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Sprout sat in front of his fellow mains, crossing his arms. His face plastered with a thick coat of annoyance and stubbornness. The rest of the main, aside from pebble, had a look of anger and disappointment.
“We told you to stop doing that.” Vee’s voice was like a fork being scraped onto a chalkboard to sprout,
“They-“
“They grow back, yes, we know! But you bleed. A lot!” Dandy stood closest to sprout, he was the only one sprout would let get close to him anyway. “You need to stop, it’s becoming a constant thing!”
“I don’t know why you guys are so worked up over stupid antlers.” Sprout scoffed and crossed his leg over the other, staring off to the side.
Vee sighed and pulled out her phone, catching everyone’s attention.
“Vee, now is not the time for that!” Shelly whispered,
“I’m not doing anything you imbecile. I’m just gonna call looey-“ sprout’s body tensed up when he heard that name. Looey was heavily against sprout cutting off his antlers and every main knew it. But after having them for almost 7 months, the velvet began to shed again, coating his leaves and face with thin streaks of blood. He also hated when they itched. So, he cut them off when looey was on a run.
“No!” Sprout stood up, reaching for vee’s phone.
Dandy hugged sprout from behind, “jeez, sprout. Don’t get so angry- she’s just teasing.” He let go of the taller toon, letting him sit back down and grumble to himself. “Ya know I love you right?” Dandy’s soft tail swished a bit, “I hate seeing you so uncomfortable whenever your antlers start growing in again, but I hate how you try to separate yourself from that part of you.” Dandy placed a soft hand on sprout’s cheek, smiling.
Sprout’s tail thumped against the seat of his chair.
“I know how it feels to wanna get rid of the antlers, but you’ll have to learn how to get used to em’ eventually. You’re stuck with them.” The flower turned to the side, letting out a loud sigh.
“And… sprout. You know looey loves your antlers… he gets so sad seeing you talk bad about them…” Astro’s ethereal voice spoke up for once, backing up dandy’s words. “He has dreams with you still having them…” sprout frowned, His face softening.
He felt dandy nudge his leg with his shoulder. “If anything, just ask me to help you peel the velvet off… I know it’s uncomfortable.” Dandy gazed up at him. Sprout could only huff, biting his lip and scrunching his nose. He hated that they were right. But he knew that if he continued to argue, he’d only be met with a giant scold session from his beloved looey.
“Maybe you’re right…” he picked at his leaves, tugging on the one covering his right eye. He then looked up at shelly, who hadn’t said anything the entire time besides her occasional ‘vee.’, trying to scare vee into submission.
Shelly noticed and perked up, “oh, I’m not here to convince you to keep them! I’m just here to see if I can have the… uh-…” she realized her bluntness and swallowed hard.
“The old antlers? Yeah, sure. I know you’re a freak for bones n stuff.” Sprout shrugged and straightened himself. “I’ll get them for you later… if looey doesn’t see them first and kill me with them.”
Shelly smiled widely and her tail began to sway side to side, vee noticing and smiling with a hand on her hip. Shelly was weird, but she liked that about her.
“Alright, well,” Vee grabbed Shelly’s hand. “Seedly, we’re off. I’ll call ya later, Kay?” The duo turned, beginning to walk away, “and next time you cut off your antlers, I swear I’ll kill you myself.” Sprout found it hard to swallow, actually feeling fear from vee’s empty threat. He wished he could understand why the mains were so protective of sprout’s antlers, he hated them. They all knew that.
He was ultimately ashamed of them. They weren’t natural on him, he was a strawberry with fur, antlers, a tail. Hell, even ears. He was supposed to be a deer, a little bit like rudie. But last minute decision had changed his ‘species’ into a strawberry, though, he was born a flower.
His brother, dandy, on the other hand, loved his antlers. Accepting their uniqueness. He loved how him and sprout were the only toons with 2 different dnas, not including cosmo and looey, of course. Dandy looked up at sprout and noticed his face alter a bit, sensing he was lost in negative thoughts again.
“Hey…” dandy’s chubby form now stood in front of sprout, “ya know she doesn’t mean it, right? She’s just worried…”
“Y-yeah.”
Astro loomed closer, staring at the bandages over sprout’s head where the antlers once laid. “Do you promise you won’t cut them off once they start growing in again?” He trailed a finger across the lining of the bandages, feeling sprout lean into the soft touch.
“I’ll try.” Sprout swallowed, his face turning a darker tint of red from embarrassment. “Thank you… both.” He glanced between Astro and dandy who simply smiled.
“What good of a brother would I be if I didn’t worry about you once in a while?”
Sprout opened his mouth to respond to dandy but was cut off by the sound of looey’s squeaky and rapid footsteps growing closer towards the small room they were in. Damnit, looey found out.
Looey barged in, not saying a word or even acknowledging the 2 mains standing next to sprout. He stomped closer, still as silent as ever. His lips pulled back into a line and he cupped sprout’s face. “Oh…” he kissed sprout’s bandaged forehead, “you had me worried when I saw all of the blood… but I guess you’re okay… right?”
Sprout nodded, his face flushed.
“Okay. Good.” Sprout lowered his guard as looey smiled, then jerked his body back as looey pinched his fluffy ear, pulling him upwards and out of the room. “You are in so much trouble! I thought I told you to stop- con esa vaina!-“ Looey’s words were scrambled due to the sheer anger he felt, his speech now mixing in with Spanish.
“Que maldito-“ Looey cut himself off and pinched his nose bridge as they made their way out. “Ya te pasaste. Te digo algo y tú-“ Looey’s spanish scoldings we’re slowly fading into the distance, astro and dandy still standing there. Not daring to cross him.
“So-“
“Nope, too tired for this. I’ll be sure to give him and looey nice dreams later. I want to take a nap. I’m heading over to cosmo’s.” Astro blurted out, his blanket majestically swaying in the air as he walked out, leaving dandy there alone.
Dandy crossed his arms and sighed. His friends were absolute morons.