Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You are Sunday Ignacio, and you’re… not having sex with Pico. That either happened before whatever this is or will happen in the future relative to whatever this is. Well, upon further thought, it’s going to happen in the future regardless of whether you’ve had sex prior, because you’re willing and Pico’s willing and you’re not gonna stop.

Really, the reason you’re bringing attention to yourself today is that you’re discussing band stuff with your friends! The layout’s pretty perfect; Pico’s a backing vocalist, Dr. Crackpot’s (they seem to prefer that over their first name solely for the funny) still deciding on an instrument, but they seem partial to the bass guitar and keyboard, Hank’s definitely about the drums, and Feika’s either gonna go guitar or keyboard, depending on what Dr. Crackpot chooses. Unfortunately, Selever can’t officially join due to contract disputes, but it doesn’t stop them from showing up to help out, especially with their prior insight into the music industry.

“Hmngh I fucking love oat milk,” Dr. Crackpot says the only thing of substance among the lot of you within the past hour, sending everyone into laughing fits as they make exaggerated slurping noises to finish up their latte. Their mask has the funniest coffee stains from it, but a wet towel is sufficient for cleaning it up.

Unfortunately, it’s not sufficient to help advance the discussion even an inch.

“Okay so… great, cool, what are we doing? How do we practice this?” You repeat a question that you don’t actually know how to answer, because you spent the hour making drinks for everyone instead of actually enacting band practice. This is because… well, you’ve never been in a band before. You’ve done solo gigs back when times were tough and you needed to pay bills and loans, and now times aren’t tough and you technically still need to pay bills and loans but the point is this is surprisingly tough!

“I’m not gonna pretend I’m the supreme authority on the matter,” Selever speaks up as they straighten their posture on their chair, “but I’m pretty sure you gotta have some knowledge of the instruments you’ll be using. Dr. Crackpot, have you decided on an instrument yet? I swear to fucking God if you haven’t—”

“Nahahaha! I actually spent the last month practicing both the bass guitar and the keyboard,” Dr. Crackpot decides to act all smug about it, wiggling and flexing their fingers to prove their point. “These old bones have been picking up some new tricks… heheh, I really have been missing out.”

“Yeah, like always,” Selever scoffs and waves Dr. Crackpot off, but they don’t mean it, you and everyone and their mom knows this. “Pico, have you been practicing the guitar?”

“Not… actively?” Pico is less sure about how to answer the question, and even if you were there for it, you definitely understand the hesitation. “I guess I do it for fun and Sunday likes it, but between volleyball with Hank, bodyguard jobs from Double D and dates with my lovely partner… wait, that’s the time I’d be practicing the guitar, nevermind.”

“It’s true,” you nod, pretending to be all solemn about it before the facade gives out 2 seconds later and you sigh dreamily. You remember just last week, Carol got an espresso machine and you could finally show Pico what a real affogato is like, and he loved it! In general, he seems to like espressos, but whenever he stops by your cafe he always tries something new; that’s the sort of life you both love to live.

“Then actively practice it??? You have a partner motherfucker, you know what well-trained fingers mean!” Selever hits Pico (and you by proxy) with such an out of pocket statement that it feels like they physically punched you in the gut, and in fact you fall out of your chairs as if that happened. Even Hank is startled, although he’s quick to offer hands for the both of you to take and pull yourselves back up.

“They really just went for it, damn,” Hank makes his comment on the situation, his voice betraying a little shock, before finally and properly pulling you up to sit down. “For the record, I did my drum practice, I figured out which thing makes what sound, and I got my sticks. If you want Pico to act as a rhythm guitarist so bad, you teach him!”

“Well it’s better to have backup— HEY,” Selever suddenly raises their voice, incensed by what Hank had to say. “I’m not that close to Miko, shut up.”

“He said Pico though,” Feika corrects them, although it quickly realizes the implication coming from them. It doesn’t press the issue further, though, and you realize what it’s planning.

“Listen, he said Pico, but he was definitely implying something else,” they try to defend themself, but Feika gets off its chair and floats menacingly in Selever’s face.

“What do you think he was implying? He didn’t bring Miko up, that was on you. You’re not gonna get a passing grade if you don’t explain your analysis, you know.”

“You fuck off we’re getting off topic,” Selever pushes Feika away in a panic, and earns some laughter from everyone else at their expense. They slump over in their chair like that one thing with Shinji, absolutely fuming but with nothing they can do about it.

“I’m going to kill yourself,” they mumble one last angry threat before letting the magic around them dissipate, and then it’s back to business as usual. “Feika, instrument, what.”

“Practiced both guitar and keyboard,” it replies, flexing its fingers to emphasize its point. “Which also means you missed a chance to counter my insinuations. Such is my brilliance.”

“I can’t fucking stand you,” Selever sighs in resignation as their loss was laid bare in front of them, but it was too late to get back into it now. Maybe one of these days you’ll check in on them and see if they’re dating Miko yet. “Alright, Dr. Freebird, Actual Roach, discuss which instruments you’ll be taking and—”

“Bass guitar.”

“Guitar but not like the bass one I’m going for the rhythm guitarist role.”

“Why can’t you be this fast all the time?” Selever huffs in frustration, but they do summon up the various instruments you’d brought along (not conjuring, because those are never tuned right), and soon enough you’ve got your instruments at the ready! Well, Hank has to get up to sit at the summoned drum set, but other than that everything’s about fine.

Alright, everything’s set up! Everyone’s in position, everyone’s got their hearing protection, and now it’s time to practice things so that you can all actually coordinate stuff!

“Alright, so we need a song for you to practice so that you can coordinate your shit,” Selever repeats your thoughts, folding their arms and giving an intense stare towards the lot of you. “Be quick about it or I’m absolutely defaulting to Mary Had A Little Lamb.”

“What about Twinkle Twinkle Miko Star?” Feika suggests, and you almost miss the joke it snuck in. You can’t really stop yourself or Pico from snickering, although you’re not sure if Dr. Crackpot or Hank caught it.

“Well I guess if— WHEN I FUCKING GET YOU, FEIKA!” Selever suddenly goes apeshit upon realizing the joke and aims their hand in a way that they’ve told you is for a “Hollow Purple”, and their fingers light up and glow with magic. Luckily for you, this technique can easily be canceled by you making a fist with one hand and slapping it with your other, and they’re reminded of the consequences of such an action in time for them to stop.

“Okay, okay, fuck you. New contract, pick any song not at our expense or I will kill— okay no I can’t and I won’t, but I WILL blow this fucking place up,” Selever issues an ultimatum that… honestly, that’s fair. You and Pico did beat Gabe up for less, and you and he have been friends for much longer.

“I wanna play Another Song About The Weekend,” Pico immediately shoots his shot.

“Like, the Spyper fic?” Selever brings up a name you’ve never heard.

“I love that one, but no,” Pico casually brushes off the existential dread that comes with Archive Of Our Own and the Friday Night Funkin’ (Video Game) fandom existing in this universe, because he’s cool like that and existential dread is for losers who can’t even successfully kill their much cooler brother. “I mean the song by A Day To Remember.”

“Oh yeah, that thing,” Selever puts their hand to their chin in thought, before sighing. “I was gonna complain about wasting time, but I started the joke, so that’s my bad.”

“Isn’t this… a little too much for Another Song About The Weekend?” Dr. Crackpot raises a hand to ask a question. “I thought this was an acoustic song.”

“You’ve only heard the acoustic version?” Hank decides to answer that particular query, and boy oh boy is today full of surprises. “There’s a metal and/or rock version that I’m pretty sure is the original, but honestly I do prefer the acoustic version.”

“EVERYONE prefers the acoustic version, dipshit, it came free with your fucking Team Fabulous 2,” Selever cuts through the argument, before falling silent. It’s hard to break it too, because most people here know why they fell silent and the few who don’t can tell it’s a serious and solemn subject.

Fuck cancer, and fuck leukemia especially.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to do that,” Selever was the one to resume the conversation, issuing a genuine apology. “Everyone look over the ASATW chords and give the metal version a listen, I’ll re-read Funkin’ High and WTTGGO while you do so.”

“You know whatever we two got going on,” you shout at Selever, and this time they laugh about it. Still, you play the metal version of Another Song About The Weekend for Dr. Crackpot to listen to while Pico looks up the chords for Feika and also Dr. Crackpot to use. Hank doesn’t really participate, but he does practice the drums while you’re doing all that, humming the tune of the song while moving and shifting his sticks around. He doesn’t actually hit the drums or cymbals yet though, hoping to not distract the rest of you.

It takes a few extra minutes of re-listening and practicing strums to get it down, but eventually everyone is sufficiently prepared. They’ve got a confidence in their eyes that can’t be matched, and when Selever looks up from their phone, they actually seem quite proud of you.

“Alright, is everyone set?” They ask the lot of you, and you all nod at them. If you’ll ever be more ready, it can only be after you’ve practiced together.

“Alright, that’s great! One day we’ll get around to showing off to others, but for now, on my count…”

Chapter Text

You are Pico Fulp, and you’re currently helping your lover, Sunday Ignacio, with tasks around the cafe. With how busy things tend to be around here, she could definitely use the help, even when the whole gang's here. Even just calling and handing out orders and doing cashier stuff is wonderfully helpful for your lover, almost as if this is a whole job you’re undertaking.

At least they pay you for it, they’re mindful of that kind of thing, which technically makes it more stable than your merc work. It doesn’t pay nearly as much as Dearest work, but Dearest work isn’t time with Sunday, so you really lucked out here.

That being said, work is work, and you’re looking forward to the end of it. Once Sunday closes up shop for the evening, you and her and whoever else among your friends is here will clean up and go home. You’ll have to think about dinner too, but you’re kinda drawing a blank. Maybe you could go for some chow mien, you’re pretty sure Sunday’s not sick of that Chinese takeout place yet (not that you know what Chinese means in the context of Nevada) and you don’t particularly feel like eating healthy for dinner.

Before you can ruminate on that thought further, you hear the doorbell ringing. Looks like there’s one last customer for the day, so you’ll have to take care of that.

“Hi, welcome to—”

“Howdy.”

You feel your heart stop as you suddenly register who just came in.

The cafe, which had been filled with the ambient idle chatter between you, Sunday and your friends, comes to a dead stop too.

You know who that is. Blake knows who that is. Despite your best efforts, Sunday knows who that is.

Standing there in the flesh is none other than Cassandra. She doesn’t remain still for long, casually walking towards the counter, but it doesn’t make enough of a difference to soothe your fears.

“Heeyyy, how’s my favorite merc doin’?” She saunters up and leans on the counter with her whole forearm on it, greeting you like an old friend whose life she didn’t ruin. As if she weren’t a more heinous murderer than even you. “Didn’t think I’d catch you here, but I guess contracts run dry sometimes. Got enough saved up for you and your lover?”

“Are you gonna order something or what?” You tell her off and change the subject, but your heart’s hammering in your chest the whole time. You also notice Sunday looking back and forth between Cassandra and below the counter where they keep their shotgun, and they’re nervous.

You can’t blame her. You are too.

“Relax, I’ll get to it!” Cassandra shoves her way past your deflection, leaning closer and invading more of your personal space as she does so. “Got a lot of friends here, I’m kinda jealous! I thought the mercenary life would be a lot lonelier than that.”

“God, it was,” you sigh, resigning yourself to entertaining this conversation with her despite your better judgement. You don’t want to do this, but she’s persistent, and she won’t get out of your hair until she gets what she wants; you know the lengths she’ll go if she doesn’t. “But I lucked out in my last big job, and I’ve found new friends and rekindled old friendships throughout. We hang out a good bit even now.”

“You don’t say?” Cassandra feigns curiosity as she tilts her head, her grin slowly displaying more and more malice. “You’ve got a few friends with plenty of star power! I didn’t think you were okay with splitting it up with anyone…”

“Hey, I don’t control what comes and goes from the public eye,” you tell her frankly, shrugging as you do so. “And I’m happier now than I’ve ever been. That’s gotta count for something.”

“Does it, though?” She tilts her head the other way this time, but she can’t really lean any more forward than she already is. Still, the intent is clear. “After all that shit you went through, after all that shit I PUT YOU THROUGH, you’re just languishing away in some cafe?”

Ah. So this is what it’s about. You’d be lying if you said you weren’t scared, but at this point you’re sort of just feeling… fatigued. You can’t believe she’s hounding you like this even now.

Maybe you need to get her to stop wanting to talk to you, given what happened the last time she wanted your attention and you refused to give it.

“Yeah,” you answer her honestly. “I peaked. I’m done. Or are you not familiar with the news?”

“Oh, I’m familiar alright,” she answers you in a frustrated tone, although there’s probably more to it you can’t discern. “But I thought you’d be better than wasting away like this! Ride that high! Brand your name in the history books for all to see!”

“Why?” You ask her back, deciding that now’s the time to stand your ground. “Does it matter whether or not I do that? If I don’t want to, why should I?”

“I really thought you’d be smarter than this,” she sighs as she takes her arm off the counter and leans back a little, if only so you can properly capture the disdain on her face. “Pico, you’re a beast with limitless potential. If you’re not living up to it, you’re wasting it.”

“I’m… not gonna raise my voice in a professional setting, but with all due respect, what the hell am I meant to be ‘living up to’ now?” You push back a little harder, even leaning towards her to assert yourself. “The show’s over, Cassandra. I’m DONE.”

“You’re not done until I say you’re done,” Cassandra snarls at you, although she doesn’t lose her smile. If anything, it’s only grown more manic. “You need motivation to keep going? I’ve motivated you before. I can motivate you again.”

You’ve never seen Cassandra use magic before; not back in school, and not in the tower. But for the first time, she displays a horrifying, blood-red aura that seems to ‘roll’ around her. It’s not quite like the dramatic flare-ups Selever has when they’re angry, and even Damien Dearest isn’t quite as calm when charging up magic for a spell or simple physical enhancements. But even with the unnatural calmness to her magic, your body reflexively breaks out in a cold sweat.

You understand what she’s implying. You understand what she can do.

And yet…

“What for? To turn my life into an endless series of rehashes, of the same peaks over and over again? For someone who ruined my life, you’re so… boring.”

And suddenly, the air clears up, no longer weighing down on you or anyone else. Although you can see that Sunday is still understandably nervous, Cassandra’s horrifying aura is just… gone. Like a light switch flicked off.

She blinks slowly, and when she speaks again, her voice is a mere whisper.

“What… what the fuck did you just…”

“I mean it,” you press on, although you lean back into a neutral standing position rather than trying to loom over her even more. “You fucked me up good back in high school, and that’s as much as I’ll give you. You killed so many people I wish I could’ve saved. I killed people I wish I could’ve saved. But in the end, I beat you. I prevented more people from dying in that school shooting.”

“B-But…” she stammers, wracking her brain for an adequate response, “that was just the start of your journey! I-I know of your exploits! The Tankmen, the Nexus Core! I saw you for that last one! You and Sunday, I dragged you into a school-lab thing! I was with—”

“Famine?” Sunday butts in, having regained a little confidence. She’s ready to reach for the shotgun now, but you gently motion for her to stand down.

“You stay out of this!” Cassandra yells at them, and they flinch a little from it. Whether it’s from actual terror or just reflexes, you’ll ask them later. But for now…

“Huh, I wasn’t sure if that was really you,” you idly muse, partly serious and partly to get Cassandra’s attention. “But if it really was you, don’t you see the irony? All this talk of my ‘journey’ and whatever, all this shit about success… and the best you can come up with is to threaten my friends and loved ones? If you really are the Horseman of War, why are you chasing after your high school memories?”

You can see that you’ve shocked her into silence, but you don’t even relish in that. She shouldn’t even be here. But as long as she’s here, that’s what you’ll have to deal with.

“I really hope you’re not thinking you peaked in high school,” you sigh, hardly even able to look at her, “because I still have my whole life ahead of me as a human, even regarding what you stole from me. But you’re going to live for a very, very long time, and even me killing you didn’t stop you from coming here. What’s that going to make you?”

She doesn’t answer, not for a long while. You don’t know how long it actually takes, and for a second you thought she wouldn’t answer at all. But as she looks to the ground and away from you, you think you can make out some words.

“I’m just a footnote in your life, huh?”

Well. That… really paints a more pathetic picture of her than you were prepared for. But with the way she looks back up to meet your eyes, she’s probably just as unwilling to dwell on it as you are.

“You got any more of those vanilla iced lattes?” She asks you as if that whole conversation from before never happened, as if you don’t recognize the pain in her eyes that she desperately tries to hide behind her smile. But even so, you also recognize that this is better than everything before. She won’t know the healthiest manners of coping right off the bat (hell, you’ve only started learning those a few days ago), but she’s trying, and you hope for her sake that she’ll sincerely get better from here on out.

“We still do, actually,” you tell her also as if you hadn’t had that prior conversation. It’s probably better this way. “What size do you want, and what kind of milk do you want?”

“I… fuck it, let’s try something new. Lemme get almond milk, and the biggest size you got too,” she shrugs and tries to play the whole thing off nonchalantly. For what it’s worth, you don’t have anything to gain from shattering that illusion… and you know what? That she’s willing to try new things is a start, however small it might be.

But you can’t be with her the whole way. No matter how much you’ve impacted each other, you’re just portions of each other’s timelines.

“Got it.”

And so, when you get to work on Cassandra’s order, it’s strictly as a barista and customer. You’re not entirely sure how Sunday feels about the whole ordeal, but you learned enough from them that you can make the last order without their involvement.

You don’t remember if either of you said goodbye once you gave Cassandra her coffee. Maybe she doesn’t deserve it. Maybe she’ll come back. But her future is none of your concern.

When Sunday closes up shop, she hugs you tightly before either of you can get started on cleanup, and you return the embrace wholeheartedly. The rest of your friends, having witnessed Cassandra’s horrifying power beforehand, have exhausted themselves just from the sheer fear they felt, and even Hank needed the table to support themself as they stood up. And yet, for all the impact Cassandra made, this too will fade.

So you clean things up with everyone, no matter how slowly you have to go about it, and head home with your lovely partner.

That’s the normal life you’ll protect and maintain now.

Chapter Text

You are Sunday Ignacio, and you’re on yet another date with Pico. You’ve been on many dates with Pico in the past year, most of them lunch and dinner dates, but the rest definitely have a good bit of variety in them, from arcade visits to strolls through the city and especially the parks. Sometimes they turn into double or even triple dates with Carol and Whitty or Blake and Gwyn, and other times you meet up with any number of your friends and it’s more of a hang-out session, unless Botan shows up in which case it’s an all-out arcade war (that you’re losing 0-5, but details are boring).

Today is a very special day, however. Today is the first anniversary of you and Pico’s meeting, and while the both of you would likely have forgotten in other circumstances, the day you met each other… well, to say it was eventful would be putting it lightly. Either way, you’ve both decided to take your date to a very important place today, or at least what remains of it.

It’s the Nexus Tower, and most of the rubble has finally been cleared.

You remember passing by this place sometimes, and most of the time there were a bunch of demolition and construction folks clearing up the rubble. Occasionally you’d see some other people that don’t look like either, and you’d later learn that those people are part of the Morningstar Film Crew, probably scavenging the tower for usable props if Selever’s vague script ideas mean anything. Hell, sometimes you catch a friend or two looking at the rubble together, reminiscing on those times together whether or not they interacted meaningfully that day.

Today, however, there’s no one but the two of you. It’s your turn to look at where the tower once stood and reminisce, and…

“Shit, I don’t think I ever got my motorbike back,” Pico realizes something out loud, which interrupts your thought process by making you chuckle at it. “Maybe I could get away with getting a regular bike now that I think about it, as long as it holds up to my pedaling speed.”

“You know what? I bet if I rode a bike into a car, I’d come out of it with fewer injuries,” you float a hypothetical by Pico, and he chuckles in turn, offering you a fistbump that you return without issue. You wish you had more to add and throw into the pile, but there’s something very important taking up your brain space right now.

See, just last month, you had an appointment with one Dr. Jebediah Christoff (you didn’t even realize he had a doctorate until then, but he’s not ready to give you the full story). It’s not something you scheduled, but rather something he did, since you were tremendously busy with your cafe and he and Deimos were about done with negotiating and rearranging Nexus Core assets by that point. You weren’t sure of the purpose behind the appointment at the time, since despite your role in destroying Phobos you figured you weren’t quite that important to warrant it.

It was only when he handed you a ring box with a glowing golden ring in it did you realize exactly why he did it.

You don’t even remember the words exchanged that day. You still don’t know if Pico knows about it, but at the very least the ring didn’t cost you anything. You actually have it with you right now in one of your many pockets in your flannel, but even just thinking about it makes you nervous. Is it too early in the relationship to think about this? How does Pico feel about marriage in general?

Why do you feel like the stakes are higher than when your cafe and possibly all of Nevada was under threat?

“I, uh,” you let the words leak from your mouth while you stall for time, and though Pico takes notice of your words, he’s also polite enough to let you stall. You don’t know what’s too subtle or what’s too forward or what’s the correct question, so this time you’re going to default to your own mostly unfiltered self and hope it works out.

It’s worked out for the past year, after all.

“Been a while, huh?” You begin for real, looking over the mostly empty lot. “It’s hard to believe all that happened in the span of a day. We’ve known each other for a year now, but somehow the day we met feels longer.”

“All because I took a job here on the same day your livelihood was threatened,” Pico adds to it, reminding you that you met the love of your life via a big fat coincidence. “I did more than I was paid to do, but then I did get way more than I was expecting.”

“Yeah…” you sigh wistfully, looking up as you collect your thoughts. “Do you still have nightmares about Hell?”

“They’ve been lessening nowadays,” he answers without looking at you, and from the corner of your vision you can see that he’s smiling a tiny bit. “Especially after that last visit from Cassandra. I hope you’re okay after all that, though.”

“Yeah, don’t worry, the nightmares aren’t so frequent for me either,” you reassure him, and you take this time to just… breathe. To appreciate the life you have, the past, the present, the future.

And finally, it clicks, and you realize that the day you met may have prepared you for this after all.

“So,” you pick your train of thought back up, “I may have realized a funny thing about that day.”

“Yeah? What’d you figure?” He takes the bait and asks, and you’re ready to keep on chugging along.

“We went through so much that day. We saw each other at our worst and at our best, even if some of them were… faster than we wanted,” you try to approach the subject of your shared Hell together with tact, even if it’s something you’re both very familiar with by this point. “We were with each other through the good times and bad, in sickness and in health… we loved and comforted and honored and kept each other the whole way through. We had to speedrun love itself before we even started dating, which is a little fucked up but it’s really funny all the same, and I guess what I’m trying to say is—”

“You’re probably about to say—”

“Will you marry me?”

As you fish for the ring box in your pocket and prepare to get down on your knee, the words Pico had spoken suddenly hit you, and you can’t help but gasp in shock. Actually, it’s strong enough that you’re actually left stumbling before you can actually kneel down to properly propose to him, and it’s only then you notice that he’s kneeling down and showing you an open ring box… one with a glowing golden ring.

“Wh— huh?!?!?! I— ah—” You’re left stammering as you double check the pocket you’re sure you kept your ring box in, and Pico is left laughing at your shock, although it’s probably all in good fun. You definitely still feel your ring box, but you’re still shaky and confused… but definitely ecstatic, even beneath all those layers of confusion!

“Hahaha, sorry, was that too much?” Pico apologizes, but most definitely does not actually feel sorry. “I asked Jeb for ring recommendations since he doesn’t visit often and I know he’s trustworthy enough not to leak this kinda thing, not that I hate everyone else because you know damn well they can’t keep their mouths shut worth a damn—”

“No no I get you, they’re like that!”

“And he straight up clipped off a piece of his Halo with bolt cutters!” He finishes his story with a laugh, and now that he mentions it, you vaguely recall Jeb doing the same when he had that appointment with you. On your end, you’ve sort of fallen on one knee and mildly hurt yourself from the sudden drop, and though you’re in the perfect proposal stance, you know damn well you reached it by complete accident from your current feelings overwhelming you.

“Weh— but I— I don’t get it, he approached me and gave me this ring to give you!” You show off the ring you were given, your legs shaking too much for you to properly focus on Pico’s amused expression. “Did you plan this too, Pico?! Tell me!”

“Wait, he gave you a ring too? I did not plan for that one, holy shit!” Pico yells out in amazement, and you can’t help but laugh out loud at the revelation, to which he joins you too in laughter. “I mean, I’m glad you didn’t have to pay for that ring, because I sure didn’t have to do that for mine.”

“Hell yeah, Jebediah taking down the diamond industry one Halo fragment at a time,” you cap it off with a joke before you and Pico take your respective rings, sliding them onto each other’s ring fingers. Even a piece as small as this has a little power to it, but you don’t care much for the physical or otherworldly power the ring can provide you.

What matters to you is that it symbolizes your love for each other. You don’t care how it measures up against the grand infinity of reality that Phobos tried to subject Jebediah to (or you and Pico by proxy, if your guesses about the Hell portal are correct), because it fills your hearts with joy and love and you know for a fact it measures up perfectly with yourselves.

You’re just so happy to be alive right now.

“So I know this is a little premature, and this is definitely a sin,” Pico breaks you out of your trance suddenly by pulling you back into a standing position, “but I’m thinking… either one of our beds is pretty big and comfy, don’t you think?”

“Man, you just love bringing that up, don’t you?” You tease him, although you make sure to give him a kiss on the lips before you continue. “I think I’m ready, if you’re thinking what I’m thinking. But I’m also thinking… tonight, not right now. I wanna just soak it all in for now.”

“It’s more fun than outright saying sex,” he answers your question, and that’s another laugh out of you (but one he quickly silences with a kiss). “But yeah, I agree. We picked here for a reason, didn’t we?”

You pull him to your side and keep him nice and close, but you don’t answer him. You don’t need to.

After all, with everything you’ve been through that day, the rings you have now are merely a formality.

Chapter Text

You are Pico Fulp, and today’s the day.

Today’s the day you’re going to end your comically long losing streak in laser tag against Shishiro Botan. That the losing streak was this long in the first place is actually sort of impressive in and of itself, because you only re-established contact with her after the whole tower business (barring the one time she saved you and Sunday from Gestalt and John), but Gil selling the arcade machines bearing her records couldn’t erase them from history.

From light gun games to fighting games, from racing games to skee-ball, from genuine gunfighting to babysitting, Botan is the queen of whatever she touches. Not your heart, though, that one belongs to Sunday.

You have prepared extensively for this. You’ve coordinated the perfect team for this. Perhaps it’s a little ridiculous that you’re coordinating a team this large for the job, but you’re facing the reason you’re even alive to this day, the reason Cassandra took such an interest in you back then.

By the time you enter the laser tag facility, your whole team is here, and boy howdy what a team it is.

Sunday Ignacio, your fiance and certified tower climber.

Blake Freeman, your ex-boyfriend and rising rap star.

Carol Light, your fiance’s roommate and guardian angel.

Dr. Zarephath Crackpot, an artist with a knack for gymnastics.

Hank J. Wimbleton, violence made manifest and a decent volleyball player.

Selever Morningstar, a bratty demon prince and great movie maker.

Faker Sky (or Feika as you’re more likely to call it), steel mimicking divinity mimicking flesh.

And you, Pico Fulp, Right Hand of the Dearests and an extra pair of hands for Sunday’s cafe.

It’s one hell of a team, but it’s the team you’ll need to take on Botan.

And speak of the devil, look who’s walking through the door.

You wouldn’t seriously describe the sensation in the same sense as Cassandra entering the cafe that one day, but when she walks into any sort of arcade or similar establishment, her presence is enough to silence anyone that isn’t a machine. In fact, it seems she can silence machines too if Feika’s stunned silence means anything, so you’ll have to extend that mental list to ‘anything sapient’.

She stops a few feet ahead of you, and though you personally ensured the extinction of tanks in the Nevadean battlefield, it doesn’t stop the feeling that you’re staring one down.

“Yo,” you wave at her, considerably less intimidated than the rest. “You’ve been good?”

“Yeah,” Botan answers nonchalantly, tilting her head and smiling at the group. “I like the crackpot team you’ve assembled.”

“I didn’t do anything go away,” Dr. Crackpot reflexively blabs out of fear, cowering behind their hands. You’d think standing up to Phobos would have granted them a greater baseline courage, but it’s Shishiro Botan, so you understand.

“Too bad, Dr. Crackpot,” Botan flashes a malicious smile at them, but it’s more playful than genuinely threatening. “You’re in my territory now.”

“Alright, enough scaring my friends,” you tell Botan off with a dismissive wave, “you wanna fill them in on the rules, or do I do that?”

“I don’t mind giving them a reminder,” Botan accepts the responsibility with open arms and a smug face. “The rules are simple; you’re all in a team against me. We can either compete for points, or we compete for elimination.”

“Question,” Sunday raises their hand, “do you have any special equipment for this? Like, if we do elimination, do you have more health?”

“Ooh, different stats, that’s a fun idea…” Botan brings her finger and thumb to her chin in thought, and it just hit everyone else that she was assuming an equal playing field the whole time. “Alright, I got it; you only have stun settings, I get the elimination style with 3 hit points.”

“Hold on, hold on,” Blake raises his hand next, “there’s literally 8 of us. This seems markedly unfair.”

“Calm down, Boyfriend,” Botan dismissively waves Blake off with his stage name, and you can’t help but feel nostalgic about your previous relationship with him. “I get some mercy invincibility after each hit, like 3 seconds give or take. Can’t shoot while in that state though.”

“What’s your win condition, then?” Carol brings up a good point, and Botan begins counting on her fingers while thinking about something you’re not privy to.

“I last through this for 10 minutes,” Botan concludes, her confidence unwavering.

“Hold on, what’s stopping you from laming us out?” Hank raises his next question, and honestly by this point you’d be beyond annoyed if you had to answer all those questions. Luckily for you, Botan’s the one handling them, and she’s at the very least much more composed about it, if not outright welcoming.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Botan evades the question with her words, but even a glance at her expression tells you she’s not about to hide in dark corners for 10 minutes. You can’t really read Hank’s face on account of all the garbs covering it, but they seem to be backing away nervously.

“Is it against the rules to use techniques not ingrained in our laser tag stuff?” Selever raises their question next, and you really feel like the answer should be yes. However, you’re not Botan, so it’s up to her and her alone.

“Well, if I did allow that, it might give me a little trouble,” Botan puts her fingers to her chin in thought once again, and you can’t believe that she’s actually considering this.

“But would you lose?” Feika asks the only question that could reasonably be left, and Botan merely laughs in response.

“Nah, I’d win.”

As all of you get into position, you can’t help but feel your heart hammering in your chest. This isn’t exactly the highest stakes thing you’ve ever participated in, but overcoming this challenge is beyond your usual paygrade. In fact, you’re not getting paid for this, nor will anyone die if you fail.

You’re here because you want to be here, and your friends are here to support you.

This is the kind of purity you enjoy when pursuing your goals.

Even so, you take a look at your left hand, the same hand that wears your wedding ring. With Botan’s stipulation that outside items and powers are allowed, it allows you to display your love for Sunday.

In this case, it allows for a slight edge in this raid boss too. And against Shishiro Botan, you’ll need all the help you can get.

The sound of your team rushing towards Botan’s side of the arena is akin to the stampede of an army, and you’re speaking from experience in that regard. Soon enough though, the team disperses in search of your shared target, and immediately you tap your ring to utilize a power you only realized a bit after Selever finished filming for that movie; the ability to see through Sunday’s eyes.

Through Sunday’s vision, you’re able to see that not only has she used the same move to see through your eyes, but that she’s accompanied by Carol and Dr. Crackpot upstairs. She’d probably be able to see that you’re with Blake on the ground floor, although the other three have gone their separate ways in their pursuit of Botan.

And then you see her through Sunday’s vision, expertly firing shots at them, Carol and Dr. Crackpot!

“SHE GOT ME!”

“I’M HIT!”

“AAGH!”

“SUNDAY!” You yell out in concern, immediately turning back and scaling the wall to skip the process of going upstairs. As you try to shortcut your way to the entrance of the room you saw Sunday in, however, you find Botan right there with her laser gun in hand, one step ahead.

“How reckless!” Botan chides you for your stunt, but even with her taunt she’s much quicker on the draw than you, and for that you end up getting tagged.

As it turns out, the vest was serious about making sure you’re stunned, tightening around your chest and back like the cuff of a blood pressure monitor. It doesn’t necessarily hurt, not when you’ve been through worse, but it causes you to lose your grip and fall to the ground floor.

Unsatisfied with the shot on you, Botan vaults over the railings to drop down to the floor you’re on, opting to chase after Blake! You are unfortunately helpless to prevent her from doing so, but as the two of them weave between all sorts of cover, you can see Sunday and her group have recovered from their stun period, and Sunday’s rushing in to get her next attempt!

And your vest suddenly deflates on top of it. From your estimates, your stun team’s stun time is about 5 seconds… that’ll work just fine for you!

Rushing on ahead, you can hear Blake giving Botan the slip again, but the advantage is slipping from the former’s fingers. In a one on one, it’d certainly look bad, but you’ve got an idea to get that first hit in!

You rush to the side opposite of Blake just in time to watch him get cornered enough to turn around to try and shoot Botan. Alas, though he’s a genius in the music department, his reflexes in combat don’t measure up to the best, and he gets stunned for his troubles. However, it buys you enough time to try and shoot your own shot…

…but it falls just short of her own reflexes, and you’re stunned before you can do the same to her.

And SUNDAY COMES IN WITH THE STEEL CHAIR, SPRAYING LASERS FROM ABOVE AND SCORING A HIT!

“From above?!” Botan shrieks in surprise as Sunday sticks the landing, but it doesn’t stop her from scampering away, unlike with you and the others when they’re stunned. Right, she didn’t promise her mercy invincibility would stun her too… but with Sunday avoiding a hit, she’s free to chase her down too!

As Sunday chases Botan down, you both know that once that invincibility is up, she’s going to shoot and stun Sunday once again. The idea (or at least your assumption of the idea) is that Sunday’s going to be a distraction for the others to at least try and score their own hit; if things keep up, you’ll get the other two hits in no time!

Unfortunately, it’s not quite so simple; when Botan does the inevitable and shoots Sunday (unfortunately and inevitably before they could do the same), Botan seems to have gotten faster and started clambering up to the second floor of another building. You can hear the people around Sunday cursing as they lose the advantage they were planning around, so it looks like it’s up to you to improvise.

Using your amazing agility, you kick off some walls in order to reach the floor that Botan was escaping to, hoping to stall her for a little longer if not outright get a hit on her. Luckily for you, this time you have the advantage when you vault over the railings already spraying and praying, and you’re too definitively on this floor for her to shoot you off.

Alas, blind luck doesn’t allow you to land the shot. Botan’s already darted off from the general area, and no doubt she positioned herself to shoot you while you have no way to meaningfully retaliate.

And then a flash of light appears in front of you.

“JUMP HER!” Selever yells with an urgency they’d previously reserved for stakes of life and death, but then you recall it happens when they’re sufficiently angry regardless of urgency, and you don’t know what the takeaway is beyond that they’re accompanied by the friends you fought along the way.

Dr. Crackpot doesn’t have a great physique compared to the others, but they can still run and squeeze the trigger of a light gun for laser tag. Unfortunately, that means there’s no way they could match up to Botan, and they’re stunned just before the others can join in.

Surprisingly, Feika is the next one to charge in, and it aims with such speed that Botan is forced to leap out of the way before it can pull the trigger! Alas, even with a portable Improbability Drive, it can still be aim dodged, allowing Botan to fire back!

And you see Feika dodge the laser.

Such a concept should be nigh impossible, and it’s certainly incredulous to you. Regardless of your personal beliefs about reality, however, Feika twists and weaves through the laser barrage with impossible speed! Although it can’t find an opening to shoot back, it still leaves Feika legally un-stunned, forcing Botan to keep firing in its direction!

You’re so enraptured by this performance, in fact, that by the time you notice you’re not actually stunned, another flash occurs, this time behind Botan.

You can see that Selever has opted to go for a low tackle in an attempt to restrain Botan, and with their freakish height of 7’ 5”, they were likely banking on it contributing enough to their weight that they can accomplish their task. Unfortunately, due to the length of their arms, it took just a few milliseconds too long for them to wrap around Botan, giving her enough time to use her free hand to throw them over her shoulder and use them as a human shield!

“I told you I’d win, didn’t I?” Botan mocks Selever as they scowl at her, and though Feika no longer has to dodge Botan’s onslaught, it has no opening through which to shoot at her with. Try as they might, the pair had no way to score the second hit, and Botan was ready to drag them away for their failure.

She would surely have done that if not for another pair charging her way and firing blindly.

It’s hard for you to make out, but you think it’s Hank and Dr. Crackpot with the latter in front. Although you wanted to question how Dr. Crackpot could stay ahead despite their differences in athleticism, you would just as quickly realize that Hank was actually using them as his own human shield, firing wildly at her in the hopes of scoring a hit!

The following back and forth was so utterly insane that you could hardly believe your eyes. Due to Selever’s height, Botan was very effectively shielded from the lasers fired her way, and due to actually being on the opposite team, shooting Dr. Crackpot actually does stun them. She also shoots Selever to stun them for good measure, but it gives Hank the opportunity to throw Dr. Crackpot aside and make a leap towards Botan!

And then, within a time difference so small it could round to zero, they pulled the triggers on their guns…

…and hit each other simultaneously!

“Augh!”

“Damn it!”

Though you are far too stunned by the laser shots registering as simultaneous to do anything, Botan isn’t nearly as stunned. She takes her three second window of opportunity to make a mad dash off the floor, letting go of Selever, and as she leaps off, you can see her unholstering a second light gun from her main laser rifle, this one in the shape of a pistol.

And from Sunday’s vision, you can see that she’s aiming for them next.

Realizing that gravity works equally on you and Botan, you run towards Selever instead, hoping their teleportation can get you down to help Sunday faster. Indeed, it seems they’re sending everyone they can down to try and corner Botan so they can get a hit in, even if Feika seems to be reeling from its previous stunt.

“Fuck, why’d I do that, oh I’m lightheaded, this isn’t even that important, ugh…”

“I guess we know now. I’ll get Miko later, don’t worry,” Selever assures them, and it’s the last you see and hear of that conversation before you’re warped down in a flash.

Downstairs is chaos, and Botan is shooting around her at all these impossible angles. Her plan seems to be to keep every one of you stunlocked for the remaining duration of the match, and she may very well succeed even with all the tactics she’s allowing you.

Dr. Crackpot has given up on landing a proper shot at all, instead taking out gymnastics ribbons in an attempt to disable Botan. Unfortunately, with a mind clear as day and a greater understanding of her opponents, she tugs them towards her and uses them as a human shield, preventing Hank from getting a clear shot as she shoots to stun them!

With neither of the pre-Gen 06 Nevadeans able to land a clean hit, Carol and Blake have stepped in to try and distract her! They’ve resorted to rapidly teleporting everywhere, and they were even shooting bolts of light from their fingers to try and psych her out! Alas, Botan was able to see through even those tricks, and before they could capitalize on their advantage, she had both hands outstretched to shoot and stun them too.

And that was when you and Sunday both leap in to capitalize on the moment.

Botan had assumed that the both of you would try for a shot, so of course she would use her momentum to try and swing to center her aim on the both of you. However, Sunday had a different idea in mind; using their ring’s magic, they point at Botan and halt their movement for the briefest of moments.

“Game over.”

And this time, your aim and trigger finger allow you to land a hit; the third and final one needed to win.

Botan doesn’t have any words this time. A surprised gasp, sure, but her vest has gone dark, signifying her elimination. In this dark, dimly lit arena, with adrenaline still pumping through your body, every remaining second will stretch over an eternity, so you think you might as well get out the words weighing on your mind after all that.

“I knew even with all the skills I’d accumulated and the feats I’d achieved, I couldn’t afford to underestimate you, especially given our previous outings,” you tell Botan as you walk up to her, your gun heavy in your hands. “Sunday and I did get busier once we got engaged, but truth be told, we were experimenting with what our rings could do, being cut from Jebediah’s halo and whatnot, and we didn’t want you to plan around that.”

“I didn’t really account for everyone’s skill levels beyond our baseline familiarity with each other,” Sunday rambles her own thoughts on the plan(s) you both came up with, scratching the back of her head in embarrassment. “To be honest, I considered inviting Gabe to help out, but he’s mainly familiar with Carol and I, maybe Pico too at best, so he might not have synergized super well.”

“Wow, you really think that highly of me?” Botan chuckles quietly, slotting her guns back together into one larger firearm. Everyone else seems to have gotten up, and you can hear some footsteps coming down, and though they know the game is over, they still feel oddly tense about it.

And then, Botan’s laughter gets louder and more unrestrained, joy coursing through her body as she takes off her laser tag gear.

“Ha, wow! I really did lose to you all! But I had a great time doing it, we should do this again sometime!”

With her last statement, the lights come on, and your session in the laser tag arena officially comes to a close. With that, everyone takes it as their cue to take their gear off, although Selever has to help Feika with it given it had overexerted itself dodging Botan’s shots.

“Aaargh! My back… why did I agree to this?” Dr. Crackpot complains as they stretch, cracking their knuckles and other joints and several other parts you’re not sure have joints.

“Skill issue,” Hank scoffs at them without sympathy, before turning to look at Botan. “We do volleyball a lot, but now we need to go to a shooting range some time.”

“Yes I agree,” Botan responds robotically, but she’s nodding at the idea too fast for her to not be sincere about enjoying the idea… is she blushing? “Who wants Burger Gil’s?”

“ME ME ME ME ME—” Sunday, Carol, Blake and you immediately start clamoring for fast food like a bunch of noisy children in a car, and though everyone does agree to go, you’re the loudest of the bunch so therefore you win. Fuck those other guys.

“Look look look,” Feika points weakly at the scoreboard from Selever’s arms. Apparently you had 30 seconds left before you lost, huh. “I didn’t get hit once. I’m the best.”

“Still don’t do that next time,” Selever scolds it, albeit more gently than you’re used to hearing. “I’m glad we know now that you can’t be doing that willy nilly though, because it’d be way worse having this conversation on an active, actual battlefield.”

“Shhhhhut up, you vanilla milkshake BITCH,” Feika punctuates its childish insult with an ineffectual slap to Selever’s face. “I know what you and Miko do.”

“Fix you up, probably,” Selever huffs and rolls their eyes, although you can see them blushing slightly too. “Is this how Rasazy feels when I do my bullshit?”

You don’t care. You’re going to eat infinity chicken sandwiches because you’ve worked up an appetite, and it’s gonna be with all your friends and loved ones.