Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He wakes up to a warping, lurching feeling in his stomach that feels not entirely dissimilar to the sensation of getting dragged into Two’s pocket dimension. He lets out a disoriented groan as he tries to figure out what the hell is happening, vision still blurry with the remnants of sleep. He’s off balance, and the side of him that had been leaning forward is chilly, as if he had spent the entire night slumped against ice or something.

Wait. Ah. Hm. Right. So that makes sense, at least. But the lurching sensation of being displaced through space certainly didn’t. There was no way Two had managed to get themselves together and send him back to where he was supposed to be in… what? The span of a night? And Four and X have no reason to send him to their pocket dimensions. Eternal algebra and whatever X has are punishments he hasn’t done anything to deserve. So what the hell is the source of that awful sensation?

Finally, after blinking and scrubbing furiously at his eyes, he gets his answer. For one, he’s on a wide couch, so comfortable he’s practically sinking into it. He’s trapped beneath a heavy night sky, far darker than the sky he’s used to, and the only thing in the sky is a massive orange moon casting its light over everything in the room, painting it all in garish colors. Across from him is a coffee table, a big screen with nothing being displayed on it, and…

Another chair, the same color but a lot shorter. Not the thing that should be catching his attention, but he’s good at compartmentalizing. As for the person sitting on it…

“Hello there, Clock,” says One, staring at him with wide, intense eyes. Her voice sounds exactly the way he imagined it, bright and friendly but with an edge of something to it. “I’m so glad we finally get to meet. I’ve heard so much about you.”

“Funny,” he says, trying to keep his breathing as even as possible. “I could say the same about you.”

She laughs. “Well, you can’t trust everything you hear, can you?” she prompts, and although her voice is airy and amused, that steely, analytical look in her eyes hasn’t gone away. Clock can’t help but feel as if he’s pinned to the back of the couch, being examined like he was an insect mounted to a wall.

“Maybe not,” he retorts with a scoff. “But I don’t think I can exactly trust the maniac going around kidnapping my friends, either.”

One summons a hand made from magic and presses it against her cheek, smiling wryly. “Oh? Do you consider Needle a friend?” she says, tone curious as she smiles widely. “Last time I checked, you resented her for abandoning you, or did that change? Hard to keep an eye on things when you’re in Two’s clutches, after all.”

Right. He doesn’t like that at all. “Creepy,” he says dryly. “You aren’t exactly helping your case, you know. Spying on people doesn’t exactly make them partial to trusting you. So why not cut to the chase and get to what you took me for?”

“Patience,” she chides, smiling. “Don’t worry, though. We’ll get to that. First, though…” Her smile takes on a sardonic edge to it as she leans forward, and he can’t help but lean back nervously. It’s power she wants? Doesn’t she have enough of that, able to unnerve anyone with just a glance thrown their way? “You, Four, and X, hm? I wouldn’t have coined you as the sort of person they’d be interested in.” She says the word interested with intense, foreboding weight, and although he can bite back the shudder at that fact, he can’t hide the goosebumps that prickle along his legs.

“It came as a surprise to me, too,” he relents, rolling his eyes. “But I don't really think-”

“Rather fascinating, is it not?” she continues, steamrolling right over him without a care in the world. “Of course, I doubt it’s you they’re interested in. Algebrailians are awfully possessive of their toys. Certainly not love by your standards, at any rate.”

“Like you are with Ice Cube?” he hisses, righteous fury scorching through him at the callous, dismissive way she speaks of his friend. “She’s not just-!”

“Not who I was thinking of, but I suppose she fits what I mean,” she says calmly, once more cutting to rush him off just as a tirade was bubbling on his lips. She so effortlessly steers the conversation he can’t help but feel horribly small. “For as predictable as you objects can be, you’re different. Amusing. It should hardly come as a surprise that you’re viewed as something fascinating to us Algebrailians. We don’t have anything like you. So yes, Clock, you’re a toy. You, Ice Cube, Gaty, and Fanny, too.” She says the last name with a significance that makes his skin crawl, but he can’t imagine why. What importance does Fanny have that Ice Cube lacks? As far as he knows, their situation is nearly identical. “Is that really love to you?”

“I don’t think this is really rele-” he begins to protest.

“Answer the question, Clock,” she says lowly, her voice dropping an octave as it takes on the same intensity as her eyes. Seized by a fight-or-flight instinct, he tightly presses himself against the couch, breathing heavily.

“Yes? No? D-Does it really matter?!” he stammers, doubting each word as he says it.

“Well, I think it does,” One croons, her eyes wide and concerned. “I’d imagine love is as important to you objects as it is to us. Are you truly willing to waste your time with two people whose love could never be equal to yours, two people whom you fear above all else, when their interest could last your whole life for all you know? I would have thought time would be important to you, as a clock…” Each word is laden with significance, as if she’s trying to force them directly through his ears to his mind.

It’s not like she’s wrong, per say. There’s an inherent imbalance to his relationship with the two Algebrailians. Boundaries are difficult for them at the best of times, and they argue and bicker like his love can be won, if they just try hard enough. They drag him every which way, engage in activities he can’t help but find unnerving at best and horrifying at worst (seriously, what the hell is the deal with them ripping off their arms to impress each other and him? If he had arms, he wouldn’t treat them so poorly), and are generally unpredictable to the point of instability. Being with them is… culture shock, to say the least.

Except. Except, except, except. For as correct as One may be in this regard, there’s nuance to the matter. For one thing, Four and X really do try. They’re eager to learn, constantly pelting him with questions that he can’t help but roll his eyes at. They try their hardest to be receptive to what he wants, peppering him with compliments since the moment he let slip that his preferred love language is words of affirmation. They make him feel loved and wanted and remembered, and for all that he doesn’t reciprocate their feelings, he stays with them because they make him happy.

Ugh, wait, hang on, saying that they make him happy is way too sappy. It’s not necessarily wrong, but there’s nuance. Their actions make him happy, not them themselves. It’s not- he doesn’t really- with everything with Winner- well, they don’t want him. Not in the same way he wants them. So it’s… complicated? Sure, let’s go with complicated.

“Don’t talk about things you don’t understand,” he grits out, his voice firm and clipped.

“You think I don’t understand?” she parrots, a wide, vicious grin spreading across her face. “As if I’m not acquainted with Four and X. As if I haven’t been told so many things about you directly from them, things that don’t paint the best picture of them viewing you as remotely an equal…” She trails off, letting the smile fall from her face as her words hang in the air, before shrugging. “But you’re right, this isn’t relevant. So let’s get into the true reason why I brought you here, shall we?”

The whiplash makes his head spin as he lets out a choked, confused noise. “Then what was the point of-?!” he begins to hiss in frustration, but he’s stopped short when she waves her hand, formed of magic, and produces a contract, seating it down on the table dividing the two. That thin sliver of wood is the only division he has from her, and now not even that is safe, the contract deposited upon it like a threat or promise of sorts.

“I’m interested in making a deal,” One croons. “Of course, that should hardly come as a surprise to you. But this deal can benefit us both.”

“Do you really think I’m dumb enough to fall for that?!” he snaps impatiently. “After everything Ice Cube and Fanny told-”

“At least let me finish,” she replies with a pout. She’s one to talk, considering she keeps constantly cutting him off. “I’ll be honest, Clock. For as much as Four and X are interested in you, I hadn’t thought you capable of being an issue. You were far too wrapped up in your own problems for that. So I let Four and X have their fun with you. But then they brought you back, and Fanny had to get involved. I’m surprised that she seems to have grown a spine. That’s something to address later. And now…”

“Now?” he echoes, because at least this way he can get a word in edgewise. He decides he’s going to ignore what she said about Fanny for now, because she can probably handle that. Maybe. She does bite.

“Now you’re getting in my way,” she says evenly, tilting her head. “Taking back Icy from me was a low blow, you know. I didn’t think you had that in you.”

“She’s my friend,” he hisses. “I wasn’t just going to leave her with you.” He eyes One, who remains silent, and emboldened, he begins to continue. “And anyway-”

“Ice Cube is mine!” she snaps the moment he stops expecting it, and her voice is filled with such sharp vitriol that he can’t help but flinch back, breathing heavily as he stares at her. “Four and X can play with you all they want, but I have my own toys. What right do you have to take them from me?”

“Neither of them belong to you!” he retorts in frustration.

“They signed the contract. They agreed to anything I could have to offer,” she retorts airily. “What I do with them from there is none of your concern. Besides, dear Icy has been eliminated from Two’s show. What other role could she play save for one beneath my heel?”

The dismissive, derisive way she talks about his friend makes his blood boil, and he scowls. “As long as I’m here–hell, as long as Four and X love me, I won’t let you get to anybody I care about!” he yells. “You might as well give up now, because I won’t sign your damn contract!”

“Oh? I wouldn’t be so quick to claim that,” she calmly replies, slipping back into her calm, professional mask. It’s so fake he could gag on the saccharine sweetness. “You haven’t even heard what I intend to offer you yet.”

“What?” he snaps, his voice barely above a hiss. “What in the world could you give me that would make me turn my back on my friends?!” Protecting Fanny and Ice Cube is the only thing he finds he’s good for, at least at the moment. It doesn’t matter what One could offer (and he’s learnt that the pool is truly limitless with her), because stripping himself of his usefulness feels like a nightmare.

“Let’s forget Four and X for a moment, shall we?” she says with a smirk. “It’s no secret you don’t have a lot of interest in them. You feel trapped with them. Suffocated, as it were.”

“...I-I don’t hate the feeling of suffocation,” he tries to weakly defend, shuffling in place.

“Astounding what you objects can get used to, isn’t it? But I know you long to be free from it. I know you long for a little more than that, too.” 

Snapping the fingers on her detached hand, the TV screen turns on, displaying the interior of a room he assumes to be Book’s, based on the decor. In it sit Pillow, Book, Price Tag, Winner, and Yellow Face, and he recognizes the books, papers, and dice from his own sessions of Goikys and Dragons.

“...encounter a fearsome dragon, perched atop a pile of gold O.o! He lets out an ear splitting roar. Seems like he’s not going to give it up without a fight >~<... Roll for initiative ',:D!” intones Price Tag, their voice going from deep and foreboding to excited and inviting within the span of just a sentence. They’re really good at building tension. He can’t blame Just Not for preferring them as their dungeon master.

One waves a foot and the audio suddenly dies down, although the screen continues to move as it cuts to Winner. They look like they’re having fun, grinning at both Book and Yellow Face in equal measure. They never looked that happy with him. If anything, they always looked sort of nervous. He could never dream of blaming them for that, of course, because he pushed their boundaries uncomfortably far, but it still hurts. He still loves them. He doesn’t think that’s the sort of thing that will go away. If not reciprocation, he just wants them to be friends. That would be nice.

And yet, he screwed it all up. He’s really good at that. The two can’t even be in the same room together without the air growing violently tense, or so he views it. Just because they made up doesn’t automatically fix all the ways he hurt them. He knows that. He can’t expect things to automatically go on the mend for them, not when they don’t talk for months. But still, he wants… Just… Anything. He’d trade Four and X for them in a heartbeat.

“Don’t they look so happy?” One purrs, leaning against the arm of her chair. “Happy now that they’re free from you. All you ever did was make them uncomfortable and miserable. But of course, you know that.”

“Of course I do,” he whispers, slumping. No matter what he does, he just screws up, sending out all the wrong messages in the process. How the hell did he end up netting Four and X when he just wanted Winner? He doesn’t care about power, no matter how much the two try to show off. Winner is just so humble and so kind and so accepting, willing to give him a fresh start even after he nearly ruined things completely. They’re everything he isn’t.

“They would love to try to be friends, of course, so long as you put in the effort to change,” she continues with a hum, and Clock can’t help but shudder as the last word is uttered. “But you want a little bit more than that, don’t you?”

His face flushes with harsh warmth as he lets out a choked sound. “Y-You- T-That’s not-” he sputters all while One watches him, her expression drenched in amusement. Why is this the one time she decides not to interrupt him? “What does this matter?” he hisses in frustration.

“You’ve made mistakes. Mistakes that ruin even a friendship with them, much less what you want.” She smiles, and this one feels more real, sharp and wicked. He hates it. “Not to mention the mess with Four and X… Well, your chances of reciprocation are low. But I have a way I can fix that. All you have to do is sign this contract, and when you open your eyes, you’ll have everything you could ever want. Your old team would have never forgotten you. You would have never screwed things up with Winner, and they would feel the same way you do. Someone else would have been eliminated in your place so you two can compete alongside each other and you would have never have become entangled with Four and X. Doesn’t that sound perfect?”

Her words take on a breathy, amazed quality to them as she widens her eyes at him, smiling all the while. As ashamed as he is to admit it, he had found himself becoming swept up in One’s words. Because he can’t stop himself from wanting. He can’t stop himself from loving. If all of the things that had caused him to spiral had never happened, if he hadn’t gotten obsessed with the idea of being remembered and thus fearing being forgotten, if he hadn’t pushed way too far with Winner, if he never had to deal with Four and X-!

God, doesn’t that all just sound amazing? He can’t help but feel a muted sort of awe as he contemplates it, unable to fully bite back his smile at the idea. He could remain in the game, remain at Winner’s side, instead of being shoved away in Two’s pocket dimension, where people have long since stopped thinking of him. He could be loved by an equal, by a person, and just as equally reciprocate that love.

But… If he did that, it wouldn’t be… “So… what?” he whispers. “If I sign this contract, you can just make all of these things happen for me?”

“So long as you stay out of my way, I can give you anything you want,” she says invitingly.

The idea is tempting. Horribly so. He can’t help but get the feeling that he’s on the verge of making a deal with the devil. “Winner will love me,” he numbly mumbles. “That… would be nice. But if they fall in love with me because of a contract, does that… really count?” His breath hitches as he stares down at his lap. “It wouldn’t be real. I wouldn’t be what I want!”

One tilts her head as she appraises this. “If I included in the deal that you’ll forget that a life where you could actually be happy was something you had to sign a contract for, would you be happy with that?” she prompts leadingly.

“I dunno,” he whispers, curling in on himself. “I-I don’t-!”

“It’s an easy choice, Clock,” One says, an impatient edge to her words. “You can finally be happy, and better yet, free from Four and X. They’d take up all of your life otherwise, and we both know that. All you have to do is keep to yourself and stop trying to spoil my fun.” The last five words come out as a hiss that makes him flinch back. She seems to notice this, because her smile takes on a sheepish edge that feels entirely fake as she shrugs unrepentantly. “Honestly, Clock, you should feel glad. I’m never this generous. You wouldn’t want to spurn me, would you? I’m sure Fanny and Icy can tell you that I’m not particularly agreeable when angry.”

He can’t help but let out an anxious whine even as he knows that showing such outright vulnerability is doing nothing but making himself an easier target. Algebrailians don’t respond well to weakness, especially not with how much they value strength. It’s literally one of the standards their culture is built around when it comes to romance.

But he’s not strong at all, as proven by the fact that he’s on the verge of being fucking swayed by One’s honeyed words, as if he can trust her. As if his happiness is truly so reliant on a piece of paper.

…He’s such a bad person. Winner would hate him if they knew he was even considering her offer. Forcing them to love him doesn’t make him real, no matter what he wants it to be. Either he earns it through change, which feels impossible when he’s so easily swept up by his wants and fears, or he learns to live with the ache of a one sided love. He’s been resigned to that.

And yet, here’s this contract on the table in front of him, offering to instantly fast track him into all he’s ever wanted in life. A team that remembers him, a shot in the competition, Four and X no longer being so obsessed with him…

Winner.

It’s easy. His life can receive the change he wants, but he himself doesn’t have to change to achieve it. It’s easy. Or it could be, anyway. He could have it all for just the measly cost of…

He’s considering it again. Why the fuck is he considering it? He has to turn down One’s offer right now before he manages to talk himself into something he can’t back out of. But the more he thinks about it, the less reasons to deny the offer come to mind. It’s all a question of morals. If he had any of those, he wouldn’t hate himself for being an awful person.

“I’m not turning my back on Ice Cube and Fanny,” he says, hating how his voice wobbles under the weight of its uncertainty.

“You don’t have to worry about them,” she says sweetly. “Breaking what belongs to me too soon would just be a bad investment.” She’s really not doing a job of making sure her intentions with the two are pure. How long can anyone last under the thumb of an Algebrailian being purposefully cruel instead of cluelessly? It doesn’t matter if they have fangs like Fanny or an iron will like Ice Cube. Eventually, they’ll be brought to heel, and Clock is startled by the realization that whatever One intends to do to them, he won’t recognize them when they’re done.

He won’t recognize himself if he’s just granted a life where he can be happy, because that isn’t him. Of course it takes thinking about himself to spur him into action, leaning forward to shove the contract off the table with grit teeth.

“I’m not signing your damn contract,” he spits.

“Stubborn,” she notes with narrowed eyes as she watches the contract float down to the floor. “Gaty was too, you know.”

He flinches at the mention of the missing object, the memory of Two laying listlessly in bed flitting through his mind. Their grieving, distraught expression suddenly becomes a hell of a lot more real to him, and as nonsensical as the thought is, he doesn’t want Four and X to be reduced to that.

“Do your worst,” he whispers, wishing he could sound more confident. “I don’t care what you have to offer me. I’m not signing your damn contract!”

“Hm.” One doesn’t look all too bothered by his declaration. “Well, that’s fine. As long as you continue to be a hindrance to my plans, I have no qualms with keeping you here as long as I need to.”

He just scoffs. “Four and X will come for me,” he says dismissively. “All I have to do is make it… what, a day with you? Ice Cube managed it, so I can too.” He folds one leg over another as he leans against the back of the couch, tossing her a smile that stretches uncomfortably across his face. To be honest, he’s unnerved by One, and he can’t help but worry about what she’ll stoop to for the sake of receiving his signature, but he can’t let any of that show more than he already has.

“A day?” One prompts, eyes comically wide as she folds one leg over the other, as if to mimic him. It makes her look at ease and in control of things all at once. What kind of power play is that supposed to be…? “Are you sure it hasn’t been longer than that?”

He squints at her. Maybe the widening of her eyes was meant to hide the slight intense glint that appeared in them, one that he thinks he can pick up on if he focuses hard enough. “Uh… yeah, I’m pretty sure?” he says dubiously. “I mean, I’m literally a clock. I can keep track of the time that goes by.”

One laughs at him, kicking one leg in the air as she does so. He squirms uncomfortably again. “Can you?” she says. “Tell me, how long have you been here?”

Usually, when people ask him what time it is, he just snaps at them to learn how to read analogue clocks, because he’s not going to be some cuckoo clock spitting out the time every hour. But he gets the odd feeling that One is testing him, and he doubts he’ll like what will happen if he fails. “Eighteen minutes and thirty-two seconds,” he snaps, rolling his eyes. “You seriously think I wouldn’t keep track of that?”

“Are you sure it’s been that long?” she probes, and he bares his teeth in frustration. Usually when he does that, it serves as a sign for Four and X to back off, but One just smiles wider, as if she knows that she was getting on his nerves more than she already was. “Just when did I take you?”

“I-It was-” he stammers, before biting down hard on his tongue when he realizes how his voice wobbles. He can’t give her that satisfaction. “It was this morning. 8:12. The day after Four and X took me back from the elimination area. I fell asleep next to Icy.”

“And you’re confident?” One croons as she leans forward. The strange lighting in the room casts a shadow over her face, making her look intense and intimidating. “Are you sure you aren’t misremembering? How painful it would be for you, if you got a fact wrong and you were actually here for far longer than you believed. Wouldn’t that be proof that Four and X wouldn’t come for you?”

“Maybe it would be,” he relents, even if he knows that might end up being a mistake. “But I know how much time has passed. I wouldn’t forget a whole day or longer. Keeping track of time is the one thing I’m good at! So no. I’m not worried. I haven’t even been here for half an hour, I’ve been back in the real world for a day, and Four and X will come for me. Hope you didn’t mind some facts for you.” He smiles sardonically at her, but his smile falters when her own grin takes on a disquietingly sharp edge.

“So that’s it. You judge the time passing based on your clock hands?” One asks, and he finds himself reminded of Four and X to a disquieting degree. Always asking, always searching, always pelting him with questions as if that will be enough to bridge the gap between them.

“I have a pretty good internal clock too,” he says stiffly, haughtily jutting out his chin. His internal clock is good, yes, but it does better when it has things like a sky to judge the relative time. The rest of him relies on the consistent rhythm of each of his clock hands, to the point where he’s physically aware of each second, and can focus on it as opposed to letting the passing of it fade into the background noise of his general existence. He relies on that rhythm, that consistency. That’s why sudden changes make him feel so dizzy, and the feeling of being off the current time is so disorienting. His entire experience revolves around time. He doesn’t exactly do well when he’s suddenly thrown off of it.

“Yes, that’s just one of the many things Four and X have told me about you,” she muses, and he can’t help but fidget in discomfort as he’s all too suddenly reminded of the two’s collaboration with her. And they really can’t keep their mouths shut when it comes to him, so One probably knows everything about him.

…Everything, including his reliance on the consistency of time. Oh, shit.

Is that what she’s trying to do here? Confuse him into dazed disorientation, in which he’ll be so dizzy and panicked that he’ll end up signing the contract anyway? He likes to think he’s capable of keeping a level head, especially when the stakes are so high. Protecting the people he cares for is all he’s capable of doing. Why would he willingly give that up?

“Listen, whatever you’re trying to do here, it’s not working!” he snaps. “I know what time it is, I know how long I’ve been gone, and Four and X will come for me!” One’s smile just grows wider at that declaration, steely, unshakable confidence glinting in her dark eyes, and he can’t help but falter, drawing back as he breathes heavily. “They… They will.” he insists, even as his voice breaks. “Fanny and Icy will tell them that I’m- and they love me, they wouldn’t just leave me here! I-I’m not going to rot away here, so stop staring at me like that!” His eyes sting with tears as he breathes heavily, and he knows all he’s doing is leaving an opening for One to swoop in and take advantage of, but he can’t just sit there and take this.

She doesn’t respond to his words outright. She just lets out a hum, adjusting her position on the armchair. “If Four and X don’t come for you within a day, the odds are pretty low that they’ll remember to come for you anytime after that. They’re awfully scatterbrained, you know. I don’t exactly have faith in them…”

“They’ll remember me,” he hisses. “They kept sending me letters, and even after they couldn’t anymore, they remembered me well enough to bring me back to see me in person. It doesn’t matter how much time passes-!”

“Let’s test that, shall we?” One says calmly. “Time will pass, and perhaps your mind will change. You said it best yourself, after all; you know how much time has passed.” Her voice remains even and unfazed, but there’s a sharp, conniving edge to her that makes him breathe heavily, fear constricting in his gut.

“What are you going to-?!” he begins to cry, but he’s abruptly cut off by One summoning a hand made from energy and snapping her finger. The moment she does so, he sees a light turn on, reflecting inside the glass of his clock face. The light’s in him? But-

All of his thoughts drop abruptly from his mind as his clock hands begin to move. Immediately, he gasps, the feeling so invasive and wrong. He can’t help but scream as he squirms in place, desperate and terrified at the outright invasion of his body, his privacy, his mind.

His clock hands lurch to a stop a moment later, and he groans as he leans forward, letting out a nauseated groan. The rhythm is all off, the ticking of each second happening exactly when it shouldn’t. His clock is reading 2:01, so distinctly off from where it had been, but he knows clocks aren’t reputable, daylight savings is annoying. Time hasn’t passed. She’s just trying to throw him off.

“What the hell was that for?!” he barks, bristling in indignation. His head is spinning, but it’s not that bad. The day Four and X had spent messing around with his clock hands, laughing at his disorientation and excitedly trying to get him to do tasks in the kitchen while his vision spun and he felt on the verge of throwing up was decidedly worse. But at least he knew their intentions hadn’t been malicious. They had just been amused by him, watching him with such adoration that the most he could do was simply grumble about it.

One, though? Her intentions are far from kind. He needs to be on his guard as much as he can, keeping his wits about him as he tries to stop her from getting to him… which is a lot more difficult when his head is spinning and he feels like he’s going to be sick. The rhythm, it’s all– tock, tick, tock, tick– It’s wrong. If he was standing, he would be staggering around as his legs turn to jelly below him.

“Just testing,” she says with a hum. “Looks like you’re still pretty coherent, hm? But you look pretty dazed…”

“I won’t let you use that to your advantage,” he hisses even as he sinks into the chair. The back of the chair is far too plush and light, giving so easily into his weight that it doesn’t do anything to ground him. He just feels like he’s floating or caught in quicksand, and the uneven rhythm jabbing sharply at the back of his mind like a jackhammer doesn’t do much at all to help the sensation.

“Big words for someone who can’t even look at me,” she teases, and he grits his teeth as he tries to focus his vision. His eyes grow unfocused with each tick of his second hand, the rhythm the opposite of what he expects it to be. But it’s fine. He’s not so weak as to give in that easily. If he cares about Ice Cube at all-

Ignoring her entirely, he moves to readjust his clock hands by pressing the switch on the back that pops open his glass clock face. He gets as far as moving his foot toward his clock hands before One shuts the glass with a wave of her foot, causing a wince from him as his foot gets caught.

“Oh, no, we can’t have you do that,” she croons lowly. “Before we continue, Clock, indulge me for a moment. Just what time is it?”

He can’t help it–he hesitates. He opens his mouth to say something, but inevitably stutters, because he doesn’t really know. When did she start messing with his clock hands…? It couldn’t have been longer than five minutes ago, but two doesn’t really sound right. Neither does one or three, to be honest. He would be able to puzzle it eventually, he’s sure, if he didn’t feel like his brain was coated in honey and each tick of hand didn’t come at exactly the time he didn't expect it to, causing a painful feeling of vertigo echoing in his ears.

“Well, it hasn’t turned nine yet,” is eventually what he settles on, because the longer he’s silent the wider One’s smirk grows. “Hasn’t even been an hour, much less a day or two. That is your argument, isn’t it?”

“Hm.” She doesn’t look phased by his stubbornness. Her smile just remains on her face, far more real than it had been before. As a consequence, it feels a lot more terrifying, at least to him. He feels like he’s been backed into a corner, and no matter what he says, he can’t do anything to escape from it. “Very well.”

Then she raises a hand made from energy again and twirls it lazily in the air, and he grits his teeth at the horribly invasive feeling of his clock hands being moved. “Stop do-!” he begins, only to cut himself off with a gag at the next wave of debilitating nausea that runs through him.

It’s one thing to feel completely thrown off about the current time, unable to orient himself no matter what he tries, but it’s another thing entirely to feel his clock hands forced into motion and the culprit just sitting across from him, her coy smile unfeeling toward his current plight. It feels wrong, like an invasion staged against him. Worse yet, she doesn’t even have the decency to come over here and mess with his stupid hands manually, throwing him off all the more.

Sometimes, when he’s thinking too hard, his clock hands begin to spin from all the things that play on his mind. That leaves him feeling off kilter, too, but that’s entirely different in comparison to this glorified torture. At least that time, he’s… mostly in control of it, and as awful as his clock hands being off time can be, the sudden disorientation wrenching him from his thoughts always helps to keep him grounded.

Here, it’s the opposite. No matter what he tries to keep himself tethered, the nauseating feeling of the offbeat rhythm of each clock hand claws at the sides of his mind, and with each brisk rotation his clock hands make he can’t help but feel his brain growing slightly more scrambled with it. He feels like he’s floating away, losing track of everything.

No. No! That’s exactly what One wants. If he gets caught up in the horrible feeling of being off beat in just the wrong way, he’ll be easy pickings for her to have her way with. And he can’t forsake Ice Cube and Fanny like that. Their future relies on his resilience.

Maybe… Maybe if he acts unaffected, she’ll stop? When she stops moving his clock hands after what feels like an eternity, she leans forward, posing the question again. “What time is it?” she asks, unable to keep the hunger out of her words.

“I know what time it is,” he mumbles, wincing at the way the words somewhat slur together in his disorientation. “You don’t have to keep pushing me.”

“If you’re so confident, say the time,” she orders.

“It doesn’t- U-Um- It’s been a few minutes-”

“The time, Clock. In numbers.” she hisses, cutting him off with an impatient expression.

“Why do you need to know?” he mumbles moodily.

“To prove a point. And the fact that you remain coherent enough to string sentences longer than “yes” together is a problem in and of itself. Very well.” With a sigh, she moves around her finger again, and he can’t help but cry out, the feeling of invasion horrible in its proximity. He thinks he would prefer if roaming hands were dragged over his body, soft or not. At least that would only be physically uncomfortable.

He doesn’t know. He thinks he’s really missing Four and X about now, and not just because they would get him out of this situation in a heartbeat. Their touch could be overbearing at times, as the two were always obsessive in their clinginess. The fact that he’s more than used to the sensation of suffocation should say it all.

But for all their touch could be tight to the point of discomfort, they could also be surprisingly soft in turn. Sometimes, one of them would run a finger over his glass or his side, the touch so soft and reverent it made him shiver in pleasant goosebumps, because the feeling of being important meant more to him than anything. He never let onto how much he enjoyed it, of course, because the last time he did that he ended up drowning in more compliments than he had a clue what to do with, but he was never particularly against it, either.

This was just invasive and wrong, as if all the basic bodily functions he had come to rely on were being turned against him. It was horrible, but he could barely squirm. And anyway, what the hell is he expected to do against magic? If it were a limb, he could bite and kick, but magic has range. He’s helpless under its weight, and he doesn’t like that thought, obviously, but at the same time there’s something faintly satisfying about giving up control and offering it to someone else, even if he fears what they could do with it.

When she finishes, she leans back, uncaring of the way Clock feels like his head is still spinning even after she lets go of his clock hands. The sensation causes a strange sense of vertigo that makes his mouth go dry, and it takes One repeating her question of “What time is it?” several times earlier for him to even become aware of it.

“How do you expect me to know?!” he grouses in frustration. “My clock is all messed up and it’s always night here! What the hell do you expect from me?!”

“So you admit that time could have passed without you being aware of it?” she says, sounding bored.

“I-I mean, how much time?” he mutters. It’s obvious he’s losing time here, unable to keep track of any of it against his messed up clock and the discordant rhythms of his clock hands. But it’s minutes, not hours and certainly not days, whatever she wants him to believe.

“Isn’t that your job?” she challenges, tucking her legs against her chest as she makes herself comfortable. “If even you can’t tell, shouldn’t you admit by now that Four and X aren’t coming? You don’t matter to them. You won’t lose anything by signing the contract, and that’s your only way out of here.” She nudges the table, her expression turning insistent.

“Piss off!” he snaps in response. “I’m not changing my back on my friends, no matter what you do to me. N-Not even if you- ugh, shit.” He curses under his breath as he presses a leg against his head. Maybe he had leaned forward too harshly, but his ears begin to ring with the motion, and he briefly loses feeling in his legs.

One laughs, and before he gets any time to get his bearings, she waves his hand again, moving around his clock hands in all sorts of directions. The general sharp discordance from the motion paired with his already existent disorientation makes his vision go completely black for a moment as he lets out a choked cry, and he doubles over completely when he lets go of him. The velvet of the couch doesn’t do anything to help him focus, and the pain remains as debilitating as ever,

Every time she stops moving his clock hands, she always asks the same damn question. “What time is it?”

Every time, he manages to spit out something, even if his responses grow less and less coherent as time goes on. How much time…? Well, he’d be powerless to say. 

Every time, she’s unhappy with what he says, or maybe it’s his frustrated refusal that does it. Either way, she’s quick to reach for his clock hands once more, starting the cycle all over again and muddying his perception of time more than it had already been trampled.

This is what he always kind of feared with Four and X. The two of them deciding to use him as a punching bag to try all of their powers on, keeping him alive but in a perpetual state of delirious agony… Well, he’s suddenly glad that they’re benevolent, even if that’s a strange adjective to attach to them, of all people. Less glad that he’s actively experiencing this, though.

Time passes. It has to, it’s not like One can just stop it. But the question of how much time is completely up in the air. It’s split between a haze of pain and delirium as his clock hands are forced into rotation after rotation, his brain becoming more and more undone with each one, and One asking harsh questions that he’s long since been unable to answer.

Maybe this is all there is for him, and all there will ever be. Everything from before he was whisked away here fades away in the uneven rhythm pounding at the side of his head– tock, tick, tock, tick, it’s wrong– obscuring it all in a blur of haze. Maybe he’s just doomed to be trapped here, under One’s intense, animalistic gaze, until he finally breaks and signs the damn contract.

What loyalty does he have to people whose faces blur together in his mind? What does anyone matter to him when they aren’t here right now, easily disappearing through his grip before he thinks twice about it? What does he owe any of them when he’s here suffering in their steed? How is it fair?

And yet, he doesn’t break. He just doesn’t want to give One the satisfaction, really. And yet, it becomes harder and harder to think, her sharp words easily rushing to the forefront of his mind and molding his thoughts into something she surely prefers. Blearily blinking down at the contract as his clock hands are released, he wonders if signing it would be so bad if he could be freed from this torture.

“Clock,” One calls in a singsong, drawing his attention. “Come on, pay attention. I couldn’t have scrambled your brain that much. I just have a question for you, although I’m sure you know it already.”

“Just tell me,” he mumbles, letting out a watery sigh as he presses his head against the back of the chair and wishes he could just sink into it, disappearing entirely.

“What time is it?” she says, prompting him to scream in frustration.

“I don’t know!” he yells, eyes stinging. “I don’t know the fucking time! I’ve told you the same thing every time you’ve asked! Just leave me alone!”

“You don’t know?” One parrots, her eyes mockingly wide. “But you’re a clock, Clock. You have no other choice but to know. It’s all you’re good for.”

“All I’m…?” he echoes, her matter-of-fact words easily taking hold in his mind. He already knew that, of course; what use do broken clocks have? But to hear it said so confidently… It hurts in a way he didn’t know he was capable of feeling anymore, after his mind had been swept away in the haze of disorientation.

“Right! So come on now, answer the question. What’s the time? You have to tell me, or you’ll be thrown away and forgotten even more than you have been already,” she says smugly.

“I don’t know the time,” he says desperately, unable to help the tears beginning to trail down his face. “I don’t know anything. Just figure it out yourself- just stop- I can’t focus- I need-”

“But you need to know the time. It’s all you have to keep you sane, keep you centered. If you don’t know the time, how are you supposed to know how long you’ve been here? How are you supposed to know how long you’ve been waiting for Four and X to save you when they never will? If you don’t know the time, is there even a point to you being alive?” 

“I-I guess there isn’t one, then,” he whines, breath hitching at the admission. “Just make it stop- don’t touch my damn hands again- it’s all-”

There has to be. Otherwise you would have stopped fighting a while ago, and I wouldn’t have had to resort to this,” One explains with a morose shake of her head. “So what time is it, Clock? What time is it?” she probes, her voice sharp as it echoes in his ears.

“I don’t know!” he sobs, on the verge of hysterics. “Please, I don’t know! Stop, stop! I can’t think, I can’t breathe!”

“I’ll stop the moment you sign my contract,” she snaps, all pretenses of niceties having been completely dropped by this point.

He can’t focus on the damn contract, though, because everything is off. The rhythm, the time, the lighting- Is it night? Is it day? How long has he been gone? What time is it? “Please, fix it!” he sobs, eyes balled closed by this point. His vision keeps swimming with the force of his dizziness, and he knows he’s going to be sick, nothing is right and it’s all just-! “I can’t think, I can’t focus, I need my clock hands fixed!”

One is entirely unsympathetic to his plight. She just continues to stare at him, one leg folded over the other, and her eyes vast and cold. At least Four and X have some level of warmth, at least one can tell that there’s something there. But in One, there’s nothing. He doesn’t realize just how much he would miss the two of them until they’re gone. Are they gone? How long has it been? Did they forget about him, did they all forget about him? He can’t think, he needs his fucking clock hands fixed, and yet no matter how hard he sobs, One remains unmoved.

“The contract, Clock,” she says coldly. “Anything will do for a signature. And if you’re truly that desperate, I can add the correction of your clock hands to my terms.” She smiles, and it’s made of daggers. It’s all he can do to focus on her words, disorientation and the haze of panic choking him to the point where the edges of his vision grow black and fuzzy.

“Leave me alone!” he screams. Once more, he finds himself considering signing the contract once more, not for any hopes of happiness or love, but just so he can reorient himself and feel right again. This feeling of aching wrongness makes him want to be sick.

“Sign the contract and you’ll never see me again,” she promises, smiling. “Better yet, you’ll feel much better afterward, too.”

“D-Don’t-” he forces out through grit teeth. “C-Can’t… I-!”

“Why are you loyal to people who will never come for you?” One says with a sigh, shaking her head. “It’s pointless. Just live for yourself, Clock, honestly.” She eyes him for a moment before shrugging. “Looks like my words aren’t getting to you. I have no qualms about resorting to anything physical, though…” She raises her energy-formed hand once more, and icy fear runs through him, sharp to the point some of him can’t help but wonder if he had been stabbed as he sits up.

“I’ll sign it!” he hysterically screams out, barely aware of the words leaving his mouth from the ringing in his ears and from the way his tongue feels like a slab of cotton as it rests limply in his mouth. “I’ll sign it, just please- don’t- stop, please!” He can’t say anything else between the horrible disorientation and the sobs wracking through his body.

“Finally,” One sighs, drawing each syllable of the word out. “Took you long enough. But, ah, you would know how long it took for you to agree, wouldn’t you? Considering you’re a clock and all. Mind reminding me?” 

The only response he can muster to that is another sob. Even the idea of time makes him want to double over and dry heave. How did something so consistent, so predictable, so precious get wrenched from his grasp and violated so completely he can’t even find refuge in the concept anymore? When did he lose control? He just wants to find comfort in all of the things he loves about time again, but the uneven rhythm thundering through him serves to remind him how little power he has over it anymore.

One laughs, looking genuinely amused by him. “Of course, my mistake,” she says, smiling widely. “As for the terms of the deal… Well, as nice as it would be to grant you them, you were so horribly uncooperative. It hardly seems like I should reward you for all the trouble you’ve caused me, right?”

“My clock hands-” he manages to gasp out, because that’s truly all he cares about in this moment. Whatever was offered to him however long ago seems completely irrelevant in the face of this pressing, horrible violation against his very being.

“-will be included in the deal, don’t worry,” she smoothly replies. “The correction of your clock hands and the return to Four and X’s kitchen, where you belong, in exchange for you staying out entirely of my matters. Not the worst deal, don’t you think?”

“Just fix me,” he begs, voice cracking on the last two words. He buries his head in his knees, his legs feeling shaky and numb beneath him. He can’t bear to watch the world spin to the point where he can’t focus on anything, One and the rest of the room becoming a hazy, featureless blur.

“Ah, ah, ah,” she chides, and he hears the rustling of paper moments before the contract is shoved into his face. “Contract first. All you have to do is move your foot just a smidgen. Do you think you can do that?” He lets out a high pitched whine in response. He can barely feel his legs, and the only reason he was able to bury his head in them was because he had begun to press them against his chest at… some point. The idea of trying to think about when that had happened makes him want to be sick. “Well, I suppose I can sign it for you. One moment…”

Between the gaps in his legs, he watches as she raises a blurry, detached blue blur in the shape of a hand, and he can’t help but whimper, icy fear constricting in his gut. Whenever she raises her hand made from energy, she always uses it to twist his clock hands in constant, dizzying loops that make him feel twice as disoriented and sick than he had before.

Instead, though, he feels his leg raise as it’s pulled gently toward the paper, and he can’t help but slowly blink at this new development. So it’s his leg instead of his hands? Or, well, clock hands. At least that’s less awful. His brain can only think in terms of what will cause less pain at the moment.

Just before his leg can be pressed against the paper, he hears a ripping sound that reminds him of… something. Faces flash through his mind, Cake and Nickel and Naily, all of their faces pale and drawn with fear as Four towers behind him in a portal forced open through the air. Ah, right, he had a life before this.

“One,” snarls the murderous voice of Four, scratchy and grating and something he never thought he would hear again. He’s so grateful he could collapse then and there, although that might have something to do with the fact that his legs feel like jelly and he can’t remember what it’s like to have a head that isn’t spinning.

“Four!” she happily returns, smiling even as her eyes narrow in obvious frustration. “As you can see, we were just about to sign a contract, so if you wouldn’t mind waiting until we finish…”

Seizing his opportunity, he shrieks out “Four, get me out of here!” He credits his coherency to the sudden rush of adrenaline that sears through him, paired with his heart leaping into his throat. His body knows just as well as his mind that Four is the one chance he has to get out of here, to fix his clock hands without compromising his freedom. He has to take advantage of that fact.

Immediately, the smile drops from One’s face, and the chiding reply she would surely offer to that is cut off as Four shoots a bolt of lightning from his fingers, leaving scorch marks on the side of the chair she sits on.

“Consider that a warning,” he snarls. “Me and X will be back to talk the moment I take back what is ours.” He wraps an arm around Clock, and he relaxes into the motion with a dazed smile, relieved to have something that can ground him after he spent so long practically sinking into that awful chair.

One’s pocket dimension warps around them as they suddenly appear into the kitchen with a pop that causes his ears to ring. Both Ice Cube and X, who had been standing with two distinctly different expressions of worry, straighten when they see him, X scrambling toward him.

“Clock, you’re back!” he says excitedly.

Four looks over to Ice Cube. “Watch over him for a moment,” he says dismissively. “We’re going to have words.” He lets go of Clock, depositing him onto the cold tile floor, before grabbing X, the two disappearing in a pop a moment later.

He gasps for air as he staggers forward. The air isn’t exactly fresh, but it’s far less stagnant than it had been in One’s pocket dimension. It feels like it’s filling his lungs, like it’s actually real. Like he’s real, and it’s fine, and it’s okay. But still, he doesn’t know for sure. His heart is thundering rapidly in his chest, and his clock hands are off even if he doesn’t know what time it’s supposed to be anymore, and he’s looking around the room wildly.

When he catches Ice Cube’s eye, he lurches forward as he breathes heavily. He knows he can trust her, he knows she’ll tell him the truth. He just needs-! “How long was I in there?!” he gasps out as he staggers forward, nearly tripping over himself in his disoriented panic. “How much time passed? What time is it?! I-I don’t-” He can’t help but hyperventilate as his legs buckle under him, knees buckling onto the cold kitchen tile. It feels so similar to how he was when he woke up and he was there in One’s grasp, his side cold from falling asleep on Ice Cube, not that he knows how long it’s been since then-

“What?” she cries, looking baffled. “Clock, what the hell? What’s going on?”

“How long was I there?!” he half-sobs, half-shrieks. “Please, I don’t know, I don’t know!”

“It’s- I don’t know!” she snaps, looking frustrated. “I woke up and you were gone! Me and Fanny looked around for you, but we couldn’t find you anywhere, so we thought One might have taken you, so we got Four and X-” She notices that her rambling isn’t making him feel remotely better. If anything, he’s growing more panicked, sobbing and gasping as he remains curled on the floor the longer she doesn’t give him an exact time. “-It hasn’t even been a day, is what I’m saying! If you were taken in the morning, it would have been an hour or two tops!” she cries.

Her words make him stop short, and he lets out a strangled gasp as he freezes. It hasn’t been two hours since he was taken? But… But his clock, and One’s words, and… He had thought… It was… “You didn’t forget me?” he whispers hopefully, even though he hates the way the feeling twists in his gut. “I wasn’t there for-? You got me out as fast as you could?”

Ice Cube’s expression breaks as she kneels, pressing herself against his side. “Yeah, Clock,” she murmurs in reply. “We remembered you and we fought like hell to get you back.” He can barely absorb the words, head still spinning under the force of his disorientation- the rhythm is so uneven he can’t even remember how it’s supposed to feel anymore- tick tock tock tick tick tock- Each movement of his clock hands makes him feel like hammers are slamming against the sides of his head, it hurts but-

He hadn’t been forgotten. Sitting next to him is proof of that fact. Would he be here without Ice Cube, advocating for him in the same way he had for her? He’s not sure. He’s terrified of having to rely on others so utterly, and yet at the same time, it’s thrilling having concrete proof that his absence will mean something to someone. He won’t ever be forgotten again.

While it would be nice for things to work like that, he isn’t so sure. For now, though, he’s too focused on the haze of panic to think on it further, easily struck from his brief, amazed reverie by the horrible, grating feeling of– tock tick tick tock tock– or is it the other way around-? Different entirely? He can’t tell anymore, it’s off, it’s off, he can’t fucking breathe without knowing it’s all wrong!

“Are you okay?” she whispers to him, leaning forward. He’s trembling, barely able to focus on her as his vision blurs, because for just a moment he was able to distract himself from the uneven rhythm but now it’s back again, stabbing at the side of his head with vehement force. He just leans against her as much as he can, because at least the cold, sharp and biting at his skin, helps center him. It can’t distract from the uneven rhythm– tick tick tick tock tock tick, maybe? It’s so off it’s hard to keep track–but it can somewhat center him, make him feel real. He’d love that.

Before the conversation can move any further, Four and X reappear with a pop. The former looks angry, his teeth grit together, while the latter looks nervous, wringing his hands. Both of them are quick to grow distracted when they notice the state he’s in, though. “Clock!” they both cry in shock, scrambling toward him and plucking him off of Ice Cube like he’s a bug to be moved. She gets to her feet, eying the two of them warily, but makes no move to stop them. Of course she’s scared of them, hell, he’s scared of them, but it’s… more complicated than he has the words for.

Four presses him tightly to his chest, and Clock groans, nauseated. Upon hearing the sound, he lifts him and examines him with a critical eye. “What’s wrong?” he asks softly.

“Clock?” X asks, brow furrowed in worry. He just wheezes, trying so hard to breathe, to shrug off the rhythm that’s supposed to be so soft and soothing beating at the back of his head like the worst migraine ever.

“What did you do to him?” he grits to Ice Cube, voice laden with rage, and she shrinks back, looking nervous, but tries to stand tall a moment later.

“I didn’t do anything, he came like this!” she snaps in reply. “Maybe it was your friend!” The two both frown at this, and emboldened, she continues “It’s not like she’s known for being gentle!”

Four gnashes his teeth together so loudly Clock swears they’re whittling down under the force. Meanwhile, X reaches forward and takes him from the other Algebrailian’s grasp, his grip a hell of a lot more gentle. He squints, leaning forward, before letting out a gasp. “Ohhhh, I know what’s wrong!” he says excitedly. Tapping at the glass of his clock, he blithely continues “The time on him is wrong. We know that messes him up!”

“You know that, huh?” Ice Cube retorts, her voice low and murderous. The two both shrink back–and if anyone could make Four and X scared it would be Icy, the most vengeful person this side of the Goiky Canal–guilty looks flickering across their faces, before Four clears his throat.

“Well, that’s easy!” he says confidently. “We know all about fixing that!” X adjusts Clock in his grip, letting his legs fall below him, not that Clock can even feel them. Four reaches forward, flipping open the glass panel with a latch on the back, and X sticks out his tongue in focus as he uses his other hand to set the correct time, holding the second hand in place just behind the top until the time ticks over to the next minute. The moment the time changes, X raises his hand, the second hand returning to ticking on its consistent, familiar, right rhythm.

He fixed the time just as Clock had taught the two of them, finding it easier to do when another person helped him. Most people screwed it up, too impatient to hold the second hand in place until the minute ticked over, but Four and X had listened with wide eyes and proceeded to do it right every time they needed to fix it.

It made him feel loved, seeing that they still remembered. That they cared enough to notice and to fix it properly. He’s so loved, here in X’s arms as Four leans forward to smile at him, and he can’t tell the feeling blooming in his chest amidst the remaining disorientation, but he thinks it might be- he’s worried about the chances of it being- if he admits it does that make it true-?

It’s fucking 10:24, so long as he’s correctly interpreting the drumming of the rhythm that does admittedly feel strange after so long of it being off. And when he throws a sidelong glance over to the stove clock, he’s relieved to see that he’s right. Jesus Christ. Barely any time had passed at all, and he had freaked out over it?

Despite his clock being fixed, he still feels dizzy and nauseated, panic rendering his heart thundering in his throat as he tries his best to just breathe. Readjusting to the proper rhythm of his clock hands will take some getting used to. He turns to look at both Four and X as he’s set down gently onto the floor, the two staring at him with wide, nervous eyes. “Thanks,” he mumbles, shifting uncomfortably in place. The two straighten when they hear his voice, and X rushes forward, crouching in front of him.

“Did we fix your clock hands right?” he asks anxiously. “I know you’ve shown us how to do it before, but I don’t want you to be in pain!”

“I’m fine,” he replies, staring at the ground. “Thank you. You did great.” Breathing heavily, he stares up at the two’s awed gazes. Has he ever complimented them before? Maybe he should do more than that, just to make sure he doesn’t ever have to go through any of that again.

Staggering forward, he falls between the two of them, pressing himself into the two of them with all of the force he can muster. Both of their hands come up to tightly wrap around him as they kneel to swallow him up with their bodies, tight and suffocating and desperately reassuring. If the breath is being forced from his lungs, he’s being loved, isn’t he? If he’s being clung to, he can’t be whisked away again? He needs the feeling of their arms around him, and finds he struggles to live without this just as much as their constant compliments.

“Please don’t let her take me again,” he whispers, his voice muffled as he keeps himself tightly pressed against the two Algebrailians. He feels them stiffen at his words, and he rushes to continue. “Please. I-I don’t care what deal you have with her, I can’t go through that again, it was awful!” He manages to lift his head enough to stare both of them in the eye. “If you love me, you’ll protect me.” Shifting anxiously in their arms, he mumbles “You do love me, don’t you…?”

He can’t bear the possibility of watching their expression change, hearing a denial bubble on their lips. So he looks down at the ground, swallowing dryly. He’s startled by the feeling of two hands cupping his cheeks and raising his head up. Four’s grip is firm and attention-grabbing, while X’s is soft and gentle.

“Of course we do,” Four says, his tone as unbreakable as steel. He grips onto Clock’s cheek like it’ll be enough to stop him from being taken again, while X’s tough is soft and light as one finger absentmindedly strokes the glass.

“We love you a lot, Clock!” X insists, before hesitating as he worries with his lip. “And… if we had known that One would have taken you, we would have protected you. We will protect you.” Even the softhearted X looks like he’s prepared to level mountains. For him.

“Can you promise?” Ice Cube cries, and Clock lets out a hiss through grit teeth. Does she really have to push further? Four isn’t exactly the sort to react well to criticism. “He was taken because you both-!”

“He was taken because he wanted you back!” Four snarls, letting go of Clock to lean forward and harshly glare at Ice Cube. She doesn’t shrink back but instead stands her ground, breathing heavily. “It’s your fault! If you know what’s good for you, you would-!”

“Hang on, hang on,” he hisses, disentangling himself from X to stand between the two of them. “Four, Ice Cube’s my friend. I wanted to protect her in the same way you want to protect me. I’m going to do what I can to protect the people I care about, regardless of what any of you have to say about it.” He glares at Four, waiting for him to challenge him, but instead he just crosses his arms and looks away, grumbling under his breath. “Ice Cube, it isn’t their fault.”

“But-” she protests, her voice small as she stares at him. “If it’s not-”

“It isn’t your fault either!” he insists. “I knew what I was getting into. Fanny knows One enough well to warn me about what could happen. I knew the risks. But I was willing to do it for you. And for myself, too. I’m not that selfless.” He frowns, looking away from her as Winner’s face flickers through his mind. He can never be that selfless, not when he’s always thinking about himself. By this point, he’s done what he can to accept it, because change is so hard he’d rather be with the people who love him no matter what as opposed to the person who could love him after he puts the effort in.

He doesn’t like to risk things on chance. And numbers are just as consistent as time, no matter how much the wild inconsistency of Four and X aims to overpower that. He knew he would be stuck with Four and X for as long as they kept interest in him, but now he’s actually starting to imagine a future, instead of just trying to get by. It’s… strange. But he doesn’t completely hate it?

“So you don’t need to fight,” he concludes with a sigh, looking away from her. “Because I’m fine. It wasn’t that bad. She just…”

“Knows exactly where to hurt you.” Ice Cube grimly concludes, swallowing, and it’s then he’s reminded that she had been with One too, for several hours longer than he had been. And if he was able to end up like that from just a bit of time with her…

“Are you okay?” he asks, something lurching in his stomach as he leans forward, eyes wide. “I-I mean- you were- and she was- did you-?”

“I’m fine, Clock,” she retorts, rolling her eyes. She glances at Four and X, the look in her eyes guarded, before she strides past them with practiced nonchalance. “I’m going to grab Fanny and go up to her room. You know where to find us when you’re ready.” Her eyes flick between him, Four, and X, disapproval coming from her in waves, but she doesn’t say a word. He appreciates that more than she knows, offering her a shaky smile. She just rolls her eyes and storms out.

The moment the door swings closed behind her, Four and X rush to swarm him, their eyes wide and concerned. Their words overlap each other as they rush to speak, asking if he’s okay, if he’s mad at them, whatever. He cuts them off by baring his teeth at him, the motion more exasperated than defensive. And isn’t it strange that he finds he can actually feel fond of the two of them?

It’s strange. But when he sat there in One’s pocket dimension, her voice growing louder and louder as her questions grew incessant and discordant, it was… well, painful for a start. But the entire time, there had been an undercurrent of desperation to him, praying to anything that would listen that Four and X would come for him, that their love was stronger than One’s power.

In the end, he had been proven right, and that fact was as satisfying as it was terrifying. They loved him enough to go against someone like One, and the physical power she lacked was more than made up for in her near-terrifying knowledge, because she was able to stare at him and dissect him with his eyes to discover just what made him tick. If they could go against her for his sake, then they… they…

Swallowing, he stares up at Four and X. “I’m fine,” he says wearily. “But, I, ah, wouldn’t mind another hug…?” Flushing, he stares down at the ground, only to tentatively look up a moment later, soaking in the two’s awed expressions like a sponge. They don’t even say anything before scrambling forward and scooping him up in a hug, and he just laughs at the tight, pressing feeling as he takes shallow breaths. This feels like the one safe place left in his world, with One lurking in every shadow and always watching.

“Thanks,” he whispers, pressing himself against them as much as he can. “This is nice. I, um…” There’s no going back from here now. The moment he says the words that have been resting on his tongue, he’s never going to be able to pry himself apart from the two of them ever again. Is he really ready to handle that?

He’s going to be stuck with Four and X anyway. He might as well enjoy their presence as much as he can. He wants to be happy. He wants to be selfish and not have to deal with the pained glances thrown his way as a result. He wants to fear only Four and X, who he's come to predict and grow used to, instead of the shadow One casts over all of them whether they’re aware of it or not.

Clock wants this. He knows full well the time is going to pass anyway, with the two remaining at his side. Why not enjoy it?

“I love you!” he blurts, before immediately sagging in relief the moment the words leave his mouth. There. That wasn’t so hard, right? All he did was… say something he can’t take back… to the two most volatile people he knows… whose moods swing as fast as his second hand ticks… who have killed him before. Not daunting at all.

Just as he begins to wonder if he should rush to take his words back, Four and X’s expressions of complete gobsmacked surprise, jaws falling from their faces, shift to the most joyous expressions he’s ever seen on anyone, and that’s taking into account the two’s exaggerated expressions. They look thrilled and overjoyed and so overwhelmingly grateful he’s not entirely sure how to feel. Is there a chance he’s misinterpreting it? Guessing when it comes to the two of them is-

His thoughts are brought to a screeching halt as he’s quickly grabbed by the two of them, and he lets out a choked wheeze as he’s hugged tighter than he’s ever been hugged before. It knocks the wind out of him, and he can’t help but grumble in frustration even as the two excitedly cheer and yell.

“That’s the first time you’ve ever said that to us!” X cries, looking overjoyed as he buries his face in Clock’s glass.

“Say it again, say it again!” Four says excitedly, bouncing up and down as he excitedly grins at Clock.

“I’m not a parrot!” he protests in dismay. The two’s grins don’t fade, though, so eventually he just rolls his eyes and reluctantly grumbles “I love you.” The two’s cheers become louder, if that’s even possible, and he just sighs as the two pass him around excitedly, occasionally holding him up to their face and asking him to say it again, which he does eventually relent to with a sigh.

The two become increasingly overjoyed with every insistence of his love, to the point where they begin to bounce off the walls, and at some point, he has to put his foot down. “Okay, okay,” he grumbles, baring his teeth at X, who immediately sets him down, smiling widely. “I’m… going to go meet up with Icy. I’ll be back. Tonight, probably. Bye.” At Four and X’s excited, hopeful expressions, he rolls his eyes and flatly adds “Love you.” He leaves the kitchen to their cheering, and as he walks forward, looking over his shoulder and closing the door, he slams face first into something and scrambles back, blinking.

Ah. It’s Fanny, staring at him with narrowed eyes and a critical expression.

“Um… hi?” he says tentatively. “Is Ice Cube in your room, still, or-?” He feels his heart lurch in his chest and he nervously leans forward. “D-Did something-?”

“She’s fine,” she interrupts, rolling her eyes. “I just wanted to tell you I don’t approve.”

“What kind of shovel talk is th-?”

“I mean it!” she yells, stopping him short. “I know it may seem like nothing to you, like I’m overreacting. But it doesn’t matter how you feel about Four and X. The differences between you and them are too vast. They can never love you in the same way, if you love them at all. You’d be better off if you got up and walked away while you had the chance.”

Her words strike an uncomfortable word with him, and after a moment he realizes why. She’s nearly mimicking what One had told him earlier, word for word. While the Algebrailian’s words had been silky and poised, hers feel startlingly genuine, as if she’s speaking from the heart. As if she’s trying hard to warn him about something she herself has fallen victim to.

He’s sick and tired of people trying to warn him about the decisions he makes with who he loves as if they know better than him, though. What does it matter that there’s such a wide gap between him and Four and X? They’ll find a way to bridge it anyway. Who the fuck cares how different they are?!

“What kind of conversation is this?!” he hisses, puffed up in indignation. “What makes you think you have to stick your head in any of my business? I can do what I want, so mind your own business!”

“I don’t want you to do anything stupid,” she says, voice flat and analytical as she keeps her eyes narrowed.

“I know what I’m doing, Fanny!” he snaps, at the end of his rope. “Don’t worry about it!”

“I hate not worrying about it!” she screams in his face, spittle flying from her mouth as her eyes ball closed. “I hate your overconfidence, and I hate knowing that a lot worse is going to happen to you than just a broken heart!”

“How do you know?!” he retorts. He can’t yell louder than her, but maybe he can use logic to feel like he’s winning here. “What do you know about Four and X?! How do you know they don’t love me?! What do you know about anything at all, and why should I bother with your stupid warnings?!”

“Because-!” she begins, but her voice cracks on the last syllable and she leans back, looking chastened. “This is stupid. There isn’t any point. I’m too far-” She cuts herself off with a firm shake of her head and storms off.

As she walks off, something occurs to him. Something wild and ridiculous and impossible and dumb, and yet it would be something that would perfectly explain Fanny’s behavior up to this point. Not just from today, but from yesterday, too. It wouldn’t make sense, because she should know better.

He should know better than to be in love with Winner, but he can’t help himself. Love doesn’t make sense. And if he’s right…

“Which one?” he calls after her, causing her to go careening to a stop. He can’t see her face, but she’s breathing heavily, the rise and fall of her shoulders laborious.

“Which one what?” she retorts without turning back to look at him. Her voice is steely enough without a harsh look in her eyes to go with it.

“Which Algebrailian are you in love with?” he elaborates.

He waits for a denial, a laugh, a scoff, maybe even outright anger at that being what he assumed. Because how could that ever be the case? Someone being in love with an Algebrailian is ridiculous enough, but someone like Fanny? She’s pragmatic and pessimistic and sensible, so how could she ever-?

“The only one who will never love me back,” she whispers. The moment the last word leaves her mouth, she darts forward, scrambling off in the distinctly opposite direction of her room.

Ah. So that’s how it is, then.

As curious as he can’t help but be, it’s obvious she needs the space. So instead, he throws a sidelong glance over his shoulder back to the kitchen. He might as well give himself what she can never have, for her sake. Or maybe it’s more for his sake, and he’s just being as selfish as he always is.

Ice Cube, he decides, can wait. Instead, he’s going to turn on his heel and throw himself into the arms of Four and X and let himself be happy for once, because it’s hardly his problem that Fanny isn’t.