oh, fuck this. No no no no -- noooooooooo.'

"I had it handled, old man -- now let's move before someone sees us," Jax says, shouldering past the chess piece into the medbay. "Wait, actually."

He shoves Kinger back out into the hallway.

"Watch Kay's dead body for me, would you?"

"Oh, I can do that!" Kinger replies as Jax makes his way to the vent in one corner of the medbay. Must have been where Kinger came from. After putting his gun away, he pulls up the grate and shimmies inside.

It's freezing, with cold air whipping past him, cold enough he feels it through his heavy pink suit.

God, why did it have to be pink? He should have gotten purple instead. But nooo, Ragatha had to be purple.

He should kill her next.

Jax shimmies forward. The metal walls press around him so closely. At the junction of the paths leading to electrical and security, he pauses, listening.

He really wishes he could perk up his ears right now. Stupid as it is, being able to move them does actually help him focus on sounds better.

There's faint clicking from his left, like someone's doing something in the security room, so he goes right, trying to be quiet.

It's probably a good thing the dumbfuck gave him this role. Kay doesn't seem to handle small spaces all that well.

The image of Kay curled in fetal position, shivering, flashes in his mind again. The way their neck felt crushed under his foot, like stepping on an eggshell. The bloom of feral vindication in his brain as he saw that locker and just acted.

That lukewarm hand sliding down, down to his tummy, touching him -- how his stupid bunny body pressed back against that pressure for just a moment, God -- Jax closes his eyes tight enough to see spots. Nausea rises up from his stomach and knocks on the door of his throat.

'Anyone ever tell you you smell like bubblegum?'

"Stupid," He mutters with a shudder, trying to lean against the cold metal and bonking his helmet into the vent's wall. His forehead feels sweaty and hot. "Stupid, stupid, stupid."

There's light. He crawls towards it, peeks through the vent. He spies Gangle's body -- a red suit, but instead of an oversized bone, piles of red ribbons spill out of the vivisected corpse. 

It looks sick.

Jax pops out of the vent and kicks the grate behind him, not bothering to replace it. He steps over wires snaking across the dark green-brown floor to Gangle's body and digs a hand into the piles of ribbon, entranced. He raises his hand, and lets the ribbons spill out of his pink-clad palm like liquid.

Cool.

"We, uh, found a body!" He hears Ragatha's voice crackle over his walkie-talkie, and that's the only warning he gets before a forced teleport deposits him back into the cafeteria.

"Aw, God, why'd you have to report? I was busy lookin' at Gangle's dead body," Jax says before anyone can get a word in. He feels his grin widen at the looks of disgust on the two remaining girl's faces. And Zooble looks like they're about to jump across the table and try to kill him, which is just bonus points in his book.

Kinger, the fool, is still holding his gun.

The ding of a vote rings out. Zooble's voted for Jax.

"Um," Pomni says.

"I know Kinger did it," Zooble downright hisses. "Let's kill Jax anyway."

Ding.

Ragatha's voted for him, too. 

Jax's eyes dart towards Pomni.

"U-uh," She says, wilting. 

"Aw, come on. Is pokin' at a corpse really a crime when you've got an actual killer on the loose?' Jax says with a shrug of his shoulders. "I haven't even killed anyone on this ship!" 

"Sssorry," Pomni says awkwardly, and Jax feels a jolt of adrenaline flood his whole body.

He acts.

Jax swings his gun out and shoots Ragatha across from him.

The bullet pierces the voting screen and it shatters into triangular shards, scattering across the cafeteria table. Stuffing spews from Ragatha's pair of purple legs before they fall over with a light poof.

"Oh, we're doing this now?" Kinger asks right before he aims at Zooble. Only Zooble's quick reflexes manage to save them as they duck and Kinger shoots.

"You can't just kill people during the meeting!" Pomni shrills, running out the door towards the storage room. 

"Kinger, get Pomni," Jax says, hopping up onto the table and standing, crunching the voting screen underfoot. "I wanna murder Zooble."

"Aye-aye, captain!" Kinger says, remaining completely still.

Jax turns away towards Zooble, who's dashing towards the weapons room, pockets his cooling-down gun. He walks backwards to the edge of the cafeteria table, the shards tinkling like broken glass, drops to a running pose.

Then he sprints forward and leaps.

He jumps far. He is a bunny, after all. 

Like a sick cross of raptor and rabbit, he lands on his prey with laser-like accuracy. He immediately bites Zooble's stupid yellow shoulder, wrapping his limbs around them like a vise, and tastes pink lemonade. Zooble screeches like a banshee and grabs at his throat, which only incentivizes Jax to bite harder.

He pulls out his knife and slashes at their silly-straw throat, ripping fabric. Suddenly, the upper half of Zooble's body is gone, and Jax is clinging to nothing. He crashes to the floor on top of Zooble's body -- it's still warm, ohh, that's freaky.

'Aw, that was over too quick.'

He tsks as he gets to his knees -- falling into a tile floor did not feel good, fake or not -- and looks down. Zooble's yellow body has a bright pink bone with cyan stripes sticking out instead of a normal white one. Go figure.

"Hey, Caine," Jax says, shouting in the general direction of the ceiling, "I think Kinger an' I won!"

"Not yet, you haven't!" Caine's voice crackles through the ship's PA system. "Our brave little jester still has the chance to save PLANET PLAZOOKY!"

Jax blinks.

"Planet what-now?" He asks, but there's no other answer. He turns around. Kinger is gone. With an irritated sigh he gets to his feet, pulls his gun out and takes a step forward.

Then furrows his brows at the sound of his boot clacking against the tile. He lifts his foot up, bends his leg right then left, examining his shoe.

Nope, attached to his pants leg. Ugh, this sucks. He would go barefoot if he could, in order to sneak better. He stalks forward briskly, finger on the trigger.

The whole ship suddenly shudders and rocks. 

Jax stumbles, throwing out his arms for balance as the lights flicker. He snaps his gaze to his left, towards the front of the ship where he knows navigation is.

If the navigation is getting fucked up, Pomni must be in there.

He starts to run.

.

.

.

Pomni has not gotten this far just to let a sick bastard who enjoys shoving people in lockers and touching dead bodies beat her at a fucking Among Us rip-off.

She throws the control wheel to the right -- it's shockingly similar to the Wii wheel she used to use for Mario Kart as a kid. Or just the regular wheel on her old car. Warnings beep and scream at her, lights flash orange and red. It doesn't matter. This is just a game, right? And being the sole survivor, she can't exactly vote the imposters off anymore.

She just has to save Planet Plazooky from the meteor to win.

This ship could serve as a perfectly good thing for a meteor to crash into, instead of a planet.

More warnings beep at her. She busies herself clicking out of them on the computer until she hears someone running down the hallway.

She flees. She's put the ship on its course. Now she just needs to live.

"Come back, Pompom, I'll make it quick!" She hears Jax shout behind her, which only makes her run faster.

There is a sudden, terrible sound. A sound so great, of thousands of pounds of metal screeching out in agony, of tons of rock crashing and cracking, of metal reverberating so wildly it throws her off her feet --

And then, with a pop, everything is silent and still.

Pomni blinks, then squints. She's in some sort of bright metal waiting room, seats lined up along the back walls, a few stray crates scattered here and there. Everyone who was killed in the game is inside -- Gangle, Kay, Ragatha and Zooble all turn towards her as though she's just popped in on a conversation.

"Pomni!" Ragatha says brightly, looks to her left, then right. "Kinger!"

"Jax," She says with much less enthusiasm.

"Did you all die at once?" Kay asks, right before Caine bursts into the room with a shower of silver and gold sparkles that sprinkle the faces of those unfortunate to be standing too close to him. Ragatha starts to cough.

"And the Good Guys win, thanks to Pomni's HEROIC and SELFLESS act, the meteor was destroyed and the citizens of Planet Plazooky rejoice!"

"How come she wins because she killed herself?" Jax cries out.

"That's bold, coming from a literal cheater!" Ragatha retorts. 

"You're just mad 'cos I blew your top off," Jax replies, crossing his arms and smirking.

"Now, I know you all want to go home, so I'll just whip up a portal for my splendiferous little rascals --"

"I wanna play another round!" Kay says, raising their hand and jumping up. Immediately shouts of protest come from Gangle, Ragatha, and Zooble. 

"Wait," Caine says, going still, his eyes flicking to Kay. "Effesikay. You actually... enjoyed this adventure?"

"Yeah!" Kay affirms, bouncing on the balls of their feet. "I wanna play again with whoever else wants to play!"

"Oh!" Caine says, his eyes going big and sparkly, little blushies adorning his face. "I see!"

He does a little loop-de-loop as he flies upwards, and then a twirl, pointing his cane at the group.

"Who else would like to play for a BONUS ROUND?!"

Kay instantly thrusts their hand up higher, and Jax's arm twitches. He continues to stare at the wall with a checked-out grin on his face.

But he doesn't put his hand up.

'Huh,' Pomni thinks. 

Several moments pass. Kay's hand lowers a bit as their fingers curl slightly. Pomni presses her mouth into a thin line and glances to the side. She would be lying if she said she wanted to play again. Jax coming after her was terrifying. Even if doing tasks with Ragatha was relaxing at first, being hunted by unknown threats was not a fun feeling.

Then, with a long-suffering sigh, Zooble raises one lobster claw.

"I could play one more time," they say, "But only once."

Jax's hand shoots up.

"I wanna murder Zooble more," He chirps brightly.

"Well," Kinger says, raising his floaty hand. "If the kids want to go outside, someone needs to make sure they put on sunscreen."

Jax blinks as his smile drops into a scowl.

"I wanna kill this guy, too," He says.

"Well!" Caine says, voice bright like that of a middle-school girl whose crush just called her cute, "Four of you is just enough for a game, what luck!"

"Only ONE game," Zooble reminds Caine as Kay cheers.

"The rest of you, into the fractal noise! Your friends will be joining you shortly!" Caine says as he whips up a portal with a whimsical sound effect.

"I hope you all have fun!" Ragatha says with a wave before walking through. Gangle simply waves, and Zooble and Kay wave back.

"Great win, Pomni," Kay says before Pomni walks through. 

She smiles at them.

"I hope you win, too!" She says before she steps back into the Circus.

Chapter Text

Ragatha sighs and stretches as she exits the portal into the main room of the circus. Over the years, seeing the black-and-white checkerboard tile after an adventure has become a bit of a soothing sight.

"I'm so glad Caine didn't make us play that second round," Pomni says, rubbing at her upper arms. "That astronaut costume was so uncomfortable."

Gangle giggles. 

"You did look a little silly with your entire hat stuffed into your helmet," The ribbon points out, and Pomni chuckles. 

"I felt silly," She replies, flicking the yellow pompom at her hat's tassel. "This thing is, like, glued to my head. Won't come off, I tried."

"That's the way clothes are here," Ragatha says with a sigh. "Nothing comes off, it's all stuck unless Caine changes our outfits. Kay really lucked out, honestly... you, too, Gangle. And Zooble, I suppose."

"Oh," Gangle replies. "I never really, um... thought about that."

"At least Kay seems to be adjusting okay!" Ragatha replies, trying not to let the conversation end on a negative note. "It surprised me they wanted to keep playing after how fast they got killed."

"Certainly adjusting a lot better than me," Pomni points out, but it sounds more glad than bitter. "Even if they're... kind of weird."

Gangle blinks so obviously she gets a blink sound effect.

"You think Kay is weird?" She asks, tilting her mask a bit.

"They named themself a swear word," Pomni says. She glances over towards the end of the main room. "I'm... gonna go outside for a bit. I'll be back before dinner."

"Need any company?" Ragatha can't help but ask. 

"No, I'm good," Pomni says, turning to look back with a friendly smile. "Just need to... get some fresh air."

Ragatha watches her leave, then glances over at Gangle beside her.

"Sooo," She says, grabbing her wrist and rocking back and forth on her feet. "Got any plans for today?"

"I was... going to draw..." Gangle says, voice suddenly small and shy. 

'Ohhh,' Ragatha thinks. 'Probably the kind of drawings Jax is always teasing her about.' 

She remembers the first drawing of Gangle's he'd found, an ink sketch of two... very well-endowed, naked women lustfully kissing one another.

Jax had taped it to Gangle's door right before they were all about to retire for the night. As everyone had filed into the hallway, the artist of said image had shrieked and grabbed for it, only for Jax to snatch it away and hold it above her head.

"Didn't know you were into this stuff, Ribbons," He'd cackled, holding the image in full view as the poor girl had stammered and started to cry, her mask almost as red as her body.

Caine had appeared, then. 

"What's all this fuss about?" He'd asked before his eyes flicked over to the offending paper. "Ope! Excellent work, Jax, we can't have any of that around here!"

Ragatha remembered how Jax's smile had instantly dropped into a scowl upon hearing praise from the ringmaster.

With a snap of Caine's fingers, the paper burst into flame. Jax yelped and dropped the thing, waving his hand: the tips of his yellow glove were charred and smoking. Gangle stared at the ashen remains of her lesbian romance on the carpet, silent as tears ran down her mask.

Then she giggled. The giggle rose into a hysterical laugh as she opened and then slammed her door, the lock a click of finality. Then, voice muffled by the wood, Gangle screamed.

That was years ago now, though.

"Well, don't let me get in your way," Ragatha says. "Enjoy your drawing time, Gangle!"

"Th-thanks," Gangle says with a little grin. "I'll see you later."

Ragatha watches her go, and sighs.

Maybe Bubble could use some help in the kitchen for dinner when the rest were done playing Among Us?

And she could clean Gangle's blood out of her handkerchief in the kitchen sink.

.

.

.

Zooble ended up being forced to play three games instead of just one with the rest of you, which makes you feel a tad bad. 

However, getting to see Jax get a taste of his own medicine in the form of Zooble chasing him with a gun really negates that smidge of guilt. And you're pretty sure Zooble thought it was worth staying for, after that.

When you leave the portal, with Caine going on about something something "my little lucky clovers", you stretch big, feeling your body hum with exhaustion. Running around a giant spaceship trying not to get killed is an actually intense workout. Who knew?

"I am starving," Jax says as he walks forward, one hand on his hip. "I swear to God if dinner is as bad as breakfast was I'm gonna kill Caine."

"I could go for some eggs," Kinger says, and Zooble just starts walking wordlessly, the little transparent dragonfly wing they've got attached to their shoulder today drooping tiredly. Zooble actually won as imposter one round -- the one where they killed Jax. The other two rounds, you won as a crewmate, Jax being imposter once and Kinger being imposter the other time. These games were not quite as long and exciting with only four people.

Ahead of you, there's the long dining table Caine spawns into the main room during mealtimes. You see Ragatha setting out plates and silverware with Bubble, and hear the low tones of conversation between the two. 

"Wow, dollface, do you not have any real friends to talk to?" You hear Jax snark as he pulls out a seat and sits. He crosses his arms on the table and lays his head down in the empty space where Ragatha was about to put the the plate.

Ragatha's mouth presses into a thin line, and she just ignores him, balancing the plain white dish on his head before putting another at the place next to him.

"It's not like you do either!" Bubble pipes up, and Jax stiffens. He grabs the plate off his face, sits up, and throws it like a frisbee straight through Bubble, who pops. At the sound of china shattering, Jax falls back into his trademark grin.

"Hey, Raggie, you forgot to give me one."

You see Ragatha's eye twitch. She doesn't respond.

"Oh no," You say, pulling out the chair next to him and pushing you plate closer to him. "We have to share, how tragic."

Jax's grin drops into a grimace as he looks at you like you're something he stepped in. You hear Ragatha chuckle from the other side of the table as she takes her seat, waiting for everyone else to arrive.

"We are not sharing," He says, turning to the seat next to him, now occupied by Kinger. He reaches for Kinger's plate.

Kinger takes one of his eyeballs off with a pop and presses it, unblinking, against the porcelain dish. Jax's hand immediately stops where it is and twitches in disgust. He returns his hand to himself and crosses his arms, starting to tap one foot irritably.

"Hi, guys!" Gangle says as she walks up, taking the seat directly across from you. Jax makes a sound low in his throat that sounds remarkably like a growl.

"Oh, wow, I didn't know you made bunny sounds," You say lowly, just for him to hear.

"Zip your lips," He mutters back.

"Don't got any."

"Kill yourself."

Then you hear Pomni's voice: 

"Hey, Kay! Did you win?" The jester asks as she sits beside Gangle, across from Jax. 

"Twice!" You reply, tapping your palms against the wooden table. "Zooble was an excellent imposter on the third round, though. You should ask them about that."

"I thought you were only playing once?" Gangle asks, turning to Zooble, who's taken a seat by Kinger. 

"Eh," Zooble says with a shrug of their shoulders. "I was having fun."

"Did SOMEBODY say FUN?" Caine asks, bursting into existence above the table.

"Was," Zooble says again, quieter.

"Listen up, folks!" Caine shouts, waving his cane in the air. "I was, uh..."

Caine then does something very strange.

He gets shy.

Normally his body language exudes pure showmanship and confidence. But now, he looks down, presses the tips his fingertips together. Even his teeth draw a little closer together, hiding his eyes a little.

"I just... wanted to thank you... It's been such a long time since any of you said you liked my adventures, let alone enough to do one again! S-so I... I! I thought I'd do something spectacular, splendorous, and absolutely wonderful for you all!"

He jerks back into his normal act, snapping his fingers. Suddenly everyone's plates are full of rice and chicken-and-vegetable kebabs. In the center of the table is a giant, multilayered, heart-shaped vanilla cake with pink frosting that looks like it came straight out of Purble Place.

"Cake," You say instantly, feeling the sparkles return around your face. Maybe little hearts, too.

"And just to let you all know... I will be taking from the SUGGESTION BOX tomorrow! I want to make another AMAZING adventure you all will enjoy!"

Caine disappears in a poof of smoke, and you look down at the plate between you and Jax. It's gotten more food than the other plates, presumably since you're sharing now. There's two chicken kebabs for each of you, resting on a bed of fresh, still-steaming rice.

"It feels so weird for my mouth to wanna water when I don't have a mouth," You mutter. 

"I know, right?" Zooble chimes in before picking up a kebab and pressing it to their face. A chunk of chicken is consumed. "Oh, that's good."

You take one skewer, clip it through your face, and hum in appreciation. The marinade on the chicken, mushrooms, onions and bell peppers has the sweet tang of honey and lemon, with a tiny bit of spicy bite to it. It's pleasantly sticky and chewy.

"Tastyyyy," You agree before looking at the purple rabbit next to you. "Dude, you said you were starving. Quit staring and eat."

Jax blinks down at your shared plate owlishly before snatching the remaining three kebabs, two in one hand and one in the other.

"Hey!" You snap as he laughs and yanks them away when you try to grab the single one with your hands. You glare at him. He grins.

"Are you five years old? Did you never learn to share? That's mine," You tell him. In response, he takes a bite of chicken -- from the skewer you were trying to take from him, the single one you'd thought of as yours.

You grab his stupid yellow hand and shove the kebab deep and hard into his throat, and he makes an interesting sound that's a combination of gag, retch, and choke. Jax drops the other two kebabs back on the wooden table. Calmly, as he makes noises like a dying cat, you take one back to hold in your hands. As the rabbit continues to suffer, you divide the rice on the plate in half with your fork, putting Jax's kebab on his side. Then you reach over him, swipe up the sauce on the table with a gray fingertip, and clip it to taste it. 

Jax heee-acks like a wounded animal before the wooden skewer in his throat clatters back onto the table, completely cleaned of all edible material, along with a copious amount of spit. You look over at him as you clip a forkful of buttery rice into your face. He's clutching his chest with one hand, the other digging into his pants leg, long ears flat, eyes little square dots. His entire face is beet-red. He audibly wheezes.

"And I hope we've learned a valuable lesson about trying to steal my food," You say simply, holding out the napkin the silverware was rolled in for him. His eyes flick over to you, and his face somehow gets even redder. He slaps your napkin away and wipes his mouth with the back of his glove. Touché.

It takes you a moment to realize the whole table is silent. Gangle has a nosebleed again, if the napkin pressed to their mask is any indication. Zooble's eyes are so wide you can barely see their eyelids. Pomni's covered her face with her mis-matched gloves.

"So!" You say, trying to break the ice. "We've got a suggestion box, huh?"

"U-uh," Ragatha says. "Yes! But Caine very rarely uses it..."

"Normally it's like it's not even there," Zooble continues, blinking their shocked expression away. 

"That's exciting! I'll have to put some suggestions in tonight," You reply. 

"I could show you and Pomni where it is, if you want," Ragatha offers. You see Pomni peek through her fingers before lowering her hands.

"That sounds like it could be nice," Pomni says. "I wouldn't mind putting in some suggestions, either."

Ragatha beams. 

"By the way," She says. "I helped Bubble make the non cake part of dinner today! It makes me happy to see you're enjoying something I made."

"Ew," Jax mutters.

"For real? This tastes delish," You compliment her.

"Oh, it's nothing! Back home mom would cook stuff like this all the time! We wouldn't cull our chickens very often, since they were for eggs, but when we did... it tasted so good," Ragatha explains.

You stare at the cake, then look back down at your plate. You've finished your half. Jax is slowly making his way through his now. You decide to wait patiently for when the plate is cleared so you can use it for cake.

"Hey, Gangle, can I borrow some pen and paper for writing suggestions?"

"As long as you make the suggestions good," Gangle replies, pulling her sketchbook from hammerspace and tearing free a page. "Here, you can have a page too, Pomni."

"Thank you," the jester replies as the ribbon hands you both pencil and paper. You suddenly hear the scoot of chair on tile, and look over to see Jax is getting up. He's finished his rice, and is now walking off with his kebab.

"You didn't get a slice of cake," You call after him. He doesn't respond.

.

.

.

Stupid fucking Fuckface Dumbfuck Kay. 

Jax slams his door behind him before opening his bag of tricks. He nudges aside jars of skittering bugs, airhorns and containers of slime to find what he's looking for. This is something he reserves for when he's truly pissed.

He pulls out the plastic box of metal tacks.

These are going straight into that Fucker's bed, for deepthroating -- doing that to him in front of the whole dinner table. Humiliation still coils hot and low in his stomach. He feels his face is red just thinking about it and he despises it. And everyone had stared at him. 

And then the Fucker offered him a motherfucking napkin.

Stupid, stupid, stupid FUCK.

He paces a circle before grabbing another box of tacks. Then he reaches under his bed and finds that golden ink he loves to put on people's doorknobs, that kind that blends in with their already-brassy color. He grabs a few mousetraps, too. 

He stands in the center of his room, panting.

When Kay had shoved that whole thing down his throat, just because he'd annoyed them, he felt -- he felt --

He closes his eyes again, hands balled into fists. Just stands there, tense and breathing deep and heavy.

He thinks of them perfectly portioning their food on their shared plate. How neatly they'd divided that stupid fucking rice with the same fork they kept putting in their gross smooth face.

Jax shoves his pranks into his back pockets, throws open his door. Nobody's gonna be in the hall, they're probably all fawning over the stupid suggestion box, as if Caine isn't gonna just find a new way to fuck up something they're wishing for. 

Still, he locks his door before making his way to Fuck's room. 

Their portrait of their dumb sphere head and anonymous sunglasses makes his eye twitch. He pulls out the correct key and swings open the door.

Blinks.

He expected something very gray. Maybe some black leather furniture or something, it would be on brand with their whole schtick. Everyone's got rooms that match their bodies, mostly. 

Kay's room looks more like an apartment someone just moved into, with the brownish-tan walls and carpet.

Jax steps inside, closes the door behind himself. He looks down at the fluffy rug he's standing on, then the two paintings.

The beds are still unmade from Kay's sleepover. 

The rabbit looks around again, but there's no closets or chests, not a lot of hiding places for personal items. He glances under the bed, but nothing there. 

Huh. Weird.

He pulls handfuls of tacks out of his pockets and starts tossing them willy-nilly under the colorful throw blankets. He pulls up the gray comforter on the single bed to use more of his tack attacks, pauses.

'This is probably where they actually sleep.'

Jax glances at the door, perking his ears high, before returning his attention to the large gray blanket.

He leans forward until his face touches fabric and inhales deep.

Jax's mouth starts watering. He swallows, then pulls his head away, eyes so big they're almost all black.

Throws more tacks in. Sets a mousetrap and puts it under the cover at the foot of the bed, to catch toes. As he backs out towards the door, he flings tacks on the carpet like he's a little flowergirl throwing petals at a wedding. When he's at the door again he pauses.

Then draws a dick in golden ink on the inside of Kay's door. Just like back when they first arrived. A smile spreads on his face at that memory.

Jax opens the door a crack before inking the doorknob itself, then kicks the door the rest of the way open before shutting it behind himself in the hall. He makes his way back to his room before putting away his stuff.

He's distracted himself sorting through items won or stolen during adventures when he hears voices in the hall. He feels his grin widen. He wants to hear Kay scream. He presses his cheek to the door and flattens his ear against it.

"I hope he picks your suggestion," Kay is saying. "Goodnight! Thanks again, Ragatha!"

Their footsteps get closer.

'Oh, don't start with some more stupid bullshit,' Jax thinks, smile dropping.

There's a knock on his door. Jax goes very still.

"Hey, Jax," He hears Kay's voice say. "I saved you a slice of cake."

Jax feels something weird twist in his chest. No words come.

"I'm just gonna put it by your door," They say, and he hears a soft tap as a dish is slid up to his door.

Jax says nothing.

"Goodnight, Jax."

'Stop talking.'

Their footsteps recede, and Jax, for a brief moment, thinks of calling out, warning them of what he just did, but nothing comes. He can't go back now. 

He's gone and fucked the room of a person who came and gave him a slice of cake they'd saved just for him --

"WAHAHAHAAHAA!! SOMEBODY PUT A BIG SMILE ON MY DOOR!!!!"

Hate. Hate. He fucking hates this idiot.

Chapter Text

Before you realized that your bed was utterly fucked with sharp objects, there was only the joy of finding a giant, sparkling golden penis painted pristinely on the inside of your door. It's huge, obnoxious, and only could have been put there by one person.

Jax. He's gone and drawn a dick on your door. It's like he's put a mark on you or something. It reminds you of your first day, when you almost got to play PicMix before you pissed off Caine and the ringmaster cancelled the whole thing.

It's hilarious. You did wish for art drawn by your friends in your room, after all. You want to put a clear varnish over the vandalism so it stays there forever as a symbol of the rabbit's intrusion.

The thought makes you pause. 

'Is Jax my friend?'

He... definitely would not say so. He's shot at you, beat you up, called you names and hurt your other friends. And that's only this week. In the time since you've arrived, you've seen that he's clearly cemented himself as, to put it lightly, a bully, and to put it heavily, a sadistic asshole.

But you like when you make him laugh.

And he gave you your nickname: Kay.

You think of how he says it sometimes, when he's not in a pissy mood: that easy, ever-so-slightly-fond syllable. Kay, Kay, Kay. His snickers at your jokes. 

Those rare little moments feel like such a reward since you have to work for them.

You bring your hand up to your forehead, where he put a bullet in your brain earlier that day. It hadn't even hurt. One moment you'd been looking up at him, feeling the sparkles of your not-there grin and panting from the exhilaration of the chase -- the next, blinking up at bright lights in the waiting room. 

His eyes had been huge as he stared down at you, like mini black holes. Like he had so many conflicting thoughts his face had just noped out. And he let the cooldown timer run out long before actually shooting you; you were counting in your head. It was painfully obvious something was on his mind.

Maybe he was just wondering if your skull would splatter across the tile like in real life. 

Or maybe he was thinking about your apology.

Either way, you'd like to see that face again. The sort of face he makes when he fucks around and then finds out. You wanna render him speechless. You want to knock him down a peg --

As you step into your room, ready to start pacing, along with the fuzziness of your carpet you feel something sharp embed itself into your foot and yelp in pain, jerking away. Then blink while balancing on one foot.

Oh, your room is so fucked.

There's teeny tiny metal tacks on every conceivable surface, bedded into the carpet, glinting in your bedding. You pull the tack embedded in your foot out and let it fall to the floor.

You realize your hand is sticky. You look down at your palm to find it coated in glittery golden paint. 

Maybe you went too far by skewer-ing Jax's throat at dinner -- well, no. He tried to take your food. Your response was very justified and normal. And it did actually make him shut up and quit insulting people for several moments, which is a rarity.

Your muscles ache as you step backwards out into the hall. You imagine yourself having to shake out all your bedding, remake your bed, crawl around on your hands and knees to pick it all up, all while getting poked and prodded.

Fuck. That.

You close your door and turn around. Everyone else has gone into their rooms. For a brief moment, you consider knocking on someone's door and explaining. Surely the others would let you stay a night.

But you've already dragged on the socialization longer than usual today, what with the extra rounds of knockoff Among Us. You don't want to get in the others' spaces so much that you start to get on their nerves.

Besides, you don't actually require sleep here. You think. And its not like there's any shortage of things to look at. 

But first. You can't let this little prank slide. You go over to knock on Gangle's door.

"Hey, Gangle, can I borrow a Sharpie?" You call into her room. You hear a squeak, then the sound of some shuffling. A moment later Gangle opens her door a crack, glancing at you.

"U-um," She says, handing you a black permanent marker. "Just remember to give it back. And don't... um... press down on the tip so hard it gets squished in. Please."

"Your marker will be safe in my hands," You reply. "I will take extra care with the tip, pinkie promise."

Gangle smiles at you. 

"Goodnight," She says. 

"Night, Gangle," You reply as you turn, putting the marker in your hammerspace. "Seeya tomorrow."

As you walk back down the hall, you glance at Jax's door. He's probably still awake. You'll save your revenge for later.

The big slice of vanilla cake you gave him is still in front of the door, untouched.

You wish you could sigh as you leave the hall and start your aimless wanderings. Your foot still throbs a little where it got poked. The circus lighting is dim in a simulation of night, it makes everything a tad eerier, even more liminal than it was before. But still, being a little bit scared can be kind of fun. 

You find yourself back in the main room and look up at the big wooden stage, the giant playground tubes crisscrossing the air and the spiraling staircase leading up to them. This place is like a fast-food playground on crack. You walk over to the staircase, wondering what the view would be like from the top --

And the second you put your foot on the first stair, get a wave of dread so powerful you feel physically nauseous with it. You jerk your foot away for the second time that night and put a hand to your chest.

'What the heck?'

Your not-heart is beating really fast. You feel like you're breaking into a sweat.

Okay, so no stairs then.

You turn away and go in the opposite direction, off into a random hallway you haven't explored before. After a few feet of going straight the hallway starts to actually zig-zag at ninety degree angles, which makes zero architectural sense, but whatever, you're rolling with it. The black and white tiles continue here, with this gaudy orange and pink striped wallpaper.

You walk. And keep walking. There's no doors in this hallway, but it keeps zig-zagging, on and on like a fucked-up math problem. If the hallway changes direction every X meters, and changes direction Y times, how long is the hallway? Some kind of hypothetical like that. 

Something that's not supposed to be real.

Then you realize the baseboards of the hall have been replaced by black tile.

You pause, keep walking. Turn another corner.

The tiles have gone up another row, eating up the bright orange with obsidian black.

You walk over to the wall and drop to a crouch, reaching out to touch the smooth tile. The ones under your feet are smooth, but the ones on the wall are slightly curved, grout between them, like bathroom tile. They're so shiny you can just barely see your reflection in them. Barely.

It's dark in here.

But now your curiosity is piqued. If you keep going, will the tiles go all the way up to the ceiling?

'I'm scared of the steps leading up to a fun, colorful slide in the most traversed part of the circus, but I wanna keep exploring the creepy desolate hallway slowly filling up with black tiles. Jax was right, there must be something seriously wrong with my head.'

You pause, considering. Your feet ache, there's a cloudiness in your head that would love nothing more than for you to close your eyes.

Your bed, however, is still full of tacks. 

So you keep walking, heedless of the increasingly dark hall, hoping you find a random side door or room to crash in for a night. After a while the motion of walking zig-zag becomes like pacing: repetitive and soothing.

And then you step into something wet with a soft splash.

You look down. There's water up to your ankle. You've stepped into a shallow pool, water lapping at your calf. The bottom of the pool is a cheerful turquoise, picturesque of summer. Looking right then left, you realize the hallway opens up here into an indoor pool room. The walls and ceiling are black, while the floor around it is black and white painted concrete squares. The shallow part you've stepped in slopes down in an incline to join the rest of the much deeper pool. When you look up, you realize the ceiling is covered in little glow in the dark stars.

In the center of the water, a giant single flamingo shaped floatie toy beckons you.

"Well, that's not ominous at all," You say out loud. The space is so vast and empty your statement echoes.

But still, it is useful, since your hands and where you've touched your own body are coated in golden paint. You kneel down and start scrubbing, watching the golden glitter flake away from your skin.

As soon as you're done, you turn around and nope out of there. Sure, you were tired, and that flamingo looked as big as your single bed, but you were not trying to drown yourself in your sleep, thank you very much. 

Plus you still had vandalism to do.

.

.

.

Gangle wakes up with a jolt.

"No," She whispers to herself, wrapping tighter around her pillow. She hates how light her body feels as she sleeps, like a dead thing. Like nothing. Like air. Like a dying breath. So she winds around whatever's close for some sort of anchor.

"No, no, no. You're forgetting it. You've already forgotten it."

And she is. She is forgetting it! People aren't supposed to remember their dreams. Or their nightmares. She's already forgetting what it was that made her wake up with a gasp, separated from her body pillow, losing her own sense of self in the fabric of her blankets. 

Everything feels so heavy to her. She is so light, too sensitive to the pressures of force and gravity. Even her own bed is hard to get out of. 

It's sad, really.

But she is already getting up. Already pushing past it. Going to her box to pick out today's mask. To an outsider, all the masks in this box would look identical. But Gangle can tell the difference. Some of these have tiny scrapes and scuffs that show they've survived more than one day. Others are pristine, shiny, brand new. 

She has to ask Caine for new batches periodically. She hates it, hates going to him with that question, watching his teeth narrow ever-so-slightly in what she just knows is disappointment. Why does she break them all so fast? How could she be so careless?

Gangle doesn't know which is more upsetting: breaking a brand new mask on the first day she wears it, or breaking one that's already survived so much with her.

She keeps her favorites, even if she can't repair them. They're taped on the wall like cobbled-together specimens from an amateur taxidermist. Here is the mask that she wore the day Zooble arrived. There is the mask she broke saving Ragatha from falling down a rickety rope bridge in a scary jungle temple adventure. There is the mask that she broke the day she won second place in the race with Jax and Fvck.

Gangle decides today is an old-mask day. Perhaps, if she stays out of arm's reach of Jax, her mask will last a little longer.

'And then it will hurt more when it inevitably breaks.'

"No," She whispers again. "No."

She rises, and turns to her door. 

Oh!

Kay's returned her Sharpie by rolling it under the crack of her door. It rests on the floor, waiting for her.

Well, it doesn't say Sharpie Permanent Marker Chisel Tip on the side. For some reason, the box of markers she snagged on a  "survive the active shooter in the office" adventure all said "Perbamnet Mark" on them, typos and all.

That had not been a fun adventure.

Gangle picks up the marker and uncaps it, inspects the tip. Perfectly chiseled, as it should be. She sighs in relief before adding it to her inventory. 

Once, Jax had found one of her stashes of markers. (She keeps multiple stashes of everything now, so if something was found she didn't find all of it was ruined or used as blackmail.) Jax had pressed down the felt tips of every single one, all the way to the plastic part, on her drywall, leaving wounded dots on the wallpaper. And they'd been good markers too. She had cried so much as soon as she was alone that day, and drew herself killing him. Then ripped the page up.

She'd moved a few of her broken masks, to cover up the dots.

Gangle lays back down and pulls close one of her plushies as she waits for the morning alarm to go off. This plushie, Thingy, was of a purple duck-thing in silly pink overalls that Zooble had won for her in a carnival game, one of the days where Caine left them to explore the grounds instead of hosting his own adventure. She's avoided Jax stealing Thingy from her by adding it to her inventory every time she leaves her room instead of just leaving it on her bed. 

The ribbon closes her eyes and falls back into a light sleep before the sound of a duck loudly quacking wakes her back up. For a confused, sleepy moment she stares at her plush before realizing the noise is the morning alarm today. She makes her way to the door, touches her face to make sure her mask is in place, then pockets Thingy and leaves her room.

Ragatha is already awake, talking to Zooble, who's leaning against the wall and nodding. Gosh, Zooble can look so effortlessly cool at times. 

Kinger is awake, too, standing in front of his door and staring silently. Pomni opens her own door a few moments later, blinking and rubbing at her eyes. Gangle doesn't think she's much of a morning person.

Gangle sees Zooble point, and she follows Zooble's digit (a yellow ball with purple fingers today) to look at Jax's door.

Her eyes widen.

'Ohh,' She thinks. 'That's what Fvck wanted a marker for.'

She sees movement at the end of the hall out of her peripherals, glances over. There's a familiar gray humanoid waltzing down the hall. Even without facial expressions, somehow Fvck is oozing delight. 

"Wonderful morning, right Gangle?" They ask as they take a place beside her. "Got up early to watch this."

Gangle returns her eyes to Jax's door. She feels that familiar icky feeling, her body wanting there to be a lump rising in her throat when there's no throat at all. 

"Jax is gonna be mad at you," She says quietly.

"Oh, I sure hope so!" Fvck responds sunnily, bouncing on their feet. "Might be so ticked at me he'll even leave you alone for a while."

Gangle feels like Jax has jerked at the ribbons making up her chest.

"You d-don't have to do that."

"Don't worry, Gangle," Fvck responds. "This is fun for me."

The ribbon looks again at the portrait on Jax's door.

"Oh, wow," she hears Pomni muse. "Somebody finally said it. It was you, Kay, wasn't it?"

"Beholding my fine creation?" Fvck responds. 

It is a fine creation, Gangle can admit.

There's a speech bubble scribbled in above Jax's head, where his ears are: "I <3 HITTING WOMEN!!1!" 

He's been given scribbly devil horns, bushy angry eyebrows, and what's unmistakably a shit emoji with stink lines has been drawn on his giant yellow grin. "I don't brush my teeth~!" has been written along the circular picture border. Cartoon flies abound in the blank spaces between doodles.

 On the wall by his doorbell, with a helpful arrow pointing to the door, in capital letters, Kay has written "LOSER VIRGIN INCEL."

The doorknob turns, and Gangle squeaks, ducking behind the nearest person for cover. She's so thin she knows she can disappear from view if she just lines up her body perfectly behind Fvck --

"What are you all staring at me for?" She hears Jax ask suspiciously.

"Pffft --" Pomni wheezes before bursting into laughter. 

It breaks some sort of tension. Suddenly Ragatha, Zooble, and Fvck are all howling with laughter, the kind that makes you laugh so hard you can't breathe and your cheeks hurt and you're crying. Gangle finds herself laughing too, half nervous, but half just pure schadenfreude as she peeks out from behind Fvck and sees Jax just staring at his door, looking two seconds away from some sort of mental break.

Caine chooses that moment to appear in the room.

"Oh, wow!" Caine chirps as he looks around, taking in the merry state of most everyone. "It seems my grand little goldfish crackers are in a GREAT mood today!"

"CAINE," Jax shrills at least an octave higher than Gangle has ever heard him yell. She flinches, dropping her weight, covering the back of her mask, and hates that she does.

"FIX my DOOR!" The rabbit commands, stomping his foot.

Ragatha slaps her leg, she's laughing so hard tears fall from her eye.

"Huh?" Caine asks, swiveling his head around, and then his body, "Your door? What's wrong with it?"

"You don't -- the -- there's -- with the -- you don't see?" Jax stammers out, face red, glancing wildly back and forth between the ringmaster and his bedroom door, gesturing and waving his hands around.

"Hmmm," Caine says, swooping over, Jax ducking to avoid getting whacked in the head with Caine's floating cane. "Hmm, hmm."

The mass of teeth grabs the doorknob, turns it. Swings the door open a tad, closes it firmly.

"Your door seems in perfect operating condition to me!"

"But the --" 

"ANYWAY, if you all recall today's adventure will be one of your SUGGESTIONS! So I SUGGEST you all get to breakfast and get ready before I change my mind!"

"CAINE!" Jax cries out right as Caine poofs out of existence again.

He stares at the spot where Caine's disappeared, the pinpricks of his pupils shaking slightly. Everyone's mostly quiet now.

"I hear rubbing alcohol is good at removing marker stains," Fvck pipes up.

"YOU," Jax says, pointing a finger accusingly. Gangle takes the opportunity to slink out of the way, feeling the tension building, and flees to hide behind Zooble. 

Zooble adjusts their blue angel wing to shield Gangle a bit more as the ribbon peeks up, unable to tear her gaze from the budding fight.

"You think you're the funny one, do you?" Jax hisses venomously. 

"Everyone was laughing," Kinger pipes up, the first time he's spoken today.

"Please point to the incorrect statements Kay wrote," Ragatha says, and Jax backs up a step, throwing his gaze between the two. His ears flatten. 

"You all just -- you don't know how to take a joke!" Jax blurts out, but he's a lot less loud. "This place isn't supposed to be taken seriously! When you -- when you put real-world rules on all this -- i-it's missing the point!"

"Look in the mirror, bun," Fvck purrs, and Jax looks like he's seriously considering jumping across the hall and ripping their guts out. "Tell you what, you go an entire day without hurting, hitting, shoving, poking, or prodding anyone, and I'll personally help you remove all that from your door -- and I'll do whatever you want for three whole days."

That makes Jax's ears perk back up. His eyes go huge, like he's just snorted a line of coke, and an absolutely devilish grin spreads on his face.

There's silence.

"I'm gonna make you regret that," Jax says in a creepy monotone that just sounds jarring against the expression on his face. 

Fvck beams pink and yellow flowers, they not-smile so hard.

"That a yes?" They ask.

"That's a promise."

Chapter Text

"That's a promise," Jax says, voice dripping with pure bloodlust.

'Cute,' You think.

You hold out your hand.

"Shake on it?"

Jax's lip curls in disgust. He spits into his palm and holds out his gloved hand, grins at the sound of disgust Pomni makes at that.

"Aw, man, I wish I could spit on mine too," You reply as you grab his hand. 

A sense of déjà vu floods you, and you would have winced if you could. You feel your fingers twitch around his.

His grip is so tight, just barely on the edge of too much. When you pull your hand away, you dip your other hand's fingers into Jax's spit on your palm and flick his own saliva back at him. His lower eyelid twitches before he turns away and starts walking. 

"Man, Kay, I'm already thinking about what I'm gonna do t'ya!" He calls over his shoulder back at you.

"Really, now?" You reply, jogging forward to walk beside him. He stares resolutely at the hallway ahead, not even sparing you a glance. His face is back to its trademark smile. "Gonna share with the class?"

"I think I'll let you stew in the anticipation," he replies. "You'll find out eventually."

"I'm shaking in my boots!" You say. "What sort of torture would you inflict on my poor, gray body? Oh, the horrors!"

"I'm getting real tired of the sound of your voice."

"You wanna hit me," You say, getting close as you dare, almost brushing against him. "You wanna shove me so bad. You wanna kick and bite me so bad its making you look stupid."

"The more you yap now, the more you're gonna hurt later, Kay. Don't say I didn't warn you."

You arrive in the main room, the table already set. In the center are platters of bacon, sausage, hashbrowns, a tray of muffins.

"So, like, wouldya strap me down to a table and carve me up like a Thanksgiving turkey? Is that how you get your sick kicks? You'd just be proving me right, you know."

"Maybe I'll see if you fit inside my toybox with a handful of razors and kick you down the stairs."

That actually makes your body thud with adrenaline, but you know if you give Jax even the slightest tell he'll pounce on the weakness. You busy yourself pulling out your chair next to Jax before responding:

"Boo, so uninspired. Maybe you should get a kitchen knife and give me an actual face, Joker-style. Like," You drop your voice into a gravelly imitation of Gotham's local psycho clown. "You wanna know how I got these scars? Why so serious?"

Jax actually laughs at that. Not a bitter or sarcastic laugh, an actual, honest-to-god involuntary laugh that makes his eyes squinty and shoulders shake. 

You've never heard him laugh quite like that before.

"Will you two quit flirting?" Zooble spits out from across the table, and you see in your peripherals that you and Jax have swiveled your heads to stare at them in unison. 

"Flirting?" You both question at the same time, and then you hear Jax tsk in annoyance.

"Yeah," Zooble says defensively, pointing their fork back and forth between the two of you. "Whatever you two have got going on between you, it's weird, gross, and kind of concerning."

"You're weird, gross, and kind of concerning," Jax mutters loud enough for them to hear, reaching across the table to grab some sausage and bacon with his fork. You fill your plate with muffins -- they smell like banana, mmm. And the hashbrowns look really good, too.

"You really like sweets, huh?" Jax says as you clip a muffin into your face and little pink hearts appear in your periphery.

"Yessssssss," You reply, clipping another bite in. "As if it's my fault humans are genetically predisposed to love the things that give up the most fuel and calories in nature."

Granted, this taste is less "banana muffin" and more "sniffing a banana scratch-and-sniff sticker while having packing peanuts in your mouth" but it's the thought that counts. And the thought of a banana muffin is enough right now.

You look up at Jax when the muffin is gone. He's staring at you. 

"What about you?"

"Huh?" He says, eyes flicking to the rest of the table. The others seem to be mostly engaged in their own, separate conversations now, voices overlapping slightly. His gaze snaps back to you. It makes his eyes look like one of those cat clocks that look back and forth.

"What foods do you like?" You ask, before going to a more mischievous tone. "Or were you lost in thought thinking about which of my fingers you were gonna cut off first?"

"You make me sound like a serial killer," Jax replies. "You realize I've spent years with these guys getting on my nerves and haven't serial killed everyone, right?"

"I dunno, man, the box of razors thing was a pretty textbook serial killer thing to say. The 'I'm gonna make you regret that' with the creepy smile? C'mon, dude."

"My smile is extremely charming and has won me the intense physical affections of many beautiful women, thank you very much," Jax replies, widening his yellow grin so much his eyes narrow. 

You make a little half-laugh as you bite into your hashbrown.

"Oh, I see, how enlightening. Many, many beautiful and busty women, I'm sure. You still haven't told me the foods you like, by the way."

You watch his smile drop a little, and he turns away from you to shovel a whole sausage patty into his mouth. He chews thoughtfully, swallows before answering:

"I think, if I could have any real food right now... there's this really good beef stroganoff my mom used to make that I want."

There's a beat of silence as you process that. He's never said anything so... genuine to you before.

"Oh, I know how good it is. Your mom made it for me the night before I joined the circus," You reply, slyness coloring your tone.

And Jax laughs again! A real laugh! You made him laugh! Something warm blooms in your chest.

You almost forget that you're trying to goad him into hitting you to prove a point.

Almost.

"Y'think your mom would be proud of how you've been acting to everyone?" You ask him in that same casual tone, and Jax goes stock still. Your primal lizard brain recognizes threat and bypasses your conscious control center to force you into a stillness of your own.

And then he moves.

He moves so fast you yelp and his hands circle your neck, not squeezing, not hurting, just holding. His fingers twitch. He wants to press in so, so badly. Your pulse jumps in your neck against the pressure of his gloves. They're softer than you expected.

Neither of you say anything for a moment.

"Good bun," You break the silence with sugar-sweet praise, and you actually hear his little "hff" of an exhale as his pupils shrink and his hands tremble. "Remarkable restraint."

"Oh, for the love of God!" You hear Zooble exclaim annoyedly, and then Jax's hands jerk away as though you've burned him. He blinks and the expression on his face instantly snaps back into easy and relaxed as he puts a piece of bacon in his mouth. 

"B-by the way, Kay!" You hear Ragatha say, and you look over at her. "I did go through my room and found a few things you might like, if you don't mind that they're secondhand."

"Yay!" You say brightly. "I don't mind! I'd like to have something I knew one of my friends gave me. I'll stop by your room after today's adventure."

"Sure," The doll replies before you see her eye falls on Jax beside you. He's probably grinning evilly or something. "U-uh, if you can!"

"Don't worry about it," You reassure her. "Jax is gonna fold, I'm sure."

"Famous last words," Jax sing-songs at your side.

The rest of breakfast is surprisingly uneventful. Turns out when Jax isn't actively antagonizing everyone, people can hold regular conversations. Who would have thought?

You glance over at him beside you a few times. He hasn't eaten much. He spends most of the meal with his hand resting on his knee, tap-tap-tapping away with his pointer finger, face a stoic, emotionless grin. You wonder idly if its some nervous tic that's popping up due to the fact he's gone at least an hour without being able to break Gangle's face or shove Ragatha over. 

Caine must be in a good mood today, because he actually lets everyone finish their breakfast and start making their way to the wooden stage in order to start the adventure. You suppose he might be trying to build suspense by not showing up as soon as possible like he usually does. That or he's just busy with something. 

"I hope he picks one of mine," Gangle says as you all loiter around, waiting for the ringmaster to start the show.

"Yours were cute," You respond. Being in a school romance anime for a day sounds like it could be really refreshing. And it would probably get on Jax's nerves, which would be bonus points.

"I bet hers were boring and lame," Jax quips from your side. "If we went on adventure on who could be the biggest loser, now that's something she could excel at. Little art-school dropout."

Gangle visibly wilts, and you glance over at Jax. His arms are crossed, fingers tucked under his armpits like he's cold or something. Probably trying really hard to keep his hands to himself.

"Ignore him," You tell Gangle. "He's being extra nasty to make up for the fact he can't kick anyone around today."

Gangle does a very tiny nod.

"HELLO, my fantastic flock of flamingos!" Caine shouts as he flies in from the obscured top of the stage. "Are you all ready for a splendiferous day of FUN from your VERY OWN MINDS!?"

He summons a cloud of seven squishy, pink cartoon brains around him when he says "your very own minds", then with a snap of his fingers they disappear and a plain box bursting with papers from the slot in the top appears in front of him. Bubble flies out from behind Caine and looks at the box.

"It's stuffed reeeeeeeeeally full," Bubble states. "It's leaking."

"I can see that, Bubble!" Caine replies, a tinge of annoyance creeping in to his showy tone. He sticks a hand into the box, rummages around, and pulls out a card.

"Let's have an adventure where we duct tape Ragatha to a wall and use her for hatchet throwing practice," Caine reads. 

"JAX!" Ragatha cries out, wrapping her arms around her chest and hunching her shoulders, taking a giant step away from the rabbit's direction.

"What, so you're just gonna assume that one's mine? Wow, Ragatha. And to think I thought we were such good friends," Jax replies, but the shit-eating grin on his face negates any possibility of someone taking his statement seriously. 

"Hm, not fans of that one," Caine mutters, tossing the card carelessly over his shoulder. Bubble swoops in behind him and eats it in one chomp as the ringmaster pulls a new suggestion from the box.

"We should have an adventure where we have a fashion show and get to keep the clothes we use afterwards to wear when we want," Caine reads on the next card.

"YES!" You shriek, pumping your arms in the air and hopping. "That's MINE! YES! YES! YEEEEES!"

"That actually sounds fun!" Ragatha says, and Pomni nods at her side. 

"It would be nice to try out some different clothes," Zooble agrees for once, and Caine turns to them with a jolt as his eyes widen. The bottom half of his jaw actually drops and clatters on the wooden stage with a sound like a metal pipe falling.

"Of course you would like girly stuff like that," Jax mutters, arms still crossed, while Caine picks up his jaw and "reattaches" it with a nasty cracking noise.

"Alrighty, folks, it seems like this SUGGESTION has become a WINNER!" Caine calls out, spreading his arms wide. The words "Best Impressive Dresser" appear in a blocky pink-and-purple glittery font behind him, and Jax groans.

"Like Best Dressed from Animal Jam?" Gangle mutters, right as Zooble says "Like Dress to Impress from Roblox?" They turn to look at one another, and you hear Gangle giggle. Jax says nothing but the murderous aura radiating from him intensifies tenfold.

"You'll all be spawned into a sprawling mall crawling with fabulous fashionistas and given a THEME!" Caine explains. "You'll have twenty minutes to look through clothes at various storefronts, or simply ask any friendly passersby for copies of their clothes or style tips! At the end of each round, you'll face our panel of GUEST JUDGES who will give you up to FIVE STARS! Whoever has the most stars at the end of the game will be declared the MOST BEST IMPRESSIVE DRESSER! And all the outfits you wear for the judges will be spawned into your rooms!"

"YESSSSS," Gangle squeals, falling to her ribbony knees and prostrating herself, bending her mask forward enough to almost touch the tile floor. "THANK YOU CAINEEEE!!!! I LOVE dress-up games!!!"

You glance over at Jax. He's staring at Gangle like a starving man watching someone tear into a juicy steak. 

"O-oh!" Caine chirps, tugging on his collar. "W-well, heheh, I'll certainly keep that in mind when designing my future adventures!"

"If you just condemned us to an eternity of playing dress-up every single day I'm going to abstract and kill you first. Slowly," Jax says flatly.

"You're gonna what-now?" You ask him, and he whips his head around. You watch his pupils go huge as you hear the whimsical sparkling sound of Caine summoning a portal.

"Everybody in, now! Don't wanna keep our judges waiting!"

You practically fling yourself through the portal, you're so excited.

The first thing that hits you when you step through is the noise.

There's a low-level chatter all around you, with varied voices -- little kids with parents, groups of people talking, the echoes and acoustics of a large, air-conditioned indoor space. As you look around you actually, for a moment, see shapes walking and talking and sitting at benches that your brain recognizes as people.

But your vision focuses, and you realize they're all just wooden mannequins dressed up in casual mall-going attire, with varying shades of wood conveying the false impression of skin tones. All the "adults" are the same size, the same frame. The "children" are all the same smaller size, too. A stroller that a mannequin pushes past is filled only with a bundle of blankets wrapped around a wooden block.

None of them have faces.

Something painful twists in your chest. To have that snippet of realism for just a second, only for it to be snatched away -- it burns. You feel your hand brush up against your smooth face and startle at the wrongness of it. The act of touching your not-face was hardly a conscious action. 

"Awww, is someone upset they're featureless and boring as an NPC?" Jax croons from beside you. 

"At least Kay knows how to socialize like a real human being, unlike some people," Zooble mutters, and Jax throws his attention from you to them with a venomous glare. If looks could kill, Zooble would be so dead.

"Alrighty, everyone!" Caine calls from where he's hovering just above the stream of an indoor water fountain. The sound of the water bubbling and splashing is pleasant, and golden coins glint at the bottom of the blue-tiled pool. 

"Your first theme today will be..."

A giant, colorful, and familiar spinning wheel thuds onto the gleaming white tile beside everyone, and for a moment the water in the water fountain flies into the air before falling back into the pool perfectly. Various fashion genres and themes are scribbled onto the slices of the wheel. You spot descriptive phrases like most gothic, most orange, silliest, grossest, and most athletic.

With a cheery tune, the wheel starts to spin by itself. Taka-taka-taka-taka...

Ding!

"Most Scene" is the category.

"I hope you're all ready to race to Hot Topic!" Caine announces. He snaps his fingers, and suddenly, about a tenth of the NPCs milling around are wearing some combo of skinny jeans, layered t-shirts, miniskirts, tutus, multiple belts, arm warmers, and spiky wigs with chunks dyed with bright colors or raccoon tails. There's little glimpses of hot pink, rainbow and neon green wherever you look now. Emo pop starts playing over the mall's music speakers.

"What's scene?" Kinger asks.

"Do I get bonus points with the judges if I make my arms look like barcodes?" Jax asks with a big grin, ignoring the chesspiece.

"JAX! That is NOT funny!" Ragatha tells him off, and the rabbit snickers.

"Have fun, my marvelous little models!" Caine calls out before disappearing. A giant timer appears where he was.

20:00

19:59

"Kinger, if you dunno what scene is, you can just ask one of the NPCs who's dressed different from everyone else. Or you can just pick whatever clothes you want at any store," You explain to him.

"Oh, I see," Kinger replies, turning to look at the crowd before starting to wander off.

You look around, trying to see if there's a mall map anywhere -- Caine was right about this being a Hot Topic sort of challenge. It seems Zooble, Gangle, and Ragatha have had the same idea, they're crowding a nearby map. 

"See a Hot Topic?" You ask, jogging over.

"Sure do," Zooble replies. "Not far from here, either."

"I've never been in a Hot Topic," Ragatha says, turning to look at the emo-dressed NPCs all around. "Some of these outfits look... super... colorful, though!"

She says the word "colorful" with the barest hint of disdain. It's honestly kind of funny that was the only positive adjective she could think of.

"If you don't wanna dress like that, nothing's stopping you from just going to a store you actually like. I designed this challenge to be shopping for us, not for Caine," You say to her in a conspiratorial tone. The doll blinks her one eye.

"Oh, wow!" She says. "I'll just walk with you guys for a while and see if any NPC outfits or different stores catch my eye, then."

You look over your shoulder as your little group starts to make their way to the fast-fashion retailer. Pomni is going the opposite direction, and Jax is following her. Maybe they're skipping out on the challenge like Ragatha. 

Which is good. They should be able to pick things they actually like.

You'll have plenty of chances to antagonize Jax later. Right now, you honestly just wanna go shopping.

.

.

.

Who cares about Dumbfuck and their stupid posse? Let them dress up like a bunch of weirdos, the kind of people who got bullied in high school.

Jax will have plenty of chances to antagonize Fuckface later.

"Hey, Pompom, Hot Topic's the other way."

"I am not dressing like that," Pomni responds, and Jax raises his eyebrows.

"Going against the rules of the game? I wouldn't have expected that out of you."

"If it's a theme I actually like, I'll do it," Pomni replies, looking left then right. She starts to walk into a normal clothing store, the kind Jax's mom used to shop at. 

'Y'think your mom would be proud of how you're acting to everyone?'

Jax shakes his head like a dog shaking off water, and follows Pomni inside. There's an NPC walking out with a ton of shopping bags on its arm, wearing the most atrocious maroon hat with a ugly black bow on it. Jax takes the opportunity to roughly shove it over, and cackles as its purchases fly everywhere.

"Why, I never!" The NPC complains soullessly. "You are so rude, young man!"

He kicks it. It provides a sliver of relief so small that it only serves to fuel his frustration more.

"Why, I never! You are so rude, young man!"

Caine must have put his energy into items instead of AI on this adventure. Boring. 

"Doesn't that count as hurting people?" Pomni asks, and Dumbfuck's stupid bet rushes back into Jax's head.

"Pomni, that," Jax says, gesturing towards the mannequin on the ground like one might gesture towards a pile of dog shit, "Is not people."

He makes quotation marks in the air when he says people, to emphasize his point.

"You are so rude, young man!" The NPC says after gathering up the last of its items and scurrying off. Pomni's mouth presses into a thin line.

"It still seems... kind of mean."

"Hah!" Jax barks. "Pomni, have you met me? If I wanted to get lectured I would have followed Ragatha around instead."

Pomni doesn't say anything at that, just turns and walks deeper into the store, follows the gleaming white tile path into the women's section, craning her neck to look at the displays.

God, she's so teeny-tiny. Jax has half a mind to pick her up and throw her. Or punt her like a football.

He thinks of the writing on his door and feels his lower eyelid twitch. As if it's his fault the circus is mostly women. It's a statistical thing! Kinger is no fun to tease, because he's already broken. It's not like Jax hates women in particular or something. They're just annoying, is all.

Pomni visibly brightens at something, and Jax follows her gaze to see her staring at at NPC in a black pullover sweater, loose black jeans and red sneakers. The jester walks up to the NPC, who is staring at a clothing rack. Pomni is all bashful and messing with the pom-pom on her shirt, as if she doesn't want to disturb a stranger.

"Pomni, just talk to it. It's not even real."

Pomni looks back at Jax with wide eyes before turning to the NPC and finally going:

"Um, excuse me?"

"Yes?" The NPC asks in a feminine voice.

"I really like your outfit," Pomni says. "Could I have a copy of it?"

"Sure thing!" The NPC says, and with a cheery confirmation sound effect, Pomni's outfit is changed. Some red, yellow, and blue stars and particle effects fly away from her body, like equipping a new skin in a video game.

"Oh, wow," Pomni says, lifting her arm to stare at the soft black sweater she's now wearing, then shuffling her leg forward to look at her jeans and shoes.

"Congratulations," Jax says. "You look basic."

"Come on," Pomni says, looking up at him while fiddling with her sleeves. The bright primaries of her gloves and hat contrast nicely with the black outfit, Jax must admit. At least Pomni has good taste.

"Don't you want a chance to pick your own clothes, too? It feels really nice to be able to look down and see something... normal," She continues.

"Nah, I'm good," Jax replies. "But you should probably, like, stack a couple more shirts on yourself under that sweater if you wanna get more bang for your buck."

Pomni's brow furrows. 

"We have time to go to the men's section, still. It's not far."

"Nahhh," Jax says, dismissing her with a wave of his hand. "What's the point? At the end of the day, I'm still all this, no matter what I put on."

He gestures to himself when saying "all this" -- all this bunny. All this stupid bunny boy body that he never asked for. Putting something on other than the loathsome pink overalls that he's gotten used to is just gonna remind him of his own body even more when he catches a glimpse of color or cloth that's unfamiliar.

Pomni stares at him a moment longer.

"Suit yourself, I guess," She says, turning and walking more into the store.

Jax sighs as he follows behind her. 

He's already so done with all this.

And it's only round one...

Chapter Text

"You look so cuteeeee!" Gangle squeals as you do a little twirl. This is the most colorful you've ever been since you joined the circus, and even though the outfit itself is kind of outlandish, looking down and seeing color instead of plain shades of gray is such a thrill that you're kinda loving it.

Nyan Cat is emblazoned on your navy shirt, leaving their signature pixelated rainbow trail across your chest and torso. Little sparkly pixel stars are all over the shirt, and the backside too. You've got on teeny tiny little hot pink jean shorts on, a sparkly belt, and rainbow tights that end at a pair of navy blue high top sneakers with bright green laces. There's so many rubber bracelets on your arms,  over your neon green fishnet arm warmers, that the subtle weight of them has become sort of relaxing.

"Put the cat ears on! Put them on!!!" Gangle cheers, handing you a pair of fluffy gray cat ears with pale pink insides. How fortunate that it not only matches Nyan Cat, but also your skin tone! You slide the ears on, then adjust your sunglasses.

"CUUUUTEEE!!!!" Gangle declares before bounding back to the accessory rack. "Zooble!! Zooble!! This would look good on you!"

She holds up a spiky black choker with a big o-ring on the front.

"Hmm," Zooble says. They're definitely leaning more emo than scene with their all-black getup. You don't blame them for wanting to go monochromatic. They probably have the opposite problem from you: a body that is too colorful, rather than too dull.

There was a frustrating moment where they couldn't find any "stompy black boots" like they wanted that would actually fit on the legs they had attached that day, but after asking an NPC to borrow their shoes, a pair of perfectly fitting, chunky black platforms appeared on their feet. After curating their whole outfit, they honestly look really good, cutting a blocky, androgynous silhouette.

"I don't know if I picked good hands today for doing stuff like that clasp," Zooble says to Gangle before slowly getting to their knees and leaning their head forward. "Y'mind putting that on for me?"

Gangle flushes. It's really cute. You haven't seen her with her comedy mask on for this long in a while.

"Uh, uh, uhhhh! O-okay!" She stammers before pulling the collar free of its paper packaging. She's wearing one of those yellow Pikachu hoodies, with ears on the hood and a tail and stripes printed on the back, along with ripped-up denim jeans that you can see her ribbon legs through and a rainbow-gradient belt. She has one red and one yellow converse shoe and has stuck a few small colorful stickers to her mask after finding a sticker sheet she liked in this store.

You make your way to the display of purses and backpacks in the front and sling a silvery star-shaped one over your shoulder before looking out the window. Ragatha is in the store across the hall, easily spotted through the glass -- she's easy to find in a crowd of NPCs, with her red hair and all.

She's swapped out her dress for elegant straight gray pants with a tied bow in the front, and a flowy sleeveless white shirt. She appears to be tying up her hair with a white ribbon. You see some bracelets on her arms. Cute!

Gladness spreads from your chest to your limbs, a physical sensation like slipping into a warm bubble bath. This was such a good idea. Everyone is having a nice time.

.

.

.

This has to be among the top fifteen worst days in Jax's not-life.

After the initial novelty of seeing the clown in a new outfit wore off after about two seconds, he quickly grew bored of watching Pomni decide between this shirt or that one to wear under her sweater, so she would get more clothes out of one round to keep. She keeps muttering about "texture" or something, she's put three shirts back on the rack already. 

"Oh my God, just pick one. We're probably gonna play a bajillion rounds of this stupid game anyway."

"You know, if you wanted to be helpful --"

"I'm gonna stop you right there. I don't wanna be helpful."

Pomni doesn't say anything back, which makes Jax start tapping his foot against the gray carpet irritably. He wants to just snatch one shirt out of her hands and throw it across the store so she'll be forced to pick the other one.

Might as well get to the whole reason he followed this clown in the first place... information.

"Hey, Pomni," Jax says. "What sorta naughtiness did you and Caine get up to alone together, huh?"

Pomni gives Jax an unimpressed glance, then returns to comparing the material of the two shirts she's holding. 

"Don't be gross," She says. "I was just asking him... where he thought we came from."

Jax's brain trips on itself for a moment, and he can't think of a response before she continues:

"I mean, Caine talks in circles so much, have you noticed that? It makes sense, considering he's AI, but... I was trying to get him to understand where we mean when we say we want to go home."

Pomni presses her lips together.

"But that's not in his power, I don't think. He sort of got what I was trying to say, but I think he was thinking I was talking in circles as much as him... we sort of just ended up frustrating one another. So... I'll use my ticket for something else, when the time comes. And maybe we'll get lucky someday and get to go home."

"Don't get your hopes up," Jax hears himself say. It slips out of his mouth before he can stop it. Pomni's face falls, and Jax feels a familiar ache in his chest. He turns away.

"What would you have used the ticket for?" Pomni asks suddenly.

"Huh?"

"I mean," Pomni says, studying his face. "Kay said you were trying really hard to win the quiz game for it. Usually you put in the bare minimum effort on everything. You must have had something you wanted, right?"

'Ribbit. I wanted Ribbit back.'

Jax hates how Pomni is looking at him, even as he stares away at the white-brick wall. Like he's a bug under a microscope, something to be studied. Unease claws up his chest. It takes effort to keep his trademark smile on. 

'Don't get your hopes up.'

"I don't think it's something Caine could do, either," Jax says, voice carefully neutral.

"Well..." Pomni says. "You could always just ask him nicely, you know. If... if you really need to, I could give--"

A sudden announcement in Caine's voice comes on over the mall's speakers: "THREE MINUTES REMAINING!"

'Oh thank God, that was getting too personal.'

"Finally," Jax whines as Pomni squeaks. "I can't waaaaait to get out of here."

Jax walks a fair distance away quickly, far enough that Pomni couldn't comfortably pick up the conversation again without following him.

Looking behind, Jax sees that she's finally decided on a shirt and is wasting time putting the other back on the rack. She glances at the sign leading to the changing room, evidently decides that it would take too long with the timer about to run out. 

Then Pomni realizes she can't pull her sweater off over her head to put the shirt on underneath.

Jax chuckles at the sight of her stretching the fabric cartoonishly far before it flies back. 

"Guess you'll have to put it on over your sweater," Jax muses.

"Ugh, it's gonna look and feel weird," Pomni complains, but she starts slipping the shirt over her head.

"Excuse me!" A stranger's voice says nearby, and Jax turns his head to spot an NPC. And not just any NPC, one of the weird ones -- this one is wearing an oversized Monster Energy shirt, striped arm warmers in black, green, and pink, and a bunch of junky plastic accessories. And are those actual facial piercings embedded into the stupid wooden mannequin face?

"What do you want?" Jax asks none too kindly.

"You haven't changed your outfit at all!" The NPC says, looking Jax up and down. "What a style travesty! This simply won't do!

"I don't care," Jax replies.

"I know!" The NPC replies, as though an idea occurred to its stupid head. "I'll share some of my outfit with you, since you don't know how to style yourself!"

Jax takes half a second to process what the NPC said, then dashes to put at least one clothing rack between himself and the stupid AI. 

Ping!

'GODDAMMIT!!!!!'

He feels that it's too late and the outfit was equipped as he drops into a crouch under a row of pajama shirts and pants. The loose fabric of the oversized shirt shifts around his torso, the dumb arm warmers are on his stupid paws -- his hands are out of their gloves. Now, there's bright yellow plastic bracelets on his wrists over the fabric of the arm warmers. He glances down and sees that he's still wearing his overalls, just with a dumb-looking belt now, the Monster Energy shirt tucked in in such a way that it's flowy instead of tight. 

He outstretches one hand, staring at his fingertips.

He's never seen them before.

They're purple. And gross-looking, since he doesn't have fingernails, and the wrong amount of fingers. 

He can feel air on his fingertips.

His breath starts to come in short pants. He reaches a hand to his chest then jerks his hand away as the fabric brushes the skin.

And then the NPC speaks again:

"And I gave you your tail back! You're welcome!"

Jax shoots into a standing position, glaring at the scene NPC.

"You gave me back my WHAT?"

"Your tail!" The NPC calls back before starting to walk off. Jax's eyes flick over to Pomni, who's staring at him. She looks silly with a pale pink sleeveless blouse over a black sweater.

"You, uh... have a tail now?" Pomni asks, having walked over at the sound of Jax yelling.

"I-- I've always had a tail!"

"I have never seen you with a tail once this whole time I've been here."

"Oh, for the love of Christ," Jax says, stalking out from behind the clothing rack, turning around and looking back at his own tail over his shoulder, poking out of his pink overalls, just below the stupid belt. "See? Right there! Feast your eyes, because you won't see character design better than this anywhere."

And Pomni giggles.

"That's the first time I've ever seen it!" She says. "Seriously! Ask Kay when you see them again, they'll back me up!"

Jax feels his blood pressure rise at the mere mention of Kay.

"TEN!" Caine's voice calls over the loudspeakers. "NINE!"

"Oh, no," Jax mutters. He looks so stupid! Everyone's gonna see and he's going to look stupid and Kay is going to laugh at him -- he looks around frantically for a normal NPC to copy, or any clothes on nearby racks to use, but they're still in the women's section, with nothing Jax could wear.

"You look fine, Jax! Honestly, it all kinda goes together. It looks good on you."

"I look like a preteen who gets called slurs at school!" Jax hisses back, grabbing at his own ears and trying really really hard not to start yanking at them in frustration.

"SIX!" 

"Jax, this whole thing is just to have fun. Nobody's gonna take it seriously, and most of the others will be dressed up too. Try to relax, okay?" Pomni replies. 

'Why is she being so nice? What does she want from me?'

Jax closes his eyes so he doesn't have to look at her stupid face. He feels his own face scrunch up at the thought of Zooble and Gangle seeing him in this ridiculous getup.

"FOUR!"

Jax forces himself to relax his expression. Open his eyes.

"THREE! TWO! ONE!"

.

.

.

Pop!

You open your eyes and you're in a dimly lit room. A quick glance around reveals that you're standing on a round pedestal, along with all the others, but you can only see their outlines and their eyes, cartoonishly bright in the dark. You're all arranged in a circle, and in the center is another, larger pedestal that has a star on it.

You hear Jax mutter something that sounds annoyed under his breath, but it's too quiet to hear. A drumroll emanates from the ether.

"AHHH!" Kinger suddenly screams, and Pomni yelps in turn.

"Oh!" The chesspiece says, and you see his big eyes looking around. "Where are we?"

"I think this is the judge's room," Ragatha replies from across the circle.

"I see," Kinger says. Then, after a pause: "What are they judging?"

And then there's a grinding noise from the ceiling -- a cartoonish sound, like stone on stone. Everyone looks skyward, and then, bit by bit, something appears in the blackness: an actual glimpse of simulated starry sky. After a few moments, there's a big round hole in the ceiling. The drumroll stops.

And then, the Moon herself hovers over everyone, pale blue light emanating from her crescent form. 

"Hello, everyone," Moon says in a gentle, soothing tone. "I'll be one of your judges today."

She hovers over to the side of the round opening, and then the sky rapidly shifts to a pink-orange of sunset. Or sunrise? The Sun flies in next to Moon and beams at you all, a big grin on her face. A single powerful ray of sunshine flies through the opening and illuminates the single center podium like a spotlight.

"Hi! I'm the other judge!" Sun says brightly. "I'm sure you're DYING to get back to playing lots and lots, so let's get right to it, okay?"

With a little pop, Kinger is summoned to the center, no longer too dark to see. He blinks and looks up at the sky in a way reminiscent of a kitten staring up at the people towering over it.

He's still wearing a full length cloak -- however, instead of purple, this one is hot pink with black tiger stripes, and the fluffy trimming is pale pink with sparkly parts interspaced throughout. 

"OOOOooooh!" Sun chirps. "Very nice! And the pattern is a good choice!"

"Agreed," Moon says. "Classic, elegant, but also kitschy enough to be scene."

Four stars appear above Kinger's head before there's another pop and Kinger is returned to his original podium. Now Zooble is summoned to the center circle.

"Oh, well done. Very alternative," Moon murmurs. "Not scene, but you get points for effort."

"You aaaaaaaaaalmost got five stars!" Sun says.

And with another pop, Zooble is returned to their place before they have a chance to speak. The judging goes very quickly, it seems, which makes sense considering the judges are computers.

Pomni is next, and her outfit is pretty normal, with a cute top layered over a sweater. You wonder if she can replace her hat and gloves with anything else, she's still wearing them. She gets only one star since she wasn't trying to stay on theme.

Ragatha gets a similar outcome, with her elegant shirt and pants. Seeing her in something new other than her dress is really nice, even though she only gets one star.

Gangle gets five stars for her scene Pikachu outfit and squeals in delight. Gosh, she's so cute when she's allowed to just be herself.

Then you're up, with your Nyan Cat ensemble. You've had enough time to know what to expect, so you strike a peace sign at the celestial judges above you, putting one hand on your hip and popping it out in a cute pose.

"WOOOOWW! Amazing! Five stars!" Sun says as Moon nods in approval.

"Yaaaa--" You start to say before getting teleported back.

"-aaaay!" You finish your cheer back at your podium.

The last one left is Jax.

He's teleported on and just puts his hands on his hips and stares up at the judges, grinning ear to rabbity ear.

Jax has actually tried!

And he looks so cute!!!

The pink of his overalls ties into the neon green and bright pink of classic scene outfits... and of course he would pick a Monster Energy shirt, he seems the type to abuse a drink that tastes like battery acid... and he's not wearing gloves?! 

His hands!!! Are!!! Adorable!!!

HE HAS A TAIL!?!

That is the thing that finally breaks your brain as you point and holler:

"WHERE did you get a TAIL?! I want a tail!!!"

Jax whirls to face you and his grin widens enough to make his eyes squinty before he's rewarded five stars. 

Then you blink and stumble because you're all back in the mall again, in front of the spinny wheel. Everyone is still wearing their outfits. You whirl to face Jax, who spawned in next you, and grab him by the shoulders, even if you have to reach up a bit to do it.

"I need to get a taaiillll!!!!" You cry out, shaking him for a moment before letting go. He shakes his head for a moment before looking at you and raising his eyebrows.

"Well, it was the last one on the shelf at the tail store!" He says with a shrug of his shoulders. "Too bad, Kay."

"I already have limited options with my dumb face, if I had a tail to wag and emote with that would change everything!"

"An NPC claimed to have 'given it back' to him," Pomni says, walking close to you. "But I never saw him with a tail before. Have you?"

"No," You agree, looking over at Jax. His eyes flick back and forth between the two of you for a moment.

"You two are gaslighting me," He says, narrowing his eyes before turning around and starting to walk off.

"But -- Jax! The wheel hasn't spun the next theme yet!" You call after him.

"I don't caaa-aare," Jax sing-songs back as the wheel starts to spin.

Pop! 

Jax is respawned back in front of the wheel at it stops:

"Day at the Office" is the theme. Canned music starts playing over the speakers, like what might play in an elevator or while you're on hold with customer service. The scenecore NPCs are suddenly replaced with people in suits, button-ups, pencil skirts and shiny shoes.

"Oh, SPLAT no," You say before your brain even forms a coherent thought, right as Jax groans in displeasure. You look over at him -- his face reads nothing but annoyed as he looks over at you.

"This is all your fault," He says with loathing in his voice.

You stare at him.

"Whhhhhhy are you looking at me like that?" He asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Nose bridge piercings," You say, pointing at his face. 

His expression morphs into shock as he touches his own face. His hand jerks away before his fingertips lightly touch the piercings.

"They're bright gold," You say, trying to be helpful. "They look cute on you!"

"Wh-- don't say that!"

"Okay, fine, they're handsome on you. That better?"

"No! Just -- don't say anything!"

You don't. Just stare at him for a moment before turning around. 

"This sounds like it could be fun!" Ragatha is saying to Pomni, who's nodding. 

"I used to work at an office," You overhear Pomni say. 

"Oh, me too," Kinger chimes in. "At least, I think I did."

The trio walk over to the map together, appearing to look for stores to raid. Meanwhile, Gangle and Zooble are already walking off somewhere together, Gangle's bright yellow Pikachu jacket contrasting wildly with Zooble's all-black outfit like day and night.

You look back at Jax, who's already starting to stalk away. You take a moment to appreciate his round little tail. Good for him. He really needed something visually appealing behind himself, considering his ass is flat as a board. 

Well, yours is the same. Everything is smooth and sexless here.

'You're not getting rid of me that easily,' You think to yourself as you walk up beside him.

"Oh, gross, it's you," He says as he looks down.

You still don't say anything. You don't remember where you read or heard it, but you think that you once learned that people generally don't like silence, and if you just stay quiet, they'll start to fill it themselves unprompted.

Plus the thought of making Jax uncomfortable by simply doing exactly what he asked -- "don't say anything" -- is really funny. 

Jax doesn't seem to have a destination in mind, just wandering aimlessly. After a few minutes of walking he veers into a generic clothing store, but when you walk in, he lets you walk ahead of him.

"So, Kay, gonna go left or right?"

Ah. The women's or men's section.

"Is this your way of asking my gender?" You ask him, breaking your silence.

"Can't I be curious?" Jax replies, putting one hand on his hip. "You're always making those sss... stuff jokes. I wanna know if they're gay or not."

"Sure. You wanna know if that's what's gay."

His eyes narrow.

"What's that s'pose to mean?"

"I already told you my gender, bun. It's whatever you want it to be."

"And what the heck does that mean? Are you nonbinary or something?"

'It means I don't remember my gender, dumbass.'

You don't say that, though. That's a whole other can of worms you don't ever wanna open.

"What do you think I am?" You ask him. He pauses, looks you up and down.

"Girl," He says after a moment, shrugging. "You sound like a boy. But you act like a girl."

You snort and start walking to the men's clothing section.

"I act like a girl? How do'ya figure that?"

"You annoy me," He responds instantly. "Like, look at you right now. Going to the men's section just to spite me. That's catty girl behavior."

"So, if girl behavior is going around annoying people on purpose, wouldn't that mean you--"

"Do NOT finish that sentence if you value your life," Jax snaps at you, and it's not in a joking way either. He sounds genuinely pissed.

You pause. 

"Really psychologically interesting that you think of being annoying as feminine behavior," You remark. 

"Oh my GOD! Do you EVER shut up?"

You pull on your Nyan Cat shirt, pretending there's a wire under there and you're recording notes:

"Patient displays aggression upon being called out."

"Quit psychoanalyzing me, dumbBEEP!"

"Sir, if you keep shouting, that will add a hundred extra dollars to your session cost today. It's the shouting fee."

And Jax giggles. 

For a single second, he just giggles. His eyes close for a moment. Then he blinks and his expression morphs to furious again. 

'Ohh, he's sooooo mad that I made him laugh.'

"Why are you funny? I'm the funny guy. We didn't need another funny one."

"It's because you're a funny guy. They needed me to fill the funny diversity quota."

And Jax laughs again, crossing his arms as he does. 

"To please the woke liberals," You add, and he laughs harder. Seeing his shoulders shake and hearing him giggle like that is mashing happy buttons in your brain you didn't know existed.

"You heard it here first, viewers," He says, staring off at the wall and gesturing grandly at you. "Kay here is only here for diversity, equity, and inclusion requirements, not any real talent."

"I'm gonna steal all your viewers away," You tell him as you start looking through patterned button-up shirts. "They're all gonna desire me carnally instead of you. I'm gonna get mountains of fan mail."

"Pffft, there's no way you could compete with me. I'm an attractive furry with a winning personality. Thousands want me in their freak dungeons."

"Bold of you to say you're furry when you're bald."

"You're also bald."

"You're balder."

"You're baldest."

You laugh as you pull free a pale turquoise top with little tiny dark blue dolphins on it. The buttons are blue too.

"What do you think of this?"

"Awful," Jax replies without even glancing at it.

"Awesome. I'm wearing it."

Your Nyan Cat shirt, however, refuses to be undone. You huff in frustration.

"Jax," You whine. "It won't come off."

"Really dumb of Caine to not fix it so we can take our clothes off in a fashion game, huh?" Jax replies, but the tone of his voice implies amusement at your predicament.

Seeing him with his arms crossed, looking down at you with a smug smirk, while dressed up like an early 2000s fever dream with little piercings in his face... is an experience.

"You're right," You respond, staring up at the ceiling.

"CAINE!" You holler. "CAINE! I need help!"

With a toot-toot like a clown nose, the ringmaster appears in the air above you.

"Whatever is the matter, Effeesikay?"

"I wanna change my shirt but I can't take the one I'm wearing off," You explain to him. 

"Oh! That little trick, I see... let me just..." Caine says, and then his eyes roll backwards in his head, showing only the whites.

An uncomfortable silence ensues.

Just as you're about to say something to Jax there's a beep like a microwave finishing, and Caine is reanimated.

"There! I updated your gender marker from undefined to male! You can take your shirt off now!"

"Wh--" You stammer. "Are you serious?! That's the only reason I couldn't take it off? That's stupid!"

"It's the rules!"

"What about the girls and Zooble?! How are they --"

"Use the changing rooms!"

"But some of us already walk around shirtless normally!"

"I'vegotsomethingtodohavefunbyeeeeeee!" Caine says before disappearing with a puff of pink and blue confetti.

You glare at the spot where he was hovering before pulling your shirt off effortlessly, shrugging on the dolphin one, and starting to button it up.

"So I guess that answers your question, Jax?" 

"What?" He asks.

"I'm AMAC," You say, starting to make your way to the denim jeans.

"A mack?" The rabbit asks, confused, as he falls into step beside you.

"Assigned Male At Circus."

He laughs again.

"You're stupid," He says. "You're dumb."

"I try," You reply.

Chapter Text

"I think I'm gonna go for a frutiger aero aesthetic," You say as you hold up a pair of soft, loose light blue denim jeans. You've shed your accessories and your Nyan Cat shirt. Now you don a pale, vibrant green long sleeved shirt under your open dolphin button-up. You can tuck the long-sleeved shirt in and leave the button-up as outerwear, and try to find a cool belt...

"Fruit what?" Jax asks.

"Frutiger aero. Like, old tech that has default pictures of grass, leaves, bubbles, dewdrops. All blue and green and bright colorful icons. Dolphins and sunshine and all that jazz."

Jax snorts in amusement.

"Y'know companies using all that when it was popular was just an advertising trick, right?"

"Yeah, and it worked for a reason. Looking at nature imagery is pretty. Blue and green are pretty."

"Those your favorite colors?"

'I don't know,' You think. 'I don't remember.'

"I like all colors," You respond. "Except maybe gray."

Jax laughs, and you feel warm and fuzzy hearing that as you drape the jeans over your arm and start walking over to the shoe section.

"Yeah, imagine how much it would suck to be gray," Jax continues, giving you a very pointed look. "What an awful, ugly, boring, monotonous color."

"Oh, yeah. My life would lose all meaning if I was gray," You respond, looking down at your dolphin print shirt. "I might as well just end it all if that were the case. Good thing I'm not gray, though. I'm dolphin-colored."

Jax chuckles again, shaking his head.

"Real dolphins are gray," He responds.

"You're right. I'm not gray," You say, holding out your hand with its unnatural skin tone and spreading your fingers as you stare at it. "I'm dolphin-colored."

"That is not what I said," Jax responds. "That is the total opposite of what I said."

"I'm a beautiful and intelligent and graceful animal... I embody all the carefree spirit of the salty sea breeze..."

"Oh, here we go," Jax says before his eyes fixate on something. "Oh, hey, Kay, look over there."

You follow the direction his yellow finger is pointing before your eyes spot a pair of perfect sneakers for your outfit. They're the kind with plastic air bubbles in the soles that look really cool but are too stupidly expensive to justify buying in real life.

You're just playing dress-up, though.

"YAYYY!" You cheer and hop over to the display, pulling out a box in your size. Good thing you already found out your size earlier with Zooble and Gangle in the shoe store next to the Hot Topic.

"Jax, help me find a cool belt!" You say, turning to face him with your jeans and shoebox in your arms.

"For me to beat you with or for you to hang yourself with?" He asks without missing a beat.

"For me to beat you with, silly rabbit!" You respond instantly, and his grin widens as he raises one eyebrow.

"You picked a good name for yourself, considering how effed in the head you are," He observes. You breeze past him to snatch a pair of plain white socks from a display.

"Don't worry, bunny boy. I know you're just kidding around. There wouldn't be anyone around to pay attention to you if you bullied them all to death."

It takes a few seconds of you walking away to realize you don't hear his footsteps behind you. You turn to look over your shoulder. Jax is staring at the socks still, his back to you.

"Jax?" 

He doesn't respond. Or move. You realize his shoulders are completely still, he doesn't even look like he's breathing. 

His hands are curled into fists at his side.

"Cottontail?"

"Ah-heh," Jax huffs out a laugh, but there's something slightly off about it. Before you can say anything else, though, he's turning, striding back over to you with that ever-present smile. 

"How many stupid nicknames are you gonna give me, Kay?"

"However many it takes for you to respond," You reply, but there's a concern weighing down your insides. You think about all the crossed-out doors as the two of you walk in silence.

"Hey, Jax?"

"Mmm," He responds with a noncommittal grunt.

"I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings."

There is a very small gasp from him, before his grin widens into something that sets off alarms in your brain. He stops walking. You stop walking. He stares at you.

"And why would you think that might hurt my feelings?"

'Because there's enough crossed out doors in the hallway to fill a graveyard and I don't think it's implausible that you might have hurt some of those people,' You think. Then:

'Fuck, I can't say that without sounding like I'm telling him that I think he's the kind of asshole to actually drive someone to suicide. I don't wanna tell him that.'

His eyes are huge. His grin is expectant.

'Does he... want me to say that to him?'

'But what if he is?'

'No, that's not right. He's not the reason we're trapped here. He's as trapped as the rest of us. You put a bunch of dogs in a cage together, eventually they'll start eating one another. That's the fault of the person who put them there.'

"It's not your fault," You state.

For a brief second, his face crumples. He blinks and his eyes go from almost all-black to pupils being tiny pinpricks. His smile drops.

He did not expect you to say that at all. Quickly, you explain before he can get a word in:

"All those crossed out doors are people who died, right? You put a bunch of animals in a cage, they're gonna start chewing their own tails off. Biting each other. It's only natural. Humans are animals, too. And we're only human."

His mouth crumples into a wavy line before he stares up at the ceiling, bringing a hand to touch his forehead. He laughs. 

This isn't the kind of laugh that makes you happy to hear, though.

"You -- you think you know everything, don't you? You think you've got it all figured out. Oh, watch out, everyone! Dumb Kay over here has the secret to surviving the hell simulation that they've been in for what, a few months?"

He leans over to jab you roughly in the chest, making you take a step back, getting in your space, grin wide and manic. 

"Well, newsflash, buddy, you don't!" He shouts as he leans up again, sighing once before continuing:

"It's all endurance! It's all about endurance!" He says in a high tone, mocking you. "Do you know how fff-- full of yourself you sound when you spout crap like that to the rest of us -- to me -- who've been here for literal years?! How we've endured? You don't even know what's happened to all those people! And yet you go around wanting to hold hands and sing 'Kumbaya' with everyone like that's gonna change anything. Like that's gonna make it all better. Well, it won't."

You stare at him, frozen.

"Ask me what happened to all those people," He says, and your brain supplies you with a helpful rush of fear at the dangerous tone of his voice, something that reminds you of a viper coiled to strike. "Since you're so curious and eager to learn. Go on. Ask."

You wish you could swallow.

You wish you could scream.

"I'm sorry," You whisper. "I d-didn't mean to hurt you. I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to -- to make it l-like I don't care about how long you've been here."

His mouth disappears into a very faint frown as his eyes go big again.

"I--" You start, but he interrupts:

"You were supposed to ask."

"But--"

His grin returns as he tilts his head slightly.

"We don't die. We never die. All those people? They're still alive, so out of their minds that their bodies turn to monsters that are hell-bent on killing any NPC or person they spot running around. Only endless pain and senseless violence. And when Caine finds 'em, they go down in the Cellar to rot with the rest. Forever."

Icy cold fear floods your whole being. 

Several seconds pass.

"That finally got you to shut up," Jax muses. He turns around and starts to walk away.

You take a few seconds to feel the pounding in your not heart.

Then you jog to catch up to him.

"Wh -- what are you doing?!" He snaps at you. 

"You're -- you're walking towards the belts!" You say shakily, breathlessly. 

"What is wrong with you?!" Jax responds, walking faster, and you match his pace.

"Are you still gonna help me find a belt?"

"Did you hear anything I just said? No!"

"Yeah, I heard you! Doesn't change the fact I want a cute outfit."

"Do I need to find another locker to shove you in?" He snarls at you darkly.

"Do I need to find a surgeon to remove the stick up your BEEP?" You ask him cheerfully. 

"We're not friends! Go bother an NPC or something!" Jax says to you, and you feel that snippet of joy again, even among the anger in his sentence. Friends. He said you weren't friends, which meant he was also considering the possibility you were. Maybe. It's kind of crazy when you examine your own logic.

"I never said we were friends!" You respond, giving him plausible deniability so that he has less reasons to turn around and walk away from you.

To you credit, he doesn't. Just glowers at you as you start comparing belts in the aisle. Follows you wordlessly as you walk to the changing rooms. 

You pull on your new pants quickly. None of the clothing has tags, the sizes are on the clothes hangers. Which makes sense since you're not really buying it. It feels a little strange, you think as you loop your belt around your waist, to be going without underwear. But it's not like you need it since there's well, nothing under what you wear.

You half-expect Jax to be gone when you exit the room. Your outfit slays, as planned. The rabbit glances at you from the bench where he's sitting.

"Entertain me and do a pose," Jax says, neutral grin on his face, voice even like nothing ever happened. You throw a peace sign while stretching one leg out. Jax hums.

"You look tacky," He declares, which are bold words for someone still completely decked out in scene fashion. You walk over to the bench and plop down beside him, leaving as much space as possible between the two of you. 

"Sigh," You say, since you can't actually sigh. "That was intense."

You feel Jax stiffen beside you without even looking at him.

"We don't have to talk about it," Jax says in a voice that makes it clear he isn't asking but telling you to drop it.

"I appreciate you being honest with me," You say, resisting the urge to look at him. "About what happens."

There's silence, but movement catches your eye. You can't resist glancing over.

Jax is bouncing his leg up and down.

"Why are you like this?" He spits out.

"Like what?"

"You just -- ugh, forget it. Don't ever talk to me about this again."

"Talk about what?" You ask, confused. Don't talk about death? Don't apologize to him for things? Don't talk about feelings?

"Exactly," He responds.

All of it, you suppose.

"THREE MINUTES REMAINING!" Caine's voice announces over the speakers, and you jump at the sudden sound.

"You gonna try and pick a new outfit?" You ask the rabbit, and he sighs and leans back against the wall.

"Nah, I'm just gonna let an NPC dress me again," Jax responds. 

"Again?"

"What, you thought I picked this out on purpose?" Jax sneers. "Nah, in the ending of the last round an NPC came up and forced this dumb getup on me."

A part of you is a little disappointed to hear that.

"They had good taste," You compliment him anyway. "Do you actually like Monster?"

Jax glances down at his Monster Energy shirt, leg still bouncing.

"Yeah," He says.

"What flavor?"

"God," He chuckles, looking up at the ceiling again. "You're makin' me crave one so bad. I liked the original. And the Pipeline Punch one. Did you like them?"

"I haven't ever tried one," You respond, which could be a lie. Or not. Not like you'd know.

"What?" Jax asks, glancing at you. "Baby can't have caffeine or something?"

'Baby?'

"Just never got around to trying one, I guess," You say vaguely. 

"What was your vice, then? Caffeine? Nicotine? Drinking? Sleeping around? Every adult has to pick at least one of those, it's an unwritten law."

"Guess," You tell him. You'll just say yes on the first thing he says. You feel a little bad about it, but...

"Hmm," He hums, leg finally going still as he brings a hand to his chin in thought. "Oh, DUH! It's the other vice. Sugar."

"Sugar?" You chuckle.

"Yeah, I bet it's candy and sweet stuff," Jax says, grinning. "I saw how you were lookin' at that cake last night. Bet you go to a coffee shop and get caramel drizzle vanilla slop that's barely even coffee anymore."

He pauses.

"You'd like a Pipeline Punch," He says. "It's 76% of your daily sugar intake in one easy-to-drink can."

You straighten up at that.

"See!" He says, pointing at you. "You got all eager! I'm right, aren't I?"

"Maybe you are," You say, and he smiles for real again.

It's so good to see him smile like that again.

You spot the movements of an NPC walking close by -- it's one of the on-theme ones, dressed in business casual. It's wearing tan loafers, gray pants, tan belt, tucked-in white button-up shirt. Basic but effective.

"Hello," The NPC says to Jax stiffly. "I couldn't help but notice--"

"Yeah, whatever, hit me," Jax interrupts, and with a pop scene Jax is replaced with office Jax.

The top four buttons of his shirt are undone, leaving a noticeable sliver of smooth purple chest visible. Jax looks down at this and back up at the NPC, whose buttons are done up to the collar.

"TEN!" Caine's voice announces over the speakers. "NINE!"

"I think the NPCs hate me," Jax mutters as the NPC walks away.

"Have you tried being nice to them?"

"I'd rather shoot myself."

"SIX!"

"You look good in that, too," You tell him.

"I could be wearing a garbage bag and you'd tell me I look good," Jax retorts. 

"THREE!"

"I just think you look good in general," You compliment him, and he rolls his eyes. Your eyes flick to some movement on the bench.

"TWO!"

Is his bunny tail... wagging?

"ONE!"

Chapter Text

Jax's tail was wagging.

Jax's tail was wagging.

You made Jax's tail wag. 

Bliss. Ecstasy. Euphoria, even. Is this heaven? Is this the pinnacle of your semi-existence?

'I wanna see that again. And again and again.'

It's dark now that you're in the judging room again. You see Jax's silhouette, his big yellow eyes in the dark. His arms are crossed as he taps his foot impatiently.

'Cute. Cute. Cute. Cute. Oh, God, am I going crazy? I feel crazy. He's so cute???'

"Welcome back, everyone," Moon says cordially. "Let's see how we all did for this round."

Gangle is spawned into the center podium, wearing a dark blue shirt and a light blue tie with black pants and shoes. She looks surprisingly good in it -- it activates some part of your brain that lights up upon seeing pretty women in masculine clothes or handsome men in feminine clothes. Dichotomy is downright delicious.

"You look ready for the work day ahead! Five stars!" Sun declares before Zooble takes their place on the podium.

They look so good in blacks and grays. They've got black shoes with silver buckles in two slightly different sizes to accommodate their mishmashed limbs, gray pants, a black belt with another shiny silver buckle, a textured gray sweater, and a professional looking black blazer overtop it. Zooble gets five stars, of course, well deserved.

Next is Ragatha. She's got a white button-up with a navy blue blazer, black belt, and matching navy pants -- but the inside lining of the unbuttoned blazer has a beautiful red-and-blue floral print that you get glimpses of as she moves, and she's added a little red heart pin to her lapel. Her doll legs still end in those black marks that loosely resemble shoes. She's tied up her hair again into a short, high ponytail. She also gets five stars.

Then Kinger is summoned.

He's wearing a turquoise blue robe with sparkly white trim, a unicorn shaped floatie ring around his middle, and a scuba mask is askew on his crown since the eye mask doesn't line up with his actual eyes.

"Hmmmmmm!" The Sun says. "One star!"

Then suddenly your perspective changes as you're spawned into the center. You make a heart with your hands up at the judges.

"Off-theme, but you get two stars for cuteness," Moon states.

You blink and then Jax is there in the middle, his back to you. He's got his yellow gloves on again, the long sleeves of his button-up covering them a bit. You watch as he turns his head just catch your eyes in the audience.

You wave both your hands vigorously.

His face doesn't change, but his tail twitches. 

"Classic, but no personal touch! Four stars," Sun says before Pomni is put in last.

"Ooooh!" You actually coo aloud. She's figured out a way around her stuck-to-her-head hat!

She's wearing a navy blue baseball cap, with a ponytail coming out the back -- but it's not just her dark hair that's in the ponytail, but also her two twin jester-hat tassels. It looks almost elegant, like a highly decorative hair ribbon. She's styled the rest of her outfit to match her natural color scheme: pale pink button-up long sleeved shirt, red tie, navy blue slacks, and black flats. She's still got her red and blue gloves, but they have things to match with with how she picked navy and red for her outfit.

"Wow!" The Sun praises her, and Pomni grins, messing with the bottom of her tie. "Amazing job! Full five stars!"

You put your hands in front of your face, blocking your vision in anticipation of spawning back in front of the picker wheel and wanting to bypass the disorientation of sudden scenery change. When you see bright light through the cracks in your fingers, you pull your hands away to see everyone. 

"Pomni!" You say, whirling. "You look soo cute! I love your new hat!"

"Thanks," The jester replies with a smile, eyes flicking upward for a moment to look at the brim of her own hat. "I had to get an NPC to spawn it on me, obviously I couldn't get this tiny hat over my huge old one... but it's okay spawned in like this, somehow? It's weird but effective."

"Y-yeah!" Gangle chimes in. "You did a good job on the colors of your outfit... you, too, Ragatha, red and blue look good on you!"

You hear Ragatha thanking Gangle at the same time as the wheel begins to spin.

Taka-taka-taka-taka... 

"Jeez, you'll call anybody cute, huh?" Jax muses from beside you. You turn to look up at him. He's staring straight ahead at the wheel, arms crossed.

"Jealous?"

"As if! It's just nice to know how low your standards are for when you open your mouth and talk a bunch of nonsense at me. Oh, wait, you can't open your mouth. Hah!"

You hum as the wheel continues to clack away

"Don't worry, cottontail. I may compliment the others, but there's only one big purple menace I can call bun, and bunny, and a million other rabbit-themed nicknames."

"Those nicknames are stupid and you're full of it," Jax growls, tail wiggling a little again. "I have a name, use it like a normal person."

"Jax," You say, dropping your tone into a rich, honey-sweet tone, and his hands tense enough on his arms to make lines in the fabric of his shirt as his tail starts to go crazy. "Jax. Jaax. Jax. Jaaaaax--"

"I said like a normal person!" He spits at you, eyebrows furrowing, right as the wheel stops spinning.

Ding!

The wheel has selected the category of "Cutest."

Jax looks like his brain has fallen onto the floor in front of him in a bloody heap: just a blank look of pure disbelieving horror that's somewhat distant.

Everyone else, meanwhile, is either cheering or talking animatedly. Jax is the only one who's silent -- and you, you guess, staring at him.

"Honeybunny?"

He blinks at that and the thousand-yard-stare morphs into revulsion.

"Oh, God, anything but that one," He says. "Eugh."

"You can always just make an actual outfit if you wanna skip out on this one," You remind him gently, and Jax's posture slumps as his entire face just exudes discomfort. "C'mon, would picking out clothes you actually like be so bad?"

"What I have is fine," He says. "Cartoon characters don't change their clothes."

"They do in Totally Spies," Gangle says beside you. Jax glares down at her, hands fisting the fabric of his sleeves, starting to tap his foot.

"You have no idea how bad I wanna shove you over right now," He threatens her darkly.

Oh, that won't do. Jax can mouth off to you all he wants, but when you see Gangle flinch at his words it ignites a fire in you that stokes action into your limbs.

You reel your hand back and slap Jax's pert purple tail hard as you can manage.

Two things happen:

One, Jax's round rubbery tail squeaks under your palm like an extremely loud rubber ducky or doggy toy.

Two, Jax himself squeaks in a much different manner -- a high-pitched yelp -- and leaps at least a foot into the air.

When he lands on his feet he whirls around to look at you, ears flat, mouth gone, face pink down to his neck and chest and the tips of his ears.

"I've invented a fun new game," You explain with a shrug of your shoulders. "It's called 'Every Time Jax Hits or Says He'll Hit Someone He Gets Spanked Like a Bad Boy.' I think I can get a high score. World record speedrun, maybe."

He doesn't answer.

You put your hands in your jeans pockets and rock back and forth on the balls of your feet.

"Squeaky-toy boy," You say, amusement coloring your tone. "I think it's fair. An eye for an eye."

Jax tilts his head as a slow grin spreads across his face. He straightens back up, looks down at you.

"Y'know, I still haven't actually hit anyone yet. I hope you're ready for the box of razors, Kay."

And then, while nausea fills you up at the thought of him actually doing that -- and he would, he fucking would -- he turns on one heel and starts walking away. 

You watch him go, half-fearfully, half-admiring his stupid little squeaky toy tail.

"W-wow," Gangle mutters at your side. You glance at her to see there's golden sparkles around her head. "That was -- wow."

"That was stupid!" Zooble chastises you. "That idiot thrives off of attention, and you give him an endless supply. Just ignore him."

"Yeah, 'cos that's helped his behavior up 'til now," You say, fidgeting your fingers with one another.

"His problems are not your problems," Pomni adds. "You can't fix him for him."

"I'm feeling like you're ganging up on me," You whine. "He's my f -- my hobby, okay? He's my little model train set. And I don't care when he suicidebaits me or calls me names. I'd rather he do that to me than you guys."

Zooble sighs.

"Nobody asked you to be a martyr, but if you're so determined, I can't stop you," Zooble says.

"Be careful, Kay," Ragatha suddenly blurts out. "Please?"

"I'm always careful," You reply. "I'm so cautious. Careful is my middle name. Kay Careful. Kayful."

Chapter Text

'This is going to blow up in Kay's face,' Pomni thinks after watching that whole train wreck of an exchange. 'They get along like a house on fire... except Kay is throwing gasoline everywhere and every time they do Jax tries to throw more, and they keep trying to one-up each other. What a mess.'

Though Pomni does have to admit, deep down, the fact Jax's tail squeaks is kind of funny to her.

Kay is watching Jax leave with obvious desire. Even with sunglasses, they're not even trying to be subtle about where they're staring. 

"Hey, Kay," Pomni says, and the gray humanoid startles, peeling their eyeless gaze away from Jax's squeaky-toy tail to look at her. "Wanna hang with me this round? I met up with Gangle and Zooble earlier, and we walked past a whole store that looks like it's selling nothing but lolita dresses and... fancy prince-type outfits? If that's more your thing."

"Lolita dresses?" They repeat in an clearly thrilled voice as they start bouncing up and down.

"Oh my gosh, you're right! We have to wear lolita or ouji this round!" Gangle states, now also bouncing slightly. She looks like a bobbing spring with the way her body is.

"I might pass on that," Ragatha says, rubbing the back of her neck. "I've gotten... sort of tired of wearing a dress all the time."

"I'll come with you, then," Zooble says to her. "Frilly outfits like that aren't really my thing."

"Aww, but you'd look so good in gothic lolita," Gangle mutters sadly. 

"Maybe another time," Zooble replies as they walk over to Ragatha's side. "Hey, Kinger, wanna join us? Or do you wanna try and find another royalty outfit with the others?"

"Oh, I dunno!" Kinger says, his eyes going slightly different directions to look at the two groups, like a chameleon's. "Hmmm... I think I'll go with you guys."

It's unclear who he means by "you guys" until he wanders towards Ragatha.

"Do you remember where the lolita store is?" Zooble asks, and Gangle nods with a cheerful "mmhmm!" as Pomni gives her own nod. 

"Mm'kay. I'll see you later," Zooble says with a wave of one plastic robot grabby-claw. 

"Have fun!" Ragatha says before walking over to Kinger, who's gone to look at the trashcan next to the map display.

"There's no trash in here!" He remarks.

Kay turns to Pomni expectantly.

"Lead the way," They say to her, putting their hands in their jeans pockets. Pomni starts walking, Gangle at her side and Kay trailing behind them.

The music playing over the speakers is soft and cute now, something that reminds Pomni of playing Animal Crossing while on call with her dad... seeing their little characters together while planting flowers, catching fish, talking about recent goings-on... her heart aches for a moment and she looks around at the scenery, trying to swallow the lump rising in her throat. 

Many of the NPCs are dressed in pastel colors now -- there's a lot of round shape language in the form of oversized shirts, big hoodies, and sweaters. But there's also some who are just dressed in skin-tight crop tops, little skirts with lacework and bows, lacy patterned tights and high heels. Pomni supposes the word "Cutest" leaves a lot of wiggle room for interpretation. 

"I'm probably not gonna stay in the lolita store the whole time," She says, turning to look at her two friends. "I wanna get another hat, and I'd rather pick my own outfit from some of these NPCs."

"That just means more dress choices for meeee," Gangle hums. "Oh, I think this is my favorite adventure ever..."

"Yeah?" Kay asks her, tone suddenly dripping self-satisfaction. "Oh, yeah, please, go on about how my adventure is your absolute favorite. It's giving me a mood boost like you wouldn't believe."

"Your adventure is the bestest everrrrr!" Gangle squeals, and Kay laughs. Pomni smiles a little, the good mood from the two is contagious.

"Thank Ca -- you know, the teeth guy whose name I won't say right now? Thank him when we get back. We've gotta, like, train the AI into putting out the stuff we like," Kay remarks.

"Oh, good point," Pomni says. "Positive reinforcement."

There's silence as they walk a few moments. The sign for the lolita store comes into sight, and Pomni points at it with her red glove.

"There --"

"Do you guys think I could clicker train Jax into being nicer?"

Gangle whirls to gape at Kay, face rapidly going crimson. Pomni feels her own blush coming on as she just stares at the humanoid, who keeps walking. They stop when they realize the two girls aren't following them.

"What? I think it could work."

"Do you not think about anything you say or do before you just do it?" Pomni grits out. "Jesus -- you and him are like -- you keep trying to one-up each other, and neither of you know how to stop! You have the kind of personalities that just wreck into one another! You do realize you CRASH -- BOINK -- sensually harassed him again today, right?!"

"I think it would be perfect and work perfectly," Gangle says, voice level. Pomni glances over to see she's nosebleeding again, and facepalms, dragging her hand down her face to pull at her eyelids and cheeks.

"It's very simple, Pomni," Kay explains. "See, I may not have eyes, but I'm not blind. I've been here a while, and I've seen what goes on here. Verbal discouragement encourages him. He likes when he makes someone mad enough to yell, it's entertaining to him. But getting BEEP -- beach slapped? Getting any pushback? He haaaates that. I'm doing the equivalent of spraying a cute dog with water for trying to chew rocks. I'm not the bad guy here."

Pomni feels a tad ill.

"Are you seriously comparing a person to a dog?"

"We found out a lot about psychological conditioning in humans by starting with animals, didn't we?"

"It's -- it's wrong!" Pomni states, voice sharp, feeling her hands ball into fists.

Kay doesn't say anything. The sound of bright, bubbly lo-fi fills the cavernous space of the mall. NPCs walk past them, ignorant of the argument taking place, and their footsteps sound so loud. 

"Um," Gangle says, shrinking away. "Iiiiii'm gonna go look at dresses now bye."

She flees into the lolita store, a bright welcoming bell over the door jingling. Pomni sighs.

'This isn't my problem.'

"I'm going to go pick something out," She mutters. "I'll see you later."

She gives Kay a half-hearted wave before turning away. It's not like she hates them or anything -- she remembers when they stood up to Caine for her sake back when she was still newer and everything was so much scarier and overwhelming. 

Still doesn't mean they're not being frustratingly obtuse right now. Two wrongs don't make a right.

"Bye, Pomni!" Kay replies, and a moment later Pomni hears the door jingle again. The jester scans the hall for any shops or NPCs that catch her eye before spotting something.

She starts to speed-walk, trying to make up for lost time, trying to put the whole thing out of her mind.

.

.

.

"At least someone is on my side," You grumble to Gangle as you step into the store. Gangle makes a sound that could be either a chuckle or a sneeze, you can't tell which.

Honestly. Why is Pomni being such a stick in the mud? All you're doing is just reflecting Jax's bullshit right back at him. Your intentions are 100% pure. 110% maybe. 

If you had a crush on him, and you were harassing him because it got you off, that would be a different story. But he's such an asshole that the thought of actually dating him — no. That's just out of the question. You can't date someone who treats others with contempt the way he does! That would practically be excusing his behavior.

And the thought of dating anyone here, with your mind half-empty... it sends a shiver up your spine for a reason you can't explain.

'My intentions are pure and I'm not thinking about this anymore.'

The inside of the lolita store has pale pink and cream-striped walls with gold filigree-bordered mirrors every so often. There's only a couple NPCs milling around, and they're just in normal attire, not dressed up for the Cutest round.

"Oh, wow," Gangle muses, gazing at the rows and rows of frilly, sparkling dresses, intricate shirts, and puffy skirts and shorts. "Wow, wow, wow. Just one of these full outfits would be my month's salary, I bet..."

“Where'd you work?” You ask, curiousity forcing the question out before you have the chance to consider it.

“Fast food manager,” Gangle replies with a sigh. You would wince if you could, that's not an enviable job. Makes sense, though, you'd suspected some sort of food service work ever since you heard her yell “Heard!” as a stand-in for confirmation.

”What about you?” She asks as she reaches out a ribbon to feel a green gingham-pattern skirt adorned with little teddy bears, picnic baskets, and strawberries.

“Uh,” You reply on instinct, searching mentally for an excuse and getting the brain equivalent of a loading icon. “Ugh, don't even get me started on that...”

'You have a million pretty dresses to look at! Quit asking me!'

“I get it,” Gangle replies sympathetically, and you feel a twinge of guilt. “Mmm... there's so much that I don't know what to choose...”

“If you have two favorites you can't decide between or something, I can wear the runner-up and then you could borrow the dress from me whenever you wanted,” You offer. 

“Wh— are you sure?!” The ribbon squeaks out. “Me, pick an outfit for you?”

“Why not? They're all cute.”

That gets Gangle excited enough to start really searching, and you follow behind her like an amicable shadow, holding dresses, skirts, and shirts that she pulls off the racks since too much cloth would cause her to just fall over. 

She tends to pick the ones with shorter, poofy skirts and cutesy imagery printed on them, like little animals or desserts. She likes the round, puffy short sleeves on shirts, too. Less fabric for her to feel weighing on her body, you suppose. 

“I wish I could pick a nice headband,” Gangle says, looking over at the display of mannequin heads with frilly, intricate headpieces. The store mannequins are different from the ones walking around — the display ones are smooth and plastic, the NPCs wooden. 

You're glad Caine did it that way. It would be pretty creepy if they were the same model. 

You walk over to the shelf next to it and grab a big green ribbon with a strawberry surrounded by white lace in its centerpiece.

“Boop!” You say, pressing the ribbon to the upper right corner of Gangle's mask, the tassels framing her right eye. It sticks. She blinks and then smiles wide.

“I could get you another color —”

“No! No, I like this one,” She says, flouncing over to the changing room and picking the gingham strawberry picnic skirt out of your arms along with a white shirt and a fluffy white petticoat. “Go pick out some shoes that would match this for me? Pretty please?”

“Aye, aye, captain,” You accept her quest before gently putting the pile of intricate clothes down in a pile by the door. Not like the virtual floor is dirty. There was a shoe display section along the opposite wall...

Definitely not red shoes. She's already red enough with her ribbons. Maybe a shiny black pair of mary janes? It would match her eyes... But she asked for something that matched the outfit. You grab a pair of soft green flats with little bows on the tips, and a pair of long white tights. And the mary janes, just to give her options.

You go back to the changing room and put the shoes and tights on the floor, by the sizable gap under there, before knocking on the door.

“One sec!” Gangle calls out before the door opens. She does a little twirl, her fluffy petticoat and cute skirt flaring out around her.

"YES!” You cheer, clapping your hands. The effect of a strawberry themed coord on her is top tier. She pulls off the red and green together in a way that feels sweet and fresh. And the little bears having a picnic among the strawberries on her skirt are adorable.

“You think it looks good?” She asks, pressing the tips of her ribbons together. “Not... too much?”

“You look awesome,” You state firmly as she picks up the pair of tights and sits on the changing room bench. She raises her ribbon-leg up to slip her “foot” into the tights — her leg is so light the fabric of the skirt barley raises up. Then she looks up at you, and blushes.

“Umm, can you close the door?”

“You normally run around naked like I do, what's the issue?”

At that she simply blushes harder.

“Just — close the door!”

You snicker and shut the door, listening to the rustling of fabric for a moment. Then, Gangle speaks:

“Why'd you pick these black shoes?”

“So you'd have black and white on the top and the bottom of your outfit. A bookend, if you will.”

“Ohh.”

You see her grab the black shoes from by the door and pull them inwards. Then some more shuffling before she stands up, and the door clicks open again.

You really wish you could grin at the sight of her. She looks amazingly sweet and adorable.

“You just need a little neck bow or acessory or something under the collar of your shirt and then you're good,” You tell her approvingly. She nods before looking at the pile of clothes.

“Hm... let's see what you'd look good in,” She says, squatting down and starting to sort through all the outfits. She glances back up, towards the inside of the store, and freezes.

“What?” You ask, following her gaze before realizing what she's staring at. “Ohhh. Ohhhhh.”

“That's the one,” Gangle whispers. “I have got to see you in that one.”

.

.

.

Jax is pacing.

He looks up at the mannequin. Feels his foot start to tap, stops, clenches his toes in his uncomfortable office-wear shoe. Turns to walk away. Turns around, faces the outfit again.

It's not even that special, or that cute. Just a pair of light blue men's overalls, with a cream-colored long sleeve shirt underneath. He could get some bracelets and get his hands back — and he wouldn't have to be so colorful anymore.

Wouldn't have to be pink anymore.

'But I don't want to play this stupid game.'

Jax has never really thought about what to wear before. Thinking about how to dress himself always felt like a chore, even when he was alive. He just coasted by on what he got for Christmases and birthdays, plain t-shirts, denim jeans. Fashion had never been exciting, and those who stepped outside of the unwritten box deserved the ridicule they got for it. It was easier to just... go along with what his parents expected out of him. Wanted out of him.

It was easier, at first.

“THREE MINUTES REMAINING!” Caine's voice warns him, and Jax nearly jumps out of his skin.

“God,” Jax huffs, one of the few swears he has left. He reaches out and touches the cuff of the denim overalls. Then, from the corner of his eye, he spots a flash of color and freezes.

Fucking Zooble.

'Don't walk this way don't walk this way don't walk this way'

He stays very very still, swiveling only one ear to listen.

“So then I told him, 'I don't think you're selling at that price with all these termites,' and he starts cussing me out! I couldn't believe him!” Ragatha is saying. 

“Oh, hey, there's Jax!” Kinger says suddenly, and all three of them whirl to face where the chesspiece is pointing.

'Fuck my stupid idiot life,' Jax thinks as Kinger approaches him. He's got a floor length white skirt on, and a light blue button-up shirt with the short sleeves tucked inside the garment. God, he's so senile he can't even pick the right gender of clothing.

“Looking at blue?” The old man asks as he looks at where Jax is standing, then at the mannequin in front of him. “You should give it a go!”

“I was just thinking about how stupid this whole adventure is,” Jax replies, putting a big smile on. He hears the endlessly grating mismatched footsteps of Zooble, and looks over to see them giving him a confused look. They've got a tight fitting sleeveless black crop top on, wide, baggy jeans with patches of little chibi animal faces on them, and black and white sneakers.

“Are you afraid of changing your clothes or something?” They ask.

“No,” Jax says way too fast. He tries very hard to keep his smile on and not cringe. 

“You know, a look like this might be a good first step,” Ragatha muses, looking at the mannequin. “It's not too different from what you usually wear.”

'Can I not even get twenty minutes of peace and quiet?'

“Oh, are we having a fashion dilemma?” A soft masculine voice states, and Jax looks over to see an NPC peering at their group. He's got on an open sky-blue shirt with white cloud-like patches, a white tank top underneath, white shorts, and white shoes with sky-blue socks that also have a cloud pattern.

“Your outfit is ugly and tacky and I'm not taking fashion advice from you,” Jax says before the NPC can try to put something on him.

The NPC reels back with a hand to their chest, affronted. 

“What did you just say to my boyfriend?” Another new voice shouts, and yet another NPC walks out from behind a clothing rack and grabs the sky-blue clad one by the hip, pulling him close to himself. 

“Boyfriend?” Jax asks, looking between the two of them. The new one had a male voice, but is dressed like the sluttiest bimbo Jax has ever seen. He has on a tight-fitting pale pink blazer but no shirt on under, showing his chest, stupid, ballroom length hot pink gloves, a black leather miniskirt, and the biggest, chunkiest black stripper boots known to man.

“What are you, a couple of BEEP-s?” Jax asks the couple.

“Jax!” Ragatha shouts at him instantly, and Jax grin twitches upwards as he looks over at the sound of  her upset voice. “You can't just say that to people!”

“TEN!” Caine's voice announces. “NINE!”

“I think you ougtha learn some manners, mister,” The slutty one hisses at Jax, stomping up to him in his boots. Normally Jax towers over the NPCs, but in the boots, this one is eye to eye with him. Jax laughs in his face.

“I'm not taking your outfit, either, since I don't work at the club,” Jax says. He's safe now that he's said that, his mistake before was not making that clear to the NPC.

“Is it just me or do they sound similar?” Zooble whispers to Ragatha. Jax feels his ear twitch in annoyance. This guy has a stupid accent that Jax doesn't, they sound nothing alike.

“SEVEN! SIX!”

“Good thing we don't need your permission!” The NPC says, snapping his fingers.

'Wait, what?'

Jax feels suddenly bare.

His thighs are exposed. Pleather hugs his legs, his waist.

'Oh, God, I'm not wearing underwear.'

Jax chokes back a yelp as he tries to yank the skirt down a few inches, only to feel it get caught on his tail with a prominent squeak. God, why does it have an actual hole for his tail?! His overalls don't! He turns around to see there's a little black bow overtop his tail now, and turns around to face the slut NPC, wide eyed.

“FIVE! FOUR!”

“I hope you win, toots, I know that outfit is cute as BLEEP,” The NPC purrs before pulling his lover into his arms and clanking their blank wooden faces together. He raises his single, fingerless hand, and it gets covered with a censor bar.

“THREE!”

'Oh, God.'

“TWO!”

'Fuck!'

”ONE!”

Chapter Text

When you spawn onto the podiums in the dark room again, movement and shuffling immediately catch your attention. You spot Jax's outline across from you, kicking the invisible walls keeping him on his podium with a fervor you've rarely seen from him. He paces a tiny circle, kicks the wall again. 

There's something off about his movements, though. He seems a bit unsteady on his feet, holding his arms out slightly like he's trying to balance. Is he okay?

You would squint if you could. Trying to "focus" your vision without eyes is giving you a fuckton of mixed brain signals that's actually just making everything darker and fuzzier. Oh, what you wouldn't give to be able to blink --

And then the world is suddenly bright again as the the sun shines her spotlight down onto Ragatha. She's picked pants for herself again -- you see long, bootcut purple jeans with a lace-up detail in the back, a little bow nestled at the top of the waistband. The doll has selected a white button-up shirt tucked in, dressed up with a navy blue paisley-pattern scarf. And the crowning achievement of her cute outfit is a dark blue cowboy hat overtop her red yarn hair done in two braids.

"COWGIRL!" You cheer at her, and she looks over in surprise before you see her expression soften and she laughs.

"Oh, how sweet," Moon observes. "Tying in your interests. I'm giving an extra star for that. Five stars."

Ragatha blushes before Zooble takes their place on the podium. They put one robot-claw on their hip and squint up at the sun expectantly. Their sleeveless black crop top is cute, and you like all the little animal patches on their jeans. They get four stars -- more accessories, Sun suggests, and Zooble rolls their eyes.

Next is Kinger. He's got a skirt on! It's white and goes all the way to the floor, and his blue top matches his eyes.

"Guys in skirts!" You cheer, and Zooble makes a choked-off sound that turns into a cough. 

"GUYS IN SKIRTS!" Gangle cheers louder as Kinger actually indugles the pair of you by grasping his skirt and doing a little curtsey. He doesn't lift his skirt high enough for you to see anything other than the floor. He gets awarded five stars and then --

And then.

And then.

Jax appears.

'Oh, I see. I've died and gone to heaven.'

Jax is stunningly beautifully perfectly sexalicious. 

Every part of him is just -- he looks like that outfit was made for him, he wears it so well. His long legs are accentuated so wonderfully by those shiny long black heeled boots. Unlike his baggy overalls, these boots do nothing to hide the shape of his legs -- and unlike your own, Jax's legs actually have individualistic shape, curve of calves and thighs and oh god his purple thighs just below his short black miniskirt, the peek of his thighs, the way he tries to pull the skirt down -- his hot pink ballroom gloves?! Hot pink is so good on him, god, all the black and pleather isn't just there but it's also slightly shiny and he looks so pretty, looks so good --

Your gaze goes upward and it just keeps getting better, you can see the shape of his behind and his tail perfectly because even though he's flat he's hunched over just slightly trying to pull the skirt down and you'd give anything just to touch that oh good lord and that's not even starting on his chest. His tight pink jacket is unbuttoned showing his chest on full display and though he's flat there too the sliver of purple is as enticing as a slice of birthday cake. You wish you could lick it -- what kind of thoughts are these? Oh but he would be so embarrassed -- he's already so embarrassed -- his whole face and chest and ears are red and he's squirming and he's absolutely mortified, he looks like he wants to just vanish.

You can't wolf whistle, sadly.

So you reach into your hammerspace and start tossing big, showy lilies you've stolen from decorative vases at him. Distantly, you think you hear Gangle making some sort of squeal. Your head feels a bit fuzzy because you're registering absolutely nothing except the rabbit on the pedestal in front of you. Your brain is taking so many screenshots.

Jax searches for the source of the barrage of flowers pelting him -- you're pretty sure you should have exhausted your inventory of them by now, but you don't care, this world runs on cartoon logic. The rabbit throws one hot pink Caine-censored middle finger at you, whole body shivering with fear or fury, you can't tell. Likely both. You toss more (they're coming out as yellow and pink roses now) and make a gesture with your free hand like you're blowing him a kiss.

"You're so gorgeous!" You call out.

"Go to HELL!" Jax shrills. He's got the prettiest eyeliner in the history of eyeliner, which is saying a lot since eyeliner is at least ten thousand years old.

He thinks you're making fun of him. That won't do.

"I'm not kidding, bun, I'd drag my nuts through glass just to keep lookin' at ya like that!"

Jax actually flinches at that, screws his eyes shut and makes a "ghh" noise that could only be described as a whimper.

"FIVE STARS!" Moon declares, her normally calm voice suddenly the most enthusiastic you've heard her the whole game.

And then Jax is gone, replaced with Gangle, who twirls, making her skirt spin.

You have to take a moment to fake-breathe after all that. You put one hand on your chest and swear you can feel your heart pounding.

'God, it's so good to see him taken down a peg.'

You hear cries of "cute!" and "adorable!" at Gangle from Zooble and Ragatha, respectively. Gangle touches her face, smiling so big. This is the longest you've ever seen her go without breaking her mask, you realize.

You have a feeling after today, Jax won't be so eager to shatter her anymore when you're around. 

The thought makes you feel good, warmth spreading in your chest.

Anytime he starts being a bitch? All you'll have to do is mention the time he wore stripper heels and a miniskirt, and he'll go ballistic on you, you bet. You basically have free ammunition against him, forever. You're winning the war on bullying. 

That's... totally how it works.

You remember all the times you've seen Gangle cry when Jax would do things like intentionally step on her mask or her feet, yank on her ribbons or shove her from behind to watch her break.

Would Jax cry like that if someone pushed him too much?

That thought makes the ecstasy in your chest sink a touch. Jax crying... like, actually crying real tears, does not bring joy.

"Oh, aren't you just the sweetest little darling! Five stars!" Sun tells Gangle, startling you out of your thoughts. The ribbon bounces excitedly before you're thrust into the spotlight.

In a fluid motion you practiced with Gangle beforehand, you unsheathe your prop sword from the scabbard at your hip. 

Then you gracefully rest the tip of it on the ground, threading your fingers, clad in white satin gloves, through its golden hilt. Lace tumbles freely around your wrists, your sleeve cuffs long, fluffy, and flowy. Your whole ensemble is shiny and white -- the pants, the two belts cinching your waist, the fluffy jabot at your neck -- save for the deep red capelet trimmed with gold embroidery and white fur around your shoulders. 

You tilt your head up at Sun, and you know the jewels in your diadem and numerous pearls draped around your neck sparkle and shine in the light.

From the corner of your eye, you spot Gangle's darkened outline put two ribbons to her mask where her mouth is and whistle loud.

'God, I look so cool.'

.

.

.

God, Jax can barely think.

His stress headache is terrible. Feels like someone reached into his skull and decided to film a slime ASMR video using his gray matter instead. He can't let go of the hem of his skirt, his shaking hands insist that he hold onto something.

The fucking skirt. The skirt. The heels. The whole Outfit From Hell was bad enough and then Fuckface had to go and throw shit at him, stupid flowers like he was a performer at a show --

With what he was wearing, it would have been more fitting for them to throw dollar bills. He looks like a slutty bimbo and they think he looks hot.

'I'm not kidding, bun!' 

He feels his thighs clench at the mere memory of the words and he hates it. The energy of it sears every individual not-there nerve in his fake fucking body and leaves every nonexistent cell begging him to just break something or hit somebody or --

'I'd drag my nuts through glass just to keep looking at you like that!'

Those words.

Jax looks at Kay in the center stage and his breath hitches.

That outfit.

Kay is plastered up and down with shining white. Every surface of them gleams. Their diadem glitters, their pearls shine. Their long sword, held out in front of them, shines with a preternatural significance. They look cringe. They look royal.

Jax wants Kay dead. Jax wants to kill them. Tear them apart with his teeth and stain that white satin red and listen to them cry and he --

'You're so gorgeous!'

That praise.

He wants to hear it again --

Oh, God, he's actually dizzy and his hands and wrists have gone so tingly that it's the first time since wearing the stupid outfit that he's loosened his grip on it. 

Kay couldn't have meant it. He knows how he looks, he's a freaky bald cartoon thing. They have to have been joking. Trying to get him to snap. 

Honestly. Look at them. Stuck-up little thing always pestering him for attention. Of course they'd wanna be royalty, want everyone to look up to them, want the recognition and praise and want to be served and --

Jax realizes, then, that he wants to go into his room and be alone very badly.

That there would be no circus-enforced buffer between himself and his pillow like normal. That he could just hike up his skirt and --

'No no no this cannot be happening right now.'

Kay, with that sword. Kay, tilting the tip of his chin up with that sword -- taunting him -- something like "What, nothing to say now, funny bunny?" or Kay, touching that peek of skin above his boots, pulling him closer, with that stupid smug aura about them even without a face and reaching around to the middle of his back, trailing that hand down, down, down to his tail and squeaking it --

'No no no no no no no no'

Jax screws his eyes shut and buries his face in his palms and even through the godforsaken gloves he can feel his face is hot.

'They don't mean any of that they're nothing you're nothing to them you're a game to them they barely even know you they just want to see you suffer they want you to break down because it's funny they're exactly like you'

Think of something unsexy. Think of something horrible.

Ribbit. Ribbit dying. 

Jax picking the lock like any other day and finding a chair and a broken light fixture and a noose on the floor.

The emotional whiplash makes him feel physically ill and he actually gags. He fights back the urge to vomit. The heat in his face and faint shaking in his hands now feel like symptoms of a fever that will kill him.

'I wanna go home,' He thinks, uselessly, for the thousandth time.

"More cool and elegant than cute -- three stars!" Sun declares cheerfully, and Jax swallows and through sheer force of will somehow pulls his hands away from his face without peeling all his skin off.

Pomni is in the center, now, and she's got her own stupid little ensemble on. Some oversized light brown hoodie with a print of little bears wearing blue neck bows all over it. She's used the baseball cap trick to get rid of her jester hat again, but this time the cap is black, matching her big loose jeans.

At least this round is finally over. Maybe Caine is bored by now and they'll all get to actually leave. Jax never thought he would be happy to be in his overalls, but right now he wants nothing more than the comfort of familiarity.

Not to mention he's gone almost the whole day without hitting anyone. All he has to do is last until the adventure is over and he can make a beeline straight to his room.

And tomorrow Kay will pay. 

A wicked grin spreads on his face at the thought.

He'll be able to do anything he wants to them for three whole days.

He could slip into their bedroom at night and --

'Oh no no no no no no no no goddammit no'

No, Jax doesn't want to fuck them! He can't even fuck them. He's got nothing between his legs, like everyone here -- never mind the fact that sometimes he still gets to a point where he just needs to rub up against something in privacy.  

He hates when he gets like that because it never goes anywhere. He just ruts himself into endless frustration against his pillow or his hand for hours and hours wanting and writhing and wishing he could feel even a modicum of relief until the morning alarm goes off and he has to act like everything's fine, everything's normal and they're not all trapped in a children's television show pulled out of Satan's asshole.

And Kay would just laugh at him, he imagines. It's such a demeaning way to try and pleasure himself, since there's nothing to stroke. Having to hump a pillow like a dog. Or like a girl. Kay would certainly laugh at him and call him pathetic --

Stop thinking about it stop thinking. 

'I seriously feel like I'm gonna throw up,' Jax thinks as that spot between his legs throbs for attention under the too-tight skirt.

He blinks as they're all respawned into the mall again.

He's still wearing the Outfit From Hell.

Instantly Jax searches his surroundings for an NPC to steal from. Literally anything would be better than this. But the mall is eerily silent save for the echo of cheery corporate pop. Nobody's around save for their group.

"Jaaaax!" Kay cheers from beside him, and Jax feels his hands curl into fists as he looks down at them. They've still got their royal getup on. 

'Pretty. Gross. I'm gonna kill you.'

"Don't start," He manages to spit out.

"That any way to address your liege?" Dumbfuck asks, twirling their stupidly long sword around.

He can feel the tension in his jaw as he clenches it and smiles wider.

"Oh, I bet you'd like it if I acted like a good little vassal and worshipped my lord, wouldn't you?" Jax counters, crossing his arms over his bare chest.

Fuck fumbles their blade and it falls to the linoleum flooring with a clatter.

"Can you two keep it in your pants for five minutes?" Zooble asks.

"He can't, he's not wearing any," Kay says, picking up their sword.

"I wish you would impale yourself on that thing," Jax hisses.

ZING!

With a cheerful, loud noise, Caine appears in the air above the decorative water fountain once more.

"Well, well! Looks like you all had an absolute blast!" The toothed asshole muses as Jax sighs in both irritation and relief. He's wrapping it up. Thank God.

"YESSSS!" Gangle cheers, bouncing, as Jax wonders if he shoved her in the water fountain, air bubbles would come up as she struggled. She doesn't have lungs, she might just end up splashing around.

"Let's see, tallying up your points..." Caine muses, pulling out a miniature notebook and scribbling away with a pen. "Hm, round that, carry the two..."

Why he's saying that when adding simple single digit numbers, Jax has no idea. He picks at the hot pink fabric on the inside of his elbow, feels his foot starting to tap. Just a little longer.

"In third place is Zooble with thirteen points!"

Why is Caine doing a buildup? He just wants this to be over with --

"In second place is Jax with fourteen points!"

Jax feels his face get hot again and wishes he could sink into the floor as he stares resolutely ahead, very much not looking at Kay or anyone else, just the water tumbling down from the fountain. He manages to keep his smile on, at least.

"And in first place..." Caine announces as a drumroll plays in the ether. 

"GANGLE!" Caine shouts, pointing his cane at her. Balloons and confetti fall down from the ceiling.

"YOU are the most best impressive dresser with a full five points in every round!"

Gangle puts her ribbons to her face and simply beams.

Jax... can't remember the last time he saw her this happy.

But it's all just a facade. She's literally masking, it's not hard to figure that out. Looking at her is like looking at a half-peeled off price sticker -- drives him nuts to just leave it there. 

It's pointless to pretend in this place.

"YAYYYY, Gangle!" Kay cheers, scooping up confetti from the floor and throwing it at her. 

"Yayyy, Kay!" Gangle replies, taking Kay's hands in her ribbons and shaking their hands up and down. "Thank you for suggesting this!"

It's so sickeningly sweet Jax wants to hurl. How can Kay just touch up on everyone else else so casually? It's gross.

"Thank you, Caine!" Kay calls up at the ringmaster, who clasps his hands together and does a happy little mid-air wiggle. 

"This adventure was really nice," Pomni adds, glancing at Kay out of the corner of her eyes. 

"I really appreciate your appreciations!" Caine replies, whipping a portal up with a whisk of his cane. "But keeping track of one hundred twenty thousand clothing items is a bit of a stretch on the ol' noggin, so go ahead and step through and get on back to not-adventuring for me."

This mood is way too cozy and nice. Jax shoulders past Kinger and steps back into the circus and feels himself relax at the familiar oversaturated circus rooms. Walks forward a bit, trying not to roll an ankle in his stupid high heeled shoes.

"Congratulations on second place, Jax," Kay says from somewhere behind him, and Jax whirls to face them and crosses his arms because he can practically feel Kay's sight burning lasers into his tail.

"I'm gonna have fun thinking up what I'll do with you tomorrow," He says easily, grin plastered on his face. He'll think of something, all right. Kay's apparent claustrophobia leaves a lot of fun options.

"Actually," Gangle pipes up, and both Jax's and Kay's faces whirl over to stare at her as she shrinks a little. "Um, actually, I don't think you'll be able to do anything to Kay tomorrow."

Jax raises one eyebrow.

"And why not, Ribbons? The deal was I don't hit anybody one day, I get Kay as a slave three days."

"T-that, um..." Gangle replies before pulling out her sketchbook and flipping to a prominently dogeared page. She tilts it towards her rapidly reddening face and says, hidden behind the pages:

"I- I wrote down what Kay said because I thought it was cool andwellumand -- I d-don't think, um, well, what Kay said was 'go an entire day without hurting, hitting, shoving, poking, or prodding anyone' and um!"

She bonks her head into the pages before saying again, quieter:

"One of the first things you did today was hurt me, Jax. It... hurts when you make fun of me."

.

.

.

You watch Jax's expression go eerily empty. Nothing on his face has actually changed -- he's still smiling. But it's like someone has flicked off the light behind his eyes. Like he's just mentally checked out completely.

'Oh, shit.'

"So the deal is off, then?" He asks, turning to face you, one hot pink hand at his hip, the other hanging loosely at his side. 

'Danger danger danger danger,' Part of your brain helpfully supplies, while the other part is chanting something like "squeaky squeaky squeaky tail."

"Well, I mean," You manage with a shrug of your shoulders, "It's not like I particularly want to get tortured in ways that would make it onto a Netflix true crime documentary, soooo no?"

Jax nods, tapping his foot. Just nods wordlessly and keeps on smiling.

Then he pulls out something from his own hammerspace -- glint of metal, that's a GUN --

BANG.

Darkness. Silence. You can't move or speak or breathe, and then --

"--iiig NO-NO, Jax!" Caine is shouting. You let out a low cry of fear as you realize you're suspended midair, go to hug yourself and look over at Caine hovering beside you.

There's a bullet hole in the floor.

"Give it BACK!" Jax demands, held in midair on Caine's other side.

"No can do, Jax! This is a gun-free zone!"

"I don't CARE!"

"It seems like you have some tension you need to resolve with your fellow humans!"

"GIVE MY GUN BACK!"

"Don't give his gun back," You mutter, and you see Jax jump at the sound of your voice. He leans over where he's stuck in the air and stares at you, the placid grin on his face not matching the angry tone of his earlier yelling at all.

"You cannot just shoot one another willy nilly! I ONLY allow shooting one another in controlled, engineered environments!" Caine says, hovering in front to look at both of you at the same time. Now there's no barrier between you two. Caine looks at you, then at Jax, his teeth in an angry V as his fingers twitch.

"What am I going to do with you two?" He says, putting his hands on his hips.

"You two? He SHOT me!" You say, pointing.

"They provoked me!" Jax yells, pointing at you.

"AUGH!" Caine replies, snapping his fingers, and a large white box appears on the circus floor with a THWUMP. For the first time, you look down to see everyone staring up at you, watching the shitshow. It gives you vertigo, you hate being held this high up, unable to even close your eyes. You slip a hand under your sunglasses and resist the urge to curl into a ball.

"THAT," You hear Caine's voice say, and you imagine that if you were looking he would be pointing dramatically at the white thing. "Is a locked room where nobody can see or hear you once inside! Nobody goes in, and you both have to agree in order to unlock the door! And YOU TWO are going in it for at LEAST seven minutes to get your ISSUES with one another SORTED, and if you shoot each other in the head in MY CIRCUS one more time, so help me, I'm TURNING THIS CAR AROUND, and we're NOT going to DIDNEY WORL!"

There's absolute silence. Caine had gotten progressively louder until he was practically screaming his last words.

"Yes, sir," You say, throwing your free hand to your head in a salute.

"See, now that's an attitude I can get behind, Jax!" Caine says pointedly, voice all cheerful like he wasn't just screaming at the top of his lungs. You hear a finger snap and there's finally solid ground under your feet again. You pull your hand away from your face to see Jax simply standing and staring past you.

You look behind yourself to see a door with a timer on it: 6:59

6:58

You turn around to look at Jax again, his expression exactly the same.

"So, uh," You say, putting your hands in your pockets, feeling your royal red cape shift around your shoulders. "You really didn't like losing that bet, huh?"

He doesn't say anything. You kick at the white tile with your shoe.

"Gonna, like, say anything?"

Silence.

"Choke me out?"

"Can you NOT?" Jax finally spits out, sounding disgusted, and his expression finally breaks into one of just -- pure weariness. He looks exhausted, lines under his eyes, mouth a thin line, shoulders slumping.

"Not what?" You ask, feeling your brow furrow. "You just SHOT me, is it a stretch to think you'd kill me again?"

Jax just sighs and looks at the ceiling before slumping back against the wall, tapping his foot. God, he still looks so good in that outfit... especially in an all-white room, it looks like he's posing for a magazine cover.

"You're weird," He says. "You're so freaking weird. And I hate you."

"Uh, okay."

He narrows his eyes.

"I despise you."

"Sure."

"And I want you dead."

"Okay?"

He blinks and looks away then, his face starting to flush again.

You walk over to the adjacent wall, sit down and lean against it, stretching out your legs.

"Look, Jax... I just hate when you pick on everyone. It makes me mad. I wanted... I dunno, I wanted to turn it back on you for once. Everyone else just -- talking to you is like talking to a brick wall. So I decided to do something."

There's only the sound of his foot for a few moments, tapping.

"Stop touchin' me," He mutters quietly.

Ah. Finally, he shows his cards.

"Oh, so I can't slap your ass but you can break Gangle's face in two? That doesn't sound very fair."

Jax just tchs at that, turns the opposite direction. Taps his foot some more.

"I'll stop hitting the others if you don't touch me at ALL," He offers.

"What, if, like, Caine has some adventure where we have to escape a volcano eruption by boat, and you fall off into the ocean, and I reach out my hand and pull you onboard, and then you're like 'Ahaha! Now I can fling Gangle's mask into a volcano!' What then?"

And Jax bursts into giggles. 

"I don't sound like -- pff, you're so stupid!"

"Yeah, but like seriously. What if I have to? Or by accident? Would you try to weasel your way out of our agreement?"

Jax's foot stops for a few moments.

"I guess you could just ask for my permission," He replies.

His permission.

You stand up and walk over to him, and he whirls to face you. He's still leaning on the wall, looking down at you, but you stand juuust on the edge of his personal space bubble, hand outstretched.

"Permission?" You ask.

He stares at your hand, and you watch his blush return full force.

"Yeah, whatever," He states, reaching out his hand and taking it in yours.

Chapter Text

You feel Jax's grip tighten on your own for a moment.

"Hey, wait a minute," He says. "Did you just say ass?"

His eyes go huge as he utters the word in full without a censor popping into place.

"Fuck," You say, and your own hand tightens at that. "Oh, FUCK. Damn! Shit! Motherfucking cunt -- oh my God, Jax, we can fucking swear in here!"

Jax pulls his hand away, but the grin on his face is so wide and genuine that it makes your heart sing, the good mood contagious. 

"Fuck you, Fuck!" He says experimentally, and then giggles. "Oh man, I've been wanting to say that for so long!"

He throws a middle finger at you and waves it joyfully when no censor bar appears. You can see that even in the confines of his tight skirt, his tail is wagging like crazy. 

"It must be because it's a soundproof room. A soundproof fuckin' room! Not even Caine can hear us!" You say, throwing your arms wide.

"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!" You sing loudly, and the echo of your voice reverberates throughout the small room. "Yay! Dripping wet cunts! Big long penis! Cock! Balls! Fuck fuck shit asshole fuckhole balls--"

Jax is doubled over laughing, his hands on his knees his tail almost a blur. 

"Fff--" He tries, but he's laughing so hard he can't get the word out. 

"Go on! You can do it!" You cheer him on, pumping your fists up and down and bouncing up and down.

"Ff-- hehehe! Fuck you! Kill yourself, Dumbfuck, Fuckface, Fff-fuck! Gargle on my cock and balls you motherfuckin' BITCH! YES!"

"Whore!" You shout. "Slut!"

"Sex!" He yells full force, staring up at the ceiling as though half-expecting Caine to appear. But nothing happens, only the echo of happy shouts. Jax giggles wildly again, throwing up both middle fingers.

"Fuck you, Caine!" He yells. "I HATE you! I hate you with a hundred percent! With a thousand percent!"

"Yeah!" You chime in, throwing up twin middle fingers of your own. "Fuck Caine!"

"And fuck YOU too, you bitchy little pervert!" Jax shouts, turning his fingers down to you. "Trying to cop a feel on me 'cos I look too good in this slutty outfit! Sticking a hand down my clothes in the hall! Pissing me the fuck OFF. You are the weirdest fuckin' fag I've ever fucking met."

You burst into laughter.

"Y-yeah, heh, yeah, okay," You acquiesce. "Okay, yeah, I deserve that, I guess. I won't squeak your juicy little tail anymore."

"Juicy?" Jax echoes, face turning crimson. "Jesus Christ, do you have any sense of shame at all?"

(This calls to mind the image of Jax in a pair of those pink sweatpants that have "Juicy" written on the butt in glittering rhinestone font. You decide not to voice this image aloud.)

"Nope! Behold the fields where I tend my fucks, and see how they are barren and dry."

Jax laughs again and walks over to the corner, kneeling into a sitting position on his knees. You turn around to see the timer: 2:52.

"I'm not leaving this fucking room until I get bored of cussing all I want. And I've got years of swears pent up in me," Jax says. 

Privately, you think it's a shame he decided to sit on his knees. Had he settled in any other sitting position, you might have been able to get a peek of what was up his tiny skirt, which would have been titillating even though you know he's smooth there too. But you know if you voice those thoughts out loud you'll ruin the tentative peace between the two of you.

You walk closer to him and lay on your back, staring up at the ceiling. The position reminds you of when you first arrived, and he leaned over you and stole your sunglasses.

Jax is humming, and you hear light tapping of his finger on his knee.

"Bitches love me 'cos they know that I can rock," He sings along with the tune he's tapping. "Bitches love me 'cos they know that I can rhyme! Bitches love me 'cos they know that I can FUCK! Bitches love me 'cos they know that I'm on time!"

His singing voice is shockingly pretty. Even though the lyrics are filthy, there's so much joy in the way his clear, strong voice punches out each swear. You look over to study his face. His eyes are closed, and the way his smile moves around the lyrics is enchanting. Even his posture is straight, like he doesn't want to ruin his breathwork.

He sings a few more lines before his brow knits and he taps a few moments without singing, hot pink finger overtop his black skirt. Then he repeats the chorus again, and his face relaxes, even though the song is very high energy.

He must not be able to remember all the words, even though he clearly loves the song.

Though that thought makes your heart sink, it can't erase the joy on his face or the ease in his whole body. You never realized how tense he was all the time until now, like this, seeing him uncoiled and relaxed. Having freedom of speech, no fear of a loud censor bar, must be amazingly therapeutic to him.

"BEEP," an obnoxiously loud alarm rings out from the door, and the both of you jump. Jax's eyes shoot open and he goes all tense again, a frown marring his face. You look over at the door to see the timer's run out.

"Damn loud thing," You growl at it before rolling over on your side and looking up at him. "Fuck that door. What song was that? I wanna hear you sing some more."

Jax blinks and looks down at you. For a moment the tension in his body remains, and you're afraid he's gonna get up and walk over to the door. 

But then he sighs, and you spot his tail wag just a bit.

"Yeah, fuck that stupid fuckin' door," He agrees. "That was Bitches by Mindless Self Indulgence. I know a metric shit ton of their music. Give me any theme and I'll bet they've got a song about fucking it."

You wiggle excitedly since you're unable to grin. 

"Give me something real fucking dirty," You say. "Like, shockingly so. Get your swears out, bunnyboy."

Jax laughs at that, reaching a hand to his chin and scratching his face. 

"Mmm, I could do Panty Shot... Oh, but À la Mode would be fun... yeah, I'm doing that one. Gimme a second."

He closes his eyes again, and after a few moments bursts out into song:

"I like my girls like my women and my women like my girls: with ice cream on their ass and my dick in their world!"

It's so shocking that you laugh a little, and the rest of the lyrics are as filthy as promised. Jax couldn't be in a better outfit to sing them in: hearing him sing about ice cream as an allusion to sex while dressed like that? Pure poetry in motion. You really can't get enough of his voice. 

This song he appears to have fully memorized, singing it to the end with no blunders or mistakes, even during a part where he recited a bunch of different ice cream flavors rapidly. You even get treated to a part where he wolf whistles.

When he finishes he opens his eyes and he's swaying along to the beat in his head.

"I wanna hear you say fag again," You inform him. His eyes narrow with how big he smiles. 

"Would ya believe me if I told you there's a song called Faggot?"

"Ooo," You coo in excitement, and he visibly brightens at that, straightens up again and makes a show of clearing his throat.

"Ah-hem. I will now be performing the song 'Faggot' by Mindless Self Indulgence -- um, excuse me? This is a very serious song -- no laughing, please," Jax says with false pompousness as you break into giggles. "No laughing. No laughing. I said no fucking laughing, shithead!"

He looks at you with your hands clasped around where your mouth would be, trying not to giggle. Evidently this pleases him, as he proceeds to croon out in a sultry tone:

"I, been denied, all the best, ultra sex..."

You break at that, collapsing into laughter, but he continues the song with a little hitch of breath and amused tone creeping into the lyrics. Your laughter trails off in favor of listening to the intense, quick rise-and-fall his voice. 

"I could've been someone, instead of falling flat upon my ass!"

That particular line is delivered with a gusto that tells you it was felt personally. 

Not hard to imagine how it would hit home, considering where he's been trapped for years.

Jax continues singing, the end of the song simply being him singing the word "faggot" over and over, but with his vocal skill he can make even that sound melodic. 

"Well done!" You praise him when he goes silent. "You're really good at singing, you know that?"

He blushes and grimaces.

"Ew," He says instantly. "Don't compliment me, Dumbfuck."

"Okay," You say, letting your tone take on the rhythm of someone delivering a romantic sonnet. "Your hellish screeching grates on my not-ears like the scream of thousands of bats damned to hell, eternally in a fuckfest of torture, like one million nails upon one trillion chalkboards. To listen to you continue to sing would be a sentence of unimaginable agony. You wound and assault my very soul every time I hear your voice. Please, I would give anything, and I mean anything, for this pain to stop."

"Oooh, but I love torture!" Jax replies, face still red, before he starts to sing some more.

.

.

.

"It's been an hour," Ragatha says as she glances at the door again, moving so fast she feels her cowboy hat shift on her head. "I can't help but worry."

"Yeah, well, staring at the door isn't gonna make them come out any faster," Zooble replies. "Pomni, have any eights?"

"Fish," Pomni replies, messing with her hoodie strings with her free hand. Zooble takes another card.

"Maybe they're having fun," Gangle suggests as she looks at her cards. "Ragatha, do you have any fives?"

Ragatha goes to hand Gangle her two fives with a sigh -- then jumps at the sound of a door clicking open and drops the cards.

"Oh, wow, Kay is still alive," Zooble observes, and the humanoid in question waves at the group playing cards on the floor. Jax is beside them, arms crossed over his chest. As the door shuts behind them both the blocky white room disappears instantly, like it was never there.

"Aww," Kay says in a disappointed tone, looking behind themself at the now-empty space. Jax sighs.

"It was bound to happen," The rabbit says. "Well, I'm going to bed. I've had enough of looking like a boytoy for a day."

"Byeeee, Jax!" Kay calls to him, waving. 

Without looking back at them, Jax waves as he wanders off.

'Are they... being friendly with each other?'

Kay's wistful sigh is audible even from where Ragatha is sitting. They walk over to the group and drop into a crouch, looking at Ragatha's cards.

"Whatcha playing?" They ask.

"Go Fish," Pomni replies. "What were you and Jax doing in there for so long? You were gone for a whole hour."

"We were working stuff out," Kay replies vaguely. "Got over some disagreements. This and that. I hope you weren't too worried?"

"I was," Ragatha interjects. "We just saw him shoot you! We had no idea what he was doing to you in there -- if you two were still arguing or worse..."

"Aw," Kay replies. "It's sweet you were worried, but I can handle my own against him, you know? I'm fine, he's fine. It all worked out in the end."

"If you're sure," Ragatha says. "Did you, um... did you still want to stop by my room today?"

"Oh, yeah! You can wrap up your game first," Kay replies, moving into a cross-legged position and looking around. "Where'd Kinger go?"

"After Caine put you two in the white room, he laughed and said something like 'Those two will be just fine' before wandering off," Pomni explains. "We thought he was being crazy at the time, but I guess he was right?"

Kay leans on their hand, elbow propped on their knee.

"Guess he was," Kay replies. 

.

.

.

"It's a little messy right now," Ragatha says as the two of you walk into the bedroom hall. "Please excuse all that -- my bed isn't even made, haha!"

"My room is still filled with tacks and my bed's unmade. I have no room to judge," You reply to the doll. As you round the corner you spot all the doors -- and one that's still full of sharpie marks.

You pause for a moment, and Ragatha stops in her tracks next to you. 

"Man," You say, walking again. "That feels like a million years ago. So much has happened in one day."

Ragatha chuckles nervously.

"Yeah, that's for certain," She says. "It was about time someone put Jax in his place, though."

"Mmm," You hum noncommittally.

After hearing him sing for so long, trading jokes back and forth, talking shit and falling into easy camaraderie back in that white room... you feel guilt gnawing at you. 

The guilt doesn't have very sharp teeth, though. It's just -- nibbling a bit. Just enough to be known.

If you hadn't done all that, after all, Jax would have never been forced into your proximity in the first place.

Your chain of thought is broken as Ragatha opens her door and steps through, holding it open for you. 

"Ohh, your room is cute," You observe, stepping onto light brown wooden flooring Her wallpaper has a floral pattern, the furniture is sturdy and dark wood, and the whole thing gives the vibes of a young girl's bedroom, or perhaps a guest bedroom in a house run by a grandmother-matriarch. 

"You have a piano?!" You exclaim excitedly, immediately honing in on the gorgeous instrument. You walk over to it, reach out, and hesitate.

"Oh, you can touch it!" Ragatha says, shutting the door. "No need to be shy or anything."

You reach out and flip open the lid covering the keys, then press one with your finger. A single clear note rings out. 

"Wow," You say. "You're so lucky. You could be, like, Mozart by the time we get out of here."

"Hm!" Ragatha responds. "I don't know about that!"

Then you hear a cry of surprise. 

"What?" You ask, looking over to see the doll in front of her open closet.

"All my new clothes!" She replies cheerfully. "This was only filled with copies of the exact same dresses before... now I have my dress and a bunch of new, real clothes... this is so nice!"

You peer around her shoulder to see her new clothing selection hanging on a rack inside half the closet. The other half holds some shelves that have folded pants, her hair ribbons, and accessories on them. She picks them up, puts them down, runs her fabric hand over clothing fabric.

It's bittersweet, to see the others get so much joy out of something so simple they've been deprived of.

"At least Caine seems to understand that we like picking how we look now," You point out.

"Yeah!" Ragatha agrees. "Yeah... he seemed really happy today. It's nice seeing everyone get along like that."

She takes off her cowboy hat, hair ties, and scarf, putting them in her closet. Then she sits on her bed and starts to undo her braids, peering at you with her one eye before looking away.

"It's been nice having you around. You... shake things up. It's good, having something to break up the monotony," Ragatha says.

"Glad to hear it," You reply, turning back to the piano and pressing a few more keys. Ding, ting, ting. You turn around as you hear Ragatha pull something out from under her bed.

"Here, come look," She says. "I picked some stuff I don't use that you might like."

"Oooh, goodies!" You reply, walking over and looking in the box. Free stuff sounds like a perfect way to end this day.

.

.

.

Jax sits on his bed, staring with contempt at the slice of vanilla cake on his desk.

The one that Kay gave him.

He's shirtless. And shoeless, thank God. The Boots From Hell were killing his feet to walk in. No, he shed all the useless, cringy pieces from his outfit the moment he locked his door behind him -- all save for the tiny skirt still hugging his waist.

Jax hates it. Loathes it. But he also doesn't know if he'll get another chance like this again, a chance where he can actually touch his own crotch with his hand, no fabric buffer. He's put on his bracelets and that allowed him to take off his gloves. Feeling the fabric peel away from the hands he'd struggled to free for years: now that was a trip. 

It felt like pulling a scab off a wound.

He wonders if that was Kay's goal all along when asking for a fashion game. Giving everyone the ability to take their clothes off. The ability to get naked.

The feeling between his legs throbs at that idea. He clenches his thighs together and openly pants.

God, he hates it. Having everything but a boner for Fucking Kay. 

For fuck's sake, he just walked through his door that was vandalized by them. They think he's a loser. A virgin. An incel.

'Please point to the incorrect statements Kay wrote,' Ragatha's voice echoes in his mind, and Jax smacks a hand to his forehead and wishes he had proper fingernails, because he wants nothing more than to scratch at his skin at the moment. 

"I can't do this," He mutters even as he traces a hand down to his inner thigh, leans back against his blankets. "I can't do -- ugh -- I can't be doing this."

It feels so good it burns, his own hand on his own skin. A feeling that coils and pulls in his tummy and thighs. Places that haven't been touched properly in years. His palm hasn't felt warmth against it in so long -- he doesn't mean to, really doesn't mean to twitch up into his hand, but suddenly his palm is pressed up against his crotch and oh, his toes curl, he fists the sheets and rubs against himself as his nerves sing --

"Oh, ghh -- G-god, fff -- BEEP."

That sound.

Years and years of dismay and hate and anger associated with sounds like that censoring him instantly flood his veins. His ears flatten at the sudden loudness. Jax whimpers and he hates that sound even more, the emotional whiplash making him dizzy as he jerks his hand away, even as his hips twitch up, seeking friction. He closes his eyes and smacks the center of his forehead with one closed fist, then the other.

Hits himself in the head a few more times. Several times.

Jax makes another stupid sound, something that sounds like a sob.

A moment later, after some quick shuffling, a black miniskirt smacks into the opposite wall.

There are no more sounds for the rest of the night.

Chapter Text

Your sleep is not very restful that night. 

Sleeping here is already hard enough what with the fact you can't follow the instincts telling you to close your eyes -- but it's made even harder when, every other time you turn over, you feel a sharp pain poking at you and you have to dig yet another tack out of your sheets to put on your nightstand. Never mind the fact you'd already went through your room and carpets and blankets thrice over, gathering handful after handful of the damned things.

All the previous guilt you felt for needling Jax is banished, now, in favor of irritation that simmers every time you're jolted out of sleep yet again.

You oughta gather all those tacks up and dump them in front of that jackass's door as a surprise when he walks out in the morning --

You go to inhale deeply to try and calm down and feel weird twinging in your chest and flinch and curl into a tighter ball.

Still, there is an upside to waking up so much, you suppose. You have more time to appreciate your new Item from Ragatha.

You've been given a toy. A soft, simple, and sizable gray kitty plushie with square patches in lighter gray colors and varying textures. It's a nice plush to hold, not too soft nor too firm, and pulling it closer to your chest does wonders for calming you down when you're robbed of the ability to do breathwork.

("I remembered you said that you wanted a tail," Ragatha had said to you, waving the kitty's tail around. "It's not one you can wear, but it has a bonus cat attached!"

You had immediately taken it and looked at it in wonder, seeing golden sparkles in your peripheries.

"I love it," You told her. "You're giving it to me? Are you sure?"

"I've made a lot of plushies over the years here," Ragatha replied warmly. "Besides, this one reminds me of you!"

"It's so cute," You said, pressing it to your face enough to smush your plastic sunglasses against your face. You ran your hands over the varying textures, marveling at how well-constructed it was. "You made it? Does it have a name?"

"No name, no," Ragatha replied. "I'm not super attached to it, honestly... it was just a little project to pass the time. It's like it was waiting for you to come along!"

"I'm naming it HONKhead. Ithead," You informed her, squeezing it tightly.

"O-oh!" Ragatha replied. "Well... it is yours now!"

Along with the delightful plushie Shithead, Ragatha had given you a plastic tea set. She'd apologized that you couldn't drink from it properly, but asked if you wanted it anyway, to which you replied you probably would be able to if you used a spoon to drink your tea. There had also been a few decorative storage containers, and one more item that stood out from the rest:

A shining, sharp kitchen knife that you could see your own reflection in.

"Jax gave this to me, in a roundabout way," Ragatha explained to you then, voice suddenly a lot more serious. "He stabbed me in the back to pin a sign that said 'Kick Me' there. I wasn't expecting it, so it didn't hurt. I didn't realize it was even there until I was going to bed."

She pressed it into the hand that wasn't holding the kitty Ithead, curled your fingers around the hilt with her own two hands. Looked up at your sunglasses with her one eye, her gaze intense.

"I'm talking to you as a woman, now."

She inhaled, exhaled, her grip on your hands steady. Her fabric was soft and warm. The blade's handle was cold.

"Jax has keys to everyone's rooms. These locks mean nothing to him. You know that. And I know that he always takes jokes too far and takes hurt too hard. He comes in your room at night? You use that. And start screaming. These rooms aren't soundproof. Yell for Caine. For us. Someone will hear."

The fuzzy, wholesome mood you'd felt looking at your new things had evaporated like cozy fog blasted away by intense sunlight. 

"Ragatha, what would he do in one night? He can't CRASH -- BEEP -- kill or grape me."

'And he wouldn't.'

Ragatha smiled, but it wasn't a happy one. She shook her head, yarn hair bobbing.

"I don't know," Ragatha said. "I... don't know. I haven't seen anyone get under his skin like you do while also getting so close to him. Well -- maybe once. But that -- wasn't like you. I don't know what Jax will do. And that's what scares me, Kay."

You're silent. There's no words that come to mind.

"Promise me you'll protect yourself if he tries to hurt you, Kay," Ragatha said to you, and you remembered how her hands tightened, and the feeling of her fabric went from cozy to uncomfortable.

"I--"

"Promise."

"...Okay," You had relented, and she had pulled away with a smile. "Okay."

It had been hours since then, and you still didn't know if you meant it.)

You reach your hand under your pillowcase. The knife is still there, in its self-sharpening sheath lifted by Ragatha from the kitchen.

You return your grip to your kitty Shithead. That's a much nicer thing to hold. 

And eventually, things go dark again before the morning alarm rings.

Today, it's a rooster crowing exceedingly loud. You sit up in bed, nuzzle Shithead, and place it on your pillow before pulling up the covers to get up --

Wait.

You're wearing underwear.

Those weren't there before.

The previous night, you had stripped and gone to bed naked, like you always did. After all, you were always naked. It was clothing that was out the norm, not the other way around. Why the hell are you wearing underwear?

It's a pair of skin-tight heart-print men's boxers. You stand up and examine them, pulling the elastic fabric away from your skin before letting it snap back, turning around to look at your butt. No, still flat. Shame. 

You go to the closet that had appeared in your room (a generic wooden construction) and open it to reveal your clothes from Best Impressive Dresser, along with more pairs of heart-print boxers and some plain white socks in addition to the ones you already got.

Hmmm. HMMMMM.

This reeks of Circus Bullshit.

You try to put a thumb under the red waistband of your boxers, but it's stuck fast to your skin. You can't wedge anything under there. So you put a leg up on your bed, stick a hand up one leg hole, and try pulling them down your legs from the inside.

Which hurts. Feels like how you imagine yanking on your own hair would have felt, if you could remember being alive -- no, you're still alive. Remember being human. No, you're still human. Remember being outside. Yeah, that works.

Everything is starting to get hot and you feel sweat beading on your skin. You kinda wish you could hyperventilate. This isn't fair. You want to go back to how you were before, free of fabric and shame.

You throw your gaze back to your pillow before shoving it aside and pulling out the kitchen knife, its edge gleaming in the light.

.

.

.

Jax did not have a restful night.

When the rooster crows jolt him awake what feel like mere seconds after he finally fell asleep, he groans and nestles deeper into his pillow. Maybe he can just skip out on today, fuck being absent. He doesn't care, he just wants to sleep. 

But Kay will notice he's gone.

And probably think he's -- unable to handle Everything from yesterday. The marker on his door. The Outfit From Hell. 

Jax hisses when he remembers The Outfit From Hell, curls into a tighter ball and clutches at his ears. He can feel himself starting to blush at the mere memory of it. God. No. 

But if he doesn't show up today, it'll look like he's still upset. And he can't look upset about things, because then people will ask questions, and Jax will have to endure even more annoyances. 

He sits up and his blanket falls away from around his shoulders. Had anyone been in his room, they would see a weary gaze with lines under his eyes, flattened ears, a yellow frown. But nobody is there to see -- not even Jax himself will see.

He covered his mirrors with construction paper and tape a long time ago.

His gaze falls upon the black miniskirt on the floor and his lip curls in disgust. When he gets up and walks to his closet he stomps on the fabric and grinds it into the floor like someone trying to kill a particularly stubborn cockroach.

The feeling of pleather on his skin only serves to irritate him more. 

He's wearing boxers again. God -- well, not like God is here. Caine forbid he try to jack off without a dick again. Not like he's twenty-two fucking years old or anything. 

'I, been denied, all the best, ultrasex...'

The lyrics to "Faggot" float into his mind again as he pulls out his usual pink overalls and starts putting them on. A little smile quirks onto his face as he remembers how Kay had stared at him, how they'd laughed, how they'd listened intently as he sang for minutes that bled into an hour, sang until his voice started to get sore. They'd ooh-d and ahh-d and given him so much rapt attention --

He shakes his head as he buttons the straps into place. Kay didn't and doesn't actually care about him -- they merely found him entertaining and nice to look at. A little novelty jukebox that spat out naughty words for a while. A wind-up toy that'll go on and on if you know how to turn it on.

Jax and Kay both know he's not exactly "friendship" material. To them, Jax's role is either to crack a joke or be the butt of it, the heel, the bully. Kay has made that abundantly clear.

All those fake apologies when Jax slipped and got upset were just that -- fake apologies so he would stick around. 

And Kay isn't exactly a walk in the park to be around either. Such a little prick. Who died and made them boss of everyone else? Jax truly pities whoever had to work or live with them in their real life.

The rabbit pauses in front of his door and inhales, exhales before plastering a stonewall smile onto his face and stepping outside.

Everyone else is slowly gathering. Kinger is wearing his skirt outfit today, Jax notices with a twinge of three-quarters disgust and one-quarter pity. Gangle hasn't got anything new on except for a few stickers on her mask, Zooble is dressed in their crop top and patchy jeans. Ragatha is wearing one of her pairs of pants with a white shirt, the scarf she was wearing on her neck yesterday used today to tie her hair back as a bandana.

A moment later, Jax hears Pomni's door open and sees her exit with a yawn. Interestingly, she's not wearing anything new.

"What happened to wanting to see something normal when you looked down, Pompom?" Jax asks her curiously as she slowly ambles over, looking sleepy still.

"I'd rather pick what I'm gonna wear after knowing what the adventure is," She explains slowly as she folds her hands together palms-out and stretches upwards, then downwards. "Imagine if I wore that black sweater and we had to get an idol from a desert temple. I'd regret my actions so bad."

She looks Jax up and down.

"What about you? You're still the same."

Jax feels heat rise to his face as he frowns.

"Don't start with that," He snaps sharply, and Pomni blinks.

"I wasn't trying to make fun of you. You've still got two... other new outfits you could wear."

"Why fix what ain't broken?" Jax replies, gesturing to himself. "I already told ya. Peak character design."

Pomni looks at him.

"It is pretty solid character design," She agrees, and Jax very carefully nonchalantly puts a hand on his hip and looks away.

"Yup, and that's why all of you," He says, pointing at the spot where the ceiling meets the wall before pointing at himself, "Love me."

That's when he hears Kay's door click open and his ear twitches. He looks over to see Kay closing their bedroom door --

Jax looks away again, feeling a blush come on. This dumb motherfucker.

He better get the first word in this time.

"Wooooow, Kay," He says, turning back around and making a show of looking at them top to bottom. "I didn't know you were an --"

They've got on a pair of panties with heart-shapes on them, and --

A bulge? A bulge? A bulge???

"A-an, exhibitionist???" 

He knows his voice went all confused the moment his eyes hit that bulge and he knows Kay knows and he is trying so hard not to cringe and he wants to look away but why is there a bulge there.

And Jax knows those underwear. He knows because Caine is lazy and reused the assets for Jax's own closet, except Jax's are boxers and Kay's underwear are the same except they have clearly been cut into panty-shape.

Why would Kay do that.

Why does Kay have a bulge?

Kay doesn't say anything. Just watches Jax watching. And now Jax knows he's been caught staring.

And now he's fucking blushing again. God dammit... this day is already slipping into "ruined" territory.

That bulge.

"You guys have literally been seeing me naked every day since the day I got here, Jax, why are you just now calling me an exhibitionist after I put on clothes?" Kay replies with a shrug.

"Th-- you know why!" Jax replies. "Your -- what's between your legs!"

"Two balled up pairs of socks," Kay replies. "I'm mad that Caine made my underwear glued to my skin, so I cut them prettier and gave myself a... thingy appearance. I'm hoping this makes him restore my old nakey-time privileges."

"Caine glued your underwear on?" Ragatha pipes in. "That's a real shame, Kay. I'm sorry to hear that."

Jax examines the others. Pomni seems to be very interested in looking everywhere but Kay right now. Gangle is openly staring and also blushing. Kinger doesn't seem to care. And Zooble is watching with more curiosity than anything else.

"You know, I don't think revenge ever works out for you very well, Kay," Kinger says suddenly. 

And it's right after that moment that Caine appears in the hallway.

"GOOD MORNING, my beautiful begonias -- why aren't you dressed." 

The tonal shift from excitement to deadpan on Caine would have been funnier if it wasn't directed at someone so close to Jax.

Jax pointedly takes several step back, both to watch the show better and also because he doesn't wanna get caught up on the fallout of whatever argument these two are about to have.

"I dunno, Caine, why can't I take these boxers off?" Kay replies, arms crossed and looking up at the ringmaster with an air of displeasure.

"I thought you liked clothes!" Caine replies, spreading his hands palms-up in exasperation. "Almost all of you spent all of yesterday showing me how much you liked clothes!"

"I like picking my clothes, not being forced to wear them," Kay replies. "I liked the freedom of having nothing on before, and now I want that back!"

"I'm not a magic genie here to grant your every wish!" Caine snipes back. "I do something you ask of me, and it's still not right?! And really, Effeesikay, out of all the people here who should be wearing extra layers, you're certainly the one who should be wearing the most. You've been pushing the envelope since you got here!"

"How come I have to wear clothes when Gangle and Zooble don't --"

"Because you're a conniving little smartass!" Caine shouts at them suddenly, snapping his fingers. "I'm trying to run a circus, not a whorehouse! You think I don't notice when you make your average of seventeen point four eight sex jokes a day? I do!"

Ping!

And now Kay is covered head to toe in the religious habit of a Catholic nun.

"What--" Kay blurts out, grabbing at their skirt and looking down at the big cross on their chest. "What -- oh God, is this what I think -- it is. God. FUDGE!"

They reach behind themselves and pull a knife from their hammerspace, grasping at their black skirt as though intending to saw it off.

"Effeesikay, if you so much as roll that skirt up to show your ankles before the day is done, you and I are gonna have a problem!" Caine says, hovering so close into the humanoid's space that they could lean their head forward and touch one of his eyeballs.

Kay freezes in place. Then slowly puts their knife away and nods a tiny bit.

Caine instantly leans back again, snapping back into his usual merry self.

"Speaking of fudge! You all are going to love today's adventure! I've been cooking up this one for a while, so you better enjoy every last drop of it! Now go enjoy your breakfast, and I'll see you all soon!"

And then he pops out of existence.

There's silence for a moment. Jax watches Kay fist the fabric of their skirt, looking miserable.

'How's it feel, bitch?'

"Did anyone else hear Caine cussing Kay out, orrrr was I having some sort of breakdown for a second?" Pomni asks.

Chapter Text

"I think you might have taken my place as Caine's least favorite," Zooble says, and you laugh nervously as you glance up at everyone staring at your new outfit. Oh, God, is this how Jax felt? 

"How's it feel now that the shoe's on the other foot, Sister?"

Jax's voice is dripping with obvious pleasure at your Caine-sponsored forcefemming, though yours is much more modest than his. 

Then again, Jax went through the same thing, and you ate that shit up, so it would be hypocritical of you to throw a hissy fit now.

Shoe... You suddenly become aware of your feet in an unfamiliar pair of shoes. You wiggle your single toe and feel the cotton of thick socks. You hike up your skirt for a moment to examine your new, shiny black pair of combat boots.

"Big shiny boots!" You gasp in delight, turning your foot back and forth and looking at the light gleaming over the surface. They go up to your ankles, the laces tied snugly and securely. You think they add an inch or so to your height, too, judging by the thick sole and heel.

"Careful, now. Wouldn't wanna flash your ankle, Sister. You're a lady of the Lord and all," Jax continues, looking you up and down. 

You smooth out your plain black skirt, taking a moment to let it settle in that you're a nun, of all things, for the day.

"Honestly... it could be worse," You say, turning around and examining your sleeves, messing with your veil. "Religious stuff aside, it does look kinda cool. And it's really lightweight and comfy."

"I agree, you do look cool," Gangle interjects, and Jax instantly snaps his eyes over to her and glowers.

"You'd agree with anything Kay said," He mutters while crossing his arms, before pitching his voice comically high in a mockery of her. "Oh, could I hold your hand, Kay? Can I sleep in your bed, Kay? Could I hold all your stuff, Kay? Could I lick your boots, Kay?"

"Wh-- no I don't!" Gangle squeals, turning red. 

"Believe it or not, cottontail, there exists a magical middle ground between HONK-ing with someone and BEEP-ing someone, where you just simply like being around them, called friendship," You explain, making sure to inject extra salt into your tone, spreading your hands as you say the word friendship as though explaining a novel concept to a toddler. "Not that you'd know much about it, but maybe you should try it sometime. Might mellow you out enough to make you stop actin' like such a beach."

"Yeah, no," Jax replies, starting to walk down the hall, arms still crossed. "I already had my free trial of that, and it expired. You can keep your gross little gray hands to Ribbons and the other females, Sister."

He says females with a hint of disdain, like one might say the word animals. 

"Hey," Zooble snaps at him, and Jax says nothing but flips them the bird, staring resolutely ahead. You jog up to the rabbit and fall into step beside him, not getting closer as he veers away from you a tad.

"Hey, Jax, completely unrelated question to the previous discussion, but how was your relationship with your mother?"

"About as good as my relationship with yours," He replies smoothly, and you feel a little thrill at how easily the two of you can slide from genuine arguing to teasing.

Maybe you can get to just teasing someday.

"Does that mean you'll be my stepfather soon?" You ask him, and he snickers.

"What, you wanna call me Daddy?"

"Only if you're the type who's, like, 'Get me another beer!' with the TV really loud and then you throw BLEEP at me," You say, giggling. "Ah, I can hear the sound of my mom yelling while you break dishes in the kitchen already."

"Jesus Christ, Sis," Jax says, laughing genuinely. "Quit projecting your daddy issues onto me!"

"Is it projection or is it observation?"

He goes quiet at that, staring ahead and walking silently. The two of you have gotten a bit ahead of the rest of the group, everyone else already engrossed in their own conversations with each other.

"I'm not some little broken toy that needs fixing," Jax says to you, low enough that you can tell it's meant for you alone to hear.

You take that phrase in your brain, turn it over in your mind.

He feels threatened by your attempts to make him stop being a bitch. Feels like you're belittling him, trying to make him something he's not.

"Jax," You say. "I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a bit of a hedonist. I make friends because it feels good and because I want to live."

You watch the corners of his eyes widen a pixel as he hears the phrase 'I want to live.'

"I do things because it feels good and because keeping your brain healthy keeps you alive. People aren't meant to go it alone. So if you wanna make me the bad guy in your brain somehow... my evil, secret ulterior motive is that it feels really good to do this back and forth dance with ya. I like when you tease me and I tease you back. I like your quick wit, I like your smile, I like your laugh, your intelligence..."

You notice his gloved hand gripping at his elbow where his arms are crossed, so hard he's leaving an impression in his arm.

"I hate you," He mutters. "You get more annoying every day."

"Oh, yeah, I hate you too," You reply, voice obviously unserious. "Hate how you make everything funny when I'm getting too deep in my head. Hate how you give me something new to do every day."

"I told you not to compliment me. You're actually going to make me vomit."

His tail is wagging again. Out of all the things you got out of the dress-up game, that has to be your favorite -- that tangible indicator that he's enjoying your attention a lot more than he lets on.

"I'm not complimenting you, I'm telling you how much you suck and I hate you," You reply, seeing the end of the hall in sight. The breakfast table is set with what looks like fifteen different boxes of cereal lined up in a row.

"But, man, Jax..." You continue, daring to drop your voice into something lower, more intimate. Flirtatious, even. "Just how long has it been since someone told you all the things that they liked about you? Given you some real praise? Real shame you won't let me --"

You see his hand going for his inventory, as you predicted he might, and run.

BANG. 

Kinger is close enough to dive behind as you hear a big blast of something, and a few of the girls scream. You peek over Kinger's shoulder -- he didn't even jump upon hearing the firing of a gun -- to see Jax holding what looks like a hunting rifle, looking furious.

"How many of those do you have in your BLEEP-ing pockets?" Zooble exclaims, voice shaky. Gangle is curled up behind them, ribbons over her head.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Jax spits out before raising the gun again. "Now get out from behind your human shield, Kay!"

He can't hit the others, after all, if he wants to keep the deal you made with him. You wisely remain squatted into a crouch behind Kinger, your long skirt pooling out around you. It's weirdly comforting to be covered in so much fabric -- it's like a protective blanket.

"Jax," Kinger says slowly. "I really don't think any of us want bullets for breakfast. How about you put that away and we can just continue on our day?"

Jax doesn't move for a second. Then, with a dramatic sigh and roll of his eyes, the long rifle disappears behind his back. 

"Fine, whatever," He says as he turns back around. "You guys are no fun."

You slip out from behind Kinger and go to walk with Jax again, only to feel a familiar, fabric hand catch your wrist. You turn around to look at Ragatha, who's giving you a wide-eyed stare, her mouth a straight line.

"What did we just discuss?" She whisper-hisses, and you laugh nervously.

"Ah-heh, well, I, uhhh... didn't mean to?"

Ragatha's eye narrows at your transparent lie.

"Oops?" You try. "Whoopsie?"

"Annoying Jax until he tries to shoot you with a gun again isn't an 'oops' or a 'whoopsie', Kay!" Ragatha scolds you quietly. "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you? You realize there's a lot less dangerous ways you can spend your time, right?"

"It's fine, Ragatha. He and I are making progress. We're getting somewhere, seriously."

She pinches the bridge of her red triangle nose with a frustrated sigh, and you take the opportunity to slip away to get a seat at the breakfast table, next to a certain purple rabbit whose face scrunches up in disgust as he glances over at you.

"You never learn, do you?" He says as he pulls forward a box of rainbow-colored fruity cereal.

"Do they have cornflakes?" You ask as you scan the boxes. Jax rudely reaches past Gangle and snags a box before lightly whapping you in the face with it. 

"Here, have your prude cereal, Sister."

"My what?" You ask as you tear open the cardboard box and pop open the plastic bag inside. Jax scoffs amusedly.

"Y'never heard? Why cornflakes were invented?"

"These are frosted flakes."

"Same difference, it's just the sugar, sugar," Jax replies. "Hand me that orange juice and I'll tell you."

'Did he just call me sugar?'

You push it over to him as you start pouring cereal into your bowl. Jax unscrews the lid on the plastic jug and, instead of pouring it into the glass beside his bowl, starts pouring it into the bowl itself.

"Are you -- are you going to have your cereal with orange juice?" You ask incredulously.

"Long ago," Jax says loudly, completely ignoring your question, "In the mid 1800s, there existed a man who hated that people were going around choking the chicken, so to speak. Pulling on their pork. Beating their meat."

He pops open his bag of fruity cereal and starts pouring it into the orange juice, and you hear an "ewww" from Gangle beside him.

"Shut up, it's fruit on fruit, it matches," He says to her before continuing the story, gesturing with the hand not stirring his cereal with a spoon. "This dumb doctor's name was John Harvey Kellogg, and he hated people using their johns for anything other than makin' more white Christian babies so much that he went around telling people to eat foods that were so tasteless and bland that they, and I quote, 'wouldn't excite the passions.' And he was vegetarian, too. Double L right there. So he made corn flakes so people would be so bored that they'd stop jerking their gherkins, and that was obviously an epic fail. And they had to put enough sugar to kill a small animal in them just to get people to eat it. The End."

"Wow," You respond, pouring some milk into your bowl. "That was... very informative!"

"I'm a wealth of knowledge," Jax replies, finally taking a bite of his orange concoction. "Mmmmm."

"You are so nasty," Zooble says, taking the box of fruity cereal from across the table and shaking some into their bowl. They don't put any milk, just start eating it dry with a spoon.

"At least I don't like going in dry like you do," Jax responds, and Zooble's antennae twitch as they wordlessly take a bite.

"As if you'd know anything about getting someone wet," They mutter after they finish.

"Sister Kay, do you hear that? It sounds like there's a fly buzzing around in here or something!" Jax says to you, a big grin on his face.

"I dunno, bun, someone tried to shoot me this morning and my hearing's been bad since," You reply before taking a bite of your cereal. It is kind of tasteless, but at least the milk being cold is somewhat of a food experience.

"Someone tried to shoot an emissary of the church?" Jax gasps with false horror. "Golly, who could that have been?! I'm sure they're going straight to hell for that!"

You laugh. 

"Some total maniac, I'm sure. A gun nut who has an itchy trigger finger and an ego fragile as spun sugar," You respond.

Jax huffs in a way that could be taken as a scoff or a short laugh.

The rest of breakfast is uneventful -- you mostly listen to the others conversing while you eat. Gangle has a weakness for any chocolate cereal, you learn, and Pomni actually prefers oatmeal.

Then, when everyone is starting to finish, Caine appears above the table with a loud "SALUTATIONS!!!" and Kinger screams. With a snap of fingers all of you are suddenly deposited into the area in front of the big stage where Caine usually makes announcements, and you can't help but make a small yelp at the sudden forced teleport.

The others don't -- they're more used to it than you are.

Caine must be really itching to get rid of you all today to be rushing you so fast. It's a big switch from how he actually let you all come to him yesterday.

You suppose the ringmaster's sudden shift in mood might be mostly your fault. You fiddle with the ends of your long sleeves as the others turn their attention to Caine.

Hopefully he doesn't inflict more Circus Bullshit on the others just because he's mad at you.

"Today's challenge will have you all smiling more than EVER before! It contains elements EACH of you enjoy! There's high stakes! The power of friendship, and also incredible violence! And even CAKES!"

As he spins and spreads his arms, a truly excessive amount of sprinkles fly from his hands and clatter onto the floor. 

You pick one up and sample it.

Mmm, food grade wax and sugar.

"Yes, that's right! Today's adventure will be CANDY CARRIER CHAOS! Nefarious ne'er-do-wells have plundered Candy Canyon Kingdom of their staple cash crop: MAPLE SYRUP! You all will have to capture those thieving gummies and bring them to face the CONSEQUENCES. OF THEIR ACTIONS." 

Is he... staring at you when he said that last part?

"Candy Candy Kingdom?" Bubble asks as he floats out from behind Caine.

"Candy CANYON Kingdom," Caine corrects him.

"Candy Cannon Kingdom?"

"Candy CANYON."

"Candy Candy--"

Caine thrusts his cane out and pops Bubble before summoning a portal.

"ANYWAY, time is money and the more time you spend here the more money Candy Canyon loses with their trade partners! So get on through that portal and start bounty hunting!"

"You had me at incredible violence," Jax says, stepping forward eagerly.

You have a feeling this will be an interesting day.

Chapter Text

"W-wait, uh, just how violent is this adventure going to get?" Ragatha asks nervously, taking a backwards step away from the portal. 

Somehow, with her bright hair tied back and her skirt not flouncing around her, she looks almost... more shy, since she isn't taking up as much space.

You suppose that's the sort of thing that happens when others are allowed to finally express themselves differently.

"Oh, nothing should go too amiss as long as you all stick to the script!" Caine says merrily. "A little birdie did tell me that some of you have been complaining about the quality of the NPCs, so I made a few tweaks here and there that you'll all be testing today. Nothing too major!"

"What sort of... tweaks?" Zooble asks, crossing their arms and raising an eyebrow. They've picked interesting parts today, one of which is a leg with orange and black stripes that pokes out from under their loose jeans. They've got a more normal yellow-fingered hand and the monkey's paw hand Caine gave them as a bribe to join the quiz game. Their small black tank crop top shows off their colorful arms well.

"I've made the NPCs a touch less agreeable and given them the confidence to be more assertive!" Caine responds, one finger raised as his voice somehow gets even more bouncy and sales-pitch-y. 

"They were plenty assertive last adventure," Jax says, pausing mid-step and suddenly looking a lot less enthusiastic.

"It'll be sixty-six times more immersive!" Caine swooshes over to Jax, ignoring how the rabbit leans back, trying to regain his personal space. "Don't you want your prey to run and fight back properly?!"

"Oh," Jax says, freezing, pupils dilating. "Oh, you make a good point."

"I prefer when the AI doesn't argue with me, if there has to be AI at all," Zooble responds, turning on one blue-booted heel and starting to walk away.

"Waitwaitwait!" Caine pleads, the sentence Zooble just said sailing over his head. "I just need you all to test the new AI! And some of your more... oppositional and defiant personalities would be perfect for testing it! I'll... I'll even pick another suggestion box adventure after this one!" 

Zooble stops walking, the pink wing on their shoulder raising slightly. They turn their triangular head halfway around and look at Caine out of the sides of their eyes.

"Mmm...." Zooble hums, considering.

"Zooble, it would be soooo fun to see you be a bounty hunter," You plead, and their attention flicks over to you.

"Oh, yeah, Zooble! You could look so -- wow!" Gangle agrees. Zooble's expression becomes a smidge more interested at that, but then they break eye contact with the two of you, gazing off towards the ground.

"Agreeable," Jax mutters quietly, still making fun of Gangle at a volume barely loud enough to hear.

"I don't wanna be a cop," Zooble says with a huff, antennae twitching. "Bringing bandits to justice? For taking what, food?"

"For stealing a valuable cash crop!" Caine interjects.

"Is maple syrup a... a luxury good like tobacco or tea in this universe?" Pomni asks.

"On the contrary, my dear Pomni! It's an important ingredient in many life-saving medicines!"

Pomni's face wilts -- even her jester hat goes a little more limp and lifeless, like a sad puppy lowering its ears.

"So we're punishing people for stealing... medicine...?"

"You're punishing people for STEALING!" Caine repeats, tone excited, as though he's a parent trying to convince a picky toddler to eat their vegetables.

"Don't look so sad, Pompom," Jax says, stepping over and leaning over to talk down to her. "As soon as we leave, everyone there will stop existing! It'll be like they were never there in the first place. It's not like they're actually alive."

"I know," The jester says quietly, looking a touch more disturbed. "But knowing that doesn't help."

"It doesn't matter, it's all just set dressing for our game today," Jax continues. His voice is cheerful, but there's nothing behind it. His wide smile doesn't reach his eyes.

"It still feels bad," Pomni remarks, and Jax rolls his eyes and stands at his full height again, expression dropping to something annoyed. 

"I'm going because I wanna kill people," He says, crossing his arms and tapping his foot. "If you all wanna be sticks in the mud, you can stay here and twiddle your thumbs, I guess."

"Who said anything about any of you STAYING?" Caine asks. He snaps his fingers, and suddenly the portal expands and a sound of rushing air fills the room. You feel yourself being pulled off your feet and make a low noise of displeasure as you curl up.

'I hate being picked up!'

You hear shouts to each side of you as the others get dragged into the colorful black hole behind you. As each of you pass through it, it sucks you up with a distinct 'fwoop', like a vacuum sucking up jellies or something.

"Wait-wait-wait!" Ragatha cries out. "I don't -- I'm not exactly cut out to be --"

"HAVEFUNBYEEEEEEE!" Caine shouts at you all as you're deposited face-first into something. The first thing your brain registers is that whatever surface you're on, it's moving. The second is that everything smells heavenly. 

You push yourself into a sitting position on your knees, smoothing out your skirt and adjusting your sunglasses as you look around. 

It's all so, so pink.

The ground is pink. The giant cakes that serve as hills and mountains are pink. There's cotton-candy clouds and lollipop trees and gummy flowers. There's a huge pink gummy elephant-thing in front of you, pulling a candy wagon that everyone's sitting on. Everything smells like a strawberry cheesecake tried to mate with several dozen chocolate chip cookies -- something you should not have walked in on that's probably ruining your blood sugar just by inhaling it, but too delicious to walk away.

"Cake," You say immediately and unconsciously, sparkles and hearts blossoming into existence around your head. You need to sample everything, who cares if it tastes like wax melts or crayons or packing peanuts. It all looks so good.

Jax, in the coach seat in front next to Pomni, turns to look at you. He fits right into this place, you think, with his pastel color scheme. Not to mention he kinda does look like a gummy candy or something... his smooth purple skin is very inviting, very bitable. Would it blemish or bruise? 

Then again, Jax couldn't leave marks on you when he was trying his hardest to.

"Looks like you've got your dream adventure, Sister Sweet-tooth," Jax observes.

"But I can't bite anything," You lament, putting your head in your hands and making a low noise of displeasure. "I have no mouth and I must sample."

Can't bite Jax properly, either.

"You clip stuff all the time!" The rabbit points out.

"It's not the same! I want to chew!"

"Where's Kinger?" Gangle's voice suddenly cuts in, and you look behind yourself at the rest of the candy wagon. It has high chocolate walls reinforced by candy canes, and the texture of graham cracker under your knees.

You see Zooble, Ragatha and Gangle behind you, and Pomni is in the front with Jax... but no Kinger.

.

.

.

Somewhere else, far away, Kinger walks back to the big stage.

Bubbles float through the air -- many small, and one large and fanged. Caine is sitting cross-legged mid-air, his coattails drooping, puffing away on his bubble pipe.

"Hi there!" Kinger says, and Caine yelps, hat flying off his head as he whirls around. His hat swoops back and forth before settling back onto his gums, like a cartoon leaf in a breeze.

"Wh-- what are you still doing here?!"

"I went to wash my hands," Kinger replies, eyes following the shiny little bubbles as they float through the air. "Where's everybody else?"

"They've already started!" Caine replies, settling into his cross-legged position again. The hand not curled around his pipe twitches. 

"Well, I'll wait here for a while, then," Kinger replies, standing serenely in his place as bubbles drift around him. One touches the tip of his crown and pops, and the chesspiece feels tiny flecks of soap hit his wooden skin.

Caine's jaw tightens a tad, then relaxes. He wordlessly offers his pipe to Kinger.

Kinger takes it without further comment, and inhales, exhales. Dewy, colorful bubbles float out around him as a pleasant buzz nestles into his head.

He hands the pipe back to Caine, who takes another draw, and they fall into a companionable silence, save for the cartoonish sound of bubbles blowing.

"Wheeeeee!" Bubble giggles. "The sound of substance use!"

.

.

.

"I guess Caine might have forgotten him?" Ragatha guesses. "He does forget to bring one or two of us along on occasion..."

"Does he ever forget to take one of us back?" You ask her with a pang of anxiety, worries of being left behind in some sort of nightmare adventure parading through your mind.

"No!" Ragatha says right as Jax says says "Oh, yeah, all the time!"

Which doesn't help your anxiety at all. You turn to face Zooble, and notice Pomni is also looking at them with a worried expression. 

"What are you guys looking at me for?" Zooble asks, shifting in their spot. "Uh, Caine hasn't forgotten to take anyone back from an adventure in the time I've been here, at least. I think he counts us as we come back, like how he does in the morning."

You feel your shoulders slump in relief at that. 

The last thing you'd want is to be left behind.

"They're just lying to make you feel better," Jax says. "I've been here longer, you know?"

"You just like DOINK-ing with everyone," Zooble retorts, and you see Pomni nod and return her attention to the road ahead. Jax shrugs and turns back to face the front, slumping against the back of his chair with a sigh.

"This place looks so pretty," Gangle observes, elongating her ribbony body to get a better view of the candyland all around. She's like the little periscope on a submarine. You shuffle towards the edge of the wagon beside her before clipping your lower face through one of the candy canes. When you pull away, there's a cartoonish chomp mark on it.

"How's it taste?" She asks, looking down at you. Usually, when she's curled up into herself and slouching over, she's a lot smaller than you. Seeing her outstretched above you like this, while you're on your knees, is an interesting experience. She's got a little heart sticker on her left cheek, and a tiny peace symbol on the right, underneath her eyes. The fact that she's getting good use out of her sticker sheets makes your chest warm.

You hum, considering her question as you put your fingers to your chin, touching the fabric bordering your face with the nun getup on.

"Tastes like someone soaked cardboard in peppermint oil and waved it in front of my face," You reply, feeling your facial muscles scrunch up in displeasure, and Gangle giggles. 

"Yeah, I wouldn't expect much flavor out of anything that Caine didn't intend for us to eat," Ragatha says. "Even if it looks good, the taste probably won't --"

She's cut off by the sound of you cracking a piece of chocolate from the wagon wall and shoving it into your face.

You shudder.

"A thin veneer of bitter dark cacao powder rubbed over plywood," You proclaim of it.

"I wanna try it," Gangle says, curling back into herself bouncily and leaning close to you. You crack off another piece off and hold it out, waiting for her to take it --

And she eats it directly from your hand with an anime-girl-esque "nom."

Even though her face is flat, it disappears into her mouth and her expression mimes chewing for a second before she gets a look of disgust on her face.

"Oh, that does taste like cacao powder and sawdust," She says. To your delight, she clips the tip of her ribbon through her mask to mimic sticking out her tongue, before pulling it back to its normal position.

'Cute...'

"Why are you two eating it?" Ragatha asks, pure confusion coloring her tone. 

"Curiosity," You say, as Gangle replies "Enrichment!"

"Oh, God, Kay's annoying tendencies are spreading like a disease," Jax groans loudly from the front. You hear Pomni snort and laugh a little.

"You just hate joy and whimsy!" You call back to him, looking to the front again. You're all coming up on a city with a giant moat, a drawbridge slowly lowering to allow you passage. Even from here, you can faintly see a colorful crowd of pastel NPCs waving, and hear them cheering jubilantly as you all approach.

"Oooo," You coo in excitement as you move to the front and lean over to get a better look. Jax leans away from you, the bored look on his face being replaced with a smile you're almost tempted to call fond. 

Almost. You know better than that, with him.

"I can't believe you still get excited over this stuff," He says, gaze flicking back to Candy Canyon Kingdom. "You know it's not real, right?"

"Yeah," You reply. "But, I mean, people don't play video games or watch movies or read books in the real world and go, 'Oh man, I would enjoy this, but I can't because it's not actually real,' so why should we? We just get a more up-close view than most."

Jax scoffs before he blinks and his grin turns more wicked. You're close enough now that you can make out individuals from the crowd -- all faceless, like you, except for their candy-coated coloring.

"Hey, Sister, you wanna eat one of these tools?"

"Ah -- eat one of the NPCs?" You ask, and you feel a shiver run down your spine as you wonder if the different colors would have different flavors. "Like, kill one? Or eat one alive? I couldn't -- I couldn't do that!"

"You wouldn't have to," Jax replies. "I'd shoot one for you, Sister. And then, you know, the corpse is already there... you wouldn't just waste a perfectly good taste, would you?"

"They're -- they're all as tall as me! I couldn't possibly finish one! And the logistics of it -- you start shooting into a crowd, are they gonna fight back or run? Is there a candy police force to kill candy mass shooters? And -- and shooting and killing NPCs is bad! No, Jax!"

And Jax laughs. Laughs loud and leans backwards, looking you full in the face.

"But you were thinkin' about it," He says, pointing with a yellow finger. "I got you thinking about it, now. You were talking logistics before you were all 'Oooh, but killing bad.' You said that part last."

You feel your face flush as you stare at him, and Jax's smile widens.

"Can you two not have serial killer conversations with me right here?" Pomni mutters from beside you, and you jump with a small "wuh!" since you were so focused on Jax you forgot Pomni was there. Jax cackles again, looking at her discomfort with amusement.

"Sister Kay is sooo devout, though, Pomni! They'd never shoot someone in the back before feasting on their fruit-flavored remains," Jax says in a tone that implies he believes the exact opposite.

"That's absolutely right!" You affirm, before turning back to Jax. "Seriously, though, I don't wanna kill a bunch of innocents on this adventure."

Jax raises one eyebrow at you.

"And why not?"

"Because games are more fun with rules?" You try, and Jax's brow furrows.

"I'm just gonna pretend you didn't say anything, since that was such a stupid answer. Now: why shouldn't I kill a bunch of innocents on this adventure?"

"Uh..." You start, looking around. You've gotten past the drawbridge, and the cheering of the crowd is so much louder now. Streamers and confetti fly over your heads and land in your wagon. The scent within the kingdom is more fruity than outside -- like opening a bag of fruit gummies and sticking your nose in.

"Maybe not all of us enjoy making everyone else miserable, even NPCs," Pomni suggests dryly, and Jax glowers at her.

"Shut up, Kay and I are talking," He snaps.

"Woah, Jax --" You start, and his eyes flick back to you. "No need to be so rude."

"Still haven't answered my question, though," Jax replies, turning around in his seat fully and leaning on the wagon wall, propping up his chin with one hand as he looks at you. "Why shouldn't I make all these little candy computers start pissing corn syrup when I open fire on 'em, huh?"

And then Jax, in one fluid and practiced motion, pulls out the shotgun he tried to kill you with that morning. None of the NPC crowd screams out in terror, even though you feel a rush of fear in your own body. Maybe they're not programmed to assume the people they're welcoming into their city are capable of killing them.

Pomni, wordlessly and wisely, scrambles over the wall, abandoning her seat beside the murderous rabbit and joining the others at the back of the wagon. You feel your not-heart start pounding hard as adrenaline fills your false limbs, making them tremble as you wish you could inhale. Fuck, you can't look weak in front of him or he'll try to step all over you.

"Jax," You say sternly, voice rough and firm, and you feel a sudden rush of pride that you managed to sound like that, even though you're shaking inside. 

You stand up in the wagon and lean over the purple rabbit, heedless of the shotgun in his hands, watching your own shadow fall over his face as you blot out the sun. 

"You promised," You remind him. "You start shooting? I'm gonna jump on ya. You thought the outfit was bad? I know you have a sense of pride, and if you act like a little witch on this adventure I'm gonna figure out how to break you like one. I'm not gonna sit here and take this bull-HONK from you. I'm here to have fun. And we're doing a DOINK-ing Pacificist Route, or I'll make you wish you were dead."

And Jax -- he blushes. His whole face turns crimson as he looks up at you, and his hands tighten on his gun. He's scowling.

But he doesn't shoot.

"Are you violently threatening me into a Pacificist Route?" He asks, but his own voice wavers. "Do you-- do you hear yourself when you talk?"

"That's the second day in a row someone's said something like that to me," You reply, thinking of Pomni's argument with you in front of the lolita shop. What she said to you.

'Do you not think think about anything you say or do before you just do it? Jesus -- you and him are like -- you keep trying to one-up each other, and neither of you know how to stop!'

'I... I need to de-escalate,' You think.

"Sigh," You say out loud, since you can't actually do that. "Jax, I'm tired of this song and dance. I told you, didn't I? I like you. I like talking to you, but I don't like you acting mean. Do we keep having to do these pissing contests? Can you just put your gun away?"

He doesn't break eye contact -- just keeps staring up at you. But his expression goes all -- hesitant. Unsure. Almost -- lost. Like you've pushed him into territory he's not quite sure how to traverse. Everything is loud around you two, so you try something soft, quiet, words just for him:

"Wasn't it nice, in the room?"

The white room. The room where you shared those words nobody else would hear, said things you could never say outside, sang and laughed and for a moment, forgot about the circus, the tension melting away. A red confetti streamer lands on Jax's ear, catching for a moment before the forward motion of the wagon blows it away in the wind.

And Jax breaks eye contact at that, the fact he heard your words, even quiet, made obvious by the full-body shiver that runs through him. You can see, standing above him, even his toes curl, his fingers tighten on his gun.

"I did -- I did make a deal, didn't I?" He says, voice light and unserious despite his words, as if he's talking about the weather. "No hurting anyone, and you don't touch me with your a-annoying hands."

The deal. Yeah, of course -- he can cling to the deal, and tell himself he's doing it because of some agreement, and that will let him keep his pride.

But the fact he tripped over his words, saying that -- something about that makes you lean forward more, just a bit. He could argue that he meant only the humans in the circus, not the NPCs. 

But he doesn't.

"Yup," You respond. "You promised."

And he moves, slow, as if not to startle. Takes his hand off the shotgun and spins it around and offers it to you, pointed at himself, for you to take.

"This'll be too much of a temptation if I keep it on me," He says, tilting his head and smiling. "Might just blow your head off again. You'll give it back when we go back to the circus, right?"

You would blink if you could. 

You grasp the weapon and he flinches the tiniest amount as you do, as if he expects you to shoot him but is trying not to react --

But you don't, obviously. Instead, you let it slip invisibly into your hammerspace. Climb over the wall to sit in the coach seat beside him, and manspread your legs in a way that no self-respecting nun would ever be caught sitting.

"See, that wasn't so hard, was it, bun?" You whisper, and he snorts, rolling his eyes.

"Guys," You call back loudly to all the girls and one other huddled in the back of the wagon. "Guys, it's fine. The Lord spoke through me and peace has been achieved. I have his gun, he's not gonna mass-shoot everybody."

"Sister Kay only has ONE of my guns," Jax calls back, cackling when he hears a soft "eep" from Gangle. Who knows if he's telling the truth or not. You notice how his ears perk at Gangle's sound of fear, as if he was listening for a reaction.

"Jax, look," You say, pointing over the pink elephant, and he follows your finger to see that you're coming up on the castle at the center of the city, an NPC with a pink, frilly cake dress, fruit gummy hair, and a crown atop her head opening the giant double doors. "I bet she's the queen."

Jax sighs. 

"I wish I could shoot her, Sister Kay," He whines. 

"No, Jax, you can't shoot her, you'll go to hell," You respond, and he snickers.

Trying to complete this adventure without making it a bloodbath is gonna be a challenge...

But you find yourself welcoming it.

Chapter Text

Ragatha feels like her head is full of cotton.

Well, it is, but that's besides the point. 

She can hardly believe her eyes -- eye. Can hardly believe what she's seen go down right in front of her face.

Kay talked Jax down.

Ragatha had been so sure everything was about to go to shit. She'd seen Jax fly off the handle dozens and dozens of times -- he'd made more adventures suddenly go south than she could count because of his impulsive violence. She'd witnessed many an NPC meet a gruesome end by his yellow-clad hands, whether it be directly from some weapon or indirectly by something like a car or a cliff or, a few memorable times, a falling anvil.

Of course, those NPCs never showed a sign of remembering their ends when they showed up two or three adventures later, no matter how closely Jax studied their faces.

Ragatha, in some twisted way, could understand. She'd long since given up trying to become true friends with the computers -- you'd have to be crazy to invest in them emotionally, considering their origins, and the fact there were perfectly good human beings around to get close with. (Well, some of them were far from perfectly good.) However, even knowing that, even when the NPCs would talk to her the same even if they'd been set on fire two adventures before, it was tempting to try and grasp at anything lasting, try to leave any permanent mark on the constantly shifting stage where they performed day after day after day.

Trying to leave a permanent mark on things that screamed when you gutted them alive, however? That was entirely the wrong way to go about it. Violence wasn't the answer -- or so Ragatha thought.

Because Kay had quite literally, unequivocally, threatened Jax into submission.

And Jax had -- well, if Ragatha didn't know any better, she might have said he seemed to enjoy it. He'd blushed and looked so flustered as if Kay had shown up at his door with a bouquet of flowers rather than threatened to "break him like a bitch" -- Kay's somewhat self-censored phrasing, not hers.

Then there had been the quiet words Kay said, words that the cheers of the crowd snatched away, but whatever sentence was uttered seemed to hit Jax like a physical blow, the way he visibly shivered, obvious even from where Ragatha and the others were curled up in the back. Gangle had tensed up at her side and made a small, choked sound upon seeing that.

"I did -- I did make a deal, didn't I?" Jax stammered out, and Ragatha felt a jolt of shock at the notion of Jax actually agreeing to anything and sticking to it. "No hurting anyone, and you don't touch me with your a-annoying hands."

Some nameless, cold emotion bloomed in Ragatha's chest when she heard that. Something sticky like oil, jostling in her chest with the movement of the wagon on candy-coated pavement. Not quite fear, not quite disgust, but not entirely bad either. She had zero clue what mixture of emotion that was, and that in itself concerned her, like she was back home on the porch watching storm clouds swirl themselves into a tornado, all dark green and moody.

Just what horrible things must have happened in that white room yesterday for Jax and Kay to suddenly act like this?

But they'd been so personable with one another, after. Jax waving goodbye at someone was practically an affectionate hug, with someone as standoffish as him.

Ragatha would have thought that maybe Jax was psyching Kay out, that he still planned on suddenly turning and firing randomly into the crowd, until he turned his gun at himself and offered it to the humanoid standing above him.

'Violence is never the answer.'

Even now, Ragatha can hear her mother's disappointed voice in her head.

'Have you ever tried beating the CUCKOO out of him?'

Ragatha remembers when Kay asked that question, after she had explained to them all her efforts to make Jax quit his nasty bullying over the years. 

A long time ago, before the circus, even, she had tried something like that. Only once. She had been in middle school, and just started wearing a bra -- and one of the boys in her class, being full of raging hormones, decided to start snapping the bra straps of every girl he walked past who couldn't pull away in time.

She had punched him and bloodied his nose when he tried that on her.

She still remembered sitting in the principal's office, head low in shame, nails breaking the skin of her palms in little half-circles, as the middle school principal -- a man -- had explained her punishment to her mother, pulled away from her important job to come pick her up, because she was suspended for two days.

Those two days had felt like arsenic was in the air in her house. She wasn't allowed any of her electronics or books, no -- she spent those two days on her hands and knees, scrubbing the house top to bottom with a bucket of soapy water (she still hated the scent of that brand of cleaner as an adult), rags, and a toothbrush, listening to endless monologues about how much of an embarrassment she was to her family, how much trouble she caused her mom, how she should have worn a shirt that didn't show off her shoulders so much.

'Violence is never the answer.'

And yet, the answer to the threat of violence has unfolded right in front of her.

Even now, as Kay points at the castle and princess ahead, and they talk back and forth with Jax, Ragatha feels a little numb, too shocked to process much. The others seem to be in a similar state, staring at the pair in front as though they've both grown second heads.

"A deal, huh," Zooble finally remarks, low enough that it's clearly meant only for the four of them. "Kay annoyed him enough with the spanking and stuff that he agreed to stop beating people up if they stopped groping on him... looks like Jax met his match."

"SHHHHHH!" Gangle whisper-hisses, ironically much louder than Zooble's quiet sentence, then whirls around to face the duo in question. Kay and Jax are still talking, apparently ignoring the others as they tend to do when engrossed in ... teasing or threatening or whatever it is they do when talking to each other. Gangle swishes back around to face Zooble, Pomni, and Ragatha, and to the doll's surprise there's a fierce pink blush on the ribbon's mask, making the stickers on her face stand out all the more.

"As a true fujoshi I cannot interfere, only bear witness," She explains in a voice that sounds almost reverent, folding her hands together under her chin as though in prayer. Ragatha is only more confused now. What the heck is a fujoshi? She jumps as she feels ribbon placed on her shoulder, looks over to see Zooble has gotten a hand on their shoulder too. Pomni, trapped in the middle of the impromptu huddle, audibly swallows.

"It's been way, wayyy too long since I've seen any good slash unfold right in front of my face in real time," Gangle says, her quiet voice hyper-intense and half-crazed. The grin on her face is so exaggerated that she looks like an actual comedy mask. Ragatha feels the ribbon on her shoulder squeeze.

"You will not say anything to them. You will not tease them. If they get embarrassed they'll stop doing it around me -- around us. Us. We're watching yaoi in the making. Truly, we're blessed with such an opportunity!"

Slash? Yaoi? What on earth is Gangle talking about? Is she -- she thinks Kay and Jax are crushing on one another, clearly, and doesn't want anyone interfering. But Ragatha doesn't get half of the lingo coming out of her mouth.

And the idea of Jax and Kay together like that? That's, well -- Ragatha barely has time to process that before Pomni squirms uncomfortably and blurts out:

"You're shipping real people?"

Gangle's smile drops into a neutral straight line and her black eyes go huge and round.

"Why not?"

And then her grin is back, and she springs back into herself, pulling her hands away and smacking one ribbon into her forehead with an audible slap that sounds like it would sting.

"I mean, I'm literally trapped in hell, so I get to pick my coping mechanisms, ahAHAHAHA!!"

And then she laughs, loud and long and manic, a laugh worthy of an unhinged, evil villainess.

When she finishes, she sighs and wipes tears from the corners of her eyes, still giggling a little. 

"You, uh, all good there, Gangle?" Kay asks, staring at her from the front seat, and Gangle jolts before turning around. 

"I-I'm, uh, all good! Nothing -- I'm awesome, super, Pomni just said something really funny was all!!"

"Pomni said something funny?" Jax asks in mocking shock, turning around with an incredulous expression. "Pomni, is, like, the lower tier on the funny list here. Which is just sad, considering she's a clown."

Pomni scoffs at that, and rolls her eyes before the carriage stops with a jolt and everyone pitches forward a little bit. The elephant in front raises its gummy trunk and trumpets.

"Greetings, good knights!" A feminine voice calls out, and Ragatha looks out of the wagon to see the princess character making her way towards them, hands clutching at her sprinkles-coated skirts. She pauses and waits for them to exit with a gentle smile, blinking her giant eyelashes at them.

'Oh, she's pretty!'

Sliding back into Adventure Mode and out of her confusing or painful emotions is certainly a skill Ragatha has honed into a fine edge over the years. She exits the wagon along with everyone else and strides forwards purposefully.

It's just one more adventure -- that's what she keeps telling herself. One more adventure.

.

.

.

"Hello there!" Ragatha says cheerfully as she steps to the head of the group. You spare a glance at Jax -- he already looks bored, hands on his hips and barely paying attention.

"You all must be the brave knights sent to us by God to help us with our recent catastrophe!" The queen remarks, and you manage to suppress a loud shout of laughter as you grasp at your nun skirts. She gestures towards a large, intricate, circular stained sugarglass window on the castle, depicting Caine surrounded by holy white doves.

"So does that mean you've dedicated your mind, chastity, and soul to Caine, Sister?" Jax asks beside you, and you have never wanted to hit him as badly as you do in that moment.

"That's the closest you've gotten me to putting my hands on you," You tell him, crossing your arms, and he huffs, grin wide and eyes flashing mischievously. You return your attention to Ragatha, who's doing a short little curtsy (even though it's harder to do with pants and no skirt), and you do too, to show respect to the leader of this land.

Jax stays still, of course -- none of the others move either.

Boring! Does nobody else have a sense of playfulness?

"That's us, your highness," Ragatha explains. "Here to help however we can!"

"Oh, no need to be so formal! I'm Princess Loolilalu, but you can call me Loo!"

Your face scrunches in confusion.

"Why aren't you a queen?" You ask before you think to stop yourself, and a sudden hush descends over everyone -- even the cheering of the crowd stops. It's eerily silent, quiet enough to hear a pin drop, and you're overwhelmed with the sudden sense that you said exactly the wrong thing.

Princess Loolilalu moves suddenly, reaching behind herself, pulling out a pink fan with chocolate icing detailing and flipping it open with a sharp "fwip." She fans it in front of her face, covering her mouth, but her eyes crinkle in a smile, as though she's amused. The background din of the crowd cuts in again.

"My, my, I'd say you have quite a mouth on you if you weren't already so, hm," She pauses, looks you up and down obviously. "Lacking, in that department. Everyone except you can call me Loo -- you get to call me Princess."

Jax laughs at your expense as you feel your hands twitch. Ugh, why'd she have to go and remind you?

But Loolilalu is already primly making her way down the steps before she flips her fan closed and points with it.

"We've prepared for you all a top of the line war rig for you to go head-to-head with those nasty bandits," She explains as a huge eighteen-wheeler truck drives out from behind the castle. It, too, is made of candy -- cake and chocolate and wafers you briefly admire before a pink donut wheel with sprinkles crushes one of the NPCs in the way with a wet squelch.

Oh, God.

Loolilalu ignores the felled peasant as Jax cries out "I call shotgun!" 

The rabbit jogs forward and clamors into the driver's seat. The truck is tall enough that even he, with his height, has to climb in somewhat gracelessly, but the sound of bones breaking and flesh squishing is still ringing in your ears too much to really appreciate the view. 

You don't really remember moving -- just one second you're standing there, the next you're by that mannequin, and the air is thick with the scent of lemon meringue pie, the yellow NPC groaning under the tire.

"Hey, shh, hey, it's alright now."

Noises coming in the sound of your voice. The NPC's fingerless hand scrabbles at the road, reaching out, and thoughtlessly you take it in your own gray one, the color of death.

"Oh, ohh, oh God oh God," They moan, hyperventilating, and they don't even have the privilege of gripping your hand properly. It occurs to you, somewhat distantly, that taking care of the dying may have been the job of nuns in some distant time and place, far from here. That you're dressed perfectly for this job.

"You're gonna be okay."

More sugar-coating words as you hold their hand tightly, and something painful twists in your head, something familiar --

"You're alright, you're okay."

The hand is warm.

The tire rolls forward,

and their skull cracks with a distinctly wet pop, like a watermelon breaking. 

Bright, juicy, tart lemon aroma wafts out, the fluid release of candy dying --

But despite the wet sound, despite the sour smell, despite the cracked and broken form at your skirts, there is no blood to be seen. Not even a liquid that could pass as blood, no -- inside the yellow shell is hollow, like a chocolate bunny. 

No substance, no soul.

There is the sound of a window rolling down, and you look up as Jax leans out and over you, looking down at the mess with a raised eyebrow.

"That was a mercy killing," He says. "No way you'd be able to patch that nobody up, yeah? I was doin' ya both a favor."

Your face twitches weirdly, because you just want to sit there and blink up at him, but you don't have the privilege of eyes. A moment passes. You adjust your sunglasses.

"You're not gonna get all weepy on me over an NPC, are you?"

You pick up one of the broken pieces in your hand -- lightweight, like a cookie -- and pop half of it into your mouthless face.

The taste blooms, lively and sweet and somehow nostalgic. 

"Lemon pie," You say of it, before getting up and handing him the other half. His hand reaches out and takes it, seemingly out of instinct rather than a conscious thought, because a moment later he looks at it as if in surprise.

But he puts it in his mouth and chews, pointer finger remaining close to his face in thought as the other hand rests on the steering wheel. You hear the sound of the opposite door opening, the girls and Zooble streaming into the truck and deciding on seat order, but you just lean on the door, staring at Jax to avoid staring at what's at your feet.

His eyes widen and his ears perk before he actually darts a tongue out and licks at his finger.

"Oh, that is good. Sure you don't wanna start killing people?"

"No," You reply tartly. "But you were right, you know, when you said I wasn't gonna waste a body."

And the expression he makes at that is downright intrigued. His grin twitches upward, and he leans towards you a bit, a couple heartbeats of silence passing between you too.

"Get in the truck, stupid," He says, mouth barely moving as he says that. His head swivels, hawk-like, to watch you through the windshield as you walk around to the passenger side door and open it.

"And lemme know when you change your mind!" Jax adds, cheerfully.