Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

An old woman sits hunched over bits and bobs of various unidentifiable parts. The room is dim, her working area illuminated by a small lamp and the screen of one of her computer monitors. For most people her age, the hour is unthinkable. For people even less than half her age, the hour is still late but, for those who know no limits, feasible.

> Jade English: Reassemble your prototype.

You halfheartedly assemble pieces of what once could have been called a phone. Your hands are shaking and you aren’t even sure you’ve worked out the bug you initially tore it apart for, but you’re tired of looking at the thing. You dropped it down a flight of stairs yesterday and it hasn’t worked quite right since, half of its keyboard no longer works and that’s a big problem for someone whose main mode of communication is text based. Sure, Johnny’s told you about those messaging clients you can just load onto your computer but you haven’t had time to investigate them yourself yet, so you haven’t let one near your computer. You don’t let anything that Crockercorp had a hand in near your computers, which makes you more than a little self reliant when it comes to technology as Crockercorp is sweeping the current world of technology. You’d been up there once too, but those days were long past, thanks to your mother methodically tearing it down around you to prove a point. She never had been a pleasant loser.

You shake yourself and refocus on sliding the smaller pieces into place within the casing. Isn’t like your mother’s around to rub in your failures anymore anyway.

You wince. You’re more tired than you thought if you’ve already hit bitter reminiscing. You’ll have to be careful not to talk to Johnny until you’ve gotten yourself a good eight hours of sleep. Not like that’ll be hard with your phone as it is. But you’ve both barely gotten over your last midnight text scuffle, you aren’t ready to stick your foot in your mouth yet again.

Though, Johnny’s just as predisposed to saying whatever pops into his head without thinking first. But while he’s gotten better with age - and raising a child - you’re woman enough to admit that you’ve only gotten worse. Your social graces have atrophied like an unused muscle with your self imposed island exile. Johnny and the brats are what stand between you and going absolutely feral.

Days like these make you want to forget all this technology crap and run away into the woods, never to return.

Johnny would just show up to fetch you back, though. You aren’t prepared for that lecture yet either, so you haven’t ever followed through.

Keyword: Yet.

Also for a lady on a deserted island, you’ve got responsibilities out the wazoo-

A light starts blinking in the corner of your eye, drawing your attention towards your idle monitor just before an incessant beeping starts up. If it were in working order, the warning might have moved to your phone as you took the time to set down the delicate parts before sliding your chair to the other end of the table. But the noise thankfully doesn’t begin to drive you out of your mind before a few clicks on your keyboard brings the screen to life. The beeping goes quiet but the light continues to flash and a shortcut on the home screen blinks at you.

With a furrow of your brow, you navigate into the program that connects you to the observatory in New York. It had been an arduous process of more than a couple of months' time between your remote instruction and Rose’s hands on efforts - with the occasional additional ‘help’ whenever Dave was visiting - to get the system functional. But with an eye in the sky as the final result, it was well worth the trouble. And if Rose didn’t talk to you for a week after the fact, then, well, sacrifices and all that.

You look at the recorded anomaly - anomalies! - and a grin slowly stretches across your face. “Yes!” you cheer and throw your arms up, spinning away in your desk chair. “Finally!” You kick a foot out to send you spinning back and lean across your desk, tapping a few keys to replay the recorded clips. You’ve just got to be sure. Sure, they’re just giant space rocks in an endless black expanse, but for you it marks the end of a decades long wait.

When your foggy mind absorbs the rest of the relevant information, however, your stomach sinks like a stone in water.

There were three meteors.

Three meteors within a week of landing which is…

Well, it’s certainly not expected and you can feel the headache coming on as you imagine trying to explain to the twenty-somethings that surprise! You’re gonna be parents after all. Yeah, that’ll be great.

Maybe you can bribe Johnny into doing it instead. The brats tended to listen to him better anyway.

You blink at the pieces of your phone and realize that it’s not like you’re going to be telling anyone anything until you manage to get it functioning again. Perhaps it is time to investigate those instant messaging things. You can’t drop a desktop down the stairs after all. Not easily at least. Your phone problem has been relegated to back burner status for now, however, because most of your mind is on, why?

It had been written on the walls, you have studied those ruins for more than half of your life, you knew all they had to say. And, sad as it is to say, the brats weren’t supposed to meet their kids in their lifetime. You had personally always found it strange, why waste resources on two guardians who would never fulfill their purpose? But this whole system was a maze of seemingly flawed aspects and reasoning that always sent your head spinning. There was a reason you’d never raised a real stink about Crockercorp developing the game, as the code had always gone over your head anyway.

Coding is more Johnny’s area. A hobby he’d gotten into and proceeded to pass onto his son, who’d taken it and run. Jeff’s working at Crockercorp has always been a point of contention between you two. You’ve never been sure why he hadn’t cut your mother out of his life the second he got the chance like you had. It wasn’t as if she’d ever done anything for you anyway.

You’d tried asking Jeff about his job before but Johnny had shut you down fast. He’s always been fiercely protective of that boy except when it came to his own japes, then it was free game.

You huff and redo your ponytail back into some semblance of order. It looks like you aren’t getting any sleep anytime soon. This is news you have to deliver and deliver soon, so you have got to get your phone functioning again.

However long that takes.

We join an old man as he crouches beside a mailbox, snickering as he rigs up a contraption entirely too intricate for its simple purpose. His son is finally out of the house for the day and he’s got himself two pounds of glitter. Come the end of the work day, he’ll have his revenge-

> John Crocker: Answer your phone.

Phone? Your phone isn’t-

Ah, there it is.

You set aside your tub of glitter - careful not to spill any, any stray grain might give up the ghost, Jeff’s got eyes like a hawk for these things - and dig your phone out of your pocket. You shove it between your ear and shoulder and answer with a “hello?” as you push yourself upright, grimacing as your knees pop.

“Johnny!”

Your eyebrows furrow. “Jay?” You haven’t heard from your sister in a few days which isn’t unheard of but certainly unusual. You glance at your watch as you head into the house instead of lingering outside, curious about what time it is for her over there, and you have to keep your jaw from hitting the floor as you do the math. “Oh my gosh, Jay! It’s so late for you, why are you calling now? Is something wrong?”

“No. Yes. Well, something isn’t right but I’m not in danger or anything. Johnny, it’s happening! It’s happening but the variables have changed and I don’t know what to do about it.” You haven’t heard Jay this scattered since she’d still been pulling all-nighters for Skaianet projects. You had a hard time handling it at the time, but you never thought about how much worse it would be when you both were basically a world apart. Being afraid that she was going to fall down those ridiculous stairs of hers didn’t help anyone over the phone. “Rose might be fine, but you know Dave’s going to throw a fit but pretend that nothing’s the matter because he can’t just act like a normal person with normal people emotions-”

“Whoa, Jay, slow down, you’re not making any sense.” you interrupt with only a bit of guilt because she just really isn’t.

“There’s no time for making sense!” Jay snaps and you sigh, pushing your glasses up and pinching the bridge of your nose. You question every day if you should really have let her run off to her little island. She’s not getting any younger and every year you only grow more worried about her isolation. “There are three meteors! The first one lands in less than a week! I’ve only just managed to get my phone functioning and I’ve got to somehow tell the kids that they need to be ready to be parents in like four days!”

Well.

You don’t quite know where to start with that but it seems as if your sister has officially hit critical levels of stress and sleep deprivation. Which means it’s on you to talk her back down. And try to do so without it devolving into an argument that left you both mad, as it tended to when one of you was riding high on emotions.

You take a deep breath, gather up your supplies, and stare longingly at your tub of glitter while settling in and making yourself comfortable on the living room couch. This isn’t likely to be a short conversation. “Jay, you aren’t fit to give anyone news like this, when was the last time you slept?” You keep all the judgment out of your voice. You are brotherly concern personified. You will not be deterred by your sister completely losing her mind on the other side of the world.

But also you cannot allow her anywhere near those kids the way she’s acting now.

“I slept a little bit earlier, what’re you trying to say, Johnny?” You don’t rise to the bait. But if she’s gotten more than an hour or two of sleep in the last 24 hours, you’ll eat your tie.

“I’m not ‘trying to say’ anything, it’s just…” You scramble to make sense of what little she’s given you to work with and, finally thinking about it, your heart skips a beat with dread. “If you’re about to get a child dropped on you,” literally, you think, with little of your usual humor, “you need to be prepared. Don’t forget, I was right with you during college, I know what you’re like and I don’t want my favorite sister crushed by a space rock.”

Jay huffs. “I’m your only sister.” she mutters before relenting to your immense relief. “Fine, I’ll give you the low down and you can pass it on.” She sighs and it’s been years since you’ve seen her but you can still picture the way she must be pacing the room as she begins to rattle off what she considers ‘the low down’.

You don’t end up getting off the phone with Jay until long after Jeff has returned home from work, though he quickly disappeared into the kitchen once he’d realized you were talking on the phone. Just as you set your phone aside, he reappears and sets a cup of coffee at your elbow before sitting on the other side of the couch with his own cup. You pick up your mug and cradle it between your hands, sinking into the couch and basking in the warmth that soaks into you and wonder how you managed to raise such a good man. You were always so sure you were going to fuck this whole thing up and yet here you are.

Jeff raises his eyebrows at you and you wait for the interrogation to begin. You raised a good man, not a stick in the mud after all. “What was all that about?” he murmurs, voice low and quiet, just like it always is. “Sounded a little… intense.” he says, hesitant. He’s never quite understood your relationship with his aunt. You’re pretty sure it’s due to the fact that he’s not got any siblings himself. He just doesn’t get what it’s like.

You sigh and shrug. “Jay just gave me some bad news to deliver to the twins.” Jeff nods along solemnly. You take a sip from your coffee and burn the roof of your mouth and sigh again, ever dramatic. “How are you supposed to just tell two kids that, well, they’re not allowed to be kids anymore? Their youth is over, no more parties or- or whatever it is they get up to?”

“Responsibilities have come knockin’ and they’re early enough to impose.” Jeff commiserates.

“I bet Rose will be fine, she’s a sensible one, but you and me both know how that Hollywood scene has been treating Dave!” you huff. You haven’t been a fan of what Dave has put himself through to get his foot in the door in Hollywood. “It’s only-” you glance at your watch and do some more quick math, “-seven o’clock and I bet you he’s already out partying!”

Chapter Text

> Dave: Bust a move.

The bass is booming.

So thumping it vibrates through you like a second heartbeat. 

You bob your head along and sweat drips from your brow. The music is so, so shitty but it’s loud and energetic and the beat’s on time, gives you something to sway to, and really that’s all you could ask of it.

You hum and mutter a few ad-libbed bars, wonder how Rose’s meeting went, figure that you’ll have to call her later to get the details, and then twist and kick and plant the heel of your old Chucks - you insist that it’s another layer of irony to wear the ratty old things with your three piece suit and not simply your refusal to break in a new pair, not like Chucks are a bitch to break in or anything - into a clown’s chin.

There’s the satisfying crack of teeth slamming together - right on the beat, hell yeah - and you grin, savage, while regaining your footing. These freaks ruined your night - and your networking opportunity - and you are about to make them seriously regret that.

You swing your hips, spin, and summon Galatine just in time to keep from losing some teeth of your own to a bowling pin. The clown you’re facing now almost looks dejected beneath their thick coating of grease paint as Gal cleaves their pin with ease and half falls at your feet. You laugh but you can’t hear yourself over the shaking music or the earplugs you jammed in your ears in a hurry when you realized what exactly was goin’ down. The earplugs aren’t a perfect solution - nothing would be when you can feel the bass of this shitty music in your bones - but they do well enough to keep you from losing your mind like the rest of the clown’s victims.

Something slams between your shoulders and you grunt, stumbling forward. You whip around and slam the flat of your blade upside the offending clown’s head, slide your leg to take their feet out from under them and raise your blade once more now that this clown is at your mercy-

-except, without warning, your heart beats all on its lonesome again and you can fucking hear yourself think. Overhead the lights burst on like a flashbang, blinding you even with your shades on. You vanish your sword… somewhere. Hope it’s in your specibus and not your sylladex. Fuck, you’re gonna have to watch your goddamn mouth. You’ve learned the hard way - embarrassingly more than once - that a lot of things have a hash value of fucking 7.

You blink your eyes back open and see clowns scattering like rats, even the one that you had taken to the ground pathetically crawling away.

Your hands are already up in front of your eyes but they raise even further when you hear a shout of, “Hands up! Nobody move!”

Ah.

The popo have finally caught up. Took ‘em long enough. Christ, you thought you were gonna end up cleaning the whole club up yourself before they even got there. Which would’ve been par for the course, really. The clown’s have been getting more bold lately, invading your primary scene and killing the fuckin’ vibes. Like hell are you gonna stand for that. Can’t get gigs if all the night club owners are partying till they pass out. Or their heart stops. Whichever comes first.

A hand grabs your wrist and you nearly spit your sword - a hearty command of ‘stop!’ would be all it took, ol’ reliable - before you remember yourself and viciously bite your tongue. Fuck, right, the police. Can’t forget that. You loll your head to the side to try and look at the officer and slur, “Who- who turn’d the fuckin’ lights on?” stumbling a bit for added measure. You’re likely to be just one more face in a sea of exhausted and dazed partygoers but you want to be sure.

The cop sighs and reaches for your shades and you swat at her, limp wristed, half hearted even though it’s viscerally upsetting. She doesn’t try again though which has relief rushing through you. “‘Nother one coming your way!” you hear her call faintly through your earplugs before she shepherds you along to the front of the club where a triage is being set up.

“Whoa.” you mumble and stumble sideways again, crashing into someone and earning yourself a rough shove into a nearby seat.

You sway and watch emergency personnel bustle around, muttering nonsense to yourself until you’re pretty sure no one’s paying you any mind and then you stand up, straighten your lapels, and slip away into the night.

Once you’re far enough away from the commotion, you shove your shades up into your hair - what? It’s fine as long as you’re the one doing it - so you can actually see where you’re fucking going. Not like there’s anyone out to see any incriminating details anyway.

The lack of people is a little strange considering that it’s not particularly late yet. You’d gotten an early start today, partially because you didn’t have anything better to do, mostly because you wanted to chat up some new potential clients before they got too deep in the bottle. You check your watch, curious about how long you’d actually gotten stuck in that whole deal before you’d caught on, and snort in disbelief. 8:53? Weak.

You tug the earplugs out as you stroll and then stew for a moment in terrible, terrible silence. Silence that threatens to suffocate you after the thunderous noise of the club. Hastily you shove the earplugs right back in even if they set you on edge in a different way. You just know that Lady English would flay you alive if she knew you were purposely making yourself so vulnerable but, well, you know that she’d do the same if she ever caught you blasting sick beats through your headphones so that’s not saying much.

Man. You shoulda thrown your headphones [6] into your sylladex before you’d left.

But how we’re you to know that you’d be wanderin’ the LA streets at barely 9pm because the first club you’d chosen was clown-infested?

Well, you shove your hands in your pockets and slump as you meander your way down the empty street, Rose woulda known but that’s because she has freaky psychic powers in addition to generally knowing everything.

You do think her side gig of being a pay by the minute psychic is hilarious but the tarot deck she keeps tucked in her purse at all times is less so. It makes you nervous. The ‘wizard orb’ you bought her as a joke for Christmas one year - that you know she keeps easily accessible, stored at the top of her coat closet - even more so because for some reason those things are the real shit. She’s only ever pulled a single card for you but it was enough for you to fly off the goddamn handle and request that she never do so again.

You can still remember the illustrated man laying face down, half in armor, half covered with a blood red cape, impaled on so, so many swords, reminiscent of your own Gal. You didn’t know what it meant, you still don’t even know what the card was called, but it had chilled you to the bone. For the first time, you understood what people meant when they said they got the feeling of someone walking over their grave.

You blow out a breath and shake yourself. 

Fuck. No. 

You don’t want to think about that. That sucks.

So, with nothing better to do and no desire to return to an empty apartment, you continue to stalk through too quiet streets with only the occasional car or two racing by clearly emboldened by the later hour.

At 10:03, just as you’re makin’ to cross a street - jaywalking like a real Hollywood bad boy - your cell phone rings. The tinny sound of your phone’s ringtone is muffled both from the earplugs in your ears and it being shoved in your pocket. You grimace even as you pause at the edge of the sidewalk to fish your phone out, hoping that it isn’t another one of those goddamn telemarketers. Can’t even be normal telemarketers either, ‘cause your life’s a fucking nightmare. Nah, you and Rose both get nutcases spouting things about the apocalypse. Just your luck.

But you check the screen and are relieved to find it to only be Rose herself. Though… it’s also odd. It’s pretty late in New York now. You hope that it doesn’t mean her book thing went bad.

You quickly tug the earplug out of your left ear because there’s only one way to find out what your dear sister is calling about.

…then you tug out the other one for good measure, so if Rose asks you about it you can tell her no without actually lying.

You answer the call with a, “Yello?” and take a step out into the street.

“You’re doing something stupid again, brother mine.”

You frown. Rose always manages to sound put together but there’s a slower rhythm to her words, a slight elongation of her vowels that hints at her carefully hidden accent. You know her well enough to know it means she’s just woken up. “Now, Rose, I am positively hurt that you would say such a thing.”

“Dave, this isn’t a joke. Whatever you’re doing I need you to stop-”

But, of course and as usual, you don’t have the time to heed the warning Rose has interrupted her night to give you.

Because you’re suddenly too busy startling at a blaring horn, whipping around to stare dumbly at headlights growing larger, getting closer. You’re too surprised to even think about flashstepping away - and too off-kilter to do more than land on your face if you did try.

You distantly hear Rose yelling as your phone slips from your numb fingers.

Your eyes shut. You brace yourself.

You hope that Rose at least uses your death for sympathy points while promoting her books. Fuck, maybe she’ll finally dedicate one to you, that’d be sick.

Then you feel something snag the back of your collar, pulling it against your Adam's apple.

Someone fuckin’ scruffs you and then your heels hit the edge of the sidewalk and you fall straight on your ass, disoriented. Your eyes pop open in shock and pain just in time to see the red of the car’s taillights as it vanishes down the street as quick as it had come.

You breathe out an, “Oh, shit,” as you press a hand to your chest. Your heart has skipped right to beating 4/8 time, impressive, if a little concerning.

“Can say that again.” someone mutters and you startle all over again.

Tipping your head back, you spot a man. Big and broad, wearing a douchey collared shirt and a ballcap pulled low over his eyes. He’s got his hands shoved in the pockets of dark pants - slacks? - and he’s not looking at you, instead out into the street where you’d almost gone splat.

Your mouth moves but no sound comes out. Christ but you’re speechless. Rose is gonna be so mad she missed this. You’re just, well, you’re stuck on just how fast this dude has gotta be to have saved you from a moving car.

Not even winded either. Man.

The guy’s jaw twitches. Ticks a measure tighter as the silence drags on.

Finally, he tips his head down to look at you but a combination of the streetlight overhead and his ballcap casts a deep shadow over his face. Meaning you can’t make out any features of his but you can make out the sound of him sighing through his nose. “Take a fuckin’ picture, kid.” he mutters and though you do flush red despite yourself.

…you also do sort of wish that you had your camera [9] on you.

There is something oddly striking about this man. Backlit, faceless, but imposing, arms shifting to cross over his chest. Looking like not even a bulldozer could make him budge. Like somethin’ carved from stone rather than a flesh and blood man.

“Jesus.” the man huffs and you realize you’re just… still starin’ at him like some kinda asshole.

He turns, as if to leave, and that’s what finally gets you scrambling to your feet.

The man turns his head back at the sound of you moving and you definitely do not stare at the sharp line of his nose in profile.

…for long.

In your defense! It’s… weirdly familiar.

But noses are noses so maybe you’re just in shock still.

“Wait, wait!” you yelp, reaching out for him even as your instincts scream ‘don’t fucking touch!’. “Holy- holy shit.” you say, pressing a hand to your sweaty, sweaty forehead. “You saved my skin for real, man, goddamn.”

The man turns back around, almost bashful about it, and mumbles, “Wasn’t nothin’.”

He’s leaving. 

He’s leaving! 

And your brain is insisting that you should not let him! “Nah, man, you saved my life, that’s a big deal in my book!” you insist even though you’re not really sure why you’re making this a federal fucking issue. The man shows no sign that he’s listening to you anymore though so one screaming instinct supersedes the other and you snag the sleeve of his stupid ass polo. “Let me say thanks, at least, c’mon-”

You make contact with him for a fraction of a second before he knocks you right back onto your ass in a move too quick for you to make any sense of. By the time you orient yourself again, the man has vanished completely from the street and you’re left once again to admire how fuckin’ fast the dude has to be to get the jump on you.

Well, you sigh and pick yourself up off the smelly street a second time, you better get over it because it ain’t like you’re ever seeing that guy again.

You pat yourself down, check that all your bits are where they should be and brush the dust off yourself as you go. Luckily enough, you find everything where it should be, except for your phone and your shades.

And you have a sinking feeling about their fates.

You glance back to the street and, sure enough, your shades and phone sit mangled in the middle of the road where you’d once stood. Their lives given for yours. You fake a sniffle and give the fallen soldiers a sloppy salute before wiping an imaginary tear from your eye.

However, you don’t even dare to step into the road again to see if any of it is salvageable. It’s obvious enough from the scattered bits that it’s unlikely.

So instead you shove your hands in your pockets and set off to find a payphone before Rose legit thinks you’re dead.

Oh man. You can’t wait to hear this lecture.

…on second thought, you’re sure Rose could keep till morning. All you want to do is go home and sleep like you actually died.

Yeah, you nod and turn on your heel, this will surely have no unforeseen consequences.

Chapter Text

>Dave: Be Rose.

Yeah. Fuck it. Not like you’ve got anything better to do anyway-

“No.”

A young woman, bleary eyed and clearly distressed, sits atop a bed not her own. The hour is terribly late and that’s made even more obvious by the fact that her hair is disheveled, the bed is slept in, and she’s in her pajamas, a simple oversized t-shirt. She clutches a phone in one hand hard enough that the plastic creaks. Her teeth grind together and she’s shaking almost imperceptibly.

“I- I am not in the mood.” she says, whisper quiet. “I’m sure there are other places for you to be.”

And then the young woman fades from perceivability.

You… didn’t know she could do that.

Uh… why don’t you go… see what happened to that weird guy that saved Dave?

>Dirk-

Stop.

That’s not your fucking name.

>...Bro? Uh. Freak the fuck out.

Better.

But you aren’t freaking out.

You’ve never been anything but chill in your life.

…no matter what that suffocating tightness in your chest is tryin’ to say.

Yeah. You’re totally chill.

But you don’t slow down until you’re probably three blocks away from where you left that- that Not-Dave. And you don’t slow down so much as your legs cramp - flashsteppin’s a sprint, not a marathon - and you tumble ass over kettle outta it. Not your coolest moment and you are forever grateful that that Not-Dave was too… whatever to give you chase.

But, like you said, you are so totally chill and you are handling this nightmare of a situation.

Case in point, you use your rolling momentum to pop back up onto your feet. You straighten your cap - and pull it lower on your brow, Christ, you wish you had your fucking shades - and shove your hands in your pockets before you continue to limp your way back to where you’ve been stayin’.

Totally cool.

The motel you’re staying at is so shitty, it’s perfect. An entomologist would have the time of their life in the bathroom alone. You’re pretty sure the mattress crunched the first time you sat down on it.

No one would look for you here.

After all, half the world is optimistic enough to believe a place like this could never exist and the other would be too disgusted to step foot in the place.

So, of course, because she’s always been a one of a kind broad, you open the door and find Rox standing in the middle of your room.

A grimace decorates her fine features and she’s dressed to the nines, not a crease to be seen. One hand holds a paper coffee cup and the other crosses under her tits. Her nails are a deep, dark magenta, long and manicured to be wicked sharp, just the same as her stilettos of which your sure she could maim a man with.

It’s… been a long time since you’ve laid eyes on Rox and yet she looks just the same as you remember.

Beautiful. Dangerous. 

The only person who’d ever been able to keep up with you. Who wouldn’t put up with your shit.

Certainly too good for a fuck up like you but you’ve always known that. And there was always that nagging voice in your ear reminding you if you ever dared forget-

A shiver races down your spine and you shut down that line of thought with extreme goddamn prejudice. You shove those memories right back into the corner of your mind they’d slithered their way out of. Pack ‘em up and stack ‘em right next to countless other boxes, countless other yous that you weren’t - or couldn’t be - anymore. You’re sure that the- the Dirk Rox had known was tucked away in there somewhere but you didn’t care to check.

You get your mind cleaned up just in time for Rox to finally turn your way, grace you with her attention - you’re not dumb enough to think she didn’t know you were there - and the smile she gives you is genuine enough to sting.

Though, in her dark magenta eyes there’s somethin’ nasty lurking that tells you you’re screwed.

And here you thought that dying, sacrificing yourself for the kids, to give Neon Dave the chance to get away, would have got you out of this conversation. Of course, you thought a lot of things about dying. Most of them were provin’ to be wrong which sucks.

“Dirk!” she greets you, turning fully on her heel to face you. Your eye twitches. Both because that’s not your fuckin’ name and because she only calls you that when she’s pissed. She takes a few steps towards you, smile beatific. “I was starting to think you’d keep me waiting here all night!” she says, hand shifting to her hip now, the other swirling her paper cup in a motion that has your eyebrow twitching next.

“Roxy.” you return because two can play at that game and, sure enough, Rox’s smile flips into a pout.

She cocks her hip further and you pray for patience. “Here I am, back from the dead, and this is the welcome I get?” she whines, in that obnoxious nasally way that’s always made you want to wring her neck. 

But, again, you are so totally cool and you’ve got all those urges locked down tight. Lock and key, whole deal. Which, you’d like to point out, is a feat you should get some goddamn credit for considerin’ that this new clusterfuck you’ve found yourself in makes your last clusterfuck look like a fuckin’ wet dream. It’s really got you puttin’ all those deep breathin’ exercises you had drilled into you as a kid to use.

No one’s hearin’ you complain though.

You count to ten. “Could say the same.” you grunt when you hit eleven, continuing right on past her and into your room, pulling your hat off and tossing it on the beat up old dresser before running a hand over your hair, trying to get a handle on the hat hair-

You freeze.

You process what she’s just said to you and you turn just your head back towards her.

Orange meets magenta.

She’s got a hand placed over her mouth now and you’ve got a sick feeling in your chest to match.

It had been naive of you, sure, but you had- had hoped-

When were you gonna fucking learn to stop doing that?

“Dirk-” she starts and stops. You can’t stand how soft she’s acting with you, like you’re something fragile, like you’re still that boy that she had to take care of and watch over and protect from the big bad world. Two idiot kids against the world. You catch that box - marked with ‘Rox’s’ in loopy letters - before it can tumble off the shelf and shove it back where it belongs. “Tricks.” she starts again, even softer and you have to look away, turnin’ your eyes to the scratched up wood of the dresser because lookin’ at her when she’s like this, dead on, no shield, no barrier, it’s too much for you.

You don’t deserve this. Not after all the things he made you do.

…and all the things he didn’t.

You grind your teeth together and tense when her heels tap-tap across the stained linoleum floor. It takes everything in you to not swing on instinct when her small, manicured hand comes to rest on the bare skin of your forearm. She’s not holding back and she knows exactly what she’s doin’ to you. Even with years between you she still probably know how you tick better’n you do. Mind like a steel trap.

Rox shimmies around you, squeezes herself between you and the dresser so you’re forced to look at her. Can’t back off without it lookin’ like some kind of defeat on your part. She knows that just as well as you.

Rox’s never been afraid of you neither and she loves to show that off, prove her fearlessness, prove that she’s different from all the others you’ve ever managed to chase off.

Course, you eventually managed to chase her off too but not because she was scared of you.

She shows off just the same now. Reachin’ up and placing her hand on your cheek, her calluses scratching across the beard you’d still been trying to grow at this age. She forces you to hold her gaze and you ignore the whispering tellin’ you you should break her wrist for the audacity of it. The whispering’s just a memory now, you don’t have to listen to him anymore.

You do sorta wish she would stop though. You wish she was a little more afraid of you. You’ve done bad things. You don’t want to hurt her.

“Game got you too, then, Tricks?” she murmurs and you sigh. You press into her touch, familiar as it was even now, despite yourself. She really does know how to wear you down. “And here I was thinking maybe one of us would make it out, see the kids through to the- the end.” Her voice wobbles, full of emotion now. Her eyes search yours and you lock your face down cold. You’re the strong one, the unbreakable, the one who’s never faltered in the face of the Game and everything that it means. You’ve been facing this down, unwavering, for years and you’re not allowed to break now.

Rox sniffs and runs a finger carefully along her waterline in an effort not to smudge her mascara. “Don’t know why I’m surprised!” she laughs and shakes her head. “Long as the kids made it, who cares about us old farts, yeah?” she jokes and you are supremely uncomfortable with whatever is happening here. Rox has lots of practice holding a conversation without your help though. “Yeah.” she nods then looks to you with bright, shining eyes. It makes your breath catch. “You think they made it, Tricks? Think there’s a new world out there and our kids are living it up without us?”

If she wanted reassurance, though, Rox should’ve known better than to come to you. Meaning she’s likely not looking for reassurance at all. You’ve got a feelin’ that that big brain of hers is already hard at work figuring out exactly what the fuck is going on.

For now, all you can offer her is a shrug. “I don’t know, Rox.” you mutter. You try and lean back, put some space between you both, she just follows you though. “But I got a feelin’ we wouldn’t be here if things had worked out like they were supposed to.”

She sighs. Takes her hand from your cheek and runs it down your chest like she’s trying to smooth out invisible wrinkles in your shirt. She never was good at keepin’ her hands to herself. “Yeah. I don’t really think so either.” But she wasn’t sure what was happening and she wouldn’t say until she had more evidence to point her in a certain direction. Ever the scientist.

The silence between you both stretches for a moment, Rox’s eyes grow distant with thought, until she shakes herself back out of it.

A grin returns to her features like it had never been gone at all though the wet shine of her eyes still gives her away. “Whew. Okay.” She shifts until she’s reclining back against the dresser, elbows pressed against the dresser’s surface, one sharp stiletto hook around your ankle, and salacious in such an exaggerated way you roll your eyes. “Enough of all that, big boy, how ‘bout you tell Rox what finally did ya in?” she coos and grins wide enough that her eyes crease when you grimace.

She knows that you hate when she calls you that. She’s known that you hate that she calls you that since you were both scrappy teens and it was ironic rather than fitting.

You huff. Ah, good old insensitive Rox. Leave it to her to jump from one morbid topic to another.

Chewing on your words, you try and figure out the chaotic jumble that had been your final moments. An ache starts behind your eyes and you press the heel of your hand hard into your eye socket. You ignore the spark of concern in Rox’s eyes.

The problem is, is that every time you poke at your death too hard it also rattles around another big box, bigger than most, labelled hastily ‘LC Keep Out!’. You try and shove that box to the furthest corner of your mind but it keeps creeping back up.

“I was… on Dave’s planet.” you murmur, leaning forward as exhaustion begins to weigh on you. You haven’t stopped since you woke up still kickin’ in Texas. But, of course, you’re careful not to lean too heavily on Rox who hasn’t bothered to move from where she’s pinned herself beneath you. You feel her hand come to rest gently on your side, rising and falling with your every breath, and the gentleness makes you want to squirm away. “There was a man and my sword got stuck in a record.” Your eyes have fallen shut. “I ran away to try and get the guy away from- from Dave, got my sword back, then everything was on fire, the guy turned into a dog, and proceeded to obliterate me and the other Dave.”

And that was something you aren’t likely to forget anytime soon.

Your little bro, beaten and bloody. Orange or not, it had been gruesome. You remember snarling at him to leave. You remember him being fuckin’ obstinant and refusing. Same old fuckin’ Dave. Never knew when to retreat. Had always been a fast fucker but couldn’t run off even just to save his own skin. One of the many things you’d failed to teach Dave, a little bit more selfishness. He’d grown wings somewhere along the way and still couldn’t high tail it.

Though… you remember the dog getting a hold of one of his wings, sinking nasty claws and teeth into it, tearing it to shreds. It had been barely hanging on, attached by just a scrap of flesh and some delicate looking bones. It had made you sick just to look at. It was one of the last things you could remember seeing before- before-

“Dirk!”

You blink back to the present.

Rox’s hands have found a home on your cheeks again. You realize that your hands are white knuckled on the edge of the dresser top. Slowly, you release your grip and let out a breath between your clenched teeth.

Rox’s hands shake minutely against your skin.

You think you might’ve actually scared her.

Fuck.

And still, she smiles at you. “There ya go, Tricks. Lost ya there for a second.”

You take a deep breath. “The other Dave. He- I- I-” You don’t know. You don’t know what you’re trying to say. Whatever it is, you can’t spit it out for the life of you.

She hushes you. “Don’t worry about it, hon. We’ll let the past rest for tonight.” Rox glances around you at the room and her lip curls. “How ‘bout you come stay at mine for the night? Get you in a bed that ain’t a dressed up petri dish.”

You bet that she’s been plannin’ on making this offer the whole time. Bet she’s got an extra bed for you and everything.

The suspicion that she’s trying to coax you in like a feral cat doesn’t stop you from agreeing though.

The drive to her hotel is quiet, peaceful almost. As peaceful as things ever are between the two of you. It’s clear that the late hour has finally caught up with you both. You genuinely can’t recall the last time you actually slept.

Sometime before Sburb, you think.

You should probably be more concerned about that than you are.

You fall into the too-soft bed closest to the door out of habit, not even bothering to strip off more than your shoes, which earns you a huff from Rox. Rox putters around for a little bit longer before she falls into bed as well.

You tuck your arms behind your head and listen as her breathing evens out. She falls asleep fast and easy, just like she always has. Like there’s not a single worry in her mind about being so defenseless hardly a foot away from you.

Your mind churns.

There’s so much to do.

Sleep is still unattainable, so you spend the rest of the night pokin’ at the problem, lookin’ for any loose threads to unravel it.

You don’t find one but you do come up with a new plan of action.

>Bro: Abscond.

When the first rays of the sun begin to peek between the curtains, you’re outta there. Quick, and careful not to wait Rox on your way out.

You snag a taxi and call ahead to buy a plane ticket to Minnesota using Old Man Harley’s account - thankfully somehow still existent in this strange new world - and a obviously fake name.

You linger about the airport until Rox bursts through the crowd, hours later, a whirlwind of pink fury. You watch and wait, careful not to draw her attention, until you see her boarding a flight.

Then you get up and leave. Back into the moderate LA air.

Rox’ll find what she’s actually looking for there and you’ve got some breathing room again.

Time to get back to keeping an eye on Dave.

Even if this one is oddly short.

You’ve dealt with orange surely you can deal with… short.

Chapter Text

>…Bro: Be Dave from a few hours ago…

The bass is booming.

So thumping it vibrates through you like a second heartbeat.

You bob your head along and sweat drips from your brow. The music is so, so shitty but it’s loud and energetic and the beat’s on time, gives you something to sway to, and really that’s all you could ask of it-

Wait, what? 

We’ve already seen Dave from a few hours ago!

>No, no! Not that one. Ugh.

>Knight of Time: Help fix some shit.

Huh.

Yeah.

Yeah. You guess you are that now.

A knight.

Crazy shit.

Though even you have to admit, the cape is pretty sick.

You grab a handful of the truly inane amount of fabric and swish it dramatically. Seeing as there’s no wind in space, you’ve got to do all the hard work yourself.

You hear Rose snickering but fuck if you care for once. You died for this cape and you’re damn well going to enjoy it for a few seconds before shit got real again-

Except you barely get to enjoy it at all before your teeth suddenly start itching, a sensation you coulda gone the rest of your life without ever experiencing, and the new tick-tock of the clock in your head begins to chime in dissonance.

Something in the Medium shifts and your hackles raise.

Rose has gone quiet as well and when you glance over at her, her eyes - just barely visible from beneath her newly earned hood - stare wide eyed over your shoulder.

You whip around, instincts screaming and Deringer already in hand with hardly a thought-

And, surprising no one!, you come face to face with yourself.

A thing that you’ve been forced to get used to since this whole Sburb thing kicked off. Though he’s not quite the same as the other Daves who’ve gotten all up in your grill before, who look just like you generally except for maybe their clothes. Which was odd. Even Davesprite - who you had a hard time believing was you at all sometimes, your paths had diverged so drastically - had still looked just like you except for a new scar slashing down his cheek and chin.

This Dave though…

His hair is longer than yours. A messy flop similar to your but that curls around the bottom of his ears rather than the top, long enough to barely brush his chin and neck. He’s got more freckles than you, darker than yours too, like he gets out more than you. Which is- is-

Is sure. A thing.

You know that Daves are all supposed to have the same starting point, the same foundation, it’s really only within the game that Dave diverge from each other.

But this one is wrong.

He’s got the same split in his right brow as you though. Probably from the same unfortunate tumble down the stairs. His nails are chewed down to the quick. You wince - just a small pull at the corner of your mouth really - at the sense memory of a hand smacking yours - gentler than you know he could be if he wanted to - and a grunted, “Get your fuckin’ fingers outta your mouth.”

…

…he’s got a broken broadsword in his hands as well which might as well be the Dave Seal of Approval. Though you can tell at a glance that it’s not the Deringer, the hilt is a similar gold color but not intricate enough. It doesn’t look like that shitty welsh sword either so you either get another upgrade or- or something.

Oh and you both got your god pjs on though his sick as hell cape has been torn at a harsh angle, now barely reaching his mid thigh.

He seems to be examining you in the same manner which you try not to find unnerving because that would be so hypocritical.

What freaks you out more than anything though, is when he cracks a bright, crooked grin - and it reveals the silver capped molar that matches your own - and glances to his companion. “We actually made it!” he says with a huff. There’s sweat beaded on his brow.

A hand touches your elbow and you twitch but of course it’s only Rose. She tucks her hand into your elbow fully as she comes up alongside you. There’s a furrow in her brow as she looks over this strange Dave as well.

“We did!” Another voice chirps, drawing your attention back to Dave’s companion. A familiar face. “Oh, Dave, we showed them, didn’t we?” She holds up both her hands and Dave’s grin grows smug as he claps his hands against hers.

Jade Harley then proceeds to toss her arm around Dave’s shoulder, shaking him lightly. You know that this is Jade because, well, you just do. It’s unmistakable. She’s as same-different as this weird Dave.

Bucktooth grin that always reminds you of John. Coke bottle glasses sliding down her nose that causes you so much fuckin’ stress. You cracked your first pair of shades because they fell right off your face. Not even while doin’ something cool like strifing. Nah, you just leaned over and they slide right the fuck off. You had been… six? seven? and you remember trying to hide them so Bro wouldn’t find out. Unsuccessfully, of course. Because if there was one thing you eventually learned it was that your Bro seemed to know everything.

And- and you had been right. He had been mad. You could tell even though his face was ice cold as always.

But he’d also let you borrow his shades whenever you had to practice on the roof until he could get you new ones so-

So.

You don’t know.

Bro’s still a- a topic you’re wrestling with and you don’t really have time for that right now.

But, yeah, Jade’s glasses. Pure fuckin’ stress.

Jade’s not as different as Dave. Or maybe it’s just because you don’t know her as well. The ways in which she’s different are almost stranger though.

For one, most of her hair is gone.

Not.

Not in a balding sense, of course.

Rather, instead of reaching nearly to the top of her thighs - a wild mane of hair that must weigh a fuckton - it curls around her chin. It’s only a couple of inches longer than Rose’s if you had to guess. She’s got god tier gear, same as the rest of you. Though much like Dave’s cape, her skirt has a raw edge, slashed to rest above her knees, revealing more of her striped leggings. Her nose is also slightly askew. Broken and probably not set right, like your Bro’s.

Weird. So fucking weird.

Dave glances back towards you and his expression falters before it smoothes out into the impenetrable mask you’re more familiar with seeing in the mirror. He shrugs off Jade’s arm which causes Jade to frown and look between you both before rolling her eyes and muttering, “Striders.”

“Sup.” Dave says, twirling his broadsword until it comes to rest on his shoulder. Your Deringer remains at the ready at your side, just like you were taught. Always prepared for a fight. “Don’t mean to crash y’all’s moment here but you,” he motions towards Rose with his bent elbow, smart, ‘cause you might’ve torn into him had he pointed his sword at her, “happen to be just the broad we were hopin’ to stumble across.”

“God tier, too!” Jade chirps, exuberant in the face of tension as always. She nudges Dave with her elbow and grins at him once more. You watch his mask waver with horror, your lips pressing hard together, jaw twitching, as he flashes his teeth in another brief smile. “We really did nail it, huh?”

“Yeah, we did.” Dave says, chin dipping, and offers a fist which Jade bumps with barely contained enthusiasm.

For once in your life, you fully flounder on what the fuck to say. Thankfully, Rose is there to pick up your slack as is slowly becoming her prerogative. “You were looking for me?” she asks, fingers pressing into the thin skin of your inner elbow, an odd sensation even through your sleeve.

Dave tries to smooth out his expression again but it’s just… so obvious how pleased he is to see Rose. Jade nods, dark hair dancing around her chin. “Yeah! We need your fancy new powers to help us figure a few things out.”

Rose looks about as suspicious as you feel. You’re guessing that she’s probably gettin’ the same off putting vibes from these two that you are. You look at them and the new clock ticking away in the back of your head ticks wrong, wrong, wrong.

They don’t belong here.

But… how else would they be here?

You’re a Knight of Time and you can tell just from lookin’ that Dave is as well. Which means the most logical explanation is that he’s just another asshole Dave skipping through timelines without any thought to the consequences.

Then again, if he’s like Davesprite…

You haven’t - obviously - seen Davesprite since you got your sick new kicks but maybe he’s got that same sense of wrong floating around him. Maybe that was just what Doomed Daves feel like and you’re only realizing it now-

“And how exactly could my newfound abilities help you?” Rose asks, cutting right through your spiralling thoughts. You notice her watching you out of the corner of your eye and you remind yourself that you're supposed to be being chill about all this. For Rose’s sake, of course.

Jade turns a bit sheepish and nudges Dave, looking at him with wide, pleading eyes.

Dave sighs out his nose in a way that reminds you eerily of Bro.

You don’t-

Do you do that? You have no idea. You sure hope not, that would be super embarrassing.

“We’re from a timeline that’s a hell of a lot different from yours so we’re not sure how to navigate your session without totally fucking up, well,” he glances at Jade, frowning, Jade grimaces as well, “everything.” Dave finishes, shrugging, simple enough. “Our Rose told us we should find you, post-pajamas, to help us out.”

Rose’s brows furrow, her fingers twitch on your arm. Her nose scrunches up just slightly. She’s got the scent of somethin’ going down here. Somethin’ fishy, if you do say so yourself. 

“What are you looking for that could cause such a thing?” Rose, once again, asks. Always 20 questions with this gal.

You… suppose you can’t really complain though because for once they’re not targeted at you .

She’s on your side this time.

…hell yeah.

Dave smirks - does that look as infuriating on your face? Surely not - and his chin shifts minutely but enough to give away to you that he’s looking at Jade around his shades now. Jade’s smile also becomes a bit smug. A new and interesting look on her. “Why Rose-!” Jade starts.

“-why would you think we’re lookin’ for somethin’?” Dave finishes. “I don’t remember mentioning that. Do you remember mentioning that?” he asks Jade.

Who crosses her arms over her chest and taps her chin with a finger. “No, I don’t remember mentioning that.”

It’s fucking obnoxious. You can tell by the tension in her shoulders, the tick of her jaw, that it’s bothering Rose too. “Could you get on with it?” you snap. Fucking Daves. They’re either goin’ at mach 20, no time for talking - cough, Davesprite, cough - or they go on for-fuckin’-ever. There is no in-between and you are ignoring the fact that every time you clown on a Dave you’re really just clowning on yourself. “We’re kinda in crunch time here.”

Which does something funny to both of their faces.

Jade’s eyes widen, she looks away, bites her lip. Dave’s lips press together, his chin dips down, hands clench and you can feel the phantom bite of your own fingernails in your palm.

Guilt.

They’re guilty of something.

Rose opens her mouth. Likely to ask another question, potentially more biting than the last, kiddie gloves off, if you will, but Dave cuts her off before she gets the chance and says, all in a rush of pure word vomit, “Your plan doesn’t work.”

“Dave!” Jade chides immediately.

Dave isn’t listening to her now though.

He’s-

He’s pulling off his shades and you’re recoiling before they’re even shoved up into his hair. He catches your eyes with ease.

“Dave to Dave.” he says. Motherfuckin’ invokes , really. It does make you perk up, pay more attention to him and what he’s saying, but you don’t take your own shades off just yet.

You don’t trust this Dave.

Honestly the longer he’s here the less you’re sure if he’s even you at all.

He seems to know this though. Might be why he’s trying to rely on this bit to begin with. His eyes flick between your own and you contain a grimace at the sensation of being seen. “We’ve got a plan that’ll make things better. For everyone.”

For everyone.

Your brain sticks on those words. You frown and glance over at Rose and see her hand pressed against her sternum, where the only gift from her mom she ever truly liked - a spherical opal on a simple silver chain - hangs. Your own fingers twitch with the urge to touch the watch on your wrist that Bro had gotten you two - three? - birthdays ago. You don’t touch it though because you’ve got some fuckin’ self control.

You glance over to where Jade seems to be scolding Dave now, a stern expression on her face that you’re not familiar with, her hand gripping his sleeve, though the gentle hold there seems to be at odds with the rest of the interaction.

Dave’s eyes drift away from her and towards you. Once again, he unerringly catches your eyes even through your shades. It reminds you of Bro and you’re not sure how to feel about that. He deliberately glances toward your left wrist and the watch as if he knew what you were thinking despite your best effort, then, even more deliberate, he flicks his eyes towards his own wrist, where a similar - perhaps the same - watch rests. When he catches your eyes again, he dips his chin.

You suck in a breath.

Jade tugs on his sleeve and draws his attention back to her and you reach for Rose’s hand because you’re not sure what else to do. Why the fuck not, you know?

She squeezes your hand back and you’re surprised now just like you were the last time, standing and watching a bomb tick to zero, at the calluses on her fingers. An odd pattern of them worn in by a combination of knitting and playing the violin. They catch against your own oddly but you can’t bring yourself to mind.

Rose’s violet eyes, made darker by the hood she’s yet to pull off, dart between the lenses of your shades, seeking your own and mostly failing. You chew on your cheek and consider the question that she’s asking without words. Finally, you nod, slowly, but certain.

What’s a little pivot in a game you’re not even sure how to play?

Rose’s jaw tightens and you see something like fear in her eyes but you know that fear’s never stopped her before, so you aren’t surprised when she dips her chin back, an oddly similar motion to the other Dave.

“-wouldn’t have helped us if I didn’t.” You just catch Dave insisting as you and Rose turn to the pair, both steely in your determination now.

“I don’t like it!” Jade says, her voice higher pitched and therefore carrying easier than Dave’s had. She was also just fucking loud. She’d clearly never learned how to whisper and you love that about her even when it scares the shit out of you when she goes off too suddenly.

You’re not really used? to loud noises?

Dave frowns.

Without his shades it’s obvious to see the disapproval in his eyes as well as the shine of a thin scar beneath his right eye catching in the green rays of the sun with his head at that angle. “You don’t like sayin’ nothin’ that doesn’t require ten layers of fucking context to make sense of.” Dave snaps back, shoulders stiffening, brows twitching towards a scowl, clearly a familiar point of contention between them.

“Oh, I don’t want to hear it, Dave.” Jade begins, hands on her hips.

You cut them both off with a, “Hey.” not loud but stern. Dave snaps to attention immediately but Jade glares at the side of his head a moment longer before looking at you as well. “We’re in.” you say.

“What?” Dave and Jade say at the same time.

“Tell us what you need.” Rose agrees, hands folding in front of her. She looks more regal now in her bright golds and oranges. “We’re willing to help.”

>Dave: Wait a second!

You stop Dave before he can go running off with his Jade and your Rose, leaving you to the fetch quests they’ve assigned you. A simple hand snagged in his pjs which halts him easy enough.

You push your shades up into your hair and meet his eyes this time, red on red, he hasn’t set his back to right yet either so you see his eyes widen when you do. “Just… tell me one more thing, Dave to Dave,” you hesitate but force yourself to continue, “is it really better?”

He hesitates as well and reveals that silver molar again as he worries the corner of his lip. “It’s not perfect.” he admits and your heart sinks a bit. You consider grabbing Rose, calling this whole thing off, going with your guys’ plan after all. 

You also know that you won’t do any of that. This is clearly something that has already happened. Some Dave long before you made this choice and now you simply have to perpetuate it. But still you consider it, under the guise of free will.

Dave carries on. “But it- it’s good.” His eyes crease and he smiles. It’s small but he looks genuinely happy in a way you’re not sure that you’ve ever been. Except maybe when talking with your friends.

You would bet that whatever Dave went along with this the first time probably got suckerpunched by the same realization.

Dave’s hands move animatedly as he talks. “We’ve got an honest to god family, man. I think you’ll like them. I know I do.”

You’re… not really sure what you would do with a family. You’re so used to it just being you and Bro and you’re beginning to understand that you could barely handle that some days. “Do we-” You’re not even sure you want to ask this question. Of course, you do anyways. You need to. “Does Bro still make us strife?”

Dave falters. Glances down and away and then back. Like he knows the rules of engagement here. Dave to Dave. No hiding. “...sometimes.” he admits, voice small. “But it’s not the same as- as what you’re thinking, I don’t think.” He rubs a hand over the back of his neck, his grip on that sword he’s carrying has only tightened. “Him and Dad both taught us all how to fight, they had to.” He pauses to think, head tilting. “Sometimes, I think that Dad wouldn’t have if he thought he could get away with it. But he knew Bro was kinda right, he couldn’t leave us defenseless with all,” he waves a hand, “this shit on the horizon.”

It’s somehow both terrifying and a relief. Your shoulders slump and you rub a hand over your eyes. “Yeah. Fuck.” You shake your head. “Fuck this shitty game. I want a goddamn refund.”

Dave snorts a laugh and then covers his mouth with horrified eyes as you glance back up at him with a raised brow. “Sorry.” he says, muffled until he removes his hand. “It’s just… I think my brother’s said the exact same thing before.”

The corner of your lip ticks up. “Sounds like a super cool dude.” 

Dave barks a laugh and it’s still just so fucking weird to see. He punches you in the arm and it stings but you find yourself snickering as well. “Shut up, ass.”

It’s the most pleasant interaction you’ve ever had with another Dave. Even Davesprite, who you think always resented you a bit for being the “real” Dave. Whatever that meant. You kinda hope that this is what having an actual brother - and not just a Bro - is like.

Of course, you punch him right back and he winces, rubbing his arm like a drama queen. “Get outta here before Rose thinks this is just one big circle jerk.”

Your nose scrunches, you’re not sure why you fucking said that, and he grimaces right back and says, “Ugh.” But then he squints at you and you already know what he’s thinking. “Would you-?” he starts.

“Hell yeah.” you answer. “But we ain’t got time for that, I’ve got your errands to run.” You wave the paper he’d passed off to you pointedly, slide your shades back on your face. He does the same and you both summon your turntables at the same time. His crooked grin matches your sly smirk. You scratch back your record and the dark void of the Medium vanishes.

>Dave: Help John with some slime babies.

See. Like. You would? You totally would. Except that between him and Dave and Rose’s judgemental overseeing of the situation, they seem like they’ve got it handled. You pass along the two items you were sent to get to a sniggering Jade - not your Jade, of course, you’re not really sure what your Jade is up to right now - and settle in to watch the show.

Which mostly consists of John chasing around one set of slime babies after another and Dave juggling a random assortment of items as John decides which knickknack to assign to which child apparently on a whim. It’s weird to think that he had already done this and neither you nor any of your other friends had been aware of it. Did this make John, like, sort of your dad? You grimace at just the thought. You really don’t need any more dad-adjacent people in your life. 

You sidle your way over to Rose despite knowing the risk of gaining her attention and ask, “You’re not helping them with this?”

To which Rose eyes you for a moment and then shrugs. “John has clearly done this once before with no interference from us, so I believe the best course of action is to continue thus.”

You consider this and then nod. “Fair enough.”

There’s a pause in between sets of slime babies just long enough for Dave to spit a- a flat square… thing from his sylladex and shove it in the bank of computers. You can hear him mumbling something to himself as the computers begin to rapidly flash though you can’t make out what he’s saying.

The computer flashes through a series of shots. A target locks on each of the people visible and snatches impressions of them and turns them into slime. Watching it happen makes the time nonsense in your head shiver. It makes you a little nauseous.

Some old man in adventuring gear flying a golden ship, leaning over the wheel and squinting out wide windows into an expanse of void.

Rose’s Mom - you know this because they just look so much alike - looking over LOLAR with a slight smile. She steps off a cliff, super casual, honestly pretty badass though you’d never say so to Rose’s face, and drops only a foot before she lands on a familiar rocketboard. You share a perplexed look with Rose.

Another woman - middle aged perhaps, clearly belonging to John or Jade’s brood, what with her glasses and gap toothed grin - is bent over and chortling as a man in business attire stands covered in glitter at the end of her driveway. John’s gaze goes wistful as he stares at them. His fingers reach out for the screen as if he can’t even help himself.

Anticipation builds in your chest as each of these scenes flash by.

Because you know who’s coming next.

Rose leans against your shoulder and you wish you could say that you didn’t need the quiet support but you appreciate it as, finally, the scene coalesces on screen.

Your Bro stands highlighted by bright orange flames, katana drawn, hat absent for the first time that you’ve ever seen in your life. His face is as implaccable as ever as he faces down a pitch black dog thing that reminds you of all the other creatures you’ve been grinding for grist except… more. You see a whirl of neon orange feathers across the screen just as it cuts off.

The collected slime creates one last group of babies. You try not to think too hard about the logistics of it all. You try not to think about how haggard Bro had looked in that scene. You try not to think about a lot of things as John distributes a coin, some marbles, another bunny, and a sword to the babies-

Wait.

A sword?

The babies are transported away almost the second that the sword is laid in the last baby’s lap.

There’s a quiet lapse and then Dave starts shouting. “Oh my god John!” The shout makes you wince. Dave’s newly emptied hands flail pointedly. “As if I’m not already gonna in enough fucking trouble! I think that sword was my Dad’s most stable relationship!”

“You didn’t have enough things!” John shouts back.

Dave shakes the headphones still hanging out of his other hand at John and you snicker. “What the fuck do mean!” Dave looks halfway to pulling his own hair out. “Are you blind!”

Rose shakes her head and sighs. You step aside and let her handle this. Not like you wanted to anyway. “Boys.” she says, evenly, and not particularly loud but catching Dave’s unerringly catching Dave’s attention even if it takes John a beat to catch up. “Aren’t we meant to part ways now? Our tasks are complete.”

“Oh.” Dave says, sheepish, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “Yeah. Yeah. Course. Dad’s already gonna kill me whether I have Gal or not, I guess.” he mutters.

Still, he shifts as if to rest a sword on his shoulder and then realizes once again that he’s armed only with some headphones. Dave sighs and wraps the headphones around his neck.

“One more stop, yeah?” you call over to him.

He nods and rubs at his eyes under his shades. “Yeah. Gotta let John get back to the rest of this timeline and I’ve got one more disk to run.”

Dave seems tired, so you summon your turntables before he can. You’ve still got some juice left, might as well use it.

Chapter Text

>Dave: Wake the fuck up.

Huh? You’re already awake. Wide awake. Though you can admit that this does feel so wild that you could be dreaming.

You’re watching John and Dave yell at each other while the baby versions of you and your friends and… some others? barrel towards a world you don’t know on- on giant meteors? You think? You… sorta lost the plot on this one. It is probably some of the wildest shit that you’ve ever thought though so-

>No, not you!

>Current Dave: Wake up.

You know, you would really like to do that.

But you’re… kinda in the middle of something.

Namely, a nightmare.

It starts on a familiar note. Follows a well-trod tempo.

It starts with-

Tripping over gangly limbs. Hitting scorching gravel. Aches and pains and blisters and road rash. So much fucking road rash. The back of your arms and palms were stripped of skin more often than not. You’ve got a blister on your thumb- your index finger- your pinky- 

You’ve got on open sore on your palm because you fell and popped your fuckin’ blister. It hurts like a bitch. The hilt of your sword - an amalgamation of Gal’s shining, pure white metal and a deep silver steel of a sword you don’t recognize, in some places double edged and others single - presses against the blister- the sore- more goddamn road rash hard. Someone tells you, “Kid, one day off won’t hurt.” and another says. “Again. Again. Again-”

>Dave: Wake up!

So you hit your ass again. Grunt and groan about it. Curse the unforgiving concrete- gravel- whatever. Shake with fear as you watch the strongest person you know - a mish mash of faces, there are so many people in your life stronger than you - face down against what you know - know, know, know, you don’t want to fucking know anymore! - is impossible.

Someone says, “Stay down. Breathe. We’re done for today.” but your heart beats get up, get up, get up . ‘Cause you ain’t never learned what’s good for you.

Slowly, you rise again. Wavering but steady overall. Your stance ain’t never been great neither - you get knocked down real easy, doesn’t help that you don’t have much substance to you - but what’s that matter when gettin’ back up’s your specialty? 

Sun blazes. Fire rages. The sky is blue, blue, blue, and bright white clouds. Even a raging fire don’t got nothin’ on the Houston sun, you know that now.

“Goddammit. Dave!” It’s a man - white skinned, grey skinned, blond hair, black? - mixed with Rose mixed with anyone who’s ever had the pleasure of getting to know you. “Stay the fuck down!”

That’s not in your nature though. So you get up.

And you die.

And you die.

You die. You die. You die. You-

>Dave: Wake. Up. 

You think you’ve fucked up in every way imaginable. You just keep goin’ though ‘cause what the fuck else are you s’posed to do?

You live. 

Then you know.

Then you die again. Alongside Rose and two universes.

What an honor.

You don’t even flinch as the explosion- the laughter- the laughter - the clashing of metal rings in your ears.

Someone stands between you and a dog. Thank fuckin’ god. 

You hate dogs. 

You don’t think you always have?

The solid planes of their back and shoulders that could carry the world take up your whole field of view. You say, “Thanks, ‘ppreciate it.”

They gurgle back. A familiar sword pierces their abdomen, staining a white shirt red-

>Dave! Wake! Up!

The tip grazes your sternum and you feel sick.

You feel sick. Your hands hurt. Your back hurts. Probably more fuckin’ road rash. Rose was gonna be pissed.

You try and get up.

A hand latches onto your bicep. Stopping you.

Your world is orange flecked with blue.

“Dave. Run.”

You’re crying, you think. That is so uncool of you. You curl your arms around your head. Cover your ears against clashing metal- snarling dogs- laughter and laughter and more laughter-

Curl tighter and tighter and tighter until-

>WAKE UP!

You tumble out of bed with a gasp and hit the floor hard. Your heart pounds a staccato against your ribs and you are just… grossly clammy. Brows and pits and the back of your knees and even fuckin’ underboob sticky with sweat.

Ugh.

You groan and scratch a hand through your hair.

…fuck.

Fuck.

That hasn’t happened in… awhile. You shiver and curl up, knees against your chest and back against your bed. Honestly, you kinda only realize now that you’d never really noticed that it had stopped happening until it was back.

Goddamn… nightmares about things that never were and never will be. A secret you’d kept even from Rose and, well, you’re still not planning on telling her. It doesn’t feel right to tell her even though you and her share just about everything.

It doesn’t feel like your secret to tell?

Which is weird but, shit, everything in your life is a little weird. At this point, who’re you to question it?

You’re still sitting there, trying to gather your wits about you, when a shrill shrieking fills the apartment.

You groan and consider continuing to not move for at least another hour.

Or maybe the rest of the day?

Instead of doing that, you get up like the responsible adult you are and go answer your fuckin’ phone. There’s only so many people who could be botherin’ you this early after all.

Of course, that don’t mean there ain’t grumbling happening as you haul your ass up and shuffle your way through your apartment and into the kitchen where you’d apparently decided was the best place to ditch your phone the night before. Weird but not overly so. Sometimes you just emptied your pockets and dex as you walked through your apartment, especially on late nights. There was one memorable morning where you had opened the fridge and found your wallet gettin’ buddy-buddy with the cream cheese.

You pick it up without looking at the ID even though you know better and start, “Rose, I swear I meant to call you back-”

“Dave Strider!” someone, decidedly not Rose-like, interrupts.

“Uh.” you say, you know, like an idiot. “Who’s speaking?” you ask because you ain’t confirming nothin’. You’ve got a sneaking suspicion you already know though. Not like you know any of their names but, like, you recognize this vibe.

“The end of your world is coming, Dave Strider!” hisses the woman - well, you assume woman, but then who’re you to assume anything? Asses and mes and all that - instead of answering you.

And, just, fuck. You’re so not with it enough yet for these gogdamn religious telemarketers. Sometimes you wonder if the convenience of mobile phones was worth the hassle at all. “Are you ready to listen or will you keep burying your thinkpan in the sand?”

A slight chill runs down your spine and you sputter, “Uh, wrong number.” and hang up.

You stare at your counter blankly for a long moment before shaking yourself and blowing out a breath.

Okay. Pretending that never happened and moving right along.

Time to make the call that you’re actually dreading-

Except…

Just as you go to dial, you notice something on the counter.

A torn out piece of paper lying on the countertop. You squint and reach for it, forgoing your dialing for the moment.

You pick it up and flip it over-

-and freeze when you read the words:

look both ways next time. and call your sister.

Then it hits you like a freight train.

The paper slips outta your grasp and you turn your attention to your phone.

Except it’s not your fucking phone at all.

Your phone got smashed to pieces last night.

And, sure enough, when you go looking for your contacts, they’re all gone. Well, not gone, they were never there.

Your first coherent though is: Thank fuck you have Rose’s number memorized.

Your second follows another chill down your spine: What the fuck?

No, seriously, what the fuck?

>Rose: Hey, what the fuck?

You’re in another meeting.

You have a feeling you’re going to be in a lot of those in the foreseeable future - a hunch, no Knowing involved - but you’re hardly aggrieved by the tediousness of the process. Someone has finally seen your novel as the prized piece of literature it is - if you do say so yourself - and you’re too enthused to be bothered by all the metaphorical hoops you find yourself now jumping through. You have another hunch that that will not be the case for long but for now you are coasting on your euphoria.

Currently, there are other, more obnoxious things to be bothered with, after all.

You hold up a hand and say, “Sorry, I need to take this.” stopping the man in his tracks as you dig through your purse for your mobile. You pull it out and answer it just as it begins to ring.

Typically, you don’t even get a ‘hello’ in before Dave is off.

“Holy shit! Rose! I think someone fuckin’ broke into my house!”

You sigh.

Then you cover the speaker and give the man your nicest, apologetic smile as you say, “I’m so sorry, I need to take this. Family emergency.” and stand and walk out while the wide eyed agent is still sputtering a response.

You walk the hallways, sensible pumps clacking as you tune back into Dave’s ranting.

Something about a new phone? You thought he was freaking out over a break-in.

Your brother has become a bit inscrutable since your respective moves.

Either way, your current displeasure with him is about to take center stage.

You put on a bright smile - you have to get into character after all - and a bubbling tone as you quite ruthlessly interrupt him. “Oh, Dave, hello! So good to hear you’re alive and well. I’m so glad you’ve found the time in your busy schedule to call your dear sister.”

The resulting silence on the other end was deafening.

You were more than happy to wait.

Finally, Dave clears his throat and says, “Yeah. Shit. Yeah, that was a dick move. I’m sorry.” He sighs and you step out into the chilly New York afternoon. You’re glad that you went with the pantsuit instead of the skirt, especially as you pull your lilac peacoat tighter around yourself.

The clouds overhead seem to be darkening. You could have snow in your future.

You hope you get all this book stuff over and done with before then or else you might have to put chains on just to make it back out to the Compound.

“Thank you, Dave.” you return, leaning back against a wall and staring as the swirling fog of your breath rises into the air. “I’m glad you’re okay. Truly.” You’ve got a vast and active creative mind but you refuse to consider a world without your brother.

(You thank the gods every day that you are not so powerful as to be able to See any worlds without him either. It had been enough to pull the ten of swords for him the one time you had read him. Now you couldn’t see that card in a spread without seeing Dave either. It frightened you dearly.)

You shake yourself. Turn your attention to Dave’s plight of the week instead. “Now, what’s all this about a break-in?”

Which was enough to send Dave right off again. “So, like, you know I nearly got flattened by a car last night, yeah?” Not in so many words but you hum in agreement anyway. “Well, my shades and my phone sacrificed themselves in my stead.” You roll your eyes just as Dave says, “Don’t roll your eyes at me, Rose, they’re heroes.”

“You’re out without your shades then?” you ask, trying to keep him on topic and also trying to picture your brother out at a payphone without his signature sunglasses. It might be better to let him get his dramatics out now before you have to drop your… other news on him.

“No!” he responds quickly and you can just see him pulling on his hair. “I just woke up, like, no shit, ten minutes ago because, craziest thing happened, I got a phone call.”

Then you Know. The pieces fit together easily in your mind without him even having to elaborate. “Why did someone break into your home to leave you a mobile phone?” you ask, incredulous. You’ve truly never met someone with luck as odd as Dave. Not good luck, not bad luck, just… strange.

“Wish I fucking knew, Rose! And that’s not-!” He stops himself before he can really get going, which you note as particularly odd. Then, when he starts again, he’s quiet, muttering almost. “That’s not even the weirdest part, Rose. Whoever it was left a note for me.”

“A note?” you ask, concern rapidly blooming in your chest. “What sort of note?”

Dave pauses for a long time. The concern has practically grown into its own garden by the time he speaks. “It says, ‘look both ways next time, and call your sister’.” The words are barely a whisper through your mobile and a chill that has nothing to do with weather dances down your spine. Dave continues, a little more bold after dropping that information. “I- I’ve got a feeling I know who it was. There was this guy, he pulled me out of the way of the car- You shoulda seen it, Rose, dude had to have been wicked fast-”

“Dave.” you try and interrupt.

“I mean, I don’t know who but he’s the only one that was there. He’s the only one who- who could know- And there was just something about him-”

“Dave!” you snap but there’s no hope for him now.

You have a feeling he’s ignoring you purposely.

“Anyway, Rose, I’m alive, hope your book things going well, and I’m going to be fine, don’t worry about me!”

And the asshole hangs up on you.

The case of your phone creaks with how hard you are holding it in your hand now.

You’re going to kill that boy one of these days. If he doesn’t go running into something else that will do it first.

You knew you should’ve never left him alone out there.

You take a few deep breaths to gather yourself and then tuck your phone away and walk back into the building. Dave’s just going to have to wait for now but, rest assured, you might be paying your dear brother a visit very soon.

Chapter Text

>Rox: Figure out why you’re in fucking Minnesota!

It really says something about what you’ve put up with when it comes to Tricks that you’re not even the maddest you’ve ever been at him when you realize he’s displaced you in a whole nother state.

(No. You know exactly when you were madder than you’ve ever been in your life at Dirk but that’s in a past long gone at this point.)

And fuckin’ Minnesota too. What the hell is in Minnesota?

You don’t remember anything being out here the last time you did all this.

But then… there were some dark days in your 20s.

Nanna gone. Gramps gone. 

Jeff trying to keep you all connected but grieving himself.

…

If there’s one thing you’ve learned about Tricks after many, many years in the man’s presence, it’s that there ain’t nothing he does that doesn’t have some sort of reasoning behind it. It’s just the whole trying to follow the man’s train of thought and logic that tends to be the hard part.

You’re more impressed at the amount of research he’s managed to do between becoming fucking revenants and taking in a whole new world. You barely even feel like you’ve had a chance to breathe, let alone consider digging into anything beyond the surface level.

But then, Tricks has always felt the need to be one, two, ten steps ahead of the next person, of course he would take this situation as a challenge as well.

You’ve been too busy running around trying to find something, anything familiar.

That’s when it hits you, of course. 

Tricks hasn’t been researching stuff willy-nilly. He’s looking for the familiar, too. When you found out he was ditching Houston for LA, you were shocked. You thought for sure he’d find himself the same shitty apartment and hole up like a cave troll again.

Then you’d found the same forwarding address for one David Strider that he had.

You’d been a moron to get on a plane in the first place. Anger at Tricks for pulling the same stunt all over again overwriting your common sense. Of course that man wasn’t about to leave Dave just like that. Even halfway outta his mind he hadn’t been able to ditch his kid. 

(That was part of the problem, of course, but that’s neither here nor there neither.)

Her next leap of logic then was:

Who could be in Minnesota that Tricks thought you might be looking for too? That held a reasonable chance of keeping your attention off of him for a while?

It couldn’t be Rose, you’d found a forwarding address for her along with Dave, which meant that Tricks almost certainly knew she was in New York too.

So, who else-?

…oh. 

No. 

No way.

There’s no way that Tricks could be so much of a dick and- and then put you in the right place to find-

You take a shaky breath as you finally exit the airport, leave behind the thoughts of chasing Tricks down - just like the ass probably wanted/expected - and hail a cab. 

You guess you’d just have to find out for yourself.

>Jeff: Answer the phone.

You’ve barely set down your briefcase and started to consider what to make you and Pops for dinner when the phone begins to chime. You hum as you walk into the kitchen and wonder who might be calling you at this hour. Not late per say but most people who know you both know you’re likely to be at work at this hour.

You pick up the receiver and say, “Crocker residence, this is Jeff speaking.” just like you have since Pops started letting you answer the phone as a child.

There’s a long stretch of silence. You press the phone closer to your ear as if that will help the person begin to speak. “Hello?” you say again.

Finally, there’s a slight hiccup. Like someone on the verge of sobbing. Then an actual sob and a click. 

You stare at the phone - now intoning at you - baffled. “How odd.” you murmur and gingerly put the phone back in its place. You try not to think about how that’s how most horror movies start and instead turn to perusing the cabinet and fridge instead.

You’ve just decided on a simple roast - likely to be done by the time Pops gets home himself - when the phone begins to ring again.

You refrain from groaning because you’re more mature than that - and it would make you feel too much like Dave with his dramatics - and once again abandon dinner to snatch up the receiver. “Crocker residence, Jeff speaking.” you say, with slightly less patience.

“Ah.” Rose says, almost awkward. “Hello, Jeff.”

Despite them both having spent nearly their whole time in high school living with you, the twins still don’t know how to act around you. You sort of find it funny honestly. And have used the fact to your advantage in more than one of your prankster's gambits.

“Hello, Rose.” you greet the woman warmly even as you stretch the phone’s cord so that you could keep working on dinner while you talk. With the twins there’s no telling how long a conversation might drag. “How goes it?”

She clears her throat. “I would… like to say that all is going well over here.”

“Oh?” you say with just enough polite curiosity to encourage expanding.

“It’s not as if it’s not going well particularly. Especially not for me.” Rose continues because the twins are nothing if not predictable. Rose can say what she will about her brother but he’s not the only, ahem, verbose one in the family. “This new book deal is still going well though it trods along the minutiae in a way that is… certainly tedious.”

You hum and nod as you set about peeling and chopping potatoes, checking the blade of your knife carefully before figuring you’ll leave sharpening to another day. “I’m sorry to hear you’re bored, Rose.” you say, sincerely.

She sighs. “Like I said, I’m fine and I’ll be even better once this book is finally done with.” She hesitates and you wait patiently, chopping a steady and soothing rhythm to you. “What I find myself more worried about is Dave.” she admits. 

That brings you pause. You tilt your head, careful not to unsettle the phone between your ear and shoulder. “Something’s wrong with Dave?”

“Yes. Well, no. Not yet?” she replies a little too quickly, in a very non-Rose manner. Then with no little frustration, “He almost got hit by a car last night and then when I finally spoke to him this morning he was acting very oddly and proceeded to hang up on me before I could inquire further.”

You freeze at ‘almost hit by a car’ and almost fail to process all the rest of what Rose says. 

You know, unlike most people would claim, you never wanted siblings. You’ve always been very content on your own. After years, you love Rose and Dave like they were very distant siblings - you simply tolerated them for a long time because you knew Pops loved them dearly - but sometimes they’re lives are so far beyond your own. It’s almost incomprehensible.

Especially since Rose continues on as if Dave almost getting run over is the least of their concerns.

Which, knowing them, it very well might be.

So you try and act the same. It’s how you get through most of your conversations with the twins, taking cues from them and generally trying to be as calm as possible. Because if you freaked out about something, they’d freak themselves out about it too. “I’m sure you didn’t appreciate that, especially since you simply seemed to be worried about him.”

“I’m quite upset about it, yes.” Rose admits. “And I haven’t been able to tell him about Jay’s news, either. I’m worried that he won’t sit still long enough to listen unless someone’s there to hold him down.”

You tilt your head. “Is that why you’re calling Pops?”

Rose sounds sheepish now. “Much as I enjoy our conversations, Jeff, that would be correct.” Not like you’re offended. You know that Pops and the rest of them are mixed up in something bigger than you. Bigger than themselves. “I can’t leave New York yet and Jay won't get there in time.”

You think about Pops currently working overtime to kick the testing department into high gear after two quarters of diminishing sales. How antsy and stressed out he’d been since Aunt Jay’s call. He’d barely even guffawed when you actually fell for that dastardly glitter bomb mailbox.

You were worried about him. 

You were worried about all of them.

Fuck. You really hadn’t wanted siblings. 

But here you were. 

“Pops is pretty busy out here, too.” you start. 

“Oh.” Rose murmurs, sounding even more upset now. “I suppose I could find some way-“

“But,” you interject, “I have some PTO saved up and accounting surely won’t miss me for a few days.” In fact, they’d probably be thrilled if you took a vacation for once instead of working through everything they put in front of you like a machine. You’d lost count of the number of times you’d been asked very politely to please take a bit more time, slow down a little, but, despite you trying, it was just against your nature.

“Really?” Rose asks and it kind of makes you sad how cautious her hopeful tone is.

“Yes, Rose,” you say fondly, “it might take me a day or two to get it all worked out but really.”

There was a breath of obvious relief on the other end of the phone. “Thank you, Jeff. Really. I’m beginning to think I should have never let him out of my sight.”

You chuckle. “I think we’ve all thought that about Dave now and again.”

“I suppose.” she agreed. “I have to get going now but let me know if anything changes. And thank you for the conversation.”

“Any time, Rose. Goodbye.”

“Talk to you later.”

And you both hang up. 

>Bro: Answer the phone.

Nope. You walk straight past the pay phone without hesitation. You know who’s on the other end.

>Bro: Answer the phone!

You pass another one - fuck you forgot how many payphones were still around in the 90s - just as it starts to ring and continue ignoring it.

>Bro: You’re supposed to be trying to be better.

When did you ever fucking say that?

>He’s gone, Bro, what’s your excuse now?

You halt two blocks over when the third one begins to ring and sigh. You walk over to it - sorta hoping it’ll stop ringing by the time you get there - and pick it up.

You put the receiver to your ear and wait. You’re not speaking first because it would definitely give her the wrong idea about your willingness to go along with this whole teamwork, help each other idea she’s got herself convinced on.

You didn’t need their help before and you certainly don’t need their help now.

(Almost everyone in your life - or who had once been in your life before you got your shit together and ditched ‘em - would disagree with that first point. But, you know, fuck ‘em.)

You expect yelling.

You expect to get a tongue lashing.

…you don’t expect to hear her sniffling.

Ah, shit.

Why didn’t you expect crying? You definitely should’ve planned for that. Especially if she had already found what you know was waiting for her.

(Waiting for her in, like, relative terms. Unless more fucked up shit had happened while you all were resurrecting, he probably didn’t know any of you existed now.)

Sure enough, when Rox speaks, it sounds like she’s been sobbing. “You’re such an asshole, Tricks.” she says, voice nasally in a way that’s almost amusing. “Couldn’t you give a girl a little warning?”

“Nah.” you say, casual, leaning your shoulder against the payphone and ducking your head to keep the fuckin’ sun out of your eyes. You really needed to get new shades. You’ve had a migraine since you woke up and you know it’s ‘cause of the sun exposure. “You woulda tried to make me come with you.”

“Oh,” she snaps back - still nasally and not particularly threatening - and you’re honestly relieved to hear her mad, “because you’re too cool and manly to care about Jeff yourself, huh?”

You bristle and the snarl that twists your lips sends a passerby skittering as far away from you as possible. Fucking. Good. “What the fuck are you on about?” you snarl. 

Wow and here you thought you had dodged this blowout argument but apparently you just hadn’t found the right trigger.

She hadn’t either.

“Don’t you play stupid with me, Tricks.” You weren’t playin’ at nothin’ but you don’t think she’d appreciate that attempt at a joke right now. Rox gives back as good as she gets, after all, and there was a point in your life when you had appreciated her inability to let you be a prick in peace. “You already knew where Dave and Rose were, why else were you still looking for him-?”

You slam the receiver down.

Which might as well have been an admission of guilt to her.

Goddammit.

The payphone immediately starts ringing again and you ignore it. 

Your migraine’s getting worse and you’re starting to think maybe it’s stress related too.

You’re too fucking old for all this.

At the same time, you’re barely an adult again.

It’s disorienting.

It makes you a little sick just to think about.

You press your forehead against the phonebooth and don’t even care that the move nearly knocks your hat from your head.

Of course, you know what she’s getting at. A whole shitload of ‘what if’s that you had thought you put behind you years ago. Yet, here you were. 20 again - your best guesstimation of your age now - and with all the same problems falling in your lap.

Well.

Maybe not all the same.

You’re not going to have anything to blame when you inevitably screw it all up this time, after all.

You try not to think too hard about that. 

About any of it.

It can all just… hold on until you’ve got your bearings for real.

Until then it’ll be easy to fall back on your constants. You’ve always known what you were put on this earth to do.

Watch over Dave. Keep him alive.

Make him stronger?

You’re not sure if that’s really part of your mission with this Dave but you’ll keep it as an optional task. You suppose you’ll wait until you figure out why, exactly, you’re here when there’s an unsettling certainty in your bones that you were never meant to see this place.

You were never meant to see anything again at all.

…you don’t try as hard as you probably should to not wish you were still dead.

Would make things a lot simpler all around. You don’t think you’re being pessimistic about saying that either.

…

……

Rox is persistent.

She keeps pestering you the whole way back to that shitty motel that you probably shouldn’t have come back to.

You manage to not pick up a phone the whole way. You sorta forgot how good she was with computers, you should probably be paying more attention to any cameras around you, so that she can’t track you so easily.

(You know you won’t.)

>What, are you a coward now?

It’s when the motel phone starts ringing that you finally give in once more. It’s just Rox, there’s no reason to be-

…

You snap, “What do you want?” into the receiver.

“For you to stop always running away! Why won’t you let someone help you?”

>Admit it. It’s ‘cause you’re scared-

No. Fuck off. 

“What else was I supposed to do?” you snarl. “I was being- being-“

You can’t say it. Still can’t. Maybe you’ll never be able to say. 

Not like it’ll fuckin’ change what happened.

And you don’t want any stupid ass pity either.

You just want to live this life you didn’t want in the first place, on your own, how you want, just like you always have. 

It feels like Rox is tearing her way through your neatly organized attic, upending everything she finds along the way, trying to find-

Dirk, you guess.

You don’t know how to tell her that your not sure there’s anything but dust left in the little compartment where her Dirk used to be.

“I know about Cal, Tricks.”

She doesn’t. “You don’t.” you grunt, throwing your hat onto the bed and running a hand through your birds nest of hair. You need some gel too. 

Right after you get shades.

“I don’t want you to.” you admit, just to try and get her off your back.

>Yeah. No other reason.

She lets out a frustrated breath. “I just want to help, Tricks. Wanted to help. You know he did too.”

Back to him. Ugh. Why was this broad so fucking persistent? “I don’t care and I don’t need your help.” you mutter. “It doesn’t matter anymore, anyway.”

“Yes it does!” she cries out, frustration obvious. Well, boohoo, you’re both miserable having this conversation. “You were being hurt and sure, you were being an ass about it, but that doesn’t mean you don’t-”

“You couldn’t even help yourself, Rox.” you say, a little meanly and not particularly sorry about it. You weren’t the only one who ended up isolated, after all. Everything had changed once the kids dropped, once Nanna was gone and the Old Man was in the wind.

Then you all were left scrounging for whatever control you could find in a world that was already outta your hands.

You weren’t some helpless child then and you certainly aren’t now.

Neither was she.

Rox just sounds sad and resigned when she speaks again. “Yeah. Well. The Game mindfucked all of us. I guess, you and me? We’re lucky that’s all it did, at least, until after the kids didn’t need us anymore.” She sniffs again. “You got the double whammy on that front, Tricks, I guess I don’t have an excuse like that.”

You don’t want a fucking excuse.

You don’t think you deserve one.

You can’t say for sure that things wouldn’t have gone the exact same way with or without Cal.

You know with that odd sort of certainty that Dave was strong enough to survive. To make himself stronger, to get where he needed to go. Though, with Dave, you know that strength and skill have never been where he’s faltered.

Fuck. You don’t want to think about this anymore.

“Can you just… give it a rest, Rox?” you very nearly plea. In your own monotonous way, of course.

She’s quiet for a moment then, very softly, she says, “I know, Tricks. I just… don’t want to see you give up again.” You don’t even have the energy to argue that. You hear a light tapping sound on the other end. “Well, fine. I’ll leave you alone for now, but I’ll be seeing you soon, Tricks.”

“Yeah, whatever.” you grunt and end the call.

Slowly, you lower yourself down to sit on the bed.

You bury your face in your hands and wonder what the fuck ‘see you soon’ means.

Chapter Text

>Jay: Drama? What drama? Enjoy a nice hike and meet your new grandchild.

Reluctant as you ever are to admit it, Johnny was almost certainly right! A good night’s sleep - or, uh, a good day of sleep? - did just the trick! Your tower and home are cleaner and more organized than they’ve ever been before!

Relatively, of course. Clutter and hoarding had always been a weakness of yours.

You’ve even managed to dig out all those old baby toys and necessities you had stocked up on when this has still been an exciting endeavor instead of a chore. It’s become exciting once again but only now that it’s actually happening!

You set it all up in your room for now, seeing as it was more than big enough to accommodate it all anyway.

Now, you’re staring at your phone - the prototype that’s more like a computer in your pocket, larger screen, smaller keyboard, struggles with making phone calls more than sending messages, you’re working on it - watching the time tick down and knowing that your wait is surely almost over.

You pack some gear into an old pack. Back from where you had spent hours and hours exploring the island and discovering new things. Some water, some snacks, baby food and formula because you’re not quite sure what sort of baby you’re getting here.

Then you shrug it all on and head out into the dense jungle.

You aren’t stupid enough to set yourself up right next to the landing zone though and you watch with a certain sort of awe as the meteor crashes, wind and heat hitting you not long after.

You shuffle your supplies back into bags and then shrug the pack back onto your shoulders, careful not to catch your unruly locks beneath the straps, and begin your trek anew.

You know exactly what you’re expecting to find in that crater so when you arrive on the scene and seen a large shape within the rapidly clearing smoke-

Your rifle is in your hands with hardly a thought. You draw back the bolt and the sound is loud enough to startle the man and snap his eyes up to you. You bare your teeth and his grip on your child tightens whether intentionally or not, you don’t care.

“Who the hell are you?” you bark and the man swallows.

The man shifts your child to his hip and tugs at the collar of his tacky, khaki shirt. “Now, now, dear, there’s no need-” You shift the butt more firmly against your shoulder and rest your finger on the trigger. 

Not even going to use the child as a shield? Amateur.

He laughs, nervous for good reason. “Jeb, at your service, ma’am.” he says, reaching up as if to grab a hat from his head and frowning when he finds nothing.

“What are you doing here?” you continue, eyes narrowing.

The man pushes his glasses up his nose and scratches at the back of his neck. “Well, you see, I’m not entirely certain myself. There’s been a mix up, of sorts, that has left me a bit… turned around.”

“‘Turned around?’” you echo, baffled. “You’re on a privately owned island in the middle of the pacific. You can’t just wander off and end up here!”

Jeb barks a laugh at that and shakes his head. “No, I suppose not. But I meant more in the… metaphysical sense.” he says with a wishy-washy wave of his hand. 

You huff. Whatever that was supposed to mean. Wasn’t like it mattered anyway, the only thing that mattered right now was, “Well, I’m not speaking metaphysically when I say: Put my kid down or I’m going to shoot you.”

Jeb blinks and glances down at his feet. “In the smouldering crater? Are you certain?”

Your lips purse. He’s got a point.

However, you want his hands off your kid as soon as possible. “Yes.” you say, with finality.

The man seems to think about this for a moment, pulling at one side of his moustache, then brightens and says, “I’ve got a better idea!”

And he throws the baby!

You fire as soon as he moves but your utter shock and intake of breath shifts your aim.

You’re not sure if you even come close to hitting Jeb but that doesn’t matter right now.

What matters is dropping the gun and diving after the screaming baby.

Your old bones protest and rattle as you hit the ground, baby securely in your grasp.

You breathe. In and out, in, out and roll onto your back, shushing the poor thing as you cradle him close to your chest.

The child finally begins to quiet and you force your weathered body to roll up to your feet.

You glance down into the crater but, of course, the man is gone. However, there are spots of blood trailing out of the crater. You’ve still got it!

Now, to get somewhere safe and hope that the man bleeds out somewhere and you don’t have to worry about him again.

>Jeb: Try not to bleed out!

Bleed out? Pshaw. You’re made of tougher stuff than that! This is merely a flesh wound, nothing you haven’t dealt with before.

However, the blood is soaking rapidly into your trousers and turning them a rusty brown. The great downside of khakis! Everything stains!

Besides, the weight of your disappointment is doing a lot to muffle the pain in your calf.

You tear a strip from your shirt to use for bandages and grumble about how Jade would’ve never missed that shot. Had you been facing your dear granddaughter, you wouldn’t currently be breathing, of that you are certain.

But, then again, if you had been facing your granddaughter, everything would be so much simpler now. It didn’t help that you couldn’t find Beck either. Poor old boy was nowhere to be found and that left an unsettled feeling in your gut.

You sigh. There wasn’t anything else to be done about it now, however. That child wasn’t your Jade and neither was that woman though you’d already suspected this to be the case with your observations.

She was a Jade, certainly, but that alone wasn’t good enough for you.

Satisfied with your makeshift bandages, you begin to limp through the forests and to the cliffs.

You dig around the foliage at the cliff’s edge until you find a backpack and laugh. Universal constants always tickled you.

Then, you strapped the pack on and jumped off the cliff.

You pulled the chute quickly and slowly drifted down to the shoreline below. Unfortunately, both wounded and no longer a young man, you don’t quite stick the landing. But! You roll back up onto your feet in a rather smooth motion, if you do say so yourself, and the twinge in your back is hardly painful at all! “Ha!” you crow. “Still got it!”

Skimming your hand along the cliffside, you finally find what you’re really looking for: a button. A button that, in another world, you had installed, just in case.

The stone facade slides up and away when you press it, revealing a cavern where a dock and a few boats sit, hidden away.

You hum and examine the gasoline containers.

Yes. There’s certainly enough there for you to make it all the way to Australia if you so desired. You might just have to! Your navigation is a little bit rusty, Australia’s a much larger target to hit than some of the other islands. You also know that you’ll be able to catch a plane to just about anywhere there.

You’ll be able to find out if any of the others made it here with you, wherever here is, now that you know for certain that your granddaughter isn’t on the island.

You think you’d rather like a bit of company this time around.

Why be lonely, if you don’t have to be?

>Roxy: Meet an old friend.

Yeah. Right. 

And old friend.

Jeff isn’t an anything anymore. Not to you. Not to Tricks. He belongs solely to this world and that means that, no matter what, he isn’t yours. He never was. Might never be. 

See, you know that there are universal constants. In your little slice of the universe - you aren’t ignorant enough to think that your world is the only one - your dysfunctional families are one such constant. In whatever configuration you’re spat out in. 

You are absolutely terrified to find out if you and Jeff are another. 

Not that- that-

Really, you and Jeff - and Tricks no matter what that bastard says - you were hardly anything to begin with. Sure, you spent most’a high school living in each others pockets under Nanna’s roof but, well… well…

You were broken long before you were legal. Hell, you were broken before you even hit double digits. Who knew paranoia and a sense of impending doom could really fuck a kid up?

Well, that and the foster care system of the 80s. You aren’t sure you would’ve survived that if you hadn’t met Tricks. Fate or code or whatever makes the universe spin had brought you together and there was a feeling deep in your chest that you and Tricks would always find each other.

Jeff, though, he was inherently different to the both of you. He didn’t have the same knowing dread, the constant thrum of anticipation.

He couldn’t create code or life from nothing. Couldn’t tear himself to pieces to hold himself together. Couldn’t wipe away a scraped knee like it never happened. Couldn’t believe so hard in a certain outcome that reality seemed desperate to accommodate.

No. Jeff was normal. Like a breath of fresh air, he had no connection to the Game, other than being Nanna’s kid.

You had always had a hypothesis that there was a sense of otherness to you all that kept other people away. Kept you isolated. The same thing that drew you to each other sent everyone else away. 

Except Jeff.

Jeff hadn’t liked you at first but he at least came by it honestly, you knew. He had routines and patterns that he kept to and you and Tricks had barreled into his life and upturned it all.

>Roxy: Reminisce. 

Nanna - well, she had still been just Mom then, reluctant as you had been to call her that - Miss Egbert, you decide as a compromise with your memories, discovered you and Tricks the fourth time you’d run away from your current group home. 

The only reason you’d even gotten to the point of having a fourth escape attempt is because there really wasn’t anywhere else for you both to go. 12 going on 13, long unadoptable, kicked out of multiple foster homes, and declared too smart for their own good by anyone who’d had the pleasure of knowing them.

It always amazed you that the same adults that pushed you to achieve could say you’re too smart like it’s a bad thing.

“Is that irony?” you asked Tricks, arms thrown out as you use the curb as a balance beam rather than walking on the sidewalk normally. “That’s ironic, right?”

Tricks scoffed. “It’s fuckin’ stupid.” he muttered, slouched alongside you, Lil Cal draped across his shoulders, hands shoved in his pockets. “Doesn’t matter anyway,” he drawled, lazily but with convincation, “Lil Cal promised they ain’t catching us this time.”

You had thrown Lil Cal away for, like, the twelfth time four days ago. Even now, almost 20 years later, you’re not sure whether Tricks was fishing the damn thing out or the dumpster or- or-

You glared at Lil Cal - had he been looking at you this whole time? - and his glassy blue eyes stared glassily back.

You shivered and looked away. 

You didn’t say that that’s what Tricks claimed last time they ran but you did give him a serious side eye and got pushed off the curb for your trouble.

Miss Egbert had always been a classy broad with a penchant for the familiar and uncertainty towards technological advancement that was making the world unfamiliar. Meaning that despite her son’s assurances and polite insistences, she had booked them round trip on a train.

4 days. Both ways.

When Jeff had decided to stop simply tolerating them and actually try and enjoy the company, he’d crack jokes about how he wished he had been more convincing or airports had better marketing. Then he never would have had to share his home or wake up at the crack of dawn to beat Tricks into the shower.

Because it was at the station that Miss Egbert had stumbled upon you.

Tricks and that stupid puppet had been trying to get you cheap last, minute tickets to anywhere. He was trying to be as casual as a 12 year old by himself could be. Really, they were banking on a worker at the counter that simply didn’t care enough to report them.

You were creeping nearby, keeping an eye out for cops or suspicious authority figures. 

Instead, your eyes fixed on a woman across the platform. A small, plump woman in a mint green skirt suit and dainty white heels. She was the sort of woman you’d always looked at and dreamed of growing into.

There was some scrawny kid at her side, dressed like a little business man or perhaps more like those little prep school kids you and Tricks had tussled with before.

It was the boy who spotted you first. His head tilted, dark eyes watching you with a placid sort of curiosity.

You sigh. Unflappable, even as a know-nothing ten year old.

You had grinned and waved. He had blinked, surprise perhaps, but waved back. Just a slight lift of his hand, really, but you were counting it!

That was what had drawn Miss Egbert’s attention to you.

When her bright blue eyes met yours, you knew. It knocked the breath out of you, her eyes widening spoke of much the same on her end.

It was the same sensation you experienced when you met Tricks the first time.

And the rest, as they say, was history.

>Roxy: Meet an old friend!

C’mon. You’ve already been over this. 

You aren’t meeting him.

Not yet, at least.

Instead, you’re going to be doing some… observation from afar.

Which certainly doesn’t include tapped phones. No. That’s crazy! And definitely stalking! You wouldn’t- You’d never do that. That’d be a serious invasion of privacy!

You are so respectful of other people’s privacy.

Sitting in the dingiest little internet cafe ever and watching Tricks prowl across LA definitely didn’t count. Not to mention, Tricks almost certainly knew you were keeping an eye on him and wasn’t doing shit about it.

That was pretty much permission, right?

Right.

Occasionally, you catch glimpses of the littler Strider as well. Admittedly, you’re way fucking excited to get to meet the kid. He seems like a riot and a half.

Also, there’s… less emotional attachment or expectations when it comes to Dave, unlike Rose, who you’re frightened to see again and have her… not know you. Even if she’s not technically your Rose at all.

You rest your chin on your hand and let out a long breath, watching Tricks look between two different pairs of sunglasses that look identical to you. Not like he’s going to pick either of them anway, you know they aren’t what he’s looking for. Tricks likes his things and things his way. It’s tearin’ him up that he doesn’t have those stupid pointy shades.

You’re both going to have to learn to get over yourselves.

“Those look like some heavy thoughts, dear.”

You lean back and press a hand to your forehead. “You’re tellin’ me.” you huff.

Then, you freeze.

>Roxy: Meet. An. Old. Friend.

Your head snaps up and to the side and you gasp because-

There she is.

Grin bright and blue eyes mischievous and- and-

You throw yourself into her arms and burst into tears.

>Roxy: Be GAMEUSER_USER_NOT_FOUND.

>...what the fuck?

>GAMEUSER_USER_NOT_FOUND: Uh. Is this thing still on?

>Oh, well. Worth a shot.

>GAMEUSER_USER_NOT_FOUND: Wake up.

Sensation comes back to you slowly, starting at the furthest prong and slowly creeping inward.

The first thing you feel is goo. It surrounds you completely, warm and comforting. Familiar but in a way that reminds you of better times, long, long ago.

Then comes the pain, shattering nostalgia and the illusion of peace.

Fronds, upper and lower, a dull ache.

Even just your increasing respiration aggravates your burning, raw windhole.

You grimace and, finally, you open your ganderbulbs.

It takes a few minutes of just blinking before the room resolves into a clear image. The room around the recuperacoon is dark grey steel. Thankfully, there’s no crimson in sight which has you breathing a little easier.

Though you imagine the Condesce would’ve simply finished the job rather than take you captive once more.

No point in making an example of someone twice, after all.

Which leaves the question:

Where exactly are you?

>GAMEUSER_USER_NOT_FOUND: Get some answers.

Your first attempt to stand outside of the recuperacoon ends up with you flat on your face.

You groan and push yourself up on shaking fronds until you’re at least sitting up instead of laid out flat.

Your think pan was still spinning but, fuck, progress was progress.

You take a deep breath and let it out very slowly, concern growing at how it rasps through your windhole.

Then, you get a deathgrip on the edge of the recuperacoon and drag yourself upwards.

This world has knocked you down, fucked you over, so many times this life, the last, almost certainly the next if you’re really lucky, you’ve become an expert in getting back up. 

You won’t be kept down.

…

But, well, you are older right now than you’ve ever been and… it does wear on you.

You feel old. Maybe you are old. Not like you know how many sweeps you’re supposed to live. None of you have lived long enough, yet, to find out.

Ugh. Depressing. Shit. You haven’t been awake long enough to be dealing with that line of thoughts.

You let go of the recuperacoon and are relieved when you don’t immediately end up back on your face, though your fronds still shake with effort.

You grin despite yourself.

Maybe you’ll make it out of this stupidass room after all.

>GAMEUSER_USER_NOT_FOUND: Push your luck.

You’re more than happy to do just that. It’s one of those things you think is ingrained in the core of your being and your ancestor’s - descendant's? Don’t know how to leave well enough alone or, perhaps, quit while you are ahead.

Death or culling had always nipped at your heels, all of you, so why not make the most of what time you did or did not have?

So, you take one shaky step and then another and another until you’ve got enough momentum and confidence to make it out the door.

It whooshes open when you finally step in front of it which is just one more piece of evidence towards you not being captive here.

Latul- Redglare would’ve been proud of your deductive reasoning.

Or she would’ve mocked you ceaselessly for not figuring it out faster.

You press a prong to your torso as the ache in your blood pusher grows, for reasons not related to your previous injuries.

You wonder if Redglare made it out. You wonder if Mindfang let her.

You’re thankful, in many ways, that Redglare had Mindfang to focus her attention on. If the Grand Highblood had set her on you, you wouldn’t have outrun her for long.

You shake yourself and those thoughts out of your think pan.

You stumble your way into what has to be the cockpit and relief swamps you when you see Porrim at the helm.

Your breath hitches which is enough to catch her attention. She turns fully towards you without speaking which tells you that she’s expecting Meulin. It’s an even greater relief to know that your moirail is alive as well.

Porrim presses both of her hands to her mouth when she realizes who she’s actually looking at. “Kankri.” she gasps and you can’t remember the last time your actual name came out of her mouth. It actually shocks you enough that when she throws herself at you, you go toppling back to the floor and her with you.

Not that you mind, your clutching her as hard as she’s squeezing you, after all.

You’re alive.

You’re all fucking alive!